A Matter of Honor Read online

  “The bathroom is at the end of the corridor,” said Adam, a little feebly.

  “It wasn’t the bathroom I was looking for, silly.” She giggled. “I don’t seem able to wake Lawrence. After all that wine he’s passed out like a defeated heavyweight boxer.” She sighed. “And long before round fifteen. I don’t think anything will rouse him again until morning.” She took a step toward him.

  Adam stammered something about feeling rather beat himself. He made sure his back shielded her from any sight of the papers on the desk.

  “Oh, God,” said Carolyn, “you’re not a queer, are you?″

  “Certainly not,” said Adam, a little pompously.

  “Just don’t fancy me?” she asked.

  “Not that exactly,” said Adam.

  “But Lawrence is your chum,” she said. Adam didn’t reply.

  “My God, this is the sixties, Adam. Share and share alike.”

  “It’s just that …” began Adam.

  “What a waste,” said Carolyn, “perhaps another time.” She tiptoed to the door and slipped back into the corridor, unaware of her German rival.

  The first action Romanov took on leaving the Chairman’s office that morning was to return to his alma mater and hand-pick a team of twelve researchers. From the moment they had been briefed they proceeded to study in pairs on four-hour shifts, so that the work could continue night and day.

  The early information had come in almost by the hour, and the researchers had quickly been able to establish that the Czar’s icon had remained in his private quarters at the Winter Palace in Petrograd until as late as December 1914. Romanov studied religiously a photo of the small delicate painting of Saint George and the dragon—Saint George in a tiny mosaic pattern of blue and gold while the dragon was in red and yellow. Although he had never shown any interest in art, Romanov could well understand why people could be moved by the little masterpiece. He continued to read details of the icon’s history but still couldn’t work out why it was so important to the State. He wondered if Zaborski even knew the reason.

  A royal servant who had testified before the People’s Court three years after the Revolution claimed that the Czar’s icon had disappeared for a few days in 1915 after the visit of Ernst Ludwig, Grand Duke of Hesse. At the time, the inquisitors had taken scant interest in the misplaced icon because it was still on the wall of the Czar’s study when they had stormed the Winter Palace. What concerned the court more was why, in the middle of a fierce war with the Kaiser’s Germany, the Grand Duke of Hesse should want to visit the Czar at all.

  The professor of history at the university had immediately been asked for his opinion. The great academic was puzzled by the request, as the KGB had never shown any interest in the nation’s past history before. Nevertheless he briefed Romanov on everything that was known of the incident. Romanov pored over his report once again. The Grand Duke, it was thought, had been on a secret visit to his sister Alexandra, the Czarina. Historians now believed that it had been his intention to secure a cease-fire between Germany and Russia, in the hope that Germany could then concentrate her war efforts on the British and the French.

  There was no proof that the Czar made any promises on behalf of his people, but the Grand Duke, it seemed, did not return to Germany empty-handed. As the reports of the proceedings of the People’s Court showed, another palace servant had been instructed to wrap up the Czar’s icon and pack it with the Grand Duke’s belongings. However, no one on the palace staff could properly explain to the court how a few days later the icon reappeared in its rightful place on the wall of the Czar’s study.

  Romanov’s chief researcher, Prof. Oleg Konstantinov, having studied the professor’s notes and the other researchers’ contributions, had underlined his own conclusion in red ink.

  “The Czar must have replaced the original painting with a brilliant copy, having handed over the real icon for safekeeping to his brother-in-law, the Grand Duke.”

  “But why,” asked Romanov, “when the Czar had a palace full of Goyas, El Grecos, Titians, and Rubenses did he bother to smuggle out one icon, and why does Brezhnev want it back so badly?”

  Romanov instructed the professor and his twenty-four researchers to turn their talents to the Royal House of Hesse in the hope of tracing what had then happened to the Czar’s icon. Within ten days, they possessed between them more information about the Grand Duke and his family than any professor at any university had managed to gather in a lifetime. As each file appeared on his desk Romanov labored through the night, checking every scrap of information that might give him a lead to the whereabouts of the original painting. Romanov came to a dead end when after the Grand Duke’s death the painting had been left to his brother, who was tragically killed in a plane crash. Nothing had been seen or heard of the icon after that day.

  By the beginning of the third week, Romanov had reluctantly reached the conclusion that there was nothing new on the whereabouts of the icon to be discovered. He was preparing his final report for the Chairman of the KGB when one researcher, Comrade Petrova, whose mind did not work in parallel lines, stumbled across an article in the London Times of Wednesday, 17 November 1937. Petrova bypassed the research leader and handed the relevant photocopy to Romanov personally, who, over the next few hours, read the news item so often that he came to know it by heart.

  In keeping with the paper’s tradition, the foreign correspondent remained anonymous. The article carried the dateline “Ostend, 16 November 1937.” It read:

  Grand Duke George of Hesse and four members of his family were tragically killed this morning when a Sabena aircraft carrying them from Darmstadt to London crashed in thick fog over the Belgian countryside.

  The Grand Duke had been on his way to England to attend the wedding of his younger brother, Prince Louis, to the Hon. Joanna Geddes. The younger brother had been waiting at Croydon Airport to greet his family when the news was broken to him. He immediately cancelled his original wedding plans and announced they would be rescheduled with a small private service in the Chapel at Windsor.

  The Times went on: “Prince Louis, who succeeds his brother as the Grand Duke of Hesse, will leave for Ostend with his bride later today in order that they can accompany the five coffins on their journey back to Germany. The funerals will all take place in Darmstadt on 23 November.”

  It was the next paragraph that the researcher had circled boldly.

  “Some of the late Grand Duke’s personal belongings, including several wedding presents for Prince Louis and his bride, were scattered for miles in the vicinity of the crashed aircraft. The German government announced this morning that a senior German general has been appointed to lead a team of salvage experts to ensure the recovery of any family possessions that still belong to the Grand Duke’s successor.”

  Romanov immediately called for the young researcher. When Anna Petrova arrived a few minutes later she gave no impression of being overawed by her head of department. She accepted that it would be hard to make any impression on him with the clothes she could afford. However, she had put on the smartest outfit she possessed and cut her hair in the style of an American actress called Mia Farrow, whom she had seen in one of the few films not banned by the authorities. She hoped Romanov would notice.

  “I want you to scour the Times every day from 17 November 1937 to six months later, and also check the German and Belgian press during the same period in case you come across anything that would show what the salvage experts had discovered.” He dismissed her with a smile.

  Within twenty-four hours Comrade Petrova barged back into Romanov’s office without even bothering to knock. Romanov merely raised his eyebrows at the discourtesy before devouring an article she had discovered in the Berlin Zeitung of Saturday, 29 January 1938.

  The investigation into the crash last November of the Sabena aircraft that was carrying the Hesse royal family to London has now been concluded. All personal possessions belonging to the family that were discovered in the vicin