Gifts of War (39 page)

Another long silence, which Greg eventually broke with “Now what? Where do we go from here?”

He looked at me and so did Rebecca.

“I hate what I’m going to say, but I can think of only one way forward. First, however, let me make some more coffee.”

I went to the kitchen and prepared three cups. Then I took them back to our office and closed the door. “We are pretty sure that Romford is the man these Germans pay. We know it must be cash, so the money must be brought to him. In that room. The fact that Rebecca could find nothing means that the paperwork is kept to a minimum— and somewhere else. More important, it means that the money doesn’t stay with Romford very long
and not overnight.”

“And so … ?” Greg spoke, but both of them were looking at me.

“We have to convert Romford’s insatiable appetite for sex with Rebecca into an asset.”

“What do you mean?” said Greg.

“How do we do that?” cried Rebecca at the same time.

“This is the bit I hate saying most. Rebecca, you must have dinner with Romford again, go back to the hotel room with him again—”

“No!”

“
—go back with him again and this time… this time… you must tell him that he is one of the greatest lovers you have ever had—”

“You’re joking—”

“—and the next morning you must say that you want to stay in bed and have him make love to you all day long. Say you are more experienced than he is—he will know that is true, somewhere inside him—but that he has this incredible effect on you. Put it down to the war, if you like, or your social differences, but say you’ve never known a man like him.”

“And the purpose of all this is what, precisely?” Rebecca was not pleased. I hadn’t imagined for a moment that she would be.

“You need to stay in his room for one whole day. See who comes, watch his routine, hope that it throws some light on what we want light thrown on.”

“No. I’ve done enough. Fuck him yourself.”

This sudden profanity surprised me but it wasn’t out of place.

I smiled. “If he were queer, I would have a go. But he’s not. He’s fallen for you, Rebecca. You are our best hope. We can’t change course now. You must see that. I know it’s hard but—”

“You have no idea how hard it is—either of you.” Suddenly she was close to tears.

I stepped forward but she held out her arm to stop me. “No, no … please. I’ll do as you say. But don’t ever say you understand. You don’t understand, even one little bit.”

Rebecca met Romford the next day, at lunchtime, and agreed to have dinner. This time they went to a club, the Astoria, and stayed late. Rebecca was clearly hoping that Romford would be too tired to make love that night. I never found out whether that was the case, but if so it made it slightly more plausible that she wanted to stay in bed all the following day. She must have said something like she was too tired the night before, but he was a wonderful lover, she wanted to make it up to him…

The way Rebecca told it, later, Romford didn’t need to be asked twice. His sexual awakening might have arrived late but he clearly intended to make up for lost time. They went their separate ways around six that evening and she came directly to us, propping up the bar at the Venner, behind the office.

She looked ravaged. She swallowed a whisky at one go but it didn’t seem to help.

“Would you like to take a bath?” I asked gently.

She shook her head, her body shuddering at the same time.

“No. No amount of soap and water could ever erase today.”

Neither Greg nor I spoke.

At length, when she had gathered her strength, she murmured, “It has to be
related
to room service.”

We looked at her.

“Can I have another Scotch?”

Greg signaled to the barman.

“Go on.”

“We had three visits from room service during the day. Besides the maid who came to make up the room, and whom he sent away. Room service came twice, for breakfast and lunch, but only after Romford had pressed the button by the bed. They came to the door, knocked, came in, took our order, went away, and came back with the food.”

“Nothing unusual there.”

“No, but the other time there was just a knock on the door. Romford went to answer it. He hadn’t summoned room service this time— I’m certain of it. He hadn’t pushed the button—because I was with him, in bed all the time. The man just arrived. I could see the trolley being pushed into the hall by a small, bald man with rimless spectacles; then Romford closed the door between the bedroom and the rest of the suite. The door remained closed for about—oh, fifteen minutes and I heard the two men talking, though I couldn’t make out what was being said. Then I heard the trolley leave—it rattled slightly. Romford came back into the bedroom and had with him a bottle of wine, which he said room service had brought, courtesy of the hotel management. Why would they need a trolley to bring a bottle of wine?”

“What time would this be?”

“Half past two.”

Greg looked at me. “They bring the money in a tureen, Romford counts it, then off it goes to the bank.”

“Maybe,” I said. “That means at least one other person is involved. Where are the kitchens in the Bar au Lac?”

“In the basement, I expect,” said Greg. “But I’ll have it checked.”

I put my hand on Rebecca’s. “You did well, but it’s over now.”

“No, it’s not,” growled Greg.

Rebecca and I looked at him. “If you stop now he might suspect something. One more time, I’m afraid.”

Rebecca looked shattered and turned to me.

“Don’t worry,” I said, smiling in what I hoped was a comforting way. “Just have dinner. Over the cheese contrive to take offense, have a fight—and walk out. Easy.”

Rebecca brightened. “You bet!”

Because it was next to impossible to follow the people from room service every time they left the kitchen and went up to the rooms,
and
do it without being noticed, we stationed a man outside the kitchens, which was easy enough to do because there were a lot of people milling around there, visiting storerooms, the barbershop, the lavatories, or the boiler room, and we put someone else on Romford’s floor. At first this proved puzzling because, when we checked the times later, we found that the arrival of room service at Romford’s suite did not always coincide with the times that the trolleys had left the kitchen.

It took two days for the penny to drop.

Every so often, a “room service” trolley arrived at Romford’s room that did
not
come from the kitchen.

The following day, therefore, we had a man on every floor. This too was easier than it sounds because they were dressed as hotel staff—carrying towels, fresh sheets, flowers, that sort of thing—and because the Bar au Lac is huge: its corridors extend for hundreds of yards, the staff almost as numerous, and as anonymous, as the guests.

What our systematic surveillance eventually showed was that, once or twice a day, “room service,” always appearing from room 306,
on the third floor, transferred first to another room—a different one each day and on different floors—and then made a second journey, always to room 411, Romford’s suite. The trolley remained in 411 for about fifteen minutes (our observations agreed on this point with Rebecca’s) and then always returned to room 306.
This trolley was never taken anywhere near the kitchens
. Sometime later, the occupant of room 306 reappeared, now dressed in a sober suit and carrying an attaché case. He was followed and invariably went to the Haller & Kuhn Bank on Westheimstrasse.

It didn’t take Greg long to establish that the occupant of room 306 was a certain Rolf von Maltzen, that he was Swiss-German, and that he was a representative for Scholz-King, an Anglo-Swiss steel company.

The system revealed itself. After the inital meeting with Romford, in the Café Odeon, his contacts moved into the Bar au Lac, for one night only. They never met Romford again. The cash was collected from them, in their room at the Bar au Lac, by von Maltzen. He took it to Romford, to be verified and counted, and then trolleyed it back, hidden in the great silver tureen, to his room. There he changed into his banker’s outfit and carried the money to Haller & Kuhn.

“Why,” said Rebecca at one point, “does Romford need von Maltzen?”

“Because no money is actually leaving the country,” I replied. “That would attract attention and create a paper trail. Smuggling so much cash regularly across borders, in wartime, is much too risky. Scholz-King is a big, multinational company. They receive payment here in Zurich. Romford confirms to the U.K. that the money has been paid, and von Maltzen confirms to his bosses. Then the Swiss in London pay Hood and others like them. There’ll be a paper invoice created, for transporting their steel, and so on. A hollow transaction.”

“How do you know all this?” said Rebecca.

“I don’t. I’m working it out as I go along.” I turned to Greg. “What do you think?”

“As you do. It must operate something like that. And I’m now going to wire the brigadier. You and I need to work out exactly how we get a look at the money—to be doubly, triply certain we have our man. But, once we do, I want his authorization to act immediately.”

“Are you really going to have to kill him?” I asked.

“Hal! Think what he’s doing! He’s helping fund the German war effort. Not indirectly, but very, very directly. He
deserves
to die.”

I looked at Rebecca.

She took a deep breath. “Can’t come soon enough for me.”

That evening I had promised myself I would write to Sam one more time but, with the denouement of our plan so close and its resolution so … so terrible, I was on edge and unable to concentrate. Greg had gone off to draft and encode his wire for the brigadier, so I asked Rebecca out for dinner.

She shook her head. “I’m having supper with Liesl.” But then, seeing how cast down I was, she said, “Why don’t you come too? Though I warn you: it’s a Dada club and quite shocking. Be prepared to be shocked.” She added with a smile, “I’m smiling but I’m not joking.”

I told her about my prewar days in Munich.

“Not bad as a warm-up sort of place, Munich. But this is the real thing. Dress casually—corduroys if you have them, no tie, be ready for a late night. We’ll meet in the Venner at nine. Bring money.”

I did as I was told. I had one pair of corduroy trousers with me, as it happened, but that was as bohemian as I got. For the rest, my ensemble was a blue shirt and a blazer.

Rebecca and Liesl were already at the bar when I arrived. They were both wearing trousers, both smoking, and both had on lots of
makeup. I didn’t know Liesl but these were all innovations so far as Rebecca was concerned.

We had two drinks at the Venner, then caught a taxi to the club. It was in the Zäune part of town and called the Club Pantagruel. Inside, it was crowded, the air thick with the reek of tobacco, and a saxophone was playing slow, sad, reedy music. Despite the crowd, Rebecca and Liesl seemed to be known to the management, and a table was found. It was very dark but as my eyes became adjusted to the gloom I began to make out some very unusual ways of dressing.

The next thing I noticed, after registering that the quality of musicianship in the band was extremely high (a virtuoso pianist was now ripping through a much faster tune), were the pictures on the walls. They were very modern—collages of sorts—and appeared to be made of wood and paper. They were very assured and I immediately liked them.

“They’re by a painter called Kurt Schwitters,” murmured Rebecca. “He’s a friend of Liesl’s.”

A waitress appeared. Or was it a waiter? He/she was very slim, very good-looking, wore lots of makeup, and spoke German with what I could swear was a Munich accent.

“Red or white, whisky or gin?”

“Champagne—and a bottle of Scotch,” replied Rebecca with a laugh. “We are going to get very steamed.”

He/she disappeared.

I looked around again. This was definitely what you would call a bohemian club. There were some very beautiful women and some very beautiful men. Almost all were dressed casually, exotically even— low-cut dresses, high-cut skirts, very high-heeled shoes, long cigarette holders, feather boas, makeup by the mile. Dark glasses. Military jackets together with tight leggings. They were arguing, canoodling, kissing,
dancing, stroking. One or two, I saw, were sprinkling powder on the backs of their hands and sniffing it.

I have to say I was glad I had come. I wasn’t part of this scene— no way, not yet, and probably never would be—but at least it was
alive
. After all I had been through, in here the war seemed a long way away.

What would Sam make of all this, I wondered. There had been no nightclubs in Middle Hill or Stratford, and in London, mainly because of Will, I suppose, we had hardly sampled the clubs the capital had to offer.

I’m sure my sister would have loved this club, I told myself. She and her flatmates would be right at home here—how did she put it?—dancing, flirting, drinking, and even, as she had said, trying drugs.