Andrew Williams - The Poison Tide

‘All except the spies,’ observed the little textiles manufacturer. ‘They’ll be going ashore.’

Dilger smiled politely. But at nine o’clock the British lieutenant read out the names of first-class passengers who were to be taken ashore.

‘Just a formality, Doctor,’ he said coolly. ‘Our people would like to talk to you — no, no, not under arrest, just a few questions — a little information.’

Dilger protested that he was an American, spitting that their war was none of his goddamn business, to disguise his fear. What information? He was visiting his sister and there was nothing more to say; a private matter, damn their formality, they were treating him like an enemy. Were they going to rifle through his belongings too? Damn them.

The lieutenant held his hands open like Pilate. ‘I’m sorry for the inconvenience but you must understand — the war.’

The launch was hanging from its davits a little below the rail. Steerage in the bow, to judge by their jackets; they were in for a good soaking. The real spies were second class, a score or more in coats amidships, de Witt and his companions among them, the priest the colour of old lace. First class were handed down into the stern.

‘Steady with my medical bag,’ Dilger shouted to the crewman offering it to him on a safety line. ‘There are bottles… steady, steady…’

He could hear the glass tinkling. Pray God they wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between one phial and another.

THE GRILLE SLID back with an emphatic clunk.

‘Lieutenant Wolff?’

‘Who the devil are you?’

A jangling of keys and after a few seconds the cell door swung open.

‘Fitzgerald. I’m to take you to London.’ He looked fresh out of school, a good school naturally, one with a tie that the doorman at the Ritz would recognise and with old friends in Whitehall.

‘Call me de Witt here, and keep your voice down.’

Fitzgerald blushed. ‘Sorry.’

‘Where are you holding the rest?’ he asked, gathering his jacket from the bench.

‘Most of them are still at the harbour Clock House.’

Wolff stopped at the door to look him in the eye: ‘Make sure they’re unpleasant to the priest, will you? God, he deserves it. Oh, and he’s carrying letters from Casement in the lining of his cassock — he rustles like a pig in straw. Tell them to ignore those.’

They caught the one o’clock from Ramsgate Station. Fitzgerald found an unoccupied carriage and wanted to talk ‘tradecraft’. He was too impressed, too Boy Scout — they’d all been like that once. ‘Learn on the job,’ C used to say, and it wasn’t a problem before the war — except for Turkey; you couldn’t make a mistake there.

‘Chuck it, will you, I’m tired,’ Wolff declared, settling into his corner.

Fitzgerald woke him as the train rattled across the Thames.

‘Fine view of the Court. Look, I say…’ he turned from the window to Wolff with a diffident smile. ‘Do you mind if I ask you one thing — why did he do it? I met him once, you know.’

‘Why did who do what?’

‘Roger Casement.’

Wolff lifted his briefcase from the rack. The trunk was still on the ship; the last of Mr de Witt — dress coat, three pairs of black shoes, two of brown, six white shirts, four aggressively American suits. Poor man, lost to the bloody British, the colonial oppressor. The first thing he was going to do now he was home was get rid of the beard.

‘He came to stay at our house in Ireland, you see,’ Fitzgerald continued. ‘I liked him, admired him.’

‘Has the Chief sent a car to the station?’

Wolff hated Cumming’s club. It reminded him of a mausoleum, pompously ornate in the Venetian style, of the last century, a waiting room for old soldiers, some old sailors, a gallery for dusty weapons and portraits of Empire officers who had won their battle honours against spear-carrying tribesmen. Not a place where the ‘temporary gentlemen’ of the new armies were made to feel welcome: it suited C perfectly. The staff knew how to look after a fellow like C.

The porter took their coats and hats and arranged for a footman to escort them up the stairs to a private room on the first floor.

‘My dear chap, come in, come in,’ C bellowed, struggling to rise from a low chair. ‘We’re the reception committee. You look exhausted. Are you hungry, some sandwiches? Beef all right? And something to drink… see to it, Fitzgerald, will you.’ He advanced on his sticks to offer his hand. ‘Congratulations. Jolly fine work,’ and his voice shook a little. A good lunch, thought Wolff.

‘Sit down,’ C said. ‘Let’s begin. We haven’t much time.’

‘Oh?’

‘You know Admiral Hall.’

Yes, Wolff knew Hall; he’d served under ‘Blinker’ in Naval Intelligence. Naval aristocracy: his father had been director too. Bloody old Blinker.

‘Well done, Wolff,’ Hall said, peremptory as ever. He reminded Wolff of a Jack Russell. Short, balding, mid forties, never still, eyes darting about the room suspiciously, always blinking.

‘The bank told me you were alive,’ C remarked, easing back into his chair. ‘Good hotel, wasn’t it?’

‘Prices in Berlin keep rising,’ Wolff replied with a wry smile. They’d directed him to the leather couch, face to face like a review board, just the Persian rug and the empty grate between them. ‘Did you say there was a drink?’ he asked.

‘The report you left with Agent T in Amsterdam — you mentioned a brigade…’

‘I don’t trust Tinsley.’

‘Too late to worry about him,’ interjected Hall impatiently. ‘This brigade?’

‘It won’t come to anything.’

‘And a rising?’

‘I can’t be sure. He hears everything second hand, you see. My guess, for what it’s worth, not this year.’

‘Second hand?’

‘All his news of Ireland comes through America. I’ll help myself, shall I?’ he asked, gesturing to a bottle on the mantelpiece.

‘You’re forgetting yourself, Wolff.’ Blinker was losing his temper; it happened quite often.

‘Forgetting myself is how I stay alive, sir.’

They watched him pour a whisky. A few minutes later Fitzgerald returned with a plate of sandwiches and a bottle of the club claret. Then Wolff told them of Casement’s failure in the camps and of his fairy-tale hope that recruits for his brigade would be found in America. The Germans were using him for propaganda, he said. When the time came, they would let him have a few rifles for his rising, but they didn’t expect it to come to anything. ‘No, they don’t have much faith in the Irish.’ He paused to light a cigarette. ‘Actually, Casement says he isn’t sure they want a rising.’

C grunted incredulously: ‘Why on earth not?’

‘He says the Germans are like us — like him…’ Wolff gestured with his cigarette to the portrait of a cavalry colonel in foreign parts, hanging over the chimneypiece. ‘At first he believed they were enemies of the British Empire — God Save Ireland the same as God Save Germany. He’s very religious.’

‘Bloody fool,’ barked Hall. ‘Realises he’s made a mistake then.’

‘He’s been very low.’

C leant forward to peer at Wolff through his monocle. ‘Do you like him?’

Silence. ‘I don’t know,’ he said at last. ‘Does it matter?’

‘No, it bloody well doesn’t.’ Hall shifted restlessly in his chair. ‘What matters is that we bring him down… anything, letters, bad habits, vices — women, does he drink? Anything useful…’

Wolff thought of Christensen.

‘Well?’

‘Only what I’ve told you,’ he replied coldly.

‘Sure?’ There was a glint of steel in C’s eyes.