Andrew Williams - The Poison Tide

The following day, they went shopping on Broadway, and the day after, Wolff heard her speak at a women’s suffrage meeting and lost his temper when a couple of Christmas drunks had the temerity to heckle.

‘We’re having dinner with Laura’s father — the Catholic Club of all places,’ he confided to Thwaites when they met at the safe apartment. ‘New territory for me.’

‘Oh? Business or pleasure?’ Thwaites enquired slyly.

‘I’m fond of her,’ he said, rising to pour another drink; ‘so, yes — pleasure and a little business. I’m enjoying New York. Don’t you think I deserve that?’ He brandished the bottle. ‘For you?’

Thwaites shook his head. ‘She may be spying on you.’

Head bent, forefinger to his lip, he grappled with this thought for a moment: ‘She’s not duplicitous. But indirectly — yes, it’s possible. Who knows what her Clan comrades ask about me? I expect they’re like us.’ He smiled and raised his drink in an ironic salute.

‘Won’t give you C’s lecture, because you gave it to me,’ Thwaites replied, contemplating Wolff over the rim of his glass. ‘Just hope you know what you’re doing.’

‘Oh, I do,’ he lied. Then, as a sop, ‘She’s my only way into Irish circles here, and if the Germans kick off another campaign…’

But as soon as he floated the thought he was angry with himself — it wasn’t how he wanted their friendship to be.

‘I say, are you listening?’ Thwaites pushed his leg playfully with the end of his stick. ‘I’m telling you about your old friend, Hinsch.’ He ignored Wolff’s sigh. ‘He’s back in Baltimore. Hilken too. Missing Martha’s tarts, I dare say. Oh, Christ!’ he exclaimed. ‘Fucking Turks.’ He was struggling to rise from his chair — ‘Sorry about the language, old boy’ — perspiring with the effort and pain.

‘And you want me to make the contact.’

‘I think my leg’s worse today,’ he muttered, leaning heavily on his stick. ‘We’re pulling out of Gallipoli, you know. Such a mess. Awful bloody mess.’

‘What do you want, Norman?’ Wolff stood up and walked over to the drinks tray.

‘Another gin.’ He slumped back in his armchair. ‘I’m so damn stiff. Must be the cold.’

‘I mean, Hinsch,’ said Wolff, thrusting a glass at him.

‘Sir William wants to know what you think.’

‘What I think?’ Gazing down at Thwaites, his hands in his trouser pockets, easy because for once no one else’s opinion mattered: ‘I think — wait. It’s too soon to do anything — they’re still looking for a spy. The Irish know I’m here so the Germans will know too.’ Reflecting for a moment: ‘Dr Albert’s still in New York?’

‘Pretending to be the perfect guest.’

‘He would be my first contact again.’

‘When will you try? The thing is, Sir William has to tell London.’

‘I’m sure C’s first thought will be for my safety,’ Wolff observed with mordant sarcasm. ‘Tell him what you like.’

Thwaites shook his head disapprovingly, pulled at his ear, shifted restlessly, sipped his drink, then smiled brightly, like a burst of winter sunshine: ‘After Christmas then.’

Wolff was guilty of a small injustice. As C pushed his Rolls from village to village his thoughts often turned to Wolff and his business in America, in particular the troubling text of a signal intercept in the briefcase beside him.

The officer prisoners at Donington called their camp ‘the zoo’, but to Cumming’s eye it was something closer to a palace. He didn’t hold with the mollycoddling of the enemy’s young gentlemen. The commandant was a fusspot called Picot, no longer fit for active duty. But after bitter coffee and the usual conversation about the war, he had the decency to surrender his office and a roaring fire. Cumming waited with his back to it, pondering whether he should attempt the interview in his indifferent German. From the lawn in front of the hall, excited English and German voices and the thump of a football reminded him of the ceasefire in no-man’s-land the previous Christmas. By order there would be no fraternisation with the enemy this year and, after so many thousands more casualties, who would wish to attempt it?

There was a sharp knock at the door and it was opened unbidden by the prisoner. Captain von Rintelen cut a less imposing figure than Cumming had imagined from the descriptions he’d been given, but his smug smile suggested he was quite as self-regarding.

‘My name is Smith — Captain Smith,’ Cumming declared in English.

‘Like the captain of the Titanic ?’ Rintelen remarked. His handshake was limp and careless, and Cumming was startled by the strangled pitch of his voice. Taken with the spirit of the house perhaps he was dressed in a brown wool suit like a country squire. ‘You have come from Admiral Hall?’ he asked, settling in a chair at the desk. ‘How is the Admiral? I enjoyed our conversations. There is a bond between naval officers, the sea, don’t you think? It is always the same. After the war we will be friends.’

‘Yes, I’m sure. As you say, the camaraderie of the sea.’ Cumming smiled benignly. ‘And I want to take a little of your time — a few small points I’m hoping to clear up.’

‘But you understand my position?’ Rintelen opened his arms and his hands in a helpless gesture. ‘I’m an officer of His Majesty’s navy, there is nothing…’

‘Yes, yes,’ Cumming interrupted. ‘Delmar, Captain, who is he?’ and dipping into the pocket of his uniform jacket he produced the square of signal paper. ‘This was sent from your embassy in Washington two days ago. It says,’ he paused, lifting it a little so he could observe Rintelen above its edge; ‘it says, “For Count Nadolny, General Staff, Section P. The Irish advise that the New York police are satisfied they have broken network. Delmar now ready to resume operations New York, New Jersey, Boston, Baltimore, Newport News. Require start date for Phase 2. Hilken estimates a cost of 25,000 dollars. Answer immediate. Hinsch.”’

Rintelen was still smiling but the corners of his mouth looked a little tighter.

‘What do you think of that, Captain?’ prompted Cumming. ‘Nadolny’s running another operation — you knew of course?’ He waited for Rintelen to speak, resuming after a few seconds when he showed no inclination to do so. ‘You’re surprised, I can see that,’ he guessed, ‘Hinsch didn’t tell you. I thought Hinsch was your man.’ He paused again. ‘Twenty-five thousand dollars. A lot of money. What do you think Delmar is going to do with it?’

Rintelen shrugged. ‘I cannot say.’

‘Guess.’

‘Go shopping on Fifth Avenue?’ Rintelen gave a yelp of laughter, but it sounded brittle.

‘I think Delmar’s network in America was more important to Berlin than yours,’ Cumming observed. Perhaps Rintelen agreed because he was uncharacteristically silent. Impossible to shut the fellow up, Admiral Hall had said, but too clever to let something of consequence slip.

‘Come on, come on.’ Cumming banged his stick down sharply on the brightly polished parquet floor. ‘Do you know Delmar or don’t you?’

‘Surely you would not expect me to say so if I did,’ he replied stiffly.

Cumming glared at him for a moment, then shuffling awkwardly through the narrow gap between the wall and the desk, lowered himself into the commandant’s chair. The football match was over and the prisoners were being summoned to lunch by handbell like the pupils at a preparatory school. Rintelen pointedly took out his pocket watch: ‘If there’s nothing more?’

‘You don’t understand your situation, Rintelen,’ Cumming snapped at him. ‘You came ashore as Emile Gaché, as a spy.’