Chapter Seventeen.The Super-Spy.Dawn was breaking, chill and stormy, over the grey North Sea.On the far, misty horizon showed four little puffs of black smoke at regular intervals upon the sky-line—four British destroyers steaming on patrol duty.Beyond, as Lewin Rodwell approached Tom Small’s cottage, he also distinguished two trawlers moving towards the left, off Sutton-on-Sea, engaged in the perilous work of mine-sweeping.Rodwell, wearing a thick and somewhat shabby overcoat, and a golf-cap pulled well down, had trudged across from those branch roads where Penney had dropped him after his night run of nearly a hundred and sixty miles. He was tired, yet he plodded forward through the mud, for the little low-built old tarred cottage was at last in sight.“If we can get those troop-ships it will be a grandcoupfor us. Molly is quite right,” he exclaimed to himself in German. “From Norddeich they can wireless away to Pola, on the Adriatic, and the Austrian submarines can go out to meet them in the Mediterranean—providing we have no undersea boats there just now.”Old Tom Small was outside his door mending a net when Rodwell approached.“Hulloa, Tom!” cried the visitor cheerily. “Didn’t expect me—eh?”“No, sir,” grinned the bronzed, wrinkle-faced old fellow in the tanned smock—tanned in the same tub as his lines and nets. “This is unusual for you to come ’ere at this ’our—isn’t it?”“Yes. I’ve just come from London,” he explained, as he entered the little sitting-room, which smelt so strongly of stale fish and rank tobacco. “Where’s Ted?”“’E’s gone along to Skegness to get me some tackle. ’E only started ’arf an ’our ago.”“Well,” asked Rodwell, throwing off his coat and cap, and flinging himself upon the old wooden armchair. “Anything happened since I was here last week?”“Not much—only that there Judd, the coastguard from Chapel Point, seems to be always a passin’ or comin’ in to smoke—as though he suspects summat.”“Ah! you’re getting nervy again, Tom, I see,” laughed Rodwell. “What the dickens can he suspect if he doesn’t see me, and you and Ted are both discreet and keep still tongues! Why, there’s no more respectable fisherman along the whole coast here than Tom Small,” he added.“Well, sir,” replied the old fellow, “I’ve tried to keep respectable always, till now. And I wouldn’t ha’ done this dirty work—no, not for a fortune, had I known what was intended.”“No, I don’t really suppose you would,” remarked Rodwell with quiet sarcasm. “But, having begun, you’ve got to go on—or else be shot, both of you, as traitors to your country. Nevertheless, don’t let’s discuss that: it serves no purpose. I must get to work. Is the line all in order?”“Yes, sir,” was the reply. “I tested just before six—as soon as I got up. Mr Stendel is on duty on the other side. He asked Ted if we’d seen you lately, and ’e told ’im you ’adn’t been down this week.”“Did he want to speak to me?”“Yes, sir. I think ’e did.”Old Small did not know the Morse code, except the testing signals, but young Ted had, before the war, been sent for a course to a wireless and cable-school in Glasgow, on the pretext that he wanted to act as wireless operator on board a Grimsby trawler. Therefore Ted always transmitted and received messages.When they wanted to speak urgently from Wangeroog, the German operator rang up Ted and informed him. Then Ted would walk into Huttoft, Alford, Chapel St. Leonard’s, or one or other of the neighbouring villages where there was a telegraph-office, and despatch a perfectly innocent-looking message addressed to either the chauffeur Penney, or to Mrs Kirby, such as “Received your letter—Small,” “My daughter left yesterday—Small,” “Thanks, am writing—Ted,” or “Will send fish to-morrow—T. Small.” The wording of the message did not matter in the least; as long as Rodwell received the name “Tom,” “Ted,” or “Small,” he knew that he was wanted at the end of the secret cable.The gentleman from London passed into the stuffy little bedroom, drew aside the old damask curtain and took off the top of the big tailors’ sewing-machine displaying the instruments beneath. Through the little window the grey, dispiriting light grew brighter as the dawn spread. The tide was out, and there was very little wind. The sea lay unusually calm in the morning mist. In the air was a salt smell of seaweed, and when he seated himself upon the old rush chair he could hear the low, monotonous lapping of the waves up and down the beach. That February morning was raw and chill upon the bleak, open coast of Lincolnshire, and while old Tom bustled about to get “Muster Rodwell” a slice of cooked bacon, the spy of the “All Highest of Germany” busied himself in looking through the intricate-looking array of cable instruments, the hidden batteries of which he had recharged a week ago, spending a whole night there working in his shirt-sleeves and perspiring freely.Presently, settling himself down to his work, he touched the ebonite tapping-key and in dot-and-dash he sent under the sea the letters “M.X.Q.Q.,” the German war-code for “Are you ready to receive message?” Thrice he despatched the letters, and then awaited the answering click.There was no response.“Stendel is always so slow!” he growled to himself. Already the appetising smell of frying bacon had greeted his nostrils. Old Tom’s daughter was away. Indeed, he kept her away as much as possible, as Mr Rodwell had no desire to have women “poking their noses into things that did not concern them”—as he once remarked.Thrice again did the man at the end of that unsuspected cable tap out those four code-letters.At last, however, came the answering sound upon the receiver.“B.S.Q.—B.S.Q.,” came up rapidly from the depths of the sea. “Who are you?” Wangeroog was asking.“Rodwell is here,” tapped out the spy. “Is Stendel there?”In a moment came the answer.“Yes. Stendel is speaking. I have a message for you.”“Mine is most urgent. Please put me through at once to J.A.J.70.”“Your signals are good. Cuxhaven is engaged with Copenhagen. Wait, and I will put you through. While waiting will you take my message?”“S.S.,” answered Rodwell, which meant, “All right. I understand.” Then he added “O.O.,” by which the German operator on the island of Wangeroog knew that he was to proceed.After a few seconds’ pause the recorder began to click, and upon its green receiving “tape” there came out the following:“J. Number 6834115. Berlin, February 21st, 1915.“Ueber die zustaende1828, 59361sind folgende Nachrichten0083joasckcumf2122: 298511, 3826, 3278: 2564: 8392schmutzig: 6111:sparsam: dannen: schiene: 2568,tbsxic zerreiben. 3286zeilverlust.”Slowly it came out accurately registered on the long green paper ribbon, which, when it stopped, Rodwell tore off and carefully rolled up in order to decipher it at his leisure by aid of his little cipher-book.Then, after a brief pause, he placed his fingers upon the key and, with an expert touch, inquired if he were yet through to Number Seventy Berlin?The answer came in the affirmative.A few moments later he tapped out the letters G.S.F.A.—the code pass-word which automatically by the calendar was so often changed. He received the answer G.L.G.S. Then, according to rule, he gave his own registered number—that of “0740.” Every spy of Germany is registered by number in the department presided over by Dr Steinhauer.Fully five minutes elapsed before he received the permission to proceed.Then, finding himself in direct communication with the headquarters of the Imperial Secret Service, that argus-eyed bureau known as “Number 70 Berlin,” he began his report with the usual preamble, as follows:“On Imperial War Service. Most Urgent. Naval. From 0740, to Berlin 70. Transmitted Personally. February 22nd, 1915.“Source of information G.27, British Admiralty. American linersEllenboroughandDesboroughleave Plymouth to-day with drafts for Alexandria. Four troop-ships also leave Plymouth for Dardanelles on Friday next, and three leave Southampton to-day. Names of latter areCardigan,Lamberhead, andTurleigh. All are escorted to Gibraltar, but not farther. In future all drafts for Mediterranean ports embark at Plymouth. Suggest Pola be informed by wireless, if none of our submarines are in Mediterranean. Are there any? Await reply. Burchardt Number 6503 left for Amsterdam with important information last night. Grossman 3684 was arrested in Hartlepool yesterday. Nothing found upon him. Will probably be released. Expecting visit of B— shortly. Tell him to call in secret upon 0740 in London. End of message.”Then he sat back and waited for the reply to his inquiry regarding the submarines of the Fatherland. He knew that even at that early hour the great bureau in the Koeniger-gratzerstrasse, the eyes and ears of the German nation, was all agog, and that one of the sub-directors would certainly be on duty. They never failed to answer any question put to them.Old Small entered with the news that the bacon was ready, therefore he ordered it to be brought in, and as he sat at the table of the old sewing-machine awaiting the response, he ate the homely breakfast with a distinct relish. He did not notice the look of hatred in old Small’s eyes.Suddenly Stendel, on Wangeroog, asked if he had finished with Berlin, to which message he answered that he was waiting for a reply.“I have another message,” Stendel tapped out. “Will you take it?—very short.”“G.G.F.,” replied Rodwell, which in the war-code meant “Am ready to receive message.”Then came the following from beneath the cold waters which divided the two nations at war, a combination of German words and the numerical code—“J.S.F.: 26378:Möwe: (sea-gull) J.S.J.J:schimpflich(infamous) Ozstc: 32;Schandfleck(blot)tollkühn(foolhardy).”And it was followed by the affix of the sender, “10,111, and the wordzerren” (pull).Again Rodwell tore off the piece of pale green “tape” and placed it carefully in his pocket, in order to decode it later on.Then he leisurely finished his bacon and declared to Tom that he felt the better for it.“I ’ear as ’ow the pay-pers are a sayin’ that the German submarines are a torpedoin’ our ships ’olesale, sir,” remarked old Tom, when the recorder was silent again. “It’s a great shame, surely. That ain’t war—to kill women an’ children on board ship. Why, the most brutal of all foreigners in the world would go out and rescue women an’ children from a sinkin’ ship!”“It’s war, my dear man—war?” replied Rodwell. “You people, living on the shores of England, don’t yet know what war means. It means that, at all hazards and at all costs, you must vanquish your enemy. No kid-glove or polite speeches. The silly peace ideas of humanity, and all that rubbish, don’t count nowadays. The German super-man does not understand such silly manoeuvres when he is out to vanquish his enemy. Why, you and your daughter and Ted would be far better off under our own Kaiser than you are to-day, with all this shuttlecock policy of your out-of-date rule-of-thumb Government, and your strangulating taxation consequent upon it. Your English sovereign is only worth fifteen shillings to-day.”“Yes, but I don’t understand how it is that you German people have put us under your thumbs, as you have done.”“Merely because you British people are trustful fools,” laughed Rodwell merrily. “You never listened to Lord Roberts, a great soldier and strategist greater than any we have to-day in Germany. You all laughed at his warnings. And now you’ll have to laugh on the other side of your mouths. That’s the real, plain, brutal truth of it all. You can’t conceal it. If you English had taken the advice of your popular hero ‘Bobs,’ there would have been no war to-day. You would have been far too strong for our Fatherland.”“But why should we sacrifice our lives any further?” asked the toiler of the sea. “I’m sick and tired of the whole affair, as I said to Ted only this morning.”“I quite appreciate that,” was Rodwell’s reply. “But—”A click sounded upon the instrument, and Rodwell, breaking off, bent eagerly to read the tape.The words, in German, which came out upon it were: “Reply to 0740. Eight undersea boats are in Mediterranean. Message will be sent by wireless to Trieste and Pola for re-transmission. Any report from 6839? Await reply.”Rodwell hesitated. The number quoted was that of his friend Mrs Kirby.In a few moments he tapped out the reply.“Number 6839 is in close touch with Minister, as reported by me a week ago. She will make cable report as soon as accurate information can be obtained. Our activity on the Clyde is progressing. The engineers are out and other branches of labour are threatening to strike. Unrest also in South Wales. Good work in progress there.”Then, for some minutes, the instruments were silent, and he watched the receiver intently.At last it again clicked, and the green tape once more began to unwind.“To 0740.—From O. Meiszner—Headquarters Imperial Intelligence Staff. Order 0213 to do utmost possible with Clyde workers. Information will reach him from Holland by Route Number 6 regarding South Wales and dockers. Report all movements of troops to Dardanelles, also movements from Aldershot to Flanders. Nothing from 0802 at Portsmouth. Please inquire reason and reply: urgent. Are you on good terms with G.27 British Admiralty? Reply.”The number “G.27” meant Charles Trustram, for as such he had been reported by Rodwell, and duly registered in thedossiersof the great spy-bureau in Berlin.“Yes. On excellent terms with G.27. But he is not yet indebted to us,” he replied, swiftly tapping the instrument.“He should be. Please see to it. His information is always good, and may be as extremely useful as that regarding the plot to entrap our Navy. I am sending Number 0324 to you as an American citizen. He bears urgent instructions, and is travelling via New York, and due in Liverpool about March 10th. He will report personally on arrival in London. End of message.”“SS.” were the letters tapped out—three dots, succeeded by three more dots—and by it Dr Otto Meiszner, seated at the headquarters of German espionage in Berlin, knew that his friend had received and understood what he had transmitted from the heart of the Fatherland.Rodwell, having replaced the cover over the instruments, lay back for a moment to think.He knew that ere long the unseen rays of wireless would flash in code the news from Hanover away across Europe, to the Austrian station at Pola, on the Adriatic, reporting the departure of those troop-ships, which, after passing through the Straits of Gibraltar, would be at the mercy of the German submarines lurking in readiness in the Mediterranean.Upon his hard mouth was an evil grin, as he rose, pushed the old chair aside and, striding into the adjoining room, joined the weatherbeaten old fisherman—the man who was held so dumb and powerless in the far-reaching tentacles of that terrible Teuton octopus, that was slowly, but surely, strangling all civilisation.
Dawn was breaking, chill and stormy, over the grey North Sea.
On the far, misty horizon showed four little puffs of black smoke at regular intervals upon the sky-line—four British destroyers steaming on patrol duty.
Beyond, as Lewin Rodwell approached Tom Small’s cottage, he also distinguished two trawlers moving towards the left, off Sutton-on-Sea, engaged in the perilous work of mine-sweeping.
Rodwell, wearing a thick and somewhat shabby overcoat, and a golf-cap pulled well down, had trudged across from those branch roads where Penney had dropped him after his night run of nearly a hundred and sixty miles. He was tired, yet he plodded forward through the mud, for the little low-built old tarred cottage was at last in sight.
“If we can get those troop-ships it will be a grandcoupfor us. Molly is quite right,” he exclaimed to himself in German. “From Norddeich they can wireless away to Pola, on the Adriatic, and the Austrian submarines can go out to meet them in the Mediterranean—providing we have no undersea boats there just now.”
Old Tom Small was outside his door mending a net when Rodwell approached.
“Hulloa, Tom!” cried the visitor cheerily. “Didn’t expect me—eh?”
“No, sir,” grinned the bronzed, wrinkle-faced old fellow in the tanned smock—tanned in the same tub as his lines and nets. “This is unusual for you to come ’ere at this ’our—isn’t it?”
“Yes. I’ve just come from London,” he explained, as he entered the little sitting-room, which smelt so strongly of stale fish and rank tobacco. “Where’s Ted?”
“’E’s gone along to Skegness to get me some tackle. ’E only started ’arf an ’our ago.”
“Well,” asked Rodwell, throwing off his coat and cap, and flinging himself upon the old wooden armchair. “Anything happened since I was here last week?”
“Not much—only that there Judd, the coastguard from Chapel Point, seems to be always a passin’ or comin’ in to smoke—as though he suspects summat.”
“Ah! you’re getting nervy again, Tom, I see,” laughed Rodwell. “What the dickens can he suspect if he doesn’t see me, and you and Ted are both discreet and keep still tongues! Why, there’s no more respectable fisherman along the whole coast here than Tom Small,” he added.
“Well, sir,” replied the old fellow, “I’ve tried to keep respectable always, till now. And I wouldn’t ha’ done this dirty work—no, not for a fortune, had I known what was intended.”
“No, I don’t really suppose you would,” remarked Rodwell with quiet sarcasm. “But, having begun, you’ve got to go on—or else be shot, both of you, as traitors to your country. Nevertheless, don’t let’s discuss that: it serves no purpose. I must get to work. Is the line all in order?”
“Yes, sir,” was the reply. “I tested just before six—as soon as I got up. Mr Stendel is on duty on the other side. He asked Ted if we’d seen you lately, and ’e told ’im you ’adn’t been down this week.”
“Did he want to speak to me?”
“Yes, sir. I think ’e did.”
Old Small did not know the Morse code, except the testing signals, but young Ted had, before the war, been sent for a course to a wireless and cable-school in Glasgow, on the pretext that he wanted to act as wireless operator on board a Grimsby trawler. Therefore Ted always transmitted and received messages.
When they wanted to speak urgently from Wangeroog, the German operator rang up Ted and informed him. Then Ted would walk into Huttoft, Alford, Chapel St. Leonard’s, or one or other of the neighbouring villages where there was a telegraph-office, and despatch a perfectly innocent-looking message addressed to either the chauffeur Penney, or to Mrs Kirby, such as “Received your letter—Small,” “My daughter left yesterday—Small,” “Thanks, am writing—Ted,” or “Will send fish to-morrow—T. Small.” The wording of the message did not matter in the least; as long as Rodwell received the name “Tom,” “Ted,” or “Small,” he knew that he was wanted at the end of the secret cable.
The gentleman from London passed into the stuffy little bedroom, drew aside the old damask curtain and took off the top of the big tailors’ sewing-machine displaying the instruments beneath. Through the little window the grey, dispiriting light grew brighter as the dawn spread. The tide was out, and there was very little wind. The sea lay unusually calm in the morning mist. In the air was a salt smell of seaweed, and when he seated himself upon the old rush chair he could hear the low, monotonous lapping of the waves up and down the beach. That February morning was raw and chill upon the bleak, open coast of Lincolnshire, and while old Tom bustled about to get “Muster Rodwell” a slice of cooked bacon, the spy of the “All Highest of Germany” busied himself in looking through the intricate-looking array of cable instruments, the hidden batteries of which he had recharged a week ago, spending a whole night there working in his shirt-sleeves and perspiring freely.
Presently, settling himself down to his work, he touched the ebonite tapping-key and in dot-and-dash he sent under the sea the letters “M.X.Q.Q.,” the German war-code for “Are you ready to receive message?” Thrice he despatched the letters, and then awaited the answering click.
There was no response.
“Stendel is always so slow!” he growled to himself. Already the appetising smell of frying bacon had greeted his nostrils. Old Tom’s daughter was away. Indeed, he kept her away as much as possible, as Mr Rodwell had no desire to have women “poking their noses into things that did not concern them”—as he once remarked.
Thrice again did the man at the end of that unsuspected cable tap out those four code-letters.
At last, however, came the answering sound upon the receiver.
“B.S.Q.—B.S.Q.,” came up rapidly from the depths of the sea. “Who are you?” Wangeroog was asking.
“Rodwell is here,” tapped out the spy. “Is Stendel there?”
In a moment came the answer.
“Yes. Stendel is speaking. I have a message for you.”
“Mine is most urgent. Please put me through at once to J.A.J.70.”
“Your signals are good. Cuxhaven is engaged with Copenhagen. Wait, and I will put you through. While waiting will you take my message?”
“S.S.,” answered Rodwell, which meant, “All right. I understand.” Then he added “O.O.,” by which the German operator on the island of Wangeroog knew that he was to proceed.
After a few seconds’ pause the recorder began to click, and upon its green receiving “tape” there came out the following:
“J. Number 6834115. Berlin, February 21st, 1915.“Ueber die zustaende1828, 59361sind folgende Nachrichten0083joasckcumf2122: 298511, 3826, 3278: 2564: 8392schmutzig: 6111:sparsam: dannen: schiene: 2568,tbsxic zerreiben. 3286zeilverlust.”
“J. Number 6834115. Berlin, February 21st, 1915.
“Ueber die zustaende1828, 59361sind folgende Nachrichten0083joasckcumf2122: 298511, 3826, 3278: 2564: 8392schmutzig: 6111:sparsam: dannen: schiene: 2568,tbsxic zerreiben. 3286zeilverlust.”
Slowly it came out accurately registered on the long green paper ribbon, which, when it stopped, Rodwell tore off and carefully rolled up in order to decipher it at his leisure by aid of his little cipher-book.
Then, after a brief pause, he placed his fingers upon the key and, with an expert touch, inquired if he were yet through to Number Seventy Berlin?
The answer came in the affirmative.
A few moments later he tapped out the letters G.S.F.A.—the code pass-word which automatically by the calendar was so often changed. He received the answer G.L.G.S. Then, according to rule, he gave his own registered number—that of “0740.” Every spy of Germany is registered by number in the department presided over by Dr Steinhauer.
Fully five minutes elapsed before he received the permission to proceed.
Then, finding himself in direct communication with the headquarters of the Imperial Secret Service, that argus-eyed bureau known as “Number 70 Berlin,” he began his report with the usual preamble, as follows:
“On Imperial War Service. Most Urgent. Naval. From 0740, to Berlin 70. Transmitted Personally. February 22nd, 1915.“Source of information G.27, British Admiralty. American linersEllenboroughandDesboroughleave Plymouth to-day with drafts for Alexandria. Four troop-ships also leave Plymouth for Dardanelles on Friday next, and three leave Southampton to-day. Names of latter areCardigan,Lamberhead, andTurleigh. All are escorted to Gibraltar, but not farther. In future all drafts for Mediterranean ports embark at Plymouth. Suggest Pola be informed by wireless, if none of our submarines are in Mediterranean. Are there any? Await reply. Burchardt Number 6503 left for Amsterdam with important information last night. Grossman 3684 was arrested in Hartlepool yesterday. Nothing found upon him. Will probably be released. Expecting visit of B— shortly. Tell him to call in secret upon 0740 in London. End of message.”
“On Imperial War Service. Most Urgent. Naval. From 0740, to Berlin 70. Transmitted Personally. February 22nd, 1915.
“Source of information G.27, British Admiralty. American linersEllenboroughandDesboroughleave Plymouth to-day with drafts for Alexandria. Four troop-ships also leave Plymouth for Dardanelles on Friday next, and three leave Southampton to-day. Names of latter areCardigan,Lamberhead, andTurleigh. All are escorted to Gibraltar, but not farther. In future all drafts for Mediterranean ports embark at Plymouth. Suggest Pola be informed by wireless, if none of our submarines are in Mediterranean. Are there any? Await reply. Burchardt Number 6503 left for Amsterdam with important information last night. Grossman 3684 was arrested in Hartlepool yesterday. Nothing found upon him. Will probably be released. Expecting visit of B— shortly. Tell him to call in secret upon 0740 in London. End of message.”
Then he sat back and waited for the reply to his inquiry regarding the submarines of the Fatherland. He knew that even at that early hour the great bureau in the Koeniger-gratzerstrasse, the eyes and ears of the German nation, was all agog, and that one of the sub-directors would certainly be on duty. They never failed to answer any question put to them.
Old Small entered with the news that the bacon was ready, therefore he ordered it to be brought in, and as he sat at the table of the old sewing-machine awaiting the response, he ate the homely breakfast with a distinct relish. He did not notice the look of hatred in old Small’s eyes.
Suddenly Stendel, on Wangeroog, asked if he had finished with Berlin, to which message he answered that he was waiting for a reply.
“I have another message,” Stendel tapped out. “Will you take it?—very short.”
“G.G.F.,” replied Rodwell, which in the war-code meant “Am ready to receive message.”
Then came the following from beneath the cold waters which divided the two nations at war, a combination of German words and the numerical code—
“J.S.F.: 26378:Möwe: (sea-gull) J.S.J.J:schimpflich(infamous) Ozstc: 32;Schandfleck(blot)tollkühn(foolhardy).”
“J.S.F.: 26378:Möwe: (sea-gull) J.S.J.J:schimpflich(infamous) Ozstc: 32;Schandfleck(blot)tollkühn(foolhardy).”
And it was followed by the affix of the sender, “10,111, and the wordzerren” (pull).
Again Rodwell tore off the piece of pale green “tape” and placed it carefully in his pocket, in order to decode it later on.
Then he leisurely finished his bacon and declared to Tom that he felt the better for it.
“I ’ear as ’ow the pay-pers are a sayin’ that the German submarines are a torpedoin’ our ships ’olesale, sir,” remarked old Tom, when the recorder was silent again. “It’s a great shame, surely. That ain’t war—to kill women an’ children on board ship. Why, the most brutal of all foreigners in the world would go out and rescue women an’ children from a sinkin’ ship!”
“It’s war, my dear man—war?” replied Rodwell. “You people, living on the shores of England, don’t yet know what war means. It means that, at all hazards and at all costs, you must vanquish your enemy. No kid-glove or polite speeches. The silly peace ideas of humanity, and all that rubbish, don’t count nowadays. The German super-man does not understand such silly manoeuvres when he is out to vanquish his enemy. Why, you and your daughter and Ted would be far better off under our own Kaiser than you are to-day, with all this shuttlecock policy of your out-of-date rule-of-thumb Government, and your strangulating taxation consequent upon it. Your English sovereign is only worth fifteen shillings to-day.”
“Yes, but I don’t understand how it is that you German people have put us under your thumbs, as you have done.”
“Merely because you British people are trustful fools,” laughed Rodwell merrily. “You never listened to Lord Roberts, a great soldier and strategist greater than any we have to-day in Germany. You all laughed at his warnings. And now you’ll have to laugh on the other side of your mouths. That’s the real, plain, brutal truth of it all. You can’t conceal it. If you English had taken the advice of your popular hero ‘Bobs,’ there would have been no war to-day. You would have been far too strong for our Fatherland.”
“But why should we sacrifice our lives any further?” asked the toiler of the sea. “I’m sick and tired of the whole affair, as I said to Ted only this morning.”
“I quite appreciate that,” was Rodwell’s reply. “But—”
A click sounded upon the instrument, and Rodwell, breaking off, bent eagerly to read the tape.
The words, in German, which came out upon it were: “Reply to 0740. Eight undersea boats are in Mediterranean. Message will be sent by wireless to Trieste and Pola for re-transmission. Any report from 6839? Await reply.”
Rodwell hesitated. The number quoted was that of his friend Mrs Kirby.
In a few moments he tapped out the reply.
“Number 6839 is in close touch with Minister, as reported by me a week ago. She will make cable report as soon as accurate information can be obtained. Our activity on the Clyde is progressing. The engineers are out and other branches of labour are threatening to strike. Unrest also in South Wales. Good work in progress there.”
Then, for some minutes, the instruments were silent, and he watched the receiver intently.
At last it again clicked, and the green tape once more began to unwind.
“To 0740.—From O. Meiszner—Headquarters Imperial Intelligence Staff. Order 0213 to do utmost possible with Clyde workers. Information will reach him from Holland by Route Number 6 regarding South Wales and dockers. Report all movements of troops to Dardanelles, also movements from Aldershot to Flanders. Nothing from 0802 at Portsmouth. Please inquire reason and reply: urgent. Are you on good terms with G.27 British Admiralty? Reply.”
“To 0740.—From O. Meiszner—Headquarters Imperial Intelligence Staff. Order 0213 to do utmost possible with Clyde workers. Information will reach him from Holland by Route Number 6 regarding South Wales and dockers. Report all movements of troops to Dardanelles, also movements from Aldershot to Flanders. Nothing from 0802 at Portsmouth. Please inquire reason and reply: urgent. Are you on good terms with G.27 British Admiralty? Reply.”
The number “G.27” meant Charles Trustram, for as such he had been reported by Rodwell, and duly registered in thedossiersof the great spy-bureau in Berlin.
“Yes. On excellent terms with G.27. But he is not yet indebted to us,” he replied, swiftly tapping the instrument.
“He should be. Please see to it. His information is always good, and may be as extremely useful as that regarding the plot to entrap our Navy. I am sending Number 0324 to you as an American citizen. He bears urgent instructions, and is travelling via New York, and due in Liverpool about March 10th. He will report personally on arrival in London. End of message.”
“SS.” were the letters tapped out—three dots, succeeded by three more dots—and by it Dr Otto Meiszner, seated at the headquarters of German espionage in Berlin, knew that his friend had received and understood what he had transmitted from the heart of the Fatherland.
Rodwell, having replaced the cover over the instruments, lay back for a moment to think.
He knew that ere long the unseen rays of wireless would flash in code the news from Hanover away across Europe, to the Austrian station at Pola, on the Adriatic, reporting the departure of those troop-ships, which, after passing through the Straits of Gibraltar, would be at the mercy of the German submarines lurking in readiness in the Mediterranean.
Upon his hard mouth was an evil grin, as he rose, pushed the old chair aside and, striding into the adjoining room, joined the weatherbeaten old fisherman—the man who was held so dumb and powerless in the far-reaching tentacles of that terrible Teuton octopus, that was slowly, but surely, strangling all civilisation.
Chapter Eighteen.Tom Small Receives Visitors.The super-spy, having concluded his work, sat with the old fisherman beside the wood-fire in the little low-pitched living-room that smelt so strongly of fish and tar.Old Tom Small presented a picturesque figure in his long sea-boots, on which the salt stood in grey crystals, and his tanned blouse; for, only an hour ago, he had helped Ted to haul up the boat in which, on the previous night, they had been out baiting their crab-pots. Ruddy and cheery-looking, his grey hair was scanty on top, and his knotty hands, hardened by the sea, were brown and hairy. He was a fine specimen of the North Sea fishermen, and, being one of “nature’s gentlemen,” he was always polite to his visitor, though at heart he entertained the deepest and undying contempt for the man by whose craft and cunning the enemy were being kept informed of the movements of Britain’s defensive forces, both on land and at sea.Now that it was too late, he had at last awakened to the subtle manner in which he had been inveigled into the net so cleverly-spread to catch both his son and himself. Ted, his son, had been sent to the cable-school at Glasgow and there instructed, while, at the same time, he and his father had fallen into the moneylender’s spider-web, stretched purposely to entrap him.What could the old fellow do to extricate himself? He and Ted often, in the evening hours, before their fire, while the storm howled and tore about that lonely cottage on the beach, had discussed the situation. They had both, in their half-hearted way, sought to discover a means out of theimpasse. Yet with the threat of Rodwell—that they would both be prosecuted and shot as traitors—hanging over them, the result of their deliberation was always the same. They were compelled to remain silent, and to suffer.They cursed their visitor who came there so constantly and sent his mysterious messages under the sea. Yet they were compelled to accept the ten pounds a week which he paid them so regularly, with a frequent extra sovereign to the younger man. Both father and son hesitated about taking the tainted money. Yet they dared not raise a word of protest. Besides, in the event of an invasion by Germany, had not Rodwell promised that they should be protected, and receive ample reward for their services?Old Small and Rodwell were talking, the latter stretching forth his white hands towards the welcome warmth of the flaming logs.“You must continue to still keep your daughter Mary away from here, Tom,” the visitor was saying. “Send her anywhere you like. But I don’t want her prying about here just now. You understand! You’ve got a married daughter at Bristol, haven’t you?”“Yes, sir.”“Well, send her down there for a long stay. I’ll pay all expenses. So book the whole of it down to me. Here’s twenty pounds to go on with;” and, taking his banknote case from his pocket, he drew forth four five-pound notes.“Yes, sir; but she may think it funny—and—”“Funny!” cried his visitor. “Remember that you’re paid to see that she doesn’t think it funny. Have her back here, say next Tuesday, for a couple of days, and then send her off on a visit down to Bristol. You and Ted are able to rub along together very well without her.”“Well—we feels the miss o’ the girl,” replied the old fellow, who, though honest and loyal, had fallen hopelessly into the trap which German double-dealing had prepared for him.“Of course you do. I should—were I in your place,” was Rodwell’s response. “But the confidential business in which you and I are engaged just now is not one in which a woman has any concern. She’s out of place here; and, moreover, few women can keep a still tongue. Just reflect a moment. Suppose she told some friend of hers what was in progress under your roof? Well, the police would soon be out here to investigate, and you’d both find yourselves under arrest. No,” he added. “Keep your girl away from here—keep her away at all costs. That’s my advice.”“Very well, sir, I will,” replied the wrinkled old fellow, rubbing the knees of his stained trousers with his hands, and drawing at his rather foul pipe. “I quite see your point. I’ll get the girl away to Bristol this week.”“Oh! and there’s another thing. I’d better remain in here all day to-day, for I don’t want to be seen wandering about by anybody. They might suspect something. So if anyone happens to come in, mind they have no suspicion of my being here.”“All right, sir. Leave that to me.”“To-night, about ten or eleven, I’m expecting a lady down from London. She’s bringing me some important news. So you’d better get something or other for her to eat.”“A bit o’ nice fish, perhaps?” the old fellow suggested as a luxury.“Well—something that she can eat, you know.”“I’ll boil two or three nice fresh crabs. The lady may like ’em, if I dress ’em nice.”“Excellent!” laughed Rodwell. Truly his was a strange life. One day he ate a perfectly-cooked dinner in Bruton Street, and the next he enjoyed fat bacon cooked by a fisherman in his cottage.Old Tom, glancing through the window out upon the grey, misty sea, remarked:“Hulloa! There’s that patrol a-comin’ back. For two days they’ve been up and down from the Spurn to the Wash. Old Fred Turner, on theSeamew, what’s a minesweeper nowadays, hailed me last night when we were baitin’ our pots. He got three mines yesterday. Those devils have sown death haphazard!”“Devils!” echoed Rodwell, in a reproachful tone. “The Germans are only devils because we are out to win.”“I’m sorry, sir,” exclaimed the old fellow, biting his lip. “I didn’t think when I spoke.”“But, Tom, you should never speak before you think. It lands you into trouble always,” his visitor said severely.“Yes, I—But—I say—look!” cried the old man, starting forward, and craning his neck towards the window. “Why, if there ain’t that there Judd, the coastguard petty-officer from Chapel Point again! An’ he’s a-comin’ across ’ere too.”“I’ll get into the bedroom,” whispered Rodwell, rising instantly, and bending as he passed the window, so as not to be seen. “Get rid of him—get rid of him as soon as ever you can.”“’E’s got a gentleman with him,” old Tom added.“Don’t breathe a word that I’m here,” urged the spy, and then, slipping into the stuffy little bedroom, he closed the door and turned the key. Afterwards he stood listening eagerly for the arrival of the visitors.In a few moments there was a loud knocking on the tarred door, and, with a grunt, Tom rose to open it.“Hulloa, Tom!” cried the petty-officer of the coastguard cheerily. “’Morning! How are you?”“Oh! pretty nicely, Muster Judd—if it warn’t for my confounded rheumatics. An’ now, to cap it all, I’ve got my girl laid up ’ere very bad. She only got ’ome last night.”“Oh!” exclaimed Mr Judd. “But I thought you had a gentleman visitor this morning?”“Gentleman visitor? Yes. I’ve ’ad the doctor to my girl—a visitor I’ve got to pay—if that’s what you mean. She’s been awful bad all night, an’ Ted’s now gone into Skegness for some med’cine for ’er.”The man who accompanied the coastguard-officer remarked:“This is a lonely house of yours, Mr Small. A long way from the doctor—eh?”“It is, sir, an’ no mistake. We don’t see many people out ’ere, except Mr Judd, or Mr Bennett—or one o’ the men on patrol.”Then, being compelled to ask the pair inside, for it had started to rain heavily, Tom Small sat with them chatting, yet full of wonder why they had called at that early hour.The man in the next room stood breathless behind the door, listening to all their conversation. It was quite plain that he had been seen to enter there, whereupon the coastguard’s suspicions had been aroused. He scented considerable danger. Yet his adventurous spirit was such that he smiled amusedly at old Small’s story of his sick daughter, and of the visit of the doctor.Judd, seated in the chair which Rodwell had occupied until he had vacated it in alarm, suddenly turned to old Tom, and said:“This gentleman here is my superior officer, Tom, and he wants to ask you something, I think.”“Yes, sir, what is it?” asked the crafty old fisherman, turning to the man in plain clothes.“You had a visitor here last Thursday—a gentleman. Who was he?” asked the stranger suddenly.“Last Thursday,” repeated Small reflectively. “Now let me see. Who came ’ere last Thursday? Weren’t we both out fishin’? No,” he added: “I know! Yes, we did ’ave someone come—Mr Jennings, of course.”“And who is Mr Jennings?”“Why, ’e comes regularly from Lincoln for our insurances.”The petty-officer exchanged meaning glances with his superior, who then asked—“Aren’t you in the habit of receiving visits from a gentleman—somebody who’s been seen about here in a closed car, painted pale grey?”“No car ’as ever come ’ere, sir,” declared the old man blankly. “Folk in cars don’t come to visit people like Tom Small.”“And yet you are not quite so poorly off as you pretend to be, Mr Small,” remarked his questioner. “What about that nice little balance you have in the bank—eh?”“Well, I’ve earned it, therefore I don’t see why it should concern you,” protested the old fellow angrily.“Just now it does concern me,” was the other’s rather hard reply—words to which the man in the inner room listened with breathless concern.Was it possible that the existence of the secret cable was suspected? Had Tom, or his son, been indiscreet? No; he felt sure they had not. They had everything to lose by disclosing anything. And yet those two visitors were bent upon extracting some information from him. Of what nature he was not quite clear.An awful thought occurred to him that he had left his cap in the sitting-room, but, on glancing round, he was relieved to see that he had carried it into the bedroom when he had sat down at the instruments.What would those two men say, if they only knew that, within a few yards of them, was the end of a cable which ran direct to Berlin?While the rain continued pelting down for perhaps a quarter of an hour, the pair sat chatting with Small. It was evident that the naval officer was disappointed with the result of his visit, for the old fisherman answered quite frankly, and had given explanation of his two visitors which could not well be met with disbelief.“Are you gentlemen a-lookin’ for German spies, then?” asked old Small at last, as though sorely puzzled at the questions that had been put to him.“We’re always on the look out for those devil’s spawn,” answered Judd. “There was a Dutch trawler off here last night, and she wasn’t up to any good—I’m sure of that.”“Perhaps it’s the same craft as wor ’ere about a fortnight back. She flew the Dutch flag, but I believe she wor a waitin’ for a German submarine, in order to give ’er petrol. They were a talkin’ about ’er in the Anchor on Saturday night. Bill Chesney was out fishin’ an’ got right near ’er. I think one o’ the patrol boats ought to ha’ boarded ’er.”“She was seen off the Spurn, and was then flying the British flag,” remarked Judd’s superior officer.“Ah! There you are!” cried Small. “I was certain she was up to no good! Those Germans are up to every bit o’ craft and cunnin’. Did you gentlemen think that Mr Jennings, from Lincoln, was a German spy?” he asked naïvely.“No, not particularly,” replied his visitor. “Only when strangers come along here, in the prohibited area, we naturally like to know who and what they are.”“Quite so, sir. An’ if I see any stranger a-prowlin’ about ’ere in future, I won’t fail to let Mr Judd know of ’im.”“That’s right, Small,” was the officer’s response. “There are lots of rumours around the coast of our fishermen giving assistance to the enemy by supplying them with petrol and other things, but, as far as I can gather, such reports are disgraceful libels upon a very hardworking and deserving class. We know that some of them put down tackle in Torbay, and elsewhere, when they learn the fleet is coming in, so that they may obtain compensation for damage caused to their nets. But as to their loyalty, I don’t think anyone can challenge that.”“I ’ope not, sir,” was Small’s fervent reply. “There ain’t a fisherman along the whole coast o’ Lincolnshire who wouldn’t bear his part against the enemy, if he could—an’ bear it well, too.”The clean-shaven officer reflected for a few moments.“You’ve never, to your recollection, seen a pale grey closed-up car anywhere about here, have you?” he asked at last.“Never, sir.”“Quite sure?”“Positive, sir. The roads about ’ere are not made for cars,” was the old fellow’s reply. “I certainly did see a car one night, about six weeks ago. The man had lost his way an’ was driving straight down to the sea. He wanted to get to Cleethorpes. They were Navy men from the wireless station, I think.”The old man’s manner and speech had entirely disarmed suspicion, and presently the pair rose, and bidding him good-bye, and urging him to keep a sharp look-out for strangers, they left.The moment they were safely away, Rodwell emerged from the bedroom, and in a low, apprehensive voice, asked:“What does all this mean, Tom—eh?”“Don’t know, sir. That Judd’s been about here constantly of late. ’E’s up to no good, I’m sure. I’ve told you, weeks ago, that I didn’t like the look o’ things—an’ I don’t!”Rodwell saw that the old fellow was pale and alarmed. He had preserved an impenetrable mask before his two visitors, but now they had gone he was full of fear.Rodwell, as he stood in the low-pitched little room, recollected certain misgivings which Molly had uttered on the previous night, just before he had left Bruton Street. His first impulse now was to leave the house and slip away across the fen. Yet if he did somebody must certainly see him.“Shall you get off now, sir?” asked the old man suddenly.“Not till to-night,” was the other’s reply. “It would be a bit dangerous, so I must lay doggo here till dusk, and then escape.”“Do you think they really suspect us, sir?” asked the old fellow, in a voice which betrayed his fear.“No. So don’t alarm yourself in the least,” replied the gentleman from London. “I suppose I’ve been seen about, and my car has been noticed on the roads. There’s no danger, as long as I’m not seen again here for a bit. I’ll get through to Stendel, and let him know that I shan’t be back again for a fortnight or so.”“Yes; you must certainly keep away from ’ere,” Tom urged. “They’ll be a-watchin’ of us, no doubt.”“I’ve got a lady coming here, as I told you—Mrs Kirby, to whom you telegraph sometimes. She won’t get here till night, and I must wait for her. She’ll have some urgent information to send across to the other side. Penney will meet her in Lincoln, where she’ll arrive by train, and he’ll bring her on by car.”“You’d better keep to the bedroom,” urged the old man. “They might come back later on.”“Yes: I won’t be seen,” and returning to the stuffy little room, he reopened the cable instruments and soon got into communication with Stendel, in order to pass away the time which he knew must hang heavily upon his hands, for even then it was not yet nine o’clock in the morning.He sat smoking and gossiping with the old fisherman nearly all the day, impatient for the coming of darkness, for his imprisonment there was already becoming irksome.It grew dusk early when, about four o’clock, a footstep outside caused them both to start and listen. In answer to the summons at the door Tom went, and was handed a telegram by the boy messenger from Huttoft.Opening it, he found it had been despatched from London, and read:“Impossible to leave till to-morrow.—M.”He gave it to Rodwell, who at once saw that the woman he expected had been delayed. Probably she had not yet been able to gather that important information which was wanted so urgently in Berlin.The telegram puzzled him. Was it possible that the arrangements which he had made with such cunning and forethought, and had left to Molly to carry out, had broken down after all?Lewin Rodwell bit his lip, and wondered. He seemed that day beset by misfortune, for when at five o’clock, Ted having returned, he tested the cable as usual, a call came through from Berlin.Rodwell answered it, whereupon “Number 70” flashed the following message beneath the sea.“Your information of this morning regarding troop-ships leaving Plymouth for Dardanelles is incorrect.Desboroughwas torpedoed off Canary Islands on January 18th, andEllenboroughis in dry dock in Belfast. Source of your report evidently unreliable.”Rodwell read the words upon the long green tape as it slowly unwound, and sat staring at them like a man in a dream.
The super-spy, having concluded his work, sat with the old fisherman beside the wood-fire in the little low-pitched living-room that smelt so strongly of fish and tar.
Old Tom Small presented a picturesque figure in his long sea-boots, on which the salt stood in grey crystals, and his tanned blouse; for, only an hour ago, he had helped Ted to haul up the boat in which, on the previous night, they had been out baiting their crab-pots. Ruddy and cheery-looking, his grey hair was scanty on top, and his knotty hands, hardened by the sea, were brown and hairy. He was a fine specimen of the North Sea fishermen, and, being one of “nature’s gentlemen,” he was always polite to his visitor, though at heart he entertained the deepest and undying contempt for the man by whose craft and cunning the enemy were being kept informed of the movements of Britain’s defensive forces, both on land and at sea.
Now that it was too late, he had at last awakened to the subtle manner in which he had been inveigled into the net so cleverly-spread to catch both his son and himself. Ted, his son, had been sent to the cable-school at Glasgow and there instructed, while, at the same time, he and his father had fallen into the moneylender’s spider-web, stretched purposely to entrap him.
What could the old fellow do to extricate himself? He and Ted often, in the evening hours, before their fire, while the storm howled and tore about that lonely cottage on the beach, had discussed the situation. They had both, in their half-hearted way, sought to discover a means out of theimpasse. Yet with the threat of Rodwell—that they would both be prosecuted and shot as traitors—hanging over them, the result of their deliberation was always the same. They were compelled to remain silent, and to suffer.
They cursed their visitor who came there so constantly and sent his mysterious messages under the sea. Yet they were compelled to accept the ten pounds a week which he paid them so regularly, with a frequent extra sovereign to the younger man. Both father and son hesitated about taking the tainted money. Yet they dared not raise a word of protest. Besides, in the event of an invasion by Germany, had not Rodwell promised that they should be protected, and receive ample reward for their services?
Old Small and Rodwell were talking, the latter stretching forth his white hands towards the welcome warmth of the flaming logs.
“You must continue to still keep your daughter Mary away from here, Tom,” the visitor was saying. “Send her anywhere you like. But I don’t want her prying about here just now. You understand! You’ve got a married daughter at Bristol, haven’t you?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Well, send her down there for a long stay. I’ll pay all expenses. So book the whole of it down to me. Here’s twenty pounds to go on with;” and, taking his banknote case from his pocket, he drew forth four five-pound notes.
“Yes, sir; but she may think it funny—and—”
“Funny!” cried his visitor. “Remember that you’re paid to see that she doesn’t think it funny. Have her back here, say next Tuesday, for a couple of days, and then send her off on a visit down to Bristol. You and Ted are able to rub along together very well without her.”
“Well—we feels the miss o’ the girl,” replied the old fellow, who, though honest and loyal, had fallen hopelessly into the trap which German double-dealing had prepared for him.
“Of course you do. I should—were I in your place,” was Rodwell’s response. “But the confidential business in which you and I are engaged just now is not one in which a woman has any concern. She’s out of place here; and, moreover, few women can keep a still tongue. Just reflect a moment. Suppose she told some friend of hers what was in progress under your roof? Well, the police would soon be out here to investigate, and you’d both find yourselves under arrest. No,” he added. “Keep your girl away from here—keep her away at all costs. That’s my advice.”
“Very well, sir, I will,” replied the wrinkled old fellow, rubbing the knees of his stained trousers with his hands, and drawing at his rather foul pipe. “I quite see your point. I’ll get the girl away to Bristol this week.”
“Oh! and there’s another thing. I’d better remain in here all day to-day, for I don’t want to be seen wandering about by anybody. They might suspect something. So if anyone happens to come in, mind they have no suspicion of my being here.”
“All right, sir. Leave that to me.”
“To-night, about ten or eleven, I’m expecting a lady down from London. She’s bringing me some important news. So you’d better get something or other for her to eat.”
“A bit o’ nice fish, perhaps?” the old fellow suggested as a luxury.
“Well—something that she can eat, you know.”
“I’ll boil two or three nice fresh crabs. The lady may like ’em, if I dress ’em nice.”
“Excellent!” laughed Rodwell. Truly his was a strange life. One day he ate a perfectly-cooked dinner in Bruton Street, and the next he enjoyed fat bacon cooked by a fisherman in his cottage.
Old Tom, glancing through the window out upon the grey, misty sea, remarked:
“Hulloa! There’s that patrol a-comin’ back. For two days they’ve been up and down from the Spurn to the Wash. Old Fred Turner, on theSeamew, what’s a minesweeper nowadays, hailed me last night when we were baitin’ our pots. He got three mines yesterday. Those devils have sown death haphazard!”
“Devils!” echoed Rodwell, in a reproachful tone. “The Germans are only devils because we are out to win.”
“I’m sorry, sir,” exclaimed the old fellow, biting his lip. “I didn’t think when I spoke.”
“But, Tom, you should never speak before you think. It lands you into trouble always,” his visitor said severely.
“Yes, I—But—I say—look!” cried the old man, starting forward, and craning his neck towards the window. “Why, if there ain’t that there Judd, the coastguard petty-officer from Chapel Point again! An’ he’s a-comin’ across ’ere too.”
“I’ll get into the bedroom,” whispered Rodwell, rising instantly, and bending as he passed the window, so as not to be seen. “Get rid of him—get rid of him as soon as ever you can.”
“’E’s got a gentleman with him,” old Tom added.
“Don’t breathe a word that I’m here,” urged the spy, and then, slipping into the stuffy little bedroom, he closed the door and turned the key. Afterwards he stood listening eagerly for the arrival of the visitors.
In a few moments there was a loud knocking on the tarred door, and, with a grunt, Tom rose to open it.
“Hulloa, Tom!” cried the petty-officer of the coastguard cheerily. “’Morning! How are you?”
“Oh! pretty nicely, Muster Judd—if it warn’t for my confounded rheumatics. An’ now, to cap it all, I’ve got my girl laid up ’ere very bad. She only got ’ome last night.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Mr Judd. “But I thought you had a gentleman visitor this morning?”
“Gentleman visitor? Yes. I’ve ’ad the doctor to my girl—a visitor I’ve got to pay—if that’s what you mean. She’s been awful bad all night, an’ Ted’s now gone into Skegness for some med’cine for ’er.”
The man who accompanied the coastguard-officer remarked:
“This is a lonely house of yours, Mr Small. A long way from the doctor—eh?”
“It is, sir, an’ no mistake. We don’t see many people out ’ere, except Mr Judd, or Mr Bennett—or one o’ the men on patrol.”
Then, being compelled to ask the pair inside, for it had started to rain heavily, Tom Small sat with them chatting, yet full of wonder why they had called at that early hour.
The man in the next room stood breathless behind the door, listening to all their conversation. It was quite plain that he had been seen to enter there, whereupon the coastguard’s suspicions had been aroused. He scented considerable danger. Yet his adventurous spirit was such that he smiled amusedly at old Small’s story of his sick daughter, and of the visit of the doctor.
Judd, seated in the chair which Rodwell had occupied until he had vacated it in alarm, suddenly turned to old Tom, and said:
“This gentleman here is my superior officer, Tom, and he wants to ask you something, I think.”
“Yes, sir, what is it?” asked the crafty old fisherman, turning to the man in plain clothes.
“You had a visitor here last Thursday—a gentleman. Who was he?” asked the stranger suddenly.
“Last Thursday,” repeated Small reflectively. “Now let me see. Who came ’ere last Thursday? Weren’t we both out fishin’? No,” he added: “I know! Yes, we did ’ave someone come—Mr Jennings, of course.”
“And who is Mr Jennings?”
“Why, ’e comes regularly from Lincoln for our insurances.”
The petty-officer exchanged meaning glances with his superior, who then asked—
“Aren’t you in the habit of receiving visits from a gentleman—somebody who’s been seen about here in a closed car, painted pale grey?”
“No car ’as ever come ’ere, sir,” declared the old man blankly. “Folk in cars don’t come to visit people like Tom Small.”
“And yet you are not quite so poorly off as you pretend to be, Mr Small,” remarked his questioner. “What about that nice little balance you have in the bank—eh?”
“Well, I’ve earned it, therefore I don’t see why it should concern you,” protested the old fellow angrily.
“Just now it does concern me,” was the other’s rather hard reply—words to which the man in the inner room listened with breathless concern.
Was it possible that the existence of the secret cable was suspected? Had Tom, or his son, been indiscreet? No; he felt sure they had not. They had everything to lose by disclosing anything. And yet those two visitors were bent upon extracting some information from him. Of what nature he was not quite clear.
An awful thought occurred to him that he had left his cap in the sitting-room, but, on glancing round, he was relieved to see that he had carried it into the bedroom when he had sat down at the instruments.
What would those two men say, if they only knew that, within a few yards of them, was the end of a cable which ran direct to Berlin?
While the rain continued pelting down for perhaps a quarter of an hour, the pair sat chatting with Small. It was evident that the naval officer was disappointed with the result of his visit, for the old fisherman answered quite frankly, and had given explanation of his two visitors which could not well be met with disbelief.
“Are you gentlemen a-lookin’ for German spies, then?” asked old Small at last, as though sorely puzzled at the questions that had been put to him.
“We’re always on the look out for those devil’s spawn,” answered Judd. “There was a Dutch trawler off here last night, and she wasn’t up to any good—I’m sure of that.”
“Perhaps it’s the same craft as wor ’ere about a fortnight back. She flew the Dutch flag, but I believe she wor a waitin’ for a German submarine, in order to give ’er petrol. They were a talkin’ about ’er in the Anchor on Saturday night. Bill Chesney was out fishin’ an’ got right near ’er. I think one o’ the patrol boats ought to ha’ boarded ’er.”
“She was seen off the Spurn, and was then flying the British flag,” remarked Judd’s superior officer.
“Ah! There you are!” cried Small. “I was certain she was up to no good! Those Germans are up to every bit o’ craft and cunnin’. Did you gentlemen think that Mr Jennings, from Lincoln, was a German spy?” he asked naïvely.
“No, not particularly,” replied his visitor. “Only when strangers come along here, in the prohibited area, we naturally like to know who and what they are.”
“Quite so, sir. An’ if I see any stranger a-prowlin’ about ’ere in future, I won’t fail to let Mr Judd know of ’im.”
“That’s right, Small,” was the officer’s response. “There are lots of rumours around the coast of our fishermen giving assistance to the enemy by supplying them with petrol and other things, but, as far as I can gather, such reports are disgraceful libels upon a very hardworking and deserving class. We know that some of them put down tackle in Torbay, and elsewhere, when they learn the fleet is coming in, so that they may obtain compensation for damage caused to their nets. But as to their loyalty, I don’t think anyone can challenge that.”
“I ’ope not, sir,” was Small’s fervent reply. “There ain’t a fisherman along the whole coast o’ Lincolnshire who wouldn’t bear his part against the enemy, if he could—an’ bear it well, too.”
The clean-shaven officer reflected for a few moments.
“You’ve never, to your recollection, seen a pale grey closed-up car anywhere about here, have you?” he asked at last.
“Never, sir.”
“Quite sure?”
“Positive, sir. The roads about ’ere are not made for cars,” was the old fellow’s reply. “I certainly did see a car one night, about six weeks ago. The man had lost his way an’ was driving straight down to the sea. He wanted to get to Cleethorpes. They were Navy men from the wireless station, I think.”
The old man’s manner and speech had entirely disarmed suspicion, and presently the pair rose, and bidding him good-bye, and urging him to keep a sharp look-out for strangers, they left.
The moment they were safely away, Rodwell emerged from the bedroom, and in a low, apprehensive voice, asked:
“What does all this mean, Tom—eh?”
“Don’t know, sir. That Judd’s been about here constantly of late. ’E’s up to no good, I’m sure. I’ve told you, weeks ago, that I didn’t like the look o’ things—an’ I don’t!”
Rodwell saw that the old fellow was pale and alarmed. He had preserved an impenetrable mask before his two visitors, but now they had gone he was full of fear.
Rodwell, as he stood in the low-pitched little room, recollected certain misgivings which Molly had uttered on the previous night, just before he had left Bruton Street. His first impulse now was to leave the house and slip away across the fen. Yet if he did somebody must certainly see him.
“Shall you get off now, sir?” asked the old man suddenly.
“Not till to-night,” was the other’s reply. “It would be a bit dangerous, so I must lay doggo here till dusk, and then escape.”
“Do you think they really suspect us, sir?” asked the old fellow, in a voice which betrayed his fear.
“No. So don’t alarm yourself in the least,” replied the gentleman from London. “I suppose I’ve been seen about, and my car has been noticed on the roads. There’s no danger, as long as I’m not seen again here for a bit. I’ll get through to Stendel, and let him know that I shan’t be back again for a fortnight or so.”
“Yes; you must certainly keep away from ’ere,” Tom urged. “They’ll be a-watchin’ of us, no doubt.”
“I’ve got a lady coming here, as I told you—Mrs Kirby, to whom you telegraph sometimes. She won’t get here till night, and I must wait for her. She’ll have some urgent information to send across to the other side. Penney will meet her in Lincoln, where she’ll arrive by train, and he’ll bring her on by car.”
“You’d better keep to the bedroom,” urged the old man. “They might come back later on.”
“Yes: I won’t be seen,” and returning to the stuffy little room, he reopened the cable instruments and soon got into communication with Stendel, in order to pass away the time which he knew must hang heavily upon his hands, for even then it was not yet nine o’clock in the morning.
He sat smoking and gossiping with the old fisherman nearly all the day, impatient for the coming of darkness, for his imprisonment there was already becoming irksome.
It grew dusk early when, about four o’clock, a footstep outside caused them both to start and listen. In answer to the summons at the door Tom went, and was handed a telegram by the boy messenger from Huttoft.
Opening it, he found it had been despatched from London, and read:
“Impossible to leave till to-morrow.—M.”
He gave it to Rodwell, who at once saw that the woman he expected had been delayed. Probably she had not yet been able to gather that important information which was wanted so urgently in Berlin.
The telegram puzzled him. Was it possible that the arrangements which he had made with such cunning and forethought, and had left to Molly to carry out, had broken down after all?
Lewin Rodwell bit his lip, and wondered. He seemed that day beset by misfortune, for when at five o’clock, Ted having returned, he tested the cable as usual, a call came through from Berlin.
Rodwell answered it, whereupon “Number 70” flashed the following message beneath the sea.
“Your information of this morning regarding troop-ships leaving Plymouth for Dardanelles is incorrect.Desboroughwas torpedoed off Canary Islands on January 18th, andEllenboroughis in dry dock in Belfast. Source of your report evidently unreliable.”
“Your information of this morning regarding troop-ships leaving Plymouth for Dardanelles is incorrect.Desboroughwas torpedoed off Canary Islands on January 18th, andEllenboroughis in dry dock in Belfast. Source of your report evidently unreliable.”
Rodwell read the words upon the long green tape as it slowly unwound, and sat staring at them like a man in a dream.
Chapter Nineteen.Days of Darkness.On the same afternoon that Lewin Rodwell was stretching himself, impatient and somewhat nervous, in the lonely little house on the beach, Elise Shearman, pale and apprehensive, was seated in Sir Houston Bird’s consulting-room in Cavendish Square.The spruce, young-looking pathologist, clean-shaven and grave, with hair streaked with grey, was listening intently to the girl’s words. It was her second visit to him that day. In his waiting-room were half a dozen persons who had come to consult him, but the blue-eyed young lady had been ushered straight into the sanctum of the great Home Office expert.“Curious! Very curious!” he remarked as he listened to her. “That anonymous letter you brought this morning I have already taken to Whitehall. The whole affair seems a complete mystery, Miss Shearman. No doubt the charge against young Sainsbury is a very serious one, but that you should have been given warning is most strange. Since I saw you this morning I’ve had a visit from Mr Trustram, whom I called up on the ’phone, and we have had a long consultation.”“What is your opinion?” she asked breathlessly.“Will you forgive me, Miss Shearman if, for the present, I refrain from answering that question?” asked the great doctor, with a smile. He was sitting at his table with one elbow resting upon it and half turned towards her, as was his habit when diagnosing a case. The room was small, old-fashioned, and depressingly sombre in the gloom of the wintry afternoon.“But do you think Jack will ever clear himself of these horrible charges?” she asked, pale and anxious.“I hope so. But at present I can give no definite opinion.”“But if he can’t, he’ll go to penal servitude!” cried the girl. “Ah! how I have suffered since his arrest! Father will hear no word in his favour. He daily tells me that Jack is a spy of Germany, and as such deserves full punishment.”“Mr Trustram has found out from the War Office that his trial by court-martial begins at the Old Bailey to-morrow.”“Yes, I know. Mr Pelham, his counsel, called on me just after lunch, and told me so,” said the girl tearfully. “But oh! he seemed so hopeless of the result. The prosecution, he said, would bring forward the most damning evidence against him. Can it be true, Sir Houston? Do you really think it is true?”“No, I don’t,” was the prompt, straightforward answer. “Nothing will ever cause me to suspect Sainsbury to be guilty of espionage. He’s far too good an Englishman to accept German gold.”“Then you believe him to be innocent!” cried the girl, her fair countenance brightening with a ray of hope.“Yes, I do. He’s the victim of some dastardly plot. That’s my firm belief. And yet it is so strange that his friend Jerrold committed suicide.”“But was Dr Jerrold a spy? That is the question!”“It seems quite true that a warrant had been issued for his arrest upon a charge of war-treason,” Sir Houston replied. “Why didn’t he try and face it?”The girl, pale and agitated, sat in silence, her gloved hands lying idly on her lap before her. Those awful weeks of anxiety had left traces upon her face, now thin and worn. And she felt that her lover’s fate was sealed unless he could clear himself. In desperation she had sought the great doctor, and he had been most thoughtful and sympathetic.“I think,” he went on in a kindly voice, “I think it would be best, Miss Shearman, if you went home, and remained there in patience. You know that Mr Pelham is a sharp lawyer, and, being quite alive to the seriousness of the situation, he will do his very utmost for his client. Go quietly home, and await the result of our combined efforts,” he urged sympathetically. “I am meeting Mr Trustram again at five o’clock. Believe me, Mr Trustram is not inactive, while I, too, am doing my level best in your lover’s interests.”“Oh! thank you,” cried the girl, tears standing in her fine blue eyes. “You are both so good! I—I don’t know how to thank you both,” and, unable to further restrain her emotion, she suddenly burst into tears.Quickly he rose and, placing his hand tenderly upon her shoulder, he uttered kind and sympathetic words, by which she was at length calmed; and presently she rose and left the room, Sir Houston promising to report to her on the morrow.“Now, don’t alarm yourself unduly,” was his parting injunction. “Just remain quite calm and patient, for I assure you that all that can be done will be done, and is, indeed, being done.”And then, when the door had closed, the great pathologist drew his hand wearily across his white brow, sighed, buttoned his perfectly-fitting morning-coat, glanced at himself in the glass to see that his hair was unruffled—for he was a bit of a dandy—and then pressed the bell for his next patient.Meanwhile, Charles Trustram was working in his big airy private room at the Admiralty. Many men in naval uniform were ever coming and going, for his room was always the scene of great, but quiet, orderly activity.At his big table he was examining documents, signing some, dictating letters to his secretary, and discussing matters put forward by the officials who brought him papers to read and initial.Presently there entered a lieutenant with a pale yellow naval signal-form, upon which was written a long message from the wireless department.Those long, spidery aerial wires suspended between the domes at the Admiralty, had caught and intercepted a German message sent out from Norddeich, the big German station at the mouth of the Elbe, to Pola, on the Adriatic. It had been in code, of course, but in the department it had been de-coded; and the enemy’s message, as the officer placed it before him, was a truly illuminating one.“I think this is what you wanted,” said the lieutenant, as he placed the paper before him. “It came in an hour ago, but they’ve found great difficulty in decoding it. That is what you meant—is it not?”“Good Heavens! Yes!” cried Trustram, starting to his feet. “Why, here the information has been sent to Austria for re-transmission to the German submarines—the exact information I gave of transports leaving for the Dardanelles! TheEllenboroughandDesboroughare not mentioned. That shows the extent of their intimate knowledge of the movements of our ships. But you see,” he went on, pointing to the message, “theCardigan,LeatherheadandTurleighare all mentioned as having left Southampton escorted to Gibraltar, and not beyond, and further, that in future all drafts will embark at Plymouth—just the very information that I gave!”“Yes; I quite see. There must be somewhere a very rapid and secret channel for the transit of information to Germany.”“Yes, and we have to find that out, without further delay,” Trustram replied. “But,” he added, “this has fixed the responsibility undoubtedly. Is Captain Weardale in his room?”“He was, when I came along to you.”Trustram thanked him, and, a few moments later, was walking down one of the long corridors in the new building of the Admiralty overlooking St. James’s Park, bearing the deciphered dispatch from the enemy in his hand.“The artful skunk!” he muttered to himself. “Who would have credited such a thing! But it’s that confounded woman, I suppose—the woman of whom poor Jerrold entertained such grave suspicions. What is the secret of it all, I wonder? I’ll find out—if it costs me my life! How fortunate that I should have suspected, and been able to test the leakage of information, as I have done!”Just before midnight a rather hollow-eyed, well-dressed young man was seated in Mrs Kirby’s pretty little drawing-room in Cadogan Gardens. The dark plush curtains were drawn, and against them the big bowl of daffodils stood out in all their artistic beauty beneath the electric-light. His hostess was elaborately dressed, as was her wont, yet with a quiet, subdued taste which gave her an almost aristocratic air. She posed as a giddy bridge-player, a theatre and night-club goer; a woman who smoked, who was careless of what people thought, and who took drugs secretly. That, however, was only her mask. Really she was a most careful, abstemious, level-headed woman, whose eye was always directed towards the main chance of obtaining information which might be of use to her friend Lewin Rodwell, and his masters abroad.Both were German-born. The trail of the Hun was over them—that Teuton taint of a hopeful world-power which, being inborn, could never be eradicated.“Well?” she was asking, as she lolled artistically in the silk-covered easy chair in her pretty room, upholstered in carnation pink. “So you can’t see him till to-morrow? That’s horribly unfortunate. I’m very disappointed,” she added pettishly.“No,” replied the young man, who, fair-haired and square-jawed, was of distinctly German type. “I’m sorry. I tried my best, but I failed.”“H’m. I thought you were clever enough, Carl. But it seems that you failed,” and she sighed wearily.“You know, Molly, I’d do anything for you,” replied the young fellow, who was evidently of quite superior class, for he wore his well-cut evening coat and soft-fronted dress-shirt with the ease of one accustomed to such things. And, if the truth were told, he would have been recognised by any of the clerks in the bureau of the Savoy Hotel as one of their most regular customers at dinner or supper.“I know that, Carl,” replied the handsome woman impatiently. “But, you see, I had made all my arrangements. The information is wanted hourly in Berlin. It is most urgent.”“Well, they’ll have to wait, my dear Molly. If I can’t get it till to-morrow—I can’t.”“Why not?”“Oh, what’s the good of explaining? Heinrich has gone off down to Brighton with a little friend of his—that’s all. He’s motored her down to the Metropole, and won’t be back till to-morrow. How, in Heaven’s name, can I help it?”“I don’t suppose you can, my dear boy,” laughed the big, overbearing woman, who held the son of the “naturalised” German financier in the grip of her white, bejewelled fingers. “But, all the same, we have both to remember our duty to the Fatherland. We are at war.”“True! And haven’t I helped the Fatherland? Was it not from information given by me that you knew the truth of the blowing up of the battleshipBulwarkoff Sheerness, and of the loss of theFormidableon New Year’s day? Have I and my friends in Jermyn Street been inactive?”“No, you haven’t. Our dear Fatherland owes you and your friends a deep debt of gratitude. But—Well, I tell you, I’m annoyed because my plans have been upset by your failure to-day.”“Rodwell’s plans, you mean! Not yours!” cried the young fellow, his jealousy apparent.“No, not at all. I don’t see why you should so constantly refer to Mr Rodwell. He is our superior, as you know, and in its wisdom Number Seventy has placed him in supreme command.”“Then why do you complain of my failure?” protested the young man viciously, placing his cigarette-end in the silver ash-tray.“I don’t. I only tell you that it has upset my personal plans. I had hoped to get away down to Torquay to-morrow. I must have a change. I’m run down.”“One day does not matter, surely, when our national interests are at stake!”“Of course not, silly boy,” laughed the woman. She saw that she was not treating him with tact, and knew his exact value. “Don’t let us discuss it any further. See what you can do to-morrow.”“I’ll compel Heinrich to get at what we want,” cried Carl Berenstein—whose father had, since the war, changed his name, with the consent of the Home Office, of course, to Burton. “I’m as savage as you are that he should prefer to motor a girl to Brighton. But what can I do?”“Nothing, my dear boy. The girl will always win. When you’ve lived as long as I have, you will understand.”“Then you don’t blame me—do you?” asked the young man, eagerly.“Why, of course, not at all, my dear Carl. Heinrich’s a fool to be attracted by any petticoat. There are always so many better.”“As long as you don’t blame me, Molly, I don’t care. The guv’nor is as wild as I am about it.”“Oh, never mind. Get hold of him when he comes back, and come here as soon as possible and tell me. Remember that Number Seventy is thirsting for information.”“Yes, I will. Rely on me. We are good Germans, all of us. These silly swelled-headed fools of English are only playing into our hands. They have no idea of what they will have to face later on.Ach! I only wish I were back again in the dear Rhineland with my friends, who are now officers serving at the front. But this British bubble cannot last. It must soon be pricked. And its result must be disastrous.”“We hope so. We can’t tell. But, there, don’t let us discuss it. We are out to win the war. This matter I leave to you, good Germans that you and Heinrich are, to make your report.”“Good. I will be here to-morrow evening, when I hope I shall have everything quite clear and precise. There is to be a big movement of troops to France the day after to-morrow, and I hope to give you a list of the names of all the regiments, with their destinations. You know, I suppose, that three parts of the cartridges they are making at the G— factory will, in a month’s time, when they get to the front, be useless?”“So Mr Rodwell told me, a couple of days ago. Herzfelder is evidently doing good work there; but it is not a matter even to whisper about. It might leak out, and tests might be made.”Then, having drained off the whisky-and-soda which his hostess had poured out for him, he rose, shook her hand warmly, saying, “I’ll be here as early as possible to-morrow night. Good-bye, Molly,” and strode out.And the maid showed the young man to the door of the flat, while Mrs Kirby cast herself into a low lounge-chair before the fire, lit a cigarette, and, with her eyes fixed thoughtfully upon the flames, smoked furiously.
On the same afternoon that Lewin Rodwell was stretching himself, impatient and somewhat nervous, in the lonely little house on the beach, Elise Shearman, pale and apprehensive, was seated in Sir Houston Bird’s consulting-room in Cavendish Square.
The spruce, young-looking pathologist, clean-shaven and grave, with hair streaked with grey, was listening intently to the girl’s words. It was her second visit to him that day. In his waiting-room were half a dozen persons who had come to consult him, but the blue-eyed young lady had been ushered straight into the sanctum of the great Home Office expert.
“Curious! Very curious!” he remarked as he listened to her. “That anonymous letter you brought this morning I have already taken to Whitehall. The whole affair seems a complete mystery, Miss Shearman. No doubt the charge against young Sainsbury is a very serious one, but that you should have been given warning is most strange. Since I saw you this morning I’ve had a visit from Mr Trustram, whom I called up on the ’phone, and we have had a long consultation.”
“What is your opinion?” she asked breathlessly.
“Will you forgive me, Miss Shearman if, for the present, I refrain from answering that question?” asked the great doctor, with a smile. He was sitting at his table with one elbow resting upon it and half turned towards her, as was his habit when diagnosing a case. The room was small, old-fashioned, and depressingly sombre in the gloom of the wintry afternoon.
“But do you think Jack will ever clear himself of these horrible charges?” she asked, pale and anxious.
“I hope so. But at present I can give no definite opinion.”
“But if he can’t, he’ll go to penal servitude!” cried the girl. “Ah! how I have suffered since his arrest! Father will hear no word in his favour. He daily tells me that Jack is a spy of Germany, and as such deserves full punishment.”
“Mr Trustram has found out from the War Office that his trial by court-martial begins at the Old Bailey to-morrow.”
“Yes, I know. Mr Pelham, his counsel, called on me just after lunch, and told me so,” said the girl tearfully. “But oh! he seemed so hopeless of the result. The prosecution, he said, would bring forward the most damning evidence against him. Can it be true, Sir Houston? Do you really think it is true?”
“No, I don’t,” was the prompt, straightforward answer. “Nothing will ever cause me to suspect Sainsbury to be guilty of espionage. He’s far too good an Englishman to accept German gold.”
“Then you believe him to be innocent!” cried the girl, her fair countenance brightening with a ray of hope.
“Yes, I do. He’s the victim of some dastardly plot. That’s my firm belief. And yet it is so strange that his friend Jerrold committed suicide.”
“But was Dr Jerrold a spy? That is the question!”
“It seems quite true that a warrant had been issued for his arrest upon a charge of war-treason,” Sir Houston replied. “Why didn’t he try and face it?”
The girl, pale and agitated, sat in silence, her gloved hands lying idly on her lap before her. Those awful weeks of anxiety had left traces upon her face, now thin and worn. And she felt that her lover’s fate was sealed unless he could clear himself. In desperation she had sought the great doctor, and he had been most thoughtful and sympathetic.
“I think,” he went on in a kindly voice, “I think it would be best, Miss Shearman, if you went home, and remained there in patience. You know that Mr Pelham is a sharp lawyer, and, being quite alive to the seriousness of the situation, he will do his very utmost for his client. Go quietly home, and await the result of our combined efforts,” he urged sympathetically. “I am meeting Mr Trustram again at five o’clock. Believe me, Mr Trustram is not inactive, while I, too, am doing my level best in your lover’s interests.”
“Oh! thank you,” cried the girl, tears standing in her fine blue eyes. “You are both so good! I—I don’t know how to thank you both,” and, unable to further restrain her emotion, she suddenly burst into tears.
Quickly he rose and, placing his hand tenderly upon her shoulder, he uttered kind and sympathetic words, by which she was at length calmed; and presently she rose and left the room, Sir Houston promising to report to her on the morrow.
“Now, don’t alarm yourself unduly,” was his parting injunction. “Just remain quite calm and patient, for I assure you that all that can be done will be done, and is, indeed, being done.”
And then, when the door had closed, the great pathologist drew his hand wearily across his white brow, sighed, buttoned his perfectly-fitting morning-coat, glanced at himself in the glass to see that his hair was unruffled—for he was a bit of a dandy—and then pressed the bell for his next patient.
Meanwhile, Charles Trustram was working in his big airy private room at the Admiralty. Many men in naval uniform were ever coming and going, for his room was always the scene of great, but quiet, orderly activity.
At his big table he was examining documents, signing some, dictating letters to his secretary, and discussing matters put forward by the officials who brought him papers to read and initial.
Presently there entered a lieutenant with a pale yellow naval signal-form, upon which was written a long message from the wireless department.
Those long, spidery aerial wires suspended between the domes at the Admiralty, had caught and intercepted a German message sent out from Norddeich, the big German station at the mouth of the Elbe, to Pola, on the Adriatic. It had been in code, of course, but in the department it had been de-coded; and the enemy’s message, as the officer placed it before him, was a truly illuminating one.
“I think this is what you wanted,” said the lieutenant, as he placed the paper before him. “It came in an hour ago, but they’ve found great difficulty in decoding it. That is what you meant—is it not?”
“Good Heavens! Yes!” cried Trustram, starting to his feet. “Why, here the information has been sent to Austria for re-transmission to the German submarines—the exact information I gave of transports leaving for the Dardanelles! TheEllenboroughandDesboroughare not mentioned. That shows the extent of their intimate knowledge of the movements of our ships. But you see,” he went on, pointing to the message, “theCardigan,LeatherheadandTurleighare all mentioned as having left Southampton escorted to Gibraltar, and not beyond, and further, that in future all drafts will embark at Plymouth—just the very information that I gave!”
“Yes; I quite see. There must be somewhere a very rapid and secret channel for the transit of information to Germany.”
“Yes, and we have to find that out, without further delay,” Trustram replied. “But,” he added, “this has fixed the responsibility undoubtedly. Is Captain Weardale in his room?”
“He was, when I came along to you.”
Trustram thanked him, and, a few moments later, was walking down one of the long corridors in the new building of the Admiralty overlooking St. James’s Park, bearing the deciphered dispatch from the enemy in his hand.
“The artful skunk!” he muttered to himself. “Who would have credited such a thing! But it’s that confounded woman, I suppose—the woman of whom poor Jerrold entertained such grave suspicions. What is the secret of it all, I wonder? I’ll find out—if it costs me my life! How fortunate that I should have suspected, and been able to test the leakage of information, as I have done!”
Just before midnight a rather hollow-eyed, well-dressed young man was seated in Mrs Kirby’s pretty little drawing-room in Cadogan Gardens. The dark plush curtains were drawn, and against them the big bowl of daffodils stood out in all their artistic beauty beneath the electric-light. His hostess was elaborately dressed, as was her wont, yet with a quiet, subdued taste which gave her an almost aristocratic air. She posed as a giddy bridge-player, a theatre and night-club goer; a woman who smoked, who was careless of what people thought, and who took drugs secretly. That, however, was only her mask. Really she was a most careful, abstemious, level-headed woman, whose eye was always directed towards the main chance of obtaining information which might be of use to her friend Lewin Rodwell, and his masters abroad.
Both were German-born. The trail of the Hun was over them—that Teuton taint of a hopeful world-power which, being inborn, could never be eradicated.
“Well?” she was asking, as she lolled artistically in the silk-covered easy chair in her pretty room, upholstered in carnation pink. “So you can’t see him till to-morrow? That’s horribly unfortunate. I’m very disappointed,” she added pettishly.
“No,” replied the young man, who, fair-haired and square-jawed, was of distinctly German type. “I’m sorry. I tried my best, but I failed.”
“H’m. I thought you were clever enough, Carl. But it seems that you failed,” and she sighed wearily.
“You know, Molly, I’d do anything for you,” replied the young fellow, who was evidently of quite superior class, for he wore his well-cut evening coat and soft-fronted dress-shirt with the ease of one accustomed to such things. And, if the truth were told, he would have been recognised by any of the clerks in the bureau of the Savoy Hotel as one of their most regular customers at dinner or supper.
“I know that, Carl,” replied the handsome woman impatiently. “But, you see, I had made all my arrangements. The information is wanted hourly in Berlin. It is most urgent.”
“Well, they’ll have to wait, my dear Molly. If I can’t get it till to-morrow—I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“Oh, what’s the good of explaining? Heinrich has gone off down to Brighton with a little friend of his—that’s all. He’s motored her down to the Metropole, and won’t be back till to-morrow. How, in Heaven’s name, can I help it?”
“I don’t suppose you can, my dear boy,” laughed the big, overbearing woman, who held the son of the “naturalised” German financier in the grip of her white, bejewelled fingers. “But, all the same, we have both to remember our duty to the Fatherland. We are at war.”
“True! And haven’t I helped the Fatherland? Was it not from information given by me that you knew the truth of the blowing up of the battleshipBulwarkoff Sheerness, and of the loss of theFormidableon New Year’s day? Have I and my friends in Jermyn Street been inactive?”
“No, you haven’t. Our dear Fatherland owes you and your friends a deep debt of gratitude. But—Well, I tell you, I’m annoyed because my plans have been upset by your failure to-day.”
“Rodwell’s plans, you mean! Not yours!” cried the young fellow, his jealousy apparent.
“No, not at all. I don’t see why you should so constantly refer to Mr Rodwell. He is our superior, as you know, and in its wisdom Number Seventy has placed him in supreme command.”
“Then why do you complain of my failure?” protested the young man viciously, placing his cigarette-end in the silver ash-tray.
“I don’t. I only tell you that it has upset my personal plans. I had hoped to get away down to Torquay to-morrow. I must have a change. I’m run down.”
“One day does not matter, surely, when our national interests are at stake!”
“Of course not, silly boy,” laughed the woman. She saw that she was not treating him with tact, and knew his exact value. “Don’t let us discuss it any further. See what you can do to-morrow.”
“I’ll compel Heinrich to get at what we want,” cried Carl Berenstein—whose father had, since the war, changed his name, with the consent of the Home Office, of course, to Burton. “I’m as savage as you are that he should prefer to motor a girl to Brighton. But what can I do?”
“Nothing, my dear boy. The girl will always win. When you’ve lived as long as I have, you will understand.”
“Then you don’t blame me—do you?” asked the young man, eagerly.
“Why, of course, not at all, my dear Carl. Heinrich’s a fool to be attracted by any petticoat. There are always so many better.”
“As long as you don’t blame me, Molly, I don’t care. The guv’nor is as wild as I am about it.”
“Oh, never mind. Get hold of him when he comes back, and come here as soon as possible and tell me. Remember that Number Seventy is thirsting for information.”
“Yes, I will. Rely on me. We are good Germans, all of us. These silly swelled-headed fools of English are only playing into our hands. They have no idea of what they will have to face later on.Ach! I only wish I were back again in the dear Rhineland with my friends, who are now officers serving at the front. But this British bubble cannot last. It must soon be pricked. And its result must be disastrous.”
“We hope so. We can’t tell. But, there, don’t let us discuss it. We are out to win the war. This matter I leave to you, good Germans that you and Heinrich are, to make your report.”
“Good. I will be here to-morrow evening, when I hope I shall have everything quite clear and precise. There is to be a big movement of troops to France the day after to-morrow, and I hope to give you a list of the names of all the regiments, with their destinations. You know, I suppose, that three parts of the cartridges they are making at the G— factory will, in a month’s time, when they get to the front, be useless?”
“So Mr Rodwell told me, a couple of days ago. Herzfelder is evidently doing good work there; but it is not a matter even to whisper about. It might leak out, and tests might be made.”
Then, having drained off the whisky-and-soda which his hostess had poured out for him, he rose, shook her hand warmly, saying, “I’ll be here as early as possible to-morrow night. Good-bye, Molly,” and strode out.
And the maid showed the young man to the door of the flat, while Mrs Kirby cast herself into a low lounge-chair before the fire, lit a cigarette, and, with her eyes fixed thoughtfully upon the flames, smoked furiously.