Munich

  It was a small bedroom looking out on to the trees in the back garden. The Venetian blind was half-down. There was a strong sickly-sweet scent of both dried and fresh flowers and of dark cinnamon-like perfumes that had dehydrated in their bottles. On the dressing table were a vase of withered roses and a bowl of yellow and purple freesias. Draped across the bed was a simple white cotton nightdress like the one Leyna had been wearing. He walked to the end of the bed and opened the door to a bathroom. He could see, through the open door opposite to Hitler’s bedroom, a jacket hanging on the back of a chair. As he retreated he took a closer look at the dressing table. A framed black-and-white photograph of a dog. A pile of notepaper with Angela Raubal in the top-left corner. A copy of the fashion magazine, Die Dame. He checked the date: September 1931.

  Leyna had been right. Once one saw it, one could not doubt it. The proximity of the room to Hitler’s, the unnatural stifling closeness, the shared bathroom, the way it had been left as a shrine, like an Egyptian burial chamber –

  Behind him he heard a noise. He stepped back quickly and closed the door. Legat was emerging from the drawing room. After glancing over his shoulder he said in a quick, quiet voice, ‘I’m afraid I have bad news – the Gestapo have the document.’

  It took Hartmann a moment to adjust his mind. He looked past Legat to the open doorway but couldn’t see anyone. He whispered, ‘When?’

  ‘Less than an hour ago. They searched my room while I was showering.’

  ‘You’re sure it’s definitely gone?’

  ‘No question of it. Paul, I’m so very sorry—’

  Hartmann held up his hand to silence him. He needed to think. ‘If it’s less than an hour, they must be looking for me. I—’

  He stopped himself. The adjutant had appeared behind Legat. He emerged from the drawing room, followed by Chamberlain and Hitler. After them came Schmidt and Dunglass. The Prime Minister was holding two small pieces of paper. He gave one to Hitler. ‘This is for you, Herr Chancellor.’

  Hitler handed it immediately to the adjutant. Now that his visitors were leaving he seemed more relaxed. ‘Doktor Schmidt begleitet Sie zu Ihrem Hotel. Ich wünsche Ihnen einen angenehmen Flug.’

  Schmidt said, ‘I will escort you back to your hotel, Prime Minister. The Führer wishes you a pleasant flight.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Chamberlain shook hands with Hitler. He looked as if he would like to make a further short speech but decided against it. The adjutant opened the front door and the Prime Minister went out on to the landing with Schmidt. Dunglass said, with an edge of sarcasm, ‘Coming, Hugh?’

  Legat knew he would never see Hartmann again. But there was nothing he could say. He nodded to him and went out after the others.

  Once the door had closed, Hitler stood staring at it for several seconds. He was rubbing the palm of his right hand with his left thumb – an unconscious action: round and round, as if he had sprained it. Finally, he noticed the press summary lying on the chair. He turned to Hartmann. ‘Is that what the foreign press are saying?’

  Hartmann said, ‘Yes, my Führer.’

  ‘Bring it in here.’

  Hartmann had been hoping to slip away. Instead he found himself following Hitler into the drawing room. The adjutant was straightening the furniture, smoothing the cushions. Hartmann handed over the press summary. Hitler fished in his breast pocket for his spectacles. From the street below came the sound of cheering. Glasses in one hand, he glanced at the window, then went over to it. He pulled back the edge of the net curtain and stared down at the crowd. He shook his head. ‘How can one make war with such a people?’ Hartmann crossed to a different window. The crowd had grown much larger in the last half-hour, once word had got out that Chamberlain was in the building. Several hundred people were lining the opposite pavement. The men were waving their hats, the women stretching out their arms. The angle made it impossible to see the Prime Minister’s car but one could tell its progress by the way people’s heads turned to follow it as he drove away.

  Hitler dropped the curtain. ‘The German population has allowed itself to be duped – and by Chamberlain of all people!’ He shook out his spectacles and put them on one-handed. He began scanning the press summary.

  Hartmann was about to move away from the window when his eye was caught by fresh activity in the street. A big Mercedes limousine roared into view and pulled up sharply opposite. Hartmann could make out Ribbentrop, and beside him Sauer. Plainly in a hurry, they jumped out and began crossing the road, looking right and left, even before their escort – a second Mercedes, carrying a quartet of SS men – had come to a stop. As Sauer waited for a truck to pass, he stared up at the apartment. Instinctively Hartmann drew back to avoid being seen.

  Hitler was flicking through the summary. In a mocking voice he read out the headline in the New York Times – Chamberlain hero of Munich crowds! – and then another sentence: The cheers for Hitler were mechanical and polite. But for Chamberlain they were ecstatic.

  In the vestibule, the entry bell rang. The adjutant left the room. Hitler threw the document on to the sofa and went over to his desk. For a second time Hartmann was left alone with him. He heard voices in the lobby. He slipped his hand inside his jacket. His fingertips touched metal. But then immediately he withdrew it. It was absurd. He was about to be arrested. Yet still he could not act. And if he couldn’t do it, who would? In that moment, in a flash of clarity, he saw that nobody – not him, not the Army, not a lone assassin – that no German would disrupt their common destiny until it was fulfilled.

  The door opened and Ribbentrop came in. Sauer was behind him. They stopped and saluted. Sauer gave Hartmann a look of violent hatred. Hartmann felt a roaring in his ears. He readied himself. Ribbentrop, however, seemed the more nervous. ‘My Führer, I am told you have just seen Chamberlain.’

  ‘He asked for a private meeting last night. I couldn’t see the harm in it.’

  ‘May I ask what he wanted?’

  ‘For me to sign a piece of paper.’ Hitler picked it up from the desk and gave it to the Foreign Minister. ‘He seemed such a harmless old gentleman. I thought it would be rude to refuse.’

  Ribbentrop’s face appeared to tauten as he read it. Of course, the Führer could not have made an error. It would be unthinkable even to suggest it. But Hartmann could sense a change of atmosphere in the room. Eventually, Hitler said irritably, ‘Oh, don’t take it all so seriously! That piece of paper is of no further significance whatsoever. The problem is here – with the German people.’

  He turned his back on them and bent to examine the papers on his desk.

  Hartmann saw his chance. With a slight bow first to the Foreign Minister and then to Sauer he withdrew towards the door. Neither attempted to stop him. A minute later he was out on the street.

  4

  The Lockheed Electra was bucketing through the low cloud that covered the English Channel. Beyond the windows there was nothing to be seen except an infinity of grey.

  Legat sat in the same rear seat he had occupied on the flight to Munich, his chin in his hand, staring out at nothing. The Prime Minister was at the front with Wilson. Strang and Malkin were in the middle. Only Ashton-Gwatkin was missing: he was still in Prague, selling the agreement to the Czechs. The atmosphere on board was exhausted, melancholy. Malkin and Dunglass were asleep. There was a hamper of food in the locker behind Legat’s seat, provided by the Regina Palast Hotel, but when Chamberlain had been told it was a present from the Germans he had given orders it was not to be touched. It didn’t matter. Nobody was hungry.

  Once again Legat could tell by the pressure in his ears when they were starting to descend. He took out his watch. It was just after five. Wilson leaned out of his seat. ‘Hugh!’ He gestured to him to come forward. ‘Gentlemen, could we talk?’

  Legat walked unsteadily to the front of the plane. Strang and Malkin shifted into the seats behind the Prime Minister. He and Dunglass had to stand with their backs to the cockpit. The plane lurched and
they knocked into one another. Wilson said, ‘I’ve been speaking to Commander Robinson. We should be on the ground in about half an hour. Apparently, there’s quite a crowd waiting for us, as you might imagine. The King has sent the Lord Chamberlain to conduct the PM directly to Buckingham Palace so that Their Majesties can convey their thanks in person. There will be a meeting of the Cabinet as soon as we get back to Downing Street.’

  The Prime Minister said, ‘Obviously, I shall have to make a statement to the cameras.’

  Strang cleared his throat. ‘May I say, Prime Minister, that I would urge you to treat any undertaking given by Hitler with the utmost caution? The actual agreement over the Sudetenland is one thing – most people will understand the reasons for that. But this other document …’ His voice trailed off.

  He was seated directly behind Chamberlain. His long face was anguished. The Prime Minister had to turn his head slightly to reply to him, and Legat registered again how stubborn he was in profile. ‘I understand the Foreign Office point of view, William. I know Cadogan, for example, believes we should treat appeasement simply as a regrettable necessity – make it clear we have no practical alternative as things stand, use it purely as an opportunity to buy time, and announce a massive programme of rearmament. Well, we are rearming massively – next year alone we shall devote more than half of all government expenditure to arms.’ And now he spoke to them all – perhaps particularly to Legat, although he could never afterwards be sure. ‘I am not a pacifist. The main lesson I have learned in my dealings with Hitler is that one simply can’t play poker with a gangster if one has no cards in one’s hand. But if I speak in such terms when we land that will simply give him the excuse to continue his belligerence. Whereas if he keeps his word – and I happen to believe he will – we will avoid war.’

  Strang persisted. ‘But what if he breaks his word?’

  ‘If he breaks it – well, then the world will see him for what he is. No one then can be in any doubt. It will unite the country and rally the Dominions in a way they simply are not at present. Who knows?’ He permitted himself a slight smile. ‘Perhaps it will even bring the Americans in on our side.’ He patted his pocket. ‘Therefore, I intend to give this joint declaration the maximum publicity as soon as we land in London.’

  It was 5.38 p.m. when the Prime Minister’s plane finally broke through the clouds and appeared above Heston Aerodrome. As the ground flickered into view, Legat could see the traffic along the Great West Road. Cars were halted for more than a mile in either direction. It had been raining heavily. Headlights reflected off the wet tarmac. A vast swarm of people, thousands upon thousands of them, was clustered at the airport gates. The Lockheed roared low over the terminal building, dropping fast. He gripped the armrests. The wheels bounced on the grass runway a couple of times, then settled, and they lurched over the airfield at a hundred miles an hour, sending up a spray of water on either side, then braking sharply, before turning on to the concrete apron.

  The scene beyond the window in the autumn gloom was chaotic – cameramen and newspaper reporters, airport workers, policemen, scores of Eton schoolboys bizarre in their formal dress, Cabinet ministers, MPs, diplomats, members of the public and the House of Lords, the Lord Mayor of London in his ceremonial chain. Even at a distance Legat could make out the immensely tall figure of Lord Halifax in his bowler hat standing like Don Quixote beside the diminutive Sancho Panza of Sir Alexander Cadogan. Syers was with them. Their umbrellas were furled. It must have stopped raining. There was only one car, a big old-fashioned Rolls-Royce, flying the Royal standard. A man in overalls guided them on to their stand and signalled that the pilot should cut the engines. The propellers stuttered to a stop.

  The cockpit door opened. As before, when they landed in Munich, Commander Robinson stopped to exchange a few words with the Prime Minister, then came down the sloping aisle and opened the rear door. This time the gust of air that blew into the cabin was English, cold and wet. Legat stayed in his seat as the Prime Minister went past. His jaw was clenched with tension. How odd that a man so fundamentally shy should thrust himself into public life and fight his way to the top! The breeze caught the door, flapping it shut, and Chamberlain had to fend it off with his elbow. He bent out his head and descended into a terrific din of clapping and cheering and shouting that seemed almost hysterical. Wilson stood in the aisle and held back the others until the Prime Minister had cleared the bottom of the steps: the moment of glory must be the chief’s alone. Only after Chamberlain had started moving along the receiving line, shaking hands, did Wilson venture out after him, followed by Strang, Malkin and Dunglass.

  Legat was the last to leave. The steps were slippery. The pilot caught his arm to steady him. In the damp blue twilight, the lights of the newsreel cameras were a brilliant white, like frozen lighting. Chamberlain finished greeting the dignitaries and turned to stand in front of a bank of a dozen microphones, crested with the names of their respective organisations: BBC, Movietone, CBS, Pathé. Legat could not see his face, only his narrow back and sloping shoulders silhouetted against the glare. He waited for the cheering to subside. His voice carried thin and clear in the wind.

  ‘There are only two things I want to say. First of all, I received a tremendous number of letters during all these anxious days – and so has my wife – letters of support and approval and gratitude; and I cannot tell you what an encouragement that has been to me. I want to thank the British people for what they have done.’

  The crowd cheered again. Someone shouted, ‘What you have done!’ Another called out, ‘Good old Chamberlain!’

  ‘Next I want to say that the settlement of the Czechoslovakian problem which has now been achieved is, in my view, only the prelude to a larger settlement in which all Europe may find peace. This morning I had another talk with the German Chancellor, Herr Hitler, and here is the paper which bears his name upon it as well as mine …’ He held it aloft, flapping in the breeze. ‘Some of you perhaps have already heard what it contains, but I would just like to read it to you …’

  He was too vain to put on his spectacles. He had to hold it at arm’s length to make it out. And that was Legat’s lasting image of the famous moment – carried burned into the retina of his memory until the day of his death, many years later, as an honoured public servant – the jagged black figure at the centre of a great bright light, his arm stretched out, like a man who had thrown himself on to an electrified fence.

  The second Lockheed came in to land just as the Prime Minister was being driven away in the King’s Rolls-Royce. As Chamberlain reached the airport gates the distant applause of the well-wishers merged with the roar of aircraft engines. Syers said, ‘My goodness, would you listen to that! The roads are blocked all the way into central London.’

  ‘You’d think we’d just won a war rather than avoided one.’

  ‘There were thousands gathering in the Mall when we left. Apparently, the King and Queen intend to take him out on to the balcony. Here, let me carry that.’ He lifted one of the red boxes out of the aircraft hold. ‘So, how was it?’

  ‘Pretty ghastly, to be honest.’

  They walked together across the apron towards the British Airways terminal. When they had gone about halfway, the newsreel lights were abruptly extinguished. In the sudden murk the crowd gave a good-humoured collective groan. They began to drift towards the exit. Syers said, ‘There’s a bus to ferry us all back to Downing Street. God knows how long it will take.’

  Inside the packed terminal, the Italian and French Ambassadors were talking to the Lord Chancellor and the Minister of War. Syers went off to see about the bus. Legat stayed behind to guard the red boxes. Exhausted, he sat down on a bench beneath a poster advertising flights to Stockholm. There was a telephone box by the customs desk. He wondered if he should call Pamela to let her know he had landed, but the thought of her voice and her inevitable questions depressed him. Through the large plate-glass window, he could see the straggle of passengers from the
second Lockheed coming into the terminal. Sir Joseph Horner was between the two detectives. Joan was walking with Miss Anderson. She was carrying a suitcase in one hand and a portable typewriter in the other. She headed in his direction the moment she saw him.

  ‘Mr Legat!’

  ‘Really, Joan, do call me Hugh, for goodness’ sake.’

  ‘Hugh, then.’ She sat down next to him and lit a cigarette. ‘Well, that was thrilling.’

  ‘Was it?’

  ‘Yes, I’d say it was.’ She turned to face him and looked him up and down. Her gaze was frank. ‘I wanted to catch you before we left Munich but you’d already taken off. I have a tiny confession to make.’

  ‘And what is that?’ She was very pretty. But he wasn’t in the mood for a flirtation.

  She leaned in conspiratorially. ‘Between you and me, Hugh, I am not altogether what I seem.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘No. In fact, I am something of a guardian angel.’

  Now she was starting to get on his nerves. He looked around the terminal. The Ambassadors were still talking to the Ministers. Syers was in the telephone box, presumably trying to track down their bus. He said wearily, ‘What on earth are you talking about?’

  She hauled her suitcase up on to her lap. ‘Colonel Menzies is my uncle – well, the father of a second cousin, to be more precise about it – and he likes to give me the odd errand to run. The truth is, the reason I was sent to Munich, apart from my typing skills, which are exemplary, was to watch over you.’ She snapped the catches, opened the lid, and from beneath her neatly folded underwear extracted the memorandum. It was still in its original envelope. ‘I took it from your room last night, for safekeeping, after you went off with your friend. And really, Hugh – I like your name, by the way: it suits you – really, Hugh, thank God I did.’