“I had supposed it must be” (dryly). “Tell me all you know about the man, Ned. I’ve heard of his courtship and marriage—in fact, pretty much everything Lady Blanche could give me.”
“Well—let me see. He was a son of General Sir Harrington Parker, who was on the staff of Engineers in the sixties and had a good deal to do with the permanent improvements at Aldershot in 1890. It’s within ten miles of Feathercote—the Parker estate in Hampshire—you know. Sir Thomas was a lad of eighteen at the time the reconstruction was started—and, during his vacations, he rode all over the place with his father. Had a taste for engineering even then—and was permitted to superintend bits of the minor construction work occasionally. I fancy he must have preserved every plan his father drew—because the War Office is finding his knowledge of Aldershot and other military camps valuable even now, and he frequently runs over to Feathercote for the purpose of consulting old drawings on file there.”
“Do you know whether duplicates of those drawings were preserved in the War Office?”
“Never had occasion to look up anything of the sort—but, unquestionably, there must have been.”
“Do you suppose Kitchener has men in his department who would be able to put their hands on those Aldershot drawings within half an hour or so?”
“I fancy there’ll be no doubt of that. I’ll have them put me on to him, and ask to have the papers sent here at once, if you think they’ll be of use to us.” (The telephoning was a matter of but a few moments—War Office calls having right of way.)
“Well—go on with the Colonel’s history. We’ve not finished with that, yet. When a man of forty-three has as young and pretty a wife as Lady Blanche, quite devoted to him, why does he kiss pretty chambermaids in a hotel, if he’s presumably sober?”
“Eh? My word! Been up to that sort of thing, has he? Er—just casually, as anyone might, or is he taking her on for a continuous performance?”
“Well—I fancy he’s had her out to dinner and the theatre more than once.”
“Humph! Must be a cut above the ord’n’ry hotel maid! Is she pretty? Good taste in clothes?”
“Quite! She’s a Wilhelmstrasse woman, Ned. What I’m trying to get at is her chance of pumping him for anything he may know.”
“Why—h-m-m-m! Might be a bit serious if there were anything in his head that Wilhelmstrasse desired to know! For at least five or six generations the men of his family have been unable to resist a pretty woman. His great-grandfather jilted an English lady to run off with the princess of a small German State. Their marriage was never recognized, and he was killed in a duel with her cousin. His grandfather married a baroness—lovely woman, four beautiful children—and lived openly with a well-known prima donna in Paris. His father had various affaires in different parts of the world—wherever the War Office sent him on engineering work. They’ve all been quite open about it, don’t you know—never seem to realize that what they do is anything more than a peccadillo which anyone of taste should ignore. They’ve all been fond of their wives and families, too—but there’s something in the blood which catches fire at the glimpse of a pretty face or ankle. The trait is not uncommon. There’s many a prominent and respectable man in London who has it.
“The principal thing which int’rests me in this affair of Sir Thomas’s is what the little baggage may get out of him—and from the information at our disposal, I can think of practically nothing! The Colonel has no knowledge of where troops are going when they leave Aldershot. His work deals with barrack-construction—seeing that the various units are quartered to advantage for prompt assembling and departure when the orders come—sanitary matters—that sort of thing. He’s not in position to know anything about munition-supply, new guns, new aeroplanes, or anything like that. Of course, he must have some knowledge that Germany would like to obtain, but it’s second-hand when it comes to him; he’s not the man from whom they’d attempt to get it. (Ah, here comes Leftenant Graham, from the War Office, with a bundle of papers—the Aldershot drawings, no doubt.) I say, Nan—you’d best disappear until I’ve sent him off again, don’t you know! The Condesa de la Montaneta isn’t supposed to be int’rested in anything of this sort—and I fancy you’ve no intention of discarding your make-up at present.”
* * *
—
When the lieutenant had delivered the Aldershot drawings to Sir Edward and had left the house, Lady Nan—still with the black hair, darker complexion, and fuller figure of the Condesa—returned to the library, and they sat down to a study of the various plans in detail. The earlier sketches appeared to have been submitted to the War Office for a reconstruction of Aldershot Camp prior to those adopted during the administration of Secretary Stanhope in 1890. These were followed by the tentative plans subsequently approved, in part—including the replacing of the old wooden huts of the Crimean period by substantial brick and stone barracks. Considerable attention appeared to have been given the question of water supply—a number of drawings illustrating plans for bringing pure drinking water from streams or ponds at considerable distance. The system eventually carried out was found in its proper place, and was shown as completed in a survey made of the district in 1898—evidently a tracing from General Parker’s original. It was Lady Nan who presently discovered upon this old survey of the General’s some dotted lines which represented a four-foot main of cast-iron piping—not connected with the system which had been adopted, but leading off north-westward from a point near Fleet Pond, and terminating in the woods of Bramshill Common eight miles away. An asterisk called her attention to a note upon the margin of the tracing, in writing so fine and faded with age that she used a magnifying glass to read it.
Dotted lines represent section of four-foot water main laid underground at time the work was abandoned. Part of Sir John Folkham’s plan in 1884 for bringing water from River Kennet, six miles S. W. of Reading. Was to have been emergency supply—location of line known only to Engineer Corps, in whose charge pumping station was to have been maintained. Plan was approved by Her Majesty, the Queen—but after ten months’ work it was decided by War Office that artesian wells could be sunk, if necessary, at far less expense.
* * *
—
For several moments Lady Nan studied the dotted lines on the tracing, noting the location of turnpikes and other roads which crossed them between Aldershot and the spot where they terminated. Then she took from one of the library files a section of Bartholomew’s half-inch-to-the-mile topographic map covering Berkshire, with the borders of Hampshire and Surrey.
“Ned, this is what Wilhelmstrasse is after—the original of this tracing! They want to know the exact survey-line of that old, long-forgotten water main. It must be there, just as it was laid down over thirty years ago. Probably a good deal eaten with rust, and yet, with neither water nor fresh air in it for all that time, there wouldn’t be so much oxidization, after all. Now, what possible use could any German spy in England make of that water main? The Aldershot end of it is at the extreme westerly edge of the camp. Even if they had men enough in Berkshire, they couldn’t get them crawling through that pipe fast enough to surprise the troops now camped around Aldershot; we must have over two hundred thousand there at this moment. My word! That’s a lot of men, isn’t it—for one instruction camp!
“Do you suppose that’s the idea working in the German mind—a force of nearly a quarter of a million picked troops bunched within a limited radius? Couldn’t have anything to do with a zeppelin attack, could it, Ned? I say! We’re getting warm, don’t you think? And we’ve spent all the time we need to on these drawings. The location of that old water main is undoubtedly what they’re trying to get out of Sir Thomas—and that pretty little devil Betty will somehow manage it before she’s through with him. Hmph! I shall have to take a hand in this—there’s not a moment to lose! Is Achmet out there with my car? Let me lock this tracing in George’s safety vault, down
underground, and you take the rest back to Kitchener with my best love and thanks for the loan of them….Oh, wait a moment! Perhaps I’d better keep one of those other drawings with this one—I think I can use it to advantage. Any one of the final plans will do!”
The Condesa knew that Sir Thomas’s duties would keep him at Aldershot most of the following afternoon. Starting at two o’clock, she motored the thirty-three miles in something over an hour—and was in the ladies’ room at the Officers’ Club, with the wife of a well-known general, when Sir Thomas came in for his tea before running up to town. As both were returning in time to dress for dinner at the Carlton, she invited him to accompany her—an opportunity which he accepted with every appearance of unexpected pleasure. The Colonel admired his wife’s distinguished friend extremely, but hadn’t dared, for obvious reason, to make any advances in the way of flirtation; so when she started in with him on a basis of friendly intimacy, he began to imagine himself a devil of a fellow with the women. By the time they reached town, the flirtation had progressed far enough for her to agree that she would accompany him, that evening, to a rather exclusive cabaret in the West End, patronized by well-known musicians and writers. She was the woman-of-the-world in every word and action—so brilliant in repartee that his duller wits found it difficult to keep pace with her. One of the handsomest women in London—alluring, provocative, and beginning to be a celebrity. He knew, the moment they entered the cabaret, that her presence with him added materially to his reputation. Under conditions of this sort his infatuation was a foregone conclusion.
Inside of a week it had reached a point where he scarcely looked up from his papers when Betty came into his suite at the Carlton—which provoked and alarmed that intriguing young person. Before the Condesa took a hand in the game, she had obtained a part of what she hoped to get from him, but it wasn’t enough for her purpose. Furthermore, she was in doubt as to where she stood with the Condesa—who certainly appeared to be interfering as far as Sir Thomas Parker was concerned. Bettina, however, gave no indication of having noticed this—until she went into the Condesa’s suite, one day, and was invited to sit down for a chat after the Moorish maids had been sent from the room.
“Betty—you remember the day you were interested in my papers, and spent a few uncomfortable hours being prodded by Ayesha’s knife?”
“Oh, yes, madame. I think your maid would have enjoyed killing me!”
“Had you made any resistance she most certainly would have killed you! That girl is worth her weight in kronen to anyone in our position! Well, you learned something about me which surprised you—even as we were surprised to know that you also were of Wilhelmstrasse. Since then we have ignored your connection with Berlin—and of course you’ve paid no further attention to me in that respect. Still, one cannot help noticing things which are apparent for anyone to see. I was in a theatre-box, one evening, when you sat in the stalls with Colonel Sir Thomas Parker. I could only guess at your object in cultivating him—until he began paying me very marked attentions. Then I heard all about his father’s connection with Aldershot, and knew that you must be working upon the plan which was under consideration several months ago. My own work has been in a different quarter altogether—in fact, I know nothing of the details which have been worked out in your affair. But an opportunity presented itself, unexpectedly, to pick up something which I am quite sure you can use to advantage. I didn’t dare keep it—so made a tracing upon strong parchment tissue, at a certain house where I was sure of being undisturbed, and put the original back where I found it.”
She drew from a drawer in her davenport a tracing of the old Folkham Water System, just as it had been drawn by General Parker in 1884, showing the dotted lines of the four-foot main, which had been partly laid down and then abandoned. Betty picked up a large reading glass and eagerly examined the drawing—going over it with an attention to detail which indicated considerable knowledge of engineering.
“It will be useful, madame, because the original—which we stole from a library drawer at Feathercote—Sir Thomas’s place in Hampshire—was accidentally destroyed. A draught blew it into a sea-coal fire at our rendezvous in Soho. I was hoping—really hoping—that you had managed by sheer luck to obtain a plan of the present tent-encampments on Laffan’s Plain and Farnborough Common—including the new barracks in the North and South Camps. That is the only thing we need to complete our preparations. The attempt should be made within a fortnight, because the number of troops now drilling there is larger than any future concentration is likely to be. The time to strike is now—as soon as we possibly can! The weather predictions are for a week or more of fog and rain—ideal conditions for the attempt!”
“You had already located the line of that four-foot main?”
“Six months ago! Our spies near Aldershot had talked with some of the older villagers west of the camp who remembered when the pipe was laid down, but couldn’t point out the exact line. It was that report which started the discussion in Berlin. We leased three old manor houses in different localities. Two are near Hartford Bridge, and the other is on the border of the woods north-east of Bramshill Park House. There are thirty-five acres belonging to this manor—almost entirely wooded. We made borings in several places, and had the luck to strike the main less than three hundred feet from the house. It was a simple matter to excavate a tunnel from the cellar to it, but it took us a month before we could locate the line as far as the woods of Blackbushes, and tap it for ventilation without being caught. Of course, the air in it would have killed anyone attempting to crawl through before that. By the end of the second month we had rigged a little track for a miniature car and cleaned out the entire length to the first section, north of Fleet Pond at Aldershot. Then we commenced tunnelling in two directions, one toward the North Camp and the other toward the South Camp, with provision for piping under the present tent-encampments on Laffan’s Plain, Farnborough Common, and Long Valley. That work has been completed. Our tunnels are twenty feet underground; we don’t dare go upward toward the surface until we know exactly where we can shove up the ends of two-inch pipes without detection.”
“You have your materials all assembled for the work—when the time comes?”
“Oh, yes, madame. We excavated a large chamber, underground, and brought in the machinery piece by piece. We run the place as a stock farm—breeding horses. The stables are fifteen hundred feet from the manor house, so that army officers who come to purchase mounts very rarely stop there. With nearly two hundred horses, mares, and foals, we use a great deal of hay and straw. All of our lime and acid—the glazed tiling for the storage tank and the conduit through the big water main—has been fetched to us inside great loads of hay and straw for the stables. It has been slow work, getting the amount we needed for the attempt, but it is amazing how much can be accumulated in six months. For the past fortnight we have been running eight air-compressors by small paraffin motors and storing the liquid chlorine in an airtight, porcelain-lined reservoir adjoining that underground chamber. The manor house stands upon high ground, and the big water main was laid twenty-five feet below the surface at that point—so the liquid chlorine will run down into, and along it, by gravity. The end section of the main at Aldershot is a hundred feet lower than that at Bramshill Park, and we have laid a porcelain-lined conduit through it for the entire distance, to carry the stuff. From the end of that conduit we will connect two-inch cast-iron pipes and shove them a few inches above the ground in spots among the tents and barracks where they will not be noticed—admitting the chlorine to them through a heavy gate-valve at the proper moment.”
“You speak as though you had seen all these preparations yourself, Bettina!”
“I have, madame. It was necessary for me to know exactly what papers and drawings we required. Of course, if we cannot obtain the plan of the tent-encampments, we must take our chances in coming up to the surface at spots determined by an underground survey�
�but that greatly increases the risk.”
“Suppose I succeed in obtaining that plan for you? I wonder if it would be safe for me to fetch it down to that manor house? Do you raise thoroughbreds at that stock farm? I ride in the Park every morning. That would be a perfectly reasonable excuse for motoring down there.”
“Oh, yes, Madame—and Franz Schufeldt would feel much honored if you would inspect his work. One never knows whether he will succeed or fail in an attempt like this, but it helps his standing in Wilhelmstrasse if it is known that he performed his part of the work faithfully. It would please us much, madame, if you would inspect the work and report it in Berlin.”
“The only point to be considered is whether by any chance my visit to that manor house might be remembered afterward, and arouse suspicion? We couldn’t afford that—because my work is even more important than yours.”
“We have sold horses to several of the aristocracy, madame—besides the army. You would be safe enough at the stables. And Franz could offer you tea at the manor house.”
* * *
—
Three days later the Condesa motored down to Hampshire and had little difficulty in locating the Bramshill Stock Farm owned by Mr. Frank Sheffield—a genial, fox-hunting county squire whom nobody would have thought of being other than a roast-beef Englishman. After purchasing a beautiful chestnut mare for saddle use she accepted his courteous suggestion of tea, and gave him a lift in her car to the manor house. When secure from observation in his study she handed him a flat parcel which she had been carrying in her muff. When he unfolded this upon his desk it proved to be a tracing of the plan, less than ten months old, upon which the tent-encampments and new permanent barracks had been laid out—in fact, a detailed survey of everything in the Aldershot district, with smaller sheets of each camp.
The Big Book of Espionage Page 26
