Merlin at War

Book 3: The DCI Frank Merlin Series

by Mark Ellis

Genres: World War II; Historical Mysteries; Historical Thrillers

Synopsis

War rages across Europe. France is under the Nazi thumb. Britain has its back to the wall. In London, Scotland Yard detective Merlin investigates a series of disturbing events ? a young girl killed in a botched abortion, a French emigré shot in a seedy Notting Hill flat, a mysterious letter written by a British officer, gunned down in Crete. With action spanning Buenos Aires, New York, Cairo and Occupied France, Merlin and his team are plunged into a dark world of espionage, murder, love and betrayal.

Release date: January 5, 2018

Publisher: Accent Press

Print pages: 496

Sample

It was nearly five o’clock when the three soldiers reached the end of the olive grove. The dust-filled air shimmered in the late-afternoon heat. Their bodies ached, their uniforms were caked with dirt and sweat and they were hungry, thirsty and exhausted. The sensible thing now would be to lay up where they were for a few hours’ rest, then finish the journey under cover of darkness. But there was a tight deadline to meet. The evacuation vessel was scheduled to leave at midnight and they had been warned the captain wouldn’t wait for stragglers.

There had been eight of them at the start of the day. During the hard slog over 15 miles of rough, hilly terrain, the company had lost five men. Corporal Johnny Thomson had been the first. Just after 10 o’clock they had halted at a deserted farmhouse to make a late breakfast of their meagre remaining rations. Thomson spotted a rabbit on the far side of the farmyard and, despite the sudden growing engine sound, stepped out from the shade of the small verandah at the back of the house and ran after it. When the soldier was halfway across the yard, his head had exploded in a mess of blood, bone and brain matter as he was struck by a burst of fire from a diving Stuka. Corporal Harry Goldsmith automatically hurried to his friend’s aid and was cut in half by a following Messerschmitt.

The captain had said they had no time to bury the bodies in case the aircraft returned. He left the dead soldiers to the swarm of insects already buzzing over them and led the way across the yard and into the trees. An hour later, they were making their way across a narrow path above a mountain gorge when Sergeant Eric Jones had slipped on some loose stones and fallen headlong the 70 or so feet between the path and the jagged rocks beneath. There being no response from below to the men’s shouts, the captain had grimaced, shrugged and pointed ahead.

The other two men had been lost when the party stopped at around two o’clock for a drink in a little glade, where a clear pool of water was fed by a small mountain stream. Privates Jack Peterson and Sid Moore were very close friends. Their attachment to each other had become a source of amusement and ribaldry to the others. The two men were lying on their fronts, sleeves rolled up, bobbing their heads in and out of the pool.

Suddenly Peterson had squealed. “Oww! Something’s just bitten me arm. What the…?” His friend lashed out at something green he had seen slithering into a bush. “Was it a snake, Sid?” Peterson looked down to see that his arm had started to swell and was taking on a bluish tinge. Within seconds, he was sweating profusely and his breath was coming in short starts. The lieutenant tried to help Peterson to his feet but the man’s legs were like jelly. The captain gave Peterson a hard look and reached a quick decision. “You’ll have to stay here, Private. With luck some locals might find you. At worse the Germans will pick you up. Someone will have an antidote.”

Peterson tried to speak but his voice failed him. His panicked eyes sought out Moore.

“I’ll stay with him, sir.”

“No, Moore. Good of you to offer but you must come with us.”

“I’m not budging, sir. Someone will come, as you say.” Despite the captain’s increasingly fierce commands, Moore persisted in his insubordination. “I’m staying or you can shoot me. It’s one or the other.” The captain briefly looked as if he was giving the shooting option careful consideration before turning on his heels and beckoning the two remaining members of his company away.

And so Captain Simon Arbuthnot, Lieutenant Edgar Powell and Private Matty Lewis stood at the edge of the olive grove. A long, wide and exposed expanse of sparse scrubland faced them. The lieutenant calculated that they had another six miles to cover before they reached the port. At the far end of the scrubland were some pine woods that he knew covered the greater part of those six miles.

“How do you want to proceed, sir?”

“I don’t think there’s any particularly clever way to do this, Lieutenant, do you? There are about a thousand yards of open land to cover. I suggest the three of us get out of these trees and run like the clappers for the other end. Unless you have a better idea?”

Powell found the captain cold and difficult. The two had been together in combat for several months, first in Greece and then in Crete, but he felt he knew the man little better than on the first day they had met at camp back in England. Arbuthnot was a good-looking, middle-aged man with small neat features and strikingly blue eyes. Just under six-foot tall, his body seemed to have weathered the deprivations of recent days better than his companions’ and retained a certain healthy solidity.

Powell had yet to see the man smile and conversation was difficult and certainly not encouraged. In his one and only moment of unguarded conversation, Arbuthnot had let slip that he was a businessman with substantial interests and property in England and South America. Further enquiries were batted away firmly and Arbuthnot evinced no interest in Powell’s own background. Powell did hear some gossip in the mess suggesting that the captain had enjoyed a reputation as a playboy of sorts back home. Whatever he was, however, Powell had realised he was no coward. Despite their antipathy, Arbuthnot had earned Powell’s grudging respect.

Before the war, Matty Lewis would not have been a man you would expect to run like the clappers. As a portly young East End butcher’s boy, his figure had reflected a healthy appetite for his employer’s products, particularly sausages, pies and pork scratchings. Now, after the general rigours of military service and the particular rigours of Crete, he was a shadow of his former self and as capable of running at speed as any athletic – if exhausted – young man. Lewis flicked a finger of salute to acknowledge his readiness.

“Give me your binoculars, please, Lieutenant. Thank you.” The captain scanned the ground ahead of them. “Do you see there is a small collection of rocks about halfway across, just to the right?”

Powell and Lewis nodded.

“The rocks look like they could provide a little cover. Why don’t we make them our first target? About 400 yards. Only a quartermile sprint. I can’t hear any engine noise.” Arbuthnot scanned the horizon with the glasses again. “No movement that I can see anywhere. Shall we?” The three men paused a second for breath, then set off as fast as they could. The lieutenant got there safely first, the captain and Lewis a second behind. As they rested on their haunches and looked around, they realised that the few boulders and rocks set amidst a clump of bracken afforded little meaningful cover. The captain took a moment to recover his breath. “Better crack on then, chaps.” As they got to their feet they heard a buzzing noise. The captain looked hard at his two companions. “Come on!”

They had run about 100 of the 600 yards remaining when the two Stukas appeared from out of the sun in the west. The buzz of their engines became a roar as they sped down on the running men. A burst of bullets from the first plane cut a neat line in the earth between Lewis and the two officers. The second plane’s bullets thumped into the ground behind them.

There were 200 yards to go. The aeroplanes disappeared into a solitary, puffy white cloud ahead of them before wheeling around to attack again. One hundred yards away the pines beckoned them. The lieutenant heard a strangled cry behind him but kept on running. He felt his lungs were going to burst. A trace of bullets pounded into the ground to his left. With a gasp of relief, he reached the wood and crashed down into a bush behind a tree just as another burst of bullets rattled nearby.

Struggling to get his breath back, he looked up through the leaves to see the planes banking and then disappearing to the north. The pounding of his heart slowed and he was able to concentrate. He turned to look out on the expanse of ground he had just miraculously covered without harm. Forty yards out, he could see Lewis sprawled on the ground. He was not moving or making any noise that Powell could hear. Twenty yards to his right, under the cover of the trees, he saw the captain. He was on his knees, his head down, a hand to his chest. Powell shouted, “Are you all right, Captain?” There was no reply.

The lieutenant struggled to his feet and walked over to Arbuthnot. By the time he got to him, the captain had slumped to the ground. His breath was a harsh rasp. He was on his back, eyes closed, his arms wrapped tightly around his body. Carefully, the lieutenant pulled the captain’s arms apart and was able to see the damage. It was bad. The Stuka’s bullets had ripped into his back and there were three exit wounds in his chest. There were other wounds in his legs and his left hand. The captain’s eyes opened. He grasped Powell’s wrist with his good hand and, to the lieutenant’s surprise, winked at him. “Powell.” The captain’s grip tightened. “In my jacket. Inside,” he croaked. “In my jacket. Inside. Letter. Take it.”

Powell knelt down and reached carefully inside Arbuthnot’s blood-stained jacket. It was impossible to do so without touching some of the captain’s wounds. The captain cried out and Powell withdrew his hand.

“No. Go on. The letter. Inside left pocket. Take it. Please.” The captain shuddered with pain. “Important. Bad things happen if letter doesn’t get to…” The captain’s eyes closed for a moment then reopened. “Please… Edgar.” The captain patted the top left part of his jacket. “There… please.” Powell reached in again, this time hurriedly so as to get the task done as quickly as possible. There was something in the inside left pocket and he withdrew a blood-soaked envelope. The shadows of the trees were lengthening and Powell struggled to make out what was written on the envelope. He found a shaft of sunlight. There was nothing.

He leant back down to the captain, whose chest was making a nasty gurgling noise. “Give it to… matter of life and death. Give to my…” A trickle of blood dribbled out of his mouth. Arbuthnot managed to lever himself up and mimicked a scribble with his good right hand. Powell found a pencil in one of his pockets, put it in the captain’s hand and held out the envelope. With a look of intense concentration, Arbuthnot managed to scrawl a few spidery letters before he dropped the pencil and the letter. He released his grip on Powell’s wrist and fell back. With a small sigh, he died.

Powell closed Captain Arbuthnot’s eyes. He wasn’t a religious man but felt he ought to say something. He stood up and recited the Lord’s Prayer then made a sign of the cross. When he had finished, he ran over to Lewis. As expected, he was dead too and the insects were already congregating. The Lord’s Prayer was spoken again. He went back to the captain and picked up his letter. The scrawled addition to the envelope was, unsurprisingly, not very clear. It looked like ‘Give to my s…’ There was one other letter following the ‘s’. It was hard to decipher. “Perhaps ‘u’, perhaps ‘a’,” Powell muttered to himself. He turned the envelope different ways in the light. “Maybe an ‘o’ or even an ‘i’?” He grunted then pocketed the letter, and retrieved his binoculars from another of the captain’s pockets. He would have to worry about the letter another day. His watch showed it was five-thirty. Powell had to make the boat. After surviving this day, he really deserved to.

* * *

The birds were chattering melodiously in the plane trees of the Parc des Sources. The two men, one in uniform and flourishing a white military baton, the other in a baggy but expensive civilian suit, sauntered out of the Hotel Splendide, followed at a distance by a small group of military men and secretaries. The outside tables at the Grand Café were crowded in the balmy late-spring sun. Several of the male customers rose to tip their hats to the strollers while as many ladies, some young, some old, smiled by way of respect.

The civilian, short and dark, with a cowlick of oiled hair and a thick black moustache, acknowledged the signs of deference with a nod of the head and the crinkling of an eye. His stiffly erect companion responded with a raised eyebrow and a baton tap of his kepi. They walked in silence under the café awnings towards Les Halles de Sources before turning into the park. Fifty yards on, they found a park bench in a secluded area of rhododendron bushes and fuchsias and seated themselves. Their attendant party took up position nearby, just out of earshot, beside a small clump of chestnut trees. In the distance, a brass band was playing a selection of military airs.

“So, Admiral, the marshal tells me your trip to Paris was a success.”

Jean Louis Xavier François Darlan, admiral of France and the senior minister in Marshal Philippe Pétain’s Vichy government, stroked his cheek. “Yes, all went as planned, Pierre, although little has been finalised as yet.”

Pierre Laval, former prime minister of France and, until recently, vice-president of Vichy France’s Cabinet of Ministers, chuckled and patted his companion on the knee. “The marshal mentioned no qualifications. He told me you had got everything he wanted from the Germans. Said you had got the occupation costs to us down from 20 million reichsmarks a day to 15 million, the return of nearly 7,000 of our best people from the German prisoner-of-war camps, and a considerable improvement on the current restrictions in our dealings with the other France.”

“By the other France, Pierre, I take it you mean occupied France?”

“Do not be a pedant, my friend. You know that is what I mean. We need to free up the limitations of our trade so that the French state can benefit to the maximum from our partnership with the Germans.”

The admiral pursed his lips. “You use the word ‘partnership’ Pierre. Others use the word ‘collaboration’, which has a less satisfactory ring.”

Laval rose stiffly to his feet and circumnavigated the bench. When he regained his seat, Darlan noted the unhealthily red flush on his cheeks. “Partnership or collaboration, what does it matter? We were in a mess and we have found a way for some kind of France to survive. At least Herr Hitler provides us with a bulwark against a worst danger.”

“And, pray, what worst danger is that, Pierre?”

“Why, Bolshevism, of course. The local Bolshevism, which we had to combat before the war, and the greater Bolshevism represented by that maniac Stalin. Hitler is by far the lesser of two evils in that context.”

“Those Frenchmen languishing currently in Hitler’s camps would find it hard to agree with your analysis, I think.”

“But you are gradually getting many of those Frenchmen home, François. That is part of the deal you have just struck, is it not?”

“In return for, among other things, allowing Germany access to our military facilities in Tunisia, Syria, Lebanon and our possessions in west Africa. No doubt ‘access’ will prove a polite substitution for ‘control’.”

Laval stroked his moustache thoughtfully. “And what is so bad about that in the overall scheme of things, if we can recover a much greater level of independence for Vichy France and further the cause of reunification with ‘the other’ France?”

The admiral removed a handkerchief from his jacket pocket and mopped his brow. The May sun was now at its highest point in the heavens and was beating down from a now cloudless sky. “Perhaps you are right, Pierre, although I somehow doubt that Herr Hitler fails to realise the strength of his negotiating position and the weakness of ours. Dealing with your friend the German ambassador in Paris is one thing but… Of course, Herr Abetz was a fine host and I have to say I was impressed by the restraint with which, under his leadership, the German occupying forces go about their business in Paris.”

The two men sat silently for a while, enjoying the warmth of the day, the mild relieving breeze and the mingled music of birdsong and trombone. For a moment, the heavy burdens on their shoulders lifted and a different France, the old France, took shape around them. Their brief reverie was interrupted by one of the admiral’s men, who ran over to deliver a note. Darlan read it and sighed. “The marshal wants to see me again at four. When do you think you will be regaining your place in the council, Pierre?”

Laval smoothed some of the creases in his baggy pinstripe trousers and shrugged. “I serve at the marshal’s discretion. As you know, there are voices speaking against me. It is tiresome but I can handle it. Sooner rather than later is the answer to your question, I believe.”

“The marshal still values your advice above all others.”

“Indeed, François. But back to those agreements with Abetz, the Paris Protocols I understand we must now call them. What next?”

Darlan slowly rose to his feet. “They must be ratified by Berlin and by us. Although I have negotiated the protocols myself, I am not completely happy with them. As for Berlin, who knows how long they will take?” The admiral looked up to the sky and sighed. “Such a beautiful day to be discussing these uncomfortable matters.”

Laval stood. “Before we go back, François, have you been briefed recently on the activities of Monsieur de Gaulle and his so-called ‘Free French’ forces in London?”

Darlan looked up, distracted for a moment by what appeared to be a fierce disagreement among the pigeons. He returned his eyes to Laval. “I see the same security reports as you, no doubt, Pierre.”

“And what about the intelligence on the activities of the so-called Resistance here in Vichy and elsewhere in France?”

“I believe I am up to speed. As yet these people appear to pose only a minor threat to us or the occupiers.”

“So the cabinet report says but I have my own sources. I understand from them that the anti-government forces here are going to be receiving direct assistance from abroad.”

“From abroad?”

“From England. In fact, according to my sources, the English secret services have already sent agents over here.”

“Two agents, perhaps three, I understood, Pierre. Is that anything to be particularly concerned about? Naturally, the British will deploy intelligence and counter-intelligence agents as the war proceeds. I would guess that the SS and other German agencies will be well on top of such problems.”

Laval shrugged. “As you say, the Germans should be on top of this. Meanwhile, our own people will be vigilant and I am happy to know that we have our own viable sources here and abroad. Now, my friend, I believe we have time for a quick bite. If we return to my rooms at the hotel, I’m sure my people can rustle up a nice bit of beef and a fine burgundy to accompany it. Shall we?”

The two men retraced their steps to the marshal’s seat of government at the Hotel Splendide, acknowledging the renewed greetings of the people again in dignified fashion.

CHAPTER 1

An inter-services game of cricket was in progress in the lush grounds behind him as Powell made his way through the grand portal of the Gezira Sporting Club. It was a hot and humid day and Powell was dripping with sweat. A fellow officer had given him a lift for part of the way but he had had to walk the last mile. Uniformed Egyptian attendants bowed and guided him through the lobby towards the bar, where he could see his host with a drink already in hand.

“Edgar, there you are. How the hell are you? So glad to see you made it back safely.”

“Thank you, sir.”

“Oh, you can forget the ‘sir’ stuff in here. Relax. Can I get you one of these very refreshing gin slings? You probably haven’t had a decent drink inside you for a while. You look like you could do with a towel as well.”

Powell opted for a whisky and soda. The drink and small towel were supplied swiftly and, after Powell had wiped his face, he clinked glasses with Major Rollo Watkinson, his second cousin.

“Chin-chin, old chap.” The major was a stout man of medium height, whose red face was dominated by a large, pock-marked drinker’s nose. “So, Edgar, tell me all about it. How was Crete? Fearful, no doubt.”

Powell related the tale of his company’s retreat to the east of Crete under relentless attack by German planes, and his final fraught journey to the evacuation point of Sphakia.

“My God, you were lucky. The only survivor of your company. Christ! Well, the whole thing was a bloody disaster. As I understand it, everything began swimmingly. At the outset the Germans suffered very big casualties but, through some cock-up, we allowed them to overrun the airfield at Maleme. They used it to fly in reinforcements and everything went wrong from then on. Air superiority proved decisive. The CO in Crete – Freyberg – is a damned good soldier. I understand he wanted to spike all the airfields before battle commenced but was thwarted by some old farts in the Middle East Command. That might have made all the difference.”

“Maybe, Rollo. It seemed from early on that there were German paratroopers and planes coming at us from all directions and we didn’t really have a hope in hell.”  

Watkinson finished his drink and ordered again for both of them. “Water under the bridge now. We’ll just have to regroup. Things were going a little better out here with Wingate taking the battle to the Italians in Abyssinia, but it looks like a different story again in Libya. That fellow Rommel is not going to be a walkover, I tell you.”

The major’s rheumy eyes stared off grimly into the distance for a moment until the arrival of a fresh gin sling perked him up again. “And despite everything, you’re feeling good in yourself, Edgar? Apart from looking undernourished, sunburnt and a little thinner on top, you look much the same. Still got those odd different-coloured eyes and the old turned-up nose, eh?”

Powell knew he looked a fright. He managed a little chuckle before sipping the whisky, which he guessed would go straight to his head.

“Who was your company commander again? I didn’t quite catch the name?”

“Captain Arbuthnot. Simon Arbuthnot.”

The major’s eyebrows rose. “Arbuthnot, eh? I know the fellow – or knew him, that is. Came across him a few times when I enjoyed my brief career in the City. Haven’t seen him for years. Did very well for himself by all accounts. Became something of a tycoon.”

“Really? You know I’m pretty ignorant about the City.” Powell reached out for a bowl of nuts that the barman had just set in front of them. “I shouldn’t speak ill of the dead, I suppose, but I have to say I found him to be rather a cold fish. We had very little conversation. He did say he had some land in the Midlands and interests in South America.”

Watkinson gave his cousin a knowing look. “A very wealthy man. A lovely Georgian estate in Northamptonshire. A very substantial trading and industrial enterprise in Argentina, a finance house in the City and God knows what else. He married into the estate in Northampton. Bagged some young aristocrat filly, whose family goes back to the Domesday Book or thereabouts. Lady Caroline something. Pretty girl by all accounts.”

Watkinson flicked a finger at the barman and raised two fingers to his lips. A large and ornate wooden box of cigarettes and cigars was produced. “Cheers, Faisal!” The major picked out a large cigar for himself while Powell took a cigarette. Watkinson trimmed his Corona and then, with a flourish, Faisal waved a flaming match in front of them and they lit up. The major took a long drag, blew a perfect circle of smoke in the air and continued. “Anyway, the poor girl died out of the blue within a year or two of the marriage. Some sort of fall, I believe – down the stairs or from a horse. She was the only child of the family and had inherited everything from her father when she was still a teenager. Anyway, Arbuthnot eventually got the lot.”

“What was Arbuthnot’s background before he married this girl?”

“Very ordinary. It’s coming back to me now. His father was the fifth son of a fifth son of a moderately good family. I think the father was a minor businessman.” The major screwed up his eyes in concentration. “Car dealer was it or machine engineer? Something like that. Anyway, Simon Arbuthnot started out as a junior stockbroker’s clerk in the City but had begun a little financial business of his own when he met the girl. It was just after the war, which he’d somehow managed to avoid. Asthma or something.” Watkinson put down his cigar and plunged his hand into the nut bowl. “Thank God they’ve got these back on the menu. For the past two weeks they only had olives. Can’t abide olives. Ghastly things.”

“Children?”

“One boy. Must be grown up now.”

“What was Arbuthnot like when you knew him? As I said, I found him a bit cold. But I could see that he might be attractive to women.”

“He was indeed a handsome fellow. Full of charm as well, if a bit fly. The wife was already dead when I first knew him. Put himself about quite a bit. A keen gambler. Not just on the tables. In business. With the opposite sex. There was a little mystery about how he did quite so well in business. Yes, he came into wealth through the wife but it was never really clear how he built up his South American business so quickly.”

Powell started coughing. He had never been much of a smoker. His cousin passed him an ashtray and Powell stubbed out his cigarette.

“Steady on, old boy. Are you all right? I should pour some more drink down your neck if I were you.”

“I’m all right thanks, Rollo. Obviously I need a little practice in dealing again with the finer things of life.”

The two men were distracted by a flurry of activity at the doorway, which marked the arrival of General Wavell and a party of officers. Wavell led his group towards the restaurant but paused when he saw Watkinson and Powell rising to salute him. “Who’s your friend, Major?”

“Lieutenant Powell, sir. A cousin of mine. A few days off the boat from Crete. Got out by the skin of his teeth.”

Wavell, a tall, well-built man with a small, bristly moustache and a head of silvery hair, smiled warmly at Powell and extended a hand. Powell grasped it and smiled back at the imposing officer, the commander-in-chief of the British army Middle East command – although, according to growing barrack-room gossip, not for much longer. “A dreadful business, Lieutenant Powell, dreadful. No doubt you lost many good comrades?”

“I did, sir.”

Wavell nodded gravely then patted Powell on the back. He glanced at the barman. “Give these two officers a round on me, please. Enjoy your recuperation, Lieutenant. I dare say you couldn’t have a better companion for recuperation than Watkinson here, eh Major?” Chuckling, he turned and headed off to the restaurant.

The two men regained their seats. “Jolly decent of him to say hello. A fine fellow…” the major leaned closer to Powell “… if a little indecisive. Anyway, where were we?”

“The Arbuthnot mystery.”

“Oh, yes. So Arbuthnot got a bundle from his wife but mostly in the form of property. There was some cash, of course, but the gossip was that it could not account for the rapid accumulation made by Arbuthnot in other areas. Within only a few years of his wife’s death, he had the extremely valuable South American business and had set up a well financed bank.”

“Did he sell any of the English properties to finance other investments?”

“Apparently not.”

“Perhaps he borrowed against them?”

“Perhaps, though people said he had no need to.”

“Maybe he was just a lucky investor?”

“Could be. Anyway, he can’t enjoy it any more can he, poor fellow? I wonder how he ended up in uniform? Chap was around the same age as me but I’m a career officer. Whatever induced a rich man like him to sign up?”

“Patriotism?”

“We must presume so, my dear Edgar. Ah, here we are. Thank you, Faisal.” The barman deposited Wavell’s round in front of them.

“If I have anything more to drink without some food in my belly, Rollo, I shall be on the floor.”

“Of course, dear boy. I should have realised. We’ll get the drinks sent through to the restaurant. And that’s enough of the Arbuthnots. Sorry for the chap but don’t think he should hog all of our conversation. Come along. They do a very fine steak here.”

As Powell followed his cousin out of the bar, he remembered, with a twinge of concern, the bloodstained envelope lying in his new army kitbag at the camp. Given all he had just learned about Arbuthnot, he couldn’t help thinking it might contain something of great importance.

* * *

“Look, Olivier. Quite a sight, isn’t it?” Commandant Auguste Angers stood tall in his stirrups as he pointed out the far distant dome of St Paul’s. The bronzed roof of the cathedral was glistening in the sun during a brief break in the clouds.

The commandant and his colleague and deputy, Captain Olivier Rougemont, had enjoyed a morning’s exhilarating ride in Richmond Park. The commandant was riding his favourite grey, Chloe, and Rougemont was on his boss’s second string, a chestnut, Annette. Several sharp showers had failed to dampen their appreciation of the park and the great views of London laid out before them. The commandant, however, could not refrain from drawing an invid