by Sapper
“I’ve had a little chat since I left you, Ronald,” he said. “With a stranger of kindly disposition.”
Standish listened in silence, though his face became more and more grave.
“It’s not the threat of death that I mind,” he said when Drummond had finished. “We’re used to that. It’s the infernal quickness of their information bureau.”
“Have you got that letter off to the Chief?”
“Yes. But I’ll send along a postscript about this. In any event one thing is now absolutely proved. Jimmy was murdered.”
“That’s so.” Drummond glanced at his watch. “What about this lunch?”
“I’m still for going. It won’t compromise Madame Pélain more than she is compromised already, and the whole thing is so incredibly obscure that any chance of a ray of light ought not to be missed. But we’d better watch our step with the gentleman.”
“You bet your life,” said Drummond. “Let’s get the bus.”
They walked in silence through the drifting crowd of loiterers, each busy with his own thoughts.
It was a perfect Riviera day, and the sun had brought the antiques from their lairs in droves. Vendors of tinted spectacles proffered their wares hopefully: it seemed impossible that there could be anything dark and sinister under the surface.
And when they brought the car round to the hotel to find Madame Pélain waiting for them, completely surrounded by the knitting brigade, it seemed more impossible still. Nothing more nerve-shattering than a dropped stitch could ever happen in such an atmosphere.
She seemed in no way surprised when Drummond told her of his encounter in the Casino. But her reaction to it was very definite.
“It is what you must both do, my friends. I have been thinking things over since I saw you. When you leave Cannes you must vanish into thin air. If, as we think, big things are afoot, you must become the hunters and not the hunted. It is they who must be in ignorance of where you are going to strike: not the other way round, as it is at the moment.”
“There is a lot in what you say, Madame,” said Standish. “And my own inclination would be to get away at once. The trouble is the police formalities over last night.”
“I think,” she said, “that I can probably arrange matters over that. For I, too, have come to the conclusion that Cannes is not the only place in the world. And if I announce my intention of not pressing the charge against the wretched man, there should not be much bother.”
She smiled slightly.
“Our police are very amenable at times.”
“I am glad you have decided that,” remarked Drummond. “We shall both feel easier in our minds. And even though I think that as soon as we have gone you will be safe, don’t relax your guard, Madame. I am beginning to have a very healthy respect for these gentlemen, whoever they may be.”
They swung into the Promenade des Anglais and a few minutes later pulled up outside the Negresco.
“Now let us see if we are in luck,” she said, as they entered the hotel. “We are; the man himself.”
A tall, hatchet-faced man was standing by the concierge’s desk glancing through a bundle of letters. On one cheek was the scar of an old wound, and his hands were the hands of a man on whose face such a mark would cause no surprise. His hair was greying: his age, the early fifties. And both Drummond and Standish, than whom no better judges of a man existed, metaphorically put their thumbs up.
“Good morning, Humphrey.”
With a start he looked up.
“Marie!” he cried, and bending over kissed her hand – an action which only one Englishman in a hundred can do without looking a fool. “This is delightful. You will join me in an aperitif?”
“Humphrey, I want you to meet two friends of mine – Captain Drummond and Mr Standish.”
“Delighted. Let us become further acquainted in the bar. My mail seems more unbelievably dull than usual. And now” – when they were settled in a corner – “tell me what fortunate chance has brought you here?”
“Easily told,” she laughed. “The fact that Captain Drummond couldn’t sleep last night.”
“I fear I may seem dense,” he said with a smile, “but I think you must admit that your remark requires a little elucidation.”
He listened in silence, and when she had finished, he lit a cigarette thoughtfully.
“I congratulate you, Captain Drummond,” he said at length. “Though you hardly look the sort of bloke with whom congratulations cut much ice. What a very remarkable story!”
“Can you throw any light on the darkness, Humphrey?” And then she gave a sudden exclamation. “Look, Captain Drummond,” she whispered. “Just coming into the bar now. Madame Pilofsky.”
Drummond glanced up, and as quickly looked away again.
“Pilofsky,” he muttered. “Ronald, it’s Madame Tomesco.”
“Pilofsky!” drawled Humphrey Gasdon, as she went back into the hall. “Tomesco! A rose by any name, etc. What seems more to the point, however, than the name, is the rose itself.”
“Do you know the lady?” asked Drummond.
“By sight – well.”
“Who is she?”
“The mistress of one of the most dangerous men in Europe – Menalin.”
“Good God!” cried Standish. “The Russian financier.”
“Is he Russian? Who knows? He is cosmopolitan. He knows no country: he cares for no country. He cares for nothing in this world save himself. And he is mad.”
“Mad!” echoed Standish.
“Not in the sense of a man who thinks he is a poached egg and calls for toast to sit down on. But in an infinitely more dangerous way. He is the world’s supreme megalomaniac, and the main driving passion of his life is his hatred of Britain and things British – a sentiment which he does not share alone.”
“Now, Humphrey.” Madame Pélain shook an admonitory finger at him.
“It’s no good doing that, Marie. I know you think I’ve got a bee in my bonnet over it, but I know also that you know I’m right.”
“You think as a nation we are disliked?” said Standish.
“My dear sir, we always have been. But in days gone by we were, at any rate, feared and respected. Now we are neither. How the devil can we expect to be when our armed strength might just cope with a three years’ defensive war against Guatemala?”
“A slight exaggeration,” smiled Standish.
“But with a very nasty element of truth in it. To me, living abroad, the thing is simply unbelievable as it is to every intelligent foreigner. Quem Deus vult perdere, prius dementat. One or two men at home have the courage to proclaim the truth; but the vast majority don’t care.”
“You’ve got the League of Nations, Humphrey,” said Madame Pélain.
“League of Fiddlesticks, my dear,” he answered. “If that damned hot air factory was anything resembling what it set out to be originally, there would be something in what you say. But we’re not dealing with what might have been: we’re dealing with reality. And it is my considered opinion that as it stands the League of Nations is the greatest menace to peace that exists in the world today. It is the sand into which, ostrich-like, England has stuffed her great fat head, and believing it to be a safeguard against future war has proceeded to disarm. Sorry,” he continued with a short laugh, “but it makes me hot under the collar. Look, you people, on this picture and on that.”
From his pocket-book he extracted two cuttings.
“If I may, I will read them to you. Here is the first:
“BROADCAST TO SIX MILLION.
“Six million Hitler boys and girls listened to this new version of the creed broadcast by all German stations from Leipzig, where a harvest festival of the Hitler Youth Organisation was celebrated (reported Reuter yesterday):
“‘I believe in the community of all Germans, in a life of service to this community: I believe in the revelation of the God-given creative force, in pure blood shed in war and peace by the sons of the community of the German people buried in the earth, hallowed by it, resurrected and living in all for whom the sacrifice was made.
“‘I believe in an eternal life of this shed and resurrected blood on earth in all who acknowledge the means of this sacrifice and are prepared to bow themselves down. Therefore, I believe in an eternal God, in an eternal Germany, and in an eternal life.’
“And here is the other:
“BISHOP CONDEMNS PACIFISTS.
“The Bishop of Sussex strongly disapproves of the Oxford Union’s decision that ‘in no circumstances will its members fight for King and country.’
“More power to his Grace’s elbow! But does he really imagine his disapproval will make ’em fight? Not on your life. They’ll be lining the streets hopefully throwing red, red flowers at the great, blond, fascinating brutes as they march in.”
He replaced the two cuttings in his pocket.
“Comment is unnecessary. You may not like the first, but, by Heaven above, it doesn’t produce a strong desire to vomit like the second.”
“Mr Gasdon,” said Standish, who had been whispering to Drummond, “it seems fairly obvious that you are, so to speak, one of the boys. And so with Drummond’s approval, I am going to take you fully into our confidence. Madame Pélain has not told you everything. So if you can spare half an hour I would like to put you wise. Only I must have your word that you won’t pass it on.”
“You have it,” said Gasdon briefly.
He listened with half-closed eyes as Standish told him the whole story, omitting nothing. And on its conclusion he lay back in his chair.
“How extraordinarily interesting,” he remarked. “Let us get one or two things straight. It is, of course, obvious that the Madame Pilofsky of Chez Paquay would recognise you, Marie. What about the Madame Tomesco of the Golden Boot? Would she recognise you, Captain Drummond?”
“Hard to say,” said Drummond. “She had no cause to look at me that night, and my back was towards her. But I wouldn’t bank on it.”
“And this Charles Burton. Is he a dark swarthy man?”
“The very reverse.”
“Then he can’t be Menalin under an assumed name. But since he was in the company of Menalin’s mistress, it seems probable the two men know each other. And that throws a pretty sinister light on Mr Charles Burton. Surely our police – for, whatever I may have said about our country as a whole, they are still the finest in the world – surely, they can get a line on him.”
“Don’t forget,” said Standish, “that it was only on Jimmy Latimer’s death that the gentleman came into the limelight at all. And, but for Colonel Talbot’s long shot, he wouldn’t have done so even then.”
“That’s true,” agreed Gasdon.
“And now that we know, from what you’ve told us, that he wants watching, he will certainly be watched.”
“You say, Marie, that Major Latimer was greatly excited by the contents of the papers,” said Gasdon.
“Very excited indeed. Gigantic; incredible; those were the words he used.”
“And he was a man on whose judgment you would rely?”
“Emphatically,” said Standish.
“I wonder if it’s possible that they’re going to have a dip at us before our so-called rearmament takes place.”
“Who?” cried Standish.
Gasdon shrugged his shoulders.
“France hates us, and only the fact that she is terrified of Germany prevents her showing it. Italy frankly detests us, and small blame to her. Germany is an armed camp. Russia – well, Russia is a problem.”
“Not the Communist bogey, surely,” said Drummond.
“Are you quite sure it is such a bogey?” asked Gasdon quietly. “What about France recently, and Belgium? And Spain? They’re fanatics, you know, and fanatics are dangerous men. Moreover they’ve always looked on us and our empire as the principal stronghold of all that they’re up against.”
“Jimmy said, given the organisation, it is possible,” said Madame Pélain. “And the will to carry it through.”
“Both could come from Menalin,” remarked Gasdon. “Mark you, I don’t say I’m right, but clearly it is something very much out of the ordinary, and Menalin is mixed up in it. And since Latimer was hurrying home it seems probable that England is involved.”
“The idea seems almost fantastic,” said Standish thoughtfully.
Gasdon gave a short laugh.
“Why? Fantastic perhaps when judged by the standards of even ten years ago. But is it fantastic now? We’ve got the biggest orchard in the world to rob, and one of the smallest forces to defend it with. We should, of course, regard it as a distinctly caddish action on the aggressor’s part, and in the intervals of talking about the old school tie we should ask Honduras to apply sanctions. Damn it, man! When will our people begin to understand that because we don’t want to go to war with anyone, having got all we want already, it doesn’t follow that other nations feel the same about us. Lead me to alcohol; I get heated.”
He beckoned to a waiter.
“What are those immortal lines of Sir William Watson?” he continued.
“Time and the ocean, and some fostering star,
In high cabal have made us what we are.
“Would he – could he – have written that today? At the present moment our fostering star is ‘the voice that breathed o’er Eden’: the ocean is as much use as a sick headache compared with the air, and in the next war we shan’t have any time. However, I’ve been talking out of my turn. A desire for food is upon me. You will, I hope, all lunch with me, and we will forget such trifling matters in the joys of the chef’s excellent bouillabaisse.”
CHAPTER 5
Gloves Off
Throughout the meal they discussed the matter from every angle, and the more Drummond and Standish saw of Humphrey Gasdon the more did they like him. From casual remarks he made it was evident that he had travelled not only widely but intelligently. Moreover he knew people as well as places, which was what was wanted in their present investigation. And towards the end of lunch his audience was more than half converted.
“There are two main questions to be answered,” was his argument. “First – is it worthwhile? To that my answer is – yes, if it can be done rapidly; no, if it can’t. Another war, such as the last one, dragging on for four years, would be sheer madness. But will it drag on for four years? Will there be time for us laboriously to build up our fighting forces after it has begun? We have it on the authority of Ludendorff himself that next time there will be no declaration of war beforehand. Which brings us to the other main point. Is it possible to knock us out in the first few weeks? That obviously only the experts can answer. But one does not require to be an expert to see that if it is possible, it may be worthwhile trying.”
“Out-Vernes Jules Verne,” said Standish half to himself. “I wonder if you’re right, Gasdon.”
“Lord knows!” The other drained his fin champagne. “But I’m certainly coming over to England with you to see. That is if we ever get there,” he added with a laugh.
“As bad as that, you think?” said Drummond.
Gasdon nodded.
“It is clear from what happened to you, Marie, that the Reds are mixed up in it. Which means rather more over here than, at present, it does in England. There, up to date, they’ve stopped short of murder. Here it’s a common occurrence. And really it’s not surprising. When you remember that the casualty list for the first four years of the USSR was one million, eight hundred thousand dead, a few more thousand don’t cut much ice.”
“Is that really so?” cried Drummond.
�
�Certainly it is so. There it was the direct doing of the big men: here, as last night, it is an isolated job delegated by someone at the top to a local branch which obeys blindly. Do you remem-ber the case of that White general in Paris who was reputed to have disappeared? Disappear my foot! He was murdered in broad daylight. An ambulance drove up behind him as he was strolling along, and the man beside the driver shot him from point-blank range with a gun fitted with a silencer. Before anybody had realised what had happened they had thrown the body inside and were off. That’s how he disappeared. Another case I know of was that of the editor of a very anti-Red paper. He was reputed to have died of a heart attack when drinking an aperitif at his favourite café. He certainly had a heart attack, but it was brought on by having his drink poisoned. One man engaged him in conversation, his accomplice slipped the stuff into his glass. No, no, friends: do not, I beg of you, be under any delusions. As I say it has not got so far as that in England yet, but it is only a question of time. They’ve got all the necessary organisation there. And when you are dealing with a fanatic who is prepared to sacrifice his own life, if need be, provided he gets yours, and who, in addition, knows you while you don’t know him, the thing becomes a little difficult.”
Standish lit a cigarette: then, with his elbows on the table, he leaned forward.
“Let us work on the assumption, Gasdon, that you are right. What is to be our plan of campaign? First of all, who is on the marked list on our side? Drummond and I, naturally; Madame; and since we’ve lunched with you I’m afraid you must join the happy band.”
“Don’t let that give you indigestion,” said Gasdon with a grin.
“Is there anyone else?”
“Not over here,” said Drummond. “But in England there’s the Chief.”
“Right. Add him in. Now, exactly what do we want to do, and how do we propose to do it?”
“First part easy,” answered Drummond. “Get over to England.”
“And miss out Paris?”