The Legion of the Lost, стр. 63
Since he had first broached the idea there had been a new impetus to the adventure.
Von Otten had visited the great lecture-room and created a stir by the simple announcement that the delegates would return to their own countries the following Friday – in six days’ time. On the Friday morning they would attend a final lecture and receive their passports. Accommodation on trains would be booked to their destinations and they would be expected to show results soon after reaching home.
Six days, thought Palfrey; it had to be done by then. In one way he was glad, the waiting was becoming unbearable.
There were times when he wondered whether von Otten was playing a cat-and-mouse game, knowing what and who they were, waiting for the last moment. There would be justification for that; if he suspected their real identity he would also suspect them of having a plan of campaign, waiting only for the signal to start. That campaign would have to be governed by their contacts in Berlin.
Palfrey could imagine that von Otten would be prepared to give them ample rope, so that when he tightened it he would find the resident agents in his noose. There was no certainty of that, Palfrey knew, but the fact that none of the other delegates had been able to make contact with them – not even Hilde – although they appeared to mix freely enough with each other, made him suspect that they were being singled out for special treatment.
The waiting game could be played by both sides.
So there was an added zest and urgency in his mind as he walked along the pavement with the drab crowd. He saw fear in all of them – as well as weariness and dirtiness. Never in his life had he passed so many people from whom a stench emanated as if it were a natural odour. The lack of soap explained it; Palfrey wondered how important the lack of soap might prove in the final defeat of the Third Reich.
He thrust the irrelevancy aside.
Six days – would that give them time? Was Stefan free to move? They had to rely on him for their outside contacts, it would not be safe to evade Stolte or his stooge again.
Rendezvous 3 was a restaurant-cum-beer garden with a dilapidated appearance, one of the few remaining open. As he turned into it and saw the drab-faced, red-eyed Ber-liners eating their ersatz food he felt a flood of optimism. It was like being free again to be able to make direct contact with the Marquis’s own agent. The risk of being followed was forgotten, the fact that his presence might get the rendezvous raided and closed down did not enter his mind.
He sat at an empty table, and when an old, sad-looking man approached, asked for a Pilsener, a Berlin formula in the Marquis’s code.
The man stared at him.
‘We have none,’ he said, sadly. ‘We have had none for a very long time.’
‘When will you be having a supply?’ asked Palfrey.
He waited, knowing that the man’s response would tell him whether he was the right contact, saw the red-rimmed eyes widen, heard the soft answer: ‘When the gulls have gone away.’
And then, in whispers, although that was not surprising because most of the conversation there was in whispers, the familiar dialogue was repeated.
The old man nodded when he finished, going off and bringing Palfrey a tankard of ersatz beer. Palfrey sat sipping at it for half an hour. Most of the customers went out, new ones taking their places. Soon the old man beckoned him and he went out into the garden where a few tables, badly in need of paint, and some broken chairs added to its neglected appearance. Palfrey followed him to a summer-house as dilapidated as the rest of the garden, walking across long grass where once there had been trim lawns.
They stopped by the summer-house.
‘Have you a message for me?’ Palfrey asked.
‘Your friend will be calling at one-fifteen,’ he was told. ‘He comes at one-fifteen each day.’
‘Where shall I see him?’ asked Palfrey.
‘At the back of the summer-house,’ the old man said. ‘It is sheltered by trees and bushes and you cannot be seen. He will come through the garden. That is all?’
‘Thanks—all for now!’ said Palfrey.
He was in a fever of excitement as he waited, afraid that there might be some last-minute hitch to keep Stefan away. But at precisely one-fifteen he heard a faint movement nearby and saw the bushes stirring. Stefan stepped into sight, smiling, no whit different from when Palfrey had last seen him.
They gripped hands.
‘It has seemed a long time,’ said Stefan. ‘The others—they are all right?’
‘So far, yes,’ said Palfrey. He did not need to ask about Stefan, was anxious to get the subject under way so as to judge Stefan’s reaction. He talked at some length, his eyes lighting up when he found that Stefan had contrived to find out much about the prison and how it was safeguarded.
As he started to talk of the gas he felt a little absurd; in cold blood, and now that the freshness of the idea had gone, it seemed fantastic.
Stefan nodded gently when he finished.
‘I cannot see why not, Sap,’ he said at last, ‘but it will mean much organising. We shall need some time.’
‘Not too long,’ said Palfrey. ‘Five clear days.’ He explained why.
‘I do not see why not,’ said Stefan. ‘And I have news of some consequence, my friend. I have been in touch with the strong subversive organisation in Berlin. Its headquarters, if you please, are at Attanstrasse 8—not the little grocer’s shop where you first heard of it.’ His eyes were smiling. ‘I contrived to make contact through the old man