The Iron Shadow

by Stefano Siggia

  Some of the men around him were wounded, their legs, arms or their heads wrapped in bandages while others leaned on crutches. Nurses of all ages tended to them, helping them walk or pushing their wheelchairs. Melbourne smiled at a young, lovely nurse walking by who walked past him with her head down. She was most likely heading to the Front as well. He could only imagine what horrors she was about to see.

  “Make a lane me, mate, coming through.” He was shoved aside by a soldier carrying a large wooden box in his hands.

  A hand suddenly grabbed his shoulder. He turned around and faced Colonel Dunn-Hamming, his face as expressionless as a block of stone.

  He gave Melbourne a nod that told him nothing. “Lieutenant.”

  “Colonel.”

  “Follow me.”

  He followed the Colonel through the sea of people until they finally found themselves in a small square.

  “Stay close to me, Lieutenant,” Dunn-Hamming said. “I imagine your trip went without incident.”

  “It did, thank you, Sir. I see you had a change of mind about my involvement.”

  “As a matter of fact, no Lieutenant, I have not changed my mind in the least. However, Captain Bassard seemed fond of you and of your expertise. He proposed you as an alternative to the agents we currently have circulating in Belgium, and it seems that you have pricked the interest of the higher echelons of Intelligence. Come now, we are to meet someone of the Foreign Office before we head to the Château for our final rendezvous.”

  They crossed the small square and entered a narrow, crooked street that snaked its way into another smaller road. The medieval buildings and churches gave it a sense that the town belonged to another age. Somehow, the modern uniforms and trucks that peppered the streets did not belong there. Melbourne could not imagine what its citizens must have felt like when they woke up to find their quiet town taken over by foreign troops and vehicles.

  A BE2 flew across their heads and the buzzing noise it made sounded almost unpleasant in the atmosphere the ancient streets created.

  “I am sure that Major Webb-Bowen was far from delighted at your change of post,” the Colonel said, bringing Melbourne back to reality.

  “He was not enthusiastic, especially given that he could not know what in the world was going on. By the way, how did Captain Bassard manage to get me out of the Squadron?”

  “We had to pull some strings here at the RFC headquarters but we were lucky. General Henderson is taking quite a keen interest in the field of Military Intelligence and what we are doing in Folkestone.”

  They passed by a small church with its doors wide open. Melbourne looked inside and saw a series of beds, all filled with wounded men as nurses and nuns tended to their needs. The entire town had been turned not only into a crossway for Allied troops but also as a hospital centre, with its churches and buildings turned into improvised infirmaries.

  “Excuse me, Colonel, but you have mentioned Folkestone various times. I — ”

  “The Foreign Office had a bureau in Brussels before the war broke out,” Dunn-Hamming said. “Its main task was the collection of information regarding German espionage in the country. We did this under the guise of a furniture shop. However, the entire operation was dismantled when the Germans invaded the country. The men that ran the bureau did not return to their respective countries and posts but instead continued their operations under different monikers, opening offices in the Netherlands, France, and the United Kingdom, and are thus continuing to collect information and recruit men to infiltrate the country as spies.

  “Two of these are currently running unsatisfactory operations, I’m afraid to say. However, there is one highly successful office running in Folkestone created by the Bureau Centrale Interallié and run by Captain Cecil Aylmer Cameron, the person we are to meet later today at the Château.”

  “Excuse me,” Melbourne said. “Captain Cecil Cameron?”

  “Yes.”

  “You mean the Captain Cameron? Condemned for the insurance fraud on his wife’s necklace a few years ago?”

  “Please, do not mention it to him in any way or form. He gets quite… easily irritated. Anyway, Captain Cameron was one of the first men to enter Belgium as a Foreign Office operative and was a crucial member of the operation in Brussels. Following the German invasion, representatives from Belgian, French, and British military authorities secretly met to form the BCI – Bureau Centrale Interallié – whose main office is located in Folkestone. It’s currently the most successful bureau in recruiting both men and women to enter Belgian soil as spies.”

  “Was my brother recruited by the BCI?”

  “Apparently not. He was the only spy to enter Belgium who was not under the supervision of Folkestone. And Lieutenant, you never heard a word of any of this, do you understand me?”

  Melbourne nodded.

  “Good. Let’s quicken our pace, we’re almost there.”

  They crossed into more streets paved with grey, worn out cobblestones and finally entered a wider, more modern street lined with cafés and the occasional shop. The tables outside were entirely taken up by Allied soldiers and pilots of all ranks, drinking tea or beer while discussing the latest news coming in from the Front. They passed the first few cafés and came upon a smaller one on the corner of the street with just four tables outside.

  Seemingly out of place among the many soldiers was a man dressed in a dark trench coat with a black hat, sipping a glass of water while a French newspaper lay on the table in front of him. He looked up towards the Colonel approaching him and gave him a little nod. “I thought you were going to be late,” the man said with a strong British accent.

  “Have I ever been?” Dunn-Hamming said. “How are you, old friend?”

  The man pointed at Melbourne. “Is this the boy?”

  “Lieutenant Summers, meet Demetrius C. Boulger, ex-agent posted in Dinant and an absolute authority on Belgium.”

  “Let’s not boast too much about my authority.” Boulger shook Melbourne’s hand. “It’s very nice to meet you Lieutenant Summers.”

  He was a stocky figure who must have been in sixties. His smile was kind but his eyes stayed hard.

  “Shall we begin moving?” Dunn-Hamming said. “I believe Cameron is already waiting for us at Longuenesse.”

  Boulger folded his newspaper and left it on the table together with a few sous as a tip. The Colonel called for a cab and the three men were soon off towards their destination. The car wound its way around the streets that were not built for modern transportation, squeezing through narrow roads and nearly running over any soldier that was in its path. Melbourne listened as Demetrius C. Boulger and Colonel Dunn-Hamming gave each other updates on the current situation of Belgium and the British troops on the Front.

  It was not long before they left St. Omer behind them. The cab followed a straight dirt road through the flat countryside that gave way to an airfield that dwarfed the one belonging to the No. 2 Squadron. Airplanes of all sorts, from heavy bombers with three-man crews to light reconnaissance crafts were parked in the grass fields on both sides of the road. Melbourne looked out the window to see a few of the airplanes flying in the air. Trucks packed with pilots came up and down the road, either heading towards the Château or bringing men to the train station, designating them to a Squadron somewhere in France. Finally, on the horizon, loomed before them the Château de Bruyeres, the headquarters of the Royal Flying Corps in mainland Europe.

  The enormous medieval castle, with its stone walls and tall turrets, was quite a sight by itself. Surrounded by the modern flying war machines, it looked even more impressive.

  The entire field behind the castle was dotted with tents of all shapes and sizes that stretched apparently to the horizon. Housing roughly five-thousand personnel, it was the biggest airfield in the entire Western Front. Melbourne perfectly remembered when he first arrived here from the United Kingdom in the fall of 1914. Memories of his enthusiasm back then seemed so distant to him now.

/>   He never thought he would be back as a spy.

  The cab pulled up to the main entrance of the castle, which was guarded by several soldiers with rifles. The Colonel paid the driver, and the three men made their way towards the short bridge that led towards two large wooden doors. A group of fighters skimmed the ground just above their heads, the rumbling of their engines was the last sound Melbourne heard as he entered the castle.

  The interior of the Château was quite dark, being lit only by gas lamps that gave off a dim white light. Boulger took the lead, walking through the large complex with Melbourne and Colonel Dunn-Hamming close behind him. They passed by rooms bustling with activity from pilots of all ranks, including a large room that had been outfitted as a complete machine shop, with partially disassembled engines scattered among clattering machinery. Melbourne imagined that some of his broken-down planes were probably being repaired in that very room. They climbed a set of large stone stairs and threaded their way through a series of narrow corridors until they had finally reached a larger corridor with four closed doors.

  Boulger studied the doors. “The room that was kindly given to us should be one of these.”

  From behind the second door on the right came the sound of something being smashed against the wall with full force.

  “Well gentlemen, I believe we have found it.” Boulger knocked at the door and opened it.

  XI

  “Horse shit!”

  The scream rolled out in the corridor. A French soldier, looking like he’d have rather faced the Kaiser’s personal guards alone, ducked out the door and dashed down the hall without even looking towards the bewildered three men standing outside.

  Boulger entered the room. Melbourne followed close behind. He looked about him and wondered if a fight had broken out. A chair lay on the ground near the door, one of its legs broken in two. Another one lay near a wall not too far away but in a somewhat better shape. But there was only one person in the room.

  The lean figure of a man in his early forties dressed in full uniform and sporting a short, nearly trimmed moustache was bent over with both hands on a table, looking down at a letter in front of him.

  “This is ridiculous!” He stood straight up and grabbed the letter in his hands. “What kind of imbeciles does Folkestone recruit! This is the second time one of our men has been caught!”

  He ripped the letter in two with full force and threw it on the ground.

  Boulger cleared his throat. The man looked up at them, eyes red with fury.

  “Ah, gentlemen.” He took a deep breath and tried to force a smile. “You are finally here. Please excuse my little tantrum. I cannot understand how a person can be so incompetent and idiotic after the training he has received.”

  “Lost a man?” Dunn-Hamming said.

  “In Bruges. He seemed like someone who could handle the situation, as well. Imbecile!” The man turned around towards Melbourne. “Is that the boy?”

  Melbourne was growing tired of that question.

  “Yes, meet Lieutenant Melbourne Summers of No. 2 Squadron,” Dunn-Hamming said, “Lieutenant, this is Captain Cecil Aylmer Cameron.”

  The two saluted each other formally.

  Boulger picked up the less damaged chair and put it back in its place around the table. “We are all here, let us start.”

  The four sat around the table, and Captain Cameron pulled out from his pocket the envelope that contained the mysterious letter and the poem. Any sign of his rage had disappeared.

  “What we have here gentlemen is something I have not seen in my entire career at the Foreign Office.” He waved the envelope in his hands. “I have submitted the letter to our expert code breakers, but none could decipher the code it contains. However, it does give us the clue that the Iron Shadow does exist.”

  “We had little doubts on that front,” Dunn-Hamming said. “Captain Summers knew he was after something real.”

  “Any clue as to what it is?” Boulger asked.

  “Sadly not. It could be a person, a weapon, the name of an operation, the name of an offensive, the name of a place where an event it to take place. We know nothing.” Captain Cameron began pacing the small, cold, and damp room. He then turned towards Melbourne. “We are all very sorry for your loss, Lieutenant. Your brother was a brave man. But he did not die for nothing. That must never be forgotten.”

  Boulger cleared his throat. “There is one thing I still do not seem to understand. How is it that you don’t know what one of your own men was after?”

  “Because he was not one of our own men,” Captain Cameron said. “At least in the sense that he was not one of the Folkestone operation. He was independent, chosen for the job by Lord Kitchener due to his prior commitments with the Lord. What we know about the whole ordeal is that Captain Summers began investigating this thing, this Iron Shadow, first in our country. Some thread or another eventually led him to Belgium, where he was lost shortly after but not without sending us a coded message.”

  “A message?” Melbourne asked. “He sent you a message?”

  “Correct. Written in a newspaper article. It stated that he had discovered what the Iron Shadow was, but that he needed more time to investigate. He was apparently working alongside another man. Someone he called Doctor V.”

  “Do we know anything about this doctor?” Boulger said.

  “Not much, I’m afraid,” Dunn-Hamming said. “Captain Summers only told us his codename. I believe not even he knew Doctor V’s true identity. From what we do know, he was working for our side. Most likely a spy of some sort, maybe French, maybe Belgian.”

  “There is one more thing,” Cameron said. “I believe the man is dead.”

  “But we don’t know for sure,” Dunn-Hamming replied.

  Melbourne could not believe they were talking about his brother. A brother he apparently never knew all that well.

  “But there is more,” Cameron said. “Captain Summers also included a date in his message. The first of May. All we know is that it is related to the Iron Shadow. The date of the launching of an operation? Or something else entirely? I’m not sure. But we must find out what the code means before that date. Today is the 21st of April, and that leaves us only a little over a week’s time.” He turned towards Melbourne. “Lieutenant Summers, the clue to finding the Iron Shadow is in this poem I have here in my hands. And apparently you are the key. What can you tell us about it?”

  “Not much, except that the poet was one of the brother’s favourites.”

  “Could you, somehow, be able to trace back his steps in Brussels?”

  “Yes, I believe I could.”

  “How?”

  “I would know where to look. The fact that the poem was a favourite of his already makes me believe that the person who sent it was someone like him, with the same interests. My brother was never really open to most people. He kept to himself. Like I said, I would know better where to look than anyone else.”

  “You already speak French and German, and have knowledge of military artillery?”

  “I do.”

  Captain Cameron nodded. “Better than our average infiltrate.” He turned to Dunn-Hamming. “Did your men investigate the provenance of the letter?”

  “They reported back from Givet the other day,” Dunn-Hamming said. “It appears that the person who sent the letter was a brown-haired girl in her mid-twenties, slim and quite pretty. That is all.”

  “That’s all?”

  “The fellow working at the post office didn’t know the girl. She was not from the town, which makes the theory that she made her way down from Brussels more plausible.”

  “That is insane,” Boulger said.

  “The clues are thin, but they are there.” Cameron stopped pacing up and down and sat in his chair. He faced Melbourne, his expression firm and determined. “Lieutenant Summers, you shall enter Brussels using false documents we will provide you. You will pose as a Swiss journalist, intending to spend some time in the capital of Belgium
to write pro-German articles for a newspaper of our invention that we will provide you. Your main mission is to find out who the letter came from and to report their name and location to us in code. We shall instruct you in the coming days on the codes you shall use. While you are there you should also snoop around and give us any information on what the Germans are doing in the city. If you hear anything regarding specific names, places, or operations you will let us know. You will also be equipped with a fake Passierschein – a pass for travelling, which is fairly hard to get and expensive these days. Oh, this might be of some help in your investigation.”

  He pulled out from the pocket of his pants a box of matches and threw it at Melbourne.

  Melbourne studied it. There was a drawing of a brown bird on it with Le Rossignol Chantant written just under it.

  The Singing Nightingale.

  “It was found in your brother’s jacket. It might give you a place to start.”

  Melbourne tucked it safely in a pocket. “Where will I stay?”

  “With a Belgian family, a husband and a wife,” Boulger said. “They are good friends of mine and wonderful people. They know you are coming and they know who you are. But not to worry, they are the most trusted people I know. They work closely with the Resistance.”

  “You shall come with us to our newly built office in Montreuil,” Cameron said, “where you shall receive a two-day training in codes and in recognising German uniforms. Then, you shall leave for Switzerland, where you will catch a train to Brussels. Is everything clear?”

  Melbourne felt the tension rise in him. This was really happening. He nodded, not really knowing what to say or ask.

  “If you get caught, no bribery, torture, or death threats will allow you to speak about your country’s operations or us in anyway. You will face death in absolute silence. Have I made myself clear?”