XPD (3 page)

Without preamble, the DG told Stuart the story again, shortening it this time to the essential elements. ‘On 8 April 1945, elements of the 90th Division of the United States Third Army under General Patton were deep into Germany. When they got to the little town of Merkers, in western Thuringia, they seat infantry into the Kaiseroda salt mine. Those soldiers searched through some thirty miles of galleries in the mine. They found a newly installed steel door. When they broke through it they discovered gold; four-fifths of the Nazi gold reserves were stored there. So were two million or more of the rarest of rare books from the Berlin libraries, the complete Goethe collection from Weimar, and paintings and prints from all over Europe. It would take half an hour or more to read through the list of material. I’ll let you have a copy.’

Stuart nodded but didn’t speak. It was late afternoon and sunlight made patterns on the carpet, moving across the room until the bright bars slimmed to fine rods and one by one disappeared. The DG went across to the bookcases to switch on the large table lamps. On the panelled walls there were paintings of horses which had won famous races a long time ago, but now the paintings had grown so dark under the ageing varnish that the strutting horses seemed to be plodding home through a veil of fog.

‘Just how much gold
was
four-fifths of the German gold reserves?’ Stuart asked.

The DG sniffed and ran a finger across his ear, pushing away an errant lock of hair. ‘About three hundred million dollars’ worth of gold is one estimate. Over eight thousand bars of gold.’ The DG paused. ‘But that was just the bullion. In addition there were three thousand four hundred and thirty-six bags of gold coins, many of which were rarities – coins worth many times their weight in gold because of their value to collectors.’

Stuart looked up and, realizing that some response was expected, said, ‘Yes, amazing, sir.’ He sipped some more of the whisky. It was always the best of malts up here in the DG’s office at the top of ‘the Ziggurat’, the curious, truncated, pyramidal building that looked across the River Thames to the Palace of Westminster. The room’s panelling, paintings and antique furniture were all part of an attempt to recapture the elegance that the Secret Intelligence Service had enjoyed in the beautiful old houses in St James’s. But this building was steel and concrete, cheap and practical, with rust stains dribbling on the façade and cracks in the basement. The service itself could be similarly described.

‘The American officers reported their find through the usual channels,’ said the DG, suddenly resuming his story. ‘Patton and Eisenhower went to see it on 12 April. The army moved it all to Frankfurt. They took jeeps and trailers down the mine and brought it out. Ingenious people, the Americans, Stuart.’ He smiled and held the smile while looking Stuart full in the eyes.

‘Yes, sir.’

‘It took about forty-eight hours of continuous work to load the valuables. There were thirty crates of German patent-office records – worth a king’s ransom – and two thousand boxes of prints, drawings and engravings, as well as one hundred and forty rolls of oriental carpets. You see the difficulties, Stuart?’

‘Indeed I do, sir.’ He swirled the last of his drink round his glass before swallowing it. The DG gave no sign of noticing that his glass was empty.

‘They were ordered to begin loading the lorries just two days after Eisenhower’s visit. The only way to do that was simply by listing whatever was on the original German inventory tags. It was a system that had grave shortcomings.’

‘If things were stolen, there was no way to be sure that the German inventory had been correct in the first place?’

The DG nodded. ‘Can you imagine the chaos that Germany was in by that stage of the war?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Quite so, Stuart. You can
not
imagine it. God knows what difficulties the Germans had moving all their valuables in those days of collapse. But I assure you that the temptation for individual Germans to risk all in order to put some items in their pockets could never have been higher. Perhaps only the Germans could have moved such material intact in those circumstances. As a nation they have a self-discipline that one can only admire.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘As soon as the Americans captured the mine, its contents went by road to Frankfurt, and were stored in the Reichsbank building. A special team from the State Department were given commissions overnight, put into uniform and flown from Washington to Frankfurt. They sifted that material to find sensitive papers or secret diplomatic exchanges that would be valuable to the US government, or embarrassing to them if made public. After that it was all turned over to the Inter-Allied Reparations Agency.’

‘And was there such secret material?’

‘Let me get you another drink, Stuart. You like this malt, don’t you? With water this time?’

‘Straight please, sir.’

The DG gave another of his ferocious grins.

‘Of
course
there was secret material. The exchanges between the German ambassador in London and his masters in Berlin during the 1930s would have caused a few red faces here in Whitehall, to say nothing of red faces in the Palace of Westminster. Enough indiscretions there to have put a few of our politicians behind bars in 1940 … members of Parliament telling German embassy people what a splendid fellow Adolf Hitler was.’

The DG poured drinks for them both. He used fresh cut-glass tumblers. ‘Something wrong with that door, Stuart?’

‘No, it’s beautiful,’ said Stuart, admiring the antique panelling. ‘And the octagonal oak table must be early seventeenth century.’

The DG groaned silently. It was not the sort of remark expected of the right sort of chap. Ryden had been brought up to believe that a gentleman did not make specific references to another man’s possessions. He had always suspected that Boyd Stuart might be ‘artistic’ – a word the DG used to describe a wide variety of individuals that he blackballed at his club and shunned socially. ‘No ice? No soda? Nothing at all in it?’ asked the DG again, but he marred the solicitude by descending into his seat as he said it.

Stuart shook his head and raised the heavy tumbler to his lips.

‘No,’ agreed the DG. ‘With a fine Scots name such as Boyd Stuart a man must not be seen watering a Highland malt.’

‘Not in front of a Sassenach,’ said Stuart.

‘What’s that? Oh yes, I see,’ said the DG raising a hand to his hair. Stuart realized that his father-in-law wore his hair long to hide the hearing aid. It was a surprising vanity in such a composed figure; Stuart noted it with interest. ‘Oxford, Stuart?’

Stuart looked at him for a moment before answering. A man who could commit to memory all the details of the Kaiseroda mine discoveries was not likely to forget where his son-in-law went to university. ‘Cambridge, sir. Trinity. I read mathematics.’

The DG closed his eyes. It was quite alarming the sort of people the department had recruited. They would be taking sociologists next. He was reminded of a joke he had heard at his club at lunch. A civil service candidate made an official complaint: he had missed promotion because at the civil service selection board he had admitted to being a socialist. The commissioner had apologized profoundly – or so the story went – he had thought the candidate had admitted to being a sociologist.

Boyd Stuart sipped his whisky. He did not strongly dislike his father-in-law – he was a decent enough old buffer in his way. If Ryden idolized his daughter so much that he could not see her faults, that was a very human failing.

‘Was it Jennifer’s idea?’ Stuart asked him. ‘Sending me to California, was that her idea?’

‘We wanted someone who knew something about the film trade,’ said Sir Sydney. ‘You came to mind immediately …’

‘You mean, had it been banking, backgammon or the Brigade of Guards,’ said Stuart, ‘I might have been trampled in the rush.’

The DG smiled to acknowledge the joke. ‘I remembered that you studied at the UCLA.’

‘But it was Jennifer’s idea?’

The DG hesitated rather than tell a deliberate untruth. ‘Jennifer feels it would be better … in the circumstances.’

Stuart smiled. He could recognize the machinations of his wife.

‘Little thought you’d find yourself in this business when you were at Trinity, eh Stuart?’ said the DG, determined to change the subject.

‘To tell you the absolute truth, sir, I was hoping to be a tennis professional.’

The DG almost spluttered. He had a terrible feeling that this operation was going to be his Waterloo. He would hate to retire with a notable failure on his hands. His wife had set her mind on his getting a peerage. She had even been exploring some titles; Lord and Lady Rockhampton was her current favourite. It was the town in Australia in which her father had been born. Sir Sydney had promised to find out if this title was already taken by someone. He rather hoped it was.

‘Yes, a fascinating game, tennis,’ said the DG. My God. And this was the man who would have to be told about the ‘Hitler Minutes’, the most dangerous secret of the war. This was the fellow who would be guarding Winston Churchill’s reputation.

‘The convoy of lorries left Merkers to drive to Frankfurt on 15 April 1945,’ said the DG, continuing his story. ‘We think three, or even four, lorries disappeared en route to Frankfurt. None of the valuables and the secret documents on them were ever recovered. The US army never officially admitted the loss of the lorries but unofficially they said three.’

‘And you think that this film company in California now have possession of the documents?’

The DG went to the window, looking at the cactus plants that were lined up to get the maximum benefit from the light. He picked one pot up to examine it closely. ‘I can assure you quite categorically, Stuart, that we are talking about forgeries. We are talking about mythology.’ He sat down, still holding the plant pot and touching the soil carefully.

‘It’s something that would embarrass the government?’

The DG sniffed. He wondered how long it would take to get his message across. ‘Yes, Stuart, it is.’ He put the cactus on the coffee table and picked up his drink.

‘Are we going to try to prevent this company from making a film about the Kaiseroda mine and its treasures?’ Stuart asked.

‘I don’t give a tinker’s curse about the film,’ said the DG. He patted his hair nervously. ‘But I want to know what documentation he has access to.’ He drank some of his whisky and glanced at the skeleton clock on the mantelpiece. He had another meeting after this and he was running short of time.

‘I’m not sure I know exactly what I’m looking for,’ Stuart said.

The DG stood up. It was Stuart’s cue to depart. In the half-light, his lined face underlit by the table lamp, and his huge, dark-suited figure silhouetted against the dying sun, Ryden looked satanic. ‘You’ll know it when you see it. We’ll keep in contact with you through our controllers in California. Good luck, my boy.’

‘Thank you, sir.’ Stuart rose too.

‘You’ve seen Operations? Got all the procedures settled? You understand about the money – it’s being wired to the First Los Angeles Bank in Century City.’ The DG smiled. ‘Jennifer tells me you are giving her lunch tomorrow.’

‘There are some things she wants from the flat,’ explained Stuart.

‘Get to California as soon as possible, Stuart.’

‘There are just a few personal matters to settle,’ said Stuart. ‘Cancel my holiday arrangements and stop the milk.’

The DG looked at the clock again. ‘We have people in the department who will attend to the details, Stuart. We can’t have operations delayed because of a few bottles of milk.’

Chapter 4

‘We have people in the department who will attend to the details, Stuart,’ said Boyd Stuart in a comical imitation of the DG’s voice.

Kitty King, Boyd Stuart’s current girlfriend, giggled and held him closer. ‘So what did
you
say, darling?’

‘Not this gorgeous little detail they won’t, I told him. Some things must remain sacred.’ He patted her bottom.

‘You fool! What did you really say?’

‘I opened my mouth and poured his whisky into it. By the time I’d finished it, he’d disappeared through the floor, like the demon king in the pantomime.’ He kissed her again. ‘I’m going to Los Angeles.’

She wriggled loose from his grasp. ‘I know all about that,’ she said. ‘Who do you think typed your orders this afternoon?’ She was the secretary to the deputy chief of Operations (Region Three).

‘Will you be faithful to me while I’m away?’ said Stuart, only half in fun.

‘I’ll wash my hair every night, and go early to bed with Keats and hot cocoa.’

It was an unlikely promise. Kitty was a young busty blonde who attracted men, young and old, as surely as picnics bring wasps. She looked up, saw the look on Stuart’s face and gave him a kiss on the end of his nose. ‘I’m a child of the sexual revolution, Boyd darling. You must have read about it in
Playboy
?’

‘I never read
Playboy
; I just look at the pictures. Let’s go to bed.’

‘I’ve made you that roasted eggplant dip you like.’ Kitty King was a staunch vegetarian; worse, she was an evangelistic one. Amazing, someone at the office had remarked after seeing her in a bikini, to think that it’s all fruit and nuts. ‘You like that, don’t you.’

‘Let’s go to bed,’ said Stuart.

‘I must turn off the oven first, or my chickpea casserole will dry up completely.’

She backed away from him slowly. In spite of the disparity in their ages, she found him disconcertingly attractive. Until now her experiences with men had been entirely under her control but Boyd Stuart, in spite of all his anxious remarks, kept her in her place. She was surprised and annoyed to discover that she rather liked the new sort of relationship.

She looked at him and he smiled. He was a handsome man: the wide, lined face and the mouth that turned down at one side could suddenly be transformed by a devastating smile, and his laugh was infectious.

‘Your chickpea casserole!’ said Boyd Stuart. ‘We don’t want
that
to dry up, darling.’ He laughed a loud, booming laugh and she could not resist joining in. He put out his hand to her. She noticed that the back of it was covered with small scars and the thumb joint was twisted. She had asked him about it once but he had made some joke in reply. There was always a barrier; these men who had worked in the field were all the same in this respect. There was no way in which to get to know them completely. There was always a ‘no entry’ sign. Always some part of their brain was on guard and awake. And Kitty King was enough of a woman to want her man to be completely hers.