'That shows you one of the great dangers one doesn't always remember, but it exists. There are people capable of communicating to others a wild enthusiasm, a kind of vision of life and of happening. They can do that though it is not really by what they say, it is not the words you hear, it is not even the idea described. It's something else. It's the magnetic power that a very few men have of starting something, of producing and creating a vision. By their personal magnetism perhaps, a tone of voice, perhaps some emanation that comes forth straight from the flesh. I don't know, but it exists.
'Such people have power. The great religious teachers had this power, and so has an evil spirit power also. Belief can be created in a certain movement, in certain things to be done, things that will result in a new heaven and a new earth, and people will believe it and work for it and fight for it and even die for it.'
He lowered his voice as he said: 'Jan Smuts puts it in a phrase. He said Leadership, besides being a great creative force, can be diabolical.'
Stafford Nye moved in his chair.
'I understand what you mean. It is interesting what you say. I can see perhaps that it might be true.'
'But you think it's exaggerated, of course.'
'I don't know that I do,' said Stafford Nye. 'Things that seem exaggerated are very often not exaggerated at all. They are only things that you haven't heard said before or thought about before. And therefore they come to you as so unfamiliar that you can hardly do anything about them except accept them. By the way, may I ask a simple question? What does one do about them?'
'If you come across the suspicion that this sort of thing is going on, you must find out about them,' said Lord Altamount. 'You've got to go like Kipling's mongoose: go and find out. Find out where the money comes from and where the ideas are coming from, and where, if I may say so, the machinery comes from. Who is directing the machinery? There's a chief of staff, you know, as well as a commander in-chief. That's what we're trying to do. We'd like you to come and help us.'
It was one of the rare occasions in his life when Sir Stafford Nye was taken aback. Whatever he may have felt on some former occasions, he had always managed to conceal the fact. But this time it was different. He looked from one to the other of the men in the room. At Mr Robinson, impassively yellow-faced with his mouthful of teeth displayed; to Sir James Kleek, a somewhat brash talker. Sir Stafford Nye had considered him, but nevertheless he had obviously his uses; Master's dog, he called him in his own mind. He looked at Lord Altamount, the hood of the porter's chair framed round his head. The lighting was not strong in the room. It gave him the look of a saint in a niche in a cathedral somewhere. Ascetic. Fourteenth-century. A great man. Yes, Altamount had been one of the great men of the past. Stafford Nye had no doubt of that, but he was now a very old man. Hence, he supposed, the necessity for Sir James Kleek, and Lord Altamount's reliance on him. He looked past them to the enigmatic, cool creature who had brought him here; the Countess Renata Zerkowski alias Mary Ann, alias Daphne Theodofanous. Her face told him nothing. She was not even looking at him. His eyes came round last to Mr Henry Horsham of Security.
With faint surprise he observed that Henry Horsham was grinning at him.
'But look here,' said Stafford Nye, dropping all formal language, and speaking rather like the schoolboy of eighteen he had once been. 'Where on earth do I come in? What do I know? Quite frankly, I'm not distinguished in any way in my own profession, you know. They don't think very much of me at the FO. Never have.'
'We know that,' said Lord Altamount.
It was Sir James Kleek's turn to grin and he did so.
'All the better perhaps,' he remarked, and added apologetically as Lord Altamount frowned at him, 'Sorry, sir.'
'This is a committee of investigation,' said Mr Robinson. 'It is not a question of what you have done in the past, what other people's opinion of you may be. What we are doing is to recruit a committee to investigate. There are not very many of us at the moment forming this committee. We ask you to join it because we think that you have certain qualities which may help in an investigation.'
Stafford Nye turned his head towards the Security man.
'What about it, Horsham?' he said. 'I can't believe you'd agree with that?'
'Why not?' said Henry Horsham.
'Indeed? What are my "qualities", as you call them? I can't, quite frankly, believe in them myself.'
'You're not a hero-worshipper,' said Horsham. 'That's why. You're the kind who sees through humbug. You don't take anyone at their own or the world's valuation. You take them at your own valuation.'
'Ce n'est pas un gar?on serieux.' The words floated through Sir Stafford Nye's mind. A curious reason for which to be chosen for a difficult and exacting job.
'I've got to warn you,' he said, 'that my principal fault, and one that's been frequently noticed about me and which has cost me several good jobs is, I think, fairly well known. I'm not, I should say, a sufficiently serious sort of chap for an important job like this.'
'Believe it or not,' said Mr Horsham, 'that's one of the reasons why they want you. I'm right, my lord, aren't I?'
He looked towards Lord Altamount.
'Public service!' said Lord Altamount. 'Let me tell you that very often one of the most serious disadvantages in public life is when people in a public position take themselves too seriously. We feel that you won't. Anyway,' he said, 'Mary Ann thinks so.'
Sir Stafford Nye turned his head. So here she was, no longer a countess. She had become Mary Ann again.
'You don't mind my asking,' he said, 'but who are you really? I mean, are you a real countess?'
'Absolutely. Geboren, as the Germans say. My father was a man of pedigree, a good sportsman, a splendid shot, and had a very romantic but somewhat dilapidated castle in Bavaria. It's, still there, the castle. As far as that goes, I have connections with that large portion of the European world which is still heavily snobbish as far as birth is concerned. A poor and shabby countess sits down first at the table whilst a rich American with a fabulous fortune in dollars at the bank is kept waiting.'
'What about Daphne Theodofanous? Where does she come in?'
'A useful name for a passport. My mother was Greek.'
'And Mary Ann?'
It was almost the first smile Stafford Nye had seen on her face. Her eyes went to Lord Altamount and from him to Mr Robinson.
'Perhaps,' she said, 'because I'm a kind of maid-of-all-work, going places, looking for things, taking things from one country to another, sweeping under the mat, do anything, go anywhere, clear up the mess.' She looked towards Lord Altamount again. 'Am I right, Uncle Ned?'
'Quite right, my dear. Mary Ann you are and always will be to us.'
'Were you taking something on that plane? I mean taking something important from one country to another?'
'Yes. It was known I was carrying it. If you hadn't come to my rescue, if you hadn't drunk possibly poisonous beer and handed over your bandit cloak of bright colours as a disguise, well, accidents happen sometimes. I shouldn't have got here.'
'What were you carrying - or mustn't I ask? Are those things I shall never know?'
'There are a lot of things you will never know. There are a lot of things you won't be allowed to ask. But that question of yours I shall answer. A bare answer, a fact. If I am allowed to do so.'
Again she looked at Lord Altamount.
'I trust your judgment,' said Lord Altamount. 'Go on.'
'Give him the dope,' said the irreverent James.
Mr Horsham said, 'I suppose you've got to know. I won't tell you, but then I'm Security. Go ahead, Mary Ann.'
'One sentence. I was bringing a birth certificate. That's all. I don't tell you any more and it won't be any use your asking any more questions.'
Stafford Nye looked round the assembly.
'All right. I'll join. I'm flattered at your asking me. Where do we go from here?'
'You and I,' said Renata, 'leave here tomorrow to the Continent. You may have read, or know, that a Musical Festival taking place in Bavaria. It is some thing quite new which has only come into being in the last years. It has a rather formidable German name meaning "Company of Youthful Singers" and is supported by Governments of several different countries. It is in opposition to the traditional festivals and productions of Bayreuth. Much of the music given is modern - new young composers are given the chance of their compositions being heard. Whilst thought of highly by some, it is utterly repudiated and held in contempt by others.'
'Yes,' said Sir Stafford, 'I have read about it. Are we going to attend it?'
'We have seats booked for two of the performances.'
'Has this festival any special significance in our investigation?'
'No,' said Renata. 'It is more in the nature of what you might call an exit and entry convenience. We go there for an ostensible and true reason, and we leave it for our next step in due course.'
He looked round. 'Instructions? Do I get any marching orders? Am I to be briefed?'
'Not in your meaning of those terms. You are going on a voyage of exploration. You will learn things as you go along. You will go as yourself, knowing only what you know at present. You go as a lover of music, as a slightly disappointed diplomat who had perhaps hoped for some post in his own country which he has not been given. Otherwise, you will know nothing. It is safer so.'
'But that is the sum of activities at present? Germany, Bavaria, Austria, the Tyrol - that part of the world?'
'It is one of the centres of interest.'
'It is not the only one?'
'Indeed, not even the principal one. There are other spots on the globe, all of varying importance and interest. How much importance each one holds is what we have to find out.'
'And I don't know, or am not to be told, anything about these other centres?'
'Only in cursory fashion. One of them, we think the most important one, has its headquarters in South America, there are two with headquarters in the United States of America, one in California, the other in Baltimore. There is one in Sweden, there is one in Italy. Things have become very active in the latter in the last six months. Portugal and Spain also have smaller centres. Paris, of course. There are further interesting spots just "coming into production", you might say. As yet not fully developed.'
'You mean Malaya, or Vietnam?'
'No. No, all that lies rather in the past. It was a good rallying cry for violence and student indignation and for many other things.
'What is being promoted, you must understand, is the growing organization of youth everywhere against their mode of government; against their parental customs, against very often the religions in which they have been brought up. There is the insidious cult of permissiveness, there is the increasing cult of violence. Violence not as a means of gaining money, but violence for the love of violence. That particularly is stressed, and the reasons for it are to the people concerned one of the most important things and of the utmost significance.'
'Permissiveness, is that important?'
'It is a way of life, no more. It lends itself to certain abuses but not unduly.'
'What about drugs?'
'The cult of drugs has been deliberately advanced and fomented. Vast sums of money have been made that way, but it is not, or so we think, entirely activated for the money motive.'
All of them looked at Mr Robinson, who slowly shook his head.
'No,' he said, 'it looks that way. There are people who are being apprehended and brought to justice. Pushers of drugs will be followed up. But there is more than just the drug racket behind all this. The drug racket is a means, and an evil means, of making money. But there is more to it than that.'
'But who -' Stafford Nye stopped.
'Who and what and why and where? The four W's. That is your mission. Sir Stafford,' said Mr Robinson. 'That's what you've got to find out. You and Mary Ann. It won't be easy, and one of the hardest things in the world, remember, is to keep one's secrets.'
Stafford Nye looked with interest at the fat yellow face of Mr Robinson. Perhaps the secret of Mr Robinson's domination in the financial world was just that. His secret was that he kept his secret. Mr Robinson's mouth showed its smile again. The large teeth gleamed.
'If you know a thing,' he said, 'it is always a great temptation to show that you know it; to talk about it, to put it in words. It is not that you want to give information, it is not that you have been offered payment to give information. It is that you want to show how important you are.
'It's just as simple as that. In fact,' said Mr Robinson, and he half closed his eyes, 'everything in this world is so very, very simple. That's what people don't understand.'
The Countess got to her feet and Stafford Nye followed her example.
'I hope you will sleep well and be comfortable,' said Mr Robinson. This house is, I think, moderately comfortable.'
Stafford Nye murmured that he was quite sure of that, and on that point he was shortly to be proved to have been quite right. He laid his head on the pillow and went to sleep immediately.
Book II - JOURNEY TO SIEGFRIED
Chapter 10
THE WOMAN IN THE SCHLOSS
They came out of the Festival Youth Theatre to the refreshing night air. Below them in a sweep of the ground, was a lighted restaurant. On the side of the hill was another, smaller one. The restaurants varied slightly in price though neither of them was inexpensive. Renata was in evening dress of black velvet. Sir Stafford Nye was in white tie and full evening dress.
