“I want you,” the General proposed, “to come and see the Chief with me as soon as an appointment can be arranged.”
“Anything fresh?”
“No, it’s an idea,” was the rather sombre reply. “I’ll tell you what I based it upon.”
The cocktails were brought and there was an interlude of several moments. Then Mallinson continued.
“We all know the position. A month or so ago it looked as though trouble were inevitable, and we are not ready for it, you know, Cheshire. We are not ready for it yet,” he added emphatically.
“Go on!” Cheshire begged. “Don’t shout.”
“The Chief, all on his own, took a bold step,” the General said in a slightly lower voice. “He gave diplomacy and a certain prominent official the go-by. He personally approached the three countries who make Europe. He asked that they should each receive a Special Envoy from here to discuss some of these difficult matters and if necessary he offered a meeting with himself, supposing an impasse was reached. It meant trouble with some of the small fry, of course, and one or two of them have had to go. Has anything struck you, Cheshire, about our progress since those offers were courteously received by the various great men concerned?”
The Admiral’s eyes glittered for a moment.
“It has,” he admitted. “I have come to the conclusion, within the last three days, that although every one of them is keeping the thing open, they are placing every possible obstacle in the way of these discussions. They are playing for time.”
“God knows you’re right,” the General declared. “That’s exactly the conclusion I have come to. You are with me so far, then?”
“Absolutely.”
“Now I’m going to move a step further,” his companion continued. “We neither of us talk about our jobs. There are millions of English people who do not know that I am the head of the real Secret Service so far as the Army is concerned, and that you occupy exactly the same position with regard to the Navy. We have exchanged confidences at various times during the last few years. Just lately we have not come together. It’s time we did. I have something to say to you, Cheshire.”
“Go ahead.”
“They are playing for time, each one of these countries to whom the Chief addressed his appeal for discussions. They want to find out how much is true of all this mighty rearmament business that the papers have been full of. They want to know how we are getting on with it and how much of it is a bluff. You know what that means? They have doubled their spies in this country. I don’t mind telling you we have had a horrible week of it—details we don’t discuss, of course—but we have twenty-three men in prison at the present moment—some from Woolwich, one or two from Aldershot, half a dozen from the War Office itself—who will never see much of the daylight again. What about you?”
“Almost the same story,” was the grim reply. “My department is working day and night and I have eleven branches and four new travelling ones a secret to everyone except myself. Your idea is perfectly right, General. They are holding off until they know the truth and they are making a big drive to get to know it, too.”
The supper was brought. They leaned back in their chairs. Mallinson lit a cigarette. They were served by a maître d’hôtel in plain clothes. Cheshire looked at him curiously as he bowed his greetings.
“I am managing this room, sir,” the man explained. “I should like to give you gentlemen my personal attention. You seem to have chosen a rather draughty corner. Would you like a screen? I can easily arrange one.”
“Not on any account,” the General replied. “What they call draughts I call fresh air. I welcome them myself at these crowded places.”
The maître d’hôtel bowed and dropped the suggestion. He opened the wine himself and lingered round after having examined the dishes served.
“If there is anything you want specially, gentlemen, I hope you will send for me,” he begged.
“Your face seems familiar,” Cheshire remarked. “Tell me your name.”
The man produced a card and handed it over.
“Antonio Machinka,” Mallinson exclaimed. “Machinka’s Restaurant in Jermyn Street anything to you?”
“My property, General. I should be proud to welcome you or your friends any time. My restaurant is very popular, a little too popular at times, but I have several attractive suites if you should be requiring privacy.”
There was not a ghost of a smile upon Machinka’s face. His were the pale cheeks, the earnest manner, the pleasant voice of the Anglicized Italian. Mallinson thrust the card into his pocket.
“We will remember,” he promised. “Just now, keep the waiters away as much as you can, there’s a good fellow. The Admiral and I have not met lately and we have plenty to talk about.”
“It shall be as you wish, sir,” the man replied, departing with a little bow.
Cheshire sipped his wine.
“Mysterious chaps, these foreigners, sometimes,” he remarked thoughtfully. “Know anything about him, General?”
“Nothing, and what I did know a year ago might not have been of any account to-day.”
“He’s on my list,” the Admiral reflected. “You should have him on yours, too.”
“You are well up to date, my friend.”
Cheshire leaned over the table.
“I try to be. One of the mystery women in London for whom we watch most closely,” he confided, “dined in a suite of Machinka’s last week. We think we know with whom. We are not quite sure. We are waiting till next time. I don’t mind telling you that the head waiter who looks after those suites is our man. We had hard work to get him there, as, although he is a foreigner, he is married to an Englishwoman. Queer his turning up. You heard how that submarine there was nearly such a row about was identified after she had been sunk in Spanish waters?”
“I only knew that she was identified and the fuss that they were trying to make had to be stopped pretty quick,” the General replied.
“The information came to us from Suite A at Machinka’s. A small world, General. We have compared notes. We agree. Now what are we going to do about it all?”
“We must see the Chief as soon as possible,” Mallinson insisted. “Remember that, shrewd fellow though he may be, he has no personal outlook upon the details of what is going on. He can only see through the eyes of his satellites. It is up to us to ram the truth home to him as to what is happening, to try and make him see exactly the way one at least of our friends on the Continent is trying to diddle us.”
“I will come,” Cheshire promised, “and I will do my best, but I don’t mind telling you, General, that the most difficult part of our task is not the work itself, is not the getting on the track of these people and hunting them down, it is getting the danger that they represent under the hide of the average British bourgeois statesman. In their hearts they don’t believe in spies. That’s where the modern fiction writer has done us such an ill turn. He has written these spy stories so long that they have become only humorous. They have ceased to be convincing. The British public does not believe in spies. If we were only to bring out a dozen of them, like our friend in Moscow, try them publicly and shoot them in the Tower, it would do us a thundering lot of good.”
“Our bosses won’t do it,” Mallinson observed gloomily. “You are quite right, Cheshire. It is fantastic the way they smile, even when we can prove that we are up against real and serious trouble. There is another thing, too. Like every other profession, the profession of espionage is chockful of the worst lot of amateurs. We have shipped back to the Continent dozens and dozens of friendless young governesses and theatrical people of every description. It is the women that are the biggest nuisance. Not one out of twenty of them could ever do us any real harm, but the very fact that there are so many fools at the game makes it difficult for us to get one or two of these sentimentalists to realise the situation. I used to take a dozen or so of them into one of the departments as typists, just to see how far they would go.
It was simply pitiful to penetrate their stupid schemes and to see the ghastly fright they got in when they were caught.”
“They are in the way, of course,” Cheshire agreed, “but our great anxiety concerns those few who are in it, who know the game and who are playing it just about up to the limit.”
The General looked at his friend steadily. They were silent while their glasses were refilled. Machinka’s figure was always there in the background—suave and eager.
“That fellow will end with his back to the wall some day,” Cheshire continued. “He was raided twice in Soho—faked-up charge organised by us. He was harbouring spies and it was a difficult locality. He bought his present restaurant with foreign money. Thinks he’s safe.”
Mallinson rose to his feet.
“Well,” he said, “it’s been a pleasant chat. See you to-morrow, Cheshire.”
He made his way back into the crowd. Cheshire remained for a few minutes longer smoking a final cigarette in thoughtful solitude. For the second time in rather an interesting evening, he was hesitating. When at last he made his departure, he paused as he passed Machinka, who was preparing with a low bow to usher him out.
“I was trying to think,” he said slowly, “who it was mentioned your restaurant the other day, Machinka. Good chef you have, haven’t you?”
“Excellent, sir. Excellent.”
“Good service, too, I was told, and some real old Chianti. Ah, I remember! It was Captain Ryson of the Devastation—off his ship just now and acting as one of my assistants at the Admiralty. You remember Captain Ryson, Machinka?”
The latter’s face wore the slightly worried expression of a maître d’hôtel who fails to recognise the name of a client.
“There are so many sometimes,” he apologised. “One hears the names and forgets. A gentleman of your own age, sir?”
Cheshire smiled.
“He would not be flattered. It must have been someone else. Good night. Thanks for looking after us. Good night.”
Machinka bowed with even more than his usual courtesy. Afterwards, he stood for a few moments without moving, gazing with an air of disquietude after his departing patron.
CHAPTER II
Table of Contents
Four men on the evening of the following day, seated in heavy mahogany chairs around a bridge table within the sacred purlieus of the St. George’s Club, leaned back with the relaxed air which follows upon the completion of a closely contested rubber. They were all men of some distinction. One was Henry D. Prestley, American banker, husband of the Princess Sabine Pelucchi and host of the previous night’s great diplomatic reception. His partner was Sir Herbert Melville, Deputy Commissioner of Police. His two opponents were General Lord Robert Mallinson and Lord Fakenham, the latter a Press magnate, owner of half a dozen newspapers and many other periodicals.
“A cheap rubber for you fellows, considering your shocking overcalling,” Fakenham observed as he rang the bell for a waiter. “I can have a drink now with a clear conscience. Join me, gentlemen. I can afford to treat you. I make it that I win forty-two pounds.”
“You are too infernally lucky,” Mallinson grumbled. “However, I’ll drink a whisky and soda with you.”
The orders were given. The door of the private room was quietly opened. Cheshire, alert and debonair notwithstanding a slight stoop, made his appearance. Fakenham drew a sigh of relief.
“Now if you fellows want to go on,” he said, “you have a fourth. As for me—I am tired. The strain of Prestley’s glorious party last night was too much for me.”
Cheshire leaned over the table, reached out for one of the packs of cards, performed an amazing trick, threw another pack into the air and had apparently shuffled it before the cards came fluttering down. Finally, he calmly nominated the partner with whom he had decided to cut and succeeded in drawing him.
“Why anyone plays cards with me I cannot imagine,” he remarked. “Cards have kept me from penury throughout my life. You all know what I can do and yet you go on trusting me.”
“The fact of it is, my dear friend,” the Deputy Commissioner of Police remarked, “you will probably end your days in prison, but it won’t be for your cheating at cards. Up till now I should say you were one of the most consistent losers in the club.”
“I purposely handicap myself by making every obvious mistake known to man,” Cheshire confided. “I also deliberately choose to play with a small circle whose appreciation of the intricacies of the game is negligible. Even on an Admiral’s half-pay, my losses mean no more than a snap of the fingers to me.”
“You look very spruce and pleased with yourself this evening,” the General yawned. “What have you been up to?”
“Work,” was the prompt and emphatic reply. “Zealous and untiring work on behalf of an ungrateful country. Seven hours at a stretch at my desk at the Admiralty.”
“I might play one more rubber,” Fakenham decided. “We four cut. This intrusive newcomer, with the deplorable manners and the absurdly inflated ideas of his own capacity, is in, anyway.”
The Admiral chuckled.
“I’m in all right,” he agreed. “You couldn’t have cut me out if you had tried. Try the seventh card from the middle if you want to play, Melville.”
Melville did as was suggested and turned up a king. The others scowled at him.
“Look here, you sea-faring charlatan,” Fakenham observed drily. “You leave off these tricks in a respectable club. I’ll choose my own card, thanks.”
He hesitated for a moment, then drew a two.
“Play instead of me, if you like,” the General suggested.
Fakenham shook his head.
“I’d sooner watch for a time.”
A long-drawn-out rubber finished some time after Fakenham had taken his leave. Cheshire glanced at a handsome clock which stood on the chimney piece. It was one of those modern creations fashioned to tell the time without any audible indication of progress. Everything in the room was made for silence, to enable the greatest brains in Europe to struggle more successfully with the problems of their latest diversion.
“Rotten time to finish a rubber,” he remarked. “Half-past seven.”
Sir Herbert grunted.
“An unpleasant reminiscence,” he said. “If I were really a faithful servant of my country I should call in at the Yard on my way home and go through the evening reports.”
“Digging up mares’ nests,” the General suggested chaffingly.
“Queer chaps, you Britishers,” Prestley sighed. “I don’t know why it is that directly a soldier retires he becomes a devastating critic of all military operations. A sailor takes you on one side and tells you that his country is at the mercy of anyone with half a dozen submarines up his sleeve.”
“And a policeman?” the Admiral interposed. “Don’t forget the policeman, Prestley.”
“He is worse than anyone else. He is always ready to assert that as soon as he gave up office and since he lost his job in one of the mysterious branches of the hidden service, the country is drifting into the hands of foreigners, every maître d’hôtel is a spy, and every Russian ballerina in the pay of some foreign country or other. You Englishmen are wonderful at your work,” he concluded, “but when you do lay off for half an hour you are the most howling mob of pessimists I ever came across.”
“What about another rubber?” Cheshire asked patiently. “It’s better than being slated by this glib-tongued millionaire.”
“Since the Navy took to revoking,” Sir Herbert declared, “this game is getting too expensive for me. I’ll play another rubber if I can be insured against cutting with Cheshire.”
The latter’s profanity for the next few seconds was both instructive and awesome. The Deputy Commissioner rang the bell.
“You are fined drinks round for using language like that,” he said sternly. “Give your orders, gentlemen. The Admiral will sign the chit.”
“Once in my life,” Cheshire grunted, “have I revoked in this
club and never shall I hear the last of it. It cost us precisely nothing at all. We won the rubber afterwards. However, I’ve told you what I think of you and I’ll pay for the drinks with pleasure. Pink Gin for me, Brooks,” he added, looking up as the waiter approached.
“Dry Martini,” Sir Herbert murmured.
“Mixed Vermouth for me,” Prestley chose after reflection.
“A glass of the Dry Amontillado for me,” the General decided.
“And what about me?” demanded a man who had opened the door a few seconds before. “Am I left out of this orgy? I warn you I am going to cut in.”
“Who cares?” the Admiral exclaimed. “I’m paying for the drinks and you can have this crowd so far as contract bridge is concerned. They’re over-cautious, George. That’s what’s the matter with them. They won’t call their hands, they get left, and they grumble. A man revokes for the first time in his life and they haven’t the least idea how to treat the matter in a gentlemanly fashion. That’s why I am paying for drinks.”
The newcomer, George Marsden, a well-known permanent official in the Foreign Office, glanced at the clock. A smile parted his lips and his expression, always amiable but sometimes a little too serious, relaxed.
“The hour has struck,” he said. “I’ll take a Dry Martini.”
The waiter departed. The five men were alone in the room. Marsden drew up a chair close to Sir Herbert’s.
“No Continental news, I suppose?” the latter asked him.
Marsden shook his head.
“I am calling at the Foreign Office on my way home,” he confided. “There will be the usual evening messages from the two capitals we are chiefly interested in. Nothing else has transpired.”
The drinks arrived. Cheshire signed the chit and rose to his feet.
“I have a leaning towards domesticity,” he declared.
There was a subdued jeer from everybody. The Admiral, more than once, had been said to be the least married man in the Service and his bachelor parties were famous.
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