it.”
“But what’s all this ancient history got to do with our present situation?”
“The present situation?” Sir David said, looking carefully at Alex. “I’ve got one word for you, Alex. Mexican treachery again rears its ugly head. To be more precise, the Mexican border. The Americans have ignored that problem for nearly a century. They can’t do it much longer.”
“Not all quiet on the Southern Front,” Alex said.
“The Southern Front,” C repeated, liking the sound of that. It was good shorthand for the direction his mind was taking. “The Mexicans were the key to the Great War,” he added, “and they bloody well may be the key to the next.”
“And we’ve got a German ambassador named Zimmermann involved in both.”
“Mere coincidence?” Hawke asked.
“Perhaps,” C said. “History has a way of repeating itself.”
C got to his feet and rubbed his hands together to warm them up. “Well. I’m famished. Feed a cold and starve a fever. I’m sure there is sustenance to be had in the dining room. Let’s continue this at the table, shall we? I’ll go make sure we’ve got a good claret to accompany the delicious goose the kitchen has prepared.”
C left them, pushing through the double doors and into the adjoining hallway that led to the dining room.
“Are you quite all right?” Congreve asked Hawke.
“I suppose.”
21
C learly, Hawke wasn’t all right. Congreve knew Hawke’s many moods, including this one, the black fugue. His condition, at least this present distraction, Ambrose believed, was hardly a deficit or even a mild disorder. It was simply the restless curiosity of a hungry mind. If anything, it explained the man’s early success in both the military and in the financial markets. And his recent triumphs in the dicey world of international espionage. Hawke’s mind was constantly ranging over a wide spectrum of subjects, often touching down only briefly before moving on. Congreve believed it was what the brain so rapidly assimilated during those brief encounters that mattered. Retention, it was called.
It surely accounted for Hawke’s ability to take by surprise those who dismissed him as merely a wealthy aristocrat laboring in the family’s financial vineyards; or those who too quickly took the measure of his strength or courage and found him wanting. Congreve hadn’t enough fingers on both hands to count the number of villains who had made the deadly mistake of underestimating Alex Hawke in these last years.
“Let’s go in, shall we?” Congreve said softly, putting a hand on Alex’s shoulder. “He’s waiting.”
“Of course. I’m sorry to be so distracted. I’ve been sick with the bloody fever again. Does something to my brain. I’ve promised C I’d call Consuelo about getting invited to this damn meeting in Key West. Well, I damn well haven’t done it, and I’m sure he’s going to bring it up.”
“Why haven’t you called her?”
“The woman hates me, Ambrose. She feels utterly betrayed and not without some justification. I’ve been rather a shit. I’ve no idea how I’m going to accommodate C’s request. He’s right, of course, to want me there in Florida. Conch’s gathering is likely to prove vital.”
“The professional should override the personal, I should think, Alex. We’ll think of something. Just keep him going on about history during lunch. You can ring her as soon as you get home.”
“And say what?”
“Tell her you can’t live without her, for starters.”
“I won’t lie to the woman.”
“Are you quite sure it would be one?”
“A lie? How should I know?”
Hawke cut his eyes toward him and left without another word. For now, Conch would remain the enigma she had long been.
They found C at the oval dining table, filling their goblets with an ’89 Chateau Batailley. Hawke had long ago learned not to bring up the subject of C’s unwavering loyalty to the French vintners if not their wretched government. Any such discussion would prove fruitless and unpleasant.
“Tell us, Ambrose,” Hawke said as soon as they were all seated, “exactly how it was that this purloined telegram changed everything.”
“With pleasure, assuming this is not too familiar ground, Sir David.”
Sir David looked up from his first course. “Well-trod ground, yes, Ambrose. But my appetite for military history far outweighs my desire for this damnable aspic. Please, Ambrose, tell the story.”
“Well, you see, Alex, by early 1917, the Germans had us dead to rights. We were fresh out of young men and fresh ideas along the Western Front. We’d gain a foot of muddy ground only to lose it in the next day’s slaughter. Half a million had died at Verdun alone. Our allies the French were drained and the Russians dying.”
“But it was the bloody U-boats had us in a corner,” Sir David said.
“Indeed. The U-boats had effectively cut our small island off from food and all other supplies. We could have held out for another two months. We were desperate for fresh troops in large numbers, men whose reserves of fighting spirit were still untapped.”
“The Yanks.”
“Correct. President Wilson was determined to keep the Yanks out of the war. But, Whitehall knew that only the entry of the United States into the fray would chase the German wolfpacks from Britain’s door. We were stalemated in that bloody abattoir of trenches, and the German U-boats were circling in for the kill. But then we got very, very lucky and intercepted Herr Zimmermann’s telegram.”
Hawke said, “The Mexican government was tempted by the notion that they might reconquer their lost territories in the southwest. Correct?”
Congreve piped up, “Precisely, Alex. This is what I was able to gather from the now deceased yesterday. These Latino-Arab terrorists are developing highly creative strategies for attacks based in Mexico. The border is still the soft underbelly of America. America’s greatest vulnerability.”
“So this modern day Zimmermann was following in the footsteps of his famous namesake? Stirring up trouble in Mexico?”
C said, “Until, for whatever reason; he apparently had a change of heart and contacted us. I assume you’ve brought along this deathbed letter I’ve heard about, Alex?”
“Yes, sir,” Hawke said, pulling it out of his inside pocket. “It’s in some code neither Ambrose nor I have ever encountered before, sir. Numeric. Apparently random, but obviously not.”
Hawke handed Zimmermann’s folded letter across the table.
“I’ll get this to our signal section immediately.”
C must have pressed a hidden button on the floor with his foot because two people suddenly appeared at the doorway. A man and a very pretty young woman.
“Yes, sir?” the man in the dark gray suit said.
C held out the envelope. “Geoff, get this to Signals right away. With a note from me. Saying Alex Hawke got it from the dying German ambassador.”
“Done, sir,” the man said, taking it.
“Oh, Pippa,” C said to the woman who’d escorted Hawke up to C’s office at MI6. “You remember Alex Hawke. He’s the fellow attending that conference in Key West next week. You’ll be accompanying him as aide. Make sure he has everything he needs will you?”
“Of course, sir,” Gwendolyn Guinness said, glancing over at Alex Hawke before she turned and left the room.
C said with a brief smile, “Brilliant girl. I’m quite sure you two shall get along famously, Alex.”
Hawke shifted uncomfortably in his chair. He knew C was deliberately putting him in an awkward position.
“Sir, with apologies, I haven’t spoken to the American secretary about my attendance yet. Terribly sorry. I’m
