N Or M? Part 15

"I?".

Her scorn, her amazement were too real to be feigned. Any suspicions Tuppence had had that Sheila Perenna was involved died at this moment. The girl knew nothing, had never known anything.

Tuppence said: "If he is innocent -"

Sheila interrupted her.

"What does that matter? The police will make a case against him."

Tuppence said sharply: "Nonsense, my dear child, that really isn't true."

"The English police will do anything. My Mother says so."

"Your Mother may say so, but she's wrong. I a.s.sure you that it isn't so."

Sheila looked at her doubtfully for a minute or two. Then she said: "Very well. If you say so. I trust you."

Tuppence felt very uncomfortable. She said sharply: "You trust too much, Sheila. You may have been unwise to trust Carl."

"Are you against him, too? I thought you liked him. He thinks so, too."

Touching young things - with their faith in one's liking for them. And it was true - she had liked Carl - she did like him.

Rather wearily she said: "Listen, Sheila, liking or not liking has nothing to do with facts. This country and Germany are at war. There are many ways of serving one's country. One of them is to get information - and to work behind the lines. It is a brave thing to do, for when you are caught, it is -" her voice broke a little - "the end."

Sheila said: "You think Carl -" "Might be working for his country that way? It is a possibility, isn't it?"

"No," said Sheila.

"It would be his job, you see, to come over here as a refugee, to appear to be violently anti-n.a.z.i and then to gather information."

Sheila said quietly: "It's not true. I know Carl. I know his heart and his mind. He cares most for science - for his work - for the truth and the knowledge in it. He is grateful to England for letting him work here. Sometimes, when people say cruel things, he feels German and bitter. But he hates the n.a.z.is always, and what they stand for - their denial of freedom."

Tuppence said: "He would say so, of course."

Sheila turned reproachful eyes upon her.

"So you believe he is a spy?"

"I think it is -" Tuppence hesitated - "a possibility."

Sheila walked to the door.

"I see. I'm sorry I came to ask you to help us."

"But what did you think I could do, dear child?"

"You know people. Your sons are in the Army and Navy and I've heard you say more than once that they knew influential people. I thought perhaps you could get them to - to do - something?"

Tuppence thought of those mythical creatures, Douglas and Raymond and Cyril.

"I'm afraid," she said, "that they couldn't do anything."

Sheila flung her head up. She said pa.s.sionately: "Then there's no hope for us. They'll take him away and shut him up, and one day, early in the morning, they'll stand him against a wall and shoot him - and that will be the end."

She went out, shutting the door behind her.

"Oh, d.a.m.n, d.a.m.n, d.a.m.n the Irish!" thought Tuppence in a fury of mixed feelings. "Why have they got that terrible power of twisting things until you don't know where you are? If Carl von Deinim's a spy, he deserves to be shot. I must hang on to that, not let that girl with her Irish voice bewitch me into thinking it's the tragedy of a hero and a martyr!"

She recalled the voice of a famous actress speaking a line from 'Riders to the Sea': "It's the fine quiet time they'll be having..."

Poignant... carrying you away on a tide of feeling...

She thought, "If it weren't true. Oh, if only it weren't true..."

Yet, knowing what she did, how could she doubt?

IV.

The fisherman on the end of the Old Pier cast in his line and then reeled it cautiously in.

"No doubt whatever, I'm afraid," he said.

"You know," said Tommy, "I'm sorry about it. He's - well, he's a nice chap."

"They are, my dear fellow, they usually are. It isn't the skunks and the rats of a land who volunteer to go to the enemy's country. It's the brave men. We know that well enough. But there it is, the case is proved."

"No doubt whatever, you say?"

"No doubt at all. Among his chemical formulae was a list of people in the factory to be approached, as possible Fascist sympathizers. There was also a very clever scheme of sabotage and a chemical process that, applied to fertilizers, would have devastated large areas of food stocks. All well up Master Carl's street."

Rather unwillingly, Tommy said, secretly anathematizing Tuppence who had made him promise to say it: "I suppose it's not possible that these things could have been planted on him?"

Mr Grant smiled, rather a diabolical smile. "Oh," he said. "Your wife's idea, no doubt."

"Well - er - yes, as a matter of fact it is."

"He's an attractive lad," said Mr Grant tolerantly.

Then he went on.

"No, seriously, I don't think we can take that suggestion into account. He'd got a supply of secret ink, you know. That's a pretty good clinching test. And it wasn't obvious as it would have been if planted. It wasn't 'the mixture to be taken when required' on the washstand or anything like that. In fact, it was d.a.m.ned ingenious. Only come across the method once before and then it was waistcoat b.u.t.tons. Steeped in the stuff, you know. When the fellow wants to use it, he soaks a b.u.t.ton in water. Carl von Deinim's wasn't b.u.t.tons. It was a shoe-lace. Pretty neat."

"Oh!" Something stirred in Tommy's mind - vague - wholly nebulous...

Tuppence was quicker. As soon as he retailed the conversation to her, she seized on the salient point.

"A shoelace? Tony, that explains it!"

"What?"

"Betty, you idiot! Don't you remember that funny thing she did in my room, taking out my laces and soaking them in water. I thought at the time it was a funny thing to think of doing. But, of course, she'd seen Carl do it and was imitating him. He couldn't risk her talking about it, and he arranged with that woman for her to be kidnapped."

Tommy said, "Then that's cleared up."

"Yes. It's nice when things begin to fall into shape. One can put them behind you and get on a bit."

"We need to go on."

Tuppence nodded.

The times were gloomy indeed. France had astonishingly and suddenly capitulated - to the bewilderment and dismay of her own people.

The destination of the French Navy was in doubt.

Now the coasts of France were entirely in the hands of Germany, and the talk of invasion was no longer a remote contingency.

Tommy said: "Carl von Deinim was only a link in the chain. Mrs Perenna's the fountain head."

"Yes, we've got to get the goods on her. But it won't be easy."

"No. After all, if she's the brains of the whole thing one can't expect it to be."

"So M is Mrs Perenna?"

Tommy supposed she must be. He said slowly: "You really think the girl isn't in this at all?"

"I'm quite sure of it."

Tommy sighed.

"Well, you should know. But if so, it's tough luck on her. First the man she loves - and then her mother. She's not going to have much left, is she?"

"We can't help that."

"Yes, but supposing we're wrong - that M or N is someone else?"

Tuppence said rather coldly.

"So you're still harping on that? Are you sure it isn't a case of wishful thinking?"

"What do you mean?"

"Sheila Perenna - that's what I mean."

"Aren't you being rather absurd, Tuppence?"

"No, I'm not. She's got round you, Tommy, just like any other man -"

Tommy replied angrily.

"Not at all. It's simply that I've got my own ideas."

"Which are?"

"I think I'll keep them to myself for a bit. We'll see which of us is right."

"Well, I think we've got to go all out after Mrs Perenna. Find out where she goes, whom she meets - everything. There must be a link somewhere. You'd better put Albert on to her this afternoon."

"You can do that. I'm busy."

"Why, what are you doing?"

Tommy said: "I'm playing golf."

Chapter 9.

"Seems quite like old times, doesn't it, Madam?" said Albert. He beamed happily. Though now in his middle years, running somewhat to fat, Albert had still the romantic boy's heart which had first led him into a.s.sociations with Tommy and Tuppence in their young and adventurous days.

"Remember how you first came across me?" demanded Albert. "Cleanin' of the bra.s.ses, I was in those top notch flats. Coo, wasn't that hall porter a nasty bit of goods? Always on to me, he was. And the day you come along and strung me a tale! Pack of lies it was, too, all about a crook called Ready Rita. Not but what some of it didn't turn out to be true. And since then, as you might say, I've never looked back. Many's the adventure we had afore we all settled down, so to speak."

Albert sighed, and by a natural a.s.sociation of ideas Tuppence inquired after the health of Mrs Albert.

"Oh, the Missus is all right - but she doesn't take to the Welsh much, she says. Thinks they ought to learn proper English, and as for raids - why, they've had two there already, and holes in the field what you could put a motor-car in, so she says. So - how's that for safety? Might as well be in Kensington, she says, where she wouldn't have to see all them melancholy trees and could get good clean milk in a bottle."

"I don't know," said Tuppence, suddenly stricken, "that we ought to get you into this, Albert."

"Nonsense, Madam," said Albert. "Didn't I try and join up and they was so haughty they wouldn't look at me. Wait for my age group to be called up, they said. And me in the pink of health and only too eager to get at them perishing Germans - if you'll excuse the language. You just tell me how I can put a spoke in their wheel and spoil their goings on - and I'm there. Fifth Column, that's what we're up against, so the papers say - though what's happened to the other four they don't mention. But the long and short of it is, I'm ready to a.s.sist you and Captain Beresford in any way you like to indicate."

"Good. Now I'll tell you what we want you to II.

"How long have you known Bletchley?" asked Tommy, as he stepped off the tee and watched with approval his ball leaping down the centre of the fairway.

Commander Haydock, who had also done a good drive, had a pleased expression on his face as he shouldered his clubs and replied: "Bletchley? Let me see. Oh! About nine months or so. He came here last Autumn."

"Friend of friends of yours, I think you said?" Tommy suggested mendaciously.

"Did I?" The Commander looked a little surprised. "No, I don't think so. Rather fancy I met him here at the Club."

"Bit of a mystery man, I gather?"

The Commander was clearly surprised this time.