The Hansa Protocol

by Norman Russell

  ‘Will you be joining the others, Miss Drake? I believe there’s to be a reception at the Highgate Tavern.’

  ‘No, Colonel Kershaw. I shall go straight home. Were – were you Arthur’s superior officer? He wasn’t an ordinary soldier, was he?’

  ‘The answer to both your questions is no, Miss Drake. No, I was not Arthur Fenlake’s superior officer. And no, he was not an ordinary soldier. Fenlake was a special courier, seconded from his army unit to the Foreign Office. I’m not allowed to tell you why he was killed – murdered. But I can tell you that he died on active service. That is why the Queen decreed a military funeral for him today.’

  ‘The Queen?’

  ‘Yes. It was Her Majesty’s express wish.’

  They had reached a small, single-storey lodge set back from the avenue, and partly cloaked by trees. The front door opened, and an elderly man in a gardener’s smock came out on to the doorstep. Vanessa could see into the room beyond, where a fire was cheerfully burning.

  ‘Will you drink a cup of tea with me, Miss Drake? You have only to step inside the lodge. It will restore your spirits after this melancholy business, and help to drive away some of this biting cold.’

  Vanessa looked searchingly at him for a moment, and then at the elderly man, who had walked away purposefully into the cemetery. She glanced up at the sky. The fitful daylight had a greenish hue, and black clouds scudded across Highgate village. There would be torrential hail, perhaps, or the final victory of the skirmishing snow. She nodded her head, and together they entered the lodge.

  ‘No, Miss Drake,’ said Kershaw, putting his cup down on the saucer, ‘I was not Arthur’s superior officer, though you’ll appreciate that we belonged to the same regiment. Arthur had been seconded to the Foreign Office, where he worked for the Under-Secretary, Sir Charles Napier, as one of his most valued couriers. I have charge of a different crowd of people entirely. They are folk who keep constant watch, and carry out assignments that help to guarantee the safety and stability of our country. Do you want to hear more?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I have two kinds of people working for me. First, there are professionally trained men and women, drawn from all ranks in society. They are required to take great risks. You will find them in the nobility, in the professions, in the working population. These people are known as secret servants, and they receive an annual purse from the Treasury.’

  Colonel Kershaw sipped his tea for a while, and Vanessa gazed at the flickering flames in the rusty grate of the little room. They were both sitting on upright Windsor chairs, placed on either side of a spindly tea-table.

  ‘And then,’ Kershaw continued, ‘there are the others – the “nobodies”. They carry out small tasks that are part of a greater project. Rather like a piece of embroidery, you know, where you can work very closely on a particular detail – a panel of an altar frontal, say – and not feel bothered about losing sight of the whole design.’

  Colonel Kershaw glanced at her briefly as he said this, and she realized that he knew how she earned her living.

  ‘The nobodies are unpaid, but know that they will never be in want, never be without friends in time of need. They are people like the cemetery gardener, whose assignment it was to make this tea for us, and to ensure that we are left alone in this lodge. Yes, the nobodies are people like him. People who will receive a verbal summons to do a certain thing at a certain place, and will do it without demur. They are people like you.’

  ‘Like me?’

  ‘Yes. In fact, you met one of my nobodies quite recently. Mrs Prout, she’s called.’

  ‘Oh! It was in my friend’s club. I was moaning about how dull life was, and this Mrs Prout told me all about her adventures in China—’

  ‘Yes, and she did that, Miss Drake, because I wanted to know what kind of young woman you were. Lieutenant Fenlake was still alive, then, and you were his friend. In addition to that, I knew that you possessed a certain skill that could prove very useful to me.’

  ‘A skill of mine?’

  ‘Yes. In three days’ time, Miss Drake, on Friday the 13th, an event will take place in Berlin that could set Europe ablaze, and plunge Britain into war. But you – with your special skill – could take part in an enterprise that would prevent that catastrophe.’

  ‘But my employer—’

  ‘There will never be any difficulty about that, Miss Drake. Or about reimbursements for lost earnings. So will you join my crowd? Will you help me to bring Arthur Fenlake’s work to fruition? There may be danger, but you will never be more than a breath away from help.’

  Vanessa Drake suddenly smiled. She looked at the cheerful fire in the lodge grate, and at the man in dress uniform sitting opposite her. That black crepe band on his sleeve was for Arthur. By accepting Colonel Kershaw’s offer, she would be uniting herself with Arthur’s unquestioning devotion to his country. She thought of his last words to her, as they parted outside the Admiralty. ‘You’ll be all right, won’t you?’ Yes; she would be all right.

  ‘Colonel Kershaw,’ said Vanessa Drake, ‘tell me what I have to do.’

  Louise Whittaker paused in her meal to sip a glass of seltzer, and glanced across the quietly sumptuous dining room of Bagot’s Hotel. The large room was heavily panelled in polished mahogany, but was prevented from being gloomy by an elaborately carved and coffered plaster ceiling. The room was skilfully lighted by shaded oil lamps, and a vast fire blazed away in a wide grate. There were a good many military and naval types taking dinner, but also a sprinkling of civilian guests and their wives. It was very comfortable, and the service was excellent.

  On the way down to dinner from her room, Louise had glanced out through a window on the landing, and had seen the vast blanket of white snow lying over Archbishop’s Park. Down in Carlisle Place, though, the snow had been churned to brown slush by the passing traffic on its way to the bridge.

  Louise put down her glass, and looked at Vanessa Drake, who was sitting opposite her. She saw the excitement in her young friend’s eyes, the animated sparkle that had been there when she had first confided this adventure to her. But she saw, too, the slight tremor in the girl’s temple, and the paleness of her face.

  ‘What’s the matter, Vanessa?’ she asked softly.

  ‘I think it’s nerves,’ the girl replied in a low voice. ‘Do you realize that poor Arthur’s funeral was only yesterday? I had to give an immediate answer to Colonel Kershaw, and agree to take a room here last night. It’s the eleventh today. The mission starts tomorrow, and the memorandum that poor Arthur delivered to Sir Charles Napier will start its journey to Berlin.’

  Vanessa suddenly realized that she was being indiscreet. She lowered her voice. ‘It’s not like an ordinary hotel, Louise. There’s always room for people connected to the colonel. And then he said it would be better if I had a woman companion – being alone might draw the wrong kind of attention to me. I told him about you. It was good of you to come, Louise.’

  ‘Not good of me at all! I have a lost reputation with Arnold Box to redeem! But come now, Vanessa, what’s the matter with you?’

  ‘I told you. It’s nerves. I enjoyed the first assignment just before dinner – Colonel Kershaw was there in the room, watching me work, and encouraging me. There was another gentleman there, too, who seemed very grand, but very reassuring. But it’s the second assignment – I’m sure I’ll tremble so much that I’ll make some frightful mistake—’

  Two waiters appeared, removed their plates, and brushed down the cloth with napkins. Would they take coffee at the table, or in the sitting-room? They would take it at the table.

  ‘Vanessa,’ said Louise Whittaker, ‘you are talking like a heroine in a cheap novel, the kind of female who trembles like an aspen in the presence of the menfolk, and is for ever casting her eyes down! But there, I mustn’t scold you – I found out the other day that not everything in the male garden is rosy. Not by any means.’

  She recalled briefly the dirty and distorted f
ace of Baby-Boy Contarini, and his frightful profanities, shrieked out in a grotesque soprano voice. No; there was no room for tremblers in Mr Box’s female posse.

  ‘Would it help if I came into the room with you?’

  ‘Oh, Louise, would you? I’m going to need a steady hand, and I’m afraid of ending up like your aspen, trembling and quivering, and ruining everything. I know that Mr Box will be there, too—’

  ‘Yes, Mr Box will be there, but it would complete the trick if I were there as well. The three musketeers. After all, we’ve worked well as a team before – first as theatre critics at the Savoy, and then as trenchermen at Simpson’s in the Strand.’

  She was pleased to see Vanessa smile, and by the time that the coffee had arrived, the girl was her own vital self again.

  ‘Devilish handsome gals over there, Lankester,’ observed Surgeon Lieutenant Goldsmith, glancing across the dining-room. ‘I wonder who they are? The little blonde one booked in last night. Her stunning friend arrived in a cab at noon today.’

  ‘I don’t know who they are, Goldsmith. Friends of Mother Prout’s, I gather. And you’re far too old to have frivolous thoughts about young ladies, so you’d better give your full attention to finishing that plum pudding.’

  The old retired naval officer chuckled, and did as he was told.

  Major Lankester would have preferred to dine in his own room, but Kershaw had advised against it. He’d been glad to share a table with old Goldsmith, a red-faced man with spiky white hair and quizzical white eyebrows, who had a fund of good naval stories to tell, and a fondness for the gaming-tables second only to his own. It was very rare, these days, to see Horatio Goldsmith at Bagot’s.

  Lankester glanced across at the two young women who were sharing a table near the fireplace. The elder one was a real beauty, raven-haired, and with an assured presence. The fair girl was no more than twenty, and very pretty. She was listening intently to something that her companion was saying. There were other ladies present in the dining-room, some with their husbands. They were probably couples up from the country for a few days of business and shopping in the capital.

  ‘So what’s brought you up to Town, Goldsmith? Last time I saw you, you swore that you’d never leave that place of yours at Brighton again. Rheumatism, or something. You said your travelling days were done.’

  Surgeon Lieutenant Goldsmith carefully garnered the remaining custard from his plate, and consigned it to his mouth. He darted an uncomfortably shrewd glance at his companion, and said, ‘Duty called me, Lankester. Something someone at the Admiralty wanted to know about. So I’m holed up here for a day or so. And what about you?’

  ‘Oh, just passing through, you know. It’s Wednesday today. I’m off to the Continent tomorrow, and hope to be back in London again late on Saturday. I expect you know the kind of thing I’m doing – ah, here’s the coffee.’

  Lankester glanced at the large clock above the fireplace. It was just after nine. Two hours earlier, in one of the rooms of Bagot’s Hotel not available for guests, he had reported to Colonel Kershaw. Sir Charles Napier, the Under-Secretary, had been with him. Napier had brought the memorandum with him from the Foreign Office, and the three men had formally examined it, noting the wax seals, and the special ciphers that identified it. At Kershaw’s behest, Lankester had brought with him the jacket of the suit that he intended to wear for his journey to Berlin the next day.

  ‘I will return this coat to you personally, Lankester,’ Colonel Kershaw had said, ‘when you retire this evening. You will find that the memorandum will have been sewn into the lining in such a way that no prying eyes would ever suspect that there was a hidden pocket there. Sir Charles Napier will stay here with me, and watch the seamstress complete the task. I wish you God speed.’

  There had been a subtle uneasiness in Kershaw’s manner, as though his usual assurance had temporarily deserted him. Sir Charles Napier, too, seemed to regard the matter with distaste – or was it contempt? Lankester had suddenly felt compelled to speak. He was still shocked and profoundly upset by the sudden violent death of his young friend Lieutenant Fenlake. Kershaw had told him all about the murderous Colin McColl, and his smouldering resentment caused him to speak more boldly than military custom allowed. Why did Fenlake’s assassin remain a free man?

  ‘Sir,’ he had said, ‘our fellow-officer, Lieutenant Arthur Fenlake, was found shot dead by this fellow McColl in one of the so-called “secure houses” belonging to Sir Charles Napier there—’

  ‘You are speaking out of turn, Major,’ said Kershaw sharply. ‘Fenlake is not the issue here.’

  ‘With respect, sir, I will speak! I intend no disrespect to Sir Charles Napier, but Fenlake must have been lured to his death by one of Sir Charles’s own Foreign Office people. Or there’s somebody in Whitehall who talks too much off duty. Too many people know too much. I’m an old hand at courier work, sir, as you know, but I shall be exceedingly nervous this time round.’

  To his surprise, Colonel Kershaw had shown no anger at his untypical insubordination. Instead, he had sighed, and glanced at Sir Charles Napier, who shook his head, but said nothing.

  ‘Well, Lankester,’ Kershaw had said, ‘your caution does you credit, and perhaps we deserve to stand rebuked. But you mustn’t think that, in choosing you to deliver this memorandum at the eleventh hour to Baron von Dessau in Berlin, I am throwing you to the lions. You will be shadowed at all times, from the moment the Dover train leaves Victoria at ten-thirty tomorrow, until the time that you conclude the business, and leave Berlin. It is the element of surprise, we are convinced, that will so unnerve the baron that he will call his curs swiftly to heel. So you have only a single day to cross Europe. Sir Charles and I will make quite sure that nothing and nobody is allowed to stand in your way.’

  Somehow, the words were unnerving rather than reassuring. Lankester had already drawn himself briefly to attention, and turned towards the door, when Colonel Kershaw had treated him to a few parting words.

  ‘You have hinted at the presence of an enemy within the gates, Lankester. Well, let me assure you that there are no rotten apples in my barrel. They can’t get in, and if any turn rotten when they are in – well, they can’t get out.’

  By eleven o’clock that evening, the air in the deserted card-room at the rear of the hotel was thick with cigar smoke and the reek of brandy, and Surgeon Lieutenant Goldsmith’s face had grown as red as a lobster. Lankester reckoned that the old boy was already half seas under, but his old, pale-blue eyes were still sharp and shrewd, for all that. Goldsmith and Lankester were two of a kind: no amount of alcohol could dim their senses. The old naval officer had talked with great animation of the casino at Monte Carlo, and the gaming-houses of Cannes. When he ran out of stories, he surged to his feet, and disappeared from the room for a few minutes, returning with two generous glasses of brandy. He put them down rather uncertainly on the table, and produced two packs of cards from a drawer in one of the green baize-topped tables.

  ‘Here you are, Lankester,’ he said, with a throaty chuckle, ‘a little nightcap, with my compliments. Best Highland malt whisky. There’s nothing like it for banishing the fumes of lesser spirits. Now, let us have a couple of hands of bezique. I’ll show you one or two tricks you may not have come across in that place of Gordon’s you go to.’

  Half an hour later, the two men parted. Surgeon Lieutenant Goldsmith remained sitting at the table, looking rather rueful. Major Lankester smiled, pocketed the three sovereigns that he had won quite effortlessly, and made his way upstairs. As he neared his room, Colonel Kershaw appeared from a turn in the corridor, handed him his jacket, and bade him goodnight.

  Downstairs in the card-room, Surgeon Lieutenant Goldsmith started from a slight doze to see Colonel Kershaw standing near the door. He made a perfunctory effort to tidy up the cards spread out across the green baize table among the glasses and tall brass ashtrays. Damn it, Kershaw always had that effect on him!

  ‘How did it go?’ asked Kersha
w.

  ‘It was all as you might have expected, Kershaw. The fish rose to the bait. Are you sure you’re right about this business, though? Really sure, I mean?’

  ‘Really sure, Horatio, alas! Thank you, as always. It’s after midnight, and time for you to make yourself scarce. I’ll get Mrs Prout to find you a cab.’

  Once in his room, Major Lankester turned the door key in its lock. He divested himself of his evening clothes, and dressed himself for the next day’s journey. He examined the jacket, and saw how a skilful seamstress had sewn the memorandum into the lining so subtly that there was nothing to be seen. Nevertheless, it was reassuring to feel the bulk of the sealed document lying securely in its concealed pocket.

  Lankester put the jacket on, and buttoned it up. Then he extinguished his bedside candle, and lay down, fully clothed, on the bed. He intended to stay awake until morning. He had laid his plans well, but there was always danger. Poor young Fenlake! If ever he came face to face with this skulking assassin, Colin McColl, he would call him to account for young Fenlake’s death.

  Stay awake …. He felt desperately tired. Bagot’s was safe enough. Its corridors, he knew, were patrolled constantly during the night by porters who looked suspiciously like trained soldiers, fitted awkwardly by the management into civilian clothes. Bagot’s was that kind of hotel. Stay awake …. Major Lankester’s eyelids began to flicker, and soon they closed. Within a few minutes, he was in the inexorable grip of a profound sleep.

  Somewhere in the darkened hotel a clock struck three. Floorboards creaked on the landing. Presently the key of Major Lankester’s door turned, apparently of its own volition, in the lock, and the door was opened. Three figures silently entered the room. There was the rasp of a match and a sudden flare, and the candle on the bedside table was lit. The major did not stir.