Dennis Wheatley - Traitors' Gate

Up in Wales, Gregory was favoured with July sunshine, but even in the private wing of the big house there was little real privacy, and it was difficult for Erika to free herself from the work of administration as long as she remained under the same roof as the hospital. Earlier in the year while he had been a permanent resident, he had not minded that, but now it irked him; so they decided to spend the weekend at Llandudno.

The trip was not a success. Owing to petrol rationing they had to go by train and were then tied to the town. At the hotel in which they stayed the wartime food was abominable and even indifferent drink obtainable only at extortionate prices. To add insult to injury a bottle of champagne that Gregory bought from a wine merchant on the Saturday morning, for them to drink up in their bedroom that night, proved when opened as happens occasionally for no known reason with the best of brands to be badly corked.

They were both glad to get back to Gwaine Meads; but there their only out-of-doors escape from patients and nurses was to take picnics in the woods, and the weather suddenly went bad on them. As Gregory was now looking forward with cheerful anticipation to his mission, all this increased his impatience to be on his way to Budapest. About that he endeavoured to conceal his feelings from Erika; but she knew him so well that she sensed and resented it, with the result that they had few really happy hours during their last days together.

On Tuesday, August 4th, he took the last train back to London. First thing the following morning he rang up Sir Pellinore, who told him to pack a bag and come to Carlton House Terrace. On his arrival in the library there shortly after eleven o'clock, the elderly Baronet told him to open a quart' of champagne that was standing ready in an ice bucket. As soon as they had taken their first swig out of the silver tankards, Sir Pellinore said:

'Your terms of reference are simply to spy out the land find out if the anti German feeling in Hungary is strong enough for us to make practical use of it. There would be no point in your trying to act as a go-between with any anti Nazi elements you may come across until the F.O. and the State Department have fully considered the whole question. But if the report you bring back is favourable, you may be sent out again to open secret negotiations.' Having taken another good swig at his champagne, Sir Pellinore went on: 'You'll be leavin' on Friday by the weekly diplomatic plane that serves our Embassy in Berne; so I thought you might as well spend your last two nights here. From Switzerland you'll proceed under your own steam by whatever route you think best. I've got devilish little information for you to go on, though. The fellers I've talked to all say their Hungarian files are hopelessly out of date.'

'Our spies can't be up to much then,' Gregory remarked, lighting a Sullivan.

'That's not the trouble. We haven't got any there.'

'Why on earth not?'

'One of the results of the MacDonald, Baldwin and Chamberlain Governments, all cheeseparing so idiotically on the Secret Service funds in the years before the war. What little money there was all had to go on the highest priorities Germany and Russia. Funds were so short that, as we had an alliance with the French, we left it to them to keep tabs on Nazi activities in North Africa; so when the French ratted on us we hadn't even got a skeleton setup there.'

'Chamberlain's shortcomings are ancient history now, though; and the M.I. shows have been on a war footing for close on three years.'

'Oh, they haven't lacked money since September '39. I was only explaining why we had no organ grinders in Budapest. And we haven't been at war with Hungary that long, you know. We didn't declare war on Hungary, Finland and Romania until last December.'

'Even so, I should have thought seven months was time enough to get something going.'

Sir Pellinore shrugged his great shoulders. 'I doubt if we' should ever have declared war against these Nazi satellites at all unless Joe Stalin had pressed us to and trained spies can't be got just by putting an advertisement in The Times. We've still probably only about one to every dozen employed by Himmler. With so much ground to cover, it would be a waste to send good men to places where the odds are all against our ever undertaking military operations. Anyway, I've drawn a blank about what's going on there apart from a digest of the stuff that has appeared in the newspapers.'

'How about an identity and a passport?'

'That's all fixed up. I didn't do it through the old firm, though. I'm told that they perform miracles to keep us in the know about the enemy's Order of Battle, but in other ways it's far from being the show it was when the little Admiral ran it. There's a new firm that specializes in sabotage, but its people bring home a lot of stuff, and its Chief is much more of a live wire. Been parachuted into Hitler's Europe himself at least half a dozen times. You're to report to him at ten thirty tomorrow morning.'

'Good. I must say I would have liked to have someone reliable whom I could contact, just to get the lie of the land; but if Hungary is now like darkest Africa to the professionals, I must go native and hope for the best.'

'Oh, I can give you a few names to start the ball rollin'. Old friends of mine. Now that our countries are at war they may not be willing to give you their active help. But they'll still observe the decencies. If you say you're a friend of mine they wouldn't dream of turning you over to the police. There's Istvan Lujza. He was a Cabinet Minister in the last years of the old Emperor. And Prince Gyorgy Hunyadi. He owns the finest partridge shoot in Hungary; probably in the world. Then there's Mihaly Zapolya. Never forget one night when we got tight together and shot out half the lights on the Franz Joseph Embankment. What a lark! That's years ago, of course; but wars don't make any difference to friendship between people with whom you've done that sort of thing.'

Next morning Gregory took a taxi to a big block of offices a quarter of a mile north of Oxford Street. It was a hive of activity and, judging from its entrance, passageways and lift, it appeared to be staffed almost entirely with pretty girls. Most of them were in the uniform of the F.A.N.Y. but quite a number wore smart civilian clothes. When they addressed each' other they spoke with the accent of Mayfair but, as they passed Gregory in short stages from the door up to the General's office, they were none the less brisk and efficient for that.

The General proved to be a small, dark, wiry man. Instead of the slacks usually worn by officers in London, or the ugly battledress which had been brought in only with the object of making officers less conspicuous in the field, he was turned out with the impeccable correctness of a staff officer in the First World War. The sight of his beautifully cut riding breeches and highly polished field boots in combination with the parachute badge on his arm made Gregory's heart warm towards him, and within a few minutes they were talking together like old friends.

When they got down to business, the General said: 'Sir Pellinore tells me that you speak both German and French well enough to pass as a native of either country. As you must know, owing to centuries of Austrian domination the Magyars have an hereditary hatred for everything German; so I think you would stand a much better chance of winning their confidence if you clocked in as a Frenchman. Diplomatic relations between France and Hungary have never been severed. With a Vichy passport you should be able to go in and out freely whenever you wish.'

'Excellent,' Gregory nodded. 'I like that idea. There must be plenty of Frenchmen carrying Vichy passports who are de Gaullists at heart; so nobody will think it particularly odd if, when sounding them out, I express views uncomplimentary to the Nazis.'