The Case of the Nazi Canary

CHAPTER ONE

It was, or would be, the misty autumn of 1931. A suite of comfortable bachelor apartments in the highest tower of London's exclusive Sporting Club Square.

Sir Seaton Begg, former MI5 special operator now metatemporal investigator, reached across the fire-grate, singeing the sleeve of his smoking jacket. As he examined the silk, his aquiline, unconventionally handsome features were illuminated by the fire.

"What d'you make of that, Taffy?"

John "Taffy" Sinclair, Begg's best and oldest friend, and the leading Home Office pathologist, accepted the rectangle of yellow paper. The balding giant had the mild but sturdy rectitude of an East End bishop. Balancing a cup of Darjeeling in one hand, he sank back into the depths of his armchair to read. Moments later, with an impatient expression, he set the telegram aside.

"The National Socialists?" Taffy frowned. "Sort of German Mus-solini-ites? Aren't they even worse than the commies for going around beating up honest citizens? And, of course, there's that lunatic anti-Jewish muck."

Begg smiled a familiar, almost sly, smile. "I gather they will restore 'German pride' and so forth, meaning, no doubt, the military. A very attractive message to the heavy industrialists, naturally, who find more profit in swords than ploughshares." He lifted delicate bone china to his full, masculine lips. "The armorers and their jackals."

Like Sinclair, Begg supported world disarmament under the League of Nations and was disappointed when Woodrow Wilson had been forced to placate the parochial exigencies of his Congress by quitting the League.

Begg continued with some emphasis. "Look here, Taffy, read that thing again and let me know any other names you recognize, apart from their Little Corporal destined to become their German Napoleon."

"You mean that awful oik who looks like Charlie Chaplin? Musso's effeminate pal Mr. Hitler? The Nazi general secretary or whatever he styles himself. Nothing new, is it?"

"I'd agree he seems to be preaching a familiar line of 1'intoxica-tion special." Sinclair reached a taper into the fire and relit his pipe. "These chaps have been getting more dangerous since the successes of Primo Riviera and Mussolini, of course." He puffed heroically on his briar.

"I agree, old man." Begg glanced into the fire. For an instant his eyes burned an angry red. "Come on, Taffy. Be a pal and glance at that wire again."

Reluctantly, Sinclair adjusted his spectacles. "Well, Hess is a pretty common German name. But don't you know a Baron von Hess? Some sort of relative of your cousin, Count von Bek?"

"Von Bek?" Begg laughed at this mention of his old sparring partner, known to the British public as Monsieur Zodiac, the Albino, Count of Crime. "I doubt if my cousin would deign to involve himself in this. It's not what you call an epicurean crime, eh? What about this Frдulein Raubal?"

"Her first name, Geli, is short for Angela, I believe. Raubal's a fairly common name in southern Germany and Austria. Who is she, do you know?"

"Herr Hitler's mistress, my dear chap." Begg smiled self-indulgently, at once mocking and forgiving his own relish for scandal. "They are also, one hears, close relatives."

Sinclair shook his head. "Afraid I don't follow the German gossip columns."

"You should, old boy." The lean detective sprang from his chair. He tapped out his own pipe against the fireplace. "You'd learn a lot more from them, Taffy, than from any piece of biased front-page news." He waved at the untidy stacks of Der Spiegel, SvenskeDagbladet, Berliner Paste, and Muncbener Telegraf which shared not always agreeable space with Le Figaro, Les Temps, Al Misr, The Times of India, The Cape Times, El Pais, La Posta, and the Berlin-published Munda Veritas. Few were open at the early pages. "Now, anything else?"

"Well, the thing's from Briennerstrasse. Seems to be genuine. That's a pretty posh avenue in the salubrious bit of Munich. Papal Nuncio's there and all that. So these chaps seem to have some powerful backers, as you say. Naturally, Begg, you wouldn't consider working for such people!"

"Well, I agree it might be a bit unsavory to take their money, but I'm curious. Fascinating, eh, the dreams of power of failed shopkeepers and frustrated shipping clerks?"

"That's downright perverse, Begg!" exclaimed the sensitive Celt. "Keep 'em away with a ten-foot pole, I say."

"Currently President Stalin's favorite foreign policy strategy, the ten-foot Pole." Sir Seaton referred to Lenin's successor, who led the Bolshevik Party in the Duma and was spouting nationalistic rubbish every day, winning votes from Monsieur Trotsky, the liberal internationalist. "Poland as a buffer zone in case civil war breaks out in Germany. Could be the touch paper for another world conflict."

"Germany's safe enough," Taffy insisted. "She has the best and most just political constitution in the world. Certainly better than ours. Even sturdier than the American."

Like so many old Harrovians, but unlike his former schoolfellow Begg, Sinclair had a comfortable, phlegmatic belief in the sense of the commons and their strong survival instinct both as social democrats and as self-interested individuals with jobs and businesses to ensure. War made economic sense for a couple of years at most and then began impoverishing the participants. It was the one lesson learned from the recent beastliness ending with the Treaty of Versailles.

Begg took back the German wire and read it aloud, translating swiftly. "My dear Sir Seaton: Here in Germany we have long admired the exploits of your famous English detectives. We are sufficiently impressed with your national virtues as a detecting folk to inquire if you, paramount in your specialized profession, would care to come at once to Munich, where you will have the satisfaction of rescuing a reputation, bringing the guilty to justice, and also knowing you have saved a noble and betrayed nation. The reputation is that of our country's most able philosopher-general. I refer, of course, to our Guide Herr Adolf Hitler, author of Mein Kampf and bearer of the Iron Cross, who has been devastated by the murder of his ward, Frдulein 'Geli' Raubal, and whose reputation could be ruined by the scandal. With a view to seeing the triumph of justice, could we, the National Socialist Party, enjoin you to lose no speed in taking the earliest zeppelin from Manchester to Munich? While B.O.A.C. provides an excellent run from Croydon and appears quicker, there is a long delay making stops at Berlin and Frankfurt, therefore we recommend you take the modern German vessel which leaves Manchester Moss Side field at five PM and arrives at ten AM the next morning. An excellent train leaves Kings Cross at two pm and connects with the airship, the Spirit of Nuremberg. Please excuse the brevity of this telegram. My inner voices tell me you are destined to save not merely Germany but the entire Western world from an appalling catastrophe and become the best-loved Englishman our country has ever known. On the presumption that you will accept our case, as you accept your historic destiny, I have sent, via courier, all necessary first-class travel documents for yourself and an assistant, together with documents enabling you to bring any personal transport you favor. We are, you see, familiar with your foibles. I will personally be at Munich International Aerodrome to meet the ZZ. 700. I look forward to the honor of shaking your hand. Writing in all admiration and expectation that your famous sense of fair play will move your conscience, I am, Yours Most Sincerely, Rudolf Hess, Deputy Leader, The N.S.D.A.P., Briennerstrasse, Munich, Bavaria, Germany.

"Rum style, eh?"

"About as laconic as his countryman Nietzsche," reflected Sinclair with a snort. "No doubt the poor blighter's trench-crazy. Harmless enough, I'm sure, but still barking barmy. I mean to say, old sport, you are our leading metatemporal snooper. There's all sorts of ordinary 'tecs could do this job. This case is merely about a particularly grubby murder of a girl, who was probably no better than she ought to be, by a seedy petit bourgeois who sets himself up as the savior of the world. He'll likely find his true destiny, if not on the gallows, among the sandwich-board men of Hyde Park Corner, warning against the dangers of red meat and Asian invasion. A distinct case of an undersatisfied libido and an overstimulated ego, I'd say."

"Quite so, old man. I know your penchant for the Viennese trick cyclists. But surely you wouldn't wish to see the wrong cove found guilty of such an unpleasant crime?"

"There's no chance he's guilty, I suppose?" Sinclair instantly regretted his words. "No, no. Of course we must assume his innocence. But there are many more deserving cases around the world, I'm sure."

"Few of them cases allowing me to take the very latest in aerial luxury liners and even put yourself and Dolly on the payroll without question."

"It's no good, Begg, the idea's unpalatable to me…"

With an athlete's impatient speed, Begg crossed to his vast, untidy bureau, and tugged something out of a pigeonhole. "Besides, our tickets arrived not ten minutes before you turned up for tea. Oh, say you'll do it, old man. I promise you, the adventure will be an education, if nothing else."

Taffy began to grumble, but by midnight he was on his feet, phoning down for his Daimler. He would meet Begg, he promised, at Kings Cross, where they would travel to Manchester that afternoon on the high-speed M amp; E Flyer, so as to be safely aboard the zep by four-thirty.

Begg was delighted. He trusted and needed his old comrade's judgment and cool head. Their personalities were complementary, like a couple of very different fives players. This time Begg felt he had involved himself in a job that would have him holding his nose for longer than he cared.

As for the Presbyterian Taffy, he would still be debating the morality of accepting the tickets when they met the next day and began the journey to Munich.