Gavin Lyall - Spy’s Honour

“And lawyers and courts and newspapers, hey?” the Secretary said shrewdly. “Well I won’t say the Navy hasn’t done that before. But who are your superiors? Who are you, come to that?”

“Oh, I’m just a Gunner, pure and simple,” Ranklin said, wishing it were true. “This is just one of those odd tasks; I was spare, between appointments …”

“Hmmm. I expect you’ll be glad to get back to your pure and simple gunnery. If I may take advantage of my age and give some advice, don’t let them – whoever they are – get you too mixed up in these sorts of carry-ons. There’s altogether too much of it about these days, spying and so on. We may need it in India and Ireland, too, sometimes, but it’s got nothing to do with honest-to-God soldiering and sailoring. We’re in clean, honourable professions and it’s our duty to keep ’em that way. And if they want spies, let ’em comb the jails for such people.”

Like most landlocked sailors (and deskbound soldiers, to be fair) the Secretary talked a strong line in blood and thunder. But Ranklin mostly agreed with him. He nodded and said: “Oh, quite, absolutely,” with sincerity, then asked: “Can you tell me what the arrangements are for the Maggie Gray when she arrives?”

“She’ll unload at Haulbowline – that’s the berths on the dockyard island in the bay.”

“Is that normal routine?”

“Oh yes. Most Naval stores go ashore there, most of them are distributed to our ships by tender anyway. That’s how the ammunition will get to your forts: they’re the devil’s own job to reach by land; the roads here aren’t made for lorries, especially in winter.”

Ranklin could well believe that, but still found it odd that the Navy’s first thought when moving something was to do it by sea, even over a few hundred yards. But it left a delicate problem.

“This may sound absurd, sir, but unloading at the island and so on – it doesn’t give anybody much opportunity to interfere.”

The Secretary raised his eyebrows and smiled. “Do you want them to have a chance? Yes, I suppose you do, if you want to catch one of them. But the matter of safety has to come first, and since we’re talking of five hundred tons of ammunition – ”

“Almost impossible to turn into bombs. Though, of course, the Fenians might not be expert enough to realise that.”

“Quite possibly, but suppose their plan is just to set the ship on fire? D’you want a blazing ammunition ship along the quayside by the town down there? You can’t expect us to take any risk of that.”

Ranklin nodded glumly. He had realised from the start that he could fail, but knowing nothing of the routines here could not see in detail why he would fail, so he hadn’t felt too depressed. But now he saw precisely how.

Only that meant that the ambushers should fail for just the same reason, and they must have known the unloading routine here when they made their plan. And a mere explosion – however unmere it might be considered as an explosion – didn’t sound like the ambition of the man he was after.

He was in a tricky situation. “If,” he said cautiously, “an attempt is to be made, is it possible that the Fenians know something that, er – I don’t?”

“Quite impossible.” Then the Secretary realised he had said that too quickly, and added: “Of course, I can’t tell just how much you do know.”

“When you say ‘impossible’ do you mean there is something, but you think it’s impossible that they should have found it out?”

The Secretary gave him a cold and senior look. But Ranklin was thinking of the rest of the dinner party leaving in a bunch, perhaps with a purpose that wasn’t the Commander’s “night’s repose”. “Could it be,” Ranklin ploughed on, “that you expect the Maggie Gray a good deal earlier than I’ve been led to believe?”

“If so,” the Secretary said blandly, “it would be earlier than certain others have been led to believe as well.”

You bloody old fool, Ranklin thought; didn’t you realise that the very existence of a plan to ambush the ship means they’ve got a source of information inside your dockyard? And if you haven’t caught that source, you’ve no idea what information it’s passing on.

With careful calm, he said: “We – and I include my London superiors – are all on the same side.”

“But our aims are different, it seems. I want to save Queenstown from being blown off the face of the earth, you want to catch a particular man. You wouldn’t care to tell me just why capturing him is so important to you – and to whoever your real superiors are?” He smiled a superior smile and puffed on his cigar. “No, I rather thought not. I’m afraid, Captain, that matters will just have to rest there.”

Only matters didn’t, because at that moment three men stepped quietly from behind the curtains covering the French windows. They carried, respectively, a shotgun, a pistol and a rifle.

“If ye’ll be keepin’ quiet, gentlemen,” the one with the shotgun said, “we’ll be doing jest the same.” And he patted the shotgun barrels. He had a long face, mostly hidden by a tangle of black moustache and beard, and wore a short seaman’s jacket over whipcord breeches. As his glance searched Ranklin he seemed to hesitate, frowning, and Ranklin had the absurd idea that they had met somewhere before.

The man with the rifle moved quickly to check the doors to the dining room and corridor; the third man made sure the curtains were properly closed, then turned, and Ranklin certainly knew him, although only from photographs: the man he had come to Queenstown to collect.

Then the Secretary decided he owed it to his age and rank to say something useless: “What the devil d’you think you’re …”

“Be quiet, Admiral,” the man with the pistol – Peter, as Ranklin was thinking of him – said with a faint accent.

The shotgun man chuckled. “Ah, he’s no admiral. But he should be knowing how many’s in the house.”

“If you think …” the Secretary began.

“Tell them,” Ranklin said. “It’ll be safer for the servants.”

“Yer a wise man.” But the dark eyes under the matted black hair were still puzzled about Ranklin.

The count came out as the butler, a footman and a kitchen maid; the cook lived out and the Admiral’s servant and his wife’s maid had gone to Dublin with them. That sounded right to Ranklin, and he let his nod of agreement show.

At a word from Peter, the man with the rifle laid it aside – cautiously; he wasn’t used to firearms – and began searching them. He was young, not yet twenty, Ranklin guessed, and probably very scared under his aggressive pose; that made him dangerous. Then he found Ranklin’s card case, opened it, and read out his rank and name.

The shotgun man gave a little satisfied grunt, then: “And now put it back. It’s got a badge on it, d’ye want that and the story of it showin’ in the pawnshop window?”

Reluctantly the younger man handed the case back. “And if he’s a captain, where’s his uniform? A spy, more like.”

“Sure, sure,” the other soothed. “And carryin’ his cards and eatin’ at the Big House for disguise.” He smiled through his beard at Ranklin.

So he knows me, and knows I can’t remember him, Ranklin thought. But he doesn’t want to announce that; could there be an advantage to me there?

Then Peter took charge. “You will go and imprison the servants. Here, I am on guard.” He was both taller and younger than Ranklin and held his sharp-faced head with a high, nervous pride. His dark hair and moustache were neatly trimmed, and when he stripped off his shabby overcoat he was wearing evening dress and, more surprisingly, a crusting of elaborate foreign decorations and honours.