Dennis Wheatley - Traitors' Gate

He could only console himself a little with the thought that, anyhow, a fortnight's holiday in Budapest with good food and good cheer to be had for the asking would be a most pleasant change after the dreariness of London. As he entered the hall of the hotel, he was thinking that for dinner he would order that famous Hungarian dish, chicken stewed with rice and red peppers. He was not expecting any letters so would have walked straight through had not one of the porters called to him from behind the desk, 'Excuse me, sir!'

When he crossed to the desk the man handed him back his passport and with it a cheap looking envelope addressed to M. le Commandant Tavenier. Tearing the envelope open, he gave a swift glance at the single sheet of paper that it contained. It was a typed note from the French Consul General to the effect that information having been received from the police of M. le Commandant Tavenier's arrival in Budapest, it was requested that within twenty-four hours he would attend at 17. Fo-utca in order that his stay in the Hungarian capital might be regularized.

This was something for which Gregory had not bargained. No doubt it was only a routine matter; but all the same he had an uneasy feeling that having to make his number with the Vichy authorities might, sooner or later, land him in just the sort of tricky situation he was very anxious to avoid.

A Sinister Figure

Chapter 6

On the following morning Gregory took a cab across the river to 17. Fo-utca and handed the porter at the door the summons he had received. The porter was a Hungarian and after a glance at the letter announced its bearer in bad French over a house telephone to some invisible person. He then showed Gregory into a small sunless room. It was furnished with the sparse economy typical of French officialdom, and occupied only by a dark-haired middle-aged woman. With a cigarette dangling from her lower lip she was thumbing through some dog-eared papers on the narrow desk before her. As he came into the room she gestured towards a wooden bench against one wall, then took no further notice of him.

After sitting there for ten minutes his patience began to wear thin, and he was just about to demand that she did something about him, when a door behind her opened and over her head a tall man gave him a swift scrutiny.

Returning the glance, Gregory was far from favourably impressed by the man's appearance. He was wearing a dark blue suit with a stiff white collar, out of which arose a scrawny neck, surmounted by a hollow cheeked face, a long narrow nose, eyes with liverish pouches beneath them and an almost bald head, that together gave him some resemblance to a vulture. With a slight inclination of his bony skull, this sinister looking individual said:

'Monsieur le Commandant, my name is Cochefert. I regret to have had to trouble you to come here, but there are just a few formalities… Please to come in.'

Gregory followed him into a somewhat larger but equally bleak room. Monsieur Cochefert gave him a hard chair and sat down in another behind a bare table piled high with bundles of documents. Drawing a printed form towards him and picking up an old fashioned steel nibbed pen, he asked:

'May I have the object of your visit to Budapest?'

Had Gregory been less experienced in such matters he would have been tempted to reply, 'We are not on French soil, so you have no authority here. My business has nothing to do with you, and you can go to the devil.' But he was much too old a hand needlessly to antagonize any official; so, with pleasant memories of the charming and helpful Diana, he said quite amiably:

'I own a truffle farm in Perigord and I have come here to investigate the possibility of supplying Hungarian" foie-gras makers with truffles after the war.'

'Indeed!' Cochefert raised eyebrows having so few hairs in them that they were only just perceptible. 'That sounds a idea. The pate made here is excellent, but could be much improved by the introduction of truffles.' As he made a note on the form, Gregory saw that it already had on it Tavenier's home address and other particulars; so the Hungarian police must have given the French Consulate a sight of his passport. To give substance to his cover story, he said:

'As a matter of fact, even if I had not had the note asking me to call here I should have done so to ask if I could be supplied with a list of the names and addresses of the principal foie-gras manufacturers.'

'Strictly speaking, that is a matter for our Commercial Attaché at the Embassy, the Frenchman replied, 'but I will telephone him and ask for a list to be sent to you.'

Gregory made a little bow. 'Monsieur is most kind.'

'It is a pleasure. May I ask how long you intend to stay in Budapest?'

'For about a fortnight.'

'Good. I see that you obtained your visa for Hungary in Switzerland; so I take it you broke your journey there?'

T have been living there for the past three months. Fortunately I am fairly well off and investments that I have there enable me to do so in reasonable comfort. I find it much more congenial than France, now that our poor country has fallen into such a sad state.'

'That is very understandable. I, too, am glad to escape the annoyances and privations suffered by everyone in France these days, and I hope to retain my post here until the end of the war. Talking of the war Monsieur le Commandant, at your age you must have been with your regiment in 1939. I would be interested to hear how you fared?'

'My battalion formed part of General Blanchard's Army of the North,' replied Gregory promptly. 'As you will know, it was trapped with the British in Belgium and the greater part of it was killed or captured. But several thousand troops of General de la Laurencie's IIIrd Corps were taken off from Dunkirk, and I was lucky enough to be among them.'

T see, and you opted to return to France?'

Gregory shook his head. 'No; I was one of those who favoured fighting on. Later, like many others, I realized the futility of doing so. Most of them are still stuck in England, but I had the good fortune to get away. I was posted as an Interpreter to one of the Commando units that took part in the St. Nazaire raid last March. Soon after I got ashore I took advantage of the smoke and confusion to slip away and look for a good hiding place. I went to earth in a grain warehouse on the docks and I had brought sufficient iron rations in my haversack to last me several days. When the excitement had died down I took a chance with a dock foreman. He brought me a suit of civilian clothes and I had enough francs for my railway fare; so four days after the raid I was back at Razac the village in Perigord where I own the chateau.'

Cochefert nodded his vulture like head, and sighed. 'Ah, Monsieur le Commandant, this war is not like other wars. It has set brother against brother; and often left gallant officers such as yourself no alternative but to adopt such means as you describe to save their honour and the honour of France.'

'Yes; the honour of France,' Gregory repeated piously.

It was the sanctimonious phrase which sprang to the lips of many Frenchmen in those days; in most cases to disguise from themselves the fact that they had been led by their military idol, old Marshal Petain, into deserting their ally and entering into a pact with Hitler.

On this they both stood up, remained silent for a moment as though paying tribute to the memory of some highly respected friend who had recently died, then shook hands. It seemed then that Monsieur Cochefert had no further questions to ask for, after exchanging punctilious salutations with his visitor, he showed him out to the front door.

Back in the sunlit street, Gregory felt that he had dealt with a possibly dangerous business very successfully. The line that he had at first thrown in his lot with the Free French but later 'seen the light' was, he thought, a nice artistic touch; and the foie-gras story could not have gone down better. Cochefert might lack most of those physical attributes which would have made him the answer to a maiden's prayer, but he had fulfilled his tiresome function in a friendly spirit and appeared to be entirely satisfied.