Although our flats were two miles apart, he visited me as often as when we lived on neighbouring staircases. His face had changed little in the last years, but he was finding it harder to pretend that his hair still grew down to his temples. That night he seemed secretly amused.
“Just had a letter,” he said. “I must say, a slightly remarkable letter.”
“Who from?”
“You should have said where from. Actually, it comes from Basel.”
“Whom do you know in Basel?”
“I used to be rather successful with the Swiss. They laughed when I made a joke. Very flattering,” said Roy.
“It must be some adoring girl,” I said.
“I can’t think of any description which would please him less,” said Roy. “No, I really can’t. It’s an old acquaintance of yours. It’s Willy Romantowski.”
I said a word or two about Willy, and then exclaimed how odd it was.
“It’s extremely odd,” said Roy. “It’s even odder when you see the letter. You won’t be able to read it, though. You’re not good at German holograph, are you? Also Willy uses very curious words. Sometimes of a slightly slangy nature.” Roy looked at me solemnly and began to translate.
It was a puzzling letter.
“Dear Roy,” so his translation went, “Since you left Berlin I have not had a very good time. They made me go into the army which made me sick. So I got tired of wasting my time in the army, and decided to come here.”
“He makes it sound simple,” I interjected.
“I have arrived here,” Roy went on, “and like it much better. But I have no money, and the Swiss people do not let me earn any. That is why I am writing you this letter, Roy. I remember how kind you were to us all at No. 32. You were always very kind to me, weren’t you? So I am hoping that you will be able to help me now I am in difficult circumstances. I expect you have a Swiss publisher. Could you please ask him to give me some money? Or perhaps you could bring me some yourself? I expect you could get to Switzerland somehow. I know you will not let me starve. Your friend Romantowski (Willy).” And he had added: “There were some changes at No. 32 after you left, but I have not heard much since I went into the army.”
The letter was written in pencil, in (so Roy said) somewhat illiterate German. He had never seen Willy’s handwriting, so he had nothing to compare it with. It gave an address in a street in Basel, and the postmark was Swiss. The letter had been opened and censored in several different countries, but had only taken about a month to arrive.
We were both excited. It was a singular event. We could not decide how genuine the letter was. As stated, Willy’s story sounded highly implausible. From the beginning Roy was suspicious.
“It’s a plant,” he said. “They’re trying to hook me.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps Reinhold Schäder. They think I might be useful. They’re very thorough people.”
I could believe that easily enough. But I could not understand why, if Schäder or Roy’s other high-placed friends were behind the move, they should use this extraordinary method. It seemed ridiculous, and I said so.
“They sometimes do queer things. They’re not as rational as we are.” Then he smiled. “Or of course they may have mistaken my tastes.”
He considered.
“That shouldn’t be likely. Perhaps Willy was the only one who’d volunteer to do it. You can’t imagine the little dancer trying to get hold of me for them, can you? But Willy wasn’t a particularly scrupulous young man. Or do you think I’m misjudging him?”
I chuckled, and asked him what he was going to do about it.
“You’re not going to reply?” I asked.
“Not safe,” said Roy. I had half-expected a different reply, but he was curiously prudent and restrained at that time. “I need to stop them getting me into trouble. It might look shady. I’m not keen on getting into trouble. Particularly if they’re trying to hook me.”
He had, in fact, already behaved with sense and judgment. The letter had arrived the day before. Roy had at once reported it to his departmental chief, and written a note to Houston Eggar, who was back at the Foreign Office handling some of the German work. Roy had told them (as Eggar already knew) that he had many friends in Berlin, and that this was a disreputable acquaintance. He added that one or two of the younger German ministers had reason to believe that he was well-disposed to them and to Germany.
He was far more cautious than he used to be, I thought. His chief and Eggar had both told him not to worry; it was obviously none of his doing; Eggar had gone on to say that the Foreign Office might want to follow the letter up, since they had so little contact with anyone who had recently been inside Germany.
Outside, the sirens ululated. They were late that night. In a few minutes, down the estuary we heard the first hollow thud of gunfire. The rumble came louder and sharper. It was strangely warming to be sitting there, in that safe room, as the noise grew. It was like lying in front of the fire as a child, while the wind moaned and the rain thrashed against the windows. It gave just the same pulse of rich, exalted comfort.
We turned off the light and drew aside the curtains. Searchlights were weaving on the clouds: there was an incandescent star as a shell burst short, but most were exploding above the cloud shelf. There were only a few aircraft, flying high. The night was too stormy for a heavy raid. Two small fires were rising pink, rosy, out to the east. The searchlights crossed their beams ineffectively, in a beautiful three-dimensional design.
The aircraft were unseen, undetected, untouched. We heard their engines throbbing smoothly and without a break. They flew west and then south; the gunfire became distant again, and died away.
We looked out into the dark night; one searchlight still smeared itself upon the clouds.
“They won’t find it so easy soon,” I said.
“Who’ll stop them? Getliffe and his gang?”
“They’ll help,” I said. “It won’t be any fun to fly.”
“You’re sure, old boy?” said Roy very clearly, in the dark room.
“I’m pretty sure,” I said. I had always had a minor interest in military history: since the war, with the opportunities of my job, it had become more informed. “It was the most dangerous job in the last war. It’s bound to become so again.”
“On both sides?”
“Yes.”
“What do you mean — the most dangerous job?”
I defined what I meant. I said that special élite troops on land, like commandos, might take greater risks than the average fighting airman; but that the whole fighting strength of the air force would suffer heavier casualties than any similar number of men on land or sea.
“They’ll take very heavy losses,” I said, staring at the night sky.
“And we shall too?”
“Quite certainly,” I said. “I don’t know how many fighting airmen will survive the war. It won’t be a very large percentage.”
“Just so.” I heard the clear voice behind me.
Two mornings later, Houston Eggar rang me up at my office. He was excessively mysterious. In him discretion was becoming both a passion and an art; both he and I had secret telephones, but he thought it safest not to speak. It would be wiser to meet, he said zestfully, revelling in his discretion. He would not give me an inkling of the reason. Would I mind going round to the Foreign Office?
I was annoyed. I did not believe that he was as busy as I was. I knew that he enjoyed all the shades of secrecy. Irritated, I went past guards, sandbags, into the dingy entrance of the Foreign Office, followed a limping messenger down corridors and up stairs.