“I understood that Peter Calleja, his father, and Joseph Calleja, Samuel’s younger brother had been arrested and interrogated by the security police…”
Julian Christopher gently corrected the young man’s terminology.
“We don’t have any security police, Mr Boffa. The Internal Security Department personnel who survived the bombing of their headquarters on Manoel Island in December were reassigned to other units and the Malta ISD formally disbanded at that time. Samuel Calleja’s father and brother were interviewed by officers of the Special Investigations Department of the Royal Military Police, and by intelligence officers attached to my Headquarters Staff.”
“Yes, of course,” Paul Boffa agreed, a little chastened. The ease with which the other man could suddenly dominate the room, and everything and everybody around him was a rude reminder of the political realities of a Maltese Archipelago under — albeit at the moment relatively benign — military occupation. “As I was saying,” he went on doggedly, “Peter and Joe Calleja were detained and interrogated and then placed under house arrest?”
“Lieutenant Siddall died as a result of an explosion on property rented by Samuel Calleja. It was important that this matter was investigated by the appropriate authorities regardless of the known connections of some of those unwittingly implicated with the, er, person, of the current Commander-in-Chief.”
“Ah, I see. Presumably, Marija Calleja has been interviewed?”
Julian Christopher scowled.
“No, of course not!” He made no effort to hide his offence at being asked such a crass and ridiculous question.
Paul Boffa flinched. “But you said…”
“Miss Calleja’s father and surviving brother had access to bomb-making equipment and demolition munitions in their work at the Naval Dockyards. They also had the training and the technical knowledge to use the same, had they been so moved. Whereas, Jim Siddall was Marija Calleja’s friend, dammit!”
“I’m sorry, I…”
The older man raised a hand.
“No, no, I apologise. One tries very hard to be aloof from things, to keep a cool head and so forth but some things make a man’s blood boil. It was a miracle that Samuel Calleja’s poor wife wasn’t killed as well! Sometimes, I just don’t understand people who can cold-bloodedly booby-trap a door like that. There might have been children killed! Honestly, it beggars belief!”
The Editor of the Times of Malta dug deep and found new resolve.
This was the story of the year, certainly the story of his career.
But it was far too good to be true.
“People are bound to say this is all very convenient, Sir Julian?”
“Oh. How so?”
“One minute the Calleja family is disgraced; the next they are exonerated, the innocent victims of a cruel and heartless conspiracy?”
The Fighting Admiral shrugged, holding his peace.
“And then there are the rumours of the involvement of Marija Calleja with your son…”
“I’d no more discuss personal tittle-tattle about a member of my family with a journalist than you would, Mr Boffa.” Julian Christopher hadn’t imagined the younger man would swallow the story hook line and sinker. As Dick White had observed, rather pithily, he thought; ‘the thing is to get a fellow hooked, then, sooner or later he will reel himself in.’ It was for this reason that one never disclosed everything even when one actually wanted everybody to know everything. In a situation in which the truth needed to be buried by a veritable bodyguard of lies, the trick was to provide just enough information to allow Paul Boffa, his readers and anybody else who sniffed around later, to give the official account the benefit of the doubt. “Miss Calleja and my son have been ‘pen friends’ for many years. To the best of my knowledge Miss Calleja and my son have never actually met each other. I have no idea if Miss Calleja and my son have any plans to meet each other in person at this time. Presently, my son is fully engaged making good battle damage to his ship. I should imagine that Miss Calleja is supporting her family in the way any good daughter would in these sad times.”
The Editor of the Times of Malta was more than a little out of his depth. He was floundering, drowning. It was because of this that he allowed his focus to shift from the immediate story, to one that was at best ephemeral, and at worst, black propaganda.
“There is a great deal of talk about something called Red Dawn on American radio stations and on the news wires coming from Reuters, Sir Julian?” He took a big gulp of air. “Is Red Dawn the real reason for the sudden naval build up?”
The Commander-in-Chief of all British and Commonwealth Forces in the Mediterranean Theatre of Operations viewed the editor thoughtfully with eyes that were instantly flinty, unforgiving.
“You and I don’t know each other very well, Mr Boffa,” he said after what seemed to the younger man, an interminable pause. “In England politicians and senior officers can sometimes rely on gentlemen of the press to unconditionally respect a confidence, usually in advance of some major public announcement or event. Are you familiar with ‘Chatham House Rules’, or ‘Lobby terms’?”
Paul Boffa nodded, but he checked he understood the proposition correctly.
“Under those ‘terms’ it would be understood that whatever I am told is either unattributable or embargoed until a future agreed date by mutual consent, Sir Julian.”
“Quite.” The great man smiled faintly. “It is a question of trust. On your part you must be confident that I am not using you for nefarious purposes relating to perfidious Imperial policy; on my part I must know that you won’t print something you have been told in confidence at an inopportune time.”
“I am an honourable man, Sir Julian.”
“As were the poor fellows in those B-52s the RAF shot down last month,” the Commander-in-Chief retorted mildly.” He hesitated. “Perhaps, you and I should begin our journey with small steps, Mr Boffa?”
“As you wish, Sir Julian.”
“Red Dawn,” the older man murmured. “Krasnaya Zarya,” he continued ruefully. “We believe was the Soviet response to the situation they found themselves in after the end of the Second War. The Americans had the atomic bomb and they didn’t. Therefore, the Soviets, specifically, Josef Stalin, believed that the USSR would lose the next war. Seventeen years later they were right; but by then Red Dawn was so deeply embedded in every facet of the Soviet system that it infected everywhere in the World touched by the Soviet State. It was by then ubiquitous. So, when the war came and blew away the old Soviet Union what was left was Red Dawn. We now suspect that the terrorists who duped,” he liked that word too much and therefore forbade its use again in this conversation, “Samuel Calleja were responsible for the worst atrocities committed on Malta in the weeks after the October War, including the assassination of one of my predecessors, were almost certainly affiliated to the Red Dawn movement.”
Paul Boffa’s eyes were widening, his pupils dilating in astonishment.
“Moreover,” Julian Christopher went on, his tone low and severe, almost schoolmasterly, “it is the considered view of Her Majesty’s Government that the attacks on Royal Navy vessels and the bombing of Malta last month was part of a broader Red Dawn inspired conspiracy against British and American interests. Furthermore, the belligerence of Spain and the irrational behaviour of Italy and other Mediterranean powers towards British interests may also have been fomented by agents of Red Dawn. The recent actions against Pantelleria, Linosa and Lampedusa were therefore necessary ‘tidying up’ operations to deny safe havens to Red Dawn terrorists, and to secure sea communications with Gibraltar. It is my sincere hope that these actions will persuade the authorities on Sicily and in North Africa, that any attempt to shelter elements of Red Dawn or to interdict our lines of communication will henceforth have the most dire consequences for those responsible. ”