Web of Spies

by Colin Smith

  “When do you want to tell Athens this?”

  “Tonight.”

  Lang got up to get his radio. At the door he paused and asked, “Do you think the woman will be punished?”

  “Jessica?”

  “Yes.”

  “I hope not. She’s been punished enough.”

  19 - An Interrogation

  “I’m sorry, I have to ask you this Mrs Hallowes but were you intimate with him?”

  “Do you mean did we go to bed?”

  Not for the first time that evening the Assistant Superintendent wished somebody would hurry up and find Calderwell. Absently, he picked up De Wet’s service cap from his desk and nodded.

  “Why? Is it a criminal offence? I always thought anybody could be the Harlot of Jerusalem.” Jessica was on the verge of tears, desperate not to show it, determined to give as good as she got.”

  “Look Mrs Hallowes,” he said, putting the cap down. “We think this man, the man you knew as Major Maurice De Wet, may be guilty of some very serious crimes.”

  “Am I allowed to know what?”

  “Murder. We think he shot dead a shepherd boy who got in his way. Then he planted a bomb which killed one person, a young nurse, seriously wounded five others and came within seconds of bumping off your boss who was almost certainly the target. There’s probably a lot more.”

  “I don’t believe it.”

  “I think you should. The man you know as Major De Wet is not Major De Wet. He’s a German agent.”

  It was too much for Jessica. Much worse than Bob going, part of her had always been prepared for that. It would have been strange if it hadn’t. This was entirely different. It made her feel used, dirty, raped.

  “My husband was killed,” she heard herself saying. “Shot down by the Vichy French last year.” Why did she have to talk about this? Any of it? “Yes, Major De Wet, whoever, sometimes spent the night at my flat. Not-” Jessica broke off, looking down, biting her lower lip, and hating herself for being so bloody stupid.

  “Sorry, smoke in my eyes,” she gulped, accepting the proferred handkerchief before recovering her cigarette from the ashtray. “I was about to say, not often enough.” And she had the satisfaction of observing a faint blush come to the cheeks of her interrogator.

  Earlier, she had declined the Assistant Superintendent’s offer of tea and a constable had brought her water in a chipped china mug. What she needed was a drink. A drink drink. One of Ahmed’s specials would do nicely thank you very much. The other thing she needed was Maurice back to explain to them, to explain to her, why it was all a terrible misunderstanding: he had run off like that because he had a brainstorm, anything. Of course, she knew now that there was about as much chance of that as raising her late husband from the Mediterranean. Maurice wouldn’t come back because Maurice had never been there. If there was a real Maurice De Wet somewhere they had never been introduced.

  Jessica had begun to suspect it even as they had brought her to the Jerusalem Compound in the back of the same taxi in which, sometime in another life, she had nuzzled against a man’s shoulder while the warm air coming through the driver’s open window caressed her face. Only this time she sat bolt upright between two silent military policemen in long shorts. In the front passenger seat a Palestine police officer had Maurice’s cap and the smallpack containing their still damp swimming things on his lap and this time the slip stream from the open front windows was no more than neutral. The taxi driver had been taken in for questioning too, poor man. How could Maurice have done this to them?

  Jessica had felt so protected by him, so confident in him when they left the taxi and walked back to the roadblock together. Maurice, dependable old Maurice, who knew so much, who could beat up men half his age and make love all night, banishing her cares again. She wasn’t going to be late for work. At least not very. It was going to be alright: the end to a perfect day.

  She had heard the policeman saying something to him but hadn’t quite caught what it was. Then this sudden flurry of movement, and somebody had yelled, “Drop him. Drop the bastard!”

  But even when Jessica heard the shots, registered the way the way the darting torch beams began to concentrate on her taxi, the notion that the bastard in question was Maurice was fantastic. Surely they had come under some sort of attack and her gallant escort had departed in pursuit?

  When she heard a scream she was surprised to recognise it as her own. “Get hold of that woman,” somebody said and they did. Even then, with a man either side of her gripping her firmly by the upper arm and wrist, it was still a moment or two before it dawned on Jessica that this was not being done for her own protection.

  Now she was ready for some tea, dash of milk, not too much sugar please. She sat, knees together, on the hard wooden chair in front of this policeman’s desk, sipping it, wondering what they had told the Secretariat, wondering when they would start to explain things properly instead of asking these ridiculous questions. For the first time Jessica recognised the antelope South African cap badge and realised it was Maurice’s hat on the Assistant Super’s desk. She found herself wanting to stroke it.

  “So you help prepare the final draft of Sir Harold’s diary of appointments for the day? Was he curious about your work? Did he ever ask you what Sir Harold was doing? Not much? But sometimes? You were worried about being late for your shift at the Secretariat. Did you tell him what you were working on? Not really? Just about Sir Harold going to see Auchinleck in case the army still has to come back to Palestine? Anything else? Don’t worry about it being trivial. We’ll be the judge of that. VIP visitors eh? To here? Oh Cairo then perhaps here? Do you know who? What was the gossip at the Secretariat? Oh Smuts? Anybody else? Really. Did you tell him? You don’t think so. Are you sure? Would you like to borrow my handkerchief again Mrs Hallowes? No charge.”

  Soon afterwards they allowed her to go home accompanied by an attentive Detective-sergeant and a constable who were to stay with her all night just in case her boyfriend remembered he had forgotten to say goodbye. They would bring their own sugar and tea. Did she have some milk in? Good. Only one sofa? That was fine. One of them had to stay awake. The constable ostentatiously checked the contents of his revolver and left it on the coffee table. The Secretariat was called and it was explained that Mrs Hallowes was assisting the police in their enquiries and might be off work for a few days yet. The Assistant Super left a message asking her immediate boss to contact him. Somebody told him they had located Inspector Calderwell and he would be in shortly. He tried to call the Inspector General and his Deputy but couldn’t find either of those illustrious personages at home. In the end, he decided to hell with it, his bosses might not like the idea that the decision had not passed through their hands but sooner or later it obviously had to happen and, in the circumstances, it was probably much better it happened sooner. He was going to have to talk to the Funnies.

  ***

  Although it was almost nine-thirty at night Arthur Davison was sitting behind his desk, which was in the south wing of the King David’s hotel where the Secretariat had been billeted for security reasons ever since 1939, the last year of the Arab troubles. His right shoe was off and in his left hand while he scraped away the dog shit on its leather sole with a pen knife, allowing it to fall on a couple of pages of yesterday’s Palestine Post which he had spread out on the wooden floor.

  Rumour had it that the Crown Agents for the Colonies, whose premises at Millbank had so far survived the Luftwaffe’s raids on London, kept in its vaults plans for a purpose built Secretariat every bit as luxurious as the King David with provision for the new air conditioning and fitted radiators for Jerusalem’s cold and wet winters. Meanwhile, the Secretariat continued to share parts of the King David with the army and, in those suites and rooms the hotel’s Swiss management were still permitted to let out, some paying guests.

  Among the latter were a few permanent residents, regional notables deprived by the war of their usual European haunts. Th
e most senior of these was the mother of the Shah of Persia whose Germanophile son the British had exiled to Mauritius. This lady was devoted to several noisy and incontinent Pekingese whose traces along the landings she expected the hotel staff to clear up. It was the second time in ten days that one of Davison’s brogues had landed on a turd of startling size and pungency given its undisputed provenance. He had just got the last of it when his telephone rang and he discovered the Assistant Superintendent at the other end of it.

  When Davison heard a little of what he had to say he cut him short and suggested it would be much better if he popped over to the King David and told him in person. While he as waiting for the policeman to arrive he folded the slivers of dog shit from his shoes into a page from the newspaper then scrunched it into a tight ball. A short walk down the corridor was a WC and hand basin where he could wash the blade of his knife.

  As he emerged from the lavatory a telephone was ringing and he ran by the locked doors of some of the other offices, certain it was his. A young woman asked for him by name then told him that he had a call from the High Commissioner and she was putting him through.

  “You mean his office,” said Davison. These girls never got a damn thing right.

  “No sir, I mean Sir Harold himself.” And there he was.

  “Not at all Sir Harold...We’re all working late nowadays.” His eye caught something on the floor. Had me missed a bit? “Of course... Happy to help. The airfield at six in the morning…I’ll have to rearrange my diary… Yes, that would be useful. I can be with you in forty-five minutes. I’m expecting somebody any moment but he shouldn’t be very long.”

  ***

  “I still don’t believe it,” Calderwell said. He had said something similar a few minutes before but he needed to say it again. “Slippery bastard! Straight through our bloody fingers. Reactions like a cat.”

  He was in civvies, the houndstooth check sports jacket over the short sleeved shirt he had put on for the beach. He had hardly got Mitzi into the house and some of her clothes off her when the Assistant Super’s office was on the blasted telephone calling him in. It was the first time it had occurred to him that his new toy came at a price.

  “Yes, he thinks on his feet all right,” agreed the Assistant Super who had just finished going through the notes he had made on the main point of his conversation with Jessica Hallowes. “And it gets worse.”

  “It can’t do. From what you’ve just told me she’s practically given him the crown jewels. Those contingency plans for Palestine! Bloody hell. Knocked me sideways to hear it. Thought we were holding them.”

  “Perhaps Auchinleck’s just hedging his bets. Anyway, London is taking the situation here very seriously.”

  “I’m very pleased to hear it.”

  “These preparations for a VIP arrival she was telling him about…”

  “She said Smuts right? She thought it was Smuts?”

  “Yes, she did. That’s the scuttlebutt at the Secretariat and it’s wrong. I’ve just come back from seeing Davison. He swore me to secrecy, need to know and all that. Pompous ass! You’ll probably be reading about it in the public prints any moment. Anyway, I do think you need to know.”

  “So who is it?”

  “They. There are two of them.”

  “Christ! Not a royal visit?”

  “In a way, that wouldn’t be so bad. No, the junior one is Field Marshal Sir Alan Brooke.”

  “He’s the junior one?”

  “Yes, in this instance the Chief of the Imperial General Staff is the junior one. The other one is Winston Churchill.”

  “My God. When?”

  “They’re already here.”

  “In Jerusalem?”

  “No. Cairo. Davison thinks Churchill definitely wants Auchinleck to put Strafer Gott in charge of the 8th Army now he’s got rid of Ritchie. As far as he’s concerned they’re not coming here. Looks like she got that wrong as well.”

  “Then it could be worse.”

  “If you say so.”

  “Do you think young Hare should be told?”

  “I’ve already called him, he’s coming in. He’s put his wireless wizards on full alert. By the way, our friend Maeltzer finally cracked the code in the first intercept. Interested in everything our Major De Wet is. All creatures great and small. It was mostly about the censor being sensitive about troop movements in southern England. So we had another word with the flame haired temptress and, sure enough, the censor had torn into a letter from her little sister who seems to be having a good time with some Canadians. The Widow Hallowes thought it was outrageous. She had a long discussion about it with her boyfriend. Or perhaps I should say her favourite boyfriend.

  “Another thing. On a couple of occasions she heard him speak what sounded to her like very good Palestinian Arabic. Told her some bullshit about how he’d picked it up quickly because of the Swahili he used in East Africa during the last war. I suppose he could have been there under Von Lettow-Vorbeck but I know a bit of Swahili and I can assure you there’s not enough Arabic in it to have much of a conversation with Palestinian Arabs. She’s also heard him speak a bit of Hebrew. What does that tell you?”

  Suddenly Calderwell was back where it all began for him at the Forsters’ Sunday lunch.

  “He’s a bloody Templer isn’t he?”

  “That’s what I think. We didn’t intern all of them. A lot got away before the balloon went up. And there were some who couldn’t settle down here again after the first war.”

  “Anything else?”

  “Yes. Do you want to know why it took Maeltzer so long to crack the cypher?”

  “It was in Sanskrit.”

  “You’re on the right track. Maeltzer assumed, as well one might, that he was looking for German words but he wasn’t. Then he looked again at his notes again and began to see words that could almost be English. So he’d tried them. And there it was, clear as daylight. The entire bloody message was in English! Wiley old fox our De Wet eh?”

  “Not De Wet,” said Calderwell. “The Templer.”

  ***

  At the bungalow, to provide the sitting room with a through draught, they had both the side window and the glass French doors leading to the back patio open though the blackout required drawn curtains which rippled to the occasional breeze. The Templer, seated in an armchair, was coding his message under a sidelight. Lang had placed the opened the suitcase containing the Siemens set on the dining table where it was illuminated by a weak bulb in the glass lampshade above it. He was uncoiling the connecting lead from the set and was about to plug it in. There was no sense in running his precious batteries down when he could do it off the mains. Also on the table was one of the Schmeissers that had been dropped on the Hattin. Its long stick magazine was out and lying alongside it.

  There were various night noises, some identifiable. Some motor traffic on the road outside. Sometimes one would stop and a door would slam. There were the railway sounds clearly carried from Jerusalem station: the hissing sigh of compressed steam, the chiming rumble of shunted rolling stock which would end in a long screech and then start again. Once the German thought he heard an owl and it reminded him of boyhood holidays spent on Templer farms.

  Then from much closer came a rustle from the acacia bushes outside the bungalow. Twice, thrice.

  Lang paused. Furtive movement. Unmistakable. Now they both stopped what they were doing, tilted their ears towards the open window. The Jew picked up the Schmeisser from the table and clicked the magazine into place. He looked at the Templer and his hand went to the cocking handle. The German waved a finger at him and shook his head. Lang took his hand away. The noise came again. “Cat?” said the Templer. He had not been followed, he was certain of it.

  Lang was about to say something when, sure enough, there came the yowling of some anguished feline encounter. He put the gun back on the table but left the magazine in. “If it isn’t a cat it’s a very gifted policeman,” he said, fishing in his pockets for cigar
ettes.

  “They’re not all fools,” said the Templer. “Somebody has some brains. But his luck is bad. He works out who they’re looking for then when I walk into a roadblock they lose me. Very unlucky.”

  “Let’s hope they stay unlucky,” said Lang. “Now they know what you look like it’s going to be harder to move about.”

  “Yes, we will have to change costume. Time to sew on the rest of those Polish shoulder flashes.”

  “Well I hope our landlady is around to oblige. It may surprise you to learn that not all Jewish men are tailors.”

  “I’ll do it if we have to,” said the Templer. “Every soldier learns to sew.”

  When the German had finished enciphering his message they began to discuss what would be the best time to send it. Lang wanted to wait until the early hours on the grounds that the British monitors would be dozy by then and there was more chance of a short message getting through undetected. The German thought the sooner the better because there would still be a lot of on air could they lose themselves in. “You don’t hide on a plain when you can get into a forest.”

  Lang considered simply refusing point blank to send until he was good and ready. But even now, when after the incident at the roadblock there must be some sort of alert on, he thought the risk was small. In the event that any British direction finding teams got a fix on them the chances were it would take them a while to narrow it down to a particular building on a particular street. As long as his message was short the best they would get initially would be the area it was coming from, nothing smaller than a square mile. Then they would have to close in and start trawling it. Lang went outside and to check his antenna was still properly in position in the bougainvillaea while the Templer enciphered what he had learned about the preparations being made to withdraw the 8th Army to Palestine.

  When he had finished the Templer found himself thinking of Jessica. She had of course been a means to an end and betrayal and flight were always inevitable. But it might have been gentler. Instead, he had vanished from her life in about the time it takes to snuff a candle. If he had succeeded at Sarafand he would have faded away, failed to return from one of his imaginary trips to Haifa without her ever realising her contribution to an assassination. No doubt his disappearance would have been hurtful enough. But even if there had been no ulterior motive, in his experience affairs that ignite with that speed and intensity usually burn out just as fast and in their hearts both sides know it’s coming. He had little in common with drunken, indiscreet and impulsive Jessica. After a while she would have settled for the idea that he left her for somebody else, either another single woman or a wife in South Africa because he was not the widower he claimed to be, about the only true thing he had told her. Unless, at the appropriate moments, it was some murmured thanks for the sex and the dancing. In and out of bed she had been a very good dancer.