The Secret Generations (60 page)

Next, they came to Hans-Helmut Ulhurt, whose body had been discovered in the early hours of that July mor
ning, following Charles’ return from Glasgow to London.

They produced statements from ticket collectors and guards, employed by the London, Midland and Scottish Railway Company, which in any court would have been damning. Charles had claimed to have returned on the night train as a Mr Harker. They not only had descriptions of Mr Harker, but a statement from the man himself. Railton would certainly have had to be a master of disguise, for Harker was barely five feet one inch in height and built like a small
barrel.

They also had descriptions of the man, later found dead in a stream, some miles north of Manchester; and statements that he had boarded the afternoon train, and statements about a man with a thick moustache and glasses, wearing a herring-bone patterned suit
– identical to the one Wood and Patridge had seen on Charles. Also this man was of Charles’ build.

The evidence went on, it appeared, interminably: Hans-Helmut Ulhurt was undoubtedly
‘The Fisherman’, and he had been shot, presumably by the man who had been detailed to find him – Charles Railton, who had gone out of his way to hide the fact. Odd, they said, for the Master of the Hunt to be coy about the kill.

Then they brought Wood on, and he told of his examination of the body, and how, on unpicking the lining of Ulhurt
’s jacket they found a waterproof packet.

The packet, and the papers it contained, were placed on the table. There were maps, printed on fine quality thin paper, marked up for rendezvous with, presumably, U-boats; there were also codes known as one-time codes; and a small, thin notebook, in which were recorded various, seemingly jotted remarks. They were written in German, and most had little meaning to the examining officers. One, however, was the key to their case. Scribbled in the corner of a page were the words,
Brenner – M6’s Lover
. As far as they were concerned, the case was clinched. M6 equalled Hanna Haas, and Charles Railton had already faced an enquiry regarding his relationship with Fraulein Haas. QED.

But they had been painstaking. At night, officers from the Branch had visited Redhill Manor. Among some garden rubbish they found pieces of a half-burned herring-bone patterned suit. Charles was told the evidence was enough to condemn him. They were prepared to bring forward officers who would testify that Charles Railton had
‘pumped them’ on certain matters.

Last of all
– and this surely shocked Charles – they laid out financial evidence: of an account, opened in the name of George Brenner at the Royal Bank of Scotland in Glasgow. Four amounts, each of one thousand pounds, had been paid out. They had all gone, by the direct transfer method, through the post, to Charles Railton’s private account at Coutts in London.

Charles said nothing. In fact he looked unimpressed with this weighty file which could lead him to a wall, facing a firing squad.

The protagonists retired, leaving the accused under the eye of Chief Inspector Wood.

Give him a week at Warmin
ster, they suggested. A combination of Kell’s and C’s confession experts would squeeze him like a lemon. The pips would drop out.

The role of the rambling mansion
– shared at that time by both MI5 and the Secret Service – was in its infancy; and it lies, not in Warminster itself, but seven miles away, off the main road at Knook, near the village of Chitterne.

They took Charles to this Georgian pile
– with ugly Victorian additions – and started work.

He remained silent, was calm, ate normally, did as he was told, but did not speak. It was as though, after seeing his silent, dying uncle, he had taken the vows of a Trappist monk. They tried everything except violence, but to no avail. Then fate took a hand.

In the spring of that last year of war, ‘Spanish influenza’, emanating from the Near East, hit the Navy in Scapa Flow and the troops in France. The disease grew, crossing England in three distinct waves, the first in mid-July, dying out and striking forcefully again in the first week of November, and reaching its peak the following February. During that period a total of one hundred and fifty-one thousand, four hundred and forty-six people died of the infection, mainly civilians.

Every single Railton in England, apart from Giles, was affected. Only one died. Charles contracted the disease at the end of the first week in November. The doctor in residence at Warminster was called, but watched helplessly as his patient
’s temperature rose and he became delirious.

Those whose job it was to prise the truth from him, stayed by the sick bed, and, as Charles sank lower, becoming weaker with the fever, they noted some of his ramblings.
‘Uncle… Uncle…’ he repeated one day. Then, ‘…Uncle Brenner!’

They sent for Mary Anne because he began to ask for her; and listened as he croaked at her, sure that she was Mildred.
‘Sorry, my dear… Sorry… One favour… Please… Madeline, a child, a child in Germany… Please, when it’s over… when… take care of the child… or let Sara… Sara… take care of the…’

At the very end, he reverted to the true Railton style. Charles
’ last words were, ‘
If we shadows have offended, Think but this, and all is mended
.’ quoting Shakespeare to the end. He died, without more fuss, on 12 November, the day after the war ended. Mary Anne could not be consoled. Whatever else she had loved her father dearly.

Giles was still alive, and there has always been conjecture in the family regarding what would have happened if Charles had lived. For the events which followed, and led to the private mythology, which is the full knowledge of truth within the Railton family, could so easily have unbuttoned Charles Railton
’s lips and changed the official story.

Yet the extent of the betrayal did not become known until the final acts of those days had been completely played out. The beginning of this end took place in Germany two days before Charles died at Warminster.

Chapter Ten

Margaret Mary knew on the morning of November 10. She opened her eyes, and felt a sudden relief, as though something incredible had happened overnight. A fountain of happiness came bubbling up and she leaped from the bed, dashing downstairs to crash out a Chopin Polonaise on the piano – loudly, with tears streaming down her cheeks.

The children followed in her wake, like two laughing little tugboats, and danced around the room, as she played.

Far away, in his castle on the Rhine, James woke imagining he heard laughter and music in the last seconds of his sleep. It hung over into the waking day as he went through the routine of washing, shaving, drinking the coloured hot water they called coffee, and eating the thick bread smeared with dripping that was his breakfast. It was 10 November 1918. Ten in the morning – though he had no idea of the real time, any more than he knew the date, except that it was late autumn. Looking from the window he saw a large Staff car labouring up the incline towards the main castle gates.

Ten minutes later the Commandant sent for him. An officer of great importance was waiting. They went into one of the cold, small offices and there he met a tired-looking man in mufti who introduced himself as Walter Nicolai.

‘You’ve come to tell me something,’ James announced, before Nicolai could open his mouth. ‘I’m to be shot?’

Nicolai raised a hand to stop him. No. He had come to take him. They would have to move quickly. There was someone else in the car
– two people actually. By eleven o’clock tomorrow the war would be over. This was not yet known by anyone – the people, he meant: neither in Germany nor England. It was finished, so it was important that Mr Railton should be out of Germany before eleven tomorrow. Tomorrow was the Armistice, Nicolai said.

Ja
mes in his bewilderment asked, ‘But who has won?’

Nicolai told him, adding that he felt Mr Railton should meet with the other two people in private, before they went on their way. They would be driven for part of the journey.
‘After that, I have arranged for an aeroplane to fly you into Switzerland. Messages have been sent. You will be expected at Zurich.’ Nicolai almost did not meet James’ eye, and was about to leave, saying he would see to the others, but James reached forward, holding his sleeve, feeling the weakness of his own body as he tried to pull the man back. He came of his own accord, standing close, looking at last into James’ face. ‘Why?’ James asked.

Nicolai spoke slowly,
‘Because you were protected. Because an arrangement was made. Now, I get the others.’

He had no idea what or who to expect. He did not even recognize the woman, thin
– like himself, he supposed – and dressed with care in shabby, worn clothes, a small child, a little girl of about three years old, peering anxiously from behind her skirts.

They looked hard at each other, glimmers appearing, as though their eyes were mirrors flashing messages between the friendly armies.

‘James?’ Her voice was immediately recognizable.

‘
Marie?’ He could not believe it. ‘Marie! My God, Marie!’ and they both knew what the Biblical words meant, for they fell on each other’s necks and wept, repeating each other’s names.

The child began to cry, and James, who had missed his own so desperately during the years of captivity, released Marie and bent to pick her up, trying to comfort her, holding the little body close.

For years after, the child remembered her first sight of Uncle James – a thin face, sad and red and blotched with tears. The thought was always one of anguish.

*

‘Yours?’ he mouthed to the equally tear-stained Marie Grenot, over the child’s shoulders.

With a look of incredible despair and sorrow, she shook her head.
‘Charles’ bastard, by some German girl he interrogated. That’s what they told me, but I’ve had charge of her since birth.’ She began to sob again, ‘I named her Josephine, after my mother.’

Nicolai hovered in the doorway, speaking words they hardly heard, or even understood.
‘You are related, we know. It is good that cousins should be reunited. We try. We have looked after you both, yes? Now we must go.’

They pulled themselves together, and took little Josephine
’s hands, leaving the room like a bedraggled family of refugees.

In the courtyard, the Commandant fawned and bowed, and a soldier stood, looking miserable, by the car.

‘You will not forget me?’ The Commandant bent so low that James thought the man would kiss his hand.

Emotionally and physically worn out, they sat in the back of the car, not hearing Nicolai as he pointed out views and sudden glimpses of beauty, as a man will talk in order to cover some embarrassment. Then the child began to point also, and say things like,
‘Tree… Water’ (which she pronounced Vorter) ‘…and House (Ow-se).’

After two hours, they stoppe
d at an inn, and Nicolai demanded food and drink while the landlord bowed, pleading they had nothing, then went away and returned with his wife who found eggs and cooked an omelette.

Nicolai finally realized that they did not want him near, so he sat apart from them, with his driver, while they ate, helping to feed Josephine by turns.

Only then did they exchange stories, and guardedly at that. Marie indicated that she had been separated from her German lover immediately they got into Berlin. ‘It was a trap,’ she spoke low. ‘A lure. I’ve never felt so suicidal.’ After that she stopped talking, and did not speak of it again until they reached the comparative safety of Switzerland.

By mid-afternoon they had passed through Karlsruhe, and James was shaken by the feel and the look of the place. There they also saw the first soldiers, grimed, muddy, cold,
walking in a shambles, defeated. Later, James was to say that it was only then that he really believed it was over.

At four in the afternoon the car turned through gates in a high wire fence
– they had seen the aeroplanes from the road for the last fifteen minutes, and James was amazed at their size. Neither side had flown monsters like this when he left England. Now, they stood in ranks, silent and massive angular giant predatory insects – things from an alien world of the future, not the present.

‘
What are they?’ he asked Nicolai as Josephine happily shouted, ‘Aiwopanes!’

These, Nicolai said, were the great Zeppelin Straaken R VIs.
‘Four engines, yes. These bombed London. Did much damage.’

James marvelled, and the car drove up to what he supposed was the officers
’ mess. They were given more watery coffee and introduced to four men who were to be their crew.

The Zeppelin Straaken had been painted white, with great red crosses marking the fuselage and the huge slab wings. They seemed to have removed all visible weapons.

Nicolai shook hands with them, and said he hoped they understood. ‘In our kind of business, there have to be terms, you know, rules – terms of trade. Sometimes a life for a life, or a life for information, even a death for a death. They are hard, the terms of our trade.’

By six they were in Zurich, met by a prim man from the British Foreign Office who said that his name was Smythe-Gilbert, but without any conviction. They would go on by train, and be made as comfortable as possible.

There was no time to rest, but a good meal was provided. Neither of them could eat much, though Josephine succeeded in getting a great deal on her hair.

‘
He doesn’t like us, Marie commented when Smythe-Gilbert left them alone for a few seconds.

‘
I fear that we’re an embarrassment.’ James realized he had not been thinking clearly. The full possibility now struck him. ‘Maybe we’re going to be an embarrassment to everyone. We could possibly be ghosts, risen from our graves.’

‘
At least you’ll be some kind of hero.’ Marie’s eyes flooded but the dam did not burst. ‘Me? I suppose they can charge me. Shoot me.’

‘
Don’t be silly,’ James snapped.

Smythe-Gilbert remained uneasy during the first leg of the journey to the frontier, where he passed the three of them over to a military escort
– Redcaps, who behaved impeccably and acted more like servants than the jailers they appeared to be. One of them asked, ‘Any truth about this Armistice business, sir?’

James said he believed there was a lot of truth in it.

During the long overnight journey Marie told him the remainder of her story. How they had interrogated her and used her also – she guessed – against the British clandestine services. How she had been set up as bait, and made to take part in question and answer sessions with intelligence officers. ‘They even made me look into a cell and identify you after your capture. Sorry, my dear, I was past caring.’ They did not sleep, though Josephine went out like a light as soon as the train started.

At dawn they reached the coast and a Royal Navy destroyer which took them across the Channel. From Dover, another car, with men who looked like detectives, transferred them to Warminster.

At eleven o’clock, as they drove through a hardly-believable England, one of the men turned around and said flatly, ‘That’s it. It’s all over. The war’s finished.’

His companion muttered,
‘God help us now.’

*

Caspar waited for them at Warminster. Marie wept again, when she saw he was crippled, and James marvelled at his exuberance as he stumped about on his peg-leg, agile, and using the makeshift metal arm to open doors for them. He laughed a great deal, and said C would be down, with one or two other people, to go through their tales of ‘derring do.’ Marie began to weep again, asking what would happen to her?

‘
Happen? What d’you mean, happen?’ Caspar looked aghast.

‘
You went for King and country, Marie, old thing. I don’t know many people who’d leave husband and children and sacrifice herself to the Hun as you did.’

She opened her mouth to speak, but felt James
’ hand on her arm, as Caspar continued. ‘Even Grandfather had us fooled with his, “The wretched girl will never darken my doorstep again,” stuff. But he came clean to C when he dismantled his private agents. Told him everything – how he’d persuaded you to have a ring-a-ding with the Hun fellow in Paris, and run off with him to get information back if you could.’ He nodded, his face beaming, ‘And they boxed you up, I gather. Even old James was dropped on from a great height trying to get you out.’

In an effort to assist, James told her that, because of the danger she was in, and the possible ramifications, he had even been instructed to kill her if he couldn
’t get her out – ‘Uncle Giles certainly did all he could.’ Again he nudged her. ‘Did you know you were putting on that show specially for me in Berlin?’

They had made her dress up and walk out,
‘Just down the road to a cab, with a young Military Intelligence officer who looked like von Hirsch. Made me do it, morning and evening for a week. They called me the cheese to catch a rat. I didn’t know the rat was you, dear James.’

Then Caspar became sober, and slowly broke the bad news: about Mildred, and Charles; about Marie
’s father – James’ uncle – Giles. ‘You’ll want to see him, of course…’

‘
Yes,’ Marie said grittily. ‘Yes. Will he live long?’

‘
Seems not. I know C wants to get all the de-briefing over quickly, and I’m pretty sure Denise wants to see you, Marie. We haven’t told her yet. Only some of the family know…’

‘
Margaret Mary…?’ James started.

‘
Knows you’re safe. Thought it best not to commit ourselves that you were back in England yet. A few days, that’s all take. My God, it’s going to be one devil of a Christmas with everyone together at Redhill, eh?’

Already they had taken little Josephine away. Nanny Coles was hustled down from London with instructions to travel with
the child to Redhill, where she was already looking after Sara’s baby son, with William Arthur due to join them in the holidays. As yet, the family had not ratified all this, but Sara had made up her mind that Redhill would be the great place of growing up for all the orphan Railtons, legitimate or not. From Redhill, in time, they would go off to their various schools but it would be their home, a place of refuge and a happy shelter from all the world’s storms. Had not John told her it was the most wonderful place for growing up? And had not she, the strident town mouse, been put under its enchantment?

After C
’s arrival, it became clear to James that, whatever he knew or suspected, Marie was to be let off the hook. He was his usual bluff self, though courteous in his questioning. They each told their stories, were passed on to other officers, signed statements and were welcomed back.

Within the week, they were free to return to their homes
– James to his beloved M-M, and Marie to join Denise and the others, at Redhill. Before she left Warminster, she asked James to go with her to Eccleston Square. Marie Grenot wanted to see her father for one last time.

He lay, looking very small, all the coldness and shrewd darkness of his trade now gone, his eyes fever-bright, and full of fear.