by Walter Ellis
“Nevertheless,” the Duke continued, “it must be, shall we say, interesting for you to be negotiating now with a government that – were he able any longer to express an opinion on the matter – would meet with Sir Oswald’s enthusiastic approval.”
“As you say, sir – interesting.”
“You know he came out in support of me during the abdication business?”
“I was abroad at the time, Sir – in Burma. But I read about it.”
“Said there should be a referendum. Put it to the people!”
For a second it looked as if the former king was going to say something he shouldn’t, but he bit his lip instead. “All a long time ago now. Different world. And I’m sure we’ve all got better things to do than reminisce about what might have been. Have you spoken with the Ambassador yet?”
“No, Sir. I just got in.”
“Excellent fellow. Knew him in the old days, when we were both … differently employed. I try to see him each day. You shall meet him with me tomorrow. You and he will no doubt wish to go over the list of those turning up at my party.”
“In fact, Sir, if you had a copy of the guest list that I might peruse ...”
“Of course. I’ll have one sent to your room. But now, we’re off to dinner. I’m sure you must be hungry yourself after your journey. Come to my suite again in the morning, about eleven. How does that sound? We can talk then.”
“Yes, Sir.”
“Well, good night to you.”
“Good night, Sir … Don Miguel.” For a split second, Bramall fancied he was supposed to reverse out of the royal presence bent double, but after a hesitant step backwards, he turned smartly around and made his exit in the standard fashion. It was only when he regained the corridor that he realised he was sweating. Time for a drink, he told himself. He made his way to the lift and was conveyed back down to the opulent hotel lobby. The bar was just down the hall.
“Gin and tonic,” he said to the barman. “And go easy on the tonic.”
“Ah, a man after my own heart,” came a voice, in clear, correct English.
Bramall turned slowly round. The man who had spoken to him didn’t look like he was a Spaniard. He had brown hair and blue eyes.
“I’m sorry, I …”
A hand stretched out. “Klaus Hasselfeldt, from the German legation, commercial section. And you are … ?”
Bramall did not accept the hand, which then clenched into a fist and withdrew. “The German legation, you say. Well, that’s a bit of a problem. I’m attached to the British embassy, you see, and given the fact your country is planning to invade my country…”
The fellow’s face creased into an ironical smile. “Ooh,” he said. “That! I’m not here to talk about the war. It is much too hot an evening for that, Mr…?”
Bramall felt his pulse racing. Croft was right. The buggers were everywhere.
“Bramall … Charles Bramall.”
The German raised his glass. “Pleased to meet you, Mr Bramall,” he said. “Also commercial section, I imagine.”
“Royal equerry, actually.”
“An ekverry? “ I’m sorry. My English is pretty good, but I don’t know that word.”
“Personal assistant. Persönlicherassistent. I’m a kind of glorified secretary.”
“A secretary? Really? How unusual. Most embassy types one meets these days are in trade, don’t you find? There are so many of us engaged in commerce, I wonder we have any time for war.”
“Indeed.”
“But it is strange I haven’t seen you before.” The fellow’s accent was Austrian, Bramall decided.
“That’s because I wasn’t here before. And now, Herr Hasselfeldt, if you’ll excuse me, I must attend to my duties.”
“Naturally. His Royal Highness will be waiting.”
The man was grinning. Fucking nerve! Not in the country five minutes and already the SD was on to him. What was he supposed to do? What was the pack-drill on this? He’d planned to get his bearings first, find his way around. That’s what they’d told him. They’d said he would be approached after a week or so at a foreign ministry reception or other public gathering, or else that he’d receive an invitation by post to lunch at the Legation. This was obviously intended to wind him up, put him on the defensive. And the worst thing was, it worked. Christ Almighty! How the hell had Croft managed to survive all these years?
Draining his drink in a single gulp, Bramall raced for the lifts and returned to his room, where he lay down on the huge bed suddenly aware of how tired and confused he was. The significance of his being in Spain under the New Order was only now getting through to him. It wasn’t so long since Franco was regarded as little more than a war criminal. Today, if the Caudillo appeared in front of him, he would have to bow and call him Your Excellency. But then again, now that he thought of it, he had toadied to both sides during his time as a correspondent. Hadn’t liked either of them, if the truth were told. His entire life, it sometimes seemed, was a series of role reversals designed to mock him. Nothing except memory was constant. But what use was memory? Memory was like a time bomb that preserved pain and detonated it when it would cause most hurt.
The bed in the Ritz was firm. The sheets were linen. Bramall lay on the bed, his eyes fixed on the ceiling, his heart palpitating. It was a knock at the door that drew him back with a start to his present incarnation. An embassy security guard stood outside with the guest list for Saturday’s reception. He took the document and closed the door, twisting his head from side to side in a bid to ease the tension building up in his neck and shoulders. He would take a shower, then dinner. He would feel better with something in his stomach besides nerves. He glanced at the guest list and decided not to take it with him into the dining room. It would be his bedside reading.
Half an hour later, in the restaurant, where he had rather hoped he would be left alone, he was joined by the same young fellow who had inspected his papers outside the Duke’s suite. His name was Anthony Buchanan-Smith and it turned out that he was an equerry, too, but the real thing, appointed by Buckingham Palace, not the Foreign Office. When the Duke left for Lisbon, thence, it was assumed, to London, he would go with him, fated to spend the war arranging dinner parties, gazing out at high society across the rim of a gin and tonic.
“If you need me to show you the ropes, you’ve only to say the word,” Buchanan-Smith enthused. He looked as if he was not merely supercilious, but supercilious for England. “Dealing with royalty is no easy matter. I can imagine how awkward it must be for a Foreign Office type like you to be thrown in at the deep end like this.”
“I think I can manage,” Bramall said quietly.
“The party’s all arranged.”
“Is that right? Well, we’ll see.”
His uninvited guest, who had been consulting the menu, looked up, irritated. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
Bramall ran his eye down the list of hors d’ouevres. They looked extremely good. “Oh, just that the list will not be final until it has my approval.”
“Is that so? Does His Royal Highness know that?”
Cocky young bastard! “He will. My instructions come directly from Downing Street. From the Prime Minister himself.”
The smirk that had lurked on the younger man’s face faded at once. “Ah.” he said. “I see. That puts rather a different spin on things.”
“I should imagine it does.” It had been a while since Bramall had found himself in the superior position dealing with British officials – or indeed, anyone at all – and he had to admit he found it most refreshing. “But there is no reason for us to quarrel,” he continued grandly. “We are both, after all, doing our duty.”
Buchanan-Smith assented readily. “We can do no more.”
“So we’re agreed, then. Now what about st
arters? I rather fancy the calamari.”
Madrid: German Legation, Avenida del Generalísimo Franco, June 26
Hasselfeldt was always first in to the embassy, long before the Ambassador and his team of diplomats, even before his secretary. That was why he had to make his own coffee. As he sat at his desk, stirring in some powdered milk, he decided to run a check on Charles Bramall. He might be exactly what he said he was. Where there was royalty there were equerries. But Bramall had looked too fit, too sharp, to be just another royal lackey. He would ask Berlin if they’d heard of him. They’d need a picture, of course. Bramall might well not be his real name. The best thing to do would be to get the embassy photographer to snap the Duke in the foyer of the Ritz and capture Bramall at the same time. It was probably nothing. He was probably exactly what he said he was. But it made sense to check.
There was little else on the immediate agenda. Berlin had told him to keep an eye on the Duke, whose pro-German sympathies were well known. Quite why had not so far been explained. It would be one thing if the ex-King were to turn up at the Legation and claim asylum. Other than that, he appeared to be no more than decadence in motion. Hasselfeldt had been in Madrid just a short time, but already he had begun to notice how out of touch with events his superiors were, obsessed with perceptions in the Chancellery. There were, thankfully, some exceptions. His boss, Obersturmbahnführer Walter Schellenberg, shared his outlook and had no interest in the to-ings and fro-ings of the Duke. The Foreign Service, on the other hand, drifting from cocktail party to cocktail party in Berlin, was reportedly excited and keen to set some kind of game in motion. Well, he would do what needed to be done and see what came of it. If there was to be a game, then someone had to win, and Hasselfeldt preferred that it should be him. There was something so deeply satisfying about victory.
Madrid: British embassy, Calle del Fernando el Santo, June 26
Sir Samuel Hoare, so dull of temperament he was rumoured to be descended from a long line of maiden aunts, was not a man given easily to levity. He had been in Madrid for less than a month, charged with ensuring that Spain did not throw in its lot with the Axis powers. Although he had shown early sympathy for Franco’s cause during the Civil War, when he was foreign secretary, and had been a key member of the so-called “appeasement set” in Chamberlain’s Government, he would fulfil his present remit to the letter. That was what duty meant. Yet, this week, with everything hanging in the balance, inordinate amounts of his time had been given up to the organisation of a gigantic party. He could not bear it. The Duke of Windsor, freed from what he regarded as the intolerable pressures of Palace life, was exerting himself in exile and had turned out, predictably, to be a right royal pain in the neck. It was tedious, as well as achingly unproductive.
“Your Royal Highness,” he began. “How good to see you again – and after so short an interval. What can I do for you this time?”
The Duke stood with his hands clasped in the side pockets of his jacket, the thumbs pointing towards the creases of his trousers as if they were a pair of concealed Derringers. “It’s not what you can do for me, Hoare, it’s what I can do for you.”
“I am intrigued.”
The Duke beckoned Bramall forward. “I don’t think you’ve met Mr Bramall, my newest equerry, appointed by a lethal combination of the Palace and Downing Street.” The two men shook hands and the Duke continued. “He’s been taking a look at our list of invitations for Saturday’s party, and you’ll be pleased to know that he has decided not to exercise his power of veto.”
“That is good news, Sir. So it will be one thousand for canapés and drinks?”
“Absolutely. He agrees with you, though, that it might be unwise to invite the Germans in present circumstances.”
The Ambassador gave Bramall the curtest of nods. “I really do think that would be best,” he said.
“Can’t see the problem myself. We’re at war, obviously, and we can’t be seen to condone in any way recent events in France. But here, in Madrid, on neutral soil, who is to say that, by way of discreet contacts, we might not set the proper tone for some kind of eventual rapprochement?”
Hoare, shocked beyond words, decided to leave the Duke’s argument where it lay. “And might I assume that the Duchess is happy with the list, as presented?”
“Her Royal Highness? She was the one drew it up in the first place.”
“Excellent. I trust she continues to find her stay in Madrid satisfactory.”
“As far as anything can be in the circumstances in which we find ourselves.”
“With respect, sir, you would need to talk to Downing Street about that. The Ambassador turned fractionally in the direction of Bramall. “And what about you, Mr Bramall? You come with the personal imprimatur of the Prime Minister. What should I make of that exactly?”
“That it is a measure, presumably, of the importance he attaches to my mission.” The preposterousness of his response hit him like the punch line of a joke. It was as if he was speaking a different language in which he’d suddenly become fluent. Christ! You had to laugh.
Hoare drew himself up to his full height, looking as if he was about to deliver a magisterial rebuke. Instead, he forced his patrician features to soften and resolve themselves into something like indulgence. “And in relation to that,” he said, “it is my solemn duty to remind you that the safety of His Royal Highness is your first and paramount responsibility. I must therefore ask you to check and double-check on everything in relation to his stay and to keep me informed of any concerns you might have that could conceivably be eased by my attention or that of my staff.”
Just for a moment, the Duke looked mildly alarmed. “I say, Hoare, what are you implying? I’m not in any danger, am I?”
The Ambassador threw up his hands. “Not that I am aware of, Sir. But it is our duty to be sure.”
“Ah. Right. Well, I’ll leave you two to get on with it then. The Duchess and I plan to do a bit of shopping this morning – if we can find anything, that is – and I don’t like to keep her waiting.”
“Your Royal Highness,” said Hoare and Bramall in almost perfect unison.
Once the Duke had gone, Hoare invited Bramall to join him on the terrace outside his window.
“What’s your first impression?” he asked.
Bramall thought for a second. “Bit early to say. The Spanish press was hanging around the hotel lobby this morning, looking for quotes. His Royal Highness was a model of decorum. The only thing that went off was a flashbulb.”
“Man’s a nightmare,” Hoare said suddenly, with what struck Bramall as admirable candour. “But of course I didn’t say that. I didn’t say it either when he was soliciting my advice during the abdication crisis. There are those who argue that the sudden appearance in Madrid of His Royal Highness is a godsend and that it gives us a perfect excuse to entertain le tout Madrid. They may even be right. We must see. But frankly, Bramall, between you and me, the sooner he’s out of our hair the sooner we can each get down to business.”
“I’m inclined to agree with you, sir.” He wondered how much Hoare knew about his mission and how free he should feel in his company.
“You’re probably wondering if I know what you’re up to and how much you can divulge to me of your activities.”
“Not at all.”
“So let me make it easy for you. Like you, I am here at the request of the Prime Minister, whom I have known for the best part of 20 years. Like you, I am entrusted with persuading the Spanish Government that it is in their best interests to remain neutral in the war and, in particular, that they should avoid any tomfoolery over Gibraltar. But whereas I will perform my role for the most part in the light of day, employing negotiation and legitimate diplomatic stratagems, you, Mr Bramall, will perforce spend much of your time in the shadows, often among people with whom it would be impolitic, not
to say impractical, for me to converse. We are to be like two pieces in an invisible jigsaw puzzle. No one will see how well we fit. Once the embassy function is out of the way, we shall not meet again. The only reason we are talking now is that you arrived with His Royal Highness, in whose service you are ostensibly engaged. You should not trade heavily on your connection with me. If things go wrong, if you find yourself in hot water, I shall deny all knowledge of you. You will be, so far as I am concerned, a royal factotum of doubtful provenance. Do I make myself clear?”
Not for the first time in recent days, Bramall was overcome by the sensation of doors closing all about him. “Don’t worry,” he said. “I know exactly where I stand.”
“Very good. A difficult task lies ahead of you. How you are supposed to uncover Franco’s war plans and the likelihood, or not, of a German attack on Gibraltar is, frankly, beyond me, but no doubt you have your methods. Should you have urgent cause to contact the embassy, you will do so through the consular section. A Mr. Burns there will act as middleman. There is little else that I can say to you, save that, in spite of all, you carry with you my best wishes.”
“Thank you, sir. If nothing else, you have been more than straight with me.”
“Goodbye, Mr Bramall.”
Two minutes later, Bramall found himself back in the street, where the summer heat was already approaching 30 degrees Celsius. He’d forgotten how hot it could get in Madrid – worse even than Barcelona. A group of Falangists, still chanting their Gibraltar Españole mantras, surged towards him, a couple waving their fists and shouting obscenities. A solitary member of the Guardia Civil, stationed at the embassy front door, shrugged his shoulders as if to say that it was nothing to do with him.
Bramall sighed. All he wanted to do was get back to his hotel. Stepping onto the roadway to avoid a confrontation, he consulted his street guide, then began to make his way west towards the Plaza de Alonso Martinez. As he did so, a blond-haired young man, slightly built, with a sallow face, wearing a sweat-stained shirt and a beret, detached himself from the protesters and fell in step some 50 metres behind. Bramall didn’t know what it was that alerted him – perhaps the regularity of the footfall or the intensity of the moment. But he could sense that something was not right. He stopped for a second and glanced round, as if to get his bearings. Out of the corner of his eye he could see a man tying his shoelaces. Textbook stuff; a test nonetheless. But whose test? An intersection lay ahead. Upon reaching it, he looked again at his street guide and scratched his head before turning smartly left down the Calle de Zurbano. The street was broad and imposing, lined with tall, nineteenth century palacios, several of them damaged by the sporadic aerial bombardment of 1937. But Bramall wasn’t interested in these. He was looking for a way out of his immediate dilemma. At length he came across an archway that led into a cobbled courtyard. He walked through and hid himself behind a pillar. Several seconds later, a head projected itself warily through the arch.
