The Scarlet Impostor

by Dennis Wheatley

  He knew very well that he ought not to go to sleep with a prisoner in his charge, but the prisoner was obviously a decent fellow who would not wilfully get him into trouble, and had himself pointed out how impossible it would be for him to get any distance in his German uniform without being caught; an observation which was more than ever true now that they were right in the interior of Holland.

  While the Corporal was pondering these matters he fell asleep, publicly announcing the fact a few minutes later by giving vent to sonorous and persistent snores.

  The train rumbled on into the night. It had halted at Zutfen while they were supping, and at Deventer, towards the end of their sing-song. When it pulled up at Zwolle, the Corporal was sound asleep. He was still sleeping when it stopped again at Meppel and Assen, but the noise of the porters shouting the Dutch equivalent of ‘All change! All change here!’ roused him a moment after it had pulled in to the platform at Groningen.

  He sat up with a guilty start; but his first sleepy glance round the carriage reassured him. The comical Englishman in the smart clothes had disappeared, but his prisoner was still there, and it was the presence of the figure opposite in the field-grey uniform that mattered to Corporal Loon. He recollected then that de Heer Rudd had said that he would be leaving the train at Zwolle.

  The Corporal yawned and rubbed his eyes preparatory to standing up. When he glanced again at the figure opposite, his blood suddenly seemed to chill in his veins. The uniform was the same, from the forage cap to the short black top-boots, but the face was no longer that of the lean-jowled saturnine Johannes Heckt who had been given into his charge.

  Yet—somehow, the little, fair, toothbrush moustache that failed to hide teeth badly needing the attention of a dentist was strangely familiar. As he stared at it, the mouth below the moustache suddenly broadened into a grin, and the unfortunate Jan Loon realised the trick that had been played upon him. His prisoner had swapped clothes with his friend, de Heer Rudd.

  Rudd leaned forward and tapped the astonished, frightened Corporal on the knee. ‘Now, don’t go getting all excited; you ain’t goin’ ter get inter any trouble as long as you act sensible, see?’

  ‘Where? … Where? …’ stammered Jan Loon, jumping excitedly to his feet.

  ‘Where’s the guv’nor? Oh, ’e’s ’opped it; but it ain’t for me ter sy where ’e got aht. Look ’ere though, ’e tole me ter give yer this ’ere little billy-doo?

  With trembling fingers the Corporal smoothed out the brief letter which Rudd handed him. He was visualising courts-martial, cells, disgrace, the loss of his pension and all sorts of other calamities as the results of letting his prisoner escape. Striving to calm his nerves, he hastily pocketed the fifty-Gulden note that Gregory had left folded in the sheet of paper, and read the pencilled message, which ran:

  Dear Jan Loon,

  Never worry over trifles. You have to deliver a prisoner in German uniform who carries the papers of Soldat Heckt to the camp at Groningen and your prisoner is still with you. No one at Groningen has seen his face, so no one will know that he isn’t the same man who was in the camp at Nijmegen. If that is discovered later you call always swear that the exchange must have been effected just after you had delivered your prisoner.

  If you report the matter you will only be court-martialed, so be a sensible fellow, take your prisoner to the camp at Groningen, get him signed for, go home and forget it.

  The Dutchman was no fool and he saw the sense of Gregory’s reasoning. With a little sigh he tore up the note; then he smiled at Rudd and said: ‘You Englishmans haf trick me very bad But you treat me very good. Not many mens who make escape think for poor guard so good.’ Peering out of the carriage window his eye caught the flashing lights above the buffet.

  ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘It is only nine hours yet. You like Dutch beer. I like very much. We haf one before I put you in camp, eh, Soldat Heckt?’

  16

  The Return of the Broken Reed

  Sir Pellinore Gwaine-Cust stretched out his long legs and regarded Gregory with a disapproving stare. ‘So Rheinhardt’s sunk and the Pastor feller’s dead. After four days in Germany you succeeded in raising the whole damned countryside against you; then land yourself in an infernal Dutch concentration-camp and I have to get you out. A pretty performance, I must say!’

  ‘Not at all!’ snapped Gregory, the scar on his forehead paling. ‘I got myself out. It was my scheme, and a damned good one. Once I’d managed to get my plan back to you via the chap from the British Passport Control office, all you had to do was office-boy’s work. It was child’s play for you to apply for my transfer from the camp at Nijmegen on the grounds of my British nationality; to send Rudd over to Holland with the instructions that I’d given you for him, so as to have him handy; to find out on what day I was to be transferred when the Dutch had acceded to your request and to turn Rudd loose on Nijmegen station to carry out his orders. He and I did the rest between us.’

  Gregory did not need telling that he had made an infernal mess of his mission and would have been the first to admit it, but he was not the man to accept criticism from anyone else.

  ‘Oh, you used your intelligence there,’ Sir Pellinore conceded a trifle more graciously, ‘except that you’ve landed that feller of yours—what’s his name—Rudd, in jug for the duration. Pretty hard on him, what?’

  ‘For God’s sake be sensible!’ exclaimed Gregory angrily. ‘The Germans will have found out by this time that Johannes Heckt is still in Germany and that it was the man they were after—the spy posing as General von Lettow—who laid him out, pinched his papers and uniform, and was subsequently interned at Nijmegen under his name. If I had broken prison and laid out several Dutchmen in the process the Germans would soon have heard of it and notified the Dutch of my doings in Germany. The Dutch authorities would have had something pretty hot to say to the British Government then, wouldn’t they? We don’t want trouble with Holland, so I had to think up a scheme for getting myself out of the country without assaulting any Dutchmen. By arranging that Rudd should take my place I succeeded in doing that very neatly. As for Rudd, you’re going to get to work right away and secure his release through ordinary channels.’

  Sir Pellinore grunted. ‘I suppose you realise that all this is delaying my contribution to the successful prosecution of the war?’

  ‘I don’t care what it’s doing. Anyhow, it won’t take you ten minutes to set wheels in motion which will result in Rudd’s release within a couple of weeks.’

  ‘Indeed? And how do you propose that I shall do that by employing above-board methods, when it was quite impossible for me to do so in your own case?’

  ‘Simply by utilising the differences that exist between Rudd’s case and my own, and employing means to liberate him which would have been useless where I was concerned. I’m thirty-nine; Rudd is getting on for fifty. I’m of an age at which I’m still liable for military service; Rudd isn’t, so he can be regarded as a non-combatant.’

  ‘You seem to forget that Rudd is not there as Rudd, but as Johannes Heckt, whose age I seem to remember your telling me is only thirty-one.’

  ‘Not so far as the Dutch authorities at Groningen are concerned. You see; before I passed it over to Rudd I took the trouble to alter the three to a five in Johannes pay-book, so he is now officially fifty-one. Any medical board would substantiate the fact that he couldn’t possibly be under forty, and what is more he suffers from night-blindness.’

  ‘And what the devil may that be?’

  ‘A comparatively rare disease in peace-time, but one which became quite common during the last war and probably will during this one if it goes on much longer. On returning from the Front some of our less courageous soldiers found it impossible to see the lights in Piccadilly at night.’

  ‘Aren’t any lights to see this time.’

  ‘True, more’s the pity; it makes for such a darned dull war, But quite seriously, night-blindness is a rare but genuine infirmity and it in
capacitates men for active service. It proved a gift from Heaven to lead-swingers in the last schemozzle; because if a man says that he can’t see at night it’s almost impossible for a medical board to trap him into admitting that he can.’

  ‘Very interesting. And you say your feller what’s-his-name suffers from this convenient affliction?’

  ‘Of course he doesn’t, but I’ve told him that he does and primed him about walking into a few brick walls at night during the next week or so in order to establish the fact with the people at the Groningen camp. Rudd will not hit anybody on the head so the Dutch won’t have anything against him. In consequence, between the facts of his being over age for active service and a night-blindness case you should have no difficulty at all in applying for his release and getting him repatriated.’

  ‘Clever young devil, aren’t you?’ muttered Sir Pellinore, ‘All right; I’ll have the matter put in hand.’

  ‘Thank you. And now, what have we got for dinner?’

  ‘Haven’t the faintest idea, and why I should feed you at all now you’re retiring into the obscurity of civilian life I can’t think.

  ‘Ah, well; your chef has never failed us yet, so I suppose I can leave myself with confidence in his hands, I only raised the matter because I still hunger for exotic fare in spite of the picnic supper in the train last night and two good meals today. The food in the Dutch camp was edible but uninspired, and I haven’t yet recovered mentally from having to go for four days on a slab of chocolate,’

  ‘If you’d played your cards properly you wouldn’t have had to, but I’m sorry you had such a rough time. Frankly, Gregory I’m terribly disappointed, too, that you’ve made such a botch of this affair. I was counting on you, you see, and I’d cracked you up to people in the War Cabinet as the one man who really might pull it off.’

  Gregory grinned suddenly. ‘That’s better! I wish you’d taken that line at first. I’m afraid eating humble-pie is not exactly one of my gifts, but you must know how dreadfully distressed I am at having let you down.’

  ‘That’s all right, my dear boy; you did your best, I’m sure. Let’s say no more about it.’ Sir Pellinore stood up and stooped from his immense height to pat Gregory on the shoulder.

  Gregory looked up quickly. ‘But I’m afraid we’ve got to say some more about it; and you’re going to shelve that quaint idea of yours about my retiring into civilian life. The only reason that I got you to send Rudd out to Holland was so that I could return home myself with the least possible delay instead of sitting there for weeks in prison while you wangled some way of getting me out, I mean to have another crack at it; and we’re starting after dinner to discuss my next campaign.’

  Sir Pellinore stroked his fine, white moustache thoughtfully. He did not turn down Gregory’s suggestion, as he knew the man with whom he was dealing and guessed at once that some plan must be hatching in that fertile brain, but after a moment’s thought he replied: I appreciate your attitude, but I don’t see how you can attempt it again. Through ill luck your only leads in Germany have been short-circuited, so there’s not much sense in your going back to poke around there like a blindfolded man.’

  ‘There’s something in that, of course. Did you have any luck with the German Army List?’

  ‘Not much. Soon as you ’phoned me I had someone run through the “G’s”’ Sir Pellinore picked up a slip of paper from his desk. ‘You quite sure that sky-pilot feller didn’t say; ‘When you see General van Gra …” the moment before he was shot?’

  ‘Certain. He just said “General Gra …” and the rest of the name was lost in the roar of the Nazi’s pistol.’

  ‘Pity. Practically every officer of the German Army above the rank of Colonel received his first commission from the Kaiser, so it’s still run by the old school tie crowd, nearly all of whom are “vons”. Best I can do for you is General Grabenhoff, General Grauwitz and General Gröner. First’s an Army Service Corps man, second’s an Austrian and the third’s a Garrison Gunner now retired.’

  Gregory made a grimace. ‘No; they don’t sound a promising lot. An Army Service Corps man wouldn’t run a thing like this; an Austrian would be too closely watched and a retired artilleryman doesn’t sound a very big shot.’

  ‘Now if the syllable you heard had indicated someone like von Fritsch …’

  ‘I thought he was killed the other day, out scouting on the Polish Front?’

  ‘He was. I meant someone of his eminence and integrity.’

  ‘Von Fritsch practically remade the German Army after they threw the Treaty of Versailles down the drain, didn’t he?’

  ‘Yes. I knew him well. Splendid feller. A good German if ever there was one. About the only one who dared to defy Hitler after he’d assumed power, too. Walked out on one of his ace speakers because he didn’t approve of Nazi ideology, and made Hitler apologise for calling him over the coals about it afterwards. He was too big to kill so they retired him and made him Honorary Colonel of the 12th Artillery Regiment. But Hitler never forgets, and he cast poor von Fritsch for the part of Uriah the Hittite.’

  ‘You mean, he sent him to the front line on purpose so that he’d get killed?’

  ‘Yes. He did that with a whole list of officers he wanted eliminated. Directly war was declared the Baron was ordered to join his regiment. He agreed, saying that he’d take command of it. Hitler said he was not to command it but merely to go with it and sent four S.S. men along as an escort. They never left him from the moment that he joined it, hoping that he’d be killed in action. But he wasn’t.’

  ‘Good God! Was he murdered then?’

  ‘Yes. After waiting for three weeks they became impatient. Last Thursday, when he was observing the fire of No. 2 battery through his glasses, one of the S.S. men shot him in the back. In all history there has never been a more deliberate, coldblooded assassination. And he was one of Germany’s finest men.’

  ‘What in Heaven’s name can one do with such people?’

  ‘Beat them to their knees, my boy; then try them for their crimes before an International Court and hang them by the neck until they’re dead.’

  ‘You’re right, and even if it takes a year or two we’ll do it.’

  ‘Yes; but in the meantime thousands of decent folk are dying. We’ve got to try to stop that if we can. If only you’d got that name properly there might have been some point in your going back to Germany, but as it is …’

  ‘We still have Tom Archer and Erika von Epp.’

  ‘As far as Archer is concerned I’ve already told you that we’ve tried everything we know on him but have drawn a complete blank. Erika von Epp is in America by this time, or more probably on her way south through Mexico. In any case, our people in the States have failed to trace her, so it’s equally useless for you to go there.’

  At that moment the under-butler announced that dinner was served, so Gregory polished off his third glass of Amontillado and dropping their conversation for the time being they went in to dinner.

  After washing down several portions of caviare rolled in smoked salmon with some yellow Zubrovka, the hay-scented Vodka favoured by connoisseurs, Gregory turned his attention to more solid fare, but meanwhile the butler brought round a magnum of champagne wrapped in a napkin and poured the best part of a pint from it into a large, silver tankard that stood near Gregory’s right hand.

  Having drunk his first draught of the wine he looked across at his host with quick appreciation in his dark eyes. ‘By jove, this is good!’

  ‘Should be.’ muttered Sir Pellinore. ‘It’s Roederer 1920 and one can’t find it on the market any more. One of the best cuvées that have come out of France in the last twenty years, in my opinion, but not up to the stuff we used to get before the last Great War. The 1900’s and 1906’s were positively magnificent.’

  Gregory nodded, ‘I remember the ’06’s, and the ’ll’s were pretty good; but whatever the vintage, how infinitely better champagne tastes out of a tankard.’

  �
��Always use ’em except on state occasions,’ volunteered Sir Pellinore. ‘Every drink has a vessel that brings out its best qualities. The finest Hock or Burgundy is hardly fit to drink out of a tea-cup, while for China tea nothing can beat the finest porcelain. Brandy must be drunk out of a glass which allows a big surface so that its esters can escape. Tastes rotten in one of those piddling little liqueur glasses that people used to push round. On the other hand, though, it’s no use putting liqueurs into brandy ballons. They lose their snap if you do; they should be drunk out of little glasses filled to the brim. As for champagne, there’s no question about it; silver is the perfect medium for the King of Wines. No glass, whatever its shape, can touch a silver tankard.’

  ‘You don’t appear to be feeling the food-shortage yet.’ Gregory remarked when they were halfway through the elaborate meal, ‘yet I hear that the Government is talking of bringing in rationing in October.’

  ‘Blithering idiots!’ growled Sir Pellinore. ‘The work of the fighting Ministries has been beyond praise and the evacuation of the children from London was a splendid piece of work. You were here when that was carried out, of course. Some of the other Ministries, though, are behaving with incredible stupidity. There’s no food shortage in this country and never will be. Damn it! What’s the Navy for? And we’ve still got one, as the German submarines already know to their cost. Even in the first weeks of the war, when they had every possible advantage, they weren’t able to sink anything like the tonnage that they sent to the bottom in 1917. They’ll be launching new ones, of course, but only this afternoon Churchill announced in the House that we’re trebling the number of our armed ships; trebling the number, my boy; think of that!’

  ‘God help the U-boats, then,’ remarked Gregory.

  ‘Exactly. And even as things are, the Seven Seas are ours. There are masses of food here and we’re free to draw upon every friendly and neutral country in the world for more, yet the fools are planning to put the nation on rations. If that’s not playing Hitler’s game for him, Lord knows what is. We laughed at him for putting his own people on rations a couple of days before the war, yet here we are, with practically the whole world as an open market, talking of doing the same thing before the war’s a month old.