by Pirate Irwin
Sebastian preferred for obvious reasons to stay over there than at his mother’s and it was after one typical night of excess that he awoke towards ten in the morning, rubbed his eyes free of sleep, looked across the bed to see Wanda was still fast asleep with one bare leg hanging loose over the side, her hand also trailing downwards, and then looked at the clock.
“Jesus Christ! The bloody alarm didn’t go off!” he rasped, his mouth and throat dry as sandpaper after several bottles of wine and half a bottle of cognac.
“That’s because, darling, you didn’t set it. Silly ass,” drawled the slumbering and equally hung-over Wanda.
“But I’m going to be late for my appointment at the Embassy. Christ, what the hell was I doing, getting so drunk on the eve of the meeting,” he said, more to himself than to his sleeping accomplice.
“Because, dearest, you wanted to and besides, I don’t see what you are going to tell them anyway. Why don’t you just get your pretty little ass back in beside me and sleep a little more and then we can go out and do some more partying,” she purred.
“Stuff that! It’s not just any old diplomat I’m meeting, it’s the bloody ambassador,” he replied as he trudged to the bathroom, thankful his feet were treading on a thick carpet rather than the wooden floor of his bedroom as the pain in his head would have hurt even more from the impact.
Staring in the mirror didn’t improve his humour as he surveyed the visual wreckage of the evening entertainment, red-rimmed eyes, hair hanging down in lank clumps, over his forehead and red wine stains surrounded his lips – so he was grateful when the steam from the bath covered up the evidence for the prosecution and he could sink into the water and wipe it away.
Feeling a bit better after cleaning himself up, though shaving took its toll as every time he bent his head it felt like a hammer trying to get out, he went back into the bedroom where Wanda lay motionless, though now her whole body was outside the covers in a contorted position.
He smiled, went over and pecked her on the cheek, then picked up his gaberdine suit trousers, slid them on, put on a fresh shirt, conservative check which should go down well with the ambassador and draped a brown silk tie round his collar which he would address on his way to the rendezvous.
He made his way out of the bedroom which looked like a theatre dressing room, pieces of clothing lying on the floor and draped carelessly over various pieces of furniture, some even hanging off the penises of the Roman sculptures – glad they’re useful for something, joked Sebastian to himself – picked up a couple of mints out of a giant glass bowl by the front door and exited.
Sebastian was ushered straight through to the German ambassador, Theodor Kordt, by an under secretary called Wilhelm Drickler, who was clearly not impressed by the tardy arrival of his chief’s appointment and didn’t hesitate to let him know. Tuttutting his way to the ambassador’s secretary’s office, Drickler handed him over to Kordt’s secretary Yolanda, a pretty middle-aged brunette who gave him a warm smile, told him to wait while she informed the ambassador that he had arrived and then came back out to tell him he was to go in.
Korth was of medium height, mid-forties, with a friendly bespectacled face, black hair and dressed in a finely tailored pinstripe suit.
He was sitting not at his desk but by the marble fireplace where there were a couple of armchairs, though he was in a rocking chair overlooking a knee-high table which was adorned with a white tablecloth and on which rested a silver tray with a coffee pot and a couple of coffee cups.
He rose, smiled warmly at Sebastian and shook his hand in a firm grip, his eyes already searching in his visitor’s expression for any sign of what he was going to tell him, dismissed Yolanda and led his guest to the chairs.
“Sorry about the rocking chair, not very elegant but I find it easier to think when I’m in constant motion,” laughed Kordt.
“Don’t worry about me, ambassador, the more informal the better! I think I am the one who should apologize for being so late,” said Sebastian with a suitably apologetic smile.
“Just call me Theo, I prefer that. Here, you look as if you could do with some coffee.”
“God, I look that bad?” mumbled Sebastian.
“I’m afraid so, Sebastian, but I am aware you enjoy the good life, and God, with things the way they are going, you might as well make the most of them,” chortled Kordt.
The coffee was thick black and under normal circumstances undrinkable but hands shaking, Sebastian poured it down his throat, which eased his headache to the extent he felt more fuzzyheaded than anything else.
After chatting about the von Preetzs and life in Berlin, Sebastian moved onto the unsuccessful meeting with Ponsonby, omitting the harsher side of the encounter while Kordt listened attentively, legs crossed but rocking backwards and forwards while chewing on a pen.
Sebastian finished and Kordt stopped his rocking, put his stocky fingers to his face as if in prayer and stayed in the pose for around five minutes before withdrawing them.
He stood up, walked over to his desk, unlocked one of his drawers and pulled out a piece of paper before returning to his chair. He handed it to Sebastian and gestured for him to read it. It was a handwritten note with no heading on it but simply read:
“That in answer to mine and Eric’s imploring the British Government to issue a public warning to their German counterparts over the potential of war, we received a negative response from Sir Robert Vansittart because ‘such threats would only exacerbate the current tensions between the two states and only serve to propel us nearer to a war’.”
“So you see, Sebastian, Ponsonby is not wrong when he told you the ears of the Foreign Office are closed to such entreaties,” said Kordt with a sad smile.
“But why get me involved, if you as German ambassador got short shrift?” protested Sebastian.
Kordt shrugged his shoulders and stared towards the window, taking off his glasses and wiping his eyes, before turning back to Stuart, who was shocked to see there were tears pouring down his cheeks.
“We are prepared to try anything and we just felt that if an Englishman could bring back some proof of a resistance to the regime then there would be some action, but I am afraid we were naïve to think that. You know, Eric – that is my brother who is referred to in the note – was also based here till last year and I took up his baton when he was recalled to Berlin. He was prepared to open up the doors of the Chancellery for a group of soldiers last year and let them round up Hitler and his cronies but alas it fell apart because of Munich . . . we have been fighting a losing game since then and I am afraid we might as well give up the ghost.”
Sebastian had expected little else but he still felt angry, not just because of the British attitude but that adults, the people who his generation and those younger than them were meant to respect for their experience and setting of examples, could not behave accordingly and were hell-bent on plunging their respective countries into war, a conflagration that they would not be directly involved in but would end in the deaths of probably millions of the very same young who would pay for the errors of their elders and betters.
“I admire you, Ambassador, and your friends. At least, even if there is war you will be able to say you did your utmost to prevent it and but for the obduracy of the British you could have achieved that,” said Sebastian, who stood and shook Kordt’s hand.
Kordt nodded, smiled weakly at Sebastian, and whispered with a trembling tone, “Thank you, Sebastian, you are quite a remarkable young man, it is only a pity there are none of your type in office but let that be a lesson to you if you are ever to assume such responsibilities . . . realpolitik is fine but occasionally it is better to see the longer term picture and let your emotions dictate what the solution should be.”
*
“So there is the report as you requested, Mr Ponsonby,” said Callaghan, after handing over his observations on Sebastian’s movements over the last three weeks.
Ponsonby sniffed and took the slig
ht report in his grasp and leafed through it, leaving Callaghan, a small wiry individual but one of the sharpest brains in Scotland Yard, to sit in silence, not bothering to survey the study as he had seen it several times over and it didn’t warrant a second look.
“He went to the German embassy, did he? Do you know who he went to see?” asked Ponsonby.
“Yes, he saw the ambassador for about an hour.”
“Interfering fool. And do you know what they talked about?”
Callaghan crossed and uncrossed his legs, feeling slightly uncomfortable, as he hadn’t the faintest idea what had been discussed, only a chat with the ambassador’s secretary in the local public house had elicited the information that Sebastian had held talks with Kordt.
“Well, Callaghan? What did they talk about?” asked Ponsonby, somewhat impatiently.
“It would be in my report if I knew what the subject was, sir,” replied Callaghan irritably.
“Well, it is most unsatisfactory. Can’t you at least guess at what it was about?”
“That is not my job, sir. I am only interested in facts and as they are not available to me I am not prepared to speculate on what may have passed between these two individuals, only to pass comment that I find it rather strange that a citizen of Great Britain is having a private audience with the ambassador of a country that we may well be at war with soon,” Callaghan commented.
Ponsonby let the report slip onto the desk, leant back in his chair, twiddling with his fingers and stared at Callaghan, the man from a solid working-class Irish family, who had risen to being regarded as the best detective in the force. But the fact he couldn’t furnish him with the details of the conversation didn’t reflect well on the rest of the police.
“Wouldn’t you call that a treasonable offence, Chief Inspector?”
Callaghan inhaled deeply and thought, here we go, down that old line of well, if you didn’t see it, it doesn’t matter, just imagine what they did or said . . . well, he was fed up with this and he wasn’t going to go along with it any more.
“A bit strange but treasonable? I don’t think so, sir.”
“Hmm. So aside from that, nothing else you would regard as strange in his behaviour?” asked a clearly dissatisfied Ponsonby.
“Well, he has questionable morals in the circle of friends and the habits they keep but again that is hardly a crime. No, he is unpredictable and undisciplined but that is all he is; there is nothing worth charging him with.”
Ponsonby smiled and dismissed Callaghan after handing over a cheque for 50 pounds, which he considered rather expensive for the information he had received. Nevertheless, he locked the report away with the dozen or so others he had received from Callaghan over the past few years, which might serve him well further down the line should he need a lifeline.
Stuart could keep for the moment.
CHAPTER SIX
“Lieutenant Stuart reporting to see Colonel Drew,” Sebastian addressed the corporal at the makeshift headquarters established by the Black Watch regiment.
The corporal saluted him and pushed back the flap of the green canvas flap which served as an entrance to the shattered cottage which was the nerve centre of one sector of the headlong retreat the allied forces found themselves in as the German army closed in around them.
Sebastian had expected a tough battle but nothing had prepared him for the ramshackle performance of the French defensive line and the rapidity of the German advance, which had left him cut off from half his section.
However, showing typical froideur and calm, he had brought his platoon back through the enemy lines and taken out several Panzer tanks on the way, though it was a mere pinprick in the rough hide of an elephant whose speed defied the size of its body.
The sight of his first dead man and indeed the first direct hit he had perpetrated on a Panzer had left him pretty unmoved – the metal cover of the tank hid the personal nature of the lives taken inside – while the first casualty on his side had been shattered into so many pieces it was hard to recall the man when he had been whole.
Besides, he had 30 or so men to look after and make sure they came out alive and one loss was to be expected.
He had taken a bullet, though the impact had been minimal and had grazed his shoulder, so a mere dressing had dealt with it, and was nothing compared to the sights they encountered on their way back coming across truckloads of wounded, a mix of various regiments where once proud units had disintegrated into babbling tongues of different nationalities and from which only the moans of the wounded appeared to speak with the same voice.
Occasionally the drone of the German air force would signal a rush to get to the relative cover of the ditches on the side of the road, but there was little one could do for the wounded stuck on the top of the trucks and many were to be put out of their agony by the dive-bombers and the fighters, who appeared out of the sky and then turned downwards like a bunch of wasps or hornets attracted to the honeypot below strafing the ragtag convoys before sweeping up skywards once more, the black and white markings of their accursed regime clear to the eye, and seldom was it possible to return fire.
The retreat was not an orderly one and it was hard to maintain discipline, with several soldiers shedding their uniforms and commandeering the richer refugees’ vehicles in order to make good their escape, though when found, summary justice was meted out – the crackle of the firing squad was often the only evidence of an Allied bullet being discharged.
Sebastian had little trouble with his platoon, having had to fight their way out from behind the enemy lines had had its benefits whereby they had undergone their baptism of fire and, encouraged by having drawn blood, they realized the best way of getting out was to stick together.
In that, Sebastian had been greatly helped by his Sergeant, Miller, who had been in the army for 10 years and was strict while being not totally ignorant of the fallibilities of several of the rawer recruits, as his father had educated him in the manner of men at war, he having come out of the First World War with a clear knowledge of the limits one could push men to.
His men were the usual mix of the unemployed who had felt there was no option but to join the one growing industry in the country, those who like Miller had felt it was a vocation and several who felt it was their duty to defend Europe against the tyranny of those damned squareheads, for want of a better word. Sebastian felt more in tune with the latter, though he also acknowledged that his employment options were not huge either. Despite his fluent German he had not felt a yearning to go into the intelligence corps, besides, his brief but unrewarding dabbling in helping the German resistance had left him cold on the cloak and dagger world that people like his erstwhile relative Ponsonby inhabited.
The only thing that got to him to begin with was the lack of a bath and the sleepless nights, which initially left him going over and over again whether he was making the right decision, but a wink here and a word there from Miller helped him adjust to life giving orders and very soon it was remarkable how one forgot that sleep was something a normal human being required to operate. Thus it was that he had been instructed to turn up at regimental headquarters for a briefing by this Colonel Drew, who was to give him his orders which he hoped would shed some real light on what was happening all over Northern France, rather than the day to day fighting which, while always a personal battle for survival, hardly reflected what was going on elsewhere.
The corporal showed him in to the roofless centre where there was a flurry of activity going on by the 20 or so subalterns, radio operators and higher ranked officers, a different world to the one out there, observed Sebastian, where these orders being sent out by radio were rarely adhered to, as the situation by the time they were received had changed to such an extent that sometimes the unit had been blasted to eternity or the ground had been lost.
The corporal led him to the back of the room, for the once three-roomed cottage had been melded into one large open space and he thanked God that at least it was
a burning hot French summer’s day for it added some brightness and warmth to this room packed full of desperate men, whose carrying out of this chore and that one to any realistic observer was fruitless and surely they would be better served at getting out and running for the coast.
“Colonel Drew, Lieutenant Stuart as you ordered, sir!” cried the corporal, which Sebastian thought was a bit out of order given the circumstances, but bless the British army and their dedication to routine – that was one thing they would never let go of, regardless of the catastrophe surrounding them.
Drew was standing with his back to Sebastian, poring over a map with a couple of other officers, and waved his finger at him to join them. Sebastian went round so he could see Drew rather than standing to the side where he received a salute from all three – the other two were majors – while Drew, whose uniform showed little sign of the chaos outside and whose red hair was swept neatly back and shone with the oil he had put on it, eyed him up, no doubt contrasting the neatness of those surrounding him in his little castle with that of the dishevelled officer standing in front of him.
Sebastian cast quite a figure, with his blond hair matted to his skull, his face blackened by days of clambering through the undergrowth, the endless fighting, the bags under his eyes gave away the lack of sleep while his lips were riddled with sores and blisters, his teeth were no longer the finely polished set he had embarked with and were showing clear signs of decay while his uniform was tatty, torn and barely recognizable as the Black Watch’s.