Andrew Williams - The Poison Tide

In the corridor outside the office, the sound of breaking glass and the clatter of a tray.

‘Clumsy fool,’ Troester muttered.

‘And the Crown Prince?’ Dilger enquired. ‘Will he be invited to visit this new experimental laboratory?’

Nadolny smiled. ‘I know why you ask — and you’re right, there is a certain hypocrisy. No, it will remain secret…’ he paused, examining his nails thoughtfully. ‘But it’s part of the science of war now, whether the rest of the world is ready to acknowledge it or not. The enemy will do the same in time; he’ll have to — it’s the future.’

Troester was shuffling papers on his desk impatiently. It was too hot in his office. I’m perspiring so profusely they’ll think I’m afraid , Dilger reflected as he gazed beyond the professor to the window and the stern face of the Charité opposite. His sister had told him that the hospital was founded by the Prussian King to treat victims of the plague. But that was then; this is now, he thought. They were at the beginning of a new century, a new age.

CSENT THE new office boy to escort Wolff to London.

‘What happened to Fitzgerald?’ Wolff enquired.

‘Didn’t care for the work, sir,’ came the reply. ‘He enlisted — probably in this latest show.’

The show was the British offensive on the Somme that had begun on the first of July, just four days before. His young chaperone, Lieutenant Snow, was full of the news and confident that victory was at most weeks away. The Times correspondent in France sounded a more cautious note, describing the battle as ‘ninety miles of continuous chaos, uproar and desolation’. Just the fog of war, Snow declared, shaking the newspaper excitedly. Wolff said he would wait for it to clear. His eye had been caught by a small piece on an inside page, confirming that the King was to ‘degrade the traitor’ Roger Casement of his knighthood.

At Charing Cross Station they were held at the platform barrier while the wounded from a hospital train were loaded into ambulances. ‘Haven’t stopped,’ Wolff heard a guard grumbling to a passenger; ‘so many we’re diverting to Paddington.’ A crowd had gathered in the Strand to cheer the wounded as they swept by. Snow spent ten minutes searching for a taxicab before tentatively suggesting they leave the luggage and walk. ‘If you’re feeling strong enough, sir?’

It was the sort of hot white-sky day that made London seem drabber and oppressively close. Christ, wasn’t it good to be home, Wolff thought with a pang of regret, what with its dirty little buildings and khaki uniforms, Coleman’s and Wright’s, ‘Enlist today’ and ‘Let your conscience be your guide, boys’, while in Trafalgar Square well-heeled women shook their tins for the limbless. He longed for the shade of a canyon street and the view to the Hudson from his last apartment, and, well, lots of things it was foolish to contemplate.

They had drained the lake in St James’s Park so the Army could build barrack huts; it wasn’t the pleasant place to walk that it used to be. Soldiers showed no respect for things they couldn’t polish. Lieutenant Snow was anxious because they were late, and C was unpleasant to people who were late. Wolff trailed faithfully in his wake, very short of breath. He’d spent the daylight hours of the Atlantic crossing wrapped in a blanket on the promenade deck and his evenings brooding and drinking in his cabin. A comfortable invalid, at least; he had Sir William to thank for easing his passage.

The doorman at The Rag recognised him although it was a year since his last visit. He would have made a good spy. Cumming was waiting in the same private room, with its guns and spears and portraits of Empire soldiers. Advancing with just one stick now and a broad smile of welcome — ‘Good crossing? First class, wasn’t it? Suppose you deserved it’ — peering at him through his gold monocle, in his particular way — ‘you’re thinner.’

‘Probably. Yes.’

They sat in the same leather armchairs by the hearth. ‘Did the war seem a long way from America?’ he asked.

‘Not when the Germans are trying to kill you.’

‘I meant the fighting in France. The newspapers say you could hear the guns firing for this new offensive in London. I didn’t hear them.’ He removed his monocle and inspected it for a few seconds, then slipped it back in his eye. ‘Country’s expecting a decisive victory.’ There was just the suggestion in his voice that he didn’t share the general optimism. ‘I hear there are a lot of casualties.’

Wolff nodded slowly. There was nothing he could say that wouldn’t sound either bitter or trite.

‘Sir William thinks we can expect more trouble in America,’ C continued. ‘Our lawyers say anthrax is illegal –’ he laughed grimly — ‘illegal! Be sure and tell the police, I told them. But the politicians are a-flutter. They want to know what will happen if the Germans try the same thing here — with something nastier perhaps. “What about civilians?” they ask. “I don’t know,” I say; “ask your scientists.” “You must have spies,” they say; “find out what they’re thinking” — as if it were as simple as marching another battalion over the top.’ C leant forward, his large sailor’s hands resting on top of his stick. ‘I’ve tried to understand why I find the use of these diseases so shocking.’ He sighed heavily. ‘It’s a long way from the Battle of Trafalgar, isn’t it?’

For a while neither of them spoke, C restlessly tap-tapping his stick against his shoe. Lifting his Punch-like chin at last, he asked: ‘Did Roger Casement know about the anthrax, I wonder? He put the Germans in touch with the Irish in America, didn’t he?’

‘He wouldn’t have approved.’

‘Well, Wolff, you must have a higher opinion of him than the rest of us,’ C remarked tartly. ‘Count Nadolny was handling both Casement and Dilger. So I think we can assume…’

‘Another reason to hang him, I suppose?’

‘I don’t think we need another reason.’ Cumming was fidgeting, trying to keep his temper. ‘Ironic that you were betrayed by the same man, don’t you think — that Norwegian sodomite Christensen.’

Wolff shook his head a little. ‘Actually, I’m glad. It was a relief.’

‘You’re a strange fish. Did you know Casement was like that, by the way?’

‘No,’ he lied.

‘I don’t think I believe you.’ C bent his head to one side, gazing at him thoughtfully. ‘We will hang him, you know. How do you feel about that?’

‘Does it matter how I feel?’

‘No, not really, I suppose. There’s a lot of bitterness, you see. They — we — put him on a pedestal, didn’t we? No one’s inclined to be forgiving, not the way the war’s going — and not with Irishmen dying in khaki for their country.’

‘I’m sure there will be plenty of his compatriots who think he’s doing the same.’

‘There may be some, yes,’ he conceded. ‘Not sure they’ll feel the same when they hear about his proclivities.’

‘Why would they?’

He looked awkward, even shifty. ‘Not my business — Special Branch are handling those things. I think it…’ He hesitated, ready to say more, then thought better of it. ‘Anyway, thought you should know.’

‘Know?’

‘That they’re going to hang him.’

‘You’re very sure.’

‘Yes,’ he said firmly, ‘I am sure.’

Wolff tried to sound matter-of-fact. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘Don’t hate yourself for it, Wolff, you’re not responsible. The bloody fool should have stayed in Germany.’

There was another long silence, with C scrutinising him through his damned monocle like Reid at the hospital in Baltimore. ‘You’re battered and bruised but safe — I’m glad,’ he said, levering himself from his chair. ‘I must let you go.’ They drifted towards the door. ‘Take a few weeks’ leave. I can see you need a little more time to recover.’ Then, more jauntily, ‘And I almost forgot, you’ve been promoted — Commander Wolff. Thoroughly deserved — congratulations.’