Simon Tolkien - Orders from Berlin

‘What happened-’, Trave began, but the man held up his hand.

‘All in good time,’ he said. Then, appearing to take pity on Trave’s obvious desperation, he added: ‘Mr Seaforth is dead, and so is Mr Thorn. The Prime Minister survived the attack.’

‘Thank God,’ said Trave.

‘Indeed,’ said the man, inclining his head.

‘Who are you?’ Trave asked.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ said the man, and went out, locking the door behind him.

Trave wrote. Sheet after sheet, not leaving anything out, from the night of Albert Morrison’s murder to the final death-defying drive to Downing Street. And when he was finished, he rang the bell.

And later, much later, the man in the glasses returned and talked to him for what seemed like hours, pressing him on this point and questioning him on that until Trave’s head ached and he couldn’t be sure any more about what was true and what was not. On and on, until abruptly, without any warning, the man got up, gathered all the papers off the table, and opened the door.

‘You’re free to go,’ he said.

‘Go?’ repeated Trave, temporarily bowled over by the unexpected turn of events.

‘Yes, and free to report for work in the morning, which is not something you’ve been used to doing recently, I think,’ the man observed with a faint smile.

Next morning, on the stroke of nine o’clock, Trave arrived in his office at Scotland Yard. Quaid was waiting for him, looking apoplectic. ‘How dare you!’ he shouted before Trave had had a chance to sit down. ‘Going against everything I tell you to do — making a fool of me, creating a national security incident outside 10 Downing Street. The north of Scotland’s too good for you. You’ll wish you’d never been born by the time I’m finished with you …’

Quaid paused for breath, but a knock on the door stopped him from finishing his tirade.

‘Sorry to interrupt, sir,’ said Twining, ‘but the commissioner wants to see you.’

‘Now?’

‘Yes. And Detective Trave too.’

‘Looks like you’re in even bigger trouble than I thought,’ said Quaid with a mean smile.

Trave had never met the commissioner, a retired air vice marshal with a reputation for hard work and discipline, and certainly feared the worst as he and Quaid waited to be called in. The brittle confidence he’d gained from being given his freedom by the anonymous government official the previous evening had evaporated under Quaid’s broadside.

The commissioner, a tall, straight-backed man with a thin, ascetic face and a beaklike nose, didn’t look up when they came in but instead instructed them with a wave of his hand to sit while he finished reading a densely written document that Trave recognized as his own handiwork of the night before.

Quaid stirred impatiently in his seat. ‘This is a bad business, Commissioner,’ he said.

‘Is it?’ said the commissioner, looking up and fixing his sharp eyes on Quaid.

‘Yes,’ said Quaid. ‘Detective Trave here has disobeyed my direct orders not once but repeatedly. He’s undermined a murder investigation-’

‘And most likely saved an innocent man from the gallows,’ interrupted the commissioner fiercely. ‘I know what Detective Trave has done. It’s what you’ve done that I’m concerned with here.’

‘Me?’ said Quaid, not understanding.

‘Yes, you. As I understand it, you’ve obtained a confession from a murder suspect by withholding critical information from him in interview and, even worse, refused to investigate a man who should have been a focus of the investigation. Have you anything to say about that?’

Quaid opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. His face was flushed and he appeared to be having difficulty breathing. He was clearly overwhelmed by the sudden unexpected turn of the conversation.

‘Very well,’ said the commissioner, looking at Quaid with revulsion. ‘You can save anything you’ve got to say for the disciplinary hearing. In the meantime, you’re suspended. Now, get out.’

Quaid got unsteadily to his feet and darted a look of hatred at Trave. He seemed about to say something, then apparently thought better of it. The commissioner waited until the door had closed and then turned to Trave.

‘I’m promoting you to detective sergeant and you’re to take over Inspector Quaid’s duties while we look for a replacement,’ he said. ‘Can you do that?’

Trave nodded.

‘Oh, and the PM wants to see you — to thank you in person, I expect. His office will tell you when.’ The commissioner got up and came round his desk to shake Trave’s hand. ‘You’ve done damned well, Detective,’ he said. ‘This whole country owes you a debt of gratitude. I’m proud of you.’

A week later, on a cold, bright October day, Trave walked across St James’s Park and met Ava at the foot of the Clive Steps. They presented the official passes they had received with their invitations to the Royal Marine on duty outside the Number 10 Annexe and climbed the stairs to Churchill’s new residence. Continued bombing around Downing Street had left the prime minister with no option but to move to the new location with its reinforced walls and steel shutters.

He greeted them at the door, coming forward with an outstretched hand. ‘Mr Trave, Mrs Brive, I have been looking forward to this moment. It is not often that a man can invite to lunch not just one person who has saved his life, but two. I shall forever be in your debt.’

He ushered them into a small dining room hung with pretty landscape paintings, all of which Trave afterwards realized must have been painted by Churchill himself, and poured them glasses of champagne. He was dressed immaculately in a dark suit and bow tie, and the dinner service laid out on the starched white tablecloth was clearly the best.

‘Thank you,’ he said, raising his glass to each of them in turn and looking them in the eye. ‘You are heroes, both of you. I have recommended you both for decorations and Alec Thorn too. You know he fell on Seaforth when he heard you shouting and that gave me time to get my pistol and fire? As St John said, “Greater love has no one than this: that he lay down his life for his friends.”’

Trave could tell that Churchill, the man of letters, enjoyed using the quotation, but he also knew with certainty that it had occurred to Churchill spontaneously as he spoke. There was nothing rehearsed about the Prime Minister. He spoke entirely from the heart.

‘I only met Thorn twice, but I think that above all he was a patriot,’ said Trave, slowly, trying to find the right words. ‘And if it is any comfort to you, I believe that he would have welcomed death if he knew it was to help his country.’

‘Yes, that does help,’ said Churchill, eyeing Trave keenly. ‘It is something I feel too. And what about you, Mrs Brive?’ he asked, turning to Ava. ‘Did you know him?’

‘Since I was quite a little girl,’ she said sadly. ‘He was always there, and so it’s hard to realize he’s not any more.’

Churchill nodded. ‘These are hard times and we are being sorely tested. Sometimes I feel in the grip of the black dog of despair, and then there are other days like today when I am full of hope. But we must persevere — it is the courage to continue that counts.’ He smiled and quite unexpectedly burst into song: ‘“Keep right on to the end of the road, keep right on to the end. Tho’ the way be long, let your heart be strong, keep right on round the bend.” Old Harry Lauder wrote that after his son died in 1916 and I remember the troops singing it in the trenches. It was very moving when you saw what they were up against.’

‘Your troops?’ asked Trave.

‘No, it was when I went out to visit them, after I’d left Flanders and gone back to politics. But I know who you’re thinking about — it’s Seaforth’s brother, isn’t it? The poor boy I court-martialled and sent to his death?’