The Spider of Sarajevo

by Robert Wilton

  Knox knew the outlines of it, and wasn’t sure that Dragan’s version of the story would give him much that was reliable. But he let him chatter and boast, with occasional wiser embellishments from Rade, and injected sympathy or surprise when it seemed appropriate.

  When the sun dropped behind the surrounding hills, they set off down into the town, and five minutes after reaching the first houses they were being ushered in through a front door by a man whose furtiveness and anxiety were perhaps understandable but certainly calculated to draw attention, had anyone seen his beckoning and his glances around behind them. Immediately there was supper: bread and potatoes and beans and more firewater. Knox was not introduced to their host, which bothered neither of them. The talk, over an intricately embroidered but much stained tablecloth, seemed to be of families and of politics. Knox ate in contented silence.

  Immediately the food was finished, their host chivvied them up into an attic room, where mattresses and bedding were ready. He seemed happy to get them out of his own sight. The two Serbs continued to pass the flask around, and to lecture Knox or – when his polite interest was insufficient – each other on history and politics. Eventually the firewater made them drowsy and, after some last murmured invocations of God and country, then they were asleep. Knox checked the door, his kit, his pistol under the pillow; then he took a second look out of the window to remind himself how it would work as entry or exit. At last he too lay down. A glance at the two faces, now deeply asleep.

  The gruntings and shiftings of men asleep together; a lifetime of barracks and tents. There was a kind of comfort in it: familiarity, companionship. But the lad, Dragan… he was almost young enough be his son.

  Must beware foolishness. Old buffer trying to be one of the boys, twenty years too late. Embarrassing. He glanced again at the two of them, and smiled. Fit enough and wise enough for this generation yet. Never seen himself as a general, anyway, bustling staff and unbroken nights. He slept.

  The morning came with shouts and a bayonet.

  On the 23rd of June the commander of the British Battle Squadron had been received by the commander-in-chief of the German High Seas Fleet, on board His Imperial Majesty’s Ship Friedrich der Grosse. Admiral Sir George Warrender was later received by their Imperial Highnesses the Prince Henry and the Princess Irene, granddaughter of Queen Victoria and sister-in-law of the Tsar of all the Russias. Their flawless English was much commented on. The prince – the emperor’s brother and a grand admiral, the inspector-general of the Germany Navy – then visited H.M.S. King George V; the prince and the dreadnought shared a grandmother, of course.

  On the morning of 24th June, Grand Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz arrived in Kiel and received his British guests on board His Imperial Majesty’s Ship Friedrich Karl. The British officers got a first look at the man they had seen so often in photographs, the creator of the new German Navy as rival to the Royal Navy, his distinctive dome of a head and his elaborately forked beard; Tirpitz talked in English of the weather, of his memories of Plymouth, of the experiences of his daughters at Cheltenham Ladies’ College. There were final discussions about preparations for the ceremonial arrival of the Kaiser that afternoon: the salute by naval guns; the aerial formation of assorted British and German aircraft, the gestures of exchange and fraternity.

  Shouts and hammering and a slam and more shouts, and Knox came awake wild to see a bayonet pointing at his throat. The instinct of shock, the instinct of resistance, and then the control. He breathed. He considered the bayonet and the face behind the bayonet; a boy, almost, as wide-eyed as the man on the other end of the bayonet had been. Knox looked away from the tip to the rest of the attic. Another uniform was waving another bayonet between the two Serbs, Rade wild and Dragan still gaping and scared. Behind the two uniforms, a third, reviewing what he had just captured. He snapped words into the room, in a language Knox didn’t recognize. He repeated them, and pointed at Rade. Rade said something back. The officer in charge didn’t challenge what he’d said, but didn’t seem convinced either.

  Knox was suppressing consideration of whether their host had sold them. First point: the Serbs had said that police checks – harassment – were frequent; this seemed like a check rather than an arrest. Second point: the possibility of resistance or escape. The lad with the bayonet didn’t look strong or sure of himself, and Knox fancied he’d have a fair chance of getting under the bayonet once the lad started to relax, and then it was all to play for. A bayonet on a rifle makes the bundle a deal more cumbersome, especially in an attic room. But he couldn’t be sure how his two companions would react, and if there was a chance to avoid having to attack a man wielding a bayonet it was usually a good one.

  These were the deductions of seconds. Knox tried to relax himself; tried to read the officer’s face. Wondered if one of his companions would try anything stupid. Now the officer was kicking at Rade’s rucksack. He bent down to it.

  Rade’s face turned quickly towards Knox. ‘Do nothing!’ he said in German. ‘This happens sometimes. It is routine.’ The officer’s glance followed Rade’s.

  Why the hell had he spoken in German? Perhaps he knew the officer was Austrian; perhaps he thought that giving a calming message in the officer’s language would help to convince him they were not a risk. But the immediate and natural effect was to turn the officer’s attention to Knox. He stepped to him. ‘Who are you?’ he asked in German.

  ‘I’m a tourist,’ Knox replied in the same. ‘An anthropologist. I’m British.’

  The officer stuck to German. ‘Your name? Your documents?’

  ‘My name is Marsden. Here.’ Deliberately, Knox lifted the fold of the jacket beside him and pulled out his identity paper.

  The officer considered it, and then played with the name. ‘Ma-Ma-res… Maresden.’ He looked up. ‘You will wait here. You must not move.’

  They did not move. One of the policemen stayed in the room, rifle and bayonet standing loose in his hand beside him. The officer and the other left. Knox and his companions could have rushed the sentry, but the tension had gone out of the room and it didn’t seem necessary. After fifteen minutes, Rade and Dragan were starting to probe the policeman with little comments, which he tried to ignore but then started to answer. After twenty minutes they were having an intermittent conversation. The officer was back inside thirty minutes, with Marsden’s identity document and permission to leave.

  To the north of the main port complex at Kiel there was a harbour separate from the rest. The evolution of Kiel as a city and naval base, and the development of ships with ever greater draught, had left it behind. It was used as an overflow berth for vessels that didn’t need deeper water or more advanced dock machinery.

  In the week of the regatta of 1914, the harbour was loaned to the British for their use. Alongside a floating jetty, a seaplane bobbed. It was a gawky insect in Royal Naval Air Service markings, with its high wings and its floats, unnatural against the backdrop of warehouse walls and scrubland.

  In the cockpit, von Cramm was reconfirming his familiarity with the essential controls. They hadn’t even needed to whistle up the fuel cart. Something flickered on the edge of his vision, and he looked up to see a figure trotting along the quayside towards the jetty – a figure in a British uniform. ‘Quickly!’ he hissed to two engineers standing by. ‘Untie the machine!’

  ‘There is not time, Mein Herr; not with the engine too.’

  ‘You know what to do, then.’

  The two engineers were standing back respectfully as the British officer – a naval uniform – climbed down onto the jetty and hurried towards them.

  Nearing the seaplane, he slowed as he saw the body of a British sailor slumped on the jetty.

  He glanced at the engineers, then up towards the cockpit. ‘Good morning.’ It was not friendly. ‘Mackay, Royal Navy. I must clearly tell you, sir, that you are not supposed to be in this machine. I must clearly tell you that no arrangement has been made for a German inspection of this machin
e, and that if you do not climb down from it now you will be in breach of all protocol agreements concerning the regatta. And I’d be obliged if you’d tell me what’s happened to my sentry.’

  ‘I am about to take off in this seaplane – Commander, is it? – Commander Mackay. In the fraternal spirit of this regatta, to participate in the display welcoming the emperor. So charming, these exchanges of equipment, no? Your sentry and one of my engineers had an unfortunate misunderstanding, and I regret to say that there was a lapse in discipline.’

  Mackay glanced back. ‘Is he dead?’

  ‘Merely unconscious. When he regains consciousness, he will not remember anything to contradict what I say.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘What you believe is irrelevant. Even if your sentry tries to contradict the German account of this incident, your high command will not contemplate making a controversy out of the story of one confused sailor, when set against the magnitude of this week’s activity.’ A smile, cold. ‘And its fraternal spirit.’

  ‘And me? You planning to knock me out as well?’

  ‘No, Commander.’ A sound from behind him, and Mackay glanced over his shoulder to see a pistol pointing at his spine. He turned to von Cramm again. ‘If you do not walk away from this jetty immediately, my colleague will shoot you and your body will be weighted and thrown into the harbour here, and you will become an unfortunate footnote to the European pageant that continues over your corpse.’

  ‘You can make me disappear, but not an aircraft.’

  ‘Its loss will be explained easily enough.’

  The officer looked around the empty waterfront. Inspiration: ‘There’s a reason why the support boat and mechanics aren’t here. An intermittent fault with the engine, which they can’t diagnose or solve; they got leave to push off and watch the regatta until a specialist fitter can get here. I must warn you—’

  ‘Oh, come! Now you become desperate – though your little story will serve us well. Ask yourself whether this small disclosure of British technology to Germany is really worth your life, and then step aside.’

  A minute later – Mackay watching intently from a distance – the engine coughed and growled and became a roar; two minutes later its pitch rose to a whine, and the seaplane began to accelerate over the water until, as it came clear of the harbour mouth, the last clutches of foam dropped away from the floats and it was airborne and rising gracefully towards the sun.

  A pair of cigarettes: Krug’s danced in the air as he spoke; Hildebrandt’s rarely moved, shrinking in regular draughts of great strength.

  ‘Berlin thinks that Austria is too indecisive, Herr Krug; too accommodating. If Serbia is to be destroyed, it must be quickly. Austria’s duty is to fight Russia.’

  ‘Her duty?’

  ‘European war is no longer a game for dilettantes, Mein Herr. Strategy must be European or it is nothing. Austria must hold Russia while Germany wins in the west.’

  ‘Germany must win quickly, if Austria is not to be overwhelmed.’ Hildebrandt nodded. ‘Berlin worries about Serbia as much as Austria does, Hildebrandt. Your masters fear for their links to Constantinople and beyond; their precious railway.’

  ‘Berlin would be delighted to see Austria smash Serbia. But this constant hesitancy and change keeps Austria weak and strengthens her enemies.’

  ‘You want such a war, Hildebrandt? France, and Russia, and all?’

  ‘It will not be my choice. But I will be ready for it.’

  Krug smiled. ‘Good, Hildebrandt. That’s good.’ The telephone jangled. Krug lifted the receiver and listened. Then: ‘Was he? But… Good. That’s good. The name again?… Very good… No – no further action. Thank you.’ He replaced the instrument. A smile. ‘He’s on time, it seems.’

  Hildebrandt nodded. Another suck at the cigarette. ‘Herr Krug: after everything, you do not want war?’

  ‘A war of such a scale?’ A spasmodic shake of Krug’s head, distasteful. ‘Chaos. I prefer my conflicts elegant, manageable. If Europe destroys itself, who is left for poor Krug to do business with?’

  ‘Herr Colonel, I regret that I bring you bad news.’

  Colonel Walter Nicolai looked up; his neck stiffened and his head came higher and the eyes went colder – it passed for an instruction to proceed.

  ‘Herr Colonel, I regret to report that von Cramm, the pilot, has crashed in the British seaplane that he was flying.’

  Nicolai smiled. Behind the smile, a laugh pulsed in his throat.

  ‘Herr Colonel?’

  ‘When you understand, Tretsche, you will wish to share in my satisfaction. The news you bring is not tragedy. It is confirmation of a very neat little comedy. Von Cramm did not crash. That is just the report that has been circulated. He has made a controlled landing in the air-machine. Our engineers are examining the prototype engine that it contained. The British will be presented with the burned-out wreckage. Von Cramm will go away to recover from injuries that are reported to be very serious.’ Again the laugh beat in the throat. ‘But he will make a fast recovery.’

  ‘Please forgive me, Herr Colonel, but you do not understand. I was aware of this plan; you will recall that I was present when it was discussed earlier in the week. Something went wrong, Herr Colonel. The machine crashed into the sea. The British Navy are recovering the wreckage. There is no doubt that von Cramm is dead.’

  When His Imperial Majesty Kaiser Wilhelm II arrived in Kiel in his yacht Hohenzollern, every ship in the British and German fleets fired a twenty-one-gun salute from her main armament, and the Baltic heavens thundered. A Zeppelin airship drifted overhead, regal among the circling aircraft. The atmosphere of celebration and grandeur had been little affected by one British seaplane crashing into the sea – great drama overlooks its minor accidents – and His Imperial Majesty received Admiral Sir George Warrender and the British captains.

  On the 25th of June, wearing Royal Naval dress uniform, the Kaiser visited Sir George, and the British orchestra played popular German tunes. This day was the formal opening of the regatta. His Imperial Majesty challenged Sir George to a race.

  German officers were invited to see the British ships. They tested the mahogany furniture, the leather armchairs and sofas, the real fireplaces; they considered the ten main guns on each ship, contemplated the effect of a projectile thirteen and a half inches wide fired ten miles.

  By the 26th of June the streets of Kiel were a cheerful mix of British sailors and German, and the city’s inhabitants were happy to celebrate such a lucrative tide of enthusiasm flowing through their shops. The city had been a power for seven centuries, a place of trade and a place of maritime power, and it was only appropriate that they should host the spectacle. The British travelled free on German public transport, and there were sports competitions between teams from the two navies.

  Admiral Sir George Warrender offered an open invitation to his opposite, Admiral Ingenohl, for German sailors to tour British ships. Only the wireless rooms and the gunnery-control stations of the conning towers would be off-limits. Admiral Ingenohl did not feel able to reciprocate, and so the invitation was declined – with polite regret and quiet satisfaction from both sides.

  In one amusing incident, a dinghy sailed by Lord Brassey and one of his sailors from the yacht Sunbeam strayed into Kiel’s submarine dock. It was not clear how he had managed to find his way so far, and the authorities were obliged to arrest his lordship. His lordship was a friend of His Imperial Majesty the Kaiser, however, and freed in good spirits in time for dinner with him. The sketch map he had carried had disappeared, the last trace of David Duval’s daring swallowed by the waters of the Baltic.

  Later that evening, on the other side of Europe – a Europe of warmer skins and more varied costumes, a Europe where two civilizations met, a Europe where the traditions of the Continent’s greatest cities mixed with those of its rawest mountains – Major Valentine Knox came through the Miljacka valley into the city of Sarajevo.

  The S
ub-Committee of the Committee of Imperial Defence:

  ‘Gentlemen, is there no useful conclusion we can draw on Ireland?’

  ‘We’re waiting to see.’

  ‘They’re all waiting to see. Meanwhile they’re arming.’

  ‘The PM has had to be extremely shrewd on this one. Constructive ambiguity in the text. No one’s quite sure what the arrangement for Home Rule will be.’

  ‘The PM’s pardon, but he’s been too shrewd by half. Both sides smell a rat. If they’re tolerating his bill it’s because they’re expecting it to be overtaken by civil war.’

  ‘We have increasingly clear reports of the nationalists trying to buy arms. They saw what the Volunteers did at Larne, and they want the same.’

  ‘The difference is that one lot are essentially patriots, the others essentially anarchists.’

  ‘Gentlemen, whatever our views on the merits of their causes, we surely cannot be happy with a flood of arms into Ulster. There’s little difference between one Briton and another firing rifles at each other.’

  ‘Have we any useful intelligence on this?’ Silence. ‘Any that colleagues are prepared to share?’ Silence. ‘The objective of our new departmental arrangements was the facilitation of efficient co-operation, not competition.’

  ‘Chairman, the question is more perhaps that we have no useful security options. We do not have a neutral force with a realistic chance of keeping the peace.’

  ‘Which brings us back to the politicians.’

  ‘Smoke and mirrors. He’s merely delayed the crisis. Perhaps only weeks.’

  Papers were straightened. A pen tapped nervously on a blotter.

  ‘Lighter note: the picture’s a little rosier on the Continent, I should say.’

  ‘The signs from Kiel are certainly good.’