Eldorado Network

by Derek Robinson

  “Whose idea was that?”

  He waved the question away. “Irrelevant. They believe I’m now operating in England and communicating with them via the Spanish embassy in London. In theory I give my reports to a man in the London embassy who sends them in the diplomatic bag to Lisbon where someone else forward them to Madrid. In fact when I left Spain I never went further than Lisbon. The reality is that I write all my reports here in this office and then mail them to the Abwehr in Madrid. That’s what I was doing all last night. I produced four thousand words of secret information about Great Britain and her allies, which is on its way to Madrid right now. Colonel Christian, whom you met, should be reading it first thing tomorrow.”

  “No,” she said. “That doesn’t work. There must be things they want to say to you. Instructions, messages. Payment, for God’s sake. According to you it’s all one-way traffic. I don’t believe the spy business works that way.”

  “They communicate,” he said. “In theory the system works in reverse. The Abwehr writes to an address in Lisbon. My friend in the Spanish embassy here collects the letter, off it goes to London in the bag. I get it from my contact there. In fact what happens is I simply pick up the letters myself.”

  “From the bank?”

  “Correct.”

  “And money? You expect me to believe they pay you through the mail, too?”

  “I have bank accounts here and in Switzerland. My earnings are automatically credited to one of them.”

  “Meanwhile in England you live off wholesome fattening English air.”

  “Not at all. As a Spanish citizen, a neutral, who is doing business in England, I can easily transfer funds from Lisbon.”

  “You can, sure. But you don’t.”

  Luis rubbed his chin. “You have a point. Perhaps I should open an account in London, for the sake of appearances.” He scribbled a note.

  “Meanwhile,” she said, “all those highpowered experts in German military intelligence are dumb enough to keep on buying the fairy-tales you’re supposed to have been sending them.”

  Luis shrugged. “It is true. What else can I say?”

  “You’ve never been to England. You don’t know any British people. But you come up here every day and just sit down and invent their secrets.”

  “Not quite. I have some reference books which help me,” He took them off a shelf and showed her.

  “This explains everything,” she said. “1923 Michelin Guide to Great Britain. Gee whiz. Great Western Railway’s Holiday Haunts, price sixpence, the rare 1937 edition. Plus would you believe this evergreen of the schoolroom, Exploring the British Isles by Jasper H. Stembridge, Book 4!” She opened it at random. “Spring in the Fen-lands,” she read out, “and the farmers are busy plowing the huge, flat fields.” She shut it. “Gee, I bet Colonel Christian never knew that until you told him. I bet he leaped to the telephone and called Berlin in a white-hot frenzy and—”

  “That page,” Luis said, “gave me all the basic information I needed for a big report on R.A.F. airfields in eastern England.” He took the books back. “And I shall be very surprised if some of what I wrote isn’t actually true. If it isn’t true, the R.A.F. is making a big mistake, that’s all I can say.”

  Julie looked around the bare, dingy room, and sniffed. “I don’t believe you, Luis,” she said. A sliver of broken lightbulb glinted on the floor. She picked it up and dropped it on the desk. “I don’t believe they’d send you off on your own like that. I don’t believe they’d trust your crazy diplomatic-bag system. I don’t believe you’re brilliant enough to invent phony reports, and I don’t believe they’d be so damn-fool gullible as to swallow an endless stream of crap.”

  “I see,” he said.

  She felt very tired. She sat at his desk and rested her plaster cast on the scratched and dented surface.

  “What do you believe?” he asked.

  She looked at him. He was thinner than he had been in Madrid, and he seemed constantly to be thinking about something else, “I believe there’s a simple answer to everything,” she said. “You’ve been spying like hell in Britain, you’re back here on a flying visit, and you made up all that stuff to keep me quiet.”

  They thought about that, in silence. He picked gently at the graze on his chin until he made it bleed. He inspected the blood on his fingertip and carefully licked it off.

  “In that case there’s only one thing to do,” he said. “You’ll just have to stay here and see for yourself.”

  “Well, that’s better than what I expected,” she said. “I thought you were going to take out your howitzer and blow my head off.”

  “I fight a non-violent war,” he said. “You’d better find something to read. This report I’m doing is all about Commando training in north Wales, and it’ll take at least two hours.”

  She picked up Jasper H. Stembridge. “Which are the juicy bits?” she asked.

  “Try chapter nine: ‘The Busy Midlands’,” Luis said. “A veritable goldmine.”

  *

  “Read this,” said Meredith. “Then you’ll know as much as I do.”

  While Squadron Leader Blake read it, Meredith poured tea for them both. He chose a digestive biscuit and dunked it in his tea. “Frightful habit,” he murmured.

  Blake looked at the back of the paper, which was blank. “Not much to go on, is there, sir? Just the name, when you boil it all down.”

  “Eldorado. Mean anything?”

  “Only ice-cream. Stop-me-and-buy-one, the Eldorado man on a tricycle. Haven’t we got an agent codenamed Tricycle?”

  “Yes.”

  “No connection, though, I shouldn’t think,”

  “No.”

  They sipped their tea. “Perhaps London’s asking us because it’s Spanish, sir,” Blake suggested. “Eldorado: something to do with gold, isn’t it?”

  “Mmm. Means ‘the gilded one’ or ‘the golden one.’ That could signify anything from bullion-smuggling to blonds.”

  “London seem sure it was an Abwehr signal they intercepted. I suppose that’s something. On the other hand the transmitter was in Hamburg, sir. Miles from here.”

  Meredith glanced at the decoded message again. “Context suggests Eldorado involves high-grade operation,” he read. “That means London is worried and guessing furiously. I bet this signal’s gone to every office from Stockholm to Kabul. Still … Keep your ears open, Teddy. Chat up the neutral embassies, you never know your luck. Madrid’s a very chatty place.”

  “Yes sir. Of course, if Eldorado’s a German agent, he won’t actually be in Madrid, will he? He’ll be in England.”

  “Perhaps that’s what’s worrying London.”

  “Perhaps,” Blake stared at the dregs of his tea, and sighed. “It really was awfully good ice-cream,” he said.

  *

  Julie read the last page of the report and handed it back. “Impressive,” she said.

  “I chose the north part of Wales because of the mountains,” Luis opened Jasper H. Stembridge at chapter seven and showed her a photograph of Mount Snowdon. “Stembridge says: ‘Here and there ranges and peaks, rising above the surrounding uplands, add more rugged charm to the wild wind-swept moors.’ Doesn’t that sound to you like ideal country for training British Commandos?”

  “Oh, perfectly spiffing,” she said.

  “And if you check it against the section for North Wales in the GWR Holiday Haunts …” He thumbed through that book. “Yes: ‘a scattered rural population … towns are neither numerous nor large … happy hunting ground for those in search of perfect peace and seclusion,’ and so on. I bet it’s stiff with Commandos.”

  “No question. I liked that bit about using live ammunition and the casualty rate.”

  “Yes. You see, it works two ways at once. The Germans are impressed by the toughness of Commando training, but they’re also pleased to know that so many British soldiers get hurt by it. You don’t think I went too far with the casualty statistics? Four point seven three pe
rcent: maybe it sounds too precise.”

  “Well, you got it straight from that medical corporal you met in the bar at wherever-it-was.”

  “The Royal Victoria Hotel, Llanberis.” Luis opened the 1923 Michelin Guide at a page marked with a ribbon. “Five miles north of Snowdon. Lunch three shillings and sixpence, dinner five shillings, parking for forty cars. I don’t think he was staying at the hotel, not on his pay. He just popped in for a drink.”

  “The angry chicken-farmer was good too.”

  “It’s just a matter of identification. I said to myself, ‘Imagine you live in a remote and tranquil area. Suddenly troops arrive and begin firing sten guns and bren guns and shooting off mortars and throwing grenades, at all hours of the day and night. What is the effect?’ Obvious: the farmers complain. They say the noise alarms their chickens, which stop laying, and they demand compensation.”

  “And you actually saw all this training.”

  “It’s not a prohibited area. I make that clear in paragraph one.”

  “So what are they training for?”

  Luis shrugged. “Not even they know that. But as I point out, those Welsh mountains are very steep, like cliffs.”

  “Uh-huh. More Commando raids on the coast of Europe.”

  “I leave that for the Abwehr’s experts to decide.”

  “The human touch. Neat.”

  “Well …” Luis stretched enormously. “Now you’ve seen for yourself. That’s how it’s done,” He put the books back on the shelf.

  “No, I don’t think so,” Julie said.

  “Come with me to the post office, if you like.”

  “Oh, I’m sure you’ll mail it. This stuff is too good to waste.”

  “Then what more do you want?” Luis slapped a carbon copy into a file and slammed the file cabinet shut. “Short of getting Colonel Christian on the telephone and—”

  “Hell, no, I’m sure he loves your stuff too. So he should. It’s all true.”

  “You just saw me—”

  “I just saw you do another snow job. You were in north Wales last week, or whenever, and you personally saw all that Commando training, which is why it sounds so convincing. Nice try, Luis. A little too nice, maybe. About four point seven three percent too nice.”

  He sat on his desk and rubbed his eyes. When he took his hands away, his fingers were trembling slightly.

  “Incidentally, Angela sends her love,” she said.

  “Angela?” He sounded flat and tired.

  “You wouldn’t remember Angela. You wouldn’t even remember Freddy. And Freddy wouldn’t remember you, that’s for sure.”

  Luis gave her a long, speculative look. She stared back, unblinking. He looked away.

  “I don’t blame you,” she said. “I wouldn’t want to talk about it either. Not even for a snow job.”

  He stood up. “It’s time for lunch.”

  “Just give me an aspirin. This wrist hurts.”

  “Aspirin. I see. There is a farmdcia around the corner.” He frowned. “What is that in English?”

  “Who the hell cares?” she said. Her anger had the raw edge of bitterness. They went downstairs in silence. At the farmdcia Luis bought aspirin and asked for a glass of water. While she was swallowing the tablets he asked: “Will you come with me to the bank, later?” She nodded. If she had shaken her head she might have choked.

  They ate a silent lunch in a noisy restaurant overlooking the Rossio, and walked down to the Rua do Comercio. It was hot again, and the streets were quiet. The Banco Espirito Santo received them into its cool and spacious gloom, and when Luis tapped the bell on the Secçao Estrangeira counter, the same somber three-piece-suit came forward.

  “Boa tarde, senhor Cabrillo.” He registered Julie’s presence with a minimal flicker of the eyes.

  “Good afternoon,” Luis said, a fraction more clearly than was necessary; and Julie knew he was speaking English for her benefit. “Are there any letters for me?”

  “I shall see.”

  He came back with a stiff brown envelope, heavily sealed. Luis had to sign for it. He showed her the form: it carried a longish column of his signatures, at least ten of them. “Three or four times each week I come here,” he said.

  “Or someone with your signature.”

  The three-piece-suit pretended not to hear that.

  “What days did I come in last week?”

  “Monday, Wednesday and Friday, senhor. As usual.”

  “Yes. I’d like to see a statement of my account, please.”

  “Of course, senhor.”

  Julie studied it. There were regular weekly credits during the previous month. The sums increased toward the end. There were a few extra credits, each rounded off to the nearest thousand escudos. Luis pointed at those. “Bonus payments,” he said. She looked at the last figure and did a quick conversion in her head. Luis had something over twelve hundred dollars in the bank. “So they pay you,” she said. “So what?”

  Luis returned the statement and they went out into the street.

  “I don’t exactly know what to do now,” he said, “I hoped you would believe the man in the bank.”

  “Bankers are finks. We’re all finks, according to you. The Germans are idiots, because they buy your junk, I’m an idiot, because I don’t buy your junk. You probably think the British are idiots, too. And the Russians.”

  “Well, the British are idiots,” Luis said, remembering his visit to the embassy in Madrid. “Sometimes.”

  “And you’re the lonely genius who’s making a killing out of this war. Terrific.”

  “I wish—”

  “You wish you could pack me off to America with a pat on the head, so that you could get back to Britain and make your pile before peace breaks out and spoils everything.”

  “I have never been to Britain,” Luis insisted. “I have no wish to go to Britain. Why should I?”

  “No reason at all. Who wants to live with an idiot?”

  “This is becoming silly. Look: I can show you my passport, it hasn’t a single—”

  “Oh, passports, passports, I can show you a guy here in Lisbon who sells ’em by the yard, he gets them off dead British seamen. Want to see what those guys look like? Not like their passport pictures, I can tell you. Give yourself a break, Luis, take the afternoon off, go browse through the British seamen’s morgue. After all, who deserves it more? You helped put the poor bastards there.”

  “You are determined to hate me.”

  “I hate what you’re doing.”

  Luis sucked his teeth. They were walking slowly, and he was stepping between the cracks in the pavingstones.

  “What’s in that?” she demanded, pointing at the stiff brown envelope. “Is it from them?”

  “Yes. Probably a new briefing.”

  “Show me.”

  The letter contained two sheets of typewritten instructions. She scanned them quickly. “Are you going to answer this?”

  “In due course.”

  “No.” She folded the pages and stuffed them down the front of her dress. “You’re going to answer it today, right now. They want a report on the new British paratroop school near Oxford, and they want your opinion of the chances of an Allied attack on Norway this year.”

  He stopped and stared at her.

  “What’s the matter: can’t you do it?” she asked crisply.

  “I worked all bloody yesterday,” he said. “Then you came and ruined my evening, so I had to work all bloody night. Then I got four hours bad sleep and went back and hammered out all that bloody Commando stuff. And now you want me to do what?”

  “Do what you say you can do.”

  Luis’s shoulders slumped. He squinted wearily into the glare. “Tomorrow,” he said.

  “Piss, or get off the pot,” she told him. “I’ll be waiting for you in the Rossio in … let’s see … three hours.”

  “I can’t work that fast,” he pleaded.

  “Tough luck. I’ll be knocking on the front d
oor of the British embassy in three hours and five minutes.”

  Luis groaned.

  “And while I remember,” she said, “that’s a really lousy mustache.”

  She watched him trudge away.

  Chapter 44

  “In short, Eldorado continues to live up to his name,” said Richard Fischer. He had just finished his analysis of the latest reports from Knickers, the soft-drinks salesman. Franz had already dealt with the information supplied by Seagull, the Liverpool docker.

  It was all good, worthwhile stuff. As Dr. Hartmann pointed out, the great thing about Eldorado was that, when he forwarded material from his sub-agents, he distinguished clearly between observed fact, reported fact, and rumor. It made evaluation and deduction so much easier. One always knew where one stood. Everyone nodded except Wolfgang Adler; he sat in the same attitude he had held since the meeting began: legs crossed at the ankle, thumbs hooked into his belt-loops, eyes staring at nothing in particular.

  “The last item today,” Colonel Christian announced, “is also good news. It seems that we may have recruited a second Eldorado.”

  Wolfgang’s eyes came up at that, but not for long.

  “The other day. Otto Krafft came to me and asked permission to follow up a contact initially made through a member of the Swiss embassy. This has now led to an American businessman of German origin, Mr. Francis X. Tanenbaum of Oklahoma.” Christian suddenly frowned, and cocked his head. “Oklahoma?”

  “Arizona,” Otto said. There was a gentle ripple of amusement, except for Wolfgang, who closed his eyes.

  “An understandable mistake,” Christian defended blandly, “both states being populated entirely by cattle and film producers.”

  “Which are themselves easily confused,” Franz Werth added.

  “Not at all,” Fischer said. “The ones you see stampeding in a cloud of dust are the producers.”

  “Arizona,” Christian went on. “Otto has established that Tanenbaum regularly trades with and visits Britain and Spain. Now, however, he has indicated his willingness to trade with the Abwehr.”

  “If he’s any good,” Dr. Hartmann said, “that could be very good.”