"But not for la petite," smiles Delzons. "She has no equal. Is it not remarkable, one so delicately feminine, so pretty and vivace, so much a child almost, but of a skill and courage and … and firm purpose beyond any agent I have seen?" He nodded thought-fully. "We have a word, colonel, that I think has no equivalent in English, which I apply to nothing and no one but her. Formidable."
"She’s all o' that." Plainly he was as smitten with her as Hutton had been, but with Delzons it was fond, almost paternal. "Where did she learn to stalk and … so on?"
"In the Breton woods as a child, with her three elder brothers." Ile chuckled. "She was une luronne—a tomboy, no? Oui, un garcon manqué. Six years younger than they, but their match in all sport, running, climbing, shooting … oh, and daring! And they were no poules mouillées, no milksops, those three lads. Yet when she was only twelve she was their master with foil and pistol. Some brothers would have been jealous, but Valéry and Claude and Jacques were her adoring slaves—ah, they were close, those four!"
"You knew ’em well, then," says I, as we strolled back.
"Their father was my copain in Crimea, before I joined the intelligence. I was to them as an uncle when they were small, and grew to love them, Caprice above all … well, a lonely bachelor engrossed in his work must have something to love, non?" He paused, musing a moment, then went on. "But then I was posted abroad for several years, and lost touch with the family until the terrible news reached me that the father and three sons had all fallen in the war of ’70—he was by then chef de brigade, and the three boys had but lately passed through St Cyr. I was desolate, above all for Caprice, so cruelly deprived at a stroke of all those she loved. I wrote to her, of my grief and condolence, assuring her of my support in any way possible. Thus it was, two years later, when I came home to command the European section of the departement secret, that she came to see me—asking for employment. Mon dieu!" He heaved in emotion, and at once became apologetic. "Oh, forgive me … perhaps I weary you? No? Then het us sit a moment."
We settled on a bench by the path overlooking the river, and Delzons lit his pipe, gazing down at the distant snow-patched roofs.
"You conceive my amazement, not only to discover that my little gamine had become a lovely young woman, but that she should seek an occupation so unsuitable, mais inconcevable, for one so chaste et modeste. `Why, dear child?' I asked. `I cannot be a soldier like my father and brothers. I shall fight for France in my own way.' That was her reply. As gently as might be, I suggested that there were other ways to serve, that the world of the département secret was a hard and dangerous one, and … highly unpleasant in ways which she, a convent-reared girl of eighteen, could not conceive. Do you know what she said, colonel? `Uncle Delzons, I have studied the world from the tableaux vivants of the Folies Gaités, and moved among its clientele, who are also hard, dangerous, and unpleasant.' Before I could even express my scan-dal, for I had known nothing of this, she added—oh, so quiet and demure with that laughter in her innocent eyes—`Also I am fluent in languages, and fence and shoot even better these days.' "
Delzons took the pipe from his mouth, looked at it, and stuck it back. "What could I say? I was shocked, yes—but I saw, too, that beneath the fresh, lovely surface there was a metal that I had never suspected. It is rare, such metal, and essential to the département secret. And if I had refused her, I knew there were other sections of the département which would not." He laughed ruefully. "The truth was, she was a gift to any chef d’intelligence. And so she proved, in small things at first, as translator, courier, embassy bricoleur—what you call jack-of-all-trades—and later as secret agent in the field … and you know what that means. Yes … she was the best."
I said he must have been sorry to lose her, and he grimaced. "She told you? Yes, sorry … but I rejoiced also. For six years I had lost sleep, whenever she went into danger. Oh, seldom enough—our work, as you are aware, brings a moment’s peril in a year of routine—but when that peril comes … No, I am glad she has gone. When I think of the risks she ran—of her facing a man like Starnberg to the death, my heart ceases to beat. If we had lost her … my friend, I should have died. It is true, my heart would have ceased forever then."
The usual exaggerated Froggy vapouring, but Delzons wasn’t the usual Frog, and I guessed he believed it. I took the opportunity to canvass his opinion.
"Well, you needn’t ha' fretted. He was a capital hand with a sabre, but not in her parish." I paused deliberately. "Can’t think I’ve ever seen a neater … execution."
His head came round sharply. "Ah! You confirm M. ’Utton’s opinion—which I happen to share. The evidence of Starnberg’s wounds was conclusive. As you say … an execution." His eyes were steady on mine. "But in my report, self-defence. As it must always be when an agent kills … in the line of duty."
That reminded me of something Hutton had said. "He told me Starnberg wasn’t the first she’d sent down. Were the others self-defence, too?"
He frowned and muttered a nasty word. "I have a great respect for our colleague ’Utton, but he talks too much." He sucked at his dead pipe, and continued rapid-fire. "Yes. She has killed before. Twice. In Egypt, in Turkey. One was a minor diplomat who had found out she was a French agent. The other an informer whose silence was essential. She was not under my control on either occasion. My responsibility is for Europe. She was on detachment to another section. I did not seek details." Abruptly he got to his feet, his mouth set like a trap. "Nor have she and I ever mentioned the incidents. Shall we walk on, colonel?"
And this was the girl who had giggled with me over Punch. I fell into step beside him as we walked down to the bridges, his stick fairly cracking at each stride, but there was a grim grin under his heavy moustache.
"Oh, M. ’Utton!" cries he. "So talkative, so shrewd! No doubt he offered you his theory that she slew Starnberg in cold blood because of a tendre for you? Bon sang de merde!" He gave a barking laugh. "Enraged because he had wounded, perhaps slain, her lover! Perhaps you believe that yourself, because you were lovers in Berlin—oh, I know all about her `holiday task' for Blowitz! What, you do not believe ’Utton’s theory? I congratulate you!" He calmed after a few steps. "Your affaire in Berlin was an amour passant, then. Not of the heart."
Gad, they’re a tactful, tasteful lot, the French. "Not on my side," I told him.
"Nor on hers, whatever the so-shrewd ’Utton may think. Shall I tell you why she killed Starnberg as she did?"
Ile had stopped on the bridge, turned to face me. "I told you her father and brothers fell in the war of ’70 against the Germans, and what she said of fighting in her own way. I did not tell you how they died. Papa and Jacques were killed in the battle at Gravelotte. Claude died of his wounds, neglected … in a German hospital. Valéry was in the intelligence. He was captured at St Privat on a mission d’espionnage. He was shot by a firing squad of Fransecky’s Pomeranians, the day after the signing of the armistice, February the first, 1871!" Suddenly the eyes in the bulldog face were bright with angry tears. "They knew the armistice had been signed, but they shot him just the same. Just the same! German chivalry."
It had started to snow, and he was hunched up against the chill wind, staring down at the river.
"So they were gone, all four, it seemed in a moment … as the poet says of a snowflake on the water. Did I mention that the diplomat in Turkey and the informer in Egypt were both Germans? No? Well, Caprice does not like Germans. As the Count von Starnberg discovered. But I am keeping you standing in the cold, colonel! Give me your arm, my friend! Shall we seek a café and a cup of chocolate—with a large cognac to flavour it, eh?"
• • •
Some clever ass has said that "if" is the biggest word in the language, but I say it’s the most useless. There have been so many coincidences in my life, good and bad, that I’ve learned the folly of exclaiming "If only … !" They happen, and that’s that, and if the one that brought my Austrian odyssey to a close was uncommon disastrous—and i
nfuriating, because I’d foreseen its possibility—well, I can be philosophic now because, as I’ve observed before, I’m still here at ninety, more or less, and you can’t ask fairer than that.
But that don’t mean I’ll ever forgive the drunk porter who mislaid my trunk at Charing Cross, because if he hadn’t … there, you see, "if " almost got the better of me, and no wonder when I think what came of that boozy idiot’s carelessness. Shocking state the railways are in.
However, we’ll come to Charing Cross all in good time. I’d have been there weeks earlier if (there it is again, dammit) Kralta hadn’t been so amorously intoxicated, and the circumstances of our reunion in Vienna so different from what I’d expected. When I took the train from Ischl early in December I was looking forward to a couple of cosy and intimate weeks in which I rogered her blue in the face, sparked her to the opera or whatever evening amusements Vienna offered, wined and dined of the best, saw the sights, took her riding (for she looked too much like a horse to be anything but an equestrian), viewed the Blue Danube from the warm comfort of her bedroom, and back to the muttons again. A modest enough ambition, and would have had me home again by Christmas. Well, I was taken aback, if not disappointed, by what awaited me at the Grand Hotel, and followed in the ensuing weeks.
I’d telegraphed from Ischl to advise her that I’d be rolling in, and when I arrived at the Grand, which was the newest and best-appointed of the leading hotels, she was awaiting me in a suit of rooms that Louis XIV might have thought too large and opulent for his taste. Vienna’s like that, you see; in most great cities the new districts are where the Quality hang out, but in Vienna the old sections are the exclusive ones, infested by the most numerous nobility in Europe, living in palaces and splendid mansions built centuries ago by ancestors who plainly felt that even a lavatory wasn’t a lavatory unless it could accommodate a hunt ball, with gilded cherubs on the ceiling and walls that looked like wedding cakes. Even new hotels like the Grand were to match, and the whole quarter reeked of money, privilege, and luxury in doubtful taste. It was reckoned to be the richest Upper Ten outside London, and the two hundred families of princes, counts, and assorted titled (rash spent ten million quid among ’em per annum, which ain’t bad for gaslight and groceries. They spent more, ate more, drank more, danced more, and fornicated more than any other capital on earth (and that’s Fetridge[23] talking, not me), and cared not a rap for anything except their musical fame, of which they’re wonderfully jealous—not without cause, I’d say, when you think of the waltz.
I’d arranged to arrive in town late, at an hour when Kralta would he cleared for bed and action, but when I reached the hotel close on midnight I saw that I’d been too long in the provinces; the hall was thronged with revellers, the dining salon was full, and an orchestra was going full swing. Even so, I was unprepared for the start I received when I was ushered into her drawing-room: where I’d looked to find her alone, there were thirty folk if there was one, all ablaze in the pink of fashion, and me in my travelling dirt.
And she, whom I’d imagined flinging aside her fur robe and flying to my arms, was magnificent in tiara, long gloves, and ivory silk, the image of her photograph, standing amidst her society gaggle, waiting calmly for me to approach, as though she’d been royalty. Which of course she was—European royalty, leastways.
But I couldn’t complain of her welcoming smile, with a hand stretched out for me to kiss. "At last, we meet in Vienna!" says she softly, and then I was being presented to Prince This and Baroness That, and Colonel von Stuff and Madame Puff—and this I’ll say for them, there wasn’t a sneer or a sniff at my tweeds, such as you’d get from Frogs or Dagoes or our own reptilia; Vienna wasn’t only polite, it was downright friendly and hospitable, putting a glass in my hand, coaxing me to the buffet, inquiring after my journey, asking how long I’d been in town, exclaiming that I must call or dine or see such-and-such, the men frank and genial, the women gay and easy—some damned handsome pieces there were, too—and Kralta, smiling coolly with her hand on my sleeve, guided me effortlessly through the crowd and out into a secluded alcove—and then she was in my arms, her mouth open under mine, fairly writhing against me, and I was making up for weeks of abstinence and wondering when we could get to work in earnest when suddenly she left off and buried her head on my shoulder.
"Thank God you are safe!" says she, in a choking voice. "When I heard what that … that vile traitor had done to you, I thought I should run mad! Oh, thank God, thank God!"
Thank a nimble little Parisienne cut-throat, thinks I, but all I did was murmur comfort, kissing her again and swearing that I’d been baying the moon at the thought of her, and when could we get shot of her guests? She laughed at that, holding my hands and regarding me fondly, and I found myself marvelling that a woman whose looks didn’t compare to half of those on view in her drawing-room could rouse such desire in me—mind you, there wasn’t a shape among ’em to match the splendid body in its ivory sheath, or a carriage to set beside that striking figurehead with its long gold tresses coiled beneath the diamond crown.
I had to bottle my ardour for more than an hour, for while the fashionable crowd soon dispersed, four who seemed to be her prime intimates stayed to sup with us. They were an oddish group,
I thought: some Prince or other, a distinguished greybeard with an order on his coat, and three females, all extremely personable. One of ’em, a countess, was dark and soulful and soft-spoken, and possessed of the most enormous juggs I’ve ever seen; how she managed her soup, heaven knows, for I’ll swear she couldn’t see her plate. T’others were a prattling blonde who flirted out of habit, even with the waiters, and a slender, red-haired piece who drank like a Mississippi pilot, with no visible effect. The Prince was plainly a big gun, and most courteous to me, and Kralta was at her most stately, so it was a decorous enough meal bar the blonde’s chatter and coquettish glances, which no one deigned to notice. Good form, the Viennese.
We parted at last, thank the Lord, with bows and nods and polite murmurs, Kralta led the way to her bedchamber, and I was all over her at once, with growls of endearment and a great wrenching of buttons. It was a true meeting of minds, for I doubt if a woman ever stripped faster from full court regalia, and we revelled in each other like peasants in a hayrick, from bed to floor and back again, I believe, but I ain’t sure. And when we were gloriously done, and I lay gasping while she wept softly and kissed the healed scar on my flank, murmuring endearments, I thought, well, this is why you came to Europe, Flash, and Ischl was worth it. She said not a word then or thereafter about Starnberg or the plot, and I was content to let it lie.
I staggered out presently to visit the little private lavatory in an ante-chamber off the drawing-room, and was taken flat aback when who should come out of the thunder-house but the Prince, clad in a silk robe with his beard in a net. What the deuce he was doing on the premises, I couldn’t imagine, but I admired his aplomb, for I’d ventured out in a state of nature, and he didn’t so much as raise an eyebrow, but waved me in with a courtly hand, bade me "Gute nacht", and disappeared through a door on the far side of the drawing-room. I performed my ablutions in some bewilderment, and my good angel prompted me to wrap a towel round myself before venturing out, for when I did, damned if the door he’d used didn’t open, and a massive bosom emerged, followed by the soulful countess in a night-rail fashioned apparently from a scrap of mosquito-net. She gave a start at the sight of me: murmured "Entschuldigung!", collared a decanter from the side-board, and with a sleepy smile and "Bis spater", vanished whence she had come.
Kralta was repairing the damage before her mirror when I rolled in, much perturbed.
"That Prince and the women—they’re out there, large as life! Who is he, for God’s sake?"
"My husband," says she. "You were presented to him."
Well, all I’d caught in the confusing moment of arrival had been "von und zum umble rumble", as so often happens. I considered, hard.
"Ah! I see. Your husband, eh?
And the women?"
"His mistresses," says she, carefully rouging her lip. "It is convenient that we share the apartment. It is quite large enough, you see." She began to brush her hair, while I struggled for an appropriate rejoinder, and could think of only one.
"Mistresses, eh? Well, well." She continued to brush calmly, so I added another trenchant observation. "He has three of them."
"Yes. The fair one, Fraulein Boelcke, I had not met before this evening. She talks too freely, don’t you think?"
But my conversational bolt was shot. For once I was at a loss—as who would not be, on discovering that while he was bulling a chap’s wife all over the shop and probably making a hell of an uproar, the chap himself was virtually next door brushing his teeth or pomading his eyebrows—and even now might be conducting an orgy just across the way with three trollops while the wife of his bosom was smiling tenderly on her bemused lover, kissing him fondly, leading him back to bed, and settling into his arms for conversation and drowsy fondling which must lead inevitably to another outbreak of feverish passion? And it did, even noisier and more protracted than before, for this time she occupied the driving seat, if you know what I mean, and rode herself into a sobbing frenzy they could have heard in Berlin.
I’m an easy-going fellow, as you know, but it struck me as I lay there, urging her on with ecstatic roars and the occasional slap on the rump, and afterwards cradling her to sleep on my breast, that this was a pretty informal household, and would take getting used to. I’m all for cuckolding husbands, and don’t give a dam if (hey know it, unless they’re the hellfire horse-whipping sort who’ll resent it; indeed, there’s nothing like a good gloat in the grinding teeth of some poor muff to whom you’ve awarded antlers. But when the muff is not only complaisant but approving, and meets you with every politeness at luncheon next day, and his wife is on cordial terms (as cordial, that is, as Kralta could ever be) with the fair trio he’s been using as though he were the Sultan of Swat, well, it’s novel, and I wasn’t sure that I cared for it above half.
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