Inside the Lines (Biggers and Ritchie)/Chapter 11
CHAPTER XI
A SPY IN THE SIGNAL TOWER
GOVERNMENT HOUSE, one of the Baedeker points of Gibraltar, stands amid its gardens on a shelf of the Rock about midway between the Alameda and the signal tower, perched on the very spine of the lion's back above it. Its windows look out on the blue bay and over to the red roofs of Algeciras across the water on Spanish territory. Tourists gather to peek from a respectful distance at the mossy front and quaint ecclesiastic gables of Government House, which has a distinction quite apart from its use as the home of the governor-general. Once, back in the dim ages of Spain's glory, it was a monastery, one of the oldest in the southern tip of the peninsula. When the English came their practical sense took no heed of the protesting ghosts of the monks, but converted the monastery into a home for the military head of the fortress—a little dreary, a shade more melancholy than the accustomed manor hall at home, but adequate and livable.
Thither, on the morning after his arrival. Captain Woodhouse went to report for duty to Major-general Sir George Crandall, Governor of the Rock. Captain Woodhouse was in uniform—neat service khaki and pith helmet, which became him mightily. He appeared to have been molded into the short-skirted, olive-gray jacket; it set on his shoulders with snug ease. Perhaps, if anything, the uniform gave to his features a shade more than their wonted sternness, to his body just the least addition of an indefinable alertness, of nervous acuteness. It was nine o'clock, and Captain Woodhouse knew it was necessary for him to pay his duty call on Sir George before the eleven o'clock assembly.
As the captain emerged from the straggling end of Waterport Street, and strode through the flowered paths of the Alameda, he did not happen to see a figure that dodged behind a chevaux-de-frise of Spanish bayonet on his approach. Billy Capper, who had been pacing the gardens for more than an hour, fear battling with the predatory impulse that urged him to Government House, watched Captain Woodhouse pass, and his eyes narrowed into a queer twinkle of oblique humor. So Captain Woodhouse had begun to play the game—going to report to the governor, eh? The pale soul of Mr. Capper glowed with a faint flicker of admiration for this cool bravery far beyond its own capacity to practise. Capper waited a safe time, then followed, chose a position outside Government House from which he could see the main entrance, and waited.
A tall thin East Indian with a narrow ascetic face under his closely wound white turban, and wearing a native livery of the same spotless white, answered the captain's summons on the heavy knocker. He accepted the visitor's card, showed him into a dim hallway hung with faded arras and coats of chain mail. The Indian, Jaimihr Khan, gave Captain Woodhouse a start when he returned to say the governor would receive him in his office. The man had a tread like a cat's, absolutely noiseless; he moved through the half light of the hall like a white wraith. His English was spoken precisely and with a curious mechanical intonation.
Jaimihr Khan threw back heavy double doors and announced, "Cap-tain Wood-house." He had the doors shut noiselessly almost before the visitor was through them.
A tall heavy-set man with graying hair and mustache rose from a broad desk at the right of a large room and advanced with hand outstretched in cordial welcome.
"Captain Woodhouse, of the signal service. Welcome to the Rock, Captain. Need you here. Glad you've come."
Woodhouse studied the face of his superior in a swift glance as he shook hands. A broad full face it was, kindly, intelligent, perhaps not so alert; as to the set of eyes and mouth as it had been in younger days when the stripes of service were still to be won. General Sir George Crandall gave the impression of a man content to rest on his honors, though scrupulously attentive to the routine of his position. He motioned the younger man to draw a chair up to the desk.
"In yesterday on the Princess Mary, I presume, Captain?"
"Yes, General. Didn't report to you on arrival because I thought it would be quite tea time and I didn't want to disturb"
"Right!" General Crandall tipped back in his swivel chair and appraised his new officer with satisfaction. "Everything quiet on the upper Nile? Germans not tinkering with the Mullah yet to start insurrection or anything like that?"
"Right as a trivet, sir," Woodhouse answered promptly. "Of course we're anticipating some such move by the enemy—agents working in from Erythrea—holy war of a sort, perhaps, but I think our people have things well in hand."
"And at Wady Haifa, your former commander" The general hesitated.
"Major Bronson-Webb, sir," Woodhouse was quick to supply, but not without a sharp glance at the older man.
"Yes—yes; Bronson-Webb—knew him in Rangoon in the late nineties—mighty decent chap and a good executive. He's standing the sun, I warrant."
Captain Woodhouse accepted the cigarette from the general's extended case.
"No complaint from him at least. General Crandall. We all get pretty well baked at Wady, I take it."
The governor laughed, and tapped a bell on his desk. Jaimihr Khan was instantly materialized between the double doors.
"My orderly, Jaimihr," General Crandall ordered, and the doors were shut once more. The general stretched a hand across the desk.
"Your papers, please. Captain. I'll receipt your order of transfer and you'll be a member of our garrison forthwith."
Captain Woodhouse brought a thin sheaf of folded papers from his breast pocket and passed it to his superior. He kept his eyes steadily on the general's face as he scanned them.
"C. G. Woodhouse—Chief Signal Officer—Ninth Grenadiers—Wady Halfa" General Crandall conned the transfer aloud, running his eyes rapidly down the lines of the form. "Right. Now, Captain, when my orderly comes"
A subaltern entered and saluted.
"This is Captain Woodhouse." General Crandall indicated Woodhouse, who had risen. "Kindly conduct him to Major Bishop, who will assign him to quarters. Captain Woodhouse, we—Lady Crandall and I—will expect you at Government House soon to make your bow over the teacup. One of Lady Crandall's inflexible rules for new recruits, you know. Good day, sir."
Woodhouse, out in the free air again, drew in a long breath and braced back his shoulders. He accompanied the subaltern over the trails on the Rock to the quarters of Major Bishop, chief signal officer, under whom he was to be junior in command. But one regret marked his first visit to Government House—he had not caught even a glimpse of the little person calling herself Jane Gerson, buyer.
But he had missed by a narrow margin. Piloted by Lady Crandall, Jane had left the vaulted breakfast room for the larger and lighter library, which Sir George had converted to the purpose of an office. This room was a sort of holy of holies with Lady Crandall, to be invaded if the presiding genius could be caught napping or lulled to complaisance. This morning she had the important necessity of unobstructed light—not a general commodity about Government House—to urge in defense of profanation. For her guest carried under her arm a sheaf of plans—by such sterling architects of women's fancies as Worth and Doeuillet, and the imp of envy would not allow the governor's wife to have peace until she had devoured every pattern. She paused in mock horror at the threshold of her husband's sanctum.
"But, George, dear, you should be out by this time, you know," Lady Crandall expostulated. "Miss Gerson and I have something-oh, tremendously important to do here." She made a sly gesture of concealing the bundle of stiff drawing paper she carried. General Crandall, who had risen at the arrival of the two invaders, made a show at capturing the plans his wife held behind her back. Jane bubbled laughter at the spectacle of so exalted a military lion at play. The general possessed himself of the roll, drew a curled scroll from it, and gravely studied it.
"Miss Gerson," he said with deliberation, "this looks to me like a plan of Battery B. I am surprised that you should violate the hospitality of Government House by doing spy work from its bedroom windows."
"Foolish! You've got that upside down for one thing," Lady Crandall chided. "And besides it's only a chart of what the lady of Government House hopes soon to wear if she can get the goods from Holbein's, on Regent Street."
"You see, General Crandall, I'm attacking Government House at its weakest point," Jane laughed. "Been here less than twelve hours, and already the most important member of the garrison has surrendered."
"The American sahib, Reynolds," chanted Jaimihr Khan from the double doors, and almost at once the breezy consul burst into the room. He saluted all three with an expansive gesture of the hands.
"Morning, Governor—morning. Lady Crandall, and same to you. Miss Gerson. Dear, dear; this is going to be a bad day for me, and it's just started." The little man was wound up like a sidewalk top, and he ran on without stopping:
"General Sherman might have got some real force into his remarks about war if he'd had a job like mine. Miss Gerson—news! Heard from the Saxonia. Be in harbor some time to-morrow and leave at six sharp following morning." Jane clapped her hands. "I've wired for accommodations for all of you—just got the answer. Rotten accommodations, but—thank Heaven—I won't be able to hear what you say about me when you're at sea."
"Anything will do," Jane broke in. "I'm not particular. I want to sail—that's all."
The consul looked flustered.
"Um—that's what I came to see you about, General Crandall." He jerked his head around toward the governor with a birdlike pertness. "What are you going to do with this young lady, sir?" Jane waited the answer breathlessly.
"Why—um—really, as far as we're concerned," Sir George answered slowly, "we'd be glad to have her stop here indefinitely. Don't you agree, Helen?"
"Of course; but"
"It's this way," the consul interrupted Lady Crandall. "I've arranged to get Miss Gerson aboard, provided, of course, you approve."
"You haven't got a cable through regarding her?" the general asked. "Her passports—lost—lot of red tape, of course."
"Not a line from Paris even," Reynolds answered. "Miss Gerson says the ambassador could vouch for her, and"
"Indeed he could!" Jane started impulsively toward the general. "It was his wife arranged my motor for me and advanced me money."
General Crandall looked down into her eager face indulgently.
"You really are very anxious to sail, Miss Gerson?"
"General Crandall, I'm not very good at these please-spare-my-lover speeches," the girl began, her lips tremulous. "But it means a lot to me—to go; my job, my career. I've fought my way this far, and here I am—and there's the sea out there. If I can't step aboard the Saxonia Friday morning it—it will break my heart."
Gibraltar's master honed his chin thoughtfully for a minute.
"Um—I'm sure I don't want to break anybody's heart—not at my age, miss. I see no good reason why I should not let you go if nothing happens meanwhile to make me change my mind." He beamed good humor on her.
"Bless you, General," she cried. "Hildebrand's will mention you in its advertisements."
"Heaven forbid!" General Crandall cried in real perturbation.
Jane turned to Lady Crandall and took both her hands.
"Come to my room," she urged, with an air of mystery. "You know that Doeuillet evening gown—the one in blue? It's yours, Lady Crandall. I'd give another to the general if he'd wear it. Now one fitting and"
Her voice was drowned by Lady Crandall's: "You dear!"
"Be at the dock at five a. m. Friday to see you and the others off, Miss Gerson," Reynolds called after her. "Must go now—morning crowd of busted citizens waiting at the consulate to be fed. Ta-ta!" Reynolds collided with Jaimihr Khan at the double doors.
"A young man who wishes to see you. General Sahib. He will give no name, but he says a promise you made to see him—by telephone an hour ago."
"Show Mr. Reynolds out, Jaimihr!" the general ordered. "Then you may bring the young man in."
Mr. Billy Capper, who had, in truth, telephoned to Government House and secured the privilege of an interview even before the arrival of Woodhouse to report, and had paced the paths of the Alameda since, blowing hot and cold on his resolutions, followed the soft-footed Indian into the presence of General Crandall. The little spy was near a state of nervous breakdown. Following the surprising and unexpected collapse of his plan to do a murder, he had spent a wakeful and brandy-punctuated night, his brain on the rack. His desire to play informer, heightened now a hundredfold by the flaying tongue of Louisa, was almost balanced by his fears of resultant consequences. Cupidity, the old instinct for preying, drove him to impart to the governor-general of Gibraltar information which, he hoped, would be worth its weight in gold; Louisa's promise of a party à deux before a firing squad, which he knew in his heart she would be capable of arranging in a desperate moment, halted him. After screwing up his courage to the point of telephoning for an appointment, Capper had wallowed in fear. He dared not stay away from Government House then for fear of arousing suspicion; equally he dared not involve the girl from the Wilhelmstrasse lest he find himself tangled in his own mesh.
At the desperate moment of his introduction to General Crandall, Capper determined to play it safe and see how the chips fell. His heart quailed as he heard the doors shut behind him.
"Awfully good of you to see me," he babbled as he stood before the desk, turning his hat brim through his fingers like a prayer wheel.
General Crandall bade him be seated. "I haven't forgotten you did me a service in Burma," he added.
"Oh, yes—of course," Capper managed to answer. "But that was my job. I got paid for that."
"You're not with the Brussels secret-service people any longer, then?"
The question hit Capper hard. His fingers fluttered to his lips.
"No, General. They—er—let me go. Suppose you heard that—and a lot of other things about me. That I was a rotter—that I drank"
"What I heard was not altogether complimentary," the other answered judiciously. "I trust it was untrue."
Capper's embarrassment increased.
"Well, to tell the truth. General Crandall—ah—I did go to pieces for a time. I've been playing a pretty short string for the last two years. But"—he broke off his whine in a sudden accession of passion—"they can't keep me down much longer. I'm going to show 'em!"
General Crandall looked his surprise.
"General, I'm an Englishman. You know that. I may be down and out, and my old friends may not know me when we meet—but I'm English. And I'm loyal!" Capper was getting a grip on himself; he thought the patriotic line a safe one to play with the commander of a fortress.
"Yes—yes. I don't question that, I'm sure," the general grunted, and he began to riffle some papers on his desk petulantly.
Capper pressed home his point. "I just want you to keep that in mind, General, while I talk. Just remember I'm English—and loyal."
The governor nodded impatiently.
Capper leaned far over the desk, and began in an eager whisper:
"General, remember Cook—that chap in Rangoon—the polo player?" The other looked blank. "Haven't forgitten him, General? How he lived in Burma two years, mingling with the English, until one day somebody discovered his name was Koch and that he was a mighty unhealthy chap to have about the fortifications. Surely"
"Yes, I remember him now. But what"
"There was Hollister, too. You played billiards in your club with Hollister, I fancy. Thought him all right, too—until a couple of secret-service men walked into the club one day and clapped handcuffs on him. Remember that, General?"
The commander exclaimed snappishly that he could not see his visitor's drift.
"I'm just refreshing your memory. General," Capper hastened to reassure. "Just reminding you that there isn't much difference between a German and an Englishman, after all—if the German wants to play the Englishman and knows his book. He can fool a lot of us."
"Granted. But I don't see what all this has to do with"
"Listen, General!" Capper was trembling in his eagerness. "I'm just in from Alexandria—came on the Princess Mary. There was an Englishman aboard, bound for Gib. Name was Captain Woodhouse, of the signal service."
"Quite right. What of that?" General Crandall looked up suspiciously.
"Have you seen Captain Woodhouse, General?"
"Not a half hour ago. He called to report."
"Seemed all right to you—this Woodhouse?" Capper eyed the other's face narrowly.
"Of course. Why not?"
"Remember Cook, General! Remember Hollister!" Capper warned.
General Crandall exploded irritably: "What the devil do you mean? What are you driving at, man?"
The little spy leaped to his feet in his excitement and thrust his weasel face far across the desk.
"What do I mean? I mean this chap who calls himself Woodhouse isn't Woodhouse at all. He's a German spy—from the .jpg)
"Pshaw! Why did Brussels let you go?" General Crandall tipped back in his seat and cast an amused glance at the flushed face before him.
Capper shook his head doggedly. "I'm not drunk, General Crandall. I'm so broke I couldn't get drunk if I would. So help me, I'm telling God's truth. I got it straight" Capper checked his tumult of words, and did some rapid thinking. How much did he dare reveal! "In Alexandria, General—got it there—from the inside, sir. Koch is the head of the Wilhelmstrasse crowd there—the same Cook you knew in Rangoon; he engineered the trick. The wildest dreams of the Wilhelmstrasse have come true. They've got a man in your signal tower, General—in your signal tower!"
General Crandall, in whom incredulity was beginning to give way to the first faint glimmerings of conviction as to the possibility of truth in the informer's tale, rallied himself nevertheless to combat an aspersion cast on a British officer.
"Suppose the Germans have a spy in my signal tower or anywhere here," he began argumentatively. "Suppose they learn every nook and corner of the Rock—have the caliber and range of every gun in our defense; they couldn't capture Gibraltar in a thousand years."
"I don't know what they want," Capper returned, with the injured air of a man whose worth fails of recognition. "I only came here to warn you that your Captain Woodhouse is taking orders from Berlin."
"Come—come, man! Give me some proof to back up this cock-and-bull story," General Crandall snapped. He had risen, and was pacing nervously back and forth.
Capper was secretly elated at this sign that his story had struck home. He stilled the fluttering of his hands by an effort, and tried to bring his voice to the normal.
"Here it is, General—all I've got of the story. The real Woodhouse comes down from somewhere up in the Nile—I don't know where—and puts up for the night in Alexandria to wait for the Princess Mary. No friends in the town, you know; nowhere to visit. Three Wilhelmstrasse men in Alexandria, headed by that clever devil Cook, or Koch, who calls himself a doctor now. Somehow they get hold of the real Woodhouse and do for him—what I don't know—probably kill the poor devil.
"General, I saw with my own eyes an unconscious British officer being carried away from Koch's house in Ramleh in an automobile—two men with him." Capper fixed the governor with a lean index finger dramatically. "And I saw the man you just this morning received as Captain Woodhouse leave Doctor Koch's house five minutes after that poor devil—the real Woodhouse—had been carried off. That's the reason I took the same boat with him to Gibraltar, General Crandall—because I'm loyal and it was my duty to warn you."
"Incredible!"
"One thing more. General." Capper was sorely tempted, but for the minute his wholesome fear of consequences curbed his tongue. "Woodhouse isn't working alone on the Rock; you can be sure of that. He's got friends to help him turn whatever trick he's after—maybe in this very house. They're clever people, you can mark that down on your slate!"
"Ridiculous!" The keeper of the Rock was fighting not to believe now. "Why, I tell you if they had a hundred of their spies inside the lines—if they knew the Rock as well as I do they could never take it."
Capper rose wearily, the air of a misunderstood man on him.
"Perhaps they aren't trying to capture it. I know nothing about that. Well—I've done my duty—as one Englishman to another. I hope I've told you in time. I'll be going now."
General Crandall swung on him sharply. "Where are you going?" he demanded.
Capper shrugged his shoulders hopelessly. Now was the minute he'd been counting on—the peeling of crackling notes from a fat bundle, the handsome words of appreciation. Surely General Crandall was ripe.
"Well, General, frankly—I'm broke. Haven't a shilling to bless myself with. I thought perhaps" Capper shot a keen glance at the older man's face, which was partly turned from him. The general appeared to be pondering. He turned abruptly on the spy.
"A few drinks and you might talk," he challenged.
Capper grinned deprecatively. "I don't know, General—I might," he murmured. "I've been away from the drink so long that"
"Where do you want to go?" General Crandall cut him off. "Of course, you don't want to stay here indefinitely."
"Well—if I had a bit of money—they tell me everybody's broke in Paris. Millionaires—and everybody, you know. You can get a room at the Ritz for the asking. That would be heaven for me—if I had something in my pocket."
"You want to go to Paris, eh?" General Crandall stepped closer to Capper, and his eyes narrowed in scorn.
"If it could be arranged, yes. General." Capper was spinning the brim of his bowler between nervous fingers. He did not dare meet the other's glance.
"Demmit, Capper! You come here to blackmail me! I've met your kind before. I know how to deal with your ilk."
"So help me, General, I came here to tell you the truth. I want to go to Paris—or anywhere away from here; I'll admit that. But that had nothing to do with my coming all the way here from Alexandria—spending my last guinea on a steamer ticket—to warn you of your danger. I'm an Englishman and—loyal!" Capper was pleading now. All hope of reward had sped and the vision of a cell with subsequent investigations into his own record appalled him. General Crandall sat down at his desk and began to write.
"I don't know—at any rate, I can't have you talking around here. You're going to Paris."
Capper dropped his hat. At a tap of the bell, Jaimihr Khan appeared at the doors, so suddenly that one might have said he was right behind them all the time. General Crandall directed that his orderly be summoned. When the subaltern appeared, the general handed him a sealed note.
"Orderly, turn this gentleman over to Sergeant Crosby at once," he commanded, "and give the sergeant this note." Then to Capper: "You will cross to Algeciras, where you will be put on a train for Madrid. You will have a ticket for Paris and twenty shillings for expense en route. You will be allowed to talk to no one alone before you leave Gibraltar, and under no circumstances will you be allowed to return—not while I am governor-general, at least."
Capper, his face alight with new-found joy, turned to pass out with the orderly. He paused at the doorway to frame a speech of thanks, but General Crandall's back was toward him. "Paris!" he sighed in rapture, and the doors closed behind him.