The Hansa Protocol (9 page)

‘Thank you, Miss Seligmann. My purpose today is really to see the various members of the household. I have seen your late uncle’s
secretary
, Mr Schneider, and in a few moments I hope to speak to the Austrian gentleman, Count Czerny—’

‘Czerny? Bah! He is one piece of my late uncle’s baggage that can go. Out he goes! He is a mountebank, a professional diner at other men’s tables. Do you know how he speaks? Like the English milord. He was brought up in England, at a school called Stowe, and then at Cambridge. And yet this Austro-Englishman claimed to have a vast web of confidants throughout Europe, and Uncle Otto believed it all. For years and years he has had his feet under poor uncle’s dining-table. He will go. I have told him so, this very morning. And that Polish woman. She sneers at us all, and bullies the English staff. This house is mine, now. She, too, will go.’

Ottilie looked quizzically and rather tauntingly at Box. A fascinating young lady, he thought, but she can’t be allowed to have the last word.

‘Very interesting, miss, to hear your arrangements for the future. And I take it that you have been devastated by your uncle’s murder?’

It was a shrewd thrust, and it went home. The black lashes dropped to veil the bright blue eyes, and there was a little silence. Ottilie drummed the fingers of her right hand impatiently on the desk in front of her. Finally she sat up straight in her chair and fixed her glance on the inspector once again.

‘My uncle was kind and good. You must catch the men who killed him and hang them high on the gallows. They are wicked. But no; I am not devastated. Fritz is devastated – Herr Schneider, you know. He was devoted to Uncle Otto, though he is a Saxon ox, and doesn’t care to parade his sorrow. Me, I will go back to Germany. I have no part in all this
politik.
When my uncle’s money comes to me, I will dance, and wear fine clothes, and go to Court in Berlin. I will look for a noble youth and beckon him to me, and we will marry. There will be fine children – noble boys and beautiful girls. That, then, is Ottilie. You have seen her and you have heard her.’

‘Thank you, miss. You’re very frank, a point which I very much appreciate. We’ll talk further, perhaps.’

Ottilie suddenly smiled at him. It was a captivating smile.

‘You are not angry with me? You will shake hands, yes?’

‘Certainly, miss. And of course I’m not angry with you. Not at all!’ Inspector Box gravely shook hands with Ottilie Seligmann. She half bowed to him, and glided out of the room. Box sat down again.

‘Phew!’ he said. ‘There’s a charmer, if you like, Sergeant Knollys. A very enchanting young lady, quite frank and fearless—’

‘Tickled your fancy, did she, sir?’ There was genuine amusement in Sergeant Knollys’ voice, though Box could hear the exasperation lurking behind it.

‘“Tickled my fancy”? Really, Sergeant, I don’t know where you get these coarse expressions from. I thought she was a charming and brave young lady. I’m sorry you’ve taken a dislike to her.’

‘And what card would you pick for her, sir? The Queen of Hearts? “I am twenty-two years old”! Thirty-two, more like it—’

There came a stir and bustle at the door, and a tall, ramrod-stiff giant of a man, blond and blue-eyed, all but erupted into the room.
The somnolent air of the study seemed to be agitated, as though the man had been accompanied by a blast of wintry air. And yet, Box
realized
, there was a stillness about this man, an air of calm command underlying a natural volatility.

‘Detective Inspector Box? I am Count Czerny. I flatter myself that I was the late Dr Seligmann’s closest confidant. I place myself at your disposal.’

Box was startled by Count Czerny’s faultless English. It held not the slightest trace of a foreign accent. True, he sported a short, trimmed beard, and wore a rimless monocle screwed into his right eye, but unless you knew the man’s name and nationality, you’d swear he was an English gentleman. Box was surprised to see that Czerny was no more than forty years old. He had assumed that old Dr Seligmann’s confidant would have been nearer to him in age.

‘Good day, Count Czerny,’ said Box. ‘Sit down, if you will. First, sir, I’d like to get clear in my mind your standing in Dr Seligmann’s entourage.’

Count Czerny thought for a moment before replying. He removed the monocle from his eye and slipped it into his waistcoat pocket. The absence of the monocle made him look even more English.

‘I was Otto Seligmann’s secret eye on the centre of Europe, Mr Box. As an Austrian subject, I was well placed to advise him on the close machinations of the dangerous war-parties in the lands of the Austrian Empire – in Hungary, in Bosnia, and in Serbia. All these things I know about through a network of contacts in the capitals of Central Europe.’

Count Czerny glanced across towards the window, where Sergeant Knollys was busy writing in his notebook. He frowned slightly, and then continued.

‘I am the successor to Dr Seligmann in his struggle for peace, and for a lasting coincidence of interests between the German and British Empires. That work will go on. But I am faced with tiresome
difficulties
. You have just seen Ottilie – Miss Seligmann – I think?’

‘I have, sir. A most attractive and personable young lady.’

‘Yes, yes. Maybe so.’

Count Czerny suddenly flushed, and banged a fist on the table.

‘But she is stubborn, and a vixen, and a selfish little baggage! She thinks of nothing but fashion, and parties, and how she will spend her uncle’s hard-earned money. I have been back from Town only half an
hour, and already things have happened. Yes, they have happened.’

Count Czerny scowled, and bit his lip.

‘What kind of things have happened, sir?’ asked Box.

‘This morning – minutes ago, you understand? – I attempted to convey my horror of last night’s atrocity to Miss Seligmann. And what does she do? She quells me with a glance. If looks could kill, I, too, would be a dead man, now. “Czerny”, she says, “you are a fool. It is all in the past. This crusade, this politicking, it was my uncle’s hobby. It interested him. But now it is done. Go back to Germany”.

‘I was astonished, stunned. “But what of all the books and records in the library? Surely”,’ I said, “you will not abandon those?” “You may take them with you”, she said, “as long as you go!” Then she stamped her foot and stormed off. So I will do as she commands, and return to Germany. The work can go forward from there.’

Count Czerny clasped his strong hands together, and glanced at both men briefly. He seemed to be making up his mind to reveal some
intimate
secret.

‘Sergeant,’ he said, ‘will you please close that notebook for a moment? I am going to tell you gentlemen some sensitive information, which is best left unwritten – for all our sakes. Our household here at Chelsea is breaking up, and I must share this knowledge with you before I go.’

Count Czerny paused for a moment. He glanced at a heavy gold signet ring that he wore, and unconsciously traced with his finger the image of an imperial eagle embossed on it.

‘There is in Germany today, gentlemen,’ he continued, ‘a growing network of brotherhoods and societies which see war as the ultimate endorsement of the validity of the German Empire. The members of these parties know – or think they know – that war with Britain will set Europe aflame, and that from that conflagration a new, cleansed Europe will be born.’

Box’s view of Count Czerny was undergoing revision. Surely Miss Ottilie had been gravely mistaken in dismissing him as a mountebank? Perhaps she was too immature – or too frivolous – to realize that he had important things to say.

‘Among those fanatics,’ Czerny continued, ‘the most dangerous
organization
is called
Die
Eidgenossenschaft.
You will find its members in Germany, in Austria, in the Balkans, in France, and – yes! – here in
England. I take it that you don’t understand German? No, well, that’s understandable. But a good rendering of those German words would be “The Linked Ring”. There are some folk in England who already employ that translation.’

‘The Linked Ring ….’

‘Yes, Mr Box. I believe it was members of the Linked Ring who wrote to Otto – to Dr Seligmann – from Bonn, pretending to be from the university there, and telling him of a present of books that they were sending him. I cannot prove that, but it is so. They appealed to his vanity as a scholar, you see, and he rose to their bait. As for the rest – the terrible assassination – well, it was
my
fault! It was as though I had done the deed myself ….’

Count Czerny held his head between his hands and groaned.

‘That accursed crate, Mr Box, was delivered to the house only yesterday afternoon. It was at my suggestion that Otto had it taken out to the Belvedere. “Let it alone until tomorrow,” I said. “You’ve visitors coming tonight. You and Schneider can open it in the morning”.’

‘Late in the afternoon I set off for my club. Schneider tells me that one of Otto’s two visitors last night brought a device with him that detonated the explosives concealed in that crate. By advising him to take it out to the Belvedere, Mr Box, I unwittingly sentenced my old friend to death!’

‘Begging your pardon, sir,’ said the bashful young man in overalls, ‘but there’s nothing wrong with this wall. It don’t need pointing, and if you was to try, you’d make a right mess of it. A plank? No, you don’t need a plank for work like that. A ladder’s all you need, and there’s no ladder there, as you can see.’

Box smiled encouragingly at the young workman, who stood twisting his cap in his hands.

‘What’s your name, my boy?’ he asked.

‘George French, sir.’

‘Well done, George French, you’re a credit to your trade, and you’ve helped the police. I’ll write your name down in my report, and there you’ll stand, when the history of this case comes to be written.’

The lad looked mightily pleased with Box’s words. He smiled,
shuffled
a bit, and then returned to the group of men who were busy repairing the ravages of the previous night’s outrage. Box turned to Knollys.

‘What did you think of Count Czerny?’ he asked. ‘I’m thinking of those playing-cards …. He seemed a worthwhile kind of man to me – sharp, and shrewd. I see him at the moment as the King of Diamonds.’

‘You might be right, sir. But he wasn’t here last night, and there might have been a reason for that. And he told us a lot of interesting things, but that might have been to disarm us. So maybe Count Czerny’s the Knave, after all.’

Box made no reply. He was watching a procession of dim figures, shepherded by Constable Kenwright, who were carrying boxes and buckets. They disappeared into some obscure area of the grounds
behind the Belvedere. It was still bitterly cold. Box glanced briefly up at the house, and then turned to Sergeant Knollys.

‘I don’t like this, Sergeant,’ he said. ‘I suspect that there are peculiar things going on in that house. You wouldn’t think an intimate member of that family had just been foully murdered. Maybe Dr Seligmann’s murder was a political assassination. Or maybe it was a well-laid plot to do away with a man for some dark private motive, cleverly presented as an assassination. I don’t trust any of them. Not even the Queen of Hearts.’

Box looked across the misty white garden towards the stunted grove of trees, where a thin column of wood-smoke still rose from the chimney of the brick garden shed.

‘Sergeant,’ he said, ‘go back into the house, and try to get Mr Lodge, the butler, into a quiet corner somewhere. See if you can get him to tell you about these peculiar people from his point of view. When you’ve finished here, I want you to go back to town, and call on Chaplin’s, the carriers at Victoria Station. Find out about that crate, and how it got through Customs filled with dynamite. Then call on Mr Bernard Quaritch, the bookseller, in Piccadilly. Maybe he’ll tell you that there’s no such person as Colin McColl. Or maybe not. We’ll see.’

‘What will you do, sir?’

‘I’ll stay here for a while, and see how PC Kenwright’s getting on. Then I’ll hare it back to Victoria Street, to spin a decent yarn to those reporters in the Clarence Vaults. After that, I’ll come back to the Rents.’

Knollys went back into the house through the now-repaired kitchen door. Box walked thoughtfully across the scanty grass, his boots crunching the rapidly freezing snow. Suddenly, he saw something that made him draw in his breath sharply, A cloaked figure was standing motionless just far away enough not to be seen clearly. For a moment he felt a little shudder as though faced with the uncanny. Then the figure moved into focus, as it trod soberly and warily across the frozen flags.

‘Oh,’ Box muttered, ‘so it’s you, is it? I was right. It’s going to be one of those sort of cases.’

Box opened the door of the shed, and stepped into the grateful warmth. The stranger followed him, stooping below the lintel of the door, and sitting down beside the still glowing stove. He smiled almost apologetically at Inspector Box, deposited his tall silk hat on the floor
beside him, and pulled the skirts of his cloak around his knees.

‘Good morning, Detective Inspector Box,’ he said.

‘Good morning, Colonel Kershaw. So it’s like that, is it?’

‘Yes, Box, it’s like that.’

Inspector Box had worked with Colonel Kershaw before. This slight, sandy-haired man with the mild face and the weary, sardonic voice, was one of the powers behind the Throne. He was feared by his enemies; but it was perhaps more significant that he was feared, too, by his friends.

‘Will you smoke a cigar with me, Mr Box?’

‘I will, sir.’

Colonel Kershaw withdrew a stout cigar case from an inside pocket, opened it, and offered it to Box. Three slim cigars reposed in the case, and beside them a rolled-up spill of paper secured with twine. Colonel Kershaw’s pale-blue eyes looked speculatively at Box for a moment. Box took a cigar, and also the spill of paper, which he placed without comment in the pocket of his overcoat. The two men lit their cigars and smoked in silence for a minute or two. Then Colonel Kershaw spoke.

‘Listen carefully, Inspector Box. I came in here through the gate in the garden wall leading to an alley. That’s why nobody saw me, and that’s why nobody will see me leave. There are deep waters here, and you are not dealing with a private murder, so I’m going to help you by telling you some things of interest.

‘First, Lieutenant Fenlake, the young man who came here last night, is a bona fide Foreign Office courier. I expect you were going to check whether that was so? I thought so. Question him by all means. He has already reported to Sir Charles Napier, the Under-Secretary. It might be a good idea to mention at this point, Mr Box, that I am keeping a benevolent eye on Sir Charles Napier and his couriers. They don’t know that, of course. I’m very interested, you see, in what they’re doing at the moment.’

So that was it. Sir Charles Napier ran the Foreign Office’s
semi-secret
courier service, and was accountable to the Prime Minister. Colonel Kershaw was the head of Secret Intelligence. It was generally thought that he was accountable to no one.

‘I have a kind of indirect connection with Lieutenant Fenlake, sir,’ said Box. ‘I know a young lady friend of his.’

‘Do you indeed? What’s her name? What kind of young lady is she?’

Box raised his eyebrows, but made no comment. When talking to Colonel Kershaw, it was well to answer his questions without demur.

‘Her name’s Vanessa Drake, and she’s an embroideress with Watts & Company of Westminster. She and this Fenlake are supposed to be sweet on each other.’

Kershaw absorbed this information without comment, though Box saw a speculative gleam briefly light up his eyes. He asked Kershaw a question.

‘Is it in order for me to ask why Lieutenant Fenlake came here? Why did he want to see Dr Seligmann?’

‘He came to collect a memorandum that Seligmann had written. It was to be delivered to a man in Berlin, a man called Baron von Dessau. A rehearsal of that collection had been attempted on the previous day, but had met with no success. Well, you know that, of course. And you’ve seen the body of the Foreign Office courier who made that unsuccessful attempt.’

‘I have, sir. And I’ve been told his name.’

‘Yes, I know you have. A villainous-looking fellow calling himself Stefan Oliver. He was one of Sir Charles Napier’s more picturesque couriers. He was half Polish, you know’ Kershaw added cryptically, ‘It’s a dangerous thing to be Polish in this particular part of the world.’

Box briefly conjured up the image of the overweight, unshaven man lying dead on the trestle table in the pier-master’s office, his body probed and manhandled by a police doctor who had become inured to violent death. Stefan Oliver, one of England’s unsung and unrewarded heroes.

‘Where is that memorandum now, sir?’

‘It was successfully collected by Lieutenant Fenlake last night. By now, it will be locked safely in the strongroom at the Foreign Office, where it will stay, presumably, until it sets out on its journey to Berlin.

‘But now, Box, I’ll tell you about Colin McColl, the other man who called upon Dr Seligmann last night. Colin McColl is a dangerous social and political pirate, who attaches himself to the disaffected, and offers them his services. He deals only with the disaffected of high rank. He expects – and receives – rich rewards. He traffics in secrets on his own account, and has been known to slaughter other rivals in the same field of activity.’

‘Not a very nice person, then?’

‘No, Box. He’s not a very nice person. He’s been active now for just over two years. Or perhaps I should say that he has come to my notice during the course of the last two years. He’s extremely dangerous, because he always carries conviction. No doubt you’ll check at Quaritch’s bookshop? Yes, well, you’ll find that McColl was, indeed, a part-time consultant to them. He’s carried out a number of minor but successful assignments for them. But Quaritch’s won’t see him again. And between you and me, I don’t think you’ll catch him, Box. He’s a decidedly slippery customer, with a positive genius for hiding himself away from prying eyes like mine.

‘Now, I think, you can see why I have interested myself in this
business
of Seligmann’s memorandum. Colin McColl is a dangerous man to spar with. In the nature of things, Sir Charles Napier at the Foreign Office will not even have heard of him.’

‘I’ve just been talking to Dr Seligmann’s friend Count Czerny,’ said Box. ‘He told me about a dangerous conspiracy of war-mongers called The Linked Ring—’

‘Did he? Did he really? The
Eidgenossenschaft.
Yes, they’re on the loose again.’

Colonel Kershaw drew thoughtfully on his cigar before adding, ‘They could well be the people behind this assassination. Sir Charles Napier thinks so. He said that Seligmann told him as much at that meeting of his last Saturday. They’re shrewd enough, you see, to realize that Colin McColl is the obvious choice of assassin. He’s a very intelligent man. He has a degree in English from one of the northern universities. He’s a pleasant enough young man to speak to, so I’ve been told, but he enjoys the anonymity of ordinariness. Sometimes people remember him, but for the most part they do not.’

‘And Colin McColl is working for this Linked Ring?’

‘Oh, no, Box; not he! Oh, dear me, no! Colin McColl is … how can I put it, without sounding melodramatic? McColl attaches himself to causes, and to subversive groups like the
Eidgenossenschaft
,
and lets them think that he is their paid servant. But all the time, Box, he is using
them
, for his own dark ends.’

‘What are those ends?’

‘To my way of thinking, Box, McColl is something more than a mere man. He’s the vehicle for a dark, manipulative force – a terrific force of evil. You ask me what are his ends. There’s somebody in
Macbeth
whose
ambition it was to “pour the sweet milk of concord into hell”. That’s what McColl wants to do. And the danger at the moment, Box, is that his sentiments accord with those of the German war groups. Each sustains the other. They follow fanatics and cranks, who crave for a new world, founded on all the old cliches about freedom, fraternity, and all the rest of it.’

Colonel Kershaw drew thoughtfully on his cigar for a moment, and then continued.

‘On the 13th of this month, Box, which is a Friday, there is to be a grand meeting in Berlin of the Pan-German League, to be addressed by Baron von Dessau. I have people there, and in Jena, who tell me that new resentments against French policy in Alsace could lead to rogue units of the German Army violating the borders. I need hardly remind you what the consequences of that would be! What happens will depend on what Baron von Dessau does. And this is where the
memorandum
comes in. Sir Charles Napier tells me that its contents will make Baron von Dessau persuade the hotheads to rein in their ardour – at least, for a time.’

‘Sir Charles has read the memorandum?’

‘No – at least, he says he hasn’t. Seligmann told him what the result would be, but not what the memorandum contained. So we must ensure that the fiery Baron von Dessau receives the memorandum. There are quite a few parties on both sides of the Channel who’d like to get their hands on that document. It’s part of our task to see that they don’t succeed. The thirteenth is the day of destiny.’

‘Then we’ve only ten days left, sir! Sir Charles and his folk will have to guard that memorandum well. I wonder what would happen if it was never delivered?’

‘Well, Box, I think that von Dessau would unleash the dogs of war. That, I know, is his intention. Without the secret constraint contained in Seligmann’s memorandum, I think that certain elements of the German Army will violate the French borders. There’ll be war of some kind, and we shall be dragged right into it.’

The two men were silent for a while, listening to the coal settling in the stove, and to the distant murmur of voices in the ruined garden. Then Box spoke.

‘Did this Colin McColl murder Stefan Oliver?’

‘I’m almost certain of it. McColl has a vindictive, vicious streak in his
nature, which is why he had the temerity to dump poor Oliver’s body practically at Sir Charles Napier’s feet. Not a nice person, Box, as you say.’

‘Why didn’t he try to murder Lieutenant Fenlake? If he was after this memorandum—’

‘Ah, but was he? Or was he bent purely upon the political
assassination
? I can’t answer these questions, Mr Box, because my mind is trained to consider the broader canvas. I need to stand back from the minutiae. McColl’s concocting some grand scheme, I’m sure of that. But I’ve no idea what it is.’

‘Mr Fenlake’s not one of your people, is he, sir?’

‘No. Like me, he’s an Artillery officer, but he’s not one of my secret intelligence crowd. Fenlake’s the wrong type of character to be one of my people. He’s a Foreign Office courier – quite a different kind of animal, Mr Box.’

Box drew thoughtfully on his cigar for a while, silently eyeing the quiet and imperturbable man sitting by the stove. Joe Peabody was one of Kershaw’s crowd – the ‘nobodies’, as he liked to call them. Joe had known that he would be at the St Swithin’s Hall last Saturday night. He had come up specifically from the river to find him. Whatever was going on, Colonel Kershaw was pulling the strings.