As he went up the steps he bumped into his brother-in-law, Archie Duncan Ross, the elder brother of the first Mrs Ruthven-Greene, coming down.
‘Archie, I was just going in for a snifter.’
Ross was shaking his head sadly.
‘Complete washout, old boy-the Hun put one right through the roof, through five ceilings and into the wine cellar last night.’
‘The swine! My God, the 1912 Margaux!’
‘Broken glass and red puddles, I’m afraid. But there is good news.’
Reggie felt there could never be good news again. The 1912 Margaux-good God, the Nazis were ruthless. First his house, now the finest drop of claret in the city.
‘I hear,’ said Ross, ‘That there is Krug ‘20 to be had at the Dorchester.’
§ 13
Champagne always gave Reggie insomnia. Hence he had lived much of his adult life with insomnia. If it had ever crossed his mind that there was cause and effect operating between the two, then he might well have regarded it as a poor choice. Between booze and no booze, no booze was on a hiding to nothing. He had long ago learnt to while away the hours with a good book or, failing the availability of a good book, any book, preferably taken with a light snack and a cup of cocoa. His chosen snack was one of his favourites-cheddar cheese with Kep sauce. His chosen book was The Flying Visit by this chap Peter Fleming. He had been given the book by the author’s brother, Ian Fleming-a colleague in the spook trade (Navy, mind, arrogant shits the lot of’em, senior service as they always managed to remind you), and he had to admit, it was a bit of a hoot. You see, Hitler gets it into his head to fly over to Britain and bale out…
Reggie slept. Reggie dreamt.
He was in the middle of a large field. He was sitting behind the wood and glass partition of a railway-station booking office gazing out upon a railway designed very much after the fashion of Heath Robinson, involving a lot of gear wheels of varying size, a few hydrogen-filled balloons, several sets of bellows and an awful lot of much-knotted string-indeed, string seemed to be far and away the most common material in this technology. The single-line tracks stretched away to meet at infinity. A line of washing hung between the signals, a lazy Jersey cow munched grass between the tracks, a painted brown and white sign read ‘God’s Wonderful Railway’ and was everywhere abbreviated GWR-it was even woven as a crest into his uniform, stamped in gold leaf on his pencil, wrought in iron into the legs of the platform benches, passengers for the use of. And high above it all a lone figure, gesticulating wildly, descended on a parachute. He landed with a bump on the wooden platform, his chute wrapped around the down signal, his backside flat on the planks and his legs splayed in front of him. He looked around him-the cow approached and proceeded to eat his hat. Then he noticed Reggie. Reggie couldn’t help the feeling that they’d met somewhere before. Little moustache, bit like Charlie Chaplin, piggy little eyes and a great cowlick of hair across the forehead.
‘Eigentlich wollte ich nach Birmingham, aber Sie haben mich nach Crewe geschickt.’
Reggie struggled with this. His dream-German was so rusty.
‘Sorry old chap. Could you say that again a bit slower? Y’know, langsamer.’
The little man sloughed off the parachute, came across the platform and banged on the glass. For a foreigner he certainly knew a thing or two about complaining.
‘Dumkopf!’
Well, that needed no translation.
‘Eigentlich wollte ich nach Birmingham, aber Sie haben mich nach Crewe geschickt!’ he said painfully slowly, and just as painfully and slowly Reggie worked it out.
‘I wanted to go to Birmingham and they sent me on to Crewe.’ Crewe? Where did the fool think he was?
‘GWR, old chap. Exeter and all stations west. You know, Cornish Riviera Express. Torbay, Plymouth, the Saltash bridge-all the way to Penzance. Can’t get to Crewe from here. You want the Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway to Evercreech Junction or Shepton Mallet. You’d have to change at-‘
A fist crashed down on the counter.
‘Trottel!’-which Reggie vaguely thought might mean ‘idiot’.
Then the gun came out and the irate visitor banged off shots in all directions. Reggie ducked. The wall behind him splintered. The little man plugged a fat bloke capering across a beach on a railway poster bearing the cheery slogan ‘Skegness Can Be So Bracing’. Reggie silently wished he was in Skegness right now, bracing or not. He felt no pain but wondered if he’d been hit when a ringing started in his ears. A persistent ringing that just would not stop.
Reggie woke. A creamy white telephone on the bedside table jumped about as though it had swallowed a Mexican bean. Regg’e picked it up, ready to slam it down if it was Hitler calling.
‘Reggie?’
This bloke certainly didn’t sound German.
‘Yes,’ said Reggie.
‘It’s me. Charlie.’
Charlie? Charlie Leigh-Hunt-Reggie’s right-hand man and a captain in the Irish Guards.
‘Reggie? Are you all right?’
‘Of course. I… I was just… sleeping.’
‘Look. There’s a flap on. I’m in the foyer downstairs. I’m coming up right away.’
‘A flap?’
Reggie looked around. The room regained its old familiarity. There were his trousers hanging off the back of a chair by his braces. He knew where he was again. Imagine the disturbing effect if you woke up and spotted another bloke’s braces. Didn’t bear thinking about.
‘A flap? Coming up? What’s the matter? Hitler not landed in person, has he?’
‘Oh God, you’ve already heard.’ Charlie hung up. Reggie sat clutching the phone no longer quite able to say what was dream and what reality.
Reggie flung on his dressing gown and paced the floor. The minutes could not pass quickly enough before Charlie knocked upon his door. He flung the door wide, the question bursting from his lips.
‘Hitler’s here? Where?’
Charlie kicked the door to.
‘Not so loud. Do you want everyone to hear?’
‘For God’s sake, Charlie-just tell me!’
‘It isn’t Hitler, it’s Hess.’
‘Hess?’
‘Deputy Fuhrer Rudolf Hess. He took off from Germany late on Saturday in a Messerschmitt and baled out over Scotland around midnight. He was picked up at once and-you won’t believe this-he asked for the Duke of Hamilton.’
‘Hamilton? Hess? Picked up? By whom?’
‘The Home Guard.’
Reggie was only seconds away from forswearing champagne for ever. He’d certainly think twice before finishing the day with a cheese sandwich again.
‘The Home Guard? The Home bloody Guard?! What did they do?’
‘Well… they sent for Hamilton actually.’
‘I don’t believe it. I do not bloody believe it!’
‘You’d better. It’s completely pukkah. And you’d better get dressed too. It’s past nine and McKendrick wants to see us in thirty minutes. He sent me over to get you. He doesn’t trust the phone at all where this is concerned.’
McKendrick was Gordon McKendrick, an Argyll and Sutherland Brigadier in a plain-clothes world where rank was all but invisible next to power-Reggie and Charlie answered to McKendrick, McKendrick answered to Churchill.
It was a fifteen-minute walk to McKendrick’s office in Broadway-all the same they took a cab, across Trafalgar Square, along the bottom end of St James’ Park and up Birdcage Walk into that corner of London that was inescapably Royal, military and, occasionally, secret. Palaces, barracks and spooks. Reggie sat in the back still fiddling with his collar studs and cufflinks, and still muttering, ‘I don’t bloody believe it’, more to himself than to Charlie.