The Secret Vanguard (11 page)

The smile vanished – as suddenly as if a battery of cameras had clicked and it was no longer necessary. ‘Does this gentleman’ – the silver-haired man’s glance turned sharply to Appleby – ‘work in the Ministry?’

‘No, sir. He–’

But the silver-haired man had swung round, frowning in recognition. ‘Are not you the police officer who dealt with the affair of Auldearn at Scamnum Court?’

‘Yes, my lord.’

‘Inspector Appleby?’ The smile hovered fleetingly over this feat of memory.

‘Yes, my lord.’

The newcomer turned again to the tall man. ‘I approve,’ he said, ‘of your bringing Mr Appleby in.’

‘Yes, sir.’ The tall man looked slightly blank.

‘He will find Orchard if anyone can.’ The silver-haired man turned to Appleby. ‘You will find him and invite him to get in touch with the Secretary to the Cabinet by noon on Thursday.’

‘Yes, my lord.’

The silver-haired man retreated to the door by which he had entered. His hand went out to open it; he half turned and the little smile repeated itself; he was gone. The tall man took out a handkerchief and made a faintly humorous dab at his brow. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘we’d better get on.’

‘Yes, Sir George.’ Discreetly, the two men smiled at each other. Appleby sat down and produced his volume of Swinburne once more. ‘The first point is to find the men who were trailing the trailers. A message was passed secretly and by means of a canting poem in the presence of Philip Ploss. But not to deceive Ploss, who was nobody in particular and would have made nothing of it, anyway. The man who spoke the verses must have either known or suspected that he was in the presence of somebody specifically on the lookout for espionage activity. And the same must hold for what happened on the train in Scotland. Swinburne’s poem was brought in to cheat somebody other than this girl who has vanished.’

The tall man nodded. ‘And apparently with a damned ironical result each time. The person to be fooled – a professional counter-espionage man –
was
fooled, while a casual onlooker tumbled to the game.’

‘It might be more ironical than that, sir. No counter-espionage man need actually have been present at all. This covert means of communication in verse may simply have been a precaution. In which case if the messages had been delivered in a perfectly straightforward way the people concerned would have got away with it. What Ploss and the girl tumbled to was the bogus nature of the poetry. All the same, I think it unlikely that on both these occasions there was no actual trailing. The trick was laborious and risky, and likely to be resorted to by a man with very good reason to believe that he was being closely shadowed. The first thing is to discover if they know anything about it over at the Intelligence. Colonel Hartley will be the person.’

The tall man’s hand hovered over the telephone. He hesitated. ‘It’s rather telling them where we think they’ve come down – don’t you agree? And has it occurred to you that our people mayn’t have been in on it at all? The trailers or shadowers – if they existed – may have been representing quite another party. Such things are happening every day.’

‘Yes, Sir George. But I don’t think the facts here quite fit in with the trailer’s being simply the agent of a third power. You’ve seen the hollow coins spies sometimes use for passing information? That’s a trick to employ when a man is very hard pressed indeed – when he knows that a telegram will be scrutinized and a pillar box searched if he passes within a yard of it. And this poetry business belongs to the same department of the game. It is designed to cheat an opponent who has the whole power of the state behind him.’

‘I dare say you’re right.’ The tall man’s hand again hesitated on the telephone. ‘Hartley, did you say? These people are damned touchy about the telephone sometimes. I’ll go round. You’ll come?’

‘No, sir. I must see the assistant-commissioner and arrange to leave for Scotland at once if necessary. May I see you again here in an hour’s time?’

The tall man looked at his watch. ‘Make it Gatti’s,’ he said, ‘and lunch.’

An hour later Appleby bumped a suitcase through swing doors, waved away a page, edged himself between a table and a plush bench. Dover sole bonne femme, he thought – and looked up to see the tall man and Colonel Hartley bearing down on him from the other end of the long restaurant. Hartley was the first to speak. ‘Appleby,’ he said, ‘this is capital. One day you will come across to us for good.’ He sat down. ‘We’ve got just less than nothing,’ he continued abruptly. ‘I’ve been telling Sir George.’ He studied the menu with amiable concentration: he was a man who had learnt to act. ‘On the Ploss incident nothing at all. None of our people could have been concerned; the poetry trick must have been used because of a false alarm. They felt Orchard was a big thing, and that made them edgy. They felt he was a very big thing or they wouldn’t have been quite so drastic with Ploss.’ He smiled grimly. ‘Or with this girl in the highlands.’

The tall man stirred uncomfortably. ‘You don’t think they’d–’ He stopped as a waiter hovered.

‘I do,’ said Hartley presently. ‘Unless they had a use for her. There’s hope in the fact that clever folk have a use for most things. In case you don’t know Appleby, by the way, I may say he’s well up in all that. And now the train from Edinburgh. That’s different. Richards was on that.’

‘Richards?’ said Appleby. ‘The sandy-haired fellow?’

‘Yes. He was trailing a worthy called Wright – or Richter if you prefer it. Wright looked like making a break out of the country with we didn’t know quite what. We thought nothing much.’ Hartley gave the ghost of a smile.

‘In fact,’ said Appleby, ‘with something you’d put in his way.’

Hartley turned beaming to the tall man. ‘There – you can’t say he hasn’t got the elements. But at least what Wright had was nothing whatever to do with Orchard according to any reckoning of ours. He showed signs of heading out of the country, though, and Richards had instructions to follow if necessary to Riga or Chungking: we wanted to improve our acquaintance with his friends abroad. Well now, Wright travelled from London to Edinburgh, and it was a fair guess that he was going to embark at Leith. But from Edinburgh he went on to Perth – by train, it seems, which connected with the one from which this girl has vanished. That was quite in the picture too: an elementary dodge to break the trail. And sure enough back went Wright to Edinburgh and there gave Richards the slip.’

The tall man made a disapproving noise with his tongue.

‘By which I mean that Wright’s last glimpse of Richards from a taxi in Waverley station was of Richards vainly trying to bestir a sleepy taxi driver to follow him. But of course somebody else had taken up the trail and when Wright, nicely disguised as a Swedish pastor, got on a tramp steamer for Larvik that evening Richards was already tucked away on board.’

‘Good work.’ The tall man fished for Worcester sauce.

‘Oh, yes: we’re smart. As smart as
they
are.’ Hartley smiled his grim smile. ‘And a shade smarter when the gods are feeling that way.’

‘This time,’ said Appleby quietly, ‘a shade less smart.’

‘It looks like it. Just why Wright should have to pass news about Orchard while on the run I don’t see. But such things happen. And it looks as if he succeeded. I think Richards ought to have marked anything so odd as Wright talking poetry – which one may guess is what happened. But he didn’t and now he’s out of reach: we mayn’t contact him for days.’

‘I wonder,’ said the tall man, ‘what sort of information about Orchard it would be? Just what could one really work into Swinburne’s poem?’

Silently Appleby once more produced
Poems and Ballads
and placed it open between his two companions: he let them read some way in
A Forsaken Garden
before he spoke. ‘The most concrete thing in the poem is a certain precise topographical element at the beginning. I think what Wright could work in is some exact pointer to Orchard’s whereabouts. In that railway compartment, and before Richards and this wide-awake girl, he told an accomplice just where Rodney Orchard was to be found.’

There was silence. Unconsciously, Hartley pushed away from him a plate of bread and cheese; the tall man began to drum on the tablecloth; Appleby started to reread the poem. And then a voice beside them said: ‘Something just came in, sir. For your little machine.’ It was a debonair young man, carrying a portable typewriter; he slipped into a seat beside Hartley and planted an envelope by his plate. ‘Old Stein is over there, sir, just by the pillar. Do give him a treat. Morning, Uncle George.’ He nodded casually to the tall man, gave Appleby a charming smile, and fell to consulting the menu.

The tall man frowned. But Hartley nodded briskly. ‘Poor old Stein – it’s something to brighten his day.’ He took the typewriter on his knees and opened it with a key from his pocket; he slit the envelope and produced a slip of paper on which was a jumble of meaningless letters; and these he proceeded to follow on the keyboard of the machine. Halfway through he said ‘Richards’ in an expressionless voice; when he had finished he slipped out the typescript he had made and laid it on the table:

OSLO JUST BOUGHT COPY SWINBURNES POEMS AND BALLADS FIND WRIGHT MISQUOTED FORSAKEN GARDEN CONVERSATION ON POETRY PERTH TRAIN FLORID MAN AGE FORTY PLUS HEIGHT SIX ONE EYES BLUE TYPE OF NOSE NOSE ALSO PRESENT GIRL AGE TWENTY FOUR TWENTY SIX HEIGHT FIVE SEVEN EYES BLUE GREY TYPE OF NOSE ADMIRABLE STRAIGHT NOT QUITE GREEK MEDIUM GOLDEN HAIR PERFECT TEETH MOUTH AND FIGURE WOULD DEVELOP FAIR COMPLEXION SOME FRECKLES BLUE COAT AND SKIRT TO KNEE CAPITAL LEGS GENTLEWOMAN READING ANTIQUARY NO ENGAGEMENT RING FINGERS LONG BUT SQUARE SOMETIMES SUCKS LOWER LIP CROSSES LEGS RIGHT OVER LEFT ROTATES RIGHT TOE MISQUOTATION CONCERNED LOCATION GARDEN RECALL ONLY LINE GIVEN BY WESTERLY SPUR OF MOUNTAIN OVER CENTRE OF A BAY SUGGEST CONSULT ALASTER MACKINTOSH X7555

‘Well,’ said Hartley when they had digested this, ‘Richards did get something.’ His voice had the conscientiously guarded tone of a schoolmaster who admits that a pupil has landed some sort of scholarship after all. ‘He might have noticed a little more about the florid man and a little less about the girl. Forty-plus, six-one, blue eyes and no sort of nose. It might be anyone. It might be Spurzheim himself. Shall we send over and ask old Stein if Spurzheim’s holidaying in Scotland? I can just see him gobble. But perhaps better not.’ His voice grew grave again. ‘It’s remarkable in the circumstances that Richards should recall anything of the hocussed poem. But it’s a desperately slender pointer.’

‘Alaster Mackintosh,’ said Appleby. ‘Who’s that?’

‘Me,’ said the debonair young man happily.

With any luck, thought Sheila, she had allies by this time; somewhere able and practised people were setting about hunting for the girl who had disappeared more than thirty-six hours before. But here meanwhile, and at little more than thirty-six paces, was the enemy – the enemy turning from their bogus railway engine and advancing upon her. Two men, walking forward with the simple deliberation of police about to make some prosaic arrest, confident that her retreat was cut off by their fellows behind her. She had against her perhaps six men all told.

Sheila looked again at the fire which had been used to lure her from cover. She looked at it because – unaccountably – it was suddenly completely quenched. It had been quenched by a downpour of rain. She was standing – these men were advancing – in sheeting torrents of water. This, though she had not noticed it, must have been the situation for some seconds. The storm had broken. Perhaps it would help her to escape.

To the right the railway line ran in a glistening curve downhill. One can go fastest downhill; Sheila turned and moved that way. One of the men before her immediately swung to his left, and further on a hitherto invisible pursuer was actually leaping a ditch to the line. So this was not a good idea. Sheila turned round and ran the other way. Before her now were the two trucks in their siding; on her left was the long wall of the barn-like structure which served as station buildings. This long wall cut off the possibility of manoeuvre; she had made another bad move. But manoeuvring was a matter of the merest dodging now. The second of these two men was within five yards of her. And impossible in this long raincoat even to dodge. She would have to fight him – which was absurd. She ran on. Only the line separated them and he was jumping it. He jumped, landed; and overbalanced, swayed, and fell. She had a second of hope, but he was on his feet again and within a couple of yards. And then – fantastically and as if at the touch of a wand – he stayed put.

He’s staying put, thought Sheila – and brushed past almost within reach of his hands. He’s staying idiotically put, having slipped in the wet and jammed the heel of a shoe in the line. A miracle, she thought: and violently slipped herself.

She lay in mud, winded and with a tingling pain where her shoulder had struck something sharp and hard. Voices were about her; several of them must be almost upon her now. Her glance caught something moving as she lay: a short shaft of metal moving slowly out of the extreme corner of her vision. As it moved out another entered. She was looking at a very slowly rotating wheel.

It was the nearest of the trucks and it was crawling past her as she sprawled breathless by the track. That was what her shoulder had done – knocked out the primitive braking mechanism with which such rolling-stock is equipped. With a sudden intuition of salvation Sheila got to her feet and scrambled in.

Sober calculation and accurate vision came to her again. It was a covered truck, empty, and the only open door was a large one through which she had climbed. Beyond this the wall of the shed was moving slowly – but very slowly – past. Perhaps the resource wouldn’t at all work; perhaps some arrangement of points would stop the truck before it gained the long, gentle incline of the main line. The merest crawl: she tried to remember in what sort of ratio or progression bodies gain momentum on an inclined plane. An academic speculation – for now a man was climbing in.