The Poison Tide (31 page)

‘Well?’ Rintelen prompted.

‘Not very much,’ Wolff declared bullishly. ‘A fire would be enough.’

‘And those?’

‘Ha.’ He rapped his knuckles against a crate. ‘Don’t concern yourself with the rest of this stuff. They’ll be picking up the pieces in Bronx County.’

Rintelen pursed his lips thoughtfully for a moment, then nodded, ‘Enough.’

They walked back along the causeway swiftly and in silence. At the gate, a hearty pat on the back and more money for the watchman. ‘For the love of old Ireland,’ he remarked without irony as he slipped it into his breast pocket. They pressed Wolff to join them at Martha’s. ‘What better place to be at this hour?’ Rintelen enquired with a disingenuous little smile. ‘My own bed,’ he replied curtly, and for once the German wasn’t inclined to argue. ‘But you must come to the ship tomorrow at eight.’

‘Oh, must I?’

‘If you want to work, yes,’ he retorted in a clipped no-nonsense voice that implied he was happy to dispense with Wolff’s services. Wolff promised to be there.

It was after midnight when he paid off the cab close to his apartment. The diminutive spy in the derby hat was loitering in a doorway down the street. To be sure I’m as good as my word, Wolff reflected, as he closed the sitting-room curtains. A mistake to appear flustered in front of Rintelen; a poor performance. An old ham with stage fright. He poured a whisky and sat with his eyes closed, breathing deeply. Just a few minutes, then he would leave a coded message for Thwaites. Tonight. No more blunders like the
Blackness
. The glass was at his lips when the sudden trilling of the telephone in the hall made him start. At that hour, it could only be the man he was preparing to call.

‘Sorry to telephone so late, sir.’ The flat unflappable voice of Thwaites’ man, White. ‘I’m ringing on behalf of
Royal
, sir. Mr Schmidt’s compliments, he’s anxious to speak to you. An offer of employment.’

‘Very well, I’ll visit Mr Schmidt . . .’

‘At the office, sir.’

‘The office, yes, of course.’ To insist on the Consulate, well, it had to be urgent. ‘I’m obliged to Mr Schmidt. I’ll visit the first opportunity I have.’

He put the receiver down gently. First opportunity was their code for right away. Was his cover compromised? But Rintelen’s cronies would have finished him and dumped his body in a boxcar. He didn’t know, couldn’t, and that was unnerving, so he put it from his mind and bent his thoughts to avoiding the spy in the derby hat. Off all lights except the lamp in the bedroom, change of hat and coat, revolver in pocket, stocking feet from the apartment, fire escape into the foul-smelling back court, the spare key to the building opposite hanging in the coalhole where he’d watched the drunken janitor leave it one evening.

It was a while before he found a taxicab and he was obliged to walk most of the way. The British Consulate was at 44 Whitehall Street in a brutal sandstone-and-brick building close to the elevated railway and an army recruitment office. Wolff walked along the street, then back, before slipping through the door. White was in the lobby and greeted him with a broad grin that suggested he was enjoying this new adventure as valet and spy. Why not? The last one had taken him on Mr Churchill’s bloody goose chase to Gallipoli. The Bureau’s new rooms were on the first floor,
Sir William Wiseman, Munitions
handwritten on a card at the door of his outer office. Perhaps Gaunt was resisting anything more permanent.

‘Whisky, isn’t it?’ Wiseman asked. He must have come from dinner, breezing into the Consulate in his white tie.

Thwaites had a face like an undertaker’s mute.

‘You better tell me,’ Wolff said impatiently. Englishmen always made a mess of bad news. ‘Come on – spill it.’

‘Sit down.’ Wiseman waved the whisky tumbler at a large leather armchair in front of his desk.

‘Is it my mother?’

‘Your mother, old boy?’ Wiseman handed Wolff the whisky and eased himself carefully into the chair opposite, Thwaites sitting beside him. ‘No, not your mother. But I’m afraid it
is
bad news. The
Blackness
was lost – sunk. An explosion.’ He jerked his hands out theatrically. ‘Terrible luck.’

‘Bloody incompetence,’ chipped in Thwaites. ‘The Navy should have dealt with it and I told Gaunt so.’

‘Gone? Christ. Christ.’

‘
Captain
Gaunt . . .’ said Wiseman reprovingly, ‘informed us this afternoon. Lost three days ago.’

‘Were there survivors?’

‘None, I’m afraid.’

‘How many men?’

‘Forty-five.’

‘Christ.’ Wolff closed his eyes, pressing his fingers firmly to his temple. When he opened them he would wake and know it for a nightmare. Just as he used to in the boxroom at the farm: always the graveyard hours. But Thwaites was speaking again: ‘. . . Gaunt says they tricked you. The fuse was set for two days, not four.’

‘Christ. I told him I couldn’t be sure.’ He shivered and opened his eyes, his head still in his hands. ‘I’ve sunk one of our ships.’

‘No. They sank one of our ships, one more of our ships,’ Wiseman insisted quietly. ‘I know how you must feel but . . .’

‘What sort of madness . . .’ he interjected. My God, what had he done? To lose a ship and crew . . . no, they didn’t know how he felt. How could they? ‘I used to be a seaman.’

‘Nothing else you could do,’ Thwaites declared firmly.

‘. . . forty-five men.’ Wolff remembered the flat, pugnacious face of the ship’s mate he’d browbeaten into letting him place the explosives. ‘I could have stopped . . .’

‘Rintelen’s operation has sunk at least three this month,’ Thwaites continued. ‘There are Clan
men in all the large ports – you said so yourself.’

‘But the
Blackness
was me.’ Rising quickly, Wolff stepped over to the fire, his mind clouded. ‘I should leave, seek another path,’ but he knew he didn’t have the courage. He had delivered them to the enemy just as he’d done in Turkey, and he would pay for both in time because, in some way he perceived only dimly, that was how it always was, and should be.

‘Our job is to stop him,’ he heard Wiseman say from what sounded like a great distance.

‘Yes,’ he said flatly.

‘Here.’ The baronet was suddenly beside him, pressing the whisky into his hand. ‘Come on, old fellow.’

‘Yes.’

They sat in awkward silence, gazing into their glasses, at the patterns of the Persian rug, the embers in the grate; Thwaites turning his stick impatiently between thumb and forefinger, Wiseman with chin on bow tie, careful not to catch his eye. Fortitude, Wolff, their silence seemed to say; only a battle lost, the war to fight; you’ve blundered, but ‘
Was there a man dismay’d
?’ Somewhere a clock with a Westminster chime struck two.

‘Rintelen’s going to attack the Black Tom,’ he said at last.

‘Oh?’ Wiseman leant forward, his elbows on his knees.

‘I was on the point of arranging a meeting to warn you.’

‘Has he told you when?’ Wiseman asked, staring earnestly at him over his fingertips, arrogant in a good-natured sort of way.

‘No.’

‘Is the fellow boasting?’ Thwaites threw in. ‘You said yourself he’s conceited, Dark Invader and all that – Black Tom is a bit of a fortress.’

‘It’s nothing of the sort,’ Wolff replied, and he told them of his visit; that the price of the ticket was a few dollars to a doorkeeper from the Clan, and that enough TNT was sitting on the dock to rock Liberty from her foundations with just toe rags from Green’s to keep her safe.

‘The Consulate would probably lose its windows,’ he remarked matter-of-factly.

‘Ouch.’ Wiseman pulled a face. ‘That would be unfortunate. Yes.’ He patted his pockets, then rose and drifted over to his desk. ‘Well, we have some ideas, don’t we?’ he said, addressing Thwaites. ‘Ah, here it is.’ He picked up a leather pouch from the desk and began tearing at tobacco, pressing the shreds into his pipe with a key. ‘You see, Norman has made contact with his friend in the Police Department Bomb Squad – you were right, he’s on to this fellow Koenig. Takes a dim view.’ Striking a match, he lowered it carefully to the bowl. ‘Have to find the right balance,’ he gasped between puffs. ‘He wants to have his cake and eat it. Doesn’t want us to interfere, but will take what he can from us – isn’t that so, Norman?’

‘He’s one hundred per cent,’ interjected Thwaites. ‘Thinks Rintelen’s men are behind a fire at a munitions factory in Pennsylvania too. Haven’t told him about you, of course. Police Department’s full of Irishmen.’

‘We’ll expose Rintelen in the newspapers, use Norman’s friends on
The Times
and the
New York World
,’ Wiseman said. ‘Only we need to offer some proof.’ He took the pipe from his mouth and began inspecting it carefully. ‘Yes, this cabin of Rintelen’s,’ he offered casually, ‘the one where he keeps his records – any chance?’

The springs of Thwaites’ chair groaned as he shifted awkwardly. Wolff glanced over at him but his head was turned away.

‘I’ll try,’ replied Wolff deliberately.

‘Yeees,’ drawled Wiseman. ‘After today, the sooner the better.’

‘Of course,’ he retorted indignantly. ‘Of course.’ Was Wiseman trying to make him feel guiltier? ‘Look, can’t you just make Rintelen disappear?’ It wasn’t a solution C encouraged, but after the
Blackness
. . .

‘Thought of that,’ said Wiseman, sitting back in his chair. ‘One of Gaunt’s Czech footpads – trouble is, the network would still be in place. And you – it might compromise you.’

‘I see.’ But I don’t care, Wolff thought, running his fingers through his hair wearily. Or am I being naïve? He wanted to stay in America, the sun shone a little brighter even in winter, and if he left he would never make love to Laura.

‘Cigarette?’ Thwaites leant forward with his case. ‘The thing is, our friends at the
World
need names, payments, meetings; they want someone at the top – in the embassy perhaps – to stir it up on the eve of a presidential election.’

‘And Delmar,’ Wiseman chipped in. ‘London keeps pestering. They’re convinced there’s something.’

Wolff bent to Thwaites’ match then leant back, inhaling deeply. ‘I’ll do my best.’ What else could he say?

‘Well, this might help,’ said Wiseman, reaching into his waistcoat and removing a pocket watch.

Wolff raised his brow quizzically. ‘With what, precisely?’

‘It’s a Ticka, a hidden camera. Look,’ Wiseman held it upright between thumb and forefinger; ‘dummy face. Lens here in the winder, the shutter release this tiny catch at the bottom. Here,’ he presented it on his palm to Wolff. ‘The film is loaded on a reel. Twenty-five exposures. Save you taking too many notes.’

‘Needs a good deal of light, doesn’t it?’ He’d heard tell of the Ticka but had never needed to use one. ‘Look, I’ll do what I can.’

They sat for a while in uncomfortable silence, the shadows of the fire dying on the walls, a winter chill creeping into the room.

‘You must be shattered,’ Wiseman observed at last, his voice soapy with concern. ‘White will whistle up a taxicab.’

Wolff said it was better if he made his own arrangements. They wished him good luck, shook his hand and Thwaites urged him to put the
Blackness
from his mind.

‘But what an explosion,’ Wiseman exclaimed, stopping suddenly at the door. ‘Like a German push. Worse.’ He was plainly stirred by the thought, shamelessly so. ‘Not the ship,’ he added hastily, ‘the Black Tom yard – can you imagine, in a presidential election year?’

Walking on the cold street, Wolff turned this remark through his tired mind for a time. There had been the glint of an idea in Wiseman’s eye. Rattle the windows of the White House. Something to tip the balance and bring America into the war, he thought, blowing warm vapour into his hands. Crossing Bowery, he slipped on the frozen sidewalk and shortened his stride. He was cold and empty.
How should I feel?
In the twisted logic of the Bureau, the ship and her crew were just small pieces. Perhaps Black Tom, too, in time. Like those decoy attacks favoured by generals in France, frightfully clever chaps who could see ‘the big picture’. Had Gaunt made any effort to remove the bombs from the
Blackness
? Did they decide on the alternative in the interests of what they perceived as a greater good? To question everything was to know nothing and to make everyone your enemy.

On Chambers Street, he managed to hail a cab. It dropped him short of his apartment and he used the janitor’s key to creep back through the yard into the building. He needn’t have bothered; the man in the derby had left his post. Four o’clock and in another hour the city would begin to stir. The Russian in the flat above would slam his door, then clatter down the stairs on his way to work at the Fulton Street fish market; while in the kitchen the landlord’s eldest daughter would feed the range and boil hot water for the family; and if the old lady on the ground floor was awake she would open her window and place a saucer of milk on the ledge for the cats.

Wolff took off his coat and hat, he took off his shoes and jacket, then rolled himself in the bedcover. ‘I don’t laugh enough,’ he muttered, closing his eyes. Violet used to make him laugh.

T
IMING WAITS FOR
opportunity, C liked to say, and a good spy is the one who recognises and seizes the perfect moment without hesitation.

‘What were you expecting to happen?’ Wolff exclaimed when von Rintelen greeted him with the
Shipping News
the following evening. In black and white on page two – the
Blackness
: hull, crew and cargo lost in an explosion at sea to a cause unknown. ‘But not to us,’ Rintelen observed with a yelp of laughter that set Wolff’s teeth on edge. ‘Good judgement – you see, Hinsch?’

‘Yes,’ Hinsch conceded, turning to acknowledge Wolff with a nod and a grudging smile, ‘you’ve done well.’ They were true comrades – who could doubt it? A toast! Rintelen insisted; and because he was a gentleman with a generous paymaster, his wine was good.

They were sitting in his office cabin, the newspaper open on the delicate lacquer table, anchored by their glasses and cigarette cases. ‘Wine is the only thing the Franzmann does better than us,’ he remarked, inspecting the bottle. ‘I will send some cases home. Quicker than waiting for our army to conquer France.’