Carnival of Spies

by Robert Moss

  One detail fascinated Bailey. Engineer Hossbach boasted that Goring had told him that Germany would soon have the most powerful air force on earth, able to bomb Paris or London into the stone age. According to Hossbach, Germany now had more than two thousand combat planes and eight thousand trained pilots.

  Bailey snatched up the report and rushed down the corridor to C.’s office.

  “I’m afraid it will have to wait till this afternoon, Major,” the chief’s secretary said, glancing up at the clock on the wall. “He’s running late for a meeting at the War Office.”

  “It’s about that.”

  C. was about to slip out the back way through his private apartment. He was dressed up in his admiral’s uniform with all the decorations. He had a habit of reverting to naval garb when he was going to do battle.

  “Johnny’s come up trumps again,” Bailey announced.

  “Colin, I’ve no doubt your man can walk on the waters, but Brazil is a very long taxi ride from the Air Parity Committee, and they’re waiting for me now.”

  “I think you’ll want to see this first,” Bailey insisted.

  C. squinted at the cable, then reread the section that mentioned the number of German pilots.

  “Good lord,” he said softly. Then, in his familiar bark, “You didn’t plant this, did you, Colin?”

  “I’ve only just opened my mail.”

  “Have you seen Winterbotham’s report?”

  “I’m not privy to the details, of course.”

  But he knew the gist of it. He could hardly fail to. Since Hitler had boasted to the foreign secretary, at their last meeting in Berlin, that the Luftwaffe had reached “parity” with the Royal Air Force, the top priority for every department of British Intelligence had been to find out exactly what this meant and whether the Führer was bluffing. Group Captain Winterbotham was the head of the firm’s air intelligence section. He had been fighting a running battle with Whitehall — and, in particular, with the Air Ministry — over the official estimates of German air power. The conventional wisdom was that Hitler was talking through his hat and that the Luftwaffe was years behind the Royal Air Force. The marshals and mandarins at the Air Ministry insisted that Germany had no more than four thousand trained pilots at its disposal. Cobbling together information from various sources, including members of de Salis’ network, Winterbotham had calculated that the true figure might be twice as high. C. had defended his estimate at the often testy sessions of the Air Parity Committee, set up to adjudicate on this single issue. But the voice of C.’s service remained in a minority. For the most part the august members of the committee believed what they wanted to believe: that Germany was weak, that German industry was as inefficient as British industry, that it would take Hitler many years to rebuild. Now, it seemed, an agent in Brazil, half a world away, had supplied what it required to win the argument — proof from the horse’s mouth.

  C. had reason to be excited. The stakes were high. The country’s whole defence program now hung on the agreed estimates of German strength. But a Secret Service victory in a battle with the other arms of the bureaucracy would bring more immediate gains.

  “This could be worth another hundred thousand to us in the Secret Vote,” C. remarked, with satisfaction.

  “I trust we can afford to give Johnny a bonus.”

  “Oh, I should think so. Now I have to run. I can’t wait to see the expression on a certain air vice-marshal’s face.”

  7

  Harry Maitland parked the Beast under the palms and strolled under the long colonnaded portico of the member’s entrance to the Jocky Club, a white marbled palace worthy of a viceroy of India.

  A reporter from the English-language paper was lounging near the betting counters, studying the racing form and the well-heeled patrons of the club. Spotting Maitland, he drifted across the tessellated floor. He was sporting a straw boater, a beard in the style of George V which was obviously dyed, and an Old Harrovian tie to which Harry was perfectly sure he was not entitled.

  “They think they’re at bloody Royal Ascot, don’t they?” He greeted Harry with a blast of whisky and stale tobacco, wagging his finger at a group of men in silk hats and women decked out in furs, despite the heat.

  “How are you, Monty? Filling up the gossip column?”

  Desmond Wild gave him a sly look. Maitland suspected that Wild supplemented his journalistic earnings by charging prominent members of the Anglo-Brazilian community a fee not to publish what he found out about their extramarital affairs. Monty was certainly not averse to writing a puff piece or to passing on a tip when the price was right. Maitland himself had made use of him on occasion, though he preferred, by and large, to deal with Brazilian reporters; they had better access to local politicians, drank less and came cheaper, by and large, than Desmond Wild.

  “I just saw His Imperial Majesty’s Ambassador Extraordinary,” Wild reported. “He was fairly seething. They’ve given his usual table to a bloody Yank.”

  “Who is it?”

  “That oil man from Houston. Don’t say you don’t read my paper, dear boy. He gave a bash that was the talk of the town. He took over the Golden Room at the Copacabana Palace. The place was drowning in champagne.”

  “I suppose you helped bail them out.”

  “I did my bit,” Desmond Wild allowed. “Speaking of which, what would you say to a stirrup cup?”

  They went up the wide marble stairs to the terrace, which commanded a sweeping view of the track and the mountains beyond. Corcovado reared up to the left. It was the start of the season, and the terrace was crowded. Every table was marked out as private turf by a bottle of Chivas or Johnny Walker Black with a tape measure along the side. Wild’s eyes glinted at the line-up.

  A white-jacketed headwaiter bobbed up, apologizing that the restaurant was completely full. His soft, pale features and half-closed eyes made him look like a calculating grouper. Casually Harry displayed a wad of thousand-cruzeiro banknotes, and a free table miraculously appeared.

  “There’s the Yank,” Wild announced, once he had armed himself with a stiff single malt. “Mister Courtland Bull. I gather he lives up to his moniker. And just look who he’s asked to lunch. Our pinko mayor. Now that’s an interesting conjunction.”

  Maitland turned without haste. The Texas oil man was in his early sixties and ruggedly handsome, his deep tan set off by a mane of white hair. He was laughing around a big cigar, flanked by two young, exceedingly well-developed women who laughed with him. Doctor Alcibiades’ attention flitted back and forth from his host to the neighbouring tables, where a number of wealthy Brazilian men affected not to see him. It was not clear whether their objections were personal or political. Some members of the Jockey Club regarded the mayor as a dangerous demagogue who stirred up trouble by flirting with the unions and making speeches on the plight of the poor. Some might have more private reasons for avoiding Doctor Alcibiades, at least while in the company of their wives; Maitland guessed that more than a few had had occasion to visit his VD clinic in previous years.

  Their eyes met briefly. Doctor Alcibiades nodded and smiled.

  Wild had a point, Harry thought. It was an odd conjunction: the “progressive” mayor and the Texas oil baron. Especially since Doctor Alcibiades had landed himself in hot water with the established oil companies by imposing a freeze on gasoline prices in Rio.

  “I’ll take the Sugarloaf on the left,” Wild said, admiring the blonde who was seated between the American and the mayor, making an inviting show of cleavage. “What do you say? Oh, I forgot. You like them darker, don’t you?”

  To avoid rising to the bait, Harry called a boy to place a bet for him on the second race, on horse number six.

  “Vencedor,” he specified. “To win.”

  Wild was impressed by the sum Maitland was betting.

  “Pretty sure of yourself, aren’t you?” He consulted his form sheet and shook his head. “She doesn’t stand a chance. Melpomene. Bloody silly name for a filly
, anyway.”

  He took another look at the form sheet. The horse was owned by a São Paulo syndicate. A thought struggled to the surface of his consciousness like a fish rising up out of a murky aquarium.

  “You own a piece of a horse syndicate, don’t you?” he said to Maitland, almost accusingly. “Do you own a piece of this nag?”

  “I might,” Harry conceded.

  “Fuck. I put a bundle on number three. Carlota.”

  When the boy came back with the betting slips, Wild asked him to put some money on Melpomene for him. He then made a great show of having mislaid his wallet.

  “You wouldn’t mind, would you, old man—”

  Harry cut short the entreaties by loaning him the equivalent of about ten dollars.

  “I’ll pay you back if I win,” Wild said generously. “I can’t wait to see the look on Sir Evelyn’s face if I do. I told him Carlota was a sure thing.”

  “Let’s hope he doesn’t listen to you.”

  The British Ambassador was sitting at a table a few steps above them on the other side of the terrace, his view of the track obscured by the constant coming and going of waiters and patrons on the level below. Sir Evelyn was looking distinctly peeved. Lady Maude was drinking a good deal of champagne and lecturing in a high, nasal voice. Summerhayes was at their table, trying to make himself invisible. Harry assumed the mousy woman in a chintzy frock who made up the party must be Summerhayes’ wife.

  The horses were at the starting gate. The jockeys’ garb was confusingly similar. Most of them wore tunics in varying shades of red, and St. Andrew’s cross, in gold or bright orange, was in great demand as an embellishment.

  Lady Maude watched the race through opera glasses, barracking for Carlota, the favourite, as stridently as any of the punters who lined the railing below the members’ stand. Harry noticed that Courtland Bull paid no attention to the race. He had swapped seats with one of the women and was talking animatedly to Doctor Alcibiades, punctuating his points with his cigar.

  Melpomene led from the beginning and won the race by nearly five lengths.

  “Bloody hell!” Wild yelled in high excitement. “It’s a good thing I ran into you. How big a piece of that filly do you own?”

  “Oh, about two per cent, I should think.”

  “Well, if she repeats that showing at the Derby” — like other Anglos, Wild persisted in calling the Grande Premio do Brasil, the biggest event in the local racing calendar, the Derby “— Courtland Bull will be taking you to lunch. Excuse me.” He got up so hastily he dropped cigarette ash down the front of his jacket. “I must go and pick up my winnings.”

  Across the terrace Sir Evelyn tore up his betting slips and strewed them over the tablecloth in disgust. The blonde at the American’s table clapped her hands and kissed everybody within reach. Harry was intrigued by the relationship between Doctor Alcibiades and his host. Was Bull Petroleum trying to undercut the other oil companies and grab the Brazilian market for itself? Or was Courtland Bull planning to move some of his oil rigs south? There had been speculation — little better than rumour — about some big offshore oil deposits along the coast of Bahia. But those were not in the gift of the mayor of Rio de Janeiro. However, Doctor Alcibiades had the ear of the president, and of other people besides.

  It struck Harry that Desmond Wild had been gone for rather a long time. Still, Wild could never be accused of hurrying to settle his debts. No doubt he had repaired to the other bar or the betting counters below.

  “Maitland?” The voice was querulous.

  Harry looked up to find the British Ambassador hovering over his table, puffed up so that it seemed he was about to pop his collar stud.

  “Good afternoon, Sir Evelyn. May I offer you a drink?”

  “I’ve got a bone to pick with you, young man. What the devil do you think you’re up to, using my embassy as a post-box? Summerhayes tells me you’ve been coming in every week, sending off cables none of us can read.”

  The ambassador was talking loudly enough to be over-heard at any of the neighbouring tables.

  “Sir Evelyn, I hardly think this is the appropriate place—”

  “I won’t tolerate my embassy being used for any of this shady business!”

  “Sir Evelyn—”

  “I want to see you in my office first thing on Monday morning, and I shall want some satisfactory answers. Otherwise, I shan’t hesitate to speak to your employers. I’m sure Rio Light will take a responsible view.”

  “Shall we say nine?” Harry responded, as calmly as possible.

  Sir Evelyn looked at him as if he had gone quite mad. “I shall receive you at ten,” he said frostily.

  The interview did not go well. In the course of the weekend Harry had prevailed on an acquaintance at Cable & Wireless to open up the shop and send a coded telegram to London, asking Colin Bailey for instructions on how to proceed. When Maitland arrived at the embassy on Monday morning, he was made to cool his heels for nearly half an hour before he was admitted to the ambassador’s presence. Sir Evelyn had the transcript of Colin Bailey’s reply on his desk.

  “Perhaps you would start by translating this,” he said, handing the message to Harry.

  “It will take me a little time, sir.”

  “I am prepared to wait.”

  “I’m afraid I also need special equipment. If you’ll give me an hour—”

  “Oh, very well,” the ambassador acquiesced grudgingly.

  Harry drove home to decipher the cable. Its twelve-letter key was based on a parallel-text edition of Xenophon’s Anabasis, which Maitland and Bailey had both studied in the original at school. The choice of the book on which the simple code was based had less to do with fond memories of Winchester than with Bailey’s sense of whimsy. The Anabasis was the story of a long march. Prestes, the Communist figurehead, had conducted a long march of his own; Emil, the controller, had been responsible for another.

  Harry drove back to the embassy with his notes.

  To his discomfiture, Lady Maude was present at the second interview. She offered him tea and settled herself, stiff-backed, in the leather chair in front of the bookcase.

  Harry remembered one of Bailey’s remarks about the ambassador, an allusion to a Russian novel about a man who was incapable either of getting out of bed or doing anything worthwhile when in it.

  “Use your own judgment,” Bailey had cabled, “but protect our source at any cost.”

  Maitland quoted this to Sir Evelyn, along with a few other selected passages.

  “Well, I’m waiting,” the ambassador re-joined.

  Harry gave a brief summary of the facts he had assembled from Johnny’s reports. The Communists’ hopes centred on the movement in the north, where there was talk of rallying an insurrectionary force of a hundred thousand men, and on Prestes’ old comrades in the military, some of whom now held strategic positions in the armed forces and the government. The Communists were strong in a number of trade unions, especially the railroad workers and the taxi drivers, but their popular base in the cities was still weak. They had been training paramilitary cells to carry out acts of sabotage against key buildings and communications. Their front organization, the National Liberation Alliance, was gathering support by advertising a few simple slogans attacking the Anglo-American banks, the big landowners and the Fascist Greenshirts. The aim was a violent revolution under the banners of nationalism and social justice that would be handed over to the Communist party once Vargas was overthrown. The operation was well funded and was under the supervision of a team of veteran revolutionists from Moscow. It was gaining momentum now that Prestes had returned to Brazil and was in personal touch with his admirers.

  “You must tell Getulio at once,” Lady Maude interrupted, addressing her husband.

  Sir Evelyn nodded. “I was hoping to play nine holes with him on Saturday,” he reported.

  “No, dear. You must go to him today.”

  Maitland cleared his throat. “If I may say so, I thin
k it would be premature to go to the Brazilian authorities.”

  “Nonsense,” Sir Evelyn admonished him. “We are dealing with a grave conspiracy. The government must be alerted, so it can take appropriate measures. I know the president well. He remembers his friends. This will do no harm to British interests. On the contrary, we can expect a more sympathetic hearing at Guanabara Palace.”

  “There are some operational matters to be considered.”

  “Operational matters?” Sir Evelyn’s expression implied that Harry had just broken wind in his presence.

  “The conspiracy is still in its formative phase, and we do not yet have sufficient information to identify all the ringleaders. If we are patient, we have the chance to bag all of them.”

  Harry thought that his appeal to masterly inertia might reach Sir Evelyn. But his formidable wife intervened once more.

  “If we merely wait,” she pointed out, “the balloon may go up while we’re all in our beds. Before we know it, we’ll have a Bolshevik mob storming the embassy.”

  “That is most unlikely,” Maitland countered, with as much patience as he could muster. “You see, we have an excellent source. A source that must be protected.”

  “Who is this source?” Sir Evelyn challenged him.

  “I’m afraid I’m not at liberty to say, sir. But he is a remarkable man who has already rendered immense service to Britain.”

  “That’s all very well, but Maude has an excellent point. We can’t just sit on this type of information. I’ve made up my mind. I shall seek an audience with the president.”