The Spider of Sarajevo

by Robert Wilton

  ‘Well, it’s your field, old chap. And your neck of the woods.’

  ‘Thanks. Thing is, one of his pet theories, based on the most dubious racial anthropology – Gobineau, Blavatsky – really the’ – he saw Knox’s impatience – ‘the theory is that Muslims and Germans are natural allies. And, therefore and conveniently, that German dominance in the Near East should be welcomed by the inhabitants.’

  ‘And he’s been in Albania.’

  ‘Makes one think.’

  ‘Mm.’ Knox took in a deep breath, and flicked at the reins. ‘But not too much, eh?’

  There was sporadic life in the city – an open shop, a house with washed linen hanging from the windows, a huddle of men in conversation – apparently oblivious to the possibility of rebels being in the city within hours, or perhaps happy. Then cobbled streets again, and the villas. The German Legation, pink and squat, was closed up. There were lights on in the British, and the Union flag still flew, but they rode on past before dismounting.

  ‘Try the Austrians first, I think,’ Ballentyne said, ‘and then—’

  He stopped, and Knox said ‘Hallo…’ Ahead, protruding from the side street where they’d twice seen it before, was the nose of a motor car.

  They strode over to it, no thought of concealment, and Knox put his hand against the bonnet. ‘Warm. Just got here.’

  A shout, and they looked round. From a doorway a man – Albanian clothes but with leather gloves, and goggles around his neck – gestured them away from the car. ‘Where’s your friend?’ Ballentyne asked in Albanian. A shrug, again the gesture, and the man turned away into the shack.

  ‘There!’ Knox pointed up the side street. Fifty yards away a back was disappearing into a doorway, something in the sash tucked against the spine, and Ballentyne was striding towards it. Knox came alongside him. ‘Legation’s t’other way. We haven’t—’

  ‘I’ve an idea. Perhaps more credible than me just bleating to Rossi and appealing to his good nature.’ He stopped. ‘We don’t know if that’s a meeting place or a café, do we? Even a – Anyway. D’you have that hat with you?’

  ‘No, Ballentyne, I don’t have that hat.’

  ‘Have to buy one off… Got your pistol, though?’ A nod. ‘Well, come along, then.’ And they continued up the cobbles, close to the wall, boots stepping carefully through the weeds and slime of the verge.

  Twenty minutes later: a murmuring, the animal sounds of men chuckling and playing at affection, a purse passed, a back slapped; a set of moustaches walked into the afternoon. He checked instinctively the pistol tucked into his sash, snug against his spine, and turned his face to the centre of town and the sea rising over the roofs. The car was ahead, and his destination just beyond it.

  An alley blinked beside him and passed behind. The memory of movement, steps, something sharp against his back. ‘Don’t turn!’ hissed at him in his own language. Somehow the suggestion of two men, a glimpse of a face, dusty-dark and hatted, his own pistol pulled out of the sash. A puff of smoke, and a voice distorted by a cigarette. ‘You don’t know me, my friend.’ Breathe. If I am to die, I would be dead. Then more words, murmured, earnest, and his eyes widened.

  Silence. A sharp prod against his spine and he flinched, feared. But it was his pistol returning to its accustomed nest. ‘Don’t look back. Don’t remember me. Now go safe, my friend.’ A slap on his shoulder, then nothing. Had they vanished? The world of the shadows. The risks, the routines. He started to walk forwards, shoulders tensed, but they felt nothing and he began to walk more freely. He did not look back, and his stride quickened as he came closer to the foreign legations.

  In the alley, Knox said, ‘What did you tell him?’

  ‘That I was a friend – from the village where I first saw him a couple of days back – and I’d just seen him coincidentally. That there’d been other visitors to the village.’ Ballentyne pulled off the hat and pushed it at Knox. ‘Thanks; a shilling well spent. That I’d just heard that the Austrians were taking the opportunity of today’s chaos to put a detachment of marines ashore and pick their own stooge to negotiate with the rebels and take power. Warning him to trim his sails.’

  ‘That should shake up the Italians a bit.’

  ‘We hope.’

  Knox looked at the crumpled felt in his hands. ‘Now I’ve got two of these damned hats.’

  The Sub-Committee of the Committee for Imperial Defence:

  ‘The foreign sec. is livid.’

  ‘Grey livid? That must be worth seeing.’

  ‘Not as funny for those of us in the room, old chap.’

  ‘Quite. I had a Latin teacher used to look at me that way. Seems the foreign sec. saves the nature-loving for the weekends.’

  ‘He was windy enough about having secret conversations with Russia. Now the German press have got hold of them and it’s proved his point. He’s livid about the leak, and self-righteous about the inadvisability of conducting them in the first place. Not a pretty sight.’

  The old man, listening, thought of yet another calculated damaging leak; thought of three men; perhaps two men.

  ‘He’ll get over it, surely. Sort of serves as a warning to Germany, don’t it?’

  A sucking of teeth. ‘The foreign sec. has a point. Parliament’ll be up in arms about secret diplomacy with the Russians at the same time as they’re playing silly asses in Persia. The Germans will be more fired up than ever about encirclement. And the Russians will cry foul because they’ll suspect we’re trying to wriggle out. We’re three ways weakened.’

  ‘Gentlemen, now that we’re all here perhaps we can get started.’ A scraping of chairs; a straightening of papers. ‘You’ve all seen the appreciation of the Turkey situation circulated by the FO. The India Office take this very seriously. They’re insistent that Turkey must be kept out of the war at all costs, otherwise we risk losing every Muslim subject in the empire.’

  ‘The foreign sec. makes the same point.’

  ‘Same from the War Office: Kitchener himself.’

  ‘Kitchener? Ah, was it necessary to—’

  ‘I should report, Chairman, that Sir Louis Mallet at Constantinople has been instructed to give a clear message to the Sublime Porte: in their neutrality is their security as an empire; but should they weigh in, there would be no limit to the territorial losses that they might suffer.’

  ‘Short and sw—’

  The knock, rare, rang loud across the room. All turned.

  The door opened, and a young official slipped in. A deferential nod to the chairman, and then he was bending over the ear of one of the men seated around the hollow square.

  A frown of inconvenience from the man, then his face opened, paled, and he turned to look at the messenger. A nod only, and the man turned back to the room.

  ‘Gentlemen, I regret to have to report – and, ah, various of you will be aware of the different implications of the news – that young Gustav Hamel is, ah… well, he’s dead. His flying machine crashed into the Channel.’

  Noises of regret from around the table. On three faces, the expressions were grimmer. Shock. Anger. Wonder.

  The face of the old man: stone; cold; far-off.

  The document sent by the unknown J. R. stayed on Cade’s desk, unconsidered, until Ali announced a late afternoon visitor, and Cade said to send him up and filled the ensuing ten seconds by flicking at the pages. He flicked at them with indifference, then surprise, and then interest. Russian shipments… To—

  ‘You are Cade.’

  He took against the man from the start, from his tone alone; took against him without even seeing him.

  He finished scanning the last page. Russian supplies to her representatives in Persia. Then he looked up.

  The man standing on the centre of the rug was local, by the look of him. Taller than the average; a heavy build that was turning to fat at neck and gut; large-lipped, large-nosed and large-eyed; improbably, the combination was handsome, in a decadent sort of way.

  ‘
You’re absolutely right,’ Cade said. He stood; slowly.

  His visitor seemed to have taken against him already too. ‘I am Muhtar.’

  ‘I’m delighted to meet you, Mr Muhtar. Won’t you sit, please?’

  ‘I choose to stand.’

  ‘Righto. I’ll sit, if that’s all right. I paid dear for these chairs; like to make the most of them.’

  ‘You know who I am, presumably.’

  ‘I know the name Muhtar; banking and… mainly insurance, isn’t it?’

  ‘It is. I am here on the subject of your association with Mrs Ani Charkassian.’

  Cade sat up straighter. ‘Oh, aye? Are you indeed?’

  ‘I wish to discuss it.’

  ‘You’ll find it a pretty one-sided discussion.’

  ‘The association is of concern to me.’

  ‘The association, as you call it, is none of your damned business.’

  ‘Mr Cade, we are discussing a lady; one who deserves to have her interests protected.’

  ‘We are certainly not discussing her, sir.’

  ‘Your association with Mrs Charkassian, whether it is innocent or whether it is not innocent, could be misinterpreted.’ Muhtar leaned forwards, and smiled in what he presumably thought was encouragement. ‘That is why it were better that you ended it.’

  ‘That I what?’

  ‘You do not know our ways, Mr Cade. If you… respect the lady as you seem to, you will understand that she should be left to associate within the domestic community here. Among those to whom she is more naturally suited. A rash association with a foreigner…’

  Now Cade stood. Muhtar watched him come.

  ‘I’ll say it once, Muhtar, and I’ll say it good and clear. I decide with whom I “associate”. Mrs Charkassian, presumably, can decide with whom she associates. You don’t come into either calculation.’ He held out his hand. ‘Good day.’

  Muhtar breathed him in, and didn’t seem to like it. ‘You’re a foreigner here, Cade. Another fortune-hunter come to take the maximum of advantage for the minimum of responsibility. Just another tourist in the Orient, seeking souvenirs and trophies.’

  The outstretched hand became a pointing finger. ‘Good day.’

  ‘If you won’t take it as advice, you must take it as warning.’

  ‘Get out.’

  Now Muhtar got out.

  Cade stared after him for half a minute, feeling his blood settle, waiting for anger to turn to calculation.

  He found he’d picked up the pages from J. R. again. The Russians had representatives in Persia; they were a well-known source of anger for the British there. The document showed a recent shipment of supplies to those representatives. Written in English, which meant it had to be some kind of manifest that would be going through non-Russian officials. No doubt a useful indication to London of the Russian strength and posture.

  His attention wouldn’t stick. Damn the man.

  The Sub-Committee of the Committee for Imperial Defence:

  ‘One very unpromising sign that I should report’ – the heads shifted round – ‘acting on, ah, information received’ – he couldn’t stop himself glancing at the old man, but the old man was lost in a paper and the glance went unregistered around the table – ‘we’ve been checking up on German foreign exchange transactions.’ Frowns, on faces that understood the power of a battleship or a spy, but not the insidious workings of international finance; hardly the sort of thing for the Sub-Committee, surely. ‘The Germans…’ – a pause for effect – ‘are calling in gold.’

  There wasn’t much effect. A few pens wrote down ‘Germans calling in gold’, glancing at neighbours to check they’d got the phrase right; check with the office what it meant later. Why the hell were the Treasury even on the Sub-Committee, anyway?

  ‘Ah… if you could give us… a little more specificity, Dalton.’

  ‘Of course, Secretary. Like any other country of economic significance – like us, indeed – Germany has gold reserves deposited in selected banks around the world, for convenience of her trading and her national expenditures, against which she holds sums of the local currencies. Now it seems that the relevant offices in Berlin are calling it all in, converting everything back into gold, to be held locally or back in Berlin. Once we knew to look out for it, we’ve logged dozens of transactions.’

  ‘And the… the implications of this, Dalton?’

  ‘It’s the act of a country that doesn’t expect to be able to trade normally for much longer, but which still needs to buy essential supplies from other countries. It’s the act of a country preparing for war.’

  Leaning forwards, nodding, grunting. They understood that bit.

  ‘Flora, offer me a fantasy.’ They were walking in the grounds, and the formality of the words and the unfamiliar prettinesses of the setting – the freshness of the green, the sound of running water, the peaks on the horizon – made the moment theatrical. ‘I’d like you to tell me that when the war comes we will still be friends.’

  Hathaway pulled her cape tighter around herself. ‘Everyone says “when the war comes”. I met a woman a couple of weeks ago: Bertha von Sutter, the Austrian; very remarkable. She said “to speak it is to will it”. When even someone like you takes it for granted, what—’

  ‘We’ve not talked about it because we’re too polite.’ When unhappy, Gerta could look very girlish. ‘And because we don’t want to think that there could be a difference between us.’ Hathaway nodded. ‘I think that is not typical of you. You say you are always too honest.’

  ‘But you want to dream still. You don’t want the honest answer about how we will feel if our countries are fighting. We both have brothers, don’t we? We know what that means.’ Hathaway felt herself chewing her lip. ‘My friendship with you – intelligent, equal, civilized – is the most special gift I have received in a long time. But if war comes, I will think the war stupid and curse the politicians and generals and worry about you and your father, and then I will watch Tim marching away and I will love him and want him to kill Germans.’

  Gerta turned away and walked on. ‘You are ruthless!’ she said, without looking back.

  Hathaway strode after her, stretching her thighs and hearing the path crunching under her boots. ‘Gerta, this honesty is precious to me,’ she said as she caught up, surprised by her vehemence. ‘All of my life I – I compromise in every relationship; every conversation. When I don’t, they look at me as a freak; an unnatural woman. To be honest and yet be respected – liked – this is rare, and… and precious.’

  Gerta nodded as she walked, still not turning.

  ‘I’ve had dreams of better worlds,’ Hathaway went on. ‘And I’ve shouted and argued for them. And still I find myself in this one. In it, I am told that there will be war, told by people who have more power than me to control it. The men I’ve met in Germany these last weeks – they’re no different from the men in England. Same conversation. Same weaknesses; same needs. What you feel when you endure those evenings over dinner – the boredom, the futility, the… the distance, the feeling that you’re acting in a play but you haven’t been given any lines – you’d feel it in England too.’

  Gerta was watching her, considering her, and nodded again. ‘And when the war comes…’

  Hathaway took a deep breath, feeling the cold in her nostrils. ‘I shall knit socks for soldiers. Or escape to Switzerland.’ She slowed, and then recovered her pace. ‘I shall be glad I don’t have sons. Be glad that Ralph is dead.’

  Gerta put a hand on her arm, squeezed; smiled. ‘Those intentions are all passive, aren’t they?’

  ‘Except the socks. I’ll make damned good socks.’ Their laughter sounded subdued, world-wise. ‘When I was in Paris everyone was talking about a woman who’d shot a newspaper editor. I think the trial was still going on. She did it to save her husband’s honour, somehow; the sort of nonsense August Niemann would appreciate. But the idea – taking a gun, taking control – the kind of… of ruthlessness’ –
she glanced at Gerta – ‘ruthlessness of calculation; I liked the sound of that.’

  ‘Perhaps we should both have been French. Charlotte Corday.’

  ‘Ah, my childhood heroine. But in the end she was just another part of the chaos. That’s the problem with the movement in Britain: too many of the women think they want to be men. I want to be a woman, without restraint; to be me.’

  ‘And it is a restraint that I am German and you are English.’ Gerta stopped, glanced around the landscape, took in a breath. ‘In the war, we shall both know of the possibility of a friendship with a woman on the other side of that restraint. Perhaps that will have to be enough.’

  By nightfall on the 23rd of May, King Wilhelm was back in his palace in Durrës, and Ronald Ballentyne had booked a bunk on a Greek steamer for his journey north up the coast to Split the next day. After breakfast, Knox walked with him to the quay to see him off. It was a warm morning, the sky clear over the sea, as if trying to compensate for the previous day’s political tumult. Out in the bay, among the fishing boats and merchant tramps, a yacht was skimming over the waves. The clarity of her colours, white sails and polished hull sharp against the misty warships beyond, a swan sleek among the crows, was beauty.

  The Poseidon was not. Ballentyne’s transport was a fifty-foot steamer, rusty and ill-maintained. As he stepped onto her, exchanging his few words of Greek with her captain, even his limited experience as a leisure sailor was enough to notice the greasy deck timbers, the clutter, the splaying and unmatched ropes.

  Knox, discreet against a lamppost and occasionally glancing at a sentry slumped against a wall with rifle propped against his shoulder, was not the only man watching Ballentyne’s departure. Fifty yards farther along the quay, obscured inside a café entrance, a man lowered a pair of field glasses. A private smile, as the steamer’s engine growled and the water behind it churned whiter.

  From a similar distance beyond him, the man with field glasses was himself being watched, by a young man in the clothes of a villager.