by Peter Rimmer
Treason If You Lose
Sixth Book in the Brigandshaw Chronicles
Peter Rimmer
Contents
Part 1
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Part 2
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Part 3
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Part 4
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Part 5
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Part 6
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Part 7
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Part 8
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Dear Reader
Principal Characters
About Peter Rimmer
Also by Peter Rimmer
Acknowledgments
Part 1
Rape and Pillage – September 1938
1
The flying boat performed perfectly on the test flight from the Isle of Wight. Dropping the fluted hull of the big, four-engined aircraft onto the placid surface of Lake Constance in Switzerland, Harry Brigandshaw sensed the light kiss of his craft on the water, felt the aircraft settle, and ran her in towards the shore, away from Germany which they could see clearly on the other side of the lake.
“Smooth as a baby’s bottom, Uncle Harry,” said Tinus Oosthuizen in the co-pilot’s seat.
“This is a beautiful aircraft, Phillip,” Harry said over his shoulder to the chief engineer of Short Brothers. “If you give your passengers caviar and oysters they’ll imagine themselves on the Queen Mary.”
“Three days from England to Cape Town, Harry. Two weeks from Southampton to Cape Town by boat, but you should know.”
“We did it once in ten days with the SS Corfe Castle just to prove a point, but the voyage was rough. The engines vibrated the length and breadth of the boat. Passengers complained.”
“Lands on the Nile near Cairo. Then the African Great Lakes. The Zambezi above the Victoria Falls. We can land in Cape Town harbour if there isn’t a southeaster blowing, then we will divert to one of the freshwater dams.”
“Imperial Airways will make a killing. People will pay a fortune to say they’ve flown to South Africa in three days. Can you see anything on the other side of the lake we don’t like, Tinus?”
“Some sailing boats. Three big ones with single high masts, making for the shore,” said Tinus.
“There’s an official-looking motorboat patrolling what’s probably the Swiss–German divide of the lake,” said Anthony Brigandshaw from where he was sitting next to Phillip Crookshank behind his father and cousin Tinus. “Do you want to look through the binoculars, Tinus? There’s a flag flying on the back of the boat I’ve never seen before. The men in the boat are all in uniform. If I’m not mistaken, one of them has a pair of glasses trained on us. Some kind of a cross on a red background.”
“Swastika,” said Phillip.
“There’s a small fishing village on the map over there where we’ll ask about Gabby and Melina,” said Harry looking at his map. “Can’t believe too many schoolgirls from Germany holiday with friends on the lake without the locals knowing. By the way Bergit spoke on the phone, I’d think the girls had been here before. They’re at school in Switzerland, Geneva. Only Erwin is at school in Berlin.”
“Romanshorn looks more than a fishing village, Harry,” said Phillip Crookshank, having read the name over Harry’s shoulder.
“Good. Then it won’t take long to trace the girls and find out what’s happened to Klaus. There’s a railway line that runs along the shore of the lake.”
“The patrol boat is coming our way.”
“Where is the divide? They won’t come into Swiss water.”
“If you taxi at a maximum speed, Uncle Harry, the wash will prevent them getting closer. The slipstream from the propellers will blow their hats off. Now this is fun. I thought all the fun would stop last week when I came down from Oxford. How old are the girls, Uncle Harry?”
“I was trying to work it out. Erwin turned seventeen last month. Why he was at home arguing with his parents about the Hitler Youth. The next youngest is Melina, probably fifteen. Gabby will be thirteen or thereabouts.”
“The patrol boat has turned away,” said Tinus. “If it rocks any more in our wash it will turn turtle. What happens if we sink a German patrol boat, Uncle Harry?”
“Just keep an eye on them. In all my travels I have never been to Switzerland before. Now we’ll have to come in real slow. Phil, this flying boat is going to make Imperial proud.”
“Can the girls speak English?” asked Anthony.
“I have no idea.”
“Are they going to come back with us to England? They can always stay at Hastings Court.”
“I didn’t think you liked girls, Anthony? You’ll be back at boarding school next week anyway.”
“I’m going to get into the Colts this season. The first fifteen Colts. Did you ever play rugby at Bishops, Tinus?”
“Of course, everyone plays rugby in South Africa.”
“Drop anchor, gentlemen. The first flight of a Short Sunderland flying boat has arrived in Switzerland.”
Harry could see the snow-capped peaks of the Alps behind the village. A small forest of masts showed in front of the church steeple. Harry thought the village must have been on the shore of the lake for centuries by the look of the old buildings. With the engines silent, the lapping of water came up to him from below. If no one came out to meet them, there was a small inflatable dinghy they would pump up in the water to its full size. Four retractable wooden paddles went with the dinghy.
Rocking gently in their own swell, they waited. Nothing happened. On a day in late September, Romanshorn was asleep. Looking back out into the lake, Harry could see the German patrol boat dead in the water. It was not moving. Taking the binoculars from Tinus he trained them on the small craft, immediately bringing into focus a man with a pair of binoculars looking at him.
Harry waved, still holding the glasses to his eyes with his left hand. There was no reply; the man, whoever he was, not wishing to be friendly. On the back of the motorboat, to one side of the small engine, Harry could now see a mounted machine gun. The man looking at him dropped his long pair of binoculars onto his chest and made a sign to the man sitting with the tiller in his hand at the back of the boat next to the engine. Even at a distance, Harry heard the motor come to life and saw the puff of white smoke from the exhaust from just above the waterline. Then the boat made off towards the far shore in German Bavaria, the man still standing up looking towards the flying boat, its propellers now motionless.
Harry put down his glasses and looked back at the village. A small open boat with two me
n was slowly being rowed out to them. The man not rowing waved. Harry put his hand out of the cockpit window Phillip Crookshank had just opened and waved back at the man. The Swiss were friendly. The Germans were not. To make sure, Tinus pushed a small Union Jack on a wooden pole out of the small window and waved it around. Harry wondered if the German standing up in the motorboat had seen the flag. Not that it made any difference. Officially the flying boat was on its first test flight out of England. Making contact with the von Lieberman girls to find out what had happened to their father was a private matter between Harry and the von Lieberman family. Old friends keeping in contact. Even Timothy Kent was still not sure what had happened to Klaus von Lieberman after he had been taken away by three men from his family estate in Bavaria the previous month.
“How do you know for certain he was taken away, Tim?” Harry had asked on the phone from the Isle of Wight to his office at the Air Ministry in London that morning.
“One of the von Lieberman tenants is a friend of ours without knowing it. His wife is from Dorset. They visit the grandparents in Langton Matravers which was how we heard, the local police have been asked to keep an eye open. The whole estate was talking about it for a day according to the wife and her friend in the village. The wife thinks one of the servants at the big house works for the German Secret Police. The girls should know if you find them. The estate is only twenty miles from the Swiss border. If the mother wants to get out of Germany there’s a train to the shore of the lake. It’s not a crime yet in Germany to hire a boat and go out.”
“When did you last speak to the police in Langton Matravers?”
“He’s back in Germany with his wife and kids. Not a word since then. The police only report anything unusual they hear out of Germany that might be of interest to us. It was the Secret Police bit that sparked our phone call.”
Feeling a bump against the hull of the flying boat Harry brought his mind back to the present. Even police in rural England were reporting anything strange they picked up about Germany.
“I hope they speak English,” he said to Tinus who was watching the three tall-masted sailing boats tacking into shore.
“Hello,” came a voice. “Does anyone want a lift to shore? What a beautiful aeroplane. It’s so big.”
“The Swiss speak English, Harry,” said Phillip. “Tourism. People always try and speak your language when they are making money out of you. There’s more money in tourism than fishing. Are there any fish in the lake? Someone told me mountain lakes don’t have fish.”
“There’s so little wind out there it will be next week before they land,” said Tinus. “I think they are trying to come into Romanshorn. There are youngsters on board. Lots of them.”
“Any teenage girls, Tinus?”
“They’re all wearing the same yellow sou’westers. Beautiful craft. What I wouldn’t do to be out on one of those yachts. There’s barely a breath of wind.”
“Never been on board anything like this before,” said a man being helped up by Anthony who had opened the door to the outside. “Who is the captain? You’ll want a stamp in your passports. You all British? Jolly good, I think you say. I’m the chief customs officer at Romanshorn. Welcome to Switzerland, gentlemen. Fact is, I’m the only customs officer at Romanshorn. We didn’t think a seaplane could ever be this big. The whole town’s come out to look. You’ve made today quite an occasion.”
“First test flight out of England. We left the Isle of Wight this morning. Harry Brigandshaw. My co-pilot Tinus Oosthuizen. Flight Engineer Phillip Crookshank. My son Anthony. I’m originally from Rhodesia. We’re less formal than the British even though we are British. They call us colonials.” Harry had discovered the British upper class called anyone by their surnames, a habit he found faintly rude.
“So you have a British passport?”
“Of course. Can you recommend a hotel?”
“My pleasure, Mr Brigandshaw.”
“We’ll anchor out here and come into shore with you if we may, Mr…?”
“Tannenbaum. German Swiss. At your service. A test flight? Everything went all right?”
“You’ll see flights from England to your lake more often, Mr Tannenbaum,” said Phillip Crookshank. “I am the chief designer for Short Brothers who make the plane. Mr Brigandshaw once flew the first seaplane down to Africa.”
“How long will you be staying in Romanshorn? There is so much to do, you know.”
“Can I go sailing?” asked Anthony.
“There is always sailing, young man. Sailing in the summer and skiing in the winter. We live a peaceful life, God willing.”
“Where is the divide?”
“In the middle of the lake. Whatever happens, Switzerland will stay neutral. The police chief in the boat with me wished to be sure your aircraft was not military, you understand. Herr Krock does not speak English. French, German and Italian like every good Swiss, but not English.”
“Where did you learn your English?”
“In America. I was a ski instructor in Colorado before I joined the customs service after my old bones began breaking too easily. Snow skiing is a young man’s sport. Two of you will come ashore and the next will follow, I’m afraid.”
“We have an inflatable dinghy,” said Phillip, who had put the dinghy on board to show Harry Brigandshaw and the Air Ministry how easy it would be for a downed pilot to be pulled out of the drink by Coastal Command using the flying boats. “You go on shore with Anthony, Harry. Tinus and I will paddle ashore to show you how it’s done.”
“Ah, now I see why you brought the dinghy. Never miss a chance, Phil, to make money.”
“The hotel belongs to my cousin,” said Tannenbaum, beaming at everyone.
Harry smiled as if he hadn’t known and followed the customs officer down into the rowing boat, taking his seat in the bow with his back to Romanshorn and facing the flying boat still gently rocking on the swell of the dissipating wake they had created coming in to land. The big wing floats were in perfect proportion to the big hull with the cockpit high above where Tinus was waving at him with the Union Jack on the end of its pole. The German motorboat was invisible to his naked eye. The three sailing boats were closer to shore despite the light wind; whoever was on the boats knew how to sail.
Looking out over his shoulder at Romanshorn and the distant mountains, Harry drew in the pure air and marvelled at how clean everything looked and felt. There were no factories around the shore that Harry could see.
“Champagne air,” he said to Anthony as the silent police chief began rowing the small boat towards the small harbour and the forest of masts below the church spire. Harry could see the remnants of a wall that had once circled the town. Switzerland had been at peace in the centre of Europe for centuries. It was protected by the Alps, he remembered, thinking of Rhodesia and his farm outside Salisbury, hoping the centuries would also leave them alone, the African bush, not the mountains, giving them protection.
“You have the most beautiful scenery, Mr Tannenbaum,” he said, trying to take it all in.
“We think so. Maybe you stay a week and go up into the high mountains.”
“And go for a sail,” said Anthony hopefully.
They came ashore at a small pier that guarded the yachts inside the basin, the police chief rowing them silently round the jetty to land them at the bottom of a small flight of steps that led them one by one out of the open boat to stand ten feet above the water. Harry could smell baking, the delicious smell wafting down from a wooden building on the jetty that looked to be more a restaurant than a bakery. So far, no one had asked to see their passports, their word enough for Mr Tannenbaum; Harry doubted the man even had a stamp to imprint their arrival. Anyone coming across the lake from Germany would likely be friends, if not relatives, most tourists arriving in Switzerland from the other direction by rail.
“Is that a restaurant?” Harry asked Herr Tannenbaum. The police chief, after a quick word with the man from customs, had tied the rowing bo
at up to a metal ring attached to a thick wooden post that rose out of the water and gone off about his business.
“My wife’s brother. Wonderful food.”
A horse with colourful tassels around its halter was looking at Harry with doleful eyes, the driver in the trap behind seemingly fast asleep. Busily, Herr Tannenbaum put the four cases into the trap.
“Why don’t you go in?” he said. “Ferdinand will take the luggage to the hotel and put it in your rooms. Four rooms for a week. My cousin will only charge you for the nights you stay.”
Looking at the horse and the waking driver, Harry was not sure which one of them was Ferdinand. With the ringing sound of clip-clopping on the wooden planks of the jetty, Ferdinand went off with their sparse luggage. No one had spoken a word to the driver.
“Does he know where to go?”
“There’s only one hotel.”
“Please join us in your wife’s brother’s restaurant. In thanks for bringing us ashore. We can watch from inside for our friends through those windows.”
“My pleasure. Every window looks out over the lake. Very popular. My wife’s brother’s cakes and chocolates are delicious. He always bakes at this time of day. You are very lucky. Swiss chocolate cake is the best in the world. My wife’s brother’s chocolate cake is the best in Switzerland. Now, young man, about you going for a sail. Do you see that nice boat over there? It is indeed my brother’s. My brother is a very good sailor and will take you out on the lake.”
