Seven

With the excitement over the sinking of the Lusitania, they had almost forgotten Huerta. But he was still in New York, closely attended by German agents and just as closely watched by allied undercover men.

‘Rintelen’s called a meeting about him,’ Midwinter reported. ‘Manhattan Hotel. We’ve got the number of the suite and we’ve hired the one next door. We’ll install bugs.’

The following day they found clear proof of Scheele’s activities. ‘Tramp steamer, Kirk Oswald,’ Horrocks said. ‘On her way to Europe with arms for the Russians. Diverted to Marseilles, which is a shorter trip, and when they unloaded they found one of Scheele’s cigars in her hold waiting to go off. A docker who must have been brighter than most took it to his boss.’

Slattery, who had had dealings with Scheele and knew him better than anybody else, was given the job of following him round New York. Always he seemed to be with a girl. At a builders’ merchants in the Bronx he found he was buying thin lead conduit and water pipe. At a chemical refinery that supplied an electroplating plant in Connecticut, he discovered he had brought sulphuric and picric acid. It was a question now of finding where his devices were being manufactured.

There were plenty of premises in and around New York that could be used for their production, but surveillance provided nothing. Then Slattery realised that in New York harbour there were dozens of German ships caught by the unexpected beginning of the war and interned there, and with them were their officers and crews. Noticing that one of the interned captains had been treated for severe burns to the hands and hip by a doctor with a German name at Mount Vernon, he made further enquiries and discovered that the burns had been of a chemical as well as of a pyrotechnic nature and the next day he started to prowl round the docks, moving quietly among the crews, warehouses, yards and landing piers. It was misty and for a long time he listened to the eerie cries of the gulls and the foghorns booming through the coal smoke hanging over the grey water, and watched the rats slipping among the crates along the waterfront. At the allied docks they were piled high, but the German quays were empty and in a dockside bar he listened to the bitter arguments of the interned German sailors.

Returning to Midwinter’s office, he found Horrocks poring over a map of New York’s working-class districts.

‘There are plenty of German-owned workshops,’ he was saying.

‘There are plenty of German ships, too,’ Slattery interrupted. He explained the way he was thinking. ‘I suspect that German captain had one of Scheele’s cigars in his pocket,’ he continued. ‘And it went off unexpectedly.’

‘Are they accurate?’

‘Surely not that accurate.’

Midwinter was pleased with their discovery. He studied the papers on his desk for a moment before looking up, his eyes hard. ‘Well, we know Rintelen subscribes to the Shipping News. He even has a lawyer who knows the ins and outs of international maritime law. Name of Boniface. Smells of whiskey and looks like a mangy hyena. Works out of his hotel room, knows all the loopholes and has friends in the Police Department who feed him information. I’ll have him followed.’

The meeting at the Manhattan Hotel produced nothing but two days later they picked up a lead on Boniface.

‘Seen aboard the interned steamship. Friedrich der Grosse,’ Midwinter said. ‘Going to the engine room. Why? He’s a lawyer, not a marine engineer.’

‘It’s just the ship they’d use,’ Horrocks agreed. ‘Same name as the flagship of the German High Seas Fleet. Nice and symbolic.’

‘She’s in Hoboken, right in the heart of the docks,’ Slattery pointed out. ‘And there are dozens of stranded German seamen round there. And, as a ship’s part of its motherland, if they manufacture them aboard the Friedrich der Grosse, technically they’re on German soil and not breaking American law.’

Midwinter took his suspicions to his superiors but when he appeared the following day he was sour-faced with disappointment. ‘They say there must be no breach of neutrality,’ he announced. ‘Goddammit, isn’t setting fire to ships a breach of neutrality?’ He slapped the desk. ‘Hell, there must be some way of stopping that sonofabitch Scheele! He must have some weakness we can play on.’

‘He likes pretty girls,’ Slattery pointed out with a grin.

Midwinter glared. ‘You can’t run a guy in for canoodling with a dame,’ he said.

 

As the Lusitania slipped from the mind, other events crowded in.

‘Rintelen’s working a deal with Huerta,’ Midwinter said. ‘They’ve asked Berlin for arms and support and U-boats to land weapons along the Mexican coast. Huerta’s promised that when he regains power, he’ll declare war on the good old US.’ He grinned. ‘Plotters are always pretty free with their promises when they want something.’

‘Not what we were taught at school, all this, is it?’ Horrocks observed to Slattery as they left. ‘Stand up and fight, face to face, man to man. Straight left and all that, they used to say. Lost us a lot of battles. Much better to shoot a chap in the back when he’s not looking. What Huerta gets up to is of the greatest importance to Britain. So where’s Graf? He’s Rintelen’s man for Mexico, but we’ve seen nothing of him since he crossed the border. Ask your German lady friend what he’s up to.’

‘She doesn’t know,’ Slattery snapped.

Horrocks gave him a cold accusing look. ‘You haven’t asked her,’ he said. ‘Suppose you try.’