The Lost Naval Papers

by Bennet Copplestone

  CHAPTER VIII

  TREHAYNE'S LETTER

  I took the letter from Dawson and glanced through it. The first sheetand the last had been written very recently--just before the boy hadleft his quarters for the last time to go on board the _Malplaquet_;the remainder had been set down at various times; and the whole hadbeen connected up, put together, and paged after the completion of thelast sheet. Trehayne wrote a pretty hand, firm and clear, the writingof an artist who was also a trained engineer. There was no trace inthe script of nervousness or of hesitation. He had carried out hisOrders, he saw clearly that the path which he had trod was leading himto the end of his journey, but he made no complaint. He was a Latin,and to the last possessed that loftiness of spirit wedded to sombrefatalism which is the heritage of the Latins. He was at war with hiskindred of Italy and France, and with the English among whom he hadbeen brought up, and whom he loved. He was their enemy by accident ofbirth, but though he might and did love his foes better than hisGerman friends of Austria and Prussia, yet he had taken the oath offaithful service, and kept it to the end. I could understand whyDawson--that strange human bloodhound, in whom the ruthless willcontinually struggled with and kept under the very tender heart--wouldallow no one to slander Trehayne.

  Cary was watching me eagerly, waiting for me to read the letter.

  Dawson's head was resting on one hand, and his face was turned away,so that I could not see it. He could not wholly conceal his emotion,but he would not let us see more of it than he could help. He did notmove once during my reading.

  * * * * *

  _To Chief Inspector William Dawson, C.I.D._

  SIR,

  Will you be surprised, my friend, when you read this that I have leftfor you, to learn that I, your right-hand man in the unending spyhunt, I whom you have called your bright jewel of a pupil, PettyOfficer John Trehayne, R.N.V.R., am at this moment upon the books ofthe Austrian Navy as a sub-lieutenant, seconded for Secret Service?Have you ever been surprised by anything? I don't know. You have saidoften in my hearing that you suspect every one. Have you suspected me?Sometimes when I have caught that sidelong squint of yours, thatstudied accidental glance which sees so much, I have felt almost surethat you were far from satisfied that Trehayne was the man he gavehimself out to be. I have been useful to you. I have eaten your salt,and have served you as faithfully as was consistent with the supremeOrders by which I direct my action. With you I have run down andcaptured German agents, wretched lumps of dirt, whom I loathe as muchas you do. Those who have sworn fidelity to this fair country ofEngland, and have accepted of her citizenship--things which I havenever done--and then in fancied security have spied upon their adoptedMother, I loathe and spit upon. I have taken the police oath ofobedience to my superiors, and I have kept it, but I have never swornallegiance to His Majesty your King, whom I pray that God may preservethough I am his enemy. To your blunt English mind, untrained in logic,my sentiments and actions may lack consistency. But no. Those agentswhom we have run down, you and I, were traitors--traitors to England.Of all traitors for whom Hell is hungry the German-born traitor is themost devilish. I would not have you think, my friend, that I am at onewith them. Never while I have been in your pay and service have I hadany communication direct or indirect with any of the naturalised-British Prussian scum, who have betrayed your noble generosity. I havetaken my Orders from Vienna, I have communicated always direct withVienna. I am an Austrian naval officer. I am no traitor to England.

  * * * * *

  I spring from an old Italian family which has long been settled inTrieste. For many generations we have served in the Austrian Navy.With modern Italy, with the Italy above all which has thrown the HolyFather into captivity and stripped the Holy See of the dominionsbestowed upon it by God, we have no part or lot. Yet when I have metItalian officers, and those too of France, as I have frequently doneduring my cruises afloat, I have felt with them a harmony of spiritwhich I have never experienced in association with German-Austriansand with Prussians. I do not wish to speak evil of our Allies, thePrussians, but to one of my blood they are the most detestable peoplewhom God ever had the ill-judgment to create.

  * * * * *

  I was born in Trieste, and lived there with my parents until I waseight years old. In our private life we always spoke Italian orFrench, German was our official language. I know that language well,of course, but it is not my mother tongue. Italian or French, andafterwards English--I speak and write all three equally well; which ofthe three I shall use when I come to die and one reverts to the speechof the nursery and schoolroom, I cannot say; it will depend upon whomthose are that stand about my deathbed.

  When I was eight years old, my father, Captain ---- (no, I will nottell you my name; it is not Trehayne though somewhat similar insound), was appointed Austrian Consul at Plymouth, and we all moved tothat great Devonshire seaport. I was young enough to absorb the richEnglish atmosphere, nowhere so rich as in that county which is thehome and breeding-ground of your most splendid Navy. I was born again,a young Elizabethan Englishman. My story to you of my origin was truein one particular--I really was educated at Blundell's School atTiverton. Whenever--and it has happened more than once--I have met asTrehayne old schoolfellows of Blundell's they have accepted withoutcomment or inquiry my tale that I had become an Englishman, and hadanglicised my name. Among the peoples which exist on earth to-day, youEnglish are the most nobly generous and unsuspicious. The Prussianslaugh at you; I, an Austrian-Italian, love and respect you.

  * * * * *

  When I was sixteen, after I had spent eight years in Devon, and fourof those years at an English public school, I was in speech and almostin the inner fibres of my mind an Englishman. Your naval authoritiesat Plymouth and Devonport, as serenely trustful and heedless ofespionage as the mass of your kindly people, allowed my father--whom Ioften accompanied--to see the dockyards, the engine shops, thetraining schools, and the barracks. They knew that he was an Austriannaval officer, and they took him to their hearts as a brother, of thecommon universal brotherhood of the sea. I think that your Navy holdsthose of a foreign naval service as more nearly of kin to themselvesthan civilians of their own blood. The bond of a common profession ismore close than the bond of a common nationality. I do not doubt thatmy father sent much information to our Embassy in London--it was whathe was employed to do--but I am sure that he did not basely betray thewonderful confidence of his hosts. Our countries were at peace. Myfather is no Prussian; he is a chivalrous gentleman. I am sure that hedid not send more than his English naval friends were content at thetime that he should send. For in those years your newspapers and yourbooks upon the Royal Navy of England concealed little from the world.I have visited Dartmouth; I have dined in the Naval College there withbright sailor boys of my own age. It was then my one dream, had Iremained in England, to have become an Englishman, and to have myselfserved in your Navy. It was a vain dream, but I knew no better. Fateand my birth made me afterwards your enemy. I would have fought yougladly face to face on land or sea, but never, never, would I havestabbed the meanest of Englishmen in the back.

  When I was sixteen years old I left England with my parents andreturned to Triest. I was a good mathematician with a keen taste formechanics. I spent two years in the naval engineering shops at Pola,and I was gazetted as a sub-lieutenant in the engineering branch ofthe Austrian Navy. My next two years were spent afloat. Although I didnot know it, I had already been marked out by my superiors for theSecret Service. My perfect acquaintance with English, my education atBlundell's, my knowledge of your thoughts and your queer ways, andtwists of mind, had equipped me conspicuously for Secret Service workin your midst.

  As a youth of twenty, in the first flush of manhood, I was secondedfor service here, and I returned to England. That was five years ago.

  * * * * *

  [I paused, for my thr
oat was dry, and looked up. Cary was leaningforward intent upon every word. Dawson's face was still turned away;he had not moved. It seemed to me that to our party of three had beenadded a fourth, the spirit of Trehayne, and that he anxiously waitedthere yonder in the shadows for the deliverance of our judgment. Hadhe, an English public school boy, played the game according to theimmemorial English rules? I went on.]

  * * * * *

  It was extraordinarily easy for me to obtain employment in the heartof your naval mysteries. Few questions were asked; you admitted me asone of yourselves. I took the broad open path of full acceptance ofyour conditions. I first obtained employment in a marine engineeringshop at Southampton, joined a trade union, attended Socialistmeetings--I, a member of one of the oldest families in Trieste. Thougha Catholic, I bent my knee in the English Church, and this was notdifficult, for I had always attended service in the chapel atBlundell's. To you, my friend, I can say this, for you are of somestrange sect which consigns to the lowest Hell both Catholics andAnglicans alike. Your Heaven will be a small place. From Southampton Iwent to the torpedo training-ship _Vernon_. Again I had no difficulty.I was a workman of skill and intelligence. I was there for more thantwo years, learning all your secrets, and storing them in my mind forthe benefit of my own Service at home.

  It was at Portsmouth that there came to me the great temptation of mylife, for I fell in love, not as you colder people do, but as aLatin of the warm South. She was an English girl of good, ifundistinguished, family. Though in my hours of duty I belonged to thatyou call the 'working classes,' I was well off, and lived in privatethe life of my own class. I had double the pay of my rank, anallowance from my father, and my wages, which were not small. Therewere many English families in Portsmouth and Southsea who weregraciously pleased to recognise that John Trehayne, trade unionist,and weekly wage-earning workman, was a gentleman by birth andbreeding. In any foreign port I should have been under policesupervision as a person eminently to be suspected; in Portsmouth I wasaccepted without question for what I gave myself out to be--agentleman who wished to learn his business from the bottom upwards. Iwill say nothing of the lady of my heart except that I loved herpassionately, and should have married her--aye, and become anEnglishman in fact, casting off my own, country--if War had not blownmy ignoble plans to shatters. There was nothing ignoble in my love,for she was a queen among women, but in myself for permitting the hotblood of youth to blind my eyes to the duty claimed of me by mycountry. When war became imminent, I was not recalled, as I had hopedto be, since I wished to fight afloat as became my rank and family. Iwas ordered to take such steps as most effectively aided me to observethe English plans and preparations, and to report when possible toVienna. In other words, I was ordered to act in your midst as aspecial intelligence officer--what you would call a Spy. It was anhonourable and dangerous service which I had no choice but to accept.My dreams of love had gone to wreck. I could have deceived the womanwhom I loved, for she would have trusted me and believed any story ofme that I had chosen to tell. But could I, an officer, a gentleman bybirth and I hope by practice, a secret enemy of England and a spy uponher in the hour of her sorest trial, could I remain the lover of anEnglish girl without telling her fully and frankly exactly what I was?Could I have committed this frightful treason to love and remainedother than an object of scorn and loathing to honest men? I could not.In soul and heart she was mine; I was her man, and she was my woman.With her there were no reserves in love. She was mine, yet I fled fromher with never a word, even of good-bye. I made my plans, obtainedcertificates of my proficiency in the _Vernon_, kissed my dear lovequietly, almost coldly, without a trace of the passion that I felt,and fled. It was the one thing left me to do. My friend, that was twoyears ago. She knows not whether I am alive or am dead; I know notwhether she is alive or is dead. Yet during every hour of the longdays, and during every hour of the still longer nights, she has beenwith me. I have done my duty, but I do not think that I wish to livevery much longer. If death comes to me quickly--and to those in mypresent trade it comes quickly--will you, my friend, of your bountifulkindness write to [here followed a name and address] and repeatexactly what I now say. Do not tell what I was or how I died, but justwrite, "He loved you to the last." There is a portrait in a locketround my neck and a ring on my finger. Send her those, my good friend,and she will know that your words are true.

  * * * * *

  I fled as far from Portsmouth, where my dear love dwelt, as I couldgo; I fled to Greenock, that dreadful sodden corner of earth where therain never ceases to fall, and the sun never shines. At Greenock onemeasures the rainfall not by inches, but by yards. Sometimes, notoften, a pale orb struggles through the clouds and glimmers faintlyupon the grimy town--some poor relation of the sun, maybe, but not thegodlike creature himself. For six months, in this cold desolate spot,among a people strangely unlike the English of Devon, though they areof kindred race, I laboured for six months in the Torpedo Factory. Ilived meanly in one room, for my Austrian pay and allowance hadstopped when War cut the channels of communication. I could, had Ichosen, have drawn money from German agencies in London, but I scornedto hold truck with them. They were traitors to the England whichtrusted and protected them, and of which they were citizens. I livedupon my wages and preserved jealously all that I had saved during myyears of comparative affluence at Portsmouth. It was duty which mademe a Spy, not gold.

  One day I was called into the office of the Superintendent, and it washinted to me, diplomatically, not unskilfully, that I was desired totake service with the English secret police. I feigned reluctance,made difficulties, professed diffidence, until pressure was put uponme, and I was forced to accept a position which I could never by anyscheming have achieved. Those whom the gods seek to destroy, theyfirst drive mad--you are a very trustful unsuspicious folk, all exceptyou to whom I write. But even you did not, I am sure, suspect me atthe beginning. I was sent to Scotland Yard in London to be trained inmy new duties. You saw me there, and claimed me for your staff, and Icame to this centre of shipbuilding and worked here with you. I wasclothed in the uniform of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve.

  There are two matters closely affecting my personal honour which willseem of small moment to you--you who display always a sublimepatriotic scorn of every moral scruple; but to me they are great. I amof the old chivalry of Italy, and I have been taught at school inEngland always to play the game. Though I wore the uniform of theR.N.V.R., it was as a disguise and cloak of my police office; I wasnever attested. I have never, never, never sworn allegiance toEngland. I have always kept troth with my own country; I have neverbroken troth with England. Had the English naval oath been profferedto me, I should have refused it at any hazard to my personal safety.My honour is unstained.

  You have paid me for my work, I have taken your pay, but I have notspent it upon myself. Every penny of it for the last twelve monthswill be found at my quarters. I have lived upon what I saved atPortsmouth--lived sometimes very scantily. My funds are running low.What I shall do when they are exhausted I cannot tell. Perhaps, whoknows, they will last my time. As for the rest, that packet ofTreasury Notes which has been my police pay, unexpended, will you takeit, my friend, and pay it to the fund for assisting the Englishsailors interned in Holland? I should feel happier if they wouldaccept it, for I have, as you will presently learn, taken some oftheir names in vain. I have not broken any oath, and I have not usedyour pay; my honour is unstained.

  * * * * *

  [Again I paused and glanced at Dawson. He had not even winced--atleast not visibly--when Trehayne had held him free from every moralscruple. He must, I think, have read the letter many times before hehad handed it to me. Cary looked troubled and uneasy. To him a spy hadbeen just a spy--he had never envisaged in his simple honest mind sucha super-spy as Trehayne. I went on.]

  * * * * *

  Now nothing was hidden from me; I h
ad within my hands all the secretsof England's Navy. My one difficulty--and it was not so great a one asyou may think--was communication with my country. Never for one momentdid it fail. Years before it had been thought out and prepared. Ivaried my methods. At Portsmouth, during the early weeks of the War, Ihad employed one means, at Greenock another, here yet another. Thebasis of all was the same. It was much more difficult for me toreceive orders from my official superiors in Austria, but even thosecame through once or twice. Never, during the whole of the past year,have I failed to send every detail of the warships building andcompleted here, of the ships damaged and repaired, of the movements ofthe Fleets in so far as I could learn them. My country and her Allieshave seen the English at work here as clearly as if this river hadbeen within their own borders. John Trehayne has been their Eye--anunsleeping, ever-watching Eye. Shall I tell you how I got myinformation through? It was very simple, and was done under your ownkeen nose. One of the R.N.V.R. who went with your Mr. Churchill toAntwerp, and was interned in Holland, was a friend of mine atGreenock, well known to me, I wrote to him constantly, though he neverreceived and was never meant to receive my letters. They were alladdressed to the care of a house in Haarlem where lived one of ourAustrian agents who was placed under my orders. All letters addressedby me to my friend were received by him and forwarded post haste toVienna. Do you grasp the simplicity and subtlety of the device? Myfriend was on the lists of those interned in Holland, no one here knewwhere he lodged, the address used by me was as probable as any other;what more natural and commendable than that I should write to cheerhim up a bit in exile, and that I should send him books andillustrated magazines? If it had been noticed by the postalauthorities in Holland that my friend did not live at the addresswhich I used, it would have been supposed that I had made a mistake,and no suspicion would have been attracted to me. But how did myletters, books, and magazines containing information, the most secretand urgent, pass through the censorship unchecked? That again wassimple. My letters were those which a friend in freedom in Englandwould write to his friend who was a captive in Holland. They werepersonal, sympathetic, no more. The books and magazines were justthose which such a man as my friend would desire to have to lightenthe burden of idleness. Between the lines of my letters, and on thewhite margins of the books and papers, I wrote the vital informationwhich my country desired to have, and I desired to give. The ink whichI used for this purpose left no trace and could not be made visible byany one who had not its complementary secret. It is the special ink ofthe Austrian Secret Service; you do not know it, your Censors do notknow it, your chemists might experiment for months and years and notdiscover it. I used it always, and you never read what I wrote. Nowyou will understand why I wish the small stock of money, my policepay, which I could not myself have used without dishonour, to go tothe interned sailors in Holland. I feel that I owe to my friend somelittle reparation for the crooked use to which I have put his name.

  There is little more to tell. Three weeks ago I received by post fromLondon a copy of _Punch_. It had been despatched to me unordered, fromthe office of the paper in an office wrapper. You know that Englishpapers may not now be sent abroad to neutral countries except directfrom the publishing offices of the newspapers themselves. It is aprecaution of the censorship, childish and laughable, for what iseasier than to imitate official wrappers? I guessed at once, when Isaw this unordered copy of _Punch_, that the wrapper was a faked one,and that it had come to me bearing orders from my superiors. I appliedmy chemical tests to the margins of the pages and upon theadvertisement of a brand of whisky appeared the orders which I hadexpected. I read what was written, and I have not suffered greaterpain--no, not upon that day when I fled from Portsmouth without aword of good-bye to the woman who possessed my heart. For I learnedthen that my country, the proud, clean-fighting Austria, had given upits soul into the keeping of the filthy Prussian assassins. I wasdirected to damage or delay every warship upon which I worked, toemploy any means, to blow up unsuspecting English seamen--not in thehot blood of battle, but secretly as an assassin. A step in rank waspromised for every battleship destroyed. Had these foul Ordersadmitted of no loophole through which my honour might with difficultywriggle, I should have taken the only course possible to me. I shouldhave instantly resigned my commission in the Austrian Navy, and takenmy own life. But it happened that I had an alternative. I was orderedto damage or delay warships. I would not treacherously slay theEnglish sailors among whom I worked, but I would, if I could, delaythe ships. My experience taught me that the simplest and mosteffective way was to cut the electric wires, and I decided to do itwhenever opportunity offered. I could not do this for long. I wascertain to be discovered. You are not a man who fails before adefinite problem in detection. But before I was discovered I could dosomething to carry out my Orders.

  I cut the gun-wires of the _Antinous_. It was easy. I was the last toleave of the shore party. Then you sent me on board the _Antigone_.She was closely watched, the task was very difficult, and dangerous; Iwas within the fraction of a second of discovery, but I took one chopof my big shears. The job was ill done, but I could do no better.

  You warned me fairly, that if injury came to the _Malplaquet_, whileunder my charge, that I should be dismissed. She was my last chance asshe was your own. But what to me were risks? I had lost my love, andmy country had dishonoured herself in my eyes. I was nameless,loveless, countryless. All had gone, and life might go too.

  * * * * *

  I am completing this letter before going on board the _Malplaquet_ andplacing it where you will readily find it. I know you, my friend, moreintimately than you know yourself. I am certain that even now you arein the ship, that you are preparing snares into which I shall in allprobability fall. Your snares are well set. If I fail, it will bethrough you; if I am caught, it will be through you. But be sure ofthis--if we meet in the _Malplaquet_, the fowler and the bird, it willbe for the last time. You may catch me, but you will not take me. Fora long time past I have provided against just such an outcome as this.Upon my uniform tunics, upon my overalls, I have fixed buttons,hollowed out, each of which contains enough of cyanide of potassium tokill three men. If I were court-martialled and shot, there would be nodisgrace to me, an officer on secret service, but a whisper of itmight steal to Portsmouth and give deep pain to one there. No one willlearn of the petty officer of R.N.V.R. who died far away in the north.The locket with the portrait is round my neck, the ring is upon myfinger. Both are ready waiting for you who will do what I ask and willkeep my secret from her.

  I have the honour to be, sir,

  Your obedient servant,

  JOHN TREHAYNE.

  * * * * *

  I folded up the papers and returned them to Dawson, who carefullyplaced them in his pocket. In the shadows the spirit of Trehayne stillseemed to be waiting. I thought for a few minutes, and then rose to myfeet. "He was an officer on secret service," said I slowly. "An enemy,but a gallant and generous enemy. In love and in war he played thegame, Requiescat in pace."

  "Amen," said Cary.

  Dawson rose and gripped our hands. "I have the locket and the ring,and I will write as he wished. It is the least that I can do."

  They buried Trehayne with naval honours as an enemy officer who haddied among us. England does not war with the dead. Though he hadfallen by his own hand, the Roman Church did not withhold from anerring son the beautiful consolation of her ritual. Cary and I openlyattended the funeral. Dawson was officially in bed, suffering from hismuch-desired attack of influenza. But in the firing party of RedMarines, whose volleys rang through the wintry air over the body ofTrehayne, I espied one whom I was glad to see present.

  PART II

  _MADAME GILBERT_