The British Cross Page 3

  “Well.” Wickham pushed his papers aside as though clearing his desk for whatever matter Mowbrey was to bring him. In fact, like all of his gestures, it concealed another careful fraud. Wickham was a shrewd, arrogant, and lazy man whose rise inside Auntie had been less a tribute to his talents than to his name. He was the second son of the ninth Earl of Bellefair.

  “Sir. We’ve been working a cross-monitor. You know. Taking some routine Russian radio traffic and comparing it on the computer with routine American traffic—”

  “That is not to be spoken of. Not even in this room,” Wickham warned.

  “Sir.” Mowbrey stood his ground though he felt terrified in the presence of the other man. He vaguely noticed that there was a print by Monet on a far wall in lieu of a window. A window would not have been practical in any case because all the rooms at this level were twenty-seven feet below the surface of the green, pleasant pastureland above. Cows grazed still in this suburb of Cheltenham. Below them lay the home of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s second most sophisticated listening post and computer espionage center.

  “Sir,” Mowbrey began again. “This is the first time that we’ve had any sort of a connector. Single name in this case.”

  “All right, Mowbrey; what are you talking about?”

  The question was delivered a little shortly, but that also masked the fact that Wickham, in all likelihood, did not have much of an idea of what Special Section was actually trying to do. It had been set up in a hurry after the latest spy scandal involving the Cheltenham post, the one that had not been publicized in the news media for the simple reason that the double agent had escaped back to the Soviet Union before British Intelligence could catch up with him.

  Wickham was in nominal charge of the section, and that was why Mowbrey had thought to go to him with his information. Mowbrey was as ambitious as Wickham was arrogant.

  “Sir. Yankee signal from Delta Z—”

  “Mowbrey, God gave us the English language to make matters clear, not to obscure the mundane.”

  “I’m sorry. The Americans received a signal from their special posting in Stockholm yesterday inquiring on a name. Tomas Crohan.”

  “So?”

  “Struck me funny, sir, at first when we picked up the American signal. Just buzzing around these last weeks, making certain the apparatus was functioning—”

  “Yes, yes.”

  “Tomas Crohan. Name struck me because it was so odd. Spelling and all. Mick name in Stockholm? It didn’t seem right. So I bought five minutes in Seeker and—”

  “Seeker?”

  “Ministry record computer, sir. New nomenclature came down at Christmas, sir, you must have the memorandum—” It was beginning to dawn on Mowbrey that Wickham was a fatuous incompetent.

  “Yes, I did. Damned names keep changing. All this razzle to impress the Americans that we’re quite certain we know what we’re doing. Not certain it works at all.”

  “Sir, Seeker sent me a query in return. The name was under wraps and Seeker wanted my identity and all, very hush-hush. I was bowled over. Tomas Crohan was in an old file but it was still protected under War Secrets Act, even for me. I’ve got a thirteen-grade classification.…”

  “When was your last vetting?”

  “Six months ago, sir, when I applied for transfer here. They were cautious, I can tell you, especially after the Prine matter and all the other—”

  “Yes. We don’t have to keep dwelling on it. What aroused your curiosity again?”

  “Sir. Here was a signal from the Yanks in Stockholm, carrying just a name, making an inquiry. I never heard of it, have you, sir?”

  “Can’t say I have.”

  “And when I run it through Seeker, I get this rude note from the computer questioning my identity, my need-to-know, all sorts of stuff. I shouldn’t be surprised if a couple of men from Internal Security come round and ask me questions. That’s why I came to you, sir. Internal Security has no need-to-know on what Special Section is up to. But if I start answering their questions, I’m going to have to bring in the American signal we picked up from Stockholm and that could lead to all sorts of complications.”

  Wickham tapped a pencil against his lip as he contemplated the neat problem for a moment. It was a characteristic habit. He also chewed pencils and pen caps in moments of stress and his desk was littered with their remains, like the small bodies of dead animals.

  “What paperwork do you have on this?”

  “Sir.” Mowbrey handed over three sheets, including the original code of the American signal from Stockholm received Saturday, the code breakdown, and the classification of the code. It was Aram One, one of the simpler American codes, indicating the inquiry was at a low level of security. Because of the notorious insecurity of the telephone systems in Scandinavia, the American signal might have had its origins anywhere: The Russians, Danes, Norwegians, Finns, Swedes, and the Americans had so many line taps operating in the vast sweep of Scandinavia from the Arctic to the Baltic that frequently a single telephone line would carry two or more taps from competing intelligence organizations.

  The second sheet contained Mowbrey’s routine search request to Seeker. The third sheet contained the computer’s chilling response.

  Yes, Wickham thought. High-level stuff and mighty strange. This was really out of Mowbrey’s hands now.

  He glanced up at the younger man and managed a smile. The avuncular Wickham was back on stage after a momentary lapse.

  “An interesting business, don’t you think?”

  “Yes, sir, I do and that’s why I brought it straight to you, sir.”

  “Now what about Miss Ramsey?”

  Violet Ramsey was operations officer, American section, Special Section, and the likely superior that Mowbrey should have spoken to about the matter in the first place.

  “Sir, I took it right to you, and Miss Ramsey didn’t have need-to-know. This was an experiment with our machines, sir. Special Section hasn’t even tapped into Stockholm yet. I did that, sir.”

  “Did you?”

  Mowbrey managed a grin that he intended to convey a sense of modesty. Unfortunately, two blackened teeth to the right-center of his mouth dampened the effect.

  “So no one in Special knows about this signal?”

  “No, sir. Only you, sir, and Seeker, of course.”

  “I’ll take care of Seeker,” Wickham said. Though a lazy man, he saw something vaguely important in the business that Mowbrey had brought to him. Perhaps a chance for promotion; perhaps a chance to take on a good foreign posting inside Auntie. “How did you answer Seeker?”

  “Didn’t, sir. Figured it was better to tell you and shut down Seeker at my terminal.”

  “All right, Mowbrey. Leave these papers here and I’ll inquire into this for you. I’m sure we can find something about this and why all this mysterious business about… what was his name? Kelly…”

  “Crohan, sir. Tomas Crohan.”

  “Yes.”

  Three hours later, Wickham had managed to duplicate the original inquiry about the identity of Tomas Crohan and feed it into Seeker. Scarcely twenty minutes later, the computer repeated the questions that it had asked of Mowbrey but this time Wickham identified himself, his position, and his grade number and demanded to know why he could not inquire further into the matter of Tomas Crohan.

  Seeker did not answer.

  The business frustrated Wickham to the point where he circumvented the computer entirely.

  It was just after four and the cows above had long been driven to their barns. Darkness poked at the edges of the sky.

  Wickham had locked the door of his office. He had taken the blue telephone out of the locked box at the bottom of his desk. He had not dialed a number; he merely picked up the receiver and waited.

  “Yes.” A woman’s thin voice with a London accent.

  “George, please.”

  “One moment.” A buzz on the line and another voice. This one was a man.
r />   “Who is it?”

  “Bluebird,” Wickham said.

  “Yes. I expected as much. I was just going to get around to you.” The voice of “George” was as thick as a heavy gravel walk in Kew Gardens.

  “You were?” Wickham was truly surprised and his voice conveyed that impression.

  “Was this something of your Special Section?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Crohan, man. You made two inquiries in the last five hours to Seeker. Why didn’t you identify yourself the first time? Could have saved us half a morning running around.”

  “I-I had no idea.”

  “Not the first time you’ve ever said that, I’ll wager.”

  Silence.

  “Well, Bluebird, why did you tumble to a name like that? After all these years.”

  “Sir, this is the highest level—”

  “Yes, damn you. What are you raving about? I am Security, there is no level above my level.”

  “I’m sorry, George.”

  “Where did you pick this up?”

  Wickham was completely shaken. He felt trapped in his own ambition. Why hadn’t he left the whole business to Miss Ramsey? Damn that Mowbrey. Now he had gotten in on it and he would have to see it through.

  “Signal, sir. Bit of an experiment in Section. I thought I would take some of their… spaghetti—”

  Spaghetti was listening-post slang for the millions and millions of pieces of cable, secret and radio chatter picked up every day in places like Cheltenham. There were so many conversations, orders, messages, and sometimes real secrets that it was a losing battle on the part of listeners inside Auntie to actually sift through all the material and isolate those bits that were truly significant. It was an enormous plate of spaghetti and by digging away at it diligently each day, bits and pieces of worth were found… while other worthwhile bits were never discovered at all because of the sheer amount of material that had to be sifted.

  “American spaghetti, was it?”

  “Yes, sir. How did you know?”

  “What the hell is Special Section supposed to be working on if not tapping the Yanks?”

  Wickham was shocked to hear George state it so baldly. After all, it was a safe phone but no one ever spoke of the project inside Special Section. The Americans were allies, after all; American liaison offices actually worked in the public buildings aboveground in Cheltenham with their British counterparts. Auntie—the nickname everyone used for the Ministry for External Affairs (Extraordinary)—was an open secret at Cheltenham, but Special Section was a secret buried within a secret and the probe of American intelligence security was the last secret of all, so sacred that none spoke of it.

  “Where was it, Bluebird?”

  “Stockholm, sir.”

  “Stockholm?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I don’t like this at all.”

  “What, sir?”

  “Nothing, Bluebird. Are you absolutely certain you handled this strictly on your own?”

  Wickham lied without compunction. He had done so all his life. “Yes, sir.”

  “Good. Now I want you to forget the whole business.”

  “Forget it?”

  “Exactly what I said,” the gravel voice rumbled. “If you’ve made notes for yourself, destroy them. Everything. And don’t breathe a word about this if you value your neck.”

  “Sir—”

  “Good night, Bluebird.”

  The connection was broken.

  The car was waiting and the motor was running. Puffs of white smoke from the rear of the Jaguar danced in the light evening wind. The lights were trained on the entrance of the modest two-story office building set in the middle of a pastureland off the main road to Cheltenham town center.

  There were six entrances to the underground complex used by Auntie and by the Auntie listening post where the man called Bluebird worked. Under new security procedures, the workforce rotated in sections each month using different entrances and exits. It was vastly confusing to all involved and no one would have been surprised that Wickham had helped devise the system and that Wickham routinely flaunted it. In fact, he had left by exactly the same entryway each night for two years.

  “Damned Rogers,” he said as he emerged from the darkened entry and was temporarily blinded by the lights of the Jaguar. Rogers was his driver and usually reliable but he had been late this evening because of motor trouble on the M4. And to cap it off, he had turned on the brights of the headlamps and it was more light than Wickham needed. He blinked and shielded his eyes as he walked across the crisp snow to the car.

  He opened the rear door and slid inside.

  The automobile was comfortably warm.

  “Have to hurry along tonight. Maggie is expecting guests at eight—”

  Rogers nodded and put the heavy car into gear.

  Wickham sighed, picked up his unread Telegraph on the seat next to him and flicked on the rear reading lamp. The Jaguar also had a small bar tucked discreetly into the back of the front seat where Rogers drove.

  The car purred onto the B highway and turned north. Maggie had finally found something suitable after an unsatisfactory six months in lodgings in Cheltenham itself. The house was not convenient but it was exactly what Maggie expected for people of their station. Maggie had greater expectations than Wickham—but that was to be expected. Wickham’s brother was in line to become earl and he was a vigorous, healthy man of fifty and it seemed quite unlikely—given the longevity of the various family members—that Wickham would ever receive the coronet. But life was not uncomfortable for him and if he would tell the truth, he found the tedious life inside the listening-post section of Auntie to be rather fulfilling in a mild way. He was an important man, by anyone’s lights, and not one of these posturing upper-class twists who couldn’t make a career on his own. Given the privileges of life he inherited with the privileges he had earned, Wickham was a contented man.

  “Careful,” Wickham said absently as the car slipped around a curve. He always said that; the car always slipped in winter on the same curve. And Rogers always replied that it looked like more ice tonight.

  Funny.

  Wickham rattled the thin pages of the Telegraph.

  Funny.

  “Rogers,” he said.

  There was no reply. He blinked in the thin light in the back of the large car and noticed that Rogers’ hair was growing a bit long. All the chauffeurs fancied a bizarre sense of personal hygiene. Their cars were cleaner than they were. That is what he had once told Maggie after they had to sack Tulliver.

  “Rogers?”

  “Yes, sir?”

  The chauffeur glanced at him in the rearview mirror.

  Well, Wickham thought. You see. It was Rogers. What had crossed your mind, old boy?

  Wickham smiled. “Thought you’d say we’d get a bit more ice tonight.”

  “Yes, sir, I expect we will.”

  “Suppose.” The subject did not interest him. He glanced at the murder story on page three. Trust the Telegraph, good and gray, to have a nice murder story each day on page three. Wickham found the occasional peek into life in the London underworld fascinating, even if he never told Maggie about it. Too brutal, she would have said. Too vulgar.

  And then the car stopped.

  Still. On the middle of the deserted roadway.

  “Rogers?”

  “Sir.” The chauffeur turned.

  “Why have we stopped?”

  “Something’s wrong with the motor, sir.”

  “Damn. Thought you had it fixed this afternoon.”

  “So did I, sir.”

  “Seems to be running.”

  “No, sir. Something wrong. Let me take a look.”

  Wickham turned back to his paper in annoyance. Woman on the Portobello Road had been raped, trussed up, and then slashed to death. Particularly brutal.

  “Sir.”

  Again, Wickham put down his paper. He glanced at Rogers standi
ng outside the car with the left front door open.

  “What is it?”

  “Sorry, sir. You weren’t the worst. I was fond of you. But you have to understand, sir.”

  “Understand?”

  “Sir, I wish it would never have come to this.”

  “Understand what?”

  “You and the Mrs. were really quite nice,” Rogers said in an uncomfortable voice.

  Wickham blinked. “What are you talking about? Close the door.”

  “Can’t, sir.”

  “Can’t?”

  “Would you come this way, sir?”

  Wickham flushed. He really was becoming quite angry. “See here—”

  “Sir.”

  And then he saw the gray pistol in Rogers’ hand.

  Slowly, as in a dream, he opened the rear door and climbed out of the Jaguar still rumbling in the middle of the deserted roadway. And then he saw the lights flash a hundred yards away.

  “Over there, sir.”

  He allowed himself to be pushed along. It had not snowed for six days but it had been freezing cold and the snow crunched under his feet. He thought absurdly that he would ruin his shoes walking across this frozen field of snow. Why was he doing it? He felt the pistol at his back.

  “Nothing will happen, sir,” Rogers said unhappily.

  “What is the meaning of this?” But the question did not carry conviction. He asked it like a man who knew the answer.

  The other car, hidden in darkness, was black. Rogers opened the rear door.

  Two foreigners were inside. Their clothes did not suit their builds. One wore a gray hat that was not fashionable. Wickham noticed these things. He was pushed into the back and sat down heavily on the vinyl seat, which felt cold through the layers of his clothing. He hated a cold automobile. He always insisted that the car be properly warmed before he would enter it, even if he was in a hurry.

  “Good-bye, sir.”

  Rogers was already crossing the field back to the Jaguar. What would he say? What would he tell Maggie? What could he expect?

  “See here. What is this? Do you know who I am?”

  The man at the wheel turned. His features were flat. His eyes were small black coals that had never burned. His tie was knotted too tightly at his thick throat.