Jack Ludlow - A Bitter Field

So for places like Cheb it was added to a series sent off with the despatch riders who distributed the bulletin to the various checkpoints and army headquarters that covered the country, and even when the bulletin was received, care had to be taken about what to act on and what to ignore, given the potential for any act to stir up trouble.

Cal was doing his exercises again when the telegram from Vince was delivered to his door and when he read it, even if it was not in code, he reckoned that it was secure, given the chances of anyone being able to read a mixture of rhyming slang, cockney and seriously colloquial English in this part of the world was zero; it took him some time to decipher the series of short sentences himself.

Hubble bubble was trouble; flown the coop simple; could be Old Bill needed no explanation and nor did done a runner; Nolan brief gone west, yours too probably, old one best took some working out; think about being on your toes did not. Trying for a meet — twelve dart finish. Will bell. Vince.

The hushed curse made no difference at all and it was exactly the reverse of what he had expected; Cal thought if anyone got into trouble it would be him and he could think of no rational explanation as to how it could be otherwise. Vince had got into some difficulty and had been forced to leave the Meran, his false passport the cause, and that put both false identities at risk. Added to that, despite being told not to, he was on his way and fast.

What to do? He could not just bale out without an explanation and Corrie had her last interview with Henlein that afternoon. Added to that, something was going to go off that night, he was certain, which almost guaranteed, though not for sure, he would be out of here within twenty-four hours anyway.

Then it struck him: only he, Vince and Peter Lanchester had known the identities they were operating under; had Peter been obliged to tell anyone at Broadway and had their names been leaked to the Czech authorities from there? Looked at from every other angle it was the only thing that made sense, but not a lot. The only other people who knew the names were Snuffly Bower and the man he used to doctor the documents and they had no idea where he was.

‘Breakfast time,’ came the breezy call as he picked up his phone.

‘Be along soon.’

‘Bring that pen of yours, I’ve got a typed draft I’d like you to look over.’

‘I’ve been promoted from interpreter to editor?’

‘Guess so.’

He was not going to rush, so he went back to his press-ups and squats, thinking, and that told him if Vince was moving he had to stay still, quite apart from the fact that he could not risk travelling on the documents he possessed. Once he had his own passport then he could make some kind of plan, until then it was best to just carry on.

Both before he went to sleep and this morning he had been thinking about what his late-night visitor had said. Either something had occurred that meant Veseli had to make a premature move, or, more worryingly for Cal, they had got him here on a false prospectus — getting him to undertake some action immediately had always been the aim!

The way to turn that down flat was easy — keep his car keys in his trouser pocket. But Cal possessed a curiosity to a greater degree than any cat. Before he left the room he put the canvas bag with the Mauser, folded tight, in the cupboard — it was not a thing to be carrying around discreetly — and downstairs he did as Veseli had asked and left the keys at reception with the requested instructions.

There was little use for his pen on Corrie’s article, it was so flattering it nearly made him choke on his fruit juice; in fact, he thought it might be too much so and it would be an interesting test of how seriously these people took themselves if they fell for it — no rational mind would, only a warped one could.

‘We still going for that spin?’

‘Of course, meet you out front in twenty.’

Standing at the desk, it suddenly occurred to him that it was here he had filled in the registration card as Barrowman. Did they give them to the Czech police? He tried to imagine one walking in to collect them and passing two Brownshirt thugs at the door. Tempted to ask he decided against it, for he could think of no way of phrasing the question that would not sound suspicious.

The first place the name Barrowman rang a bell was at a checkpoint halfway to Cheb, crossed by two foreigners that the officer in command could recall very easily — how uncommon was it to find an American female journalist in Czechoslovakia at all, or perhaps just as unusual, a foreigner, an Englishman, travelling in his homeland, who could speak German like a native, though not with an accent he could place?

With the gift of a field telephone, though frustrated by the way the traffic had to be routed on a busy network, he was through to the Ministry of the Interior within half an hour. So occupied was he that he instructed his men to be lenient about letting the stream of cars and lorries going in both directions through the barriers.

Vince, who had set off from Prague at dawn, was one of the beneficiaries and in passing he made sure they would think him Italian as he shouted, ‘ Mille grazie!’

‘ G ot him,’ Gibby Gibson cried when he came off the phone to Colonel Dolezal, before he wondered what he was getting so excited about. ‘Your friend Barrowman crossed a checkpoint going towards Karlovy Vary two days ago in the company of an American female and I have even got the make of motor he was driving.’

‘Not short of a bob or two,’ McKevitt remarked when he saw what that was. ‘A bloody Maybach Zeppelin, for Christ’s sake. Any idea who the lass was?’

‘Journalist apparently, she had accreditation papers but the name has not come through.’

‘Saturday — we must have missed him by a whisker.’

‘Rotten luck that,’ Gibson replied insincerely.

‘She had to come from Prague, Gibby.’

‘You’d think so. Most of the journos stay at the Ambassador.’ Picking up the telephone Gibson added, ‘And there can’t be too many who are female.’

Annoyingly, McKevitt was drumming his fingers on Gibson’s desk as he made the call but it did not take long to establish who the lady was and the fact that she was not presently in residence, but given Gibson was talking to reception, and not the concierge desk, that was all he got.

‘She must have left some form of contact address,’ Gibson insisted, his eyes going to the ceiling, given the time he was obliged to wait until the reply came through; they did not stay there when he was told.

McKevitt was equally surprised and he had read the latest briefing before he left London. ‘Cheb! That’s where Henlein had his headquarters, isn’t it, and that other bugger Frank?’

Gibson nodded and waited for the obvious follow-up — like what was their man doing going there? — but it did not come. Instead he picked up the phone again. ‘Should I tell Dolezal we’ve found him?’

‘No!’

‘Noel, he will have men searching hotel registration cards all over the place to no purpose. You can’t just leave him in the dark.’

‘We’ve let him think our man’s a spy. If we tell him, who will pick him up? Not us.’ Still drumming his fingers, McKevitt went into deep thought, the conclusion surprising the station chief. ‘I need a car, Gibby, and some cash.’

‘You’re going after Barrowman yourself?’

‘I am, but I doubt that’s the bastard’s real name. Tell me, what’s the situation with weapons?’

‘You mean-’

‘Look, this man is dangerous, Gibby, and he has to be stopped.’

‘From doing what, Noel?’

‘I can’t tell you.’