Invasion (23 page)

“As to its appearance, well, a key can be of many forms—an arithmetical formula, a grid of nonsense, a passage in a book and in fact anything—but without it . . .”

Kydd realised that the men would not have acted as they had unless the matter was vitally important, and Renzi would not have given his name unless he himself was the key.

“Show me the message,” he demanded.

Reluctantly it was handed over. Kydd examined it minutely: it was in his friend's hand but consisted of lines upon lines of meaningless letters in groups of five and covered several pages. A few mistakes were blotted out and there were one or two crossed-out sequences in the margin, but that was all. It was not signed, and the beginning was only a bare date on one side, with what looked like a doodle on the other. No doubt it had occupied lonely hours of danger for Renzi.

He looked at the little picture. It was a stylised open book and a fat exclamation mark next to it as though in exasperation at the tedium of the task. Was this a sign—or a pointer of some kind? A clue?

Then he had it! “Why, I think I know what it is. A passage from a book, you said. Will a poem do at all?”

“Yes, damn it!”

The sudden tension in the room made Kydd think better of a grand gesture and he contented himself with the plain facts. “By this little picture Renzi is reminding me of a poem he's got fastened to the bulkhead in his cabin above his desk. Taut hand with words, is Nicholas.”

“What poem?” the taller man ground.

“Oh, it begins—let me see:

Up! up! my Friend, and quit your books;
Or surely you'll grow double
Up! up! my Friend, and clear your looks;
Why all this toil and trouble . . . ?

Kydd tried to recall what went next but failed. “I can't remember the rest.”

“Go out to your ship and get the doggerel! Now!”

“I don't see any reason why I should,” Kydd replied quietly, but at the man's reddening face he relented. “We can find it at the bookseller just along by Beach Street here. It's by his friend Wordsworth, whom he much admires. Should you get an 1800 edition you'll no doubt find the poem in it.”

The proprietor was taken aback when three men burst into his shop, demanding urgently that precise volume of Wordsworth but hurriedly obliged. There was the poem: “The Tables Turned.”

At the office the table was swiftly cleared and paper produced. The taller yielded to the other, who drew up his chair, sharpened his pencil and opened the book.

“Priceless!” He chuckled and read:

Books! 'tis a dull and endless strife:
Come, hear the woodland linnet,
How sweet his music! on my life,
There's more of wisdom in it.

“Damn you, sir! Get on with it!”

Patiently, a
tabula recta
for the tableau was constructed and the cipher-text applied. In a short time the man raised his head and, with a satisfied smile, said quietly, “Gentlemen, we have a solution!”

Renzi returned to his rooms weary and depressed. It had been weeks of waiting and no reply—and the worst of it was that Fulton had disappeared. Renzi had sent him a short message saying that London had been contacted on his behalf but it had been returned unopened with the terse notation “not at this address” and no further clue.

It had been maddeningly frustrating. Was Fulton taken by the authorities? Had he quit the field entirely, returned to America? Or was he in possession of a fine new contract from the French that now saw him in some palatial lodging and for ever out of reach?

As he flopped into his chair he noticed the vase back in the window. Nervously he lifted it—but there was no message. Then he saw a copy of that morning's
Moniteur
tossed carelessly to one side. And deep within it he found a substantial packet.

The superscription was in an unknown hand and, unusually, the packet was secured with sailmaker's twine instead of the usual ribbon. Inside, there were two parts, both ciphered. One was short, no more than a few sentences, Renzi guessed. The other was boldly inscribed even if in coded groups and on stiff, expensive vellum.

There was no key, no little drawing or textual hint. However, he guessed immediately the significance of the unusual fastening, for that would surely be:

Age! twine thy brows with fresh spring flowers,
And call a train of laughing Hours . . .

He took the vellum first, a prominent “1” indicating the key-stream was to start with it and continue to the other. He set out his matrix. Soon finding himself correct in his assumption, the two pages were swiftly deciphered and then he sat back, satisfied.

It had told him two things: the first was that Kydd, knowing his penchant for memorising poetry, had correctly divined his key. The next was that Whitehall had accepted his difficult situation and taken positive steps to help him, for this was in effect a counter-offer from the foreign secretary of Great Britain himself. Renzi could prove it by decoding the vellum in front of Fulton.

The offer was interesting, but would it be sufficient? He turned his attention to the shorter message and applied himself. This was a very different document—and Renzi was shocked to the core. It was terse and to the point: if Fulton did not accept the offer he was to be killed.

Mechanically he burned his workings and stirred the ash carefully. All he had feared was coming to pass. He was now being expected to perform the ultimate act of dishonour in this whole wretched business, that of mercilessly ending the life of an unsuspecting other.

Could he do it? He knew he must. This was the transcendent logical outworking of what he had undertaken to do.

The means? Silent but sure—a blade. He had none, but a quick foray produced a kitchen knife, thin-bladed but effective, the point honed to a wicked sharpness. There was, of course, the chance that he would never use it, for where was Fulton now?

The prisoner-of-war talks dragged on with no sign of an agreement, even though Britain held some four times as many prisoners as the French and was prepared to exchange at the rate of many for one. The unspoken obstacle was the reality that trained seamen were too valuable to return to duty in a navy that was so successful. There was every probability now that there would be no hope left to the wretches in Bitche and Verdun.

Utterly depressed by the futility of the situation, Renzi was un-prepared for what met him when he reached his room after another week of tedium. As he entered, he was confronted by a grinning Fulton rising from a chair. “Hail to you, Smith!” he declaimed dramatically. “How goeth it?”

Recovering himself Renzi said, “What the devil are you doing here? You're being followed, you fool!” Anger flooded over him at the careless attitude and jocular tone. Then he became alarmed. Was this part of a French trap?

“No, I'm not trailed,” Fulton said lazily, stretching. “I'm only this day back in Paris, and nobody knows I'm here. Er, have you, by chance, heard anything from London?”

“Where have you been all this time, may I ask?”

“Oh, Amsterdam. Thought I'd like to see the canals—very interesting to me.”

Renzi bit off a retort and forced himself to be calm. If the French wanted to catch them together they would probably have made their move by now. “Well, I'm pleased to tell you that I've been in contact with England—and at the highest level.” He moved to the other chair and smiled winningly. “It seems that you've earned the attention of no less than Lord Hawkesbury, the foreign secretary of Great Britain. In fact I have a communication from him addressed to you.”

“Oh?” Fulton said.

Renzi drew a deep breath. “Indeed so.” He went to a picture on the wall and felt behind it, detached the packet and opened it. “Here.” He handed it over, letting Fulton feel the quality of the paper.

“It's in code.”

“Naturally. For your protection, should the French discover you are treating with the English.” Renzi took it back and smoothed it. “However, I shall now decipher it before you as your assurance of its authenticity.”

“Don't trouble yourself. If you're fooling me we'll find out soon enough. Just tell me what he's got to say.”

Renzi's stomach contracted. It was the last throw of the dice. “Well, in it the foreign secretary welcomes your interest and notes the terms you are asking, including the forming of a plenary committee and, er, your one-hundred-thousand-pound fee. I'm happy to say he sees no insuperable bar to any of your provisions.”

“Go on.” There was no reading anything in Fulton's face.

“Of course, he trusts you will understand that there can be no question of payments until your inventions have been properly examined and tested in England.”

Fulton wheeled about. “That's it? No advances, no promises?”

“I do assure you, sir, that should you trust us with your naval secrets then the government will treat you with the utmost liberality and generosity in strict accordance with the importance of your inventions.”

“And that's all?”

“At the moment, it is.”

Fulton sauntered over to the window and looked out over the rooftops. “Are you seriously suggesting I pack my bags and leave on the strength of
that?
” he asked, continuing to gaze out.

Dread stole over Renzi: Fulton was not going to accept the offer and therefore he was going to walk off for ever. He had his grim instructions. Fulton was facing away, unsuspicious, and it was not in public. Would a protest that he had had no idea Fulton was any one but a common intruder fool the French long enough to buy him time to get away? He had so little time to think.

Rising silently, he tiptoed over to the bureau and eased open the drawer. The knife glittered up at him. With it he would end the life of one whose mind had dreamed of voyaging with Neptune, and had so brilliantly succeeded. Renzi reached for it but at that instant he became aware that Fulton had swung around. The man cleared his throat and said abruptly, “Yes, I will.” He moved back across the room. “I trust you. We'll go back to England together.”

Renzi went rigid, then his hand moved to the decanter. “A drink, then, Mr. Fulton?” he said huskily, and splashed cognac into two glasses. “To brighter times.”

He'd done it! Against all the probabilities he had brought it off. Then despair flooded him. How were they to flee across France ahead of vengeful pursuers when he had only the sketchiest plan prepared? When they were seen together the conclusion would be obvious.

The solution, when it came, was an anticlimax. Renzi would find an excuse to return to England alone, using his diplomatic passport. At the last minute Fulton would arrive at Calais to join the cartel ship and they would leave together. Fulton's papers from the ministry gave him access to all the northern ports and, in any case, as a neutral he could not be prevented from leaving.

Renzi left it until the last possible moment. The tedious carriage ride with another petulant young lieutenant had been a trial—but finally, rising above the low Customs building ahead, he saw the upper yards of the cartel ship. His heart beat faster for it would mean the end to the nightmare.

He sat outside a nearby tavern in the warm sunshine where he was able to view the comings and goings into the building, and as time wore on for the evening sailing, he grew more and more anxious. There was no sign of Fulton.

It was impossible that he should return without him, but who was to say that Fulton had not arrived early and was at this minute in his cabin? Or that word had been sent from Paris to detain him?

They had let him alone to take his last fill of France, but when he passed through the gates and was processed aboard, there would be no turning back. In an agony of indecision Renzi waited until just two hours before departure; then he rose, paid the tavern-keeper and walked slowly to the hall.

There, he handed in his passport and other papers, which were notated, and after guarded pleasantries, he was escorted to his ship. He mounted the gangway and stopped to breathe in the familiar tang of tar, timber and shipboard odours, a poignant moment after his recent travails.

Nodding civilly to the dour captain, he enquired casually if any Americans were on board. It seemed there were not and none expected. It was hard to take and, with a sinking heart, Renzi watched the lines singled up, the capstan bars shipped for warping out.

Two hours had become one: in despair, he allowed himself to be shepherded below with the other passengers in preparation for the awkward manoeuvre out into the stream, hearing the clunks and slithers of rope-handling above, the business-like squeals of the boatswain's calls and sharp orders.

Then came the shuddering creaks as the hull took up after the lines were thrown off. It was all over. They were on their way out.

As the first dip and heave of the sea took the vessel, Renzi realised they were clearing Calais Roads. Shortly afterwards passengers were allowed on deck into a soft, violet dusk. The excited chatter of the others depressed him and he wandered forward to where the jib sheets were being hardened in. The lines were belayed, the seamen dispersed, and then he became aware of another, standing in the shadow of a staysail. The man moved towards him.