Complete Works of a E W Mason

by A. E. W. Mason

  He undressed and went to bed, but he did not sleep. He lay in the berth in the darkness, listening intently as the train rushed out of Paris across the plains of France. Once or twice, as the hours passed, he heard a stealthy footstep in the corridor outside, and once the faintest possible little click told that the latch of his door had been lifted to make sure that the bolt was still shot home in its socket. Hillyard smiled.

  “You are safe, my friend,” he breathed the words towards the anxious one in the corridor. “No one can get in. The door is locked. The door of the dressing-room too. Sleep in your corner in peace.”

  The train sped over a moonlit country, spacious, unhurt by war. It moved with a steady, rhythmical throb, like an accompaniment to a tune or a phrase, ever repeated and repeated Hillyard found himself fitting words to the pulsation of the wheels. “Berlin ... Berne ... Paris ... Cerbère ... Barcelona ... Madrid ... Aranjuez and the world”; and back again, reversing the order: “Madrid ... Barcelona ... Cerbère ... Paris ... Berne ... Berlin.”

  But the throb of the train set the interrogation at the end of the string of names. So that the sequence of them was like a question demanding confirmation....

  Towards three in the morning, when there was no movement in the corridor and the lights were blue and dim, Hillyard silently folded back his bedclothes and rose. In the darkness he groped gently for the door of the lavatory between his compartment and the compartment of the manufacturer of Perpignan. He found the handle, and pressed it down slowly; without a creak or a whine of the hinges the door swung open towards him. Through the clatter he could hear that the manufacturer of Perpignan was snoring. But Hillyard did not put his trust in snores. He crept with bare feet across the washing-room, and, easing over the handle of the further door, locked the manufacturer out. Again there had been no sound. He shut the door of his own compartment lest the swing of the train should set it banging and arouse the sleepers. Towards the corridor there was a window of painted glass, and through this window a pale, dim light filtered in. Hillyard noticed, for the first time, that a small diamond-shaped piece of the coloured glass was missing, at about the level of a man’s head. It was advisable that Martin Hillyard should be quick — or he might find the tables turned. With his ears more than ever alert, he set up the steps for the upper berth, in the lavatory, and whilst he worked his eyes watched that little aperture at the level of a man’s head, which once a diamond-shaped piece of coloured glass had closed....

  The door of the manufacturer was unlocked, the steps folded in their place, and Hillyard back again in his bed before two minutes had passed. And once more the throb of the train beat into a chain of towns which went backwards and forwards like a shuttle in his brain. But there was no note of interrogation now.

  “Berlin ... Berne ... Paris ... Cerbère ... Barcelona ... Madrid ... Aranjuez and the world”; and with a thump the train set a firm full stop to the sequence. Across the broad plain, meadowland and plough, flower-garden and fruit the train thundered down to the Pyrenees. Paris was far away now, and the sense of desolation at quitting it quite gone from Hillyard’s breast.

  “Berlin ... Berne ... Paris ... Cerbère ... Barcelona ... Madrid.”

  Here was one of the post-roads by which Germany reached the outer world. Others there were beyond doubt. Sweden and Rotterdam, Mexico and South America — but here was one, and to-morrow, nay, to-day, the communication would be cut, and Germany so much the poorer.

  The train steamed into Cerbère at one o’clock of the afternoon.

  “Every one must descend here, monsieur, for the examination of luggage and passports,” said the attendant.

  “But I am leaving France!” cried Hillyard. “I go on into Spain. Why should France, then, examine my luggage?”

  “It is the war, monsieur.”

  Hillyard lifted up his hands in indignation too deep for words. He gathered together his bag and his coat and stick, handed them to a porter and descended. He passed into the waiting-room, and was directed by a soldier with a fixed bayonet to take his place in the queue of passengers. But he said quietly to the soldier:

  “I would like to see M. de Cassaud, the Commissaire of Police.”

  Hillyard was led apart; his card was taken from him; he was ushered instantly into an office where an elderly French officer sat in mufti before a table. He shook Hillyard cordially by the hand.

  “You pass through? I myself hope to visit Barcelona again very soon. Jean, wait outside with monsieur’s baggage,” this to the porter who had pushed in behind Hillyard. M. de Cassaud rose and closed the door. He had looked at Hillyard’s face and acted quickly.

  “It is something more than compliments you want from me, monsieur. Well, what can I do?”

  “The second sleeping-car, compartments numbers 11 and 12,” said Hillyard urgently. “In the water-tank of the lavatory there is a little metal case with letters from Berlin for Barcelona and Madrid. But wait, monsieur!”

  M. de Cassaud was already at the door.

  “It is the attendant of the sleeping-car who hides them there. If he can be called into an office quietly on some matter of routine and held there whilst your search is made, then those in Madrid and Barcelona to whom these letters are addressed may never know they have been sent at all!”

  M. de Cassaud nodded and went out. Hillyard waited nervously in the little whitewashed room. It was impossible that the attendant should have taken fright and bolted. Even if he bolted, it would be impossible that he should escape across the frontier. It was impossible that he should recover the metal case from the water-tank, while the carriage stood openly at the platform of Cerbère station. He would be certain to wait until it was shunted into the cleaning shed. But so many certainties had been disproved, so many possibilities had come to pass during the last two years, that Hillyard was sceptical to his finger-tips. M. de Cassaud was a long time away. Yes, certainly M. de Cassaud was a very long —— and the door opened, and M. de Cassaud appeared.

  “He is giving an account of his blankets and his towels. There are two soldiers at the door. He is safe. Come!” said the Commissaire.

  They crossed the platform to the carriage, whilst Hillyard described the attendant’s anxiety that he should bolt his door. “No doubt he gave the same advice to the manufacturer of Perpignan,” Hillyard added.

  It was M. de Cassaud who arranged and mounted the steps in the tiny washing-room.

  “Look, monsieur,” said Hillyard, and he pointed to the little aperture in the coloured glass of the window. “One can see from the corridor what is going on in this room. That is useful. If a traveller complains — bah, it is the war!” and Hillyard laughed.

  M. de Cassaud looked at the window.

  “Yes, that is ingenious,” he said.

  He drained off the water, folded back his sleeve, and plunged his arm into the tank. Then he uttered a little cry. He drew up into the light an oblong metal can, like a sandwich-case, with the edges soldered together to make it water-tight. He slipped it into his pocket and turned again to the window. He looked at it again curiously.

  “Yes, that is ingenious,” he said softly, like a man speaking to himself. Then he led the way back to his office, looking in at the guard-room on the platform to give an order on the way.

  The soldered edges of the case were quickly split asunder and a small package of letters written on very thin paper revealed.

  “You will let me take these on with me,” pleaded Martin. “You shall have them again. But some of them may want a special treatment of which we have the secret.”

  M. de Cassaud was doubtful about the propriety of such a procedure.

  “After all I found them,” Martin urged.

  “It would be unusual,” said M. de Cassaud. “The regulations, you know — —”

  Martin Hillyard smiled.

  “The regulations, for you and me, my friend, are those we make ourselves.”

  M. de Cassaud would admit nothing so outrageous to his trained an
d rather formal mind. But he made a list of these letters and of their addresses as though he was undecided. He had not finished when a sergeant entered and saluted. The attendant of the sleeping-car had been taken to the depot. He had been searched and a pistol had been found upon him. The sergeant laid a very small automatic Colt upon the table and retired. M. de Cassaud took up the little weapon and examined it.

  “Do you know these toys, Monsieur Hillyard?” he asked.

  “Yes. They are chiefly used against the mosquitoes.”

  “Oh, they will kill at twenty-five paces,” continued the Commissaire; and he looked quickly at Hillyard. “I will tell you something. You ran some risk last night when you explored that water-tank. Yes, indeed! It would have been so easy. The attendant had but to thrust the muzzle of this through the opening of the window, shoot you dead, raise an alarm that he had caught you hiding something, and there was he a hero and you a traitor. Yes, that is why I said to you the little opening in the window was ingenious! Ah, if he had caught you! Yes, if he had caught you!”

  Martin was quick to take advantage.

  “Then let me have those letters! I will keep my French colleagues informed of everything.”

  “Very well,” said M. de Cassaud, and he suddenly swept the letters across to Hillyard, who gathered them up hastily and buttoned them away in his pocket before de Cassaud could change his mind.

  “It is all very incorrect,” said the Commissaire reproachfully.

  “Yes, but it is the war,” replied Hillyard. “I have the authority of the attendant of the sleeping-car for saying so.”

  CHAPTER XVI

  Tricks of the Trade

  “NOW!” SAID HILLYARD.

  Fairbairn fetched a couple of white porcelain developing dishes to the table. Hillyard unlocked a drawer in his bureau. They were in the deck-saloon of the Dragonfly, steaming southwards from Valencia. Outside the open windows the brown hill-sides, the uplands of olive trees and the sun-flecked waves slipped by in a magical clear light; and the hiss of the beaded water against the ship’s planks filled the cabin with a rustle as of silk. Hillyard drew a deep breath of excitement as he took out from the drawer the letters he had carried off from M. de Cassaud. He had travelled straight through Barcelona to Valencia with the letters in his pocket, picking up Fairbairn at the Estación de Francia on the way, and now, in the sunlight and in the secrecy of the open sea, they were to appraise the value of their catch.

  They sat at the table and examined them, opening the envelopes with the skill and the care which experience had taught them. For, even though this post-road was henceforth closed it might possibly be worth while to send forward these letters. One or two were apparently family letters for German soldiers, interned at Pampluna; one or two were business communications from firms in Berlin to their agents in Spain; and these seemed genuine enough.

  “They may be of value to the War Trade Board,” said Fairbairn; and he put them aside for dispatch to London. As he turned back Hillyard cried suddenly:

  “Here we are!”

  He had come to the last letter of the little heap. He was holding the envelope in front of him and he read out the address:

  “Mr. Jack Williams,

  “Alfredo Menandez, 6,

  “Madrid.”

  Fairbairn started up, and tugging at his moustache, stared at the envelope over Hillyard’s shoulder.

  “By Jove!” he said. “We may have got something.”

  “Let us see!” returned Hillyard, and he opened the envelope.

  As he spread out the letter both men laughed. The date of the month had been corrected by the writer — thus:

  8

  “July 27th, 1916.”

  There was no doubt any longer in either of these two men’s minds that hidden away under the commonplaces of a letter of affection was a message of grave importance.

  “They are full of clever tricks in Berlin,” said Hillyard cheerfully. He could afford to contemplate that cleverness with complacency, for it was now to serve his ends.

  There was a German official of high importance living in the Calle Alfredo Menandez, although not at number 6 in that street. The street was a short one with very few numbers in it; and it had occurred to the German official to point out to the postman in that street that if letters came to English names in that street of which the owners could not be discovered, they were probably for the governess of his children, who had a number of English relations moving about Spain, and was accustomed to receive their letters for them, and in any case, five pesetas would be paid for each of them. Shortly after, letters had begun to arrive addressed to English nonexistent people in the quiet little Calle Alfredo Menandez, sometimes from Allied countries, sometimes from Holland, or from Port-Bou over against Cerbère in Spain; and every one of these found its natural way to the house of the German official. The choice of English names had a certain small ingenuity in that, when passing through the censorship of Allied countries, they were a little more likely to be taken at their face value than letters addressed to foreigners.

  So far so good. But the German high official was a very busy person; and letters might find their way into his hands which were really intended for English persons and not for him at all. Accordingly, to make all clear, to warn him that here indeed was a letter deserving his kind attention, that little trifling alteration in the date was adopted; as though a man writing on the 28th had mislaid the calendar or newspaper and assigned the 27th to the day of writing, and afterwards had discovered his mistake. It was no wonder accordingly that hope ran high in both Fairbairn and Hillyard as they read through this letter; although, upon the face of it, it was nothing but a sentimental effusion from a sister to a brother.

  “We have got to clear all this nonsense away first,” said Hillyard.

  Fairbairn took the letter, and placing it on one of the developing dishes, poured over it a liquid from a bottle.

  “That won’t take very long,” he said.

  Meanwhile Hillyard busied himself with the second of the two white porcelain dishes. He brought out a cruet stand from a cupboard at the side of the stove and filled the dish half full of vinegar. He added water until the liquid rose within half an inch of the rim, and rocked the dish that the dilution might be complete. Next he took a new copying-pencil from the pen-tray on his bureau and stripping the wood away with his knife, dropped the blue lead into the vinegar and water. This lead he carefully dissolved with the help of a glass pestle.

  “There! It’s ready,” he said.

  “I, too,” added Fairbairn.

  He lifted out of the developing dish a wet sheet of writing paper which was absolutely blank. Not one drop of the black ink which had recorded those sentimental effusions remained. It was just a sheet of notepaper which had accidentally fallen into a basin of water.

  “That’s all right,” said Hillyard; and Fairbairn gently slid the sheet into the dish in front of Hillyard. And for a while nothing happened.

  “It’s a clever trick, isn’t it?” Hillyard used the words again, but now with a note of nervousness. “No unlikely paraphernalia needed. Just a copying pencil and some vinegar, which you can get anywhere. Yes, it’s a clever trick!”

  “If it works,” Fairbairn added bluntly.

  Both men watched the dish anxiously. The paper remained blank. The solution did not seem to work. It was the first time they had ever made use of it. The coast slid by unnoticed.

  “Lopez was certain,” said Fairbairn, “quite certain that this was the developing formula.”

  Hillyard nodded gloomily, but he did not remove his eyes from that irresponsive sheet.

  “There may be some other ingredient, something kept quite secret — something known only to one man or two.”

  He sat down, hooking his chair with his foot nearer to the table.

  “We must wait.”

  “That’s all there is to be done,” said Fairbairn, and they waited; and they waited. They had no idea, even if the form
ula should work, whether the writing would flash up suddenly like an over-exposed photographic plate, or emerge shyly and reluctantly letter by letter, word by word. Then, without a word spoken, Fairbairn’s finger pointed. A brown stain showed on the whiteness of the paper — just a stroke. It was followed by a curve and another stroke. Hillyard swiftly turned the oblong developing dish so that the side of it, and not the end, was towards him now.

  “The writing is across the sheet,” he said, and then with a cry, “Look!”

  A word was coming out clear, writing itself unmistakably in the middle of the line, at the bottom of the sheet — a signature. Zimmermann!

  “From the General Staff!” said Hillyard, in a whisper of excitement. “My word!” He looked at Fairbairn with an eager smile of gratitude. “It’s your doing that we have got this — yours and Lopez Baeza’s!”

  Miraculously the brown strokes and curves and dots and flourishes trooped out of nothing, and fell in like sections and platoons and companies with their due space between them, some quick and trim, some rather slovenly in their aspect, some loitering; but in the end the battalion of words stood to attention, dressed for inspection. The brown had turned black before Hillyard lifted the letter from the solution and spread it upon a sheet of blotting paper.

  “Now let us see!” and they read the letter through.

  One thousand pounds in English money were offered for reliable information as to the number of howitzers and tanks upon the British front.

  A second sum of a thousand pounds for reliable information as to the manufacture of howitzers and tanks in England.

  “So far, it’s not very exciting,” Hillyard remarked with disappointment, as he turned the leaf. But the letter progressed in interest.

  A third sum of a thousand pounds was offered for a list of the postal sections on the British front, with the name, initials and rank of a really good and reliable British soldier in each section who was prepared to receive and answer correspondence.