VI
They sat in the library with the doors closed, and talked about what to them were the most important subjects in the world. In eight months they had exchanged no letters, because what they wanted to say could not be trusted to the eyes of censors. So there was much to tell: Lanny’s adventures in New York, Hollywood, Vichy, Berlin, Paris, Madrid, Lisbon. He appeared to be talking freely, but in reality he was holding back a lot. Nothing about the plot against Roosevelt, for that did not concern this couple; they might wonder how he had come to know so much, and might suspect that he was romancing. The same went for the misadventure in Toulon; let sleeping dogs lie. What concerned this pair was the personalities of the Vichy leaders, and the prospects regarding the French Fleet, North Africa, Syria. And then Franco and Gibraltar. Lanny told what Hitler had said on the all-important problem of an understanding with Britain; what Hess and Göring had said, and the activities of Hess in Madrid. There he stopped, and waited for his friends to comment. He said nothing about Hess’s project of corning to England.
“The situation here is extremely depressing,” declared the Earl of Wickthorpe. “Did you see anything about my speech before the Lords last month?”
“I saw it mentioned in one of the papers, but very briefly.”
“I will give you the text to read. I went as far as I dared, but I am afraid you won’t think it was far enough. Sentiment in England has been steadily hardening, on account of the bombing of districts where there are no military objectives and where the purpose can only be that of terrorizing. Also, the torpedoings have been so merciless, and so cruel, especially in winter. I am afraid we have to concede that Churchill has the country in his hands.”
“That is not quite the same as winning the war,” ventured Lanny.
“No, indeed, and that is the tragedy of it. The ruinous struggle goes on, and we have to watch it helplessly.”
“Tell me,” put in Irma, “do you still feel that the Führer can be trusted?”
“I don’t think I have ever said quite that, Irma. I think he can be trusted so far as his immediate objectives are concerned. He wants peace very much, because it is obviously to his interest. What his attitude will be later depends upon the arrangements you make with him and how matters work out.”
“That uncertainty is precisely what makes our position intolerable,” resumed Ceddy. “I find that our friends and sympathizers are conceding one point after another to the government. Most significant of all, they lose interest in the cause of peace; they just retire, and occupy themselves with their personal affairs.”
“Like yourself,” Lanny thought, but didn’t say it.
“What has made it so impossible for us,” declared Irma, “is this lease-lend business that Roosevelt has started. Does Robbie think that is going to continue?”
“I haven’t heard from Robbie since it started. I cabled him from Lisbon and no doubt he’ll write me here, but you know how the censorship delays mail for weeks; Robbie knows it, too, and never discusses public affairs. Just ‘all well and busy,’ or perhaps that one of the grandchildren has the mumps.”
There it was, all very depressing, as Ceddy had declared. Really, only one gleam of light in the sky, for a member of the old nobility. (Ceddy didn’t count the press lords and the beer barons, and found it hard to be polite to the labor peers of the Ramsay MacDonald era.) “Tell me,” he said, “is Hitler really going after Russia?”
“He practically admitted it to me, and so did Hess. It seems to be generally accepted in Paris and Madrid.”
“Yes, but should we accept it? It seems to me that if he really meant to do it, he’d be admitting something else.”
“So far he hasn’t worked that way. He makes a joke of it, saying that he always tells exactly what he is going to do, because then his enemies will be sure it can’t be true.”
“I know; but in this supremely important matter he might decide to vary his technique.”
“It might be. We’ll soon know, for he has finished in Greece and must show his hand.”
“All our reports indicate that he is going into Crete.”
“Yes, but that’s a job for paratroopers, not for a large army. He’s bound to be moving his Balkan troops to the eastward, and surely your Intelligence will report that to you before long.”
“It seems almost too good to happen,” was the wife’s comment; and the pessimistic husband admitted: “I suppose that is the solution we have to accept. Let those two dictators chew each other up, and give us a chance to get some goods from America!”
VII
Lanny stayed a week-end at the Castle and met the usual distinguished company. He gave them picturesque and entertaining details concerning life among their enemies. Americans were still in that fortunate position, they could go anywhere in the world if they had the proper credentials—and nobody found it strange that the son of Budd-Erling should have obtained them. He didn’t tell any crucial facts, and, above all, no hint that Rudolf Hess was contemplating a visit. In the first place, Lanny didn’t think he was coming, and, in any case, the statement would have made a sensation, and would almost certainly have got into the newspapers, and brought Lanny in with it.
Enough to say that the Führer desperately wanted reconciliation with England, and that all three of the top men had begged the American to say this on every possible occasion. The company raised the same question as Ceddy: Could anybody trust him? Lanny evaded, saying that it was a question for psychologists and statesmen, not for an art expert. He would listen attentively and make note of facts that came out during the talk. Thus, from Gerald Albany of the Foreign Office he learned that the Russians were making overtures for new trade agreements with Britain; they had become much “softer” in their attitude, which meant, said the clergyman’s son, that they had discovered which way the wind was blowing. They were trying to buy arms in America, and Washington was being extremely noncommittal.
Lanny went back to town, under the bombs, and wrote out a report on what he had learned. It was considered good form to ignore danger, so he attended a symphony concert, and some of the music was German. He came back to his hotel and was reading an evening paper in his room when the phone rang. “A gentleman to see you, sir; the name, Mr. Branscome.” Lanny didn’t know any such gentleman, but it was the business of an art expert, and also of a secret agent, to see anybody. He went downstairs—it being easier to get rid of a bore that way.
There was a man in the lobby, middle-aged, well dressed, and speaking properly; but he had a dissipated look, or something off color—Lanny decided at a glance that it wasn’t anybody he cared to cultivate. Then he got a start. The stranger said: “Mr. Budd, are you acquainted with a person named Kurvenal?”
Caution was instinctive in this matter. Lanny said: “I have heard the name.”
“Would it be a woman, by chance?”
Smiling his most amiable smile, Lanny replied: “Why would you want to know?”
“I was asked to find out if you had a message for her.”
“I see. And are you in a position to convey a message to her?”
“I am.”
The P.A. didn’t have to take time for thought, having anticipated this possibility and decided upon a reply. “Tell her I have been working busily and that the situation is favorable.”
“Is that all, Mr. Budd?”
“She will understand that, and it will be all right.”
“Thank you, sir, and good evening.” The man turned and left the lobby quickly. Lanny went back to his room, wondering what kind of Englishman was doing dirty work like that. It was easy to understand why he had not stayed to get acquainted, for if he had been caught he would surely have been shot. “Branscome” was doubtless a name he had made up, and he would be careful to keep himself where the son of Budd-Erling would not lay eyes on him again. Talk about “a woman” was no doubt meant to prepare himself an alibi; he could say that he hadn’t known what the message was about, he had been tricked i
nto doing the errand for another man.
VIII
Lanny gave a lot of thought to that incident. He knew that he was playing a complicated and dangerous game, and he didn’t want to make any slip. He reminded himself that he was not working for Rudi Hess, and owed him neither help nor truth. To the Wickthorpes he owed something, but nothing compared to what he owed to the cause of human freedom. The noble pair were beginning to hedge, but they hadn’t been hedging eight months ago, when they had given Lanny every encouragement to go and see Hess and to speak for them. If now they had changed, Lanny had no way to let Hess know it. He certainly wasn’t going to name any names or give any personal messages to a strange Mr. Branscome who looked like what was called a “ticket-of-leave” man.
The more Lanny thought about this episode, the more firmly he decided that “Kurvenal” should remain a woman from this time on. If B4 was setting a trap for Nazi Three, what was more likely than that they had been watching him in Madrid, and even in Berlin? If so, they knew that the son of Budd-Erling had visited Hess’s home, and had been closeted with him in the Madrid palace. They might somehow have learned that the two had exchanged passwords, and in that case they would surely have made use of the words to find out what the much-traveled American was up to.
Lanny had been caught in one trap, and was firmly resolved not to let it happen again. The more he thought about the Toulon episode, the more clear it became to him that the French underground must have had a spy in Admiral Darlan’s office, and received a report to the effect that the Admiral had been drinking Pernod brandy with an American pro-Nazi posing as an art expert, and had given that dangerous person a letter of introduction to the commandant of the port of Toulon. What sort of hornets’ nest Lanny had there blundered into he could only guess. The partisans, hiding out in the hills and getting arms and ammunition by raiding government camions, would be hunted incessantly by government police and troops; spies and informers would be swarming, and doubtless there had been executions in the courtyard of the naval prison, and assassinations in reprisal. It was a civil war, everywhere the most cruel.
Whatever it was, Lanny had walked blandly into it, and he surely didn’t want to repeat the error. Let B4 and Nummer Drei fight their secret war and leave a P.A. out of it! He would go back to Wickthorpe and play the piano for Frances and teach her to dance; he would help make up a four for contract bridge with Fanny Barnes, Irma’s large worldly mother, and Fanny’s poor crippled old derelict stock-gambler brother whom Lanny had been taught to call “Uncle Horace.” Now and then, when he was tempted to worry, he told himself that it was all nonsense anyhow—Rudi Hess, while he was a fanatic, had some common sense, and would realize that the scheme was crazy. Or he would tell his Führer about it—and the Führer would send him to organize the National-Socialist Party of Yugoslavia or of Greece.
IX
Lanny returned to the Castle. On account of war crowding, he had to stay in the spare bedroom of the two-hundred-year-old cottage occupied by Fanny and her brother. It had been “modernized” by Irma, along with everything else on the estate, and had two tiled bathrooms, a telephone, and the proper kitchen gadgets. Lanny could shut himself up in his room and read, or come out and turn on the radio and listen to the tragic news from southeastern Europe. When Frances was through with her daily studies he would play croquet with her, or teach her tennis strokes. He could get more time with her by agreeing to speak French, for then it would be a lesson. His pleasure in her society he explained by saying that she was the only female creature he knew who did not wish either to marry him or to get him married. Even Irma had made a couple of passes at finding him the right sort of wife!
When his conscience troubled him in the midst of war he told himself that he had reported to F.D.R. everything he knew; he had got far ahead of the game, and now must wait until Hitler made another move. As for the cabal against Roosevelt, the Chief had as much as told him there was no need to bother with it; Europe was Lanny’s field. And besides, you never knew who was going to turn up at Wickthorpe; a week-end here was better than sitting in at a meeting of the British Cabinet. All sorts of people came and brought all sorts of news, and a secret agent of any government in the world would have paid a high price for the privilege of being present.
So matters went, until Friday, the 9th day of May, 1941: a day when the newspapers were full of debates in the House, where “Winnie” had got a vote of confidence of 447 to 3—which seemed like a slap in the face to Wickthorpe Castle. Lanny read the news from New York and Washington, rather skimpy as a rule; the papers quoted the Secretary of War, who promised generous aid to Britain; also President Roosevelt had asked Congress for funds to build five hundred bombers. That would take two years and cost a billion dollars, the opposition objected; they called it “perfectly wicked.”
Lanny’s reading was interrupted by a maidservant bringing the morning mail to the cottage. There was only one letter for him, an inconspicuous envelope, addressed by an unfamiliar hand. Opening it he found a plain sheet of paper with four handwritten words which caused his heart to give a violent thump. “I am coming. Kurvenal.”
The words were English, and the script also. It was not a note that Hess himself had written, but one that he had had written by one of his agents in England, perhaps “Branscome.” The Deputy Führer might have ordered it by radio, or by one of those devices the Nazis were using, such as advertisements in the newspapers of Sweden, Spain. or Portugal, which came into Britain regularly; the advertisements looked innocent, but they were code. The letter had been mailed in London the previous day, but it bore no date and no one could guess how long the message had taken to reach London. For all that Lanny could tell, Hess might be flying tonight!
X
He took a walk, to think the matter over; then he went to the Castle, where he found the Earl of Wickthorpe in his study, busy with his secretary. Lanny said: “There is something urgent that I must talk to you and Irma about.” Ceddy told the secretary to go and ask his wife to come down, and presently the three of them were shut up in the study: Ceddy in plus-fours and a polo shirt, Irma in a brocaded Japanese kimono, her hair in two long dark braids. She wouldn’t have come that way, only her husband had commanded “at once.”
Lanny wasted no words on preliminaries. “I have just received a note telling me that Rudolf Hess is coming to England.”
“To England!” echoed Ceddy, dumfounded. “What for?”
“Mainly, in the hope of seeing you. He is going to fly in an unarmed plane, and land somewhere on your shooting grounds in Scotland. He wants you to be there and meet him.”
“Good God!” exclaimed the noble earl.
“For the sake of peace on earth and good will toward men,” countered the other. “He expects to enlist your aid in that cause.”
“Is the man mad, Lanny? Or are you?”
“He may be a bit mad, as most men are who want to change the world. But he’s not too mad to fly a plane, and to come down by parachute if necessary.”
“Did he tell you about this in advance?”
“He broached it to me in Madrid. I did what I could to discourage him. I told him he would be a prisoner of war.”
“He will be shot!”
“No, he will wear a uniform, and his plane will be unarmed.”
“Why didn’t you tell us about this sooner, Lanny?”
“I didn’t take it seriously. I thought I had managed to dissuade him, and I was quite sure the Führer wouldn’t permit it.”
“Oh! The Führer knows of it, then?”
“How that stands I can’t be sure. This is all I have.” Lanny passed the letter to his friend and both he and Irma studied it. “Kurvenal is the code name that Rudi took, so that if he sent any message I would know it was genuine. He said he had agents in England.” Lanny had decided that there was no use mentioning “Branscome.”
“What precisely does the man expect me to do?” demanded Ceddy.
“He wants you an
d Irma to take me and Frances on a pleasure trip, and be at the shooting box to meet him when he arrives.”
“And for what purpose?”
“To consult with him as to how to bring peace between his country and yours.”
“He thinks I have such power?”
“He thinks you are the center of a group of men who have great influence. You understand, Ceddy, I have been feeding him this idea for several years, in order to get him to talk. I did that with your knowledge, and brought you the results and you accepted them. Of course I never foresaw the possibility of such a development as this. I couldn’t believe it then and I can hardly believe it now.”
“It’s going to raise the very devil if it happens, Lanny. It can’t possibly be kept secret and it will blacken us for life.”
“I don’t see why you should expect such results. You have never met Hess anywhere, have you?”
“Never in my life.”
“And you don’t want to go to Scotland, I take it?”
“I do not!”
“All right, then. Sit tight, and let the government deal with Rudi. Maybe he won’t mention you. If he does, just say you know nothing about it. You have had no communication from him and no sympathy with his ideas. That lets me out as well as you.”
“Suppose he mentions you?”
“I doubt if he will, for I’m an American, and no excuse for his coming to England. If he does, I have my story: I’m an art expert and I went to Germany on business; I have two paintings in the Dorchester vault to prove it.”