The Lieutenant shepherded them straight upstairs to the ante-room. Ruran sat there behind a desk table; on it reposed her bag, camera and the package containing the infernal machine: a small alarm clock attached by a fuse to a pound of gelignite and set to go off at three-thirty exactly.
Ruran dismissed the Lieutenant of Caribineers with a nod, glanced at Korto, and signed to two troopers standing at the door. ‘Take this man away. Put him below in the courtyard and keep him under observation from the gateway. No one is to be allowed to speak to him or go near him.’
With a baleful glance at Sabina, Korto turned, but Ruran called after him. ‘Here, take this trash away—your girl friend’s not likely to need it from now on.’
He held out the camera and handbag. With a sullen shrug Korto took them and left the room between his guards. Ruran and Sabina were alone.
‘Have you anything to say?’ His eyes were hard as rocks, his voice flinty.
‘You—you don’t remember me?’ Sabina loathed herself even as she spoke for attempting to soften him by recalling their old friendship, yet they were the only words she could think of.
‘Perfectly,’ he replied coldly. ‘You are Sabina Tovorri, daughter of Count Tovorri, the Liberal leader whose estates were confiscated for having opposed my great Master’s ordinances for saving our country from anarchy. Now, it seems, you have turned anarchist yourself. What have you to say about this?’ He tapped the square package on the desk before him.
Sabina stared at it in sudden horror. ‘Good God, you haven’t opened it?’ she gasped. ‘It—it’s timed to go off at half past three.’
‘So you told the porter on the telephone,’ Ruran observed. ‘It is now twenty-three minutes past. His Excellency is not original in desiring that, wherever possible, punishment should fit the crime. I shall not touch the infernal thing, but propose to leave you with it.’
Her eyes flickered towards the window, but he caught her glance. ‘Oh, no!’ he smiled sardonically, as he stood up. ‘I do not intend that you should throw it outside and kill somebody else.’
With a swift movement he opened the top drawer of the desk, slipped the package inside and, locking the drawer, pocketed the key. ‘It will shatter the desk, of course, but I doubt if it will kill you. Your chance of surviving will be slightly better than His Excellency’s would have been.’ Before Sabina had time to collect her wits he had gone, locking the door behind him.
With a gasp of dismay she flung herself on the heavy desk and wrenched at the drawer. A brass handle came away in her hand, grazing her knuckles. Her eyes distended by terror, she stared frantically round for some implement with which she might force the lock. It was a sparsely furnished hotel sitting-room and she could see nothing which would serve her purpose. She ran to the window, but a wire mosquito screen was nailed across it. As she stared out she saw Korto, the cause of her desperate plight, sitting hunched up on the edge of a fountain in the empty courtyard. By banging on the wire she endeavoured to attract his attention, but he was sunk in torpid gloom. A clock showed above the stables opposite; it was twenty-six minutes past three. Swinging round she attacked the drawer again with renewed frenzy. For three ghastly minutes, each of which seemed an age, she stabbed at the lock with the splintered end of a bone paper-knife. Her hands were bruised and bleeding. She glimpsed the clock again, it was twenty-nine minutes past. In another moment the desk would shatter in a searing sheet of flame. Its jagged splinters would pierce her flesh. She would be stunned, perhaps killed, by the force of the explosion. Wildly she stared round for cover; but the room held no cupboards, only the desk and a few chairs.
Suddenly the door opened. Ruran and the ‘Great Man’ stood there.
‘Your Excellency,’ said Ruran, ‘you have met this lady as a journalist; I now wish to present her as the Countess Tovorri. Her father’s estates were confiscated, you will remember, but today she has rendered you a great service. She warned us by telephone that the anarchist Korto was about to attempt your assassination with a bomb.’
‘Korto!’ exclaimed the Dictator. ‘Where is he?’
‘Down there in the courtyard,’ said Ruran pointing.
For one second Sabina withdrew her terrified gaze from the desk. The clock above the stable stood at half past three. There was a blinding flash, a cloud of smoke, windows rattled violently; and when they could see again, Korto’s mangled body lay on the flagstones by the fountain.
. . . . .
A few minutes later Ruran was giving Sabina a badly needed cognac; his eyes had softened to their old friendliness and humour.
‘I had to give you a lesson,’ he said softly, ‘but I have memories too. It was quite simple to transfer the bomb from the package to your camera case before you came in and send Korto out there with it.’
STORY XI
THE main interest of this little piece is that it is based on a true episode in which I participated. As a member of the Deception Section of the Joint Planning Staff, I sat in at the meetings at which it was decided on the steps that should be taken when the first V-2 descended on London. And it so happened that I was one of the officers who exchanged particulars with others about the, happily, poor performance of the rocket the day after its arrival.
The lunch party was at Rules and our host my good friend Colonel Eddie Combe, the Military member of the Inter-Services Security Board. Michael, however, was not an airman and to give away his real name, or the Service to which he belonged, would be to give a lead to his extremely windy Chief. The real Michael was a middle-aged officer who had no desire at all to leave his job in London, but only the fact that he was admirably qualified for it saved him from being given a ‘Bowler Hat’.
A BOWLER HAT FOR MICHAEL
FLIGHT LIEUTENANT (acting Wing Commander) Michael O’Haleran was a Battle of Britain pilot. He had also shown fine leadership in North Africa. Out of the war he had, by the summer of 1944, got a D.S.O., a double D.F.C., a grotesquely twisted leg and what, for him, amounted to a bowler hat.
He still wore uniform but, after several months in hospital, had been declared unfit for further operational service. In vain he had pleaded that his game leg would not debar him from acting as a Flying Instructor, or anyway doing a ground job at an R.A.F. Station, until it was more fully mended. The powers that be had other views. They thought well of Michael, and that his future prospects in the Service would be all the better if he put in a period learning how the wheels went round in Whitehall.
Grudgingly he had admitted that it might be rather interesting to work in ‘Plans’ for a while, but his posting had put the crown on his dissatisfaction. Instead of being given a desk in the heart of the war machine, he found himself attached to one of the less important Civil Ministries as a liaison officer. His Minister being, as it was termed, ‘below the salt’, it was not considered necessary to inform him of any operational secrets, so Michael’s job boiled down to attending a succession of dreary conferences mainly concerned with security matters.
To make things worse, his happy-go-lucky temperament was the very antithesis of his Minister’s, a pernickety little man with a passion for exactitude. After three months of the paper work he detested and lugging a brief-case from one stuffy room to another, Michael yearned, like a mother for her young, to get up in the air again, or even to be back in the gay companionship of an R.A.F. Mess. But ‘his not to reason why’. He could only stick it till some high-up remembered him and decided that he was now fit for a more active appointment.
One afternoon he was summoned to a conference at the Home Office. As soon as he limped into the big room on the second floor he realised that it was a much more high-powered affair than those he usually attended. Among the thirty-odd people present there were two Air Marshals, an Admiral, a General; and most of the civilians were obviously of the type that holds senior appointments. The only faces he knew were those of a group of comparatively junior officers with whom, as they were also concerned with security, he had in recent months
become friends.
His round, freckled face breaking into a smile he joined them and said to a middle-aged Lieutenant-Colonel wearing tartan trews: ‘ ’Afternoon, Sandy. D’you know what this gathering of the mighty is in aid of?’
‘Little old ’Itler’s secret weapon,’ replied the Scot cheerfully.
Michael’s bright blue eyes widened. ‘I thought we’d had that one. Or is it that they’re getting really worried about the mess the buzz-bombs are making in south London?’
A short, rotund Commander R.N. grinned: ‘You poor infant. It’s a shame that we have to keep these titbits from you. This is secret weapon No. 2 and it’s been causing a lot of people headaches for quite a while.’
‘He’s lucky,’ put in a Group Captain with a handle-bar moustache. ‘At least he’s been spared the sort of worry I’ve had these past few weeks. I brought my family back to London in the spring and I’ve been racking my brain till it’s addled for an excuse to pack them off to the country again; but how the hell can I, without giving it away that we are expecting London to be blown sky-high?’
‘Phew!’ Michael let out a soft whistle. ‘Is it really as bad as all that?’
The sailor nodded. ‘Sandy has been endeavouring to boost morale by offering lunch at Rules to anyone who will salute the arrival of the first one with him by standing in the middle of Whitehall without a tin hat on; but up to date there are no takers. Personally, I’m thinking of applying for a course in immunising unexploded mines on a nice safe beach somewhere.’
There was a slight stir near the door as an Under-Secretary of State came in. When he had smiled greetings to several of the senior people he took the chair. Michael and his friends sat down at the far end of the long table. There was a rustle of papers and the Under-Secretary opened the meeting.
‘Gentlemen. To date the subject we are about to discuss has been kept a very close secret, as any leakage about it would be liable to cause grave despondency and alarm. However, the time has now come when certain steps to be taken may require the co-operation of Ministries not normally concerned with the prosecution of the war. For those of you who have been asked to attend as the representative of such Ministries, I will begin by disclosing the problem which confronts us.
‘At least two years ago, reports reached us that the enemy was preparing a number of new scientific weapons, one of which had as its object the long-range bombardment of London. The information about the type of missile we might expect varied greatly; but with the arrival of the first buzz-bomb most of us felt we knew the worst. However, the Air Ministry remained sceptical on account of certain great concrete installations that the enemy was erecting in the Pas de Calais. It was clear that they had no connection with the buzz-bombs, and later it was definitely established that these monster emplacements are the launching sites for giant rockets. According to our latest intelligence, this new weapon has a range of two hundred and fifty miles, weighs seventy tons and has a war-head containing twenty tons of high explosive.’
A sound like a faint sigh went round the room as several of those present drew a sharp breath. Most of them were aware that the biggest bomb so far dropped in the war contained only two tons of high explosive and they were speculating on the awful havoc likely to be wrought by ten times that amount.
Smiling bleakly, the Under-Secretary proceeded to enlighten them.
‘Our experts have estimated that each of these missiles will devastate a square quarter of a mile of buildings, cause eight thousand deaths and some twenty thousand stretcher-case casualties.’
After pausing a moment, he went on: ‘You will realise, gentlemen, the gravity of the menace that confronts us. Arrangements for the re-evacuation of children, invalids, and elderly people have, of course, already been put in hand; but there are many other steps which must be taken. It is important that the enemy should be deprived for as long as possible of knowledge concerning the accuracy of his aim and the extent of the damage inflicted. All traffic to Ireland will be temporarily suspended. The Foreign Office has been asked to consider placing a ban on the despatch of diplomatic bags to neutral countries. Preparations must be made for the taking over, equipping, and staffing of a large number of buildings outside London as emergency hospitals. The results of a major dislocation of our railway system must be envisaged and it may be thought desirable to create dumps of food, clothes, and tentage well away from the capital. There is also the question of deciding on a suitable cover-plan.
‘As you are aware, it is entirely contrary to the Government’s policy to deceive the people about the conduct of the war. But this case is exceptional. In their own interest we must do everything possible to prevent the general panic which is all too likely to ensue on the arrival of the first rocket. Fortunately, Intelligence takes the view that it is unlikely that the enemy will prove capable of launching more than one in each twenty-four hours; at all events to begin with. If we localise knowledge of the true facts about the first, that will give us time to set our emergency measures in operation. Therefore, the B.B.C, must be provided with a plausible story to put out at once, which would account for a great explosion.’
For the three hours that followed the thirty-odd men round the table gloomily debated the measures to be taken and, after certain of them had been charged with arranging this and that, the meeting broke up. As Michael stuffed his papers into his brief-case he remarked to Sandy:
‘This will fairly put the breeze up my Minister. He is the windiest little rat I’ve ever met and I’ll bet Winston would sack him if he knew how he bolts for the basement every time a siren goes.’
The Colonel wore an M.C. with bar, earned in the First World War. He smiled understanding. ‘I’ve gathered he is not exactly your favourite man, Michael. What about amusing us with his reactions over lunch one day next week?’
‘Thanks, Sandy; but I’m going on a fortnight’s leave tomorrow night.’
‘Lucky young devil. How about the day after you get back then?’
‘There’s nothing I’d like better. Your parties are always fun.’
‘Right! Same place and time as usual. I’ll get some of the boys together.’
On Michael’s first day back from leave he ploughed grimly through a mountain of papers. Next morning he had to visit one of his Ministry’s offshoots outside London, so he was a little late in keeping his luncheon appointment.
Sandy, the Commander, a Brigadier and a civilian from MI.5 were already drinking at a table in the bar of the restaurant. Their faces glowed with suppressed excitement and the cheerfulness of men who had been reprieved from death. All of them had come from different Ministries and when Michael limped over to them they were exchanging in whispers bits of information about the cause of their abnormal hilarity.
‘I’m told the crater was only fourteen feet deep,’ whispered the Commander.
‘That’s right,’ supplemented the man from MI.5, ‘and only one house was destroyed. Quite a small place; a semi-detached down in Chiswick.’
The Brigadier nodded. ‘What’s more, there was only one casualty. Interesting about the bits, though. I hear they still had stratospheric ice on them when they were collected.’
Sandy smiled. ‘I never did believe that scare-mongering about it having a twenty-ton war-head.’
Michael gave a gasp. ‘What … what the devil are you talking about?’
‘Not so loud,’ said Sandy sharply, and added below his breath: ‘You must have heard that single sharp crack just after six o’clock last night. Nearly everyone in London did.’
‘You don’t mean that … that was IT?’
‘Of course,’ grinned the Commander. ‘Didn’t you know? What are you looking so fussed about?’
‘Yes. I heard it.’ Michael swallowed hard. ‘But I’ve bought myself a packet. You know how windy my Minister is. The echo had hardly died before he rang for me and asked what it was. I said I would find out and rang up Scotland Yard. They told me it was a petrol barge that had blown up in Ham
mersmith Reach. Naturally I passed on what they said.’
A howl of laughter went up from the table, then the Commander tittered. ‘You poor mutt. You sold your boss the cover-plan.’
Michael’s face was a study in consternation as he muttered: ‘You’ve said it. And I’ve got to see the little swine at three-thirty.’
Sandy looked his sympathy. ‘I’m afraid this may mean a bowler hat for you, Michael’.
Suddenly Michael’s blue eyes began to dance and he exclaimed: ‘Yes! I’ll be out on my ear all right. But for me this job has been the equivalent of having a bowler already. The only kind that little rat can give me is a tin one. Whoopee! A week from now, I’ll be back on an R.A.F. station.’
STORY XII
THIS story has never before appeared in print for a very simple reason—it has never been offered to an Editor. As soon as I had written it I realised that it contained the bare bones of a skeleton strong enough to carry the flesh and blood of a full-length novel. I held it back with the sure instinct that some day I would write a book centring round a golden-headed Castilian girl; and sure enough, some seven years later I did, bringing it out under the original title.
Those readers who recall the book need have no fear that the short story is simply a synopsis of it. Except that the central figure in both is a young Royalist plotting against the Government which took over after King Alfonso was compelled to leave his throne, they have nothing in common; even the girl’s name is different.
When I wrote the short story the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War was still some years ahead in an unknown future. The book, on the other hand, covered the first six months of that ghastly struggle, and into it came my old friends the Duke de Richeleau, Simon Aron, Rex Van Ryn, Richard Eaton, and the Princess Marie Lou.
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