Last Writes

by Catherine Aird

  Peter essayed a small smile for the first time. ‘I agree. The penalties for failure are severe. Don’t worry, I’ve checked my chute half a dozen times already.’

  ‘And the reserve one?’

  ‘And the reserve one.’

  ‘But is anyone going to check that you’ve had no sleep for the last two nights?’

  ‘No,’ he said wearily, ‘but perhaps I’ll get some tonight.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ she said dryly. ‘But only if …’

  ‘Look, there’s someone over there waving to me,’ he said swiftly. ‘That means it’s time to go.’ He opened the car door and slipped out, grabbing his parachute. ‘They like you to check over all your kit in front of them before you take off.’

  ‘Quite right, too.’ She switched on the ignition as he closed the door behind him. ‘I’ll be on my way, then.’

  ‘Better not kiss me …’ he said.

  ‘No, I understand.’ She turned the engine on. ‘Now, remember, I’ll be back here to collect you at two-thirty.’

  ‘I’m not likely to forget, am I?’

  ‘Good,’ she said firmly. ‘Because you’re Mr Murgatroyd’s last patient and dentists don’t like to be kept waiting – especially when it’s for an extraction.’

  1666 AND ALL THAT

  Henry Tyler drifted, as was often his wont at lunchtime, across Green Park and then made his way into St James’s Street. His destination, The Mordaunt Club, was discreetly tucked away behind the much more important buildings near there. It was well hidden. The club’s nameplate was so unobtrusive as to deceive most casual passers-by into thinking it was in fact a commercial venture a little ashamed of having its being in such an august region of the country’s capital.

  ‘Morning, Mr Tyler, sir,’ said the hall porter as he stepped through the door. The club itself was exclusive enough for the hall porter to recognise all its members at sight even though it was open to all those of a similar cast of mind to Sir John Mordaunt, fifth baronet, except, that is, for active politicians of any – or, indeed, of no – party. This reservation was because Sir John, (1643–1721), although an assiduous Member of Parliament himself in his day, had promised to vote in the House according to the promptings of reason and good sense.

  The hall porter took a quick look at the pigeonholes ranked behind him. ‘No messages for you today, sir.’

  ‘Splendid,’ said Henry warmly. In his line of country (he worked at the Foreign Office) and at this anxious time in European history (the late 1930s) the absence of messages could only be a good thing. Unfortunately most of those that he was receiving these days were exceedingly worrying ones for a man in his particular profession.

  The porter went on to cast a swift glance down at the big diary open on his counter. ‘Would you be expecting any guests today, sir? I don’t think I’ve got a note …’

  ‘Not today, Bill,’ said Henry. ‘Today I’m my own man.’ With the numerous responsibilities attendant on Henry’s present position in the Foreign Office, this was a rare treat and he intended to relish it.

  ‘And shall you be lunching with any other members, sir?’

  Henry shook his head. ‘No, I’ll be at the Long Table this morning.’

  The Long Table at the Mordaunt Club was an old tradition. If any member didn’t propose to eat at the club with other members by prearrangement or with guests, then – by a time-honoured convention – he sat at the Long Table at the far end of the dining room next to whomsoever happened to be sitting there already.

  As a system it worked very well in that members often met other members whom they might not have otherwise encountered, but its greatest boon was that this encouraged courteous conversation rather than shop talk. Henry could do without shop talk.

  ‘Oh, it’s you, Tyler,’ said the only other man sitting at the Long Table, his countenance brightening at once. ‘Good to see you.’

  ‘Morning, Ferguson,’ responded Henry amiably. He knew Edward Ferguson slightly – he’d met him once or twice before at the club. If he remembered rightly, the man worked for another government department – the one so secret that none dared speak its name: hence its ironic nickname of “The Department of Invisible Men”.’ He said, ‘And how’s the world with you these days?’

  ‘Just the man I wanted to see,’ said Ferguson, ignoring this pleasantry. ‘You’re at the Foreign Office, aren’t you, Tyler?’

  Henry admitted to this with a certain amount of caution. Dealing with Herr Joachim von Ribbentrop was a full-time job these days. He didn’t want to know about any extra problems, especially arcane ones from Ferguson’s arcane department.

  His fellow diner didn’t hesitate for a moment. ‘So you must be good at history then …’

  ‘I don’t think it follows,’ Tyler temporised, although there were those in his ministry who were now regretting more than ever the activities of Lord North in relation to the American Colonies. It looked as though before long Britain was again going to need reinforcements from the other side of the Atlantic.

  ‘What does 1666 mean to you?’ asked Ferguson, pulling a piece of paper out of a waistcoat pocket.

  ‘Fire of London,’ responded Henry promptly. ‘And to you?’ he added politely.

  ‘Incendiary bombs,’ growled Ferguson.

  ‘Ah …’ said Henry, sighing. ‘I’m afraid you could be right.’

  ‘Although one of our people is a bit of an expert on the German Liquid Fire at Hooge – you know, when they sprayed jets of flame out of fire hoses in July ’15.’

  ‘As I remember,’ mused Henry, whose own ministry was regrettably full of old soldiers fighting old battles, ‘the Fire of London was started by a careless baker in Pudding Lane.’

  ‘I think this one’s going to be started by a paper-hanger in Berlin,’ said Ferguson, ‘but the date 1666 – if it is a date, and we don’t even know that yet – isn’t the whole story. Unfortunately there’s a bit of text that’s a little less easy to pin down.’

  ‘Codes and ciphers,’ murmured Henry largely, ‘are really getting out of hand these days.’

  ‘If it had been all in numbers it would have been a mite easier for our code-breakers,’ said Ferguson. ‘You can do a lot with numbers and a decent cipher book.’

  ‘I’m sure.’ This was something that no member of the Foreign Office needed telling. Diplomatic bags were only theoretically secure and King’s Messengers only safe couriers while actually alive. He helped himself to a bread roll from the basket on the table.

  ‘Even with just numbers,’ said Ferguson, ‘and without a cipher book you can usually get somewhere if you put your mind to it.’

  Henry Tyler nodded. They knew all about making bricks without straw at the Foreign Office, too.

  ‘Besides, we were expecting this particular message from our man in … never mind where – to come in numbers,’ went on Ferguson. ‘It’s two particular numbers we want.’ He grimaced. ‘And, Tyler, there’s no need for me to tell you, we want ’em pretty badly. And the sooner the better.’

  ‘So 1666 isn’t one of them?’ deduced Henry intelligently.

  ‘Our people think not.’ Ferguson frowned. ‘That’s because the figures 1666 seem more of a signature to the piece rather than part of the story.’

  ‘And that’s not his – er – works number so to speak?’

  ‘It is not,’ said Ferguson firmly. ‘In spite of what the general public may think our department is not overmanned to the extent of having over sixteen hundred employees.’

  ‘Is this problem message of yours in English?’ enquired Henry idly. ‘Ah, here’s our waiter …’

  Sir John Mordaunt had also put good food high on his list of priorities, causing supplies of game, pickled bacon, cheese and such-like country fare to be dispatched to London from his estate in the Midlands while Parliament was sitting.

  ‘I’ll have the beef,’ said Henry to the waiter, eyeing the sirloin on the serving trolley. ‘Medium rare, please.’

  Edward Fergu
son opted for Barnsley lamb chops. ‘English words,’ he said when the waiter had departed, ‘but it’s just a meaningless list to anyone who reads them.’

  ‘And meant to be meaningless to everybody except your department, I take it?’ Henry Tyler knew he could ask this with impunity. There was a long tradition at the Mordaunt Club that that which was spoken there between members was as sacrosanct as the confessional. It was an unbroken history of total discretion that was implicit rather than having been enjoined upon the members, and very much in the tradition of the seventeenth-century country gentleman after whom the club was named.

  ‘Exactly, but even our best brains can’t get anywhere with it,’ agreed Ferguson mournfully. ‘All it seems to be is the names of some birds – our man was meant to be birdwatching, that was his cover – with a fox thrown in.’

  Henry nodded. ‘I heard that you’d snatched one or two of them from under our noses.’

  ‘Birds?’

  ‘Best brains,’ said Henry.

  ‘We trawl the colleges like everyone else,’ said Edward Ferguson a trifle defensively.

  ‘The women’s colleges now, too, it seems,’ said Henry. Women had never been admitted to the Mordaunt Club but he could see that at this rate it was going to be difficult to keep them out. If they were welcome in Edward Ferguson’s department, let alone his own ministry, there ought to be a place for them at the Mordaunt Club too.

  ‘You must admit that women perform this sort of work extraordinarily well, Tyler,’ said Edward Ferguson, giving himself away by saying plaintively, ‘Their minds do leap about so.’

  ‘You mean that their minds make connections that don’t occur to mere males,’ agreed Henry sagely.

  ‘So take this message then …’ began Edward Ferguson again, waving his piece of paper in the air.

  ‘Don’t do that, Ferguson,’ pleaded Henry, wincing. ‘The Prime Minister’s waving about of his famous piece of paper at Heston aerodrome is quite bad enough as it is. Go down in history, that will.’

  ‘Sorry.’ Ferguson glanced round. ‘I’ll read it out to you instead.’ He placed the message on the table mat before him and read aloud, ‘The first line goes “Ravens, widgeon, dotterel, collared dove”, and the second line is “Mallard”…’

  ‘Beef,’ said the waiter, appearing at Henry’s elbow. ‘With Yorkshire pudding, sir?’

  Henry agreed to Yorkshire pudding. ‘Go on, Ferguson.’

  ‘There’s just the fox with the mallard …’

  ‘Funny, that,’ mused Henry. ‘Tell me, what sort of order of numbers are you waiting for?’

  ‘Low thousands. At least,’ he lowered his voice, ‘I hope they’re low. Otherwise …’ He did not elaborate on this but opened his hands in an age-old gesture of despair and sighed deeply.

  The man from the Foreign Office gave an understanding nod. Much was routinely left unsaid there, too.

  ‘And I can assure you, Tyler, this isn’t one of those so-called intelligence tests where you have to pick the odd one out in a sequence,’ said Edward Ferguson with all the authority of one who knew that intelligence was not the only requirement of his department. Physical and mental sturdiness counted for more than brains in the Department of Invisible Men.

  ‘But we do, don’t we?’ murmured Henry. ‘Have to pick the odd one out, I mean.’

  Ferguson looked anxious. ‘You think that that’s the only thing we’ve got to go on, do you?’

  ‘One of the things,’ said Henry.

  Edward Ferguson sat up. ‘There’s something else, then? What have we missed?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ said Henry slowly, ‘but I think there’s something out of kilter about having a collared dove there.’

  ‘It’s a bird, isn’t it?’ said Ferguson, a touch of truculence creeping into his manner.

  ‘It’s a variety of bird,’ said Henry, putting the truculence down to a combination of hunger and worry. ‘What I would like to know is why it isn’t just a plain dove?’

  ‘There’s a lot of symbolism attached to doves …’ began Ferguson.

  ‘It’s a good deal too late now for ones bearing olive branches in their beaks,’ growled Henry, upon whom even mention of the word ‘appeasement’ had begun to have a deleterious effect, ‘if that’s what you’ve got in mind.’

  ‘No, I’m sure it’s too late for anything like that,’ assented Ferguson gloomily. He hitched a shoulder. ‘One of your Foreign Office people was into birds, wasn’t he?’

  ‘Edward, Viscount Grey of Fallodon,’ replied Henry promptly. ‘Found them very restful after international diplomacy.’

  ‘I don’t find these birds at all restful,’ said Ferguson pointedly.

  ‘And a fox among the chickens is always dangerous in any shape or form,’ said Henry absently. ‘What is it about the word “fox” that makes it needed there, I wonder?’

  ‘If he’d just wanted the letter x he could have said “waxwing”,’ said Ferguson, demonstrating that the message had already received quite a lot of attention in his own department, ‘and kept to birds.’

  ‘Your Barnsley chops, sir,’ intervened the waiter, placing a plate in front of the member.

  ‘What’s that? Oh, thank you …’ Ferguson’s mind was clearly far away. ‘So he must have wanted the f or the o to be in the message.’

  ‘Or not wanted the rest of “waxwing”,’ said Henry. At the Foreign Office they always had to explore every possibility.

  ‘That doesn’t explain “collared”, though,’ said Edward Ferguson, applying himself to his chops with alacrity. ‘He’s got two ls in mallard already if that’s what he wanted.’

  ‘Back to your intelligence tests,’ said Henry lightly. ‘What is in “fox” and “collared” that isn’t in “waxwing”?’

  ‘I never was any good at riddles,’ complained Ferguson.

  ‘Or is in “waxwing” that isn’t in “fox”?’ said Henry, continuing the riddle theme.

  ‘If x marks the spot, that is,’ said Edward Ferguson, beginning at last to enter into the spirit of the chase. He was making short work of his chops.

  ‘So why “fox” instead of “waxwing”, if it was an x that was wanted?’ mused Henry. ‘There must be a reason.’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ said Ferguson, ‘there’ll be a reason, all right. Our man’s a bright enough fellow. A Classical scholar, actually. We got him from … well, never mind where we got him from, except to say that they weren’t at all pleased to lose him. Where he is now is what matters and in theory he’s birdwatching somewhere in Eastern Europe, binoculars and all.’

  ‘Which is why the message had to come en clair, I suppose,’ divined Henry. ‘Anything too obviously in code mightn’t have got through.’

  ‘Exactly.’ Ferguson looked thoughtful. ‘Besides, there’s always the possibility that the fellow has had to dump his code book. As a last resort, of course, but sometimes the safest thing to do is to destroy it on the spot. We understand that.’

  ‘Better than letting anyone else get their hands on it.’ Henry chewed his beef for a while in thoughtful silence. ‘Did your people find any other birds with two ls in them?’ he asked presently.

  Edward Ferguson looked uneasy and said with lowered voice, ‘“Swallow”, but …’ He looked round. ‘We use that word for something else. And only in extreme circumstances, of course.’

  ‘So your man needed two ls for his message,’ concluded Henry.

  ‘Twice,’ said Ferguson. ‘Don’t forget the mallard.’

  ‘So both mentions are part of the message.’ Henry suddenly sat up rather straight. ‘The letter l does stand for something else, doesn’t it? Have you forgotten?’

  The other man still looked mystified.

  ‘Give me a moment, Ferguson,’ said Henry, putting his napkin on the table and getting out his pen. ‘Now read the names of those birds out to me again while I try something.’

  ‘Ravens …’ said Ferguson, pushing his plate away.

  ‘Five,’ said Hen
ry, scribbling on his napkin.

  ‘Five what?’

  ‘Five. Go on …’

  ‘Widgeon.’

  ‘One and five hundred,’ murmured Henry.

  ‘You’re quite sure, Tyler,’ Ferguson said acidly, ‘that you don’t mean the four and twenty blackbirds that were baked in a pie?’

  ‘Quite sure,’ said Henry. ‘Next?’

  ‘Dotterel.’

  ‘Five hundred and fifty.’

  ‘I’ve lost you,’ said the man from the department with no name. ‘But if you insist …’

  ‘I do,’ said Henry.

  ‘Then your “collared dove” comes next,’ said Ferguson.

  ‘One hundred and twice fifty,’ said Henry.

  ‘Twice fifty is a hundred,’ objected Ferguson. ‘Same thing.’

  ‘No, it isn’t,’ said Henry, still scribbling. ‘And five hundred.’

  ‘You’ve still lost me,’ complained Ferguson.

  ‘Oh, and five hundred and five from the dove.’

  ‘Then there’s a full stop,’ said Edward Ferguson, adding with more than a touch of irony, ‘or isn’t that important?’

  ‘That’s your first number then,’ said Henry.

  ‘I’m not with you,’ said Ferguson.

  ‘Your first number is the sum of all those I’ve already mentioned,’ said Henry.

  He scanned his eye down the figures. ‘I don’t know about you but I make that two thousand, two hundred and sixty-one.’

  Edward Ferguson nodded. ‘That would fit although it’s a little higher than we were bargaining for.’

  ‘Know thine enemy,’ said Henry.

  The man opposite leant over and said, ‘And the mallard and the fox?’ Ferguson gave a quick frown, lifted his hand to stay an answer, and said slowly. ‘No, don’t tell me. Would I be right in saying a thousand, two times fifty and five hundred for “mallard”?’

  ‘You would,’ said Henry. ‘Good man.’

  ‘Adding ten for “fox”?’ Ferguson twitched the napkin out of Henry’s hand. ‘And our man couldn’t use “waxwing” because it had got an i in it as well as the x… that right?’