These purely class interests were reinforced by the intense concern, common to all Hungarians, that Hungary should retain such provinces as she had succeeded in getting back since the Treaty of Trianon, and have the others she had lost restored to her. These 'Lost Provinces' had, under the Treaty, gone to Italy, Rumania, Austria and the newly created sovereign states of Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. Hitler, having occupied the last two against opposition, had penalized them by making them disgorge to Hungary much of the territory she had been forced to cede to them in 1920; but the question was, would the United States and Britain allow them to keep these lands that for twenty years had been a part of the newly created countries which had recently become the victims of Hitler. Above all they were concerned to retain their beloved Transylvania and get back Croatia with the old Hungarian port of Fiume on the Adriatic. They had little hope that Hitler would ever coerce Mussolini into giving up the latter, whereas, although the Allies might insist that the two new States should retain their pre-war frontiers, Rumania and Italy had played the part of enemies who could be despoiled in favour of a Hungary which had taken a hand in Hitler's defeat.
Eventually it was agreed that as a long-term policy it would be in Hungary's best interests to go over to the Allies; but soon several voices were raised with fearsome warnings of the brutal treatment that the country might receive at Hitler's hands before help from the Allies could reach her. Gregory spoke of the landings at Dieppe on the previous day and asserted with confidence that others in greater strength would hold the German armour; but again controversy raged on whether such measures would prove successful.
He was bombarded with scores of questions on these various aspects of the problem and could only say that he was in no position to answer for the British Government, but that if the meeting could give him an idea of the terms likely to be acceptable he would return to London and come back in a few weeks' time better qualified to enter into negotiations.
The upshot was the appointment of a Committee to discuss' matters further with him and determine the Heads of Agreement under which a secret pact might be formulated. Count Zapolya was asked to serve but declined on the grounds that he had done his part by bring them together, and that he now wished younger men to formulate the policy upon which the future of their country might depend. However, as the retired General Baron Alacy the Bishop and the hunchback Count Laszlo Zapolya had all participated in the early conversations with Gregory at Nagykata, they were elected. To them were added a youngish Colonel named Janos Orczy, who had lost his left arm early in the war and was now serving in the War Office, and a Count Zsigmond Szegenyhaz who held a post in the Foreign Office.
It was six o'clock before the meeting broke up, and after several drinks in the big salle downstairs Gregory took leave of Count Zapolya and his other new friends with very mixed feelings.
On the one hand he was extraordinarily elated by the thought that, whereas only five days earlier he had been prepared to write off his mission as a total failure, there was now a body of the most influential men in Hungary actually preparing to negotiate on his proposals.
On the other he was horrified and alarmed by their complete disregard for security. It had been bad enough at Nagykata, as he had found that within twenty-four hours the whole house party had become aware of the reason for his presence there; but at least they were an isolated group with only the Austrian tutor whom he hoped was still in the dark as a possible immediate danger. Here, in Budapest, matters were infinitely worse.
When opening the meeting, Count Zapolya had not asked his friends for any pledge of secrecy, or even warned them to refrain from mentioning the matter under discussion to anyone who had not been invited. Then, after the meeting broke up, several groups had dispersed about the Club still debating the subject in tones loud enough for members who had not been present to hear what they were talking about. No doubt the Count took it for granted that the high sense of honour traditional among the Hungarian nobility was guarantee enough of secrecy. But Gregory was well aware that many men, however discreet in other respects, confided everything to their wives, and that quite a number of women had the deplorable habit of treating their hairdressers as father confessors; so, one way or another, there seemed a quite frightening possibility that, before many days had passed, the news that a conspiracy to break with Hitler was brewing would reach the ears of some fanatical pro Nazi.
At the Vadaszkürt a clerk behind the reception desk told him that his old room had been kept for him and that his luggage had been sent up. As he took the key he got the idea the man had given him a rather queer look; but he thought no more of it until he stepped out of the lift on the third floor. The chambermaid who had done his room during his first visit was there sorting out some dirty linen. Stopping her work she bobbed him the usual curtsy and murmured, 'Kuss die hand'; but no smile accompanied the greeting and she stared at him with an unhappy expression in her round blue eyes.
Gregory was liked by servants because he not only always had a pleasant word for them and never showed ill temper, but was tidy by nature and took some pains to save them as much work as possible. Now, it did not occur to him that this plain strong limbed peasant girl might be concerned on his account, but thinking something had upset her he smiled and asked:
'What's the trouble, Tina?'
In her halting German she stuttered out, 'Perhaps, sir, I should not tell. But there are men in your room. The Manager, he bring them up an hour ago. They wait for you. I think they are the police.'
The smile froze on Gregory's lips. His spine stiffened slightly and he had the sensation that his feet had suddenly turned to lead. But his brain raced from thought to thought with the swiftness of a prairie fire.
Could someone who had been at the meeting have inadvertently betrayed him already? No; that was hardly possible quite impossible, in fact, if the police had been waiting in his room for him for the past hour. Could one of the women at Nagykata have blabbed about his talks with Zapolya and the others? That was unlikely as they were still all in the country and would hardly have been so wantonly indiscreet as to give particulars about him and his mission to anyone in a letter or during a telephone conversation. But what of the Austrian tutor? Surely no one in the house party would have been so imbecile as to confide in him? He might have overheard something to rouse his suspicions, though, then deliberately played the part of a snooper and sent the results of his spying to the police.
As Gregory released the breath he had unconsciously been holding, the thought flashed across his mind that the police might wish to see him only on a routine matter. But he instantly dismissed it. If they were concerned with some regulation to do with foreign visitors, which he had failed to observe, they would simply have left a message for him to call at the police station, or sent a man round to catch him in the entrance of the hotel as he came in. There would not be two of them and Tina had made it quite clear that there was more than one. And they would not be waiting to confront him without warning in the privacy of his room.
The question now was what course to take. Should he face the music or cut and run for it?
It was certain that the police would be armed and, although he was carrying a small automatic that he had smuggled through the customs, a shooting match at close quarters was not a thing to enter upon lightly. Anyhow, they would be two to one and, even if he succeeded in rendering them both hors de combat, once the sound of shooting had raised a general alarm he would not be able to get out of the hotel without encountering further trouble. Yet if they did know about his secret mission and he entered his room but did not shoot it out with them, in another few minutes he would be walking back along the corridor with his wrists locked into a pair of handcuffs.