by John Creasey
They could get nothing more out of him, and Errol and he went out. On the landing Errol raised his brows.
‘Phoney or not?’ he asked.
‘Very suspiciously like it,’ said Loftus. ‘He choked and chloroformed himself, of course, staged it for our benefit.’
‘If you’re so sure, why the devil did you let him think he’d fooled you?’
‘I want him to believe that he put it across. I want him to think that we’re very sorry for him, and that we know he was attacked by many wicked men. I want him to believe that we take him at his own estimate—the soul of righteousness. I also want,’ added Loftus casually, ‘to know just why he did it, and what he knows about Grafton and the new lens.’
Mark shrugged.
‘You could have forced it out of him.’
‘Possibly,’ shrugged Loftus. ‘We’ll see. Well now, friends and brothers.’ He glanced round the lounge, where Carruthers, Best, Davidson—sitting on a chair bolt upright so that he did not touch it with his back—were also sitting, while Lister and Allison watched outside the hotel. ‘You will get all the rest you can, except the man who’s watching Grey.’
‘What about the girls?’ asked Mark.
‘We’ll have a nurse in for Janice Grafton. Garry’s coming back to Town with me. I want to see the mysterious Mr. A. Smith, who goes from time to time to the Regal Hotel, Piccadilly. We also want your report on the talk with Forster.’
‘It’s ready.’ Mark passed over a paper which he took from his breast pocket. ‘Coded, of course. It looks to me as if Forster could tell you a lot about Warncliffe and the syndicate if you worked on him properly.’
‘He’s given you something,’ said Loftus. ‘If he knows who’s got the lens he won’t tell us, because we would use it against his country—and Forster won’t talk when that’s at stake. Now listen. Things should be fairly quiet down here now. Have Grey watched closely, and I’ll see that the nurse who comes doesn’t let Janice out of her sight.’
‘Damn it, she’s all right!’
‘She might,’ said Loftus tentatively, ‘be in danger of some kind, Marko.’
Garry, warned that she was to travel, was dressed soon after half-past seven.
‘We’ll breakfast in London,’ Loftus said. ‘We’ll be there in an hour by air.’
During the flight he studied Forster’s statement, and put it in his pocket without comment. Sitting back in the corner of the car which met them at the airport he looked sideways at the girl.
‘Forster seems to have known about your arrangements with the syndicate. In fact his story coincides with yours. The one thing he failed to get, as far as I can tell, is the names of the members of the syndicate.
‘Forster states that after leaving the Manor his car was attacked, and your brother was taken by others. Presumably the syndicate. Forster also says that he had regained consciousness by then.’
The girl’s eyes shone.
‘Thank God,’ said Garry Cartwright.
There was a moment of silence, before Loftus went on.
‘Well, now. If Cartwright is with the syndicate, and does not approve of the sinking of the destoyer, he won’t be popular. Grafton is probably with them also. Some of them, we’ve good reason to believe, are at sea. There’s a thing you’ve never told me, you know—and I didn’t ask before.’
‘What is it?’
‘The name of the armed vessel.’
The girl stared at him for some seconds, and then she lifted her hands helplessly from her lap.
‘Oh, it’s so absurd. I don’t know...’
‘A moment,’ said Loftus. ‘No country in this world is likely to allow the arming of a vessel in time of war without reporting it. As far as we’re concerned this ship could belong to the enemy, but Forster’s activities put that out. It could not have been fitted-up in a combatant port, and it’s not likely to have been fitted in a neutral one.’
‘I suppose so. What are you driving at?’
‘To me,’ said Loftus, ‘it looks as if this ship might be a regular warship, belonging to some nation or other—a neutral nation—and fitted while at sea with the glass lenses. It also seems to me that your brother, and for that matter yourself, would hardly be satisfied with help from a money-syndicate without any practical means of assisting you in the drive for peace. But a small neutral country might be considered. He’s been negotiating with Vania, hasn’t he?’
‘Good—God!’ gasped the girl.
‘Thanks,’ said Loftus dryly. ‘A small neutral country which because of its size has always been in danger of aggression. What a beautiful position for it to be able to shake its fists at the belligerents? To sink a British ship, a Russian, and a German—and then to give a warning-off note. That was your brother’s idea, wasn’t it?’
She said haltingly: ‘Yes. But how did you know?’
‘I didn’t believe from the first that you and Cartwright would rely solely on financial help, and when the sinking was reported Vania seemed the one and only nation. Moreover—the Foreign Secretary was the one man in this country who might have learned that Vania was getting too big for its boots. Hence his disappearance.’
‘Has Scott been kidnapped?’
‘He has,’ said Loftus. ‘It wouldn’t surprise me to hear that other Foreign Secretaries are kidnapped before the day’s out. I wouldn’t be surprised if your guess isn’t the true one, Garry. For you, bad luck.’
‘What—do you mean?’ she said in a strangled voice.
‘That Vania accepted the invitation, that the syndicate reached an understanding with the Vanian Government,’ said Loftus very slowly. ‘That instead of using their weapon to promote peace they’re going to try enforcing it as victors. One little country against a dozen big Powers. That’s why you were at such pains to keep it secret, why your brother had such confidence. Misplaced confidence, I’m afraid, Garry. Vania will seek victory by force before many days are past.’
She believed it, with him...
Loftus was not even perturbed when, half an hour later, Craigie told him that the French Foreign Minister and the German counterpart were missing from Paris and Berlin respectively.
Which could only precede an ultimatum.
20
‘David Among Nations’
The three most sensational kidnappings of recent times had been carried out almost simultaneously. Scott from England, Ariel from Paris, and von Holstein from Berlin. And that was not all, for Dagliov, the Soviet Foreign Minister, who had been on a visit to Leningrad in an effort to stir the Russian troops out of the lethargy that had fallen on them after the effective opposition of the Finns, was also kidnapped.
The four men were smuggled out of their respective countries by air on the evening of their kidnapping—smuggling which had been comparatively easy in view of the fact that the kidnappers could see in the dark. Each man was flown to Vania, each was treated with exemplary courtesy.
It was Sibilla, the Vanian Prime Minister, who interviewed them together in the Palace of Kings at Venn, the Vanian capital. He talked in French, the language which all four men knew well, with a quiet assumption of confidence which had a considerable effect. He delivered an ultimatum. Virtually, Vania held the four major warring Powers at the point of a gun. He acted as the representative of a David among nations, and after he had talked for two hours he had each Foreign Minister conducted to a bedroom and told them that they would be free to return to their own countries on the following day.
Scott was the only man to comment.
‘We know what you can do, and this isn’t a time for counter-threats. But why waste time? I can be back in London in four hours.’
Sibilla was a tall, thin, grey-bearded man who looked like a French aristocrat and who dressed in the French fashion of the late ‘nineties—in tails, a semi-Gladstonian collar and a black cravat held in place by a solitaire diamond ring. His red lips parted in a smile that gave Jonathan Scott little consolation.
‘You
do not appear to understand. We are making the arrangements. It may appear a waste of time to you, but we consider it necessary.’
‘Are we allowed to consult each other tonight?’ asked Scott.
And it was in the small hours of that night that news reached Berlin of one of the major and certainly the most mysterious reverses of the war. The pocket-battleship Admiral von Bohn was sunk in mid-Atlantic under cover of darkness. In Berlin there was alarm and despondency.
Moscow, about the same time, suffered the heaviest reverse of their war with Finland. The Kronstadt naval and air base was bombed in a dark night, and the bombs were dropped with such accuracy that fifty planes, two destroyers, and two petrol dumps were completely destroyed. Not long afterwards the French aircraft-carrier Dupress was sunk by submarine action on a night which was dull and overcast, and when visibility had been negligible. The wires hummed between London and Paris, and Malladet, the French Prime Minister, flew to London.
• • • • •
‘It would appear, then,’ said Malladet in his clear but curiously precise English, ‘that in your opinion, my friend, the Vanian Government considers itself able to dictate any terms it desires. Is that so?’
‘It is possible,’ said Wishart cautiously. The contrast between the tall, stately looking Englishman and the solid, chunky Frenchman who could not hide—and did not wish to hide—the traces of his peasant ancestry, was remarkable. Wishart looked more French than Malladet, and Malladet would have passed anywhere as an Englishman.
‘It can be taken as certain,’ said Craigie.
‘But so much of it is guess-work.’ Malladet looked at Loftus, who smiled amiably and began to stuff his pipe.
‘Hardly guess-work, M’sieu Malladet. There is every reason to assume that it is a fact. I have been carefully into every angle of the situation, and innumerable factors make it less an assumption than a reasoned deduction. The success of the modern David is remarkable only because it has been kept so closely secret. Within twelve hours you will have word from M’sieu Ariel, we shall have news from Mr. Scott. We shall learn that Vania has equipped all her fighting services with the new lenses, and we’ll know that by night we’re virtually at her mercy.’
Malladet stared. Wishart drew a sharp inward breath, and Craigie fiddled with the stem of his meerschaum.
‘Are you insane?’ demanded Malladet. ‘At the mercy of Vania, of Sibilla? No, it is nonsense!’
‘I’m afraid that it’s reasonable,’ said Craigie.
‘The Service experts will agree,’ said Loftus quietly, ‘that unless we can counter the effects of the lens by night we shall be well advised to make terms, whatever they are.’
Loftus stopped abruptly, for across his mind there flashed a solution to much of the mystery, a solution to the trouble with Grafton, to Forster’s determination to get at Warncliffe before the man could obtain all Grafton’s formulae. The idea grew apace as he stared at Malladet.
‘My dear M’sieu Loftus...’
‘A minute, please,’ said Loftus. ‘Of course, the effect of the weapon will be cancelled out if more than one country has it. Vania—and the syndicate of which you have heard—holds Cartwright, the inventor, and Grafton, the other man who was reputed to know what comprised the glass. Germany may have some samples of it, but I understand that that will not help them much. We’ve some samples, and they’re being thoroughly examined by our own experts. The key people, however, are Cartwright and Grafton.’ He looked at Wishart and then at Malladet, and he spoke with a conviction which was impressive. ‘Gentlemen, I would like a word with Mr. Craigie, and then your permission to leave for a while.’
Wishart hesitated. Malladet said sharply:
‘Of course, M’sieu.’
‘Thank you. Gordon...’
In the passage outside Loftus conducted a brief conversation with his chief, and then was driven rapidly to 55g, Clarges Street. In his flat found Garry Cartwright reading and smoking.
‘Well?’ she started up.
‘Scott’s not back, Ariel’s disappeared, and it’s a safe bet that Dagliov and von Holstein are missing. Are you convinced yet that you’ve gone the wrong way about it? That this war’s got to be finished, and the Allies have to win it, before there can be any hope of permanent peace? Or do you still think Vania will act as a fairy godmother?’
Garry said: ‘You were right, of course.’
‘Prepared to help to break the Vanian hold?’
‘Yes.’
‘Right,’ said Loftus. ‘We’re going to Vania.’
‘But...’
‘Right now, and by air,’ said Loftus. ‘You’re going to telephone Sibilla, the Prime Minister there, and tell him you’re free, but you must talk to your brother. He’ll invite you over.’
‘And then?’
‘We’ll see,’ said Loftus.
• • • • •
Before Loftus and Garry reached Venn, Jonathan Scott and Ariel were in London—the latter’s plane diverging after a broadcast request from Malladet. In Number 10 it was Scott who confirmed all that Loftus had suggested—Scott who in his downright way said sharply:
‘Sibilla didn’t beat about the bush. Practically every Vanian merchant ship of over five thousand tons is armed and fitted with the glass. They’re in every part of the Seven Seas. The Navy, for what it’s worth, is spread round—officially it’s been convoying their merchantmen, actually it’s been getting ready for this. The Air Force can strike at any one of the four capitals without much trouble. If we start a major action by day, we can’t get through the night. We’ve got to talk turkey, Wishart.’
‘What are the terms?’ asked Wishart.
‘The immediate cessation of all hostilities. The immediate withdrawal of all countries’ nationals to those countries. The immediate despatch of all ships of war of all warring countries to Vanian ports and Vanian water under Vanian control. The immediate...’ Jonathan Scott was talking mechanically, while the four men listening—Wishart, Malladet, Ariel and Craigie—were staring at him with their expressions strained. ‘The immediate surrender of all fighting aircraft to Vanian territory, and the shipment as soon as possible of all heavy arms, guns, and tanks to Vania. In short,’ added Scott, and he talked like a man in a dream, ‘we give everything to Vania, and Sibilla talks of policing the world. Oh, he made it sound beautiful! We’ve had our chances and lost them, now the smaller countries are going to have their turn. But behind Sibilla and Vania are these financial interests—this syndicate Loftus talked about. Sibilla wants us disarmed, and then he’ll give us our orders. He hinted that France has no business in Africa, we’ve no business in India. The self-governing dominions he will be pleased to leave as they are,’ shouted Scott, and he lifted a clenched hand high above his head. ‘We’re finished if we give way! All of us! Vania will dictate a damned sight more effectively than Russia or Germany. We’ve got to fight.’
‘While we’re fighting each other,’ Wishart said slowly.
‘When we can’t fight in the dark,’ said Malladet abruptly.
‘The result will be the same, except that we shall lose millions of men and women,’ said Ariel. ‘We must come to terms. If the terms are dictated we can do nothing about it.’
‘What was the time limit, Jonathan?’ Craigie asked.
His quiet voice, almost homely as he addressed the Foreign Minister, did something to ease the tension.
‘Twenty-four hours.’
‘Then I suggest that Messieurs Malladet and Ariel consult their Governments, and that we call a special meeting of the War Cabinet,’ said Craigie. ‘In an emergency Parliament can be summoned within twelve hours. And meanwhile Loftus has gone to Vania to negotiate. He is a remarkable man, and may succeed.’ When he reached his Whitehall office he sat back in an easy-chair in front of the fire which rarely went out, and closed his eyes wearily.
The work of a generation had been destroyed when the war had started—and now it seemed that the Department and all that
the Department stood for was to be destroyed. A David had risen among nations, a David which would dictate its own terms, which would be the terms of a victorious aggressor. He was in no doubt of that. Among the financial backers of the little country were men from England, Germany, Russia and America—from every country in the world. Beneath the cloak of good intentions Vania was to take all and give nothing.
World dictatorship.
It was possible, Craigie knew...
And only Loftus, flying towards Vania alone, but for the sister of the man who had made this possible, could stop the catastrophe.
21
The Syndicate of Power
Sibilla entered the Senate House of Vania at nine o’clock on the morning following the despatch of the ultimatum to the major Powers. Only Europe was so far affected; there had been no suggestion of holding a gun at the heads of the Americans—but in the mind of Sibilla there was the conviction that such a day would come. Here was a man with unbridled ambition—a man combining the ruthlessness of Stalin and Hitler, a man with a dream of a world state more fantastic then theirs only because of the smallness of the country he controlled.
First, money had been needed.
In a small chamber of the Senate when he entered the building were forty men, representing the largest financial combines in the world. There were representatives from Britain, France, America, Russia—where the shibboleth of Communism had been evaded for a long time—there were representatives from Japan and China, Turkey and India, from the British Dominions and the French Empire. In their hands was money enough to compete with any one of the big Powers. In their names gold balances stood higher than the gold reserves of Britain and France together. Throughout the world they controlled vast commercial enterprises and for years their hands had pulled the strings behind the power politics which had made the war inevitable. Some had ostensibly claimed to be interested only in the restoration of Peace. To those Cartwright had first appealed.
And slowly their strength had grown.
Sibilla, who was Vania, had been bought.