by Len Deighton
‘I’ll come down to the kitchen,’ I said.
‘No, I’ll bring it up,’ she said hurriedly. ‘Cheese or chicken?’
‘Chicken.’
‘Stay there. I’ll bring it up.’
I walked out on to my balcony. There was still a light burning somewhere in the lower part of the house, and there were the mixed smells of capsicums being scorched in the style of Arab cooking, and the sweet smell of incense.
I was still on the balcony when the girl arrived with the tray. I watched her as she put it down on the bedside table. She’d unpinned her hair. It was corn-coloured and fell on her shoulders in an attractive disarray. She was tall and slim, with high cheekbones, a generous mouth and blue eyes. She seemed to sense that she was being watched, and she looked up suddenly and smiled, as if reading my carnal thoughts.
‘You’re English, aren’t you?’ The voice was home counties, but it had been a long time away from home.
I nodded.
‘First Englishman I’ve seen in an age,’ she said.
‘No shortage in Nice.’
‘These people won’t let me borrow a car,’ she said. ‘Just because I dented their lousy old Fiat. And you change twice on the bus – I tried it once, and once was enough, I’ll tell you!’ She turned down the cover on the bed and tucked it in, with the quick nervous movements of a trained nurse. ‘The maid should have done that before dinner,’ she explained. ‘No, I’m trapped here.’ She smoothed her skirt over her hips as she straightened her body, and looked at me. ‘I used to go for walks but I twisted my ankle, and there are mine-shafts out there with no fencing or warning notices or anything – just like the French – you could fall right down them and no one would even know about it.’
‘And no cabs?’
‘On my salary – you must be joking.’ She gave me a knowing smile. It was the sort of smile that only beautiful young girls know about: a provocative smile from moist open lips, as sweet as fresh cream. And as ready to turn sour at the first sign of thunder.
I smiled. She walked across to the balcony where I stood. ‘It’s fantastic weather for this time of year,’ she said. The sky was purple, and from somewhere over the hill there was a glow of red neon, like an electronic sunset switched on all night.
Even before she put her arm round me, I felt the warmth of her body and smelled the cologne. ‘I think I’m going to like you,’ she whispered. She reached around to clasp her hands in front of me. Then she pressed her body against my back. ‘I’m going to like you very much.’
‘Why?’ I said.
She laughed. ‘You’re a cool bastard.’ She blew on the back of my neck and then gently bit the lobe of my ear. ‘I’m lonely,’ she said finally, when she grew tired of the game.
‘Not tonight,’ I said. ‘I’ve got a headache.’
She chuckled, and gripped me more tightly.
‘Why don’t you drink your tea?’ she asked. ‘It might start your blood circulating.’
‘Good thinking,’ I said. I took her wrists and gently broke free from her tight grasp.
I went across to the bedside table where she’d put the tray. It was an impressive spread. There were hand-embroidered napkins, solid silver cutlery and some spring flowers in a vase. The tray was set for two. I sat down on the edge of the bed and poured two cups of tea, and added milk. I heard a rustle of silk; by the time I turned round, with the cup and saucer in my hand, she was stark naked, except for a string of pearls and a heavy gold bangle that denoted her blood group.
‘Damn!’ she said mildly. ‘I wanted to surprise you.’ She flipped back the counterpane and climbed into my bed, stretching her legs down into the crisp starched sheets with a sound like tearing tissue paper. ‘Oooh! The sheets are cold!’
‘You want a chicken sandwich?’
She shook her head. She seemed little more than a child, and, like a child, was suddenly sad. ‘You are angry?’ she asked. ‘Have I shocked you?’
‘No,’ I said.
‘Be nice to me,’ she pleaded. ‘If you want me to go, I’ll go. But be nice to me.’ She was tanned, except for the places that would be covered by a small two-piece.
I gave her the cup and saucer. ‘You want sugar?’
‘You’re very English,’ she said. ‘You don’t want it yourself, but you can’t bear to turn it away. No, no sugar.’
‘Was this Mr Champion’s idea?’ I said. I turned to watch her as she answered.
She sat up in bed to drink her tea. ‘You’re his best friend, he said.’ A drip of tea had dribbled down her breast. When she rescued it with her spoon she looked at me and giggled. She raised the spoon to my lips, and when I accepted it, giggled again.
‘Was it his idea?’ I persisted.
‘Yes, but I told him I’d have to see you first.’ She stretched her long tanned arm out, to run a fingertip down my back. ‘My name is Topaz,’ she said. ‘It means yellow sapphire.’ She was in her early twenties, with educated speech and calm confident eyes. Forty years ago, girls like this had converged upon Hollywood; now they can be found wherever there are yachts or skis or racing cars, and men to pay for them.
‘So he’s going to pay you?’
‘No, darling, I do it for love.’ She chuckled as if that was the greatest joke in the world. Then she drank her tea greedily and put her tea-cup down on the table at her side of the bed. ‘Put your arms round me for a minute.’
I did so.
‘I get frightened here,’ she said in a whisper. ‘I’m serious now, I really am.’
‘Why should you be frightened?’
‘These bloody Arabs arrive by the dozen and then literally disappear!’
‘Now, come on, Topaz.’
‘I’m not kidding. They arrive in cars in the night, and then next morning there’s no sign of them.’
‘Oh, yes.’
‘I’m serious!’ she said angrily. ‘Footmarks on the hall carpet, and funny noises in the night. Sometimes I wonder if it’s worth the money.’
‘Why are you telling me all this?’ I said.
‘I don’t know,’ she admitted. ‘Because you’re English, I suppose.’
‘But Mr Champion is English too, isn’t he?’
She screwed up her face in deep thought. She was either the greatest actress I’d ever seen in action, or she was speaking right from the heart. I looked at her heart with more than casual interest. ‘Not really English,’ she said finally. ‘They laugh and joke together in Arabic. I don’t call that being English, do you?’
‘You’re quite right,’ I said.
Her arms reached out again. ‘Do you wear an undervest?’ she said. It was a rhetorical question. ‘It’s a long time since I met a man who wears undervests.’
‘I can always take it off,’ I said.
‘Yes, take it off.’ She had probably been telling me the truth, but I knew enough about Champion not to dismiss the idea that she might be the greatest actress in the world.
I looked at her. What was she: a housekeeper, a cast-off girlfriend of Champion, a nurse brought here just to look after Billy, or a spy planted to check out what I might say in my sleep. Or did she play some other unsuspected role in this strange household where no pork was eaten, and where the night air smelled of burning incense.
I said, ‘It’s just that I’ve stopped believing in Santa Claus, reincarnation and love at first sight.’
‘And which of those am I supposed to be?’ she asked. ‘You want me to go? If you want me to go, say so.’
‘A man can suss out Santa,’ I said, ‘without stuffing his presents back up the chimney.’
14
The N562 road from Grasse deteriorates after Draguignan. From its sharp hairpins you can see the Mediterranean on a fine day, or at least the shiny new autoroute that swings inland at Cannes and goes past Aix and Avignon. That – if you have the right sort of car, and keep your foot on the floor – will take you to Paris within five hours.
But to the north of that ‘r
oute sinueuse’ is a barren region of scrub and rock that the French Army have possessed since the early years of this century. There are no autoroutes there. In fact, the local people will tell you that there are no roads there at all, although they themselves drive north. The raincoated policemen and armed soldiers who huddle around the zone militaire barriers wave the grey corrugated vans of the grocer, the butcher and the baker through the cordon, except when the gunnery ranges are in use.
Champion’s black Mercedes was well known to the sentries. Champion had a local resident’s pass, for the Tix mansion and the quarry were close to the military zone, and the most direct route was through the barriers.
The chauffeur showed the pass to the sergeant of gendarmerie. The sergeant leaned into the car and stared at all three of us before handing the papers back. There was a buzz as the window was raised, and the car rolled forward into the military exercise zone. With a rattle of gravel we passed over the junction of the communications roads. Soon we reached the reinforced surface that the army built to withstand the weight of the AMX 50s, brought up here to ‘the Atelier’ for testing under battle conditions.
Even in fine weather it is a grim place. Like all such military establishments, it is an example of decades of neglect interspersed with panic spending. The buildings at the north-western tip were built by the Germans during the war. It is a walled compound, with guard towers and ditches. The emplacement area, which the US Army built in 1946, included a cinema and swimming-pool that are still in use, but a more important legacy from the Americans is the line-up of artillery stands, where the big guns are anchored during the firing trials.
The heart of the Atelier is to the south of the plateau. It is called the Valmy complex. It was built in 1890, and the name of the great victory for French artillery is carved in stone above the main entrance. It’s a curious-looking place: probably designed by some architect who had waited all his life for a chance to use poured concrete, for almost every wall is curved. It stands amid the stone barracks and the metal tank-hangars like a set for some old Hollywood musical, and it’s not difficult to imagine lines of dancers kicking their way along the curved balconies, tap-dancing on the prow, or poking their smiling faces out of the circular windows.
‘Stop a moment,’ Champion told the driver.
‘They’ll move us on,’ he replied.
‘Go and look at the plugs or something,’ said Champion. He turned to me. ‘Quite a place, isn’t it,’ he said. ‘That’s the research block.’
I pushed the button to lower the window. The clouds were scudding low over the superstructure of the block, tangling in the aerials to make it look more than ever like a ship at full steam.
‘Real research?’
‘Missiles, atomic artillery … some interesting heat-seeking ideas, and one of the best electronic countermeasures research teams in the West.’
‘And what are you interested in?’
‘What are we interested in, you mean.’
‘That’s it.’
Champion had his gloved hands locked together. I noticed him pinching his fingers to find the place from which the tips were missing. I wondered if it gave him pain. ‘I wouldn’t pass anything to the bloody Russians, Charlie.’
I didn’t answer.
He looked at me to see how I’d reacted to his promise about not working for the Russians, but I didn’t react in any way. Champion wiped the back of his glove across his mouth as a child might after an indiscretion. ‘The Arabs will pay for the best anti-aircraft defence that can be bought … defensive weapons, Charlie … you’ve been good not to ask before, but you deserve an explanation of what you are doing.’
‘I’ve never had one in the past.’
Champion smiled grimly. ‘No, I suppose not.’
‘Fuses? Working drawings? One of the research team, is it?’
‘They’ve taught you to think wholesale,’ said Champion. ‘Is that the way the department would do it?’ He didn’t expect an answer. He looked through the rain-specked windscreen to watch the driver prodding the engine. The bonnet closed, and Champion spoke hurriedly to provide an answer before the driver came back inside the car. ‘You know what I’m trying to say, Charlie. If you’ve got any doubts about what I’m doing, for God’s sake tell me.’
‘OK.’
‘Not just OK, Charles. Promise me!’
I smiled. It was not like the Champion I used to know. ‘Scout’s honour, you mean? Will it make you feel more secure if I say I won’t betray you?’ I asked him.
‘Funnily enough,’ said Champion irritably, ‘it will.’
‘I’ll give you a contract,’ I offered. ‘And then if I shop you, you can sue me.’
Then even Champion saw how ridiculous it was to seek assurances from men who were professional betrayers. ‘You killed the men at the quarry,’ he said. ‘Admit it!’
The driver opened the door and got in. I nodded.
The car turned away from the Valmy complex, and took the main road west. There is a large hotel only ten miles down the road. Crowded into the smoke-filled bar there were civilians from the administration and from the laboratories. In the restaurant sat a few off-duty artillery officers in uniform eating lunch. Three of them had wives and children with them.
Champion pushed his way through the noisy men at the bar and ordered drinks. He had dressed to be inconspicuous here – a short brown leather jacket and a stained hat. He made some joke to the bartender and the man smiled. We took our drinks to a battered wooden table under the window, and an old woman put a checked tablecloth on it and set the cutlery for four. She gave a nod of recognition to Champion. We had come a long way round by road, but as the crow flies Champion was almost a neighbour.
‘One of the lab workers will be here,’ said Champion. ‘An old-time Communist, he thinks I make regular trips to Moscow. Don’t disillusion him.’
‘I’ll try not to.’
‘The test firings begin next week. He’ll let you have whatever he can get hold of, but we might have to lean on him.’
The waitress brought three beers, and the menu. Champion tapped the plastic menu on the edge of the table and said to me, ‘Remember what I told you, Charlie. I’m trusting you.’
I reached for my beer and drank some. It seemed unlikely that Champion trusted me, for he’d told me countless times that a spy should trust no one.
Champion stared at the menu. ‘Choucroute! It’s a long time since I last had choucroute garni,’ he said. He pursed his lips as if he was already tasting it. But he didn’t order sauerkraut, he had fillet steak and imported asparagus.
15
It was my idea that Gus – Champion’s contact in the Valmy depot – should get a local contractor’s pass for me. He had doubts about it, but the application went through within seven days and they gave me the pass the following Monday. With it I was able to crisscross the whole military zone. Providing Gus came down to the door of the administration block, I was also permitted to enter the buildings there.
From the top floor I saw the flash of the guns far away on the other side of the range, and I could look down to the bottom of the old fault on the edge of which Valmy was built. On the firing days, yellow helicopters scoured the range for warheads and the striped dummy atomic shells. They clattered across the rift to deliver the target-graphs to the administration block’s front lawn – that is to say, the wind-scoured piece of scrubland where stood two ancient field guns, an old missile ramp, and a sign saying ‘No Admittance’.
‘The French are being very co-operative,’ said Schlegel.
‘Too bloody co-operative,’ I said. ‘When that pass came through within seven days, this fellow Gus couldn’t talk about anything else.’
Schlegel stopped pacing up and down and looked at me. He recognized other unspoken criticisms in my voice.
‘We’ve got to keep in contact,’ said Schlegel defensively. ‘And this was the only place.’
I didn’t pursue the argument. Schlegel
was right. He looked at his watch. ‘Mustn’t keep you too long, or our friend Champion might wonder where you are.’ He put the papers that Gus had given me into my document case and clicked the locks closed. ‘Worthless,’ he pronounced. ‘If Champion can sell that to the Arabs, he deserves every penny he gets!’
‘A dummy-run perhaps. Just to see if I’m going to blow the works.’
‘What for?’ said Schlegel. ‘Who needs you, one way or the other? Why try to convince you that he trusts you – where’s the percentage?’
‘That’s right,’ I agreed.
‘Now don’t go all hurt on me. Champion doesn’t need you, or any other cut-out. He’s met Gus – Gus knows his face – Jesus! It doesn’t make sense, does it?’
I blew my nose. Then I walked over to the window and looked down at the other buildings. I was suffering the first symptoms of influenza, and the weather promised nothing but thunder and lightning and endless torrents of rain. I put my hands on the radiator and shivered.
‘Come away from that window, bird-brain,’ said Schlegel. ‘You want your pal Gus to see you?’
‘It could make sense,’ I said, moving away from the window. ‘It would make sense, if there was something very big coming up. Something that the French don’t want to talk about.’
Schlegel pulled a horrified face and waved his flattened hands at me to warn me to stop.
‘I know, I know, I know!’ I said. I looked round at the soft furnishings, the hand-tinted portraits of nineteenth-century generals and the faded plastic flowers. Such a reception room – in such a place – was sure to have electronic plumbing, but I continued anyway. ‘If they are putting something really important through the Atelier in the near future, Champion will get his hands on it.’
Schlegel shrugged at what most people in the department would have considered a major breach of security. ‘Not if our pal Gus goes into the cooler. That’s the way they’d reason.’