The Poison Tide (18 page)

‘He doesn’t seem himself, you know . . .’ Cohalan observed at last. ‘Disappointed, angry even, at least that’s what I read in his letters.’

Nicholson said he thought Casement was in good spirits. But short of money, Christensen chipped in. Sir Roger wasn’t able to stay at the best hotels and didn’t eat like a gentleman.

‘Like a gentleman, you say?’ John Devoy leant forward, turning his shaggy grey head to stare menacingly down the table at them.

‘He has expenses,’ Christensen ventured nervously. ‘The grand circles he must be in . . . some costs . . . clothes . . .’

Devoy snorted sceptically.

‘. . . clothes . . .’ Christensen repeated, nonplussed.

The priest came to his rescue. ‘He lives very modestly, Mr Devoy, but he must put our case to the German leaders, their Chancellor and high command.’

‘Father, we’ve sent him six and a half thousand dollars – he’s no reason to complain,’ replied Devoy, softly spoken, distinctly Irish, too old to mince his words.

Cohalan patted his arm. ‘He’s out there dealing with these fellas on his own, John, it’s a tricky business; they’ve larger fish to fry than us . . . You’ve been very quiet, Mr de Witt. What do you say? You’re here to speak on Roger’s behalf, aren’t you?’

‘Before he does, I’d like to know who he is,’ Devoy remarked, and there was a murmur of assent round the table.

Wolff reached lazily into his jacket pocket for his cigarette case, took one out and rolled it lightly between his fingers. ‘I’m a private man, Mr Devoy. Roger Casement trusts me because he knows me.’

‘He says in his letter you fought the British in South Africa with MacBride.’

‘That’s right, Mr Cohalan . . .’ Snap. His lighter burst into flame; ‘. . . but that’s no sort of bona fide, I’m sure you’ll agree. I’m here to present Roger’s view, to answer the questions I can – my past is none of your business.’ He paused again to remove a strand of tobacco from his lip; ‘if you don’t respect Roger’s choice I have no business here—’

‘I don’t,’ interrupted Devoy.

‘Let’s hear him out,’ the judge said.

‘The Germans won’t help you if you don’t do anything for yourselves,’ Wolff continued. ‘That’s Roger’s opinion. He wants young Irishmen from here and someone, an Irishman, to command the brigade. Then they might believe you’ve got the guts to do more than sing about dying for old Ireland.’

‘You’re sneering at us,’ someone said. They were angry now, too angry to care who Sir Roger’s representative might be.

‘He’s wasting his time with the brigade,’ Devoy shook his head. ‘Vanity, that’s what it is . . .’

‘So you say,’ Wolff pressed on, ‘but what proof do the Germans have that there’s any cause in Ireland they can count on?’ There were more complaints. ‘Gentlemen, they want you to show some spirit.’

It was the judge who brought them to order. The battle was won: Mr de Witt was allowed to speak his mind because they were Irish rebels for whom it was a great virtue, and perhaps after years of sentimental talk they were inclined to believe what he said was true. But if de Witt’s role was to speak for his friend Roger, what of the spy Wolff? A patina of mistrust, a little more of Casement’s reputation lost, the suggestion of a man close to a breakdown; goodness, it was easy enough. The man’s letters, his soul-baring letters, and the facts that de Witt presented to them, were all that the spy, Wolff, needed because they spoke for themselves. It was Roger’s view that hundreds, thousands of Irish Americans might be recruited to the brigade, and Roger was sure they could cross the Atlantic in disguise, and Roger had been promised rifles and a ship to carry them all to Ireland. Mr de Witt declined to give his own view. He did speak with passion of his friend’s faithful heart, of his frustrations, the slights he bore without complaint and his much reduced circumstances. With too much passion, C might have said. He would have been wrong. Wolff could see it in their heavy Irish faces. They had no faith in the brigade – what was it Casement called his men? – no faith in his ‘Poor Brothers’ – and they were going to leave them, like it said in the song, hanging on the barbed wire. But if some passion helped Mr de Witt’s friend to have a little more money in exile, good meals, a comfortable bed, then Mr Wolff was content too.

‘We must send more, of course,’ declared Justice Cohalan. ‘You will carry it back, de Witt . . .’

Wolff shook his head. ‘I’m not returning to Berlin.’

‘Oh?’

‘This isn’t my cause, although I pray it succeeds in time and have faith that it will. I have a living to make here – Roger’s friend is to act as a courier,’ he said, half turning to Christensen.

‘Yes, perhaps,’ the judge replied without enthusiasm.

‘Our cause will succeed without
your
prayers,’ growled Devoy.

Wolff smiled sardonically. ‘I hope you’re right because I’m not a man who prays a great deal.’

They glared at each other for a few seconds but with difficulty. ‘I felt sure you weren’t that sort of man,’ Devoy chuckled mischievously. ‘Sorry, Father.’

With a smile on his face, the old man reminded Wolff of a grey Casement – the man he might become if he slipped the hangman’s noose. The priest blew out his cheeks and waved his hand, relieved to see a little sunshine.

After the smiles, they wanted Wolff to go. There were handshakes, thanks, a promise that the Clan would be in touch – the Algonquin, wasn’t it? Was there anything they could do for him? Perhaps, he said; he was a businessman.

‘Be gentle with Roger. Your country has no more devoted servant,’ he told them. It was meant as a parting shot and he was turning to the door when the young woman spoke to him.

‘Mr de Witt, will you find time to visit Sir Roger’s sister while you’re here?’

He’d presumed she was just the girl who took the minutes: early twenties, not married – he always looked for a ring – educated East Coast voice, fine features, intelligent face.

‘Yes, perhaps tomorrow,’ he said.

‘I know Mrs Newman is very anxious for news of her brother.’

They made eye contact and she offered an embarrassed smile then looked down, turning her notes deliberately.

‘All right, gentlemen.’ Justice Cohalan clapped his big hands together. ‘For now . . .’

T
HE FOLLOWING MORNING
Wolff visited the offices of the Hamburg America Shipping Line on Broadway. ‘Contact Dr Albert, he will have something for a man like you,’ Nadolny had said to him. But Albert wasn’t there and his clerks pretended they didn’t know when he would be. Wolff left a note with his name and address, mentioning their ‘friend’ in Berlin.

It was another blue day and with nothing particular to do until the afternoon he walked to Battery Park and sat in the sunshine watching the traffic along the waterfront, a liner creeping upriver to Hoboken, freighters in and out of the Jersey wharfs. Busier than he remembered it, with a score or more ships waiting for a berth, smoke and steam drifting north-west on a warm breeze. Horses, cattle, grain, iron, guns, ammunition to stoke the fire in Europe. In the name of peaceful commerce, of course. Stocks at the Broad Street exchange up again. No wonder the Germans were raging. Like children in a sweetie shop, everything for sale without discrimination, but with no possibility of slipping the British naval blockade of the Atlantic. If they couldn’t dip into the jar, the best they could do was stop the enemy doing the same. Sabotage made sense. But not Dr Albert; he was the man with the purse strings, the commercial attaché in Washington before the war. No, he would pass Wolff’s note to someone else – if he decided it was worth the trouble. What were his instructions from Berlin? The sun slipped behind cloud; somewhere in the outer bay a ship was sounding its horn, three, four, five urgent blasts. Rising from the bench, Wolff ambled by the river rail in the direction of the pier and a line of taxicabs. For now it was Casement, quietly losing his mind in Berlin, sad, desperate, lonely Roger, who was still his passport.

Wolff telephoned Casement’s sister later that morning and arranged to visit her at four. Not just for King and Country, he liked to think, but out of a sense of duty to Casement too – or was he deluding himself? Mrs Agnes Newman lived in a prosperous tree-lined neighbourhood of Brooklyn among bank clerks and city accountants, a modest single-storey house, neat white picket fence and garden. Her bell tinkled impatiently. She answered the door herself and he was struck at once by the family resemblance. A little greyer, fuller in face and figure, but the same fine features and brooding deep-set eyes.

‘Roddy wrote to us about you,’ she said, stepping from the door. ‘I’m worried about him, you must tell me everything . . . please . . .’ She led him into her sitting room.

‘You met Miss McDonnell?’

‘Still to be properly introduced,’ he said. It was the young committee secretary of the night before. ‘Miss McDonnell.’ He gave a stiff bow.

She smiled in amusement: ‘Mr de Witt.’

‘Sit down, sit down, please.’ Mrs Newman patted the only armchair. It had been positioned in the middle of a tight circle of wooden ones like a throne. The room was crammed with furniture, none of it interesting, the atmosphere alive with dust, swirling impatiently in the sunlight pouring through the lace curtains.

‘Laura says you spoke well,’ said Mrs Newman, taking a seat opposite. ‘Those people don’t understand Roddy – such a pity his friend, McGarrity, from Philadelphia wasn’t there.’

She leant forward, hands clasped in a big fist, almost touching his knees, but gazing at his face too intently to notice. ‘His last letter . . . I’m worried, Mr de Witt.’

‘I have another,’ he said, reaching into his jacket. She took it from him, turned it over twice, three times, as if reading it with her fingertips, then put it to one side. ‘I want to hear from you first, everything – where is he living, is he eating well? . . . he wrote to say he’d seen the Blüchers.’

Wolff told her a little of the party, an account so anodyne it might have been another event. Then he described Casement’s life in Berlin, his hotel and routine and the sympathetic hours he’d spent walking with Roger in the Tiergarten, friend and confidant. ‘He likes to walk, Mrs Newman . . .’

‘Yes, of course he does,’ she said irritably. ‘What I want—’

He cut across her, ‘. . . and walking is free.’

‘. . . to know . . .’

She lifted an anxious hand to the nape of her neck, her mouth opening and shutting like a trout’s. ‘I know he’s short of money,’ she said, finding her voice again. ‘Be frank with me – how is he managing? He seems so very low.’

Wolff nodded. ‘I think he’s lonely. He doesn’t trust the Germans and they don’t entirely trust him, Mrs Newman. Do you know anything of his plans for a brigade?’

The two women exchanged glances. Plainly it was Clan
business and she wasn’t supposed to know. Laura McDonnell was avoiding his gaze.

‘He’s loyal to his men but he must doubt, well, he has black times. He’s so alone. I think that’s why we became friends – ships in a storm . . . you’re right to be concerned for him.’

She looked away, discreetly brushing a tear from the corner of her eye. ‘I knew it,’ she said fiercely. ‘He gives so much – people don’t understand – he’ll sacrifice himself.’

What could they do to help him? The Clan must answer his rallying cry with recruits and money. For the good of Ireland, for freedom, for liberty, for Roddy – Mr de Witt, don’t you agree? Mr de Witt was careful not to pour cold water on his ‘friend’s’ high hopes, not in sister Agnes’ sitting room. Miss McDonnell chose her words with care and said very little. He was conscious of her watching him closely, watching him nod, watching him smile, perfectly insincere, the smile he’d practised in front of a mirror, a ‘whatever you’re buying I’m selling’ smile, the friend, leader, hero, saint smile. Ah, dear Agnes, if only you knew about me, he mused. May I call you ‘Nina’? Your brother calls you ‘Nina’ in his letters, doesn’t he? Nina, you’re passionate like your brother but a bit of a bully. But, Nina, the world is so full of duplicity and confusion. There are things you don’t know, even about your Roddy. Yes, wipe away that tear and I’ll tell you. Imagine him bent over his dear sweet Adler. Yes, giving it to the Empire in Ireland’s name. It’s true, really. That much is true. Can’t you read it in my eyes? Of course he couldn’t, no; couldn’t stir the dust in the room.

‘Tea, Mr de Witt?’ she asked after a while.

When they were alone, Miss McDonnell observed, ‘You’re very . . . discreet, Mr de Witt, careful – practised, like a lawyer.’

‘You disapprove, Miss McDonnell; what would you . . .’

‘Laura, please, I really do prefer it.’

‘What would you have me say, Laura?’

‘You should tell the truth,’ she said quietly.

‘Do you? You were at the meeting – is your committee going to recruit young men here in America for Roger?’

She shook her head sadly.

‘Roger isn’t going to recruit any there, you know – in Germany – but he might go mad trying.’

They sat in silence, Laura trying to avoid his gaze. Short, curvy, well dressed but not expensively, with the easy confident manner of someone older. Content to say nothing, a smile close to her lips and a twinkle in her blue-green eyes; a rich mane of dark auburn hair – proud of her hair, she wore it loose, turning her head out of habit to present it to advantage.

‘And you, Mr de Witt . . .’ it swept towards him as she looked him in the eye at last, ‘what about you?’

‘There are always jobs for engineers.’

‘And gun runners.’

He raised his brow quizzically. ‘Who have you been talking to, Laura?’

She gave a mischievous laugh but didn’t answer, and a moment later Mrs Newman came into the room with a tray. The conversation returned to Casement and childhood tales. Plainly dear Nina had always known what was best for her brother. There was no mention of Mr Newman. Out of politeness she asked Wolff about his own childhood and his time in South Africa and listened to his answers with an expression entirely empty of curiosity. But when he rose to leave, she made him promise to visit her again soon so they could settle what ‘our Roddy’ should do. ‘He needs his family,’ she said, ‘. . . and friends,’ she added with less conviction. Laura made her excuses too and left with him.