The Spider of Sarajevo

by Robert Wilton

  One face was not looking forwards; it had happened to turn as the shutter had clicked, and it was only a blur.

  Krug’s finger stroked the face very softly; then he stopped, uncertain, as if the stroking might make the blurring worse.

  What game are we playing, old fox?

  ‘Herr Krug?’

  Krug’s head snapped up, for once off-balance.

  Hildebrandt was standing by the door; Krug glared at him, then sniffed. ‘Come, Count Paul; sit, have a cigarette.’

  Hildebrandt’s boots echoed over the parquet; the face alternated pale and shaded as he passed the tall windows; he sat, watchful.

  ‘You’re an active fellow, Hildebrandt; you probably hunt, don’t you?’ Hildebrandt didn’t reply; took a cigarette, tapped it, lit it; watched. ‘Too much boisterousness for me. Sometimes one waits for the fox to break cover; sometimes one must make one’s guess and ride at it. Do I have that right?’

  Hildebrandt shrugged. All intelligence work was metaphor; and he could spot a rhetorical question.

  ‘Europe is boiling. The British watch it with one eye. The other eye is worrying about Ireland, which is also boiling. The British have their spies: these new offices, for counter-espionage and for foreign work. New structures, new energy, everyone running around.’ He touched the photo. ‘And somewhere, in the shadows…’ He was silent.

  ‘You mean the Comptrollerate-General?’ Hildebrandt had difficulty with the syllables.

  ‘And I’m not even sure who you are.’ It was addressed to the photograph; he looked up again, and the voice came with him. ‘Do you see the page of Chinese script in the frame over there?’ Hildebrandt glanced over his shoulder politely. ‘Merely an affectation of connoisseurship, you may think.’ He shook his head. ‘A reminder. They are very wise philosophers, the Chinese. Of all peoples, perhaps the most naturally gifted for espionage work. Next to them, Europeans – with their energies, their enthusiasms – are like… like little children. One of the greatest of those great philosophers teaches us about “doing by not doing”. You get it, Hildebrandt?’ Hildebrandt tried to look thoughtful. ‘I ask myself: what is the Comptroller-General for Scrutiny and Survey doing, by not doing anything?’

  The German shifted in his chair. ‘Perhaps he can’t do anything; perhaps he is superseded by these new departments.’ Krug tutted at this, waved a dismissive hand, shook his head. ‘These three agents, what they are doing is not very different—’

  ‘They are Comptrollerate-General agents!’ Krug’s fist hovered over the table; he caught himself, opened the hand flat, laid it soft on the papers. ‘You’re right. What they’re doing is nothing unusual – even that wonderful young woman. She could hardly have expected such an opportunity; an unforeseen side effect of her otherwise unremarkable tour through Germany. Yet they are each impressive in their way, and they are each the choice of that man…’

  Something began to warm in his face. Hildebrandt waited.

  ‘And it is the more likely that they have seen him.’ The voice was quiet, hungry. ‘Think of it, Hildebrandt. With the rest of the British apparatus busier, he is quieter. We see more of them; we see less of him. It is only by the brilliance of my network that I am even aware these agents are his. No grand machinery; no chain of command. It is surely more likely that they – some of them – have met him; or know something of him, at least.’ He was in the photograph. The eyes up again. ‘If I could talk to one of these people. If… If I could turn one! But which?’

  ‘Why choose?’

  Krug’s face opened in delight. ‘Hildebrandt!’ He waved a finger, mock-scold. ‘You surpass yourself.’ He scanned the desk. ‘Ronald Ballentyne, the hunted. James Cade, the embarrassed. Flora Hathaway, the vulnerable. We have these people where we want them. We shall… issue some invitations.’

  MOST SECRET S.I.B.

  Circulation list 8

  Periodic visit by ******* to the office of the Director of the German Imperial Railways (Ruhr Department) reports planned line expansion/redevelopment work Mannheim, Karlsruhe (S. District) and Trier, Koblenz, Aachen (Central District).

  Visit also reports new logistic assessment by General Staff. Each of G. Army’s 40 Corps will require railway transport as follows:

  Officers 70 cars

  Infantry 965 cars

  Cavalry 2,960 cars

  Artillery & Supply 1,915 cars

  total 140 trains + additional 140 trains for supplies.

  Report refers to companion report detailing provision of same, and planned deployment by route and time.

  [SS D/3/1/319]

  Osman Riza called on Cade a few days after he had contrived the disappearance of a body. The same as ever, as he sat upright in the guest chair: neat; careful. A bird considering a nut.

  ‘Dear friend, I come with an offer – a suggestion. And yet please to forgive me if I suggest that there is an element of… of obligation in the matter.’ Cade’s open face more watchful, the smile flatter. ‘And I’m sorry to raise that distasteful business at all, but… Well, you will of course recall the gentleman whose help I sought when… when…’

  ‘When we found a corpse on my carpet with his head blown in. Mr… Silvas.’

  Pained smile. ‘Quite so. Well, Mr Silvas has an interest in you.’

  Cade felt the kick of nausea. ‘Oh, aye?’ A deal gone south; your cheque cashed and a cargo of one-legged trews on the quayside.

  ‘As someone active in commerce in Constantinople himself, he had been aware of your work before – before the incident. Since then he has taken the trouble to learn more about the firm of Cade & Cade, and about your dealings here.’

  So where was the bite? I’d expected more from you, Riza.

  ‘He – he would like to meet you. He would like you to visit him.’

  Cade scowled. ‘And, ah, now that he has… information that could embarrass me, I should expect him to make certain demands. Money?’

  ‘Mr Cade, no! No, I am sure not.’ He seemed sincere, too. ‘I believe he wishes to explore the possibility of a business connection. Just an exploratory deal at the first – to see whether the two of you are suited.’

  Could it be this straight?

  ‘I’m always interested in a deal, you know that.’

  ‘Dear friend, I must be candid with you. This is a powerful man. More powerful, perhaps, than you are used to in your affairs. But a man of business nonetheless. It is…’ – Riza was wriggling for the words – ‘it is not a matter of embarrassment. But he does have now… he does have an expectation of you. That you would be… open-minded, in considering his offer. It would – it would not do, Mr Cade, to disappoint him.’ Riza leaned forwards. ‘I urge you to visit him.’

  Cade chewed on it. ‘He truly wants a business deal? As in, an arrangement beneficial to both parties?’

  ‘I believe it.’

  ‘Well enough.’ He didn’t like the sense of compulsion, but if the ground was level then a Cade would come out even at least. ‘I’m going to need a pile more information from you, my friend, about this fellow.’ Riza nodded cautiously. ‘Where is this to be? Here?’

  ‘No, Mr Cade. You are… invited… to Vienna.’

  ‘Your brother the Austrian is packing.’ It was a joke among the Albanians, who here too thought Ballentyne and Belcredi amusingly alike, two fair Anglo-Saxons of an age and build. Ballentyne didn’t find it funny.

  ‘Any idea where he’s going?’

  ‘Vienna, it seems. While he is here we will not lose him. But if you want to follow, you must be ready now.’ Ballentyne nodded, and stood. ‘He sent two telegrams.’ Two papers were handed over; Ballentyne didn’t ask how they’d been acquired.

  One was to the offices of the International Cultural Exchange in Sarajevo, informing the manager of when Belcredi would be arriving in Vienna. The second was longer.

  TO: HVE VIA ATHENESINSTITUT BERLIN.

  FROM: HPB MOSKVA HOTEL BELGRADE. OUR FRIENDS INSIST I TRAVEL VIENNA. FURTHER DISTRACTION
TO OUR WORK. EXPECT RETURN DAYS AND NEW PROGRESS IN FERTILE GROUND HERE. YOUR CAUSE AND YOUR SUPPORT NEAREST MY HEART.

  [SS X/72/N/3 (COPY, TRANSLATED)]

  Ballentyne shook his head at it, and pushed the message into his pocket. He held up the first. ‘Why tell Sarajevo when you arrive in Vienna?’ It was addressed to the paper. He looked up. ‘If he arrives in Vienna at 6 p.m., when does his train leave?’

  ‘One hour.’

  ‘I need a smart lad with fast legs.’

  Sir, at last a shadow of our young friend [presumably R. Ballentyne, from context]. Assume has been hiding among Albanians here but active. Following BELCREDI to Vienna. By his envoy I have intercept messages of same. Will forward. I have given name of reliable friend.

  [SS G/1/891/14 (DECYPHERED)]

  A knock, a word, and Colonel Mayhew was in the old man’s doorway. ‘Duval’s disappeared.’

  The old man’s eyebrows rose a fraction. Mayhew closed the door behind him. ‘I say “disappeared”; we’ve an idea where he’s headed, but the point is that he’s slipped his leash – he’s rogue.’

  The old man considered this. ‘Mm. That presupposes that we ever really had control of him.’

  ‘I expressed my doubts, you will remember.’

  Thin smile. ‘It was noted, Colonel. Do we know what’s prompted this?’

  ‘No. As we ordered, he met Frosch, the shipping man. My man Lisson saw him later that night, and he reported back one or two useful details that he’d got from Frosch. The Larne incident. Should be on your desk any time.’

  ‘I hope so. Then what?’

  The old man was looking even older, Mayhew thought; more tired, more dusty. ‘Lisson got a message mid-morning that Duval wanted to meet at noon. He never showed, and it seems he’d paid a lad to send the message. He’d hooked it hours earlier.’ There was something like amusement on the old man’s face, a hint in the lips. Mayhew didn’t like it; something pitying. ‘A body of pillows under the sheets in case the maid stuck her head in first thing, bag still there, but he was long gone: back stairs or out the window in the small hours. That’s another hotel bill unpaid, too; my man’s hopping m—’

  ‘Yet you know where he’s going.’

  ‘Indeed.’ Mayhew looked even more stiff than usual. ‘Interceptions from the Russian secret police and German Intelligence: they were both watching Duval.’

  ‘Goodness. Popular fellow. And where, Colonel, is he going?’

  ‘Vienna.’

  Something changed in the old face; it was the first time Mayhew had noticed the slightest loss of control – the first suggestion of real emotion. ‘But how?’ The eyes, the voice were far off. ‘How did he get to Duval?’

  ‘I’ve – I’ve lost you there.’

  ‘You never had me, Colonel.’

  Mayhew waited, uneasy.

  ‘Yesterday, Cade reported through the embassy that he was off to Vienna to pursue a business opportunity. This morning I received a message from an acquaintance in Belgrade reporting that Ballentyne was following a trail he had picked up in Albania and then Serbia, and that the trail was leading Ballentyne to Vienna. Just before you arrived, I received a letter in the usual style from Miss Hathaway; her German friend has proposed an excursion. You can guess whither, can you, Colonel?’ He straightened Hathaway’s letter on the desk in front of him. Tapped instinctively at the other papers. ‘You see the pattern, I take it. In each case our agent believes they are heading to Vienna on their initiative. The… coincidence is not credible. They are being lured there. But Duval – I don’t see how Duval has been lured. Perhaps if we knew more.’

  Mayhew had the point now. His hands fidgeted; he wanted action. ‘Can’t we stop them?’

  ‘I doubt it. And… I don’t want to.’ The old man’s eyes were frozen solid. He steepled his fingers together slowly, as if making a house of cards out of them. ‘I wanted to provoke a reaction. I have done so.’ The voice was calculating; cold; lost. ‘I had not believed it would be so complete, so inclusive.’ He let out a breath, long, thin, a whisper of wind across the floor of a ruined church. ‘But we have no choice now.’

  Mayhew was far away; and irritated. ‘What – what does any of this mean?’

  ‘It means the Spider is hungry. He has watched the flies, and now he is ready.’ He looked up. ‘I wanted them spotted, Colonel. I wanted the Spider to notice these agents. I wanted him to show himself.’ The voice dropped again. ‘If it’s Vienna, it’s one of two men. Hermes wouldn’t be able to operate effectively there.’

  ‘Spider…’ Mayhew was still grappling with the folly of the old man’s scheme. ‘Wait; you said “you wanted”. Respect your ideas and so forth… I’ve taken your advice, sir – naturally recognizing your, er – but – but…’

  The old man considered him. ‘Colonel, I think we may be reaching the point where this business exceeds your responsibility; best perhaps if you take a step back, now.’ A dead smile. ‘Prudent, too.’

  ‘But… but I’m—’

  ‘A loyal and senior officer of Military Intelligence, Colonel, and rightly respected as such. If it helps, I will arrange that within ten minutes you receive confirmation from Sir Henry Wilson regarding the… circumstances.’

  ‘You mean General Wilson knows—’

  ‘General Wilson knows very little of this, nor does he wish to. But he does know that there are powers behind him; greater than him.’

  ‘We’re supposed to be getting away from this old-fashioned amateur stuff. New departments, clear responsibilities.’

  The eyes snapped up, and the voice. ‘Believe me, Colonel, I am doing what I can to help those new departments through their rather fraught infancy. I strongly suspect that thus far they have been responsible for little more than drawing attention to Duval, perhaps to Hamel, who now lies at the bottom of the Channel, and to who knows what else.’

  ‘I’m – ah – not following.’

  ‘No, Colonel.’ Behind the desk, in the dust, the eyes were again cold and far away. ‘You’re not. It’s relatively simple: I have staked the future of British Intelligence – our ability to shape the affairs of Europe – on those four lives. I need to speak to Major Knox, now.’

  Agron Balaj had always been the other one.

  He always seemed to be standing with his brother when things were happening, understanding a moment slower what those things were. The two Balaj brothers, Burim and the other one. The two Balaj brothers standing in front of their father, Burim getting screamed at, getting punched, the other one watching and worrying and trying to understand.

  Agron thought slower because he thought deeper, that’s what no one seemed to realize; he laughed to himself about it. Wandering through the village with his brother, oh, there’s unlucky Burim, and the other one, and Agron watching it all and thinking deeply, hahaha.

  They all thought he was simple; his father thought it, Burim thought it, everyone in the village. They said so, to his face, and they didn’t worry that he would hear. Because he was simple, so it didn’t matter; hahaha. He knew. His thoughts weren’t simple, oh no; quite the opposite, they were complicated. His thoughts flowed, and wandered, and stopped, and considered, and walked off on their own path, down the river to the market, or over the pass, because sometimes he was on his own, he wasn’t just the other one, although usually he was, down the river to market with his brother, through the fields, over the pass to the Kelmendi.

  Agron got into trouble with his brother, and people disliked him with his brother, but his brother usually got the blame, because he was just the other one, hahaha, seeing it all. Sitting in the Kelmendi village by the fire, a very warm memory that was, somehow warmer than others, sitting with his brother and talking to the Kelmendi and to the foreigner, not a nice man but polite to his brother and that made him think. They’d sat nearer the fire in the Kelmendi village, that’s why it had been warmer. The foreigner wanting to talk about their village, and listening to his brother’s complaints, and then business
and arrangements and money, none of it with him, except suddenly he’d told them about the gully near the mill and how easy it was to hide there and the foreigner had looked at him first because he was surprised that the other one could speak at all, everyone had said he was simple, and then looked at him with smaller eyes; and Agron knew that the foreigner knew that they were both men who thought deeply, hahaha.

  Agron Balaj had always been the other one, until the day when he did not go with his brother to the market, and instead his brother’s wife went and his brother did not return, and Agron became the only one.

  The wife, that was strange; he’d thought a lot about that.

  Agron had never exactly enjoyed life with his brother, just being the other one, second, forgotten, might as well wander the paths for ever, no one talked to him, no one even blamed him, but there was something. Some feeling about being with his brother; not a feeling of being with his brother but a feeling when he wasn’t with his brother. Uncomfortable, when he wasn’t with his brother, when he was walking along the edge of a field and someone spoke to him and they weren’t speaking to his brother because he wasn’t with his brother, and he had to look. So much harder to think then, much more uncomfortable.

  The woman changed all that. A woman, not like his mother, not noise and curses and knowing he was simple and being the other one. Just a woman, a face, a body, different shape and different smell, and watching him as he ate the food she served, breasts in the blouse as he was trying to eat, hips moving near him as he tried to work. And his brother became different too, sharper, less relaxed, less with him.

  Agron thought deeply about it all. He heard them at night, hahaha, heard his brother’s animal noises, heard nothing actually from the woman except maybe if he listened closely some grunt of discomfort.