Men, Women and Guns Part 6

Adjutants had been known to hold him up as an example to those of their flock who needed chastening for any of the hundred and one things that adjutants do not like--if they have their regiment at heart. And he deserved it all.

I, who knew him, as well perhaps as anyone; I, who was privileged to call him friend, and yet in the hour of his greatest need failed him; I, to whose lot it has fallen to remove the slur from his name, state this in no half-hearted way. He deserved it, and a thousand times as much again. He was the type of man beside whom the ordinary English gentleman--the so-called white man--looked dirty-grey in comparison. And yet there came a day when men who had openly fawned on him left the room when he came in, when whispers of an unsuspected yellow streak in him began to circulate, when senior subalterns no longer held him up as a model. Now he is dead: and it has been left to me to vindicate him.

Perchance by so doing I may wipe out a little of the stain of guilt that lies so heavy on my heart; perchance I may atone, in some small degree, for my doubts and suspicions; and, perchance too, the whitest man that ever lived may of his understanding and knowledge, perfected now in the Great Silence to which he has gone, accept my tardy reparation, and forgive. It is only yesterday that the doc.u.ment, which explained everything, came into my hands. It was sent to me sealed, and with it a short covering letter from a firm of solicitors stating that their client was dead--killed in France--and that according to his instructions they were forwarding the enclosed, with the request that I should make such use of it as I saw fit.

To all those others, who, like myself, doubted, I address these words.

Many have gone under: to them I venture to think everything is now clear. Maybe they have already met Spud, in the great vast gulfs where the mists of illusion are rolled away. For those who still live, he has no abuse--that incomparable sportsman and sahib; no recriminations for us who ruined his life. He goes farther, and finds excuses for us; G.o.d knows we need them. Here is what he has written. The doc.u.ment is reproduced exactly as I received it--saving only that I have altered all names. The man, whom I have called Ginger Bathurst, and everyone else concerned, will, I think, recognise themselves. And, pour les autres--let them guess.

In two days, old friend, my battalion sails for France; and, now with the intention full formed and fixed in my mind, that I shall not return, I have determined to put down on paper the true facts of what happened three years ago: or rather, the true motives that impelled me to do what I did. I put it that way, because you already know the facts. You know that I was accused of saving my life at the expense of a woman's when the _Astoria_ foundered in mid-Atlantic; you know that I was accused of having thrust her aside and taken her place in the boat. That accusation is true. I did save my life at a woman's expense. But the motives that impelled my action you do not know, nor the ident.i.ty of the woman concerned. I hope and trust that when you have read what I shall write you will exonerate me from the charge of a cowardice, vile and abominable beyond words, and at the most only find me guilty of a mistaken sense of duty. These words will only reach you in the event of my death; do with them what you will. I should like to think that the old name was once again washed clean of the dirty blot it has on it now; so do your best for me, old pal, do your best.

You remember Ginger Bathurst--of course you do. Is he still a budding Staff Officer at the War Office, I wonder, or is he over the water? I'm out of touch with the fellows in these days--(_the pathos of it: Spud out of touch, Spud of all men, whose soul was in the Army_)--one doesn't live in the back of beyond for three years and find Army lists and gazettes growing on the trees. You remember also, I suppose, that I was best man at his wedding when he married the Comtesse de Grecin. I told you at the time that I was not particularly enamoured of his choice, but it was _his_ funeral; and with the old boy asking me to steer him through, I had no possible reason for refusing. Not that I had anything against the woman: she was charming, fascinating, and had a pretty useful share of this world's boodle. Moreover, she seemed extraordinarily in love with Ginger, and was just the sort of woman to push an ambitious fellow like him right up to the top of the tree. He, of course, was simply idiotic: he was stark, raving mad about her; vowed she was the most peerless woman that ever a wretched being like himself had been privileged to look at; loaded her with presents which he couldn't afford, and generally took it a good deal worse than usual. I think, in a way, it was the calm acceptance of those presents that first prejudiced me against her. Naturally I saw a lot of her before they were married, being such a pal of Ginger's, and I did my best for his sake to overcome my dislike. But he wasn't a wealthy man--at the most he had about six hundred a year private means--and the presents of jewellery alone that he gave her must have made a pretty large hole in his capital.

However that is all by the way. They were married, and shortly afterwards I took my leave big game shooting and lost sight of them for a while. When I came back Ginger was at the War Office, and they were living in London. They had a delightful little flat in Hans Crescent, and she was pus.h.i.+ng him as only a clever woman can push. Everybody who could be of the slightest use to him sooner or later got roped in to dinner and was duly fascinated.

To an habitual onlooker like myself, the whole thing was clear, and I must quite admit that much of my first instinctive dislike--and dislike is really too strong a word--evaporated. She went out of her way to be charming to me, not that I could be of any use to the old boy, but merely because I was his great friend; and of course she knew that I realised--what he never dreamed of--that she was paving the way to pull some really big strings for him later.

I remember saying good-bye to her one afternoon after a luncheon, at which I had watched with great interest the complete capitulation of two generals and a well-known diplomatist.

"You're a clever man, Mr. Spud," she murmured, with that charming air of taking one into her confidence, with which a woman of the world routs the most confirmed misogynist. "If only Ginger----" She broke off and sighed: just the suggestion of a sigh; but sufficient to imply--lots.

"My lady," I answered, "keep him fit; make him take exercise: above all things don't let him get fat. Even you would be powerless with a fat husband. But provided you keep him thin, and never let him decide anything for himself, he will live to be a lasting monument and example of what a woman can do. And warriors and statesmen shall bow down and wors.h.i.+p, what time they drink tea in your boudoir and eat buns from your hand. Bismillah!"

But time is short, and these details are trifling. Only once again, old pal, I am living in the days when I moved in the pleasant paths of life, and the temptation to linger is strong. Bear with me a moment. I am a sybarite for the moment in spirit: in reality--G.o.d! how it hurts.

"Gentlemen rankers out on the spree, d.a.m.ned from here to eternity: G.o.d have mercy on such as we.

Bah! Yah! Bah!"

I never thought I should live to prove Kipling's lines. But that's what I am--a gentleman ranker; going out to the war of wars--a private. I, and that's the bitterest part of it, I, who had, as you know full well, always, for years, lived for this war, the war against those cursed Germans. I knew it was coming--you'll bear me witness of that fact--and the cruel irony of fate that has made that very knowledge my downfall is not the lightest part of the little bundle fate has thrown on my shoulders. Yes, old man, we're getting near the motives now; but all in good time. Let me lay it out dramatically; don't rob me of my exit--I'm feeling a bit theatrical this evening. It may interest you to know that I saw Lady Delton to-day: she's a V.A.D., and did not recognise me, thank Heaven!

(_Need I say again that Delton is not the name he wrote. Sufficient that she and Spud knew one another_ _very well, in other days. But in some men it would have emphasised the bitterness of spirit._)

Let's get on with it. A couple of years pa.s.sed, and the summer of 1912 found me in New York. I was temporarily engaged on a special job which it is unnecessary to specify. It was not a very important one, but, as you know, a gift of tongues and a liking for poking my nose into the affairs of nations had enabled me to get a certain amount of more or less diplomatic work. The job was over, and I was merely marking time in New York waiting for the _Astoria_ to sail. Two days before she was due to leave, and just as I was turning into the doors of my hotel, I ran full tilt into von Basel--a very decent fellow in the Prussian Guard--who was seconded and doing military attache work in America. I'd met him off and on hunting in England--one of the few Germans I know who really went well to hounds.

"Hullo! Trevor," he said, as we met. "What are you doing here?"

"Marking time," I answered. "Waiting for my boat."

We strolled to the bar, and over a c.o.c.ktail he suggested that if I had nothing better to do I might as well come to some official ball that was on that evening. "I can get you a card," he remarked. "You ought to come; your friend, Mrs. Bathurst--Comtesse de Grecin that was--is going to be present."

"I'd no idea she was this side of the water," I said, surprised.

"Oh, yes! Come over to see her people or something. Well! will you come?"

I agreed, having nothing else on, and as he left the hotel, he laughed.

"Funny the vagaries of fate. I don't suppose I come into this hotel once in three months. I only came down this evening to tell a man not to come and call as arranged, as my kid has got measles--and promptly ran into you."

Truly the irony of circ.u.mstances! If one went back far enough, one might find that the determining factor of my disgrace was the quarrel of a nurse and her lover which made her take the child another walk than usual and pick up infection. Dash it all! you might even find that it was a spot on her nose that made her do so, as she didn't want to meet him when not looking at her best! But that way madness lies.

Whatever the original cause--I went: and in due course met the Comtesse.

She gave me a couple of dances, and I found that she, too, had booked her pa.s.sage on the _Astoria_. I met very few people I knew, and having found it the usual boring stunt, I decided to get a gla.s.s of champagne and a sandwich and then retire to bed. I took them along to a small alcove where I could smoke a cigarette in peace, and sat down. It was as I sat down that I heard from behind a curtain which completely screened me from view, the words "English Army" spoken in German. And the voice was the voice of the Comtesse.

Nothing very strange in the words you say, seeing that she spoke German, as well as several other languages, fluently. Perhaps not--but you know what my ideas used to be--how I was obsessed with the spy theory: at any rate, I listened. I listened for a quarter of an hour, and then I got my coat and went home--went home to try and see a way through just about the toughest proposition I'd ever been up against. For the Comtesse--Ginger Bathurst's idolised wife--was hand in glove with the German Secret Service. She was a spy, not of the wireless installation up the chimney type, not of the doc.u.ment-stealing type, but of a very much more dangerous type than either, the type it is almost impossible to incriminate.

I can't remember the conversation I overheard exactly, I cannot give it to you word for word, but I will give you the substance of it. Her companion was von Basel's chief--a typical Prussian officer of the most overbearing description.

"How goes it with you, Comtesse?" he asked her, and I heard the sc.r.a.pe of a match as he lit a cigarette.

"Well, Baron, very well."

"They do not suspect?"

"Not an atom. The question has never been raised even as to my national sympathies, except once, and then the suggestion--not forced or emphasised in any way--that, as the child of a family who had lost everything in the '70 war, my sympathies were not hard to discover, was quite sufficient. That was at the time of the Agadir crisis."

"And you do not desire revanche?"

"My dear man, I desire money. My husband with his pay and private income has hardly enough to dress me on."

"But, dear lady, why, if I may ask, did you marry him? With so many others for her choice, surely the Comtesse de Grecin could have commanded the world?"

"Charming as a phrase, but I a.s.sure you that the idea of the world at one's feet is as extinct as the dodo. No, Baron, you may take it from me he was the best I could do. A rising junior soldier, employed on a staff job at the War Office, _persona grata_ with all the people who really count in London by reason of his family, and moreover infatuated with his charming wife." Her companion gave a guttural chuckle; I could feel him leering. "I give the best dinners in London; the majority of his senior officers think I am on the verge of running away with them, and when they become too obstreperous, I allow them to kiss my--fingers.

"Listen to me, Baron," she spoke rapidly, in a low voice so that I could hardly catch what she said. "I have already given information about some confidential big howitzer trials which I saw; it was largely on my reports that action was stopped at Agadir; and there are many other things--things intangible, in a certain sense--points of view, the state of feeling in Ireland, the conditions of labour, which I am able to hear the inner side of, in a way quite impossible if I had not the entree into that particular cla.s.s of English society which I now possess. Not the so-called smart set, you understand; but the real ruling set--the leading soldiers, the leading diplomats. Of course they are discreet----"

"But you are a woman and a peerless one, chere Comtesse. I think we may leave that cursed country in your hands with perfect safety. And, sooner perhaps than even we realise, we may see der Tag."

Such then was briefly the conversation I overheard. As I said, it is not given word for word--but that is immaterial. What was I to do? That was the point which drummed through my head as I walked back to my hotel; that was the point which was still drumming through my head as the dawn came stealing in through my window. Put yourself in my place, old man; what would you have done?

I, alone, of everyone who knew her in London, had stumbled by accident on the truth. Bathurst idolised her, and she exaggerated no whit when she boasted that she had the entree to the most exclusive circle in England. I know; I was one of it myself. And though one realises that it is only in plays and novels that Cabinet Ministers wander about whispering State secrets into the ears of beautiful adventuresses, yet one also knows in real life how devilish dangerous a really pretty and fascinating woman can be--especially when she's bent on finding things out and is clever enough to put two and two together.

Take one thing alone, and it was an aspect of the case that particularly struck me. Supposing diplomatic relations became strained between us and Germany--and I firmly believed, as you know, that sooner or later they would; supposing mobilisation was ordered--a secret one; suppose any of the hundred and one things which would be bound to form a prelude to a European war--and which at all costs must be kept secret--had occurred; think of the incalculable danger a clever woman in her position might have been, however discreet her husband was. And, my dear old boy, you know Ginger!

Supposing the Expeditionary Force were on the point of embarkation. A wife might guess their port of departure and arrival by an artless question or two as to where her husband on the Staff had motored to that day. But why go on? You see what I mean. Only to me, at that time--and now I might almost say that I am glad events have justified me--it appealed even more than it would have, say, to you. For I was so convinced of the danger that threatened us.

But what was I to do? It was only my word against hers. Tell Ginger? The idea made even me laugh. Tell the generals and the diplomatists? They didn't want to kiss _my_ hand. Tell some big bug in the Secret Service?

Yes--that anyway; but she was such a devilish clever woman, that I had but little faith in such a simple remedy, especially as most of them patronised her dinners themselves.

Still, that was the only thing to be done--that, and to keep a look-out myself, for I was tolerably certain she did not suspect me. Why should she?

And so in due course I found myself sitting next her at dinner as the _Astoria_ started her journey across the water.

I am coming to the climax of the drama, old man; I shall not bore you much longer. But before I actually give you the details of what occurred on that ill-fated vessel's last trip, I want to make sure that you realise the state of mind I was in, and the action that I had decided on. Firstly, I was convinced that my dinner partner--the wife of one of my best friends--was an unscrupulous spy. That the evidence would not have hung a fly in a court of law was not the point; the evidence was my own hearing, which was good enough for me.

Secondly, I was convinced that she occupied a position in society which rendered it easy for her to get hold of the most invaluable information in the event of a war between us and Germany.

Thirdly, I was convinced that there would be a war between us and Germany.