A Very British Ending (Catesby Series)

by Edward Wilson

  The host, despite having an Asian niece, had blue eyes and greying blond hair. He greeted Catesby with formality and showed him to a low table where they seated themselves on richly brocaded cushions.

  ‘Do you like fermented mare’s milk?’

  ‘I think I could acquire a taste for it.’ Catesby held out a silver goblet and studied his host while his eyes were averted pouring.

  ‘The Mongolians call it airag – it’s their national drink.’ The host lifted the lid of a silver tray. ‘These dumplings are called buuz – they are filled with minced mutton, but any meat can be used.’

  ‘Thank you. Is your niece Mongolian?’

  ‘She is a Manchurian princess, but she also has the blood of my own ancestors. We are Baltic German aristocracy, but related to the royal families of Finland and Russia.’

  ‘Have you a name?’

  ‘Quite a long list of names, but I’m not going to tell them to you.’

  Catesby smiled and nodded to the portrait of Baron Roman von Ungern-Sternberg. ‘But you obviously are not him?’

  ‘No, but he is a close kinsman.’

  Catesby looked at the painting and then at his host. They both had the same mad – completely insane – eyes. One of the baron’s eyes was so demented and glaring that Catesby had thought it magnified by a monocle, but there was none. ‘There is a resemblance.’

  ‘Thank you for saying so.’ The nameless host raised his goblet and drank. ‘Airag has a calming influence. They say you should drink it if you suffer from a nervous condition.’

  Catesby laughed.

  ‘You find that amusing?’

  ‘I was thinking of Genghis Khan – did airag calm him down?’

  ‘It might have made his strategic planning more thorough. Genghis Khan was a great and visionary conqueror.’

  For the first time Catesby noticed a number of strange objects hanging from a bright yellow cord affixed to the oak panelling next to the baron’s portrait. ‘Are those things Mongolian?’

  ‘What things?’

  Catesby pointed.

  ‘They’re sacred,’ said the man. ‘But I’ll let you see them and touch them – it is a great honour.’ The man got up with difficulty; he seemed to have a gamey leg. He limped across the room, unhooked the yellow cord and brought the objects to the table.’

  Catesby guessed they were talismans of some sort. The largest was a round copper disc with an outer ring inscribed with symbols. There were also leather pouches, tiny mirrors with blue strings attached, painted pieces of wood and various chains and charms. The most sinister was a silver plaque embossed with skeletons.

  ‘They’re not all Mongolian,’ said the host touching the copper. ‘This is a Tibetan zodiac disc. The yellow cord, by the way, was blessed by Gautama Buddha. But these are my favourite toys.’ The man picked up a pouch with a leather drawstring. He loosened the string and emptied four yellow-white objects on to the table. ‘They are Mongolian dice. We use them for divining the future.’

  Catesby was tempted to ask how Ipswich Town were going to finish the season, but bit his tongue.

  The man picked up the objects and rolled them.

  ‘Good news?’ said Catesby.

  The man stared for a second. ‘Outside force will influence you.’

  ‘They look like bones,’ said Catesby.

  The man smiled and picked up the first die: ‘This one is from a horse.’ He then pointed to the other bone dice: ‘Cow, goat, man.’

  Catesby gave a cold smile. ‘May I roll them?’

  ‘Please, you are my honoured guest.’

  Catesby gathered the bones. They were dry and smooth. He momentarily pressed the human one between his thumb and forefinger. Then shook them in his fist and rolled them.

  The man looked at them from two angles and frowned.

  ‘What’s the verdict?’ said Catesby.

  ‘Others might try to harm you, better be careful.’

  ‘How do you know they refer to me?’

  ‘You were the one who rolled them.’ His host smiled. ‘Would you like to try again?’

  ‘No, thank you. I’ll leave fate alone.’

  ‘Sometimes that is wise. Meanwhile, we must eat.’ The man lifted another silver lid. ‘The next course is khorkhog. It is a popular dish from the countryside that you eat with your fingers.’

  As Catesby ate he felt the mad eyes of the baron burning into the side of his head. And when he looked across the table he saw the same demented eyes staring at him. ‘You like khorkhog?’ said his host.

  ‘It’s lovely.’

  ‘It was a staple of the great Khan’s warriors as they pillaged the lands of the Jin Dynasty. As you know, they conquered Zhongdu in 1215.’

  ‘Modern Peking,’ said Catesby wiping his lips.

  ‘And it will happen again.’ The nameless host paused and glared. ‘You are a strange person, Herr Catesby.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘You have not asked why I invited you.’

  ‘I assumed you would eventually tell me.’

  ‘You assumed correctly. First of all, I owe you an apology – even though I did not personally arrange your attempted murder.’

  Catesby struggled to keep his composure. It wasn’t what he had expected to hear. He assumed that his host was just another right-wing monarchist nutcase. Catesby reckoned that one in five of his agents claimed blood ties with the Romanovs. He calmed himself. Perhaps the ‘attempted murder’ was just another of his host’s fantasies and had nothing to do with what had actually happened that night in Kensington. Catesby smiled blandly. ‘Which particular attempted murder?’

  ‘You mean there have been others?’

  ‘Yes, but I can’t give you the details.’

  ‘I didn’t realise that being a very junior cultural attaché was such a dangerous job.’

  ‘Artists are very sensitive – and sometimes explosive creatures.’

  ‘The people who tried to kill you were not artists – they were low-level criminals of the most common sort. I was utterly appalled when I found out.’

  ‘Are they likely to strike again?’

  ‘I very much doubt it. They are legionnaires and both have been sent to Indochina.’

  ‘Alsatians?’

  ‘Naturally, that’s why they were chosen.’

  Catesby nodded. His host wasn’t a complete fantasist.

  ‘Your would-be assassins are now part of a Foreign Legion unit composed largely of ex-SS. They have been tasked with fighting behind Viet Minh lines and few are expected to return.’

  Catesby glanced up at Baron von Ungern-Sternberg. He was wearing his St George’s Cross on his Mongol caftan. How, Catesby thought, the mad baron would have loved the war in Vietnam. And yet, his hands were small and delicate, his right gently holding his left as if to stop it from shaking.

  ‘We had the painting commissioned from a photograph that was taken the evening before he was executed by firing squad. At least the Bolsheviks gave him that honour.’

  Catesby smiled. He doubted that the Bolsheviks had regarded von Ungern-Sternberg’s execution as an ‘honour’ – more likely as a warning to others.

  His host suddenly looked sly and suspicious. ‘How much do you know about my kinsman?’

  Catesby had done his homework on von Ungern-Sternberg, but he preferred to hear his host’s own account. ‘I only know the barest details.’

  ‘My noble kinsman was a great warrior. He fought for the Tsar in East Prussia in 1915 and 1916. Following the Bolshevik revolution, he pledged his allegiance to the Romanovs and fought against the Bolsheviks in Siberia during the civil war. After the White Guards were defeated by the Reds, my kinsman led the remnants of his division thousands of miles into Outer Mongolia. He added Tibetans and Mongol tribesmen to what was left of his White Army Cossacks. Against all odds, he succeeded in driving the Chinese out of the capital Urga.’ The host nodded at the portrait of Baron Roman. ‘It was a stunning feat of arms – worthy of a T
eutonic knight. The Chinese outnumbered my kinsman’s tiny army by five to one.’

  Catesby knew that his host’s version of his kinsman was a glorified one that left out ugly details. He had said nothing about von Ungern-Sternberg’s rabid anti-Semitism, his use of unspeakable forms of torture, his execution of anyone with physical defects, his drug addiction – his dinner party set piece of roasting the hearts of his victims and serving them in their own skulls.

  ‘In the end, he was betrayed.’

  ‘By whom?’ said Catesby.

  His host got up and limped over to the baron’s photo. If, thought Catesby, von Ungern-Sternberg should suddenly step alive out of the painting, his host had better hide that physical imperfection or he was for the chop. Catesby smiled bleakly and drank his fermented mare’s milk. It was, surprisingly, not unlike a mild, malty ale.

  ‘Who betrayed him? It might have been his Mongol translator, who subsequently disappeared with two thousand kilos of gold – or a Bolshevik agent hidden in the ranks.’

  ‘Was it,’ ventured Catesby, ‘a good idea to invade Siberia?’

  ‘The peasants of Siberia were ready to rise up against Bolshevism. My kinsman proclaimed Siberia a sovereign Russian land under Emperor Mikhail Alexandrovich.’

  Catesby thought it pointless to add that Grand Duke Mikhail Alexandrovich had been executed well before von Ungern-Sternberg’s invasion of Siberia.

  His host shrugged. ‘Perhaps his actions were ill timed. The Siberian uprising never took place. He was betrayed and handed over to the Red Army on 22 August 1921. He was executed by the Cheka on the fifteenth of September. He was ambushed while riding at the head of a column of his most loyal followers and it happened too suddenly to fight back. They were starving; for weeks their only food had been grass and the flesh of lame horses. They say he was gaunt and naked at the end.’ The host picked up the yellow Buddhist cord bearing the amulets and talismans. ‘This was all he was wearing when they captured him.’

  Catesby stared at his host for a long second. When the explanation didn’t come, he said, ‘Is it not odd?’

  ‘What?’

  Catesby nodded at the talismans. ‘That the Cheka returned those to you. I didn’t realise that they were in the habit of returning personal belongings to the next of kin.’

  His host gave a sly smile. ‘I have my connections. The Soviet Union is one of the world’s most corrupt regimes – and that is why it is about to fall.’

  ‘And what will replace it?’

  ‘Monarchy, of course. Not the feeble sort you have in England, but absolute monarchy. It is the world’s most natural and civilised form of government. All our great monuments have been built under kings and queens – the pyramids, the cathedrals, the Potala Palace in Tibet. And all our great works of art too – S hakespeare didn’t write his plays in a socialist republic.’

  Catesby wasn’t going to alienate his host with counter-arguments. He regarded him as an agent, however mad, to be humoured and milked.

  ‘My kinsman was right. It must begin with the restoration of the great Khan’s empire – a movement spreading from Mongolia and Tibet. Let me get a map and I will show you the plan.’

  The man returned with an ancient atlas where Leningrad was still Petrograd and where the North Sea was the German Ocean. He described a pincer movement of new Mongol hordes heading west while Baltic, Ukrainian and Polish monarchists pressed eastwards. Pointing to Warsaw, he said, ‘The szlachta are fearsome horsemen, almost the equal of the Cossacks.’

  Never, thought Catesby, write off an agent as mad and useless. ‘How well do you know the Polish aristocracy?’

  ‘Very well, but many of them are mad and unreliable.’

  That seemed to describe his sister’s boyfriend, thought Catesby. It was worth a try. ‘Does the name Tomasz Król ring a bell?’

  The host gave a hearty laugh.

  ‘You do know him.’

  ‘Tomasz Król is a pretender. His claim to be a member of the szlachta is exaggerated. He cannot be trusted.’

  ‘Can you tell me more?’

  ‘I don’t think so – not yet.’

  Catesby racked his brain for another German equivalent, but Der Elefant im Zimmer was the only one he could recollect. He looked directly at his host. The blue eyes were growing madder. ‘What,’ said Catesby, ‘did you do in the war?’

  ‘I fought.’

  ‘For whom?’

  ‘For European civilisation and against barbarism.’

  Catesby struggled to hide his disgust and revulsion. His host belonged to a cult that glorified violence. You couldn’t defeat them with words, but only with violence. London’s finest hour was when the heroes of Cable Street drove Mosley and the Black-shirts out of the East End with fists and bricks. But at the moment, Catesby’s job was spying. The fighting might come later.

  ‘How did you find out about the attempt to murder me?’

  His host picked up the last piece of khorkhog and slowly macerated the meat as if the food of the Mongolian nomads was helping him think. He finally wiped his mouth and spoke. ‘I heard rumours that you were considered troublesome in some quarters. One has to occasionally make tactical alliances. Among those who wanted you removed were staunch and fierce anti-Communists – who had, in their own way, been fierce warriors in their lost cause.’

  Catesby detected echoes of the Gehlen Org.

  ‘I now regret that I did not intervene to prevent the attempt on your life?’

  ‘Why?’

  His host smiled. ‘You are a Catesby – a descendant of England’s most noble family.’

  Catesby felt his stomach churn. He ought to have changed his name by deed poll.

  ‘Your ancestor tried to overthrow a regime that began England’s degeneration into a nation of shopkeepers and sly merchants. Your country’s break with Rome threw away a thousand years of civilisation. Catesby, Fawkes, Percy, Wintour, Keyes and the others were noble knights fighting to restore England to its proper place in the Holy Roman Catholic Empire. Had they succeeded, England and Spain together would have conquered the new worlds for monarchy and not profit.’

  Catesby wished there were something stronger than fermented mare’s milk. His host’s interpretation of history wasn’t easy to take in with a clear head. But he didn’t want to express scepticism and lose him.

  His host smiled. ‘A lot of your fellow Englishmen, Protestant shopkeepers too busy counting every last penny in their tills, would not understand what I’m talking about, but you do.’

  Catesby smiled back. ‘Have you any brandy?’

  ‘I believe I have a Frapin Grand Cru cognac. Please wait a moment while I fetch it.’

  Catesby didn’t like being left alone in the room with von Ungern-Sternberg. There was something hypnotic as well as demented about his eyes. Catesby knew he would never fall under the spell of such monsters, but he understood why many did. It flattered the ego to be part of an elite secret order. Indeed, it was even part of the allure that attracted many to the Secret Intelligence Service. Catesby’s own boss in SIS, Henry Bone, had once given him a priceless piece of advice: ‘You must never forget, William, that most of our colleagues are mad.’

  His host came back clanking two enormous tulip-shaped glasses and a dusty bottle. As he poured, the night was shattered by the steam-horn of a Rhine barge. Catesby refrained from quoting Heine. The poet’s humane liberal politics would have been out of place.

  ‘There are a few things,’ said his host in a tone that was low and conspiratorial, ‘that I must tell you.’

  Catesby waited and watched as his host sipped his brandy. His eyes remained alert, fixed and unblinking above the huge glass.

  ‘Your country is heavily infiltrated by Soviet agents at the very highest level.’ The piercing whistle of a train both mocked and underlined his words.

  ‘I have,’ said Catesby offering encouragement, ‘always suspected that.’

  ‘Would you like to copy their names down?’

/>   Catesby shook his head. ‘I’ve got a good memory.’

  The host started with a list of Labour politicians, the usual suspects routinely bandied about by right-wing disinfo, but he also added a Conservative and a Liberal. The host then spat out the name of a novelist, whom he described as ‘a Communist pretending to be a Catholic.’ He then launched into an attack on a Scottish poet who had indeed been a member of the Communist Party – but then was thrown out of the Communist Party for being a Scottish nationalist and thrown out of the Scottish Nationalist Party for being a Communist. If anyone, thought Catesby, would fight tooth and nail against a Soviet takeover of Britain, it would be that awkward squad poet, Hugh MacDiarmid. Every significant trade union leader was, of course, name-checked. The most disturbing list contained Catesby’s own SIS colleagues – one of which he also suspected. Catesby was especially concerned that his host knew the names of some very secret people. The fires of paranoia were easy to light. The list of Communist subversives ended with a Church of England bishop.

  ‘How,’ said Catesby, ‘did you find out this information?’

  ‘As I said before, the Soviet hierarchy is corrupt even unto itself. The Soviet Union is a rotten tree ready to be pushed over. The Caucasus, the Ukraine, the Baltic and the Islamic south are ready to revolt and the Red Army will not be able to stop them.’

  ‘But an autocratic Tsar would?’

  ‘Of course – and, by the way, Stalin will be dead in less than eighteen months.’

  Catesby took the last bit with a great pinch of salt. He was ready to leave and stood up. For the first time he addressed his host in English, ‘Thank you for a most enjoyable and informative evening.’

  ‘And thank you for coming.’

  Catesby continued the formalities and small talk in English. His host was far from fluent, but Catesby detected what he was looking for – a slight American accent.