Estocada

  The confirmation that Kreisky was Jewish came as no surprise. The name itself was all you’d need. Tam would have liked to find out more about the American businessman but Schultz was already moving on. The subject had been laid to rest and Tam sensed the beginnings of a rapport with this strange envoy. There was a hint of warmth in his eyes and when he asked how Tam was coping in his new role, he appeared to mean it.

  ‘How much do you know about me?’ Tam asked.

  ‘Enough. My organisation has excellent connections in London, far better than Herr Ribbentrop’s. Putting someone like you into play is a brave thing to do. The risk is substantial. You should be flattered.’

  ‘Because?’

  ‘Because you’ve come from nowhere. Because you carry so little baggage. Because your German is excellent. And because your experience in these matters is exactly this.’ He narrowed the space between his thumb and his forefinger until it didn’t exist. ‘You were a serving soldier, am I right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘A volunteer. Am I correct?’

  ‘Yes. I was in the Royal Marines.’

  There was a hint of pride in Tam’s voice and Schultz caught it at once. For the first time, he smiled.

  ‘The little Scotsman from Glasgow had been a Marine,’ he said. ‘They threw him out after some row or other. I think he hit one of the officers.’

  ‘So what happened to him? In Spain?’

  ‘We interrogated him. I just told you.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘We handed him over to Franco’s people.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘They shot him.’

  Tam reached for his glass. Then came footsteps along the corridor and the softest knock at the door. The waiter was back to take an order. Tam’s appetite had suddenly vanished.

  Schultz was watching him across the table.

  ‘I suggest the veal,’ he grunted. ‘You’ll feel better in a minute.’

  *

  They talked throughout the meal. Two dishes came and went. Tam knew from Ballentyne that Schultz, after recovering from a serious war wound, had fought with various Nationalist groups hatched by the rise of the Nazis. He was rumoured to have had a hand in a number of killings but also cultivated an interest in poetry and journalism which gave him a special cachet amongst the brown-shirted thugs in Ernst Rohm’s Sturmabteilung.

  This combination of street warrior and poet was deeply unusual and probably accounted for his break with Hitler. The Führer, Schultz decided, had turned leadership into megalomania. Enough was enough. This decision had nearly cost him his life when Hitler ordered the slaughter of the SA’s top chieftains but he’d then found a perch with the Reich organisation charged with military intelligence.

  According to Ballentyne, it was indeed the Abwehr had offered Schultz a safe haven from the attentions of the Gestapo. In return, Schultz was only too willing to maintain his links to the netherworld of disgruntled paramilitaries who’d also fallen out of love with Hitler’s leadership. After years of service with the Abwehr, Schultz had now become one of their trusted envoys. Hence his presence in Paris.

  The dessert plates lay empty. Schultz had lit a small cigar.

  ‘The Czech thing’s over,’ he said. ‘And you know why?’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Hitler assumed the Czechs wouldn’t fight. That’s lazy on his part. There were plenty of people who knew otherwise.’

  ‘Abwehr people?’

  ‘Certainly. And others. But the man never listens. He thinks history’s on his side. He plays to the street. He loves an audience. He gives the people Vienna and they howl for more. Or that’s the way he chooses to think.’

  ‘You’re telling me he’s wrong?’

  ‘I’m telling you he’s pulled back from the border. I’m telling you the Czechs have seen him off. And you know why? Because it turns out we were right all along. Toe-to-toe, they’d have made a fight of it. Maybe for a week. Maybe for longer. But that’s all they needed to do. Hitler’s a bully. He shouts a great deal. He thumps the table. He bites the carpet. He carries a big stick. He acts the maniac. He frightens people. But it’s all bluff. Bend the knee and it’s over. Do what the Czechs have just done and the man can be stopped.’ Schultz tapped ash on to the side of his plate. ‘He’ll be back for more. I guarantee it.’ He looked up. ‘So what happens then?’

  Tam shook his head. He was out of his depth and he knew it. He began to talk about how good the Czech Army looked in the field, about the strength of the fortifications, about Prague’s determination to fight, but Schultz dismissed it all with a wave of his hand. This was common knowledge. This the Abwehr knew already. It shaped the contents of countless memoranda despatched to the Berlin Chancellery, only to be ignored. Hitler lived in a world of his own. He had no interest in either advice or moderation. Just now, the only person he listened to was Ribbentrop and that’s because Ribbentrop knew exactly what his beloved Führer wanted to hear.

  ‘Brickendrop,’ Tam murmured. ‘In London they called him Brickendrop.’

  He explained the phrase. Schultz wasn’t amused.

  ‘The man’s dangerous,’ he said. ‘We all know he fucked up in England. A year in London and he’d made an enemy of everyone who mattered. That’s why he’s turned against you English. That’s why he’s making eyes at the Japanese. And when he tells Hitler that you’ll never fight, that the Czechs are there for the taking, Hitler believes him. Why? Because it’s what he wants to believe. He thinks the French and the English have turned their backs on the Czechs. Somehow we have to change that.’

  ‘By convincing Hitler?’

  ‘By getting rid of him.’ At last a smile. ‘Don’t tell me you’re surprised.’

  Part Two

  15

  MAY–JULY 1938

  Tam Moncrieff returned to London from Paris. He spent two days in the Mayfair flat with Ballentyne and from time to time they were joined by others, all strangers to Tam, who were interested in specific elements of his report from Czechoslovakia. One of them was an American who appeared to be attached to the Embassy. He was disappointed that Tam hadn’t met Thomas Kreisky personally but confirmed the businessman’s interest in the Jáchymov uranium mine. When Tam asked him about Edvard Kovač he said he’d never heard of him. After he’d left, Ballentyne admitted this might be somewhat wide of the truth but when Tam pressed him about Edvard’s whereabouts he simply shrugged. If Schultz said the man was still alive, then so be it. Lucky Edvard.

  At the end of the second day Tam was alone in the flat when Ballentyne arrived. Tam heard him humming a piece of light opera as he let himself in. Schultz, he said, had been in touch from Berlin. The good news was that he’d enjoyed the meal he’d shared with Tam at the Paris hotel and was happy to discuss the possibility of further meetings. Reports from his contacts in the Sudentenland suggested that Tam had done well to avoid the fate of Renata. The ex-Marine certainly knew how to handle himself. He was resourceful. He could think on his feet. More to the point, he spoke German like a native and appeared to be undaunted in his new role.

  Tam listened to the string of compliments from Schultz without comment. This was like being at school, he thought. He’d just sat some kind of exam and this was the verdict. Ballentyne’s own congratulations were more than welcome but simply added to the mystery. Was his role over? Or was there something else these people wanted him to do?

  He put the question to Ballentyne. Tam had been in touch with both his sister and with the housekeeper up in Scotland. There were pressing reasons why he needed to step back into his former life. His father’s move to London wasn’t going well, and neither were the bookings at The Glebe House. On both counts, something needed to be done.

  Ballentyne was sympathetic but Tam sensed at once that his days as an apprentice spy were far from over. Schultz’s approval appeared to be the key to whatever might happen next. Tam had indeed passed an important test and Ballentyne’s assumption, for which he was careful to apolog
ise, was that Tam might have an appetite for more.

  ‘But what does more mean? More what?’

  ‘More operational engagement. In the field.’

  ‘That means nothing to me. So far I’ve done your bidding. To be frank, a lot of it was far from pleasant and what makes it worse is that I’ve no idea where I fit, no real notion of who you people are. The need for secrecy I understand. But if operational engagement means what I think it means, then you have to start to trust me. Does that sound reasonable?’

  Tam’s bluntness made no visible impression on Ballentyne. On the contrary, he seemed to be expecting it.

  ‘We’re the orphan child in the world of Intelligence,’ he said. ‘If you ask yourself what might happen if certain people are at their wit’s end with this government of ours, then you might end up with an outfit like ours.’

  ‘Are you official?’

  ‘We are. Most of the time. Oliver is a businessman. He made a fortune in Malaya and he still attends to his interests there but unlike most businessmen he sees a great deal further than his balance sheet. He knows trouble’s coming and he wants to head it off. Just now he’s in Singapore. He worries about the German tie-up with the Japs and so he should. Me? I work in Whitehall. If you’re going to press me for details I’m afraid I’ll have to regretfully decline but you wouldn’t be wrong to suspect that I, along with a number of other like-minded players in this game, would like to see an end to Mr Hitler.’

  ‘Is that why you sent me to meet Schultz?’

  ‘Yes. We’ve known about him for a while. We’re impressed by what we’ve heard about the man. And now, thanks to you, we find we share a common interest.’

  ‘In getting rid of Hitler?’

  ‘Indeed. Diplomacy’s hopeless and Schultz knows it. Only a bullet will do.’

  Tam nodded. He’d worked much of this out for himself in the days and nights since leaving Schultz at his hotel but it was somehow different hearing it from Ballentyne’s lips.

  ‘And you’re telling me we’re going along with this? Assuming it happens?’

  ‘Quietly, yes.’

  ‘So it’s official government policy? Having a hand in the murder of a head of state?’

  ‘God forbid. Oliver and I and a number of other folk are simply there to chuck a log or two on the fire. And even that, we’d deny.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘About the denial?’

  ‘About the logs. Why does Schultz need you?’

  ‘Because he and his colleagues need to be certain that Hitler is leading them to disaster. And to make that credible they have to believe that we will fight.’

  ‘For Czechoslovakia?’

  ‘Of course. The current little upset is only a prelude. In the end Hitler will march. Regardless of whatever threats we make. The man himself believes our threats are empty. This is the world of bluff and counter-bluff – our world, if you want the truth. So our job is to persuade the likes of Mr Schultz that we mean to stand by our treaty with the French. That would take us to war. And that’s the threat that will push Schultz and his friends to attend to Mr Hitler.’

  ‘Friends?’

  ‘Top generals. People in the Abwehr. Businessmen. The old Germany, if you like.’

  ‘This is fact? Not wishful thinking?’

  ‘Fact, Tam. We know about these people. So far their minds aren’t made up and by mobilising just now the Czechs have let them off the hook. But the thing to remember is that these men, these generals, these intelligence chiefs, see themselves as patriots. They’d love to help themselves to Czechoslovakia. They’d love to own the entire bloody world. But not at the cost of a war they’re convinced they’d lose.’

  ‘In the short term?’

  ‘Of course. One day, in their judgement, they’ll be ready. But not now. And not in a couple of months when Hitler will march again.’

  ‘Regardless?’

  ‘Indeed. That’s the one thing we can depend on. In fact, that’s the one thing that underpins this entire little operation of ours. Hitler is a glutton. He eats countries for breakfast. The marching season ends in October. The man can’t help himself.’

  ‘So he needs to be stopped.’

  ‘That would be extremely helpful.’

  ‘By Schultz and his friends?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘With our help?’

  ‘I’m afraid so.’ Ballentyne offered a thin smile. ‘Or yours, to be precise.’

  *

  Tam spent the night at his sister’s house in Belgravia, trying not to think too hard about the implications of his conversation with Ballentyne. On the phone from the Mayfair flat he’d had the impression that Vanessa had tucked his father away in the basement but it turned out that she and her husband had taken a joint decision to parcel him up and lodge him in a nursing home north of King’s Cross. Having him on the premises, she said, had proved both tiresome and distressing. He hadn’t got a clue who she was and appeared to believe that Alec had once played cricket for the Australians. Far better, under these circumstances, to leave him in the care of people who knew what they were doing.

  That night, Tam ate at the kitchen table with his sister and her husband. Conversation was fitful and revolved around what Alec termed ‘the happy resolution of the Sudeten nonsense’. Close friends of theirs, one a Tory MP, the other a journalist on The Times, commended Mr Chamberlain and his government for keeping their nerve, and looked forward to the day when Hitler’s manners would improve. Neighbours, said Vanessa, had started to stockpile food in the belief that war was imminent but she viewed this reaction as unseemly. The fact that neither his sister nor Alec made any effort to ask Tam what he’d been up to over the last couple of weeks, came as a profound relief. Only Vanessa’s choice of reading matter, left casually on the coverlet of his bed, offered any evidence that she’d even remembered their conversation before he’d left. Erskine Childers. The Riddle of the Sands.

  *

  Next morning Tam took a bus to King’s Cross railway station. He booked himself a ticket on the night sleeper through to Aberdeen and then returned to the street. His father’s nursing home was a five-minute walk away. It stood at the end of a rundown Georgian terrace beside a church but inside it was both clean and well appointed. It was also on the small side, which came as a bit of a relief. Half a dozen patients, all old, all male, were under the care of two women who’d spent most of their lives as missionaries in equatorial Africa.

  One of them, who termed herself the Matron, sat Tam down with a cup of tea and a plate of rock buns still warm from the oven. Mr Moncrieff, she admitted, could be a challenge on occasions but he’d settled in well and had made best friends with a parson from Rotherhithe. Their games of chess, she said, could last for over a week and no move from either party appeared to comply with any of the known rules. Tam spent most of the afternoon beside these two men as they peered down at the five remaining pieces on the chessboard, and on three occasions his father lifted his head to enquire whether Tam had come to deal with the new gas boiler.

  Before he left, gone seven in the evening, Tam escorted the old man to his room. In contrast with downstairs it was sparsely furnished, with few of the keepsakes that Tam had been careful to leave with his sister, but his father seemed happy enough. The tall window faced west. The view was dominated by a cemetery, a maze of crooked headstones, and when the clouds parted to reveal the beginnings of an impressive sunset, Tam thought he detected just a glimmer of recognition in his father’s rheumy eyes when the old man glanced across at him. His nose was running and Tam lent him his handkerchief.

  ‘Take care of that cold, Dad.’ He bent to kiss him lightly on his forehead. ‘I’ll be back.’

  Downstairs, before he left to find a restaurant, Tam paused to say goodbye to the Matron. She’d just emerged from a room at the back of the entrance hall and she smelled of bleach. She escorted Tam to the door and then suddenly asked him to wait while she fetched something. Moments later
she was back with an envelope.

  ‘Take your time.’ She nodded at the envelope. ‘There’s no hurry.’

  *

  It was an hour or so before Tam opened the envelope. He’d found a decent hotel near the station and settled down with a copy of the Daily Telegraph to await the arrival of the food. A report on the front page confirmed that Czech President Beneš had ordered the bulk of his army back to barracks. The crisis, it seemed, was over. Tam sat in the hotel’s restaurant, wondering what the people in this teeming city had made of the last few weeks. Unpronounceable names. Unfathomable political groupings. A hotchpotch of strangers bent on doing each other immeasurable harm. Did any of it matter? Was there any real possibility that this faraway quarrel would come to a proper war?

  Tam permitted himself the faintest smile, knowing now that the answer was yes, then he reached for the envelope. Inside was an account for the first month of his father’s stay. Four pounds ten shillings and sixpence was a sum he couldn’t possibly afford. He gazed at the bill for a moment longer. Then he folded it into his pocket.

  *

  Over the weeks that followed, back at The Glebe House, Tam buried himself in tasks that needed addressing before he could think of opening the shoot again. Parts of the garden were a wilderness. Fencing needed attention. Long days of hard physical labour brightened his mood and gradually memories of the Sudetenland, of Renata and Edvard, began to recede. By the end of June The Glebe House was finally ready to accept more shooting parties when a letter arrived from his father’s nursing home.

  Tam opened it in some trepidation. By raiding a fund set by for estate emergencies, he’d managed to settle the first bill but he’d still no idea how to keep meeting sums as large as he knew he should expect. This problem had been compounded by a brief phone call with the Matron. His father, she said, was beginning to deteriorate physically. While he was still at peace with himself and his surroundings, he was having gastric and urinary problems and required a great deal of attention. This was bad news. Over the recent days Tam had toyed with getting his dad back to Scotland but under these circumstances he knew the move would be impossible. The Glebe House was a business, not a hospital.