The Prime Minister's Secret Agent (21 page)

Howard snorted, then made a steeple of his fingers. “Miss Hope, I think I can help you. We can help each other.”

“I highly doubt it.”

“There’s an epidemiologist here in the city. He’s worked with some of our boys who’ve accidentally been infected with the anthrax spores. He has a seventy-five percent success rate. You give me all of the evidence you have and promise you’ll never speak of it again—and I’ll call the doctor and have him save your friend.”

Dr. Janus met Maggie outside Sarah’s hospital room. “I just spoke with the epidemiologist,” he said in low tones. “Now that we know she’s come in contact with cutaneous anthrax, we’re going to wash her thoroughly. He also recommended that we put her on a new medication we’re calling an ‘anti-biotic.’ That should give her a fighting chance.”

“What
are
her chances, Doctor?” Maggie managed. She opened the door gently and saw Sarah, gaunt and gray, eyes closed, looking almost like a corpse already. She felt dizzy with fear. “Of survival?”

“We’re doing the best we can, Miss.”

Maggie went back to the Caledonian. Mark was on the telephone. When he hung up he asked, “How did it go?”

“In exchange for our silence, he gave me the name of a epidemiologist who’s helping Sarah,” she answered, her voice flat.

“How is she?”

“It’s touch and go.”

Mark shook his head. “I’m glad. But I haven’t found the murderer. As far as I can tell, Mildred Petrie never used a stage name and she has no connection to Porton Down.”

“And what about Diana Atholl?”

Mark rubbed his eyes with his fists. “No connection to Diana Atholl, either.”

“Mark,” Maggie said, thinking, “what about Diana Angius. Can you look up the name Angius?”

Mark returned to his papers. “Angius, Angius …” He stopped, eyes wide. “There’s a Simon Angius here, who’s a scientist. Works on the spore research for ‘N.’ ” He read further. “From his date of birth, he might be Diana’s father. Let me check.”

Mark went to the telephone in the hall and made a few calls. “Yes, Diana Atholl is Simon Angius’s daughter,” he panted when he returned. “And Diana visited him last month for two weeks. And she signed into the lab—under her maiden name.”

Maggie brushed loose hair out of her face. “Diana Atholl had motive and access to the poison and to the theater—that’s enough to arrest her.”

“And Mildred Petrie?”

“She was no doubt involved, but I don’t think she’s Estelle’s killer. It’s something we could ask Mrs. Atholl when we question her.”

“When we arrest her, you mean.” Mark raised an eyebrow. “Would you like to do the honors?”

Maggie shook her head. “You’re the actual MI-Five agent on the case. Frain just let me in as a courtesy.”

“You’ve earned the right to make the arrest, Miss Hope. I’m just glad I’ll be there to see her face when you do.”

At the other end of Edinburgh, at the Balmoral Hotel, the Atholls were having tea at the Palm Court. A harpist played Debussy’s “First Arabesque” as waiters in black and white circulated under the tall Victorian glass dome with silver trays.

There was a tiered tray of sandwiches in front of the Atholls, though neither was eating. Richard Atholl looked as handsome as ever. Diana, his wife, looked even shorter and stockier in a floral dress with gaping spaces between its buttons. And although waves of genteel conversation passed over them, they did not speak.

Maggie and Mark walked in, shrugging off an offer to be seated. They went directly to the Atholls’ linen-covered table.

“I’m Agent Standish and this is Miss Hope of MI-Five.” Mark showed his identification. He looked to Maggie.

She continued, “Mrs. Diana Atholl, you are under arrest for the murders of Estelle Crawford and Mildred Petrie.”

Around them, conversation stopped as curious eyes looked over.

Mrs. Atholl pressed her lips together, then stood. “Do you need to use handcuffs?” she asked. “I promise not to make a scene.”

Maggie had expected more protest, but Mrs. Atholl seemed
almost relieved. “Just come with us, Mrs. Atholl, and there’s no need for handcuffs.”

“Are you coming?” Mrs. Atholl turned toward her husband.

“You?
You
killed Estelle?” the conductor said softly.

“Yes, I killed Estelle,” Mrs. Atholl replied tonelessly. “And it still didn’t make any difference. Even with her gone, you still don’t love me.”

“What did you do to her, Diana?” the conductor asked, voice breaking. “What did you do to
my
Estelle?”

“We’ll talk about that at the station,” Maggie interposed, motioning for Mark to hurry. “Will you be coming, Mr. Atholl?”

He was staring at his wife as if he’d never seen her before. “No. No, I won’t be coming.”

“Richard!” Diana half screamed, half moaned. “Please!
I’m your wife!
” The harp music stopped. Everyone in the tearoom waited, on edge, to see what would happen.

“Not anymore,” he told her. “Our sham of a marriage is over.”

Diana Atholl’s eyes were wild. She was still for just a moment, like a startled bird, and then she broke from Mark’s hold, lunged to her feet, and began to run.

“I’ve got this,” Maggie called, setting out.

The women’s heels clattered on the floor. Mrs. Atholl slammed into a startled waiter, then staggered into a potted palm. But she kept running.

Maggie dodged a woman swathed in furs and reeking of perfume and leapt forward at Diana. Both women slammed to the marble floor. She straddled Diana’s facedown body, forcing her hands behind her back.

“You nearly killed one of my best friends,” Maggie growled in her prisoner’s ear. “Two women are dead because of you. Why is Mildred Petrie dead and Sarah Sanderson in the hospital, Mrs. Atholl?”

“Mildred,” she gasped, “Mildred bought the flowers for me. I didn’t want to be spotted. I never thought she’d touch them after I’d left them for Estelle …”

“So Mildred touched the bouquet after you poisoned it. And Sarah accidentally touched it, too,” Maggie finished. “Revenge didn’t bring back your husband, but it did kill two, maybe three, women.”

Diana began to cry. “I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “I’m so, so sorry …”

Mark handcuffed her and brought her to her feet, then looked to Maggie, who stood and brushed herself off, ignoring the shocked looks of the hotel guests and staff. “Are you all right?”

“Yes,” Maggie answered. “But if you wouldn’t mind taking her to St. Leonard’s, I’d like to get back to Sarah.”

Dr. Carroll continued to update Frain with telephone calls. Elbows propped on his desk, he watched the Union Jack snap in the stiff breeze outside his window.

“I consider this a visit to the mad tea party, Dr. Carroll,” Frain said. “Frau Hess is playing you.”

The doctor shook his head. “I’m no Sigmund Freud, but I don’t think she is.”

“You don’t know Clara Hess.”

“I know her better than you do.”

“You know what she
chooses
to show you.”

“I’ve done my research. The woman we know as Clara Hess was born Agna Frei—Agna Clara Frei. She changed her name to Clara Schwartz when she began her opera career, and became Clara Hope when she married Edmund Hope, and then became Clara Hess when she returned to Germany and married the conductor Miles Hess.”

“So she knows her name,” Frain deadpanned. “Remember, she’s an actress—she knows how to create a role and how to perform it brilliantly.”

“I don’t believe this is a performance, Mr. Frain.”

“You have a few more days. If she doesn’t start talking and giving us information, she’ll be executed.”

The doctor looked at his desk calendar. It was December 3.
Four days left until her execution. “I think that would be a terrible mistake.”

“Get some intel out of her that I can use—or just flip her to our side. Unless you can do that, she’s going to end up like Josef Jakobs—dead.”

“I want books, Dr. Carroll.” This time, Dr. Carroll was visiting her in her room at the Tower. He had ordered the cage and the restraints removed.

“I’m sorry, Frau Hess, but prisoners do not have the privilege of receiving books.”

“What do you think I’m going to do with them? Make paper airplanes? Pinprick code? It’s not as if everyone wouldn’t be on the lookout for that.” Clara rose from her chair and stretched.

Then, she doubled over in pain, clutching her stomach. It was the telltale sign of another personality coming to the fore.

“Frau Hess?”

“I’m—I’m—” She struggled to speak. When she did, a different voice came from her mouth.

It was Agna. “My favorite book is Hoffmann’s
Der Struwwelpeter
. Do you know it?”

“I do.” Dr. Carroll’s voice gentled as it always did when he spoke with the child Agna.

“Am I banished?” she asked, looking around, eyes wild. “I must be. I’m in my room and I can’t get out. Mother must have locked me in!”

She flung herself on the narrow bed and began to weep. “I don’t know what I do to her! She’s always locking me places—the closet, the pantry. She locks me away! Sometimes she forgets about me!”

“Is that what you think is happening?” the doctor asked.

“Isn’t it? And I don’t even have my dolly. Or my books.”

“Well, surely a book wouldn’t hurt,” Dr. Carroll said. “I’ll see if I can hunt up a copy of
Der Struwwelpeter
for you. I’ll bring it tomorrow.”

Agna smiled.

Churchill was in bed, surrounded by a half-eaten breakfast and various papers and files, as well as his precious Box of top-secret documents, wearing nothing but his dragon-embroidered silk dressing gown. “Cars and refrigerators!”

“Sir?” Churchill’s long-suffering manservant, Mr. Inces, was unruffled by his boss’s sudden exclamations.

“The Americans!” The Prime Minister crumpled a memo and threw it into the fireplace, where it burst into flame. “While we fight for our last breath, American factories are producing cars and refrigerators, not planes and tanks!”

“Yes, sir,” Inces agreed, tidying up the overflowing ashtrays and drained brandy snifters.

“Their ships are being sunk by Nazi U-boats in the Atlantic, and still they make cars and refrigerators! Meanwhile, Kurusu goes from Hitler’s snake pit in Berlin to Washington, DC. ‘Special envoy’ my arse.”

“I thought Admiral Nomura was the Japanese Ambassador to the United States, sir?” Inces remarked.

“Looks like Tōjō’s sending in reinforcements,” the Prime Minister growled. “The Japs are up to something … And where the hell’s the Japanese fleet? Well, don’t just stand there—get me Mr. Sterling and Mr. Greene!”

“Yes, sir,” Inces said.

The two private secretaries reached the P.M.’s bedchamber less than three minutes later. “Yes, sir?” David managed, out of breath.

“The bloody Japanese are up to something. Get me all of the intelligence reports from Bletchley. Call my Chiefs of Staff. We need to consider all options—Japan may attack our holdings in Thailand, Singapore, the Philippines—maybe even they’ll attack Russia, now that they’ve signed that blasted pact with the Nazzies.”

“And what if they do attack us in the Pacific, sir?” John knew as well as anyone that all of Britain’s power, not that it was much, was tied up with defending her home island.

“Just get me the goddamn papers!” the P.M. roared. “And find out where the damn Japanese fleet is!” he thundered, flinging a pillow at the two young men, who departed hastily.

Minutes crawled by until the two private secretaries reappeared in his doorway. “No one seems to know where the Japanese fleet is, sir,” David reported.

“Not good enough!” the Prime Minister shouted. “Gimme decrypts!” Bletchley Park had broken the Japanese naval and diplomatic codes. Still, the codes only gave part of the picture.

Churchill pulled out one particular piece of paper from the rest. “What’s this one mean?” he asked, putting on his gold-framed spectacles to take a closer took. “ 
‘Climb Mount Niitaka 1208’
?”

“It’s a JN-25 transmission from Tokyo, sir,” David replied. “It went out on the second of December.”

The P.M.’s face hardened. “Where the hell is Mount Niitaka?”

“I—I don’t know, sir,” David stammered.

“Well, bloody well find out! That’s why I have you young pups here! Why the devil—”

“Mount Niitaka is the highest mountain in Formosa, even higher than Mount Fuji. It’s often referred to here in Britain as Mount Morrison,” John interposed.

“Highest mountain … A naval message to climb a mountain?” the Prime Minister growled. Nelson, who’d been curled up at the
end of the P.M.’s bed, had endured enough and jumped off. “That’s an attack code! That’s a
bloody attack code
!”

John and David looked at each other, realizing he was right. “Yes, sir,” they both managed.

“And 1208—the eighth of December?” John ventured. He’d run his hands through his hair, causing it to stand on end as if he’d been electrocuted.

The P.M. was lost in his thoughts again. “But why so much time?” he murmured. “And where’s the damn Jap fleet?” Then, “Gimme map!”

John hurried to the perimeter of the room, where there was an antique globe in a Queen Anne stand. He took out the orb. “Just throw it, young man!”

John tossed the world, and the P.M. caught it with ease. David almost whistled in appreciation.

“Mount Niitaka …” the Prime Minister mumbled, searching for it on the globe. “ ‘Climb Mount Niitaka’ must have been the order to begin a mission—the climb
—not
the order to attack … The Japanese fleet was last spotted off Formosa almost a week ago … So they’re at sea … But where? God blast it to hell and back!”

“They’d probably be sailing about three hundred miles a day, sir,” David ventured, trying to make up for not knowing Mount Niitaka.

The P.M. thrust up a finger. “Remember, I was First Lord of the Admiralty, young pup! I know bloody well how fast a ship can sail! But they won’t go in a straight line … Let’s give them three thousand miles … They were last spotted off the coast of China, near Formosa …”

“Yes,” John said. “We sent all of that information to the Americans in Washington, both the Army and Navy. And our double agent, Dušan Popov, went to J. Edgar himself, with the intel we
received, about the Japanese making a grid map of Pearl. Popov said Hoover threw him out of his office, then tried to throw him out of the country …”