The Poison Tide (51 page)

‘There’s a telegram for you, Sebastian,’ his mother said when he returned one afternoon. ‘Behind the clock.’

It was a summons to the Admiralty signed by C.

‘We should start harvesting next week,’ she said, gazing at him over her spectacles. ‘We’ll be short if you go.’

‘I’ll come back.’

‘I’ve got five women and Griggs who’s too old to fight, Atkin the butcher’s boy from Long Sutton, and our neighbours will help when they can.’ She closed her eyes, the care lines obvious in the lamplight. ‘I expect I’ll manage.’

‘I’ll come back – I said so.’

His instructions were to report to Naval Intelligence at precisely four o’clock the following day. He arrived in his old country suit, patched at the elbow, flannel waistcoat, green tweed tie.

‘You’ve caught the sun. You look healthier but like a bumpkin,’ C observed as they walked slowly up the stairs to Admiral Hall’s office. ‘Disrespectful, Wolff.’

The Director of Naval Intelligence was on the first floor of the new building, with large south-facing windows overlooking Horse Guards Parade. The white stone heart of our Empire, he’d once observed to Wolff, with its view of 10 Downing Street, the Admiralty, Parliament and the Foreign Office and, craning east, the top floor and roof of the War Office.

Hall greeted him with a reproachful frown. ‘Undercover, are we?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Well, sorry to drag you from your fields then. Thought you might help us win the war. Sit down.’ He retreated behind his desk but remained standing, hands resting on the back of his chair. ‘Last night there was an explosion at an ammunition depot in America – the largest.’ He paused, blinking furiously. ‘Are you smiling, man?’

‘Was it the Black Tom yard?’

‘You think it’s sabotage?’

‘Ask von Rintelen. You still have him, don’t you?’

‘Captain Gaunt thinks so too. Two million pounds of ammunition and explosive – broke windows twenty-five miles away and damaged the Statue of Liberty. Like the Somme, Gaunt says – how the hell he knows, I can’t imagine,’ Hall observed dryly. ‘But that isn’t why you’re here.’ He reached down to a file and slid a piece of paper from it across his desk. ‘Take your time.’

It was an enciphered signal in number groups of five, bearing the legend at the top: BRITISH EMBASSY, PARIS. Rendered in English beneath:

Wolff lowered the telegram to the edge of the desk.

‘Seems your Dr Dilger is set on turning this into an industry,’ Hall remarked grimly. ‘Who knows what else his laboratory is cooking up. I suppose it was naïve to hope the fuss in America would end it all.’

C leant forward to place his large hand on the telegram. ‘One of our people needs to question the German agent,’ he said. ‘I don’t expect we’ll get any more but . . .’ He was deliberately avoiding Wolff’s eye.

For a time no one spoke. Admiral Hall stepped out from his desk, dragging his fingers across its bright surface. ‘Can you imagine the panic out there if the public thought it was under attack from some disease?’ A battalion of soldiers was stamping rhythmically beneath his window. Turning, it began to advance on Downing Street in close order. ‘The War Office is setting up a new experimental station so some of our scientists can run tests on anthrax and a few other diseases . . .’ he paused, leaning closer to the window, ‘. . . just to see how we might fight an attack – understand what we’re up against.’

Wolff was conscious of C fidgeting uncomfortably beside him.

Hall turned to face them again, a short broad silhouette against the window. ‘The scientists aren’t going to tell us what Delmar is planning and where. The Army is circulating a confidential memorandum to intelligence officers urging them to be vigilant – the Home Office is doing the same with the police.’ He paused again, then said, as if to himself, ‘Just a damn shame we didn’t dispose of Dilger when we had the chance.’

‘For God’s sake, have you ever stabbed a man?’ Wolff asked with a cold fury that surprised him too. ‘So close you can smell him, feel his beard against the back of your hand, wriggling, biting – then that last little gasp. Christ.’ He was shaking his head. ‘The Germans – Nadolny – would have found someone to take his place – wouldn’t you?’

The incredulous silence was broken only by the distant beat of marching feet. Then Hall exploded: ‘Who the hell do you think you’re talking to, Commander?’

‘Was it you?’ Again, Wolff was surprised to hear his voice trembling with passion. ‘Did you instruct the police – instruct Special Branch to give the newspapers that poison?’

‘Sir,’ C prompted him quietly. ‘Did you give the newspapers Casement’s diary, sir?’

‘I’m here to tell you how contemptible—’

‘You’re here, Wolff, because I ordered you to come,’ C said, struggling to his feet to stand above him. ‘I thought you might be of use but I see—’

‘As you ask, yes,’ Hall cut in belligerently. ‘Yes, I asked Special Branch to circulate extracts – to politicians, bishops, the King – they have a right to know. I have a copy here, if you’d like to look – if you have the stomach for it. Perfectly genuine,’ he sucked his teeth; ‘the man is a disgrace. But you knew that, didn’t you?’

‘And libelling him in the newspapers is your idea of decency and duty?’

‘Don’t be a bloody fool. He was a traitor . . .’

‘Not to Ireland.’

‘There are Irishmen dying every day out there for their country and the Empire.’ Hall gestured angrily to the window. ‘Those few misguided souls calling for a reprieve – radicals, Americans – need to understand this man’s nature. He knew what he was doing when he introduced the Germans to his friends in America – he probably knew about Dilger and his diseases – he’s a traitor, he’s a sodomite – he’s a moral degenerate . . .’

‘Tawdry – it wasn’t enough . . .’

‘No. Shut up before I – you fool. Shut up and listen,’ Hall commanded icily. ‘This isn’t about Casement – it’s you – your guilt. If it wasn’t, I’d have you thrown in a brig – just pull yourself together. You did your duty – you did what was right. Now get the hell out of my office before I change my mind. Oh, and Wolff, for God’s sake see a doctor. You’re cracking up.’

And Wolff did leave – meek like a lamb. He left because there was nothing he could say with integrity. Blinker was right, and bleating, wringing his hands, just made him a hypocrite. In the Admiral’s outer office, heads were bent over desks, sideways glances, silence. Wolff passed them in a daze, slowly, one foot in front of the other like a bandsman slow-marching to the Mall. He was fumbling with a bent cigarette and his lighter at the Admiralty entrance when C limped over to speak to him.

‘Would you like me to do that?’ he asked.

‘I can manage.’

‘Go home. You’re not ready.’

‘Ready?’ Wolff gave a shaky little laugh. ‘Ready?’

‘I think you should see a doctor. There’s someone . . .’

‘Is he good with a bad attack of conscience? No, thank you. I don’t need a doctor.’

‘You do need more time. My God, you almost died. Go home, Wolff – that’s an order.’

‘Yes, I will.’

C’s Rolls-Royce was parked at the kerb a few yards away. He took a step towards it, then checked. ‘I don’t know if I should say this, but I expect you’ll work it out for yourself in time. This is the best thing that can happen to Roger Casement. I don’t mean the attacks on his reputation – the diary.’ He sounded disapproving. ‘No, his execution – his death. If you’d been a little less confused about your own part in it all, you’d have . . . well . . . He wasn’t much of a rebel, was he? He’ll be a bloody good martyr. Dying is the best thing he can do for his country –’ he corrected himself at once – ‘his cause.’ He pursed his lips thoughtfully. ‘Actually, I think we’re making a mistake – can I still say “we”?’ He sighed heavily. ‘It won’t be the first we’ve made in this war, will it?’

Wolff nodded slowly.

‘I hear he’s being received into the Roman Church – that will help, of course.’ He swung the end of his stick at a cigarette packet, neatly driving it into the gutter. ‘This place used to be spotless – they’ve let the Army into St James’s Park, you know. Anyway, I have—’

‘One more thing,’ said Wolff abruptly. ‘Turkey – did you . . .’ he was struggling for the words, with his feelings. ‘I wanted to ask, were you going to . . .’

C’s small grey eyes were fixed intently on Wolff’s face, the monocle dangling on its string for once. ‘If you’re trying to ask whether anyone betrayed or abandoned you – no, Wolff.’ He shook his head sadly. ‘We think the worst of everyone, don’t we? No. No one betrayed you. Now go home.’

‘Nine months – you could have . . .’

‘Go home,’ he repeated firmly.

Wolff heaved a lungful of smoke. ‘All right. Yes. I will. Soon.’

At nine o’clock the hangman released the trapdoor in the execution shed and the prison bell tolled once for the benefit of the crowd. There was some cheering, mocking, then silence. Roger Casement was pronounced dead at nine minutes after nine o’clock on the morning of 3 August 1916. He would have been hurt by the cheering, Wolff thought as he stood waiting for the notice to be posted at the gate. He wouldn’t have understood why anyone would wish to cheer the death of another.

Women and a few men with the sickly yellow faces of munitions workers, chatting, joking, flirting; city clerks in bowlers and ready-to-wear suits; mothers and young children, some with breakfasts or mugs of tea from local shops that had opened early to offer ‘a service’. The sort of gathering a prince several degrees from the throne might expect at the opening of a library. Just to say they were there,
Wolff thought.
And me?

At the back wall of the prison, thirty Irish men and women were bent discreetly in prayer. At the front, a prison warder was pasting whatever proclamation there was still to be made on the gate and the crowd was pressing round him for a part in this final scene.
Judgement of death was this day executed on Roger David Casement in His Majesty’s Prison of Pentonville in our presence.

There was no one for Wolff to say sorry to, no one to comfort; he didn’t believe, so he couldn’t say a prayer. But he was there to keep watch, as he knew she would be doing through the early hours in America. For Laura then, for Roger and his sister, for Reggie Curtis and the little man in the derby hat whose name he’d never known, and for others – the men who even at that hour were advancing across no-man’s-land on the Somme.

At the station he bought an evening newspaper and read the report of Casement’s last hours. He’d mounted the gallows’ steps firmly and commended his spirit to God. Then they had buried him in an unmarked grave, like many who were dying at the Front.

‘So this time you
have
come back.’ She smiled and stepped aside to let him through the door. ‘We started on the barley yesterday.’

‘I’ll take the wagon over at six tomorrow.’

‘They won’t be there before half past seven.’

‘Half past seven then.’

And in September he would burn the stubble, for miles the fields aflame, flickering in the night sky as far as the eye could see, plumes of choking brown smoke – like the torment reserved for the unjust on the last day, his mother said – until it settled at dawn on the fen, so dense it was easy to stumble and fall, but only for the hours it took the sun to rise and a fresh breeze from the sea to blow.