Redcap

by Philip McCutchan

  “Uh-huh . . . I’ll have a word with him myself one day. I don’t know anybody called Andersson so far as I remember, but I’m sure I’ve come across that chap. Tell me, Colonel —does the name Karstad mean anything to you?”

  “Can’t say it does. Why?”

  “Only that I think that chap could be Karstad.” He told Gresham what was known about the double agent. “Don’t ask me any more just now, and keep this under your hat. I’ve got just a suspicion that if Andersson is Karstad, and knows I’m aboard, something may happen pretty soon. Meanwhile, I’m going to ask you to keep your eyes skinned and watch all you say to him, Colonel.”

  Gresham seemed put out at that. He said stiffly, “I’m not in the habit of talking about my work to everyone I meet.”

  “I know,” Shaw said quickly. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean that. Well—what about going below?”

  “Very well, Shaw. Stay around for a minute or two after I leave. I’ll be down at the for’ard end of the dining-room deck, starboard side. There’s a door into the working alleyway from there, and we go from there along to the entry into the tween-deck in Number One hold.”

  “Right.”

  Shortly after that Colonel Gresham got up stiffly and strolled away. He stopped to chat gallantly to two old ladies, and his abrupt laugh floated back to Shaw. A little later he moved slowly away as though he was going nowhere in particular.

  Shaw drank up his coffee, sat there thinking. He didn’t like the thoughts that came to him as a result of what Gresham had said in the Captain’s cabin earlier, his hints about a full-scale attack. While REDCAP was there, all was well. But without it . . . what then? A teeming country, rampantly on the march, the endless hordes sweeping Western civilization off the world’s map, those millions of men backing up the decontrolled missiles, every major power wiped out? Under such massive nuclear potential, the world could be knocked out almost before anyone realized what was going on.

  Shaw gave an involuntary shiver.

  Three minutes later Shaw met Gresham at the door into the working alleyway, walked along with him through passages cluttered up with domestic materials, crates of tinned food, stewards’ accessories, hatchways leading down into the bowels of the ship where the cool-rooms and the deep-freeze stores were situated. Shaw asked:

  “What are the guarding arrangements, Colonel?”

  Gresham laughed. “Pretty good ones! You’ll see for yourself. The entry into the tween-deck is kept locked all the time, I’ve got two armed men on watch together at the crate, and they’re in telephone communication with the bridge and with my cabin.”

  “Uh-huh. Sounds all right.”

  After they had gone down a short steel ladder, they came up to a firescreen door and Gresham brought out a bunch of keys on a chain round his waist. He fumbled at the lock, went through and along to a watertight door, swung the handwheel which released the clips, and pushed it open. They walked into the tween-deck running along the ship’s side above the lower hold. Well lashed to ringbolts in the bulkhead with steel-wire cable, REDCAP’s crate stood upright, vast, bulky, awesome. One of the two MAPIACCIND guards came forward, saluted Gresham.

  Gresham said genially, “Well, well, Bormann. All right, what?”

  “Yes, Colonel.”

  “Good. Well now, we just want to take a look round,” he told the guard breezily. “Shaw, you’d like to see how it works?”

  “I would indeed.”

  “I can show you the control panel.” Gresham spoke briefly to the German guard and handed him a key. The man unfastened a lock and very carefully removed a section of the big crate. Shaw went forward, looked with interest at a panel of dials and knobs and small circles of thick coloured glass. Here before him, open to his touch, was the very key to world peace and security. It gave him almost a sense of awe, made him reluctant to approach it too closely.

  Gresham’s voice, when he spoke, was hushed as though in reverence. He said, “General idea is this, Shaw. Once news is received of any member-nation going into action on a nuclear basis, all the Governments would first of all confer on scramble lines. If they then all agree, a unanimous authorization is sent to the Secretary-General of MAPIACCIND in Geneva. He then passes an order to the officer in charge of operating, which incidentally is me while we’re in transit to B'andagong, and that officer, using the appropriate signal from the list, starts the first transmission—it’s made in two parts, d’you see. That’s the key he uses.” Gresham indicated a Morse key at the side of the control panel. “Right? Now, after the first transmission, he has to wait until an identical and automatic signal is received back from the set attached to the stockpiles concerned. It’s a kind of safety-check, you follow, to make quite sure it’s working on the correct three-letter group and so forth. Eliminates the human element so far as possible. Checks the frequency too, of course.”

  Shaw asked, “Suppose any country should smash the receivers on their stockpiles?”

  “They couldn’t do that—they’re under strong MAPIACCIND guard. That guard couldn’t be overpowered so suddenly that there wouldn’t be time for a radio warning to be sent out.”

  Shaw murmured, “Which would invite an immediate transmission from REDCAP, I suppose. But what about if anyone got on to one of those frequencies by chance, and transmitted an identical signal?”

  Gresham chuckled. “Ah—this check-back would negate anything like that. You see, until the signal is actually repeated back, and then a second and different group sent out, the receiving end doesn’t come into operation at all. D’you follow?”

  Shaw grinned. “Not really, but I get the drift. I’m no technician!”

  “Neither was I, till I started on this. Awfully absorbing, I find it. A great, wonderful thing . . . however. That check-signal comes back, as I said, and the operator hears it. At the same time, if the signal is correct as it should be, this lamp glows red.” He touched one of the glass circles. “The operator reports contact to Geneva, using this other Morse key.” He indicated the second key at the other side of the panel. “Then, if the offending country hasn’t backed down in the meantime—it would be given a chance to do that—the first key, after a set interval, transmits again, using the second signal from the list. Exactly one minute before, the MAPIACCIND detachments go to ground in specially prepared and fully stored deep concrete shelters, and just wait.”

  “And then?”

  Gresham said simply, “Well, then the stockpiles are blown and the country concerned vanishes—as a nuclear Power, at any rate.” He blew out his cheeks. “Pouf . . . like that!” He grinned almost happily. “It’s so frightful, so dreadful even to think of, that I don’t believe for one moment anyone would risk aggression. Do you? It’s a great concept, wonderful really.”

  He seemed to have forgotten about the threat from China. Shaw reminded him; and Gresham said, “Ah, well, that’s in a different category. What I said was, that China would perhaps try to interfere with REDCAP in some way. I don’t suggest she’s thinking in terms of direct, outright aggression— that is, of risking the reprisal. What I think she’s after is some way of circumventing it first. I thought I’d made that plain.”

  “Yes, you had.” Shaw frowned. “But I don’t think you quite get what I mean. Before she does get hold of REDCAP, or blows it up, can’t we transmit and blow up China’s stockpiles? Or at least threaten it?”

  Gresham was nonplussed. He gnawed at his moustache for a moment, then said stiffly, “That’s the theory—yes, certainly. But, you know, Shaw . . . going into operation is very extreme. The casualties would be astronomical, terrible.

  I doubt if you’d ever get agreement of all the powers—and you must have a unanimous decision under the constitution of MAPIACCIND—unless you could advance extraordinarily convincing reasons. They’d never do it on mere suspicion.”

  Shaw said ominously, “Exactly, Colonel. That’s probably just what China realizes too. And that’s precisely the difficulty, isn’t it? Part of my job’
s to find that convincing reason—if it exists. Meanwhile, we may be standing in danger all this time.”

  “Well, yes. But it’s only meant to be a deterrent. Not a weapon in any sense.”

  Shaw gave a bitter laugh. “When is a deterrent not a deterrent? If every one knows it won’t ever be used, which is rather what you’re suggesting, it ceases to be a deterrent at all, doesn’t it? It seems to me that this is exactly the kind of case REDCAP’s designed to stop, and it’s just not working.”

  Gresham flushed. He said, “Oh, come, that’s not quite right. If we can get real proof of an extreme threat, Geneva would consider the matter, naturally.” With embarrassed haste, as Shaw moved a little closer to the control panel, Gresham took up the wood section and replaced it. Shaw was amused; it was almost as though Gresham thought he was about to operate his toy. He found himself hoping that all the MAPIACCIND directorate wasn’t quite so idealistic as this little sandy colonel. Drawing Gresham aside a moment later, he asked quietly:

  “By the way, these signals. The list of three-letter groups—I understand Lubin wouldn’t know what they are, and we can assume that goes for Karstad too. Mind if I ask where you keep them?”

  “Of course not. They’re in the safe in my stateroom. That’s pretty secure. You’ve seen yours—your safe, I mean?”

  “Yes. Have all the staterooms got one?”

  Gresham nodded. “All combination locks. I’ve put a setting on mine that no one’ll ever break!” He chuckled, put his mouth closer to Shaw’s ear and whispered: “Doesn’t matter if they do, really. It won’t help ’em. They’re just a fake set. Real one’s in the Captain’s private safe.”

  Next morning, and most of the afternoon as well, Shaw and Gresham, in the privacy of the Captain’s spare cabin, went through the P2 forms and the other documents covering in great detail every person aboard.

  It was a laborious and frustrating business.

  Of the two thousand five hundred-odd passengers, all had British or Commonwealth passports—all except a mere thirty-two of them. Not that this meant very much in itself; but Shaw could find nothing to arouse suspicion in any of the particulars given, and short of interviewing personally every adult aboard—which might have to be done if he couldn’t get a lead soon—he didn’t see what he could get hold of. Meanwhile all he had got was a bad headache and eyestrain.

  The one man who stuck in his gullet was Mr Sigurd Andersson, known as a Swedish subject. Swedes were not so very unlike their neighbours the Norwegians, and Karstad, of course, was a Norwegian. Andersson’s country of last permanent residence was shown as England, address London; and he was emigrating to Australia where he intended to remain. He was booked to Fremantle, first Australian port of call. His profession was given as refrigerator salesman, his age as forty-eight. If he really was Karstad, then some one had done a good job on his documentation. No apparent holes could be picked in this.

  It was a puzzle all right; but Shaw meant to hold his hand a little longer, give the fellow a chance to make himself known if he was genuinely trying to help—anyway let things crystallize a little more certainly first, before he made any report to Latymer. But in the meantime he would keep an eye on Andersson.

  He said as much to Gresham, adding: “There doesn’t seem to be anyone else. I’m damned if I can see where to start in on this job, Colonel.” He sighed, rubbed at his nose. “It’s a waiting game, and I don’t like waiting games.”

  Gresham blew out his moustache. “We’ll get a lead sooner or later,” he said. “Just be patient. Like the Chinese—what?”

  He gave his staccato laugh.

  Shaw spent what was left of the afternoon familiarizing himself properly with the ship’s layout, feeling once again that extraordinary tenseness in the atmosphere. Every one, he thought, had the sort of look as though they were constantly glancing over their shoulders . . . the stewards seemed surlier than ever, the leading hands always looking around for an opportunity to pounce. There had been the dance late last night, but there had been no gaiety beyond a feverish and phoney kind of fervour whipped up by the ship’s orchestra and the entertainments staff. Few couples danced and mostly the passengers had drifted off comparatively early to bed, only a few earnest drinkers remaining in the bars. That wasn’t the usual style in a luxury liner. Nerves? If so, why? Gresham had been positive there had been no leak about REDCAP.

  It was just a feeling in the air.

  Coming down the companion way from the sports deck he almost bumped into Judith Donovan, who was coming out of the lounge on the veranda deck. He had only seen her at meals—they were both at the same table—since they’d embarked, and they hadn’t talked much. Now, he smiled at her in a friendly way; he couldn’t help that. He noticed that she looked brighter straight away when he smiled at her.

  She asked demurely, “Forgiven me?”

  “Oh—I suppose I have! I don’t know. You’re a naughty girl, you know.”

  “Yes. I’m sorry.”

  He looked at her critically, noted the black rings under her eyes, eyes which looked red and puffy. She’d been crying. He said, “You won’t feel like joining in the fun and games, I know. But perk up, Judith, and take things easy.” He added, “What about a cup of tea?”

  “All right. It’s a bit late, though, isn’t it?”

  He glanced at his wrist-watch. “Not very. Just late enough so we may get a table to ourselves. We sit anywhere we like for afternoon tea, I understand.”

  He took her arm, assisted her down the stairway to the dining-room. The place was emptying, and Shaw found a table for two over by the ship’s side. He led her to it, collected some food on the way. When they’d sat down Judith poured the tea. As she did so, she gave a small shiver and spilled some tea in a saucer.

  She said quietly, “Sorry.” She glanced up at Shaw quickly, “It’s this ship. Somehow it’s giving me the creeps.”

  “You too?”

  She looked up again. “Why—yes! Don’t tell me it’s affecting you as well, Commander Shaw?”

  “But it is.” He grinned, reached out and touched her hand. “But not to worry. I rather suspect it lies only in our own imaginations. Don’t you?”

  She said, “Yes, could be.” She fiddled with the tea-things, then asked: “Have you got anywhere yet?”

  He protested. “Give me time!” He looked across at her sympathetically. He added, “If I were you, do you know what I’d do?”

  “What?”

  He said seriously, “Just forget all about this. Everything that’s happened, if you can. Just try to have a holiday, and get over things.”

  She shook her head decisively. “No. That’s not what I came aboard for. I want to help you.”

  “But look, I can’t let you get involved in this. Anything could happen, you know that. It wouldn’t be right. Besides, if anybody by the name of Donovan was known to be helping me it’d stand out a mile to—certain people.”

  She gave a small, exasperated sigh. “I told you, the name’s Dangan.” She hesitated, then went on passionately: “I know the risks. I’ve lived with this kind of thing so long on and off, not knowing what the next knock at the door would turn out to be, whether we were going to be arrested, Daddy and me. Or shot. Or anything. I said I came to help. Well?” She looked him right in the eyes, challengingly; her fresh young appearance, so appealing, struck Shaw almost like a blow in the face. He looked away, down at the table, pushed a knife around awkwardly. This was a remarkably self-possessed young woman, quite different from the broken girl who’d been looking out of the window of the West Kensington flat so short a time ago; she had steeled herself in some way . . . Shaw had the sudden idea that if once she let go, then she really would go right under, and that she was holding on only by keeping active, keeping in touch with what had been her father’s life, holding fast to the single idea of finishing what he had started and if possible of clearing his name in the end.

  Shaw looked up, met the straight glance. “All right, Jud
ith,” he said quietly, knowing now that he couldn’t rebuff the girl altogether. “You shall help me. And I’ll be glad of it.”

  She said, “Well, that’s fine; that really is. What do you want me to do?”

  He leaned across the table. “Are you quite sure, for a start, that you’ve told me everything? And you’re quite sure you’ve never seen Karstad?”

  “Of course—to both questions.”

  “And you’re sure, positive, that he never saw you? That may be important.”

  She said wearily, “Yes, of course I’m sure.”

  “Very well. Now, there’s a man called Andersson aboard —Sigurd Andersson.” He described the man. “I want you to keep as clear of him as you know how, short of getting him to think there’s anything behind it.”

  She smiled, dimpling attractively. “You mean if he makes a pass at me, or something? A girl can cope with that all right.”

  He shook his head. “It’s nothing to do with making passes. I believe he may be Karstad.” He noted that she had gone a little pale as he said that. He went on, “We still don’t know what sort of a game Karstad’s playing, but I really don’t believe leopards do change their spots, you know, Judith. So I’d rather you kept away.” He added, “My dear, you do understand—unless he’s absolutely sure you never saw him when he visited your father he may think you can identify him, that’s if he links Dangan with Donovan of course, and we can’t be sure he won’t.”

  She made a face at him. “It’s too late to worry about that now.” Then she looked at him accusingly. “Is all this what you mean by helping you?”

  “In a way, yes. But there’s something else. It won’t sound exciting, but it’s very important in its way. Help to give me cover. If Andersson is really Karstad he’ll know me and he’ll know what my job is, so that’s a chance we must accept—in any case, if he’s Karstad, and if Karstad’s on our side, he should be actually wanting to pass on some information to me, shouldn’t he? But there’s no reason why anybody else should know about me, and I’d just as soon they didn’t. Just to be on the safe side and keep the passengers from asking too many questions or getting panicky. Now, it’d be quite natural for us to strike up a friendship on board, just as we’re doing now, and just as you said after we’d left Naples yesterday. You can know all about me, spread the word that I’m harmless.” He repeated his cover-story and then he smiled kindly. “All right?”