The Eldorado Network

by Derek Robinson

  'Don't you think you ought to read it?' she asked.

  'Plenty of time. According to the system, it won't reach me in London until tomorrow.' He tossed the letter into a wire tray, and squared his shoulders. 'I apologise for my churlish behaviour,' he said.

  'Hell, no, forget it. I was the one who was wrong.'

  'That does not excuse my ill manners.'

  'I gave you a very hard time.'

  'Surely that is exactly when courtesy and consideration are most needed.'

  'Look, if anybody loused things up, I did. For Pete's sake, • I might have killed you.'

  He dismissed the idea with a brisk gesture. 'You were in much greater danger. It was criminally careless of me to leave such a stupid weapon lying around.'

  'It went off with one almighty hell of a bang.'

  They looked at the ragged hole in the picture-rail. 'I don't think the other tenants were altogether convinced that it was an exploding lightbulb,' Luis said. 'There was a strong smell of gunpowder, and several of them wanted to know why you were changing the lightbulb in the middle of the afternoon.'

  'Good question.'

  'Not at all. I pointed out the great difficulty of changing a lightbulb after dark. But a good deal of curious sniffing took place, all the same.'

  'Gee, I'm sorry.'

  'It was my fault.'

  That seemed to complete the exchange of apologies. Luis went back to his desk. They sat in silence. A breath of wind crept through the open window and curled a sheet of paper, until he put a bottle of ink on it. 'When do you go to America?' he asked.

  She stiffened. 'Who says I'm going to America?'

  'The ticket was in your bag. I searched your bag, you see,' Luis said. 'It seemed an obvious thing to do, in the circumstances. If you remember.'

  Julie remembered. 'I guess you're right . . . Anyway, I'm not going to America. Things are different today. I don't even have a ticket any more.'

  'Oh,' Luis said. 'I see.' He squared-off his papers and put them to one side. After a moment he placed the ink-bottle on top of them. 'Well,' he said.

  'Listen, you great Spanish dummy, is that all you can say?'Julie cried.

  'What's wrong?' He looked slightly alarmed.

  'Everything's wrong! Why the hell are we sitting here talking about airline tickets, for Chrissake?'

  He thought hard. 'As distinct from what?'

  She got up and kicked a filing cabinet. It made a gloomy boom. 'I can remember, and it wasn't so long ago, when you came crashing into my hotel and let it be known that you loved me.'

  'Yes, that's true.' He shuffled in his chair. 'In Madrid, it was a luxury we could both afford. What's more, in those days we had a lot in common.'

  'Sure. Still do.'

  'I believe there were even occasions when«you said that you loved me.'

  'Thank God for that. I thought you'd forgotten.'

  He opened a drawer and took out her letter. 'This isn't exactly an expression of warmest affection,' he said.

  'What d'you expect, after all your lying and cheating? Monogrammed condoms?'

  'I didn't expect anything.'

  'Okay, I love you, goddam it. Is that good enough?'

  Luis cleared his throat. 'I'm not sure. Yesterday you tried to kill me.'

  She gasped. 'You just said that didn't matter.'

  'Oh no. It was the danger that didn't matter. Life itself

  Las little value. But your gesture was insulting. To murder

  someone is the supreme act of contempt. That's what makes

  it such a cheap act. There's absolutely no respect involved.'

  'But all that was yesterday! Things are different today. Anyway, I wouldn't ever have wanted to kill you unless you once mattered to me so damn much. Can't you see that?'

  'I'm not sure.' He stroked his young moustache. 'To be absolutely honest, I'm not really sure of anything any more. I mean, I'm fairly sure I told you all those lies in Madrid because you were important at the time, but since then I've been doing a tremendous amount of lying to just about everyone, so maybe I've started lying to myself as well. It gets to be a habit, you see, and you can't stop. I mean, I could probably get up now and say, "I love you, Julie," and I might really mean it. Or I might quite possibly be lying.'

  'Try it,' she said,

  'For example, when you came in just now I was writing about a new British tank called the "crusher", and I really meant every word.'

  'Try it, Luis,' she said.

  'But it doesn't exist,' he added.

  'I don't care.'

  'As far as I know, that is. Perhaps it does exist.'

  'For God's sake, Luis!'

  'All right, I love you,' he said fast.

  'Oh, forget it, I don't care any more. It doesn't matter. God, my wrist hurts.'

  'How did it sound?' he asked. 'Did it sound right?' He got out the aspirin.

  'It sounded lousy.' She salivated hard and swallowed an aspirin. It went down painfully slowly.

  'Then maybe I don't love you. How does that sound?'

  'Go to hell.'

  He shook the aspirin bottle. 'Another?'

  She glared. 'You'd like me to take an overdose?'

  He wandered away and looked out of the window. It was a short view of about six feet, onto a blank wall. 'What are we going to do?' he asked.

  'Well ... I can't go home. No money. And Harry's disappeared.' It was beginning to sound like a very negative answer. 'I suggest I stay here. You've got money, and you look like you need some help.'

  Luis thoroughly scrutinised the wall. 'Can you type?' he asked.

  'I can learn.' As soon as the words were out, she recognised them, and uttered an amused snort which made him turn. 'Last time I said that, I was in the British Embassy in Madrid,' she explained. 'Just as well they didn't believe me then.'

  'Why?'

  'I was trying to get into England.'

  That made him blink. 'Good heavens above,' he said. 'What on earth for?' And then his brain caught up. 'Oh, oh, oh,' he said.

  'Don't take it personally, Luis. It's just a passing madness. Like yours.'

  He heaved in a deep breath, stretching his chest, flooding his lungs. 'What a lot of terrible rubbish you talk,' he said. They came together, cautiously, avoiding her broken wrist and his grazed jaw, and briefly kissed. 'Maybe you should give me lessons,' she mumbled. 'At least your brand of rubbish makes money.'

  'There is that to be said for it,' he agreed.

  Julie collected her bags from the pensdo and moved into Luis's apartment. For the next week she spent every day with him in the office. While he. wrote his reports, she read his files; and when he took a break, she asked questions: about Seagull, about Knickers, about the Abwehr's scale of payment for sub-agents, about his controllers in Madrid. Eventually she had a grasp of the entire operation.

  'One thing worries me,' she said. They were at lunch, eating baked stuffed crab and drinking vinho verde in a rooftop restaurant with a view of all the hills of Lisbon. Her wrist was mending; now she could manage a knife and fork. 'They must have other agents. What if one of them double-checks some of your information? And finds that it's all baloney?'

  'All right. Let's examine that.' Luis ate a little salad while he organised his thoughts. 'As far as I know, Christian has only one other agent in England. He's called Mercury, which is a joke, because he's really very slow. He never takes risks, never argues, never contradicts, just sits tight and plays safe, which probably explains how he's survived so long. Nobody in Madrid has much faith in him. If Christian asked Mercury for a second opinion, my guess is Mercury would just leave it for a couple of days, and then radio back a confirmation.'

  'On the other hand, he might actually do what he's told and drop you in the sewage.'

  'Then they have to choose who to believe.'

  'He's got seniority.'

  'I'm getting paid more.'

  The waiter came by and topped up their glasses. Luis held a fingertip in the sparkl
ing fizz, and licked it. 'Anyway,' he said, 'the Germans are very painstaking people. Christian would probably ask me to explain the discrepancies.'

  'Which you can't do.'

  'Who says? I simply point out the time-lapse between my report and Mercury's-- a couple of weeks, at least. For instance, suppose I find a Commando training school in north Wales but Mercury doesn't. So what? The Commandos moved elsewhere.'

  'Are Commandos really that mobile?'

  'My Commandos are.'

  They strolled through the botanical gardens on the way back to the office, taking wide detours to avoid the sprinklers which hissed and pattered in glittering sweeps, cooling the air and sharpening the scent of the flowers. She said: 'It's not going to last, though; is it?'

  'Of course it's going to last.'

  'Come on, be your age, Luis. What are you doing? You're flying a kite, that's all, and it's a great big kite but one day the wind's going to drop and then what'll you do?'

  He stopped. 'Look,' he said. 'I'm not a suicide. I'm a businessman. I do just what Ford Motors does, and Coca-Cola, and MGM. I give the customer what he wants. When I sit down to write, I ask myself two questions. What would the Abwehr like to know next? And what is Britain probably doing now? Then I put the two answers together. I tell you, it works.'

  'And I tell you it's crazy.'

  'Okay, good, fine, it's crazy. 'They began walking again. 'If it makes me the richest maniac in Lisbon, I can stand a little insanity.'

  'Certainly. But each section is terribly independent and jealous of the others. When I was there, Madrid Abwehr wouldn't even speak to Paris Abwehr.'

  'Ah. So they're not likely to compare reports.'

  'Not much.'

  'But somebody might. I mean, who gets all the reports in the end?'

  'Berlin, I suppose.'

  'I have to pee,' she said.

  When she came back he had made a pot of tea, and he was browsing through the 1937 GWR Holiday Haunts. 'Budleigh Salterton, bracing climate, pebbly beach,' he said. ' "Its tranquillity soothes those who have become wearied of the bustle of modern life." I think I might give them a couple of batteries of heavy anti-aircraft guns.'

  'To protect the tranquillity?'

  He sipped his tea. 'Don't know. Something important must be going on there.'

  'Well, forget it for a minute. I've been thinking about your Abwehr set-up. Look: suppose there are ten sections operating from ten cities. That means they're running a total of maybe two dozen German agents inside Britain right now.'

  'Yes, at least that number.'

  'Well, hell ..." She took her cup in her left hand and rested it on her cast. 'You're outnumbered, Luis! Those guys are all selling the genuine article. When they dig up some dirt it's real dirt, the stuff you can grow things in. Sooner or later some smart-ass at Abwehr headquarters is going to start noticing that one guy is always out of step. Those square heads are full of square brains, remember.'

  'Perhaps.'

  'It doesn't worry you.'

  'There's lots of room in Britain for two dozen spies without treading on each other's toes. Besides . . . the others are making mistakes, too. Spies always get things wrong. The Abwehr expects it. I myself stumble from time to time, just to be more convincing. C.L.B., for instance.'

  'C.L.B.' She drank some tea. 'Wasn't there something about C.L.B. in a report you made last week? Canadian something. Canadian Lowflying Bombardiers. Isn't that right?'

  Luis finished his tea and examined the pattern of leaves in the bottom. 'Looks like a dead camel,' he said. 'That's very significant.'

  'Come on, tell me. What does it really mean?'

  Luis went back to his desk. 'Don't miss next week's gripping instalment,' he said; and began writing.

  Chapter 46

  Julie practised on Luis's typewriter Until she had a degree of two-fingered competence. Luis then agreed to pay her the equivalent in escudos of twenty-five dollars a week. After pounding the machine for two days«she struck for fifty dollars a week. He refused, and threatened to finish the job himself. She pointed out that, if he did, the difference in typing styles would be obvious to the Madrid Abwehr. A moody silence fell.

  It was the end of a particularly sultry afternoon. He had worked until two in the morning for three days in a row, he wanted the report to be mailed as soon as possible, and he was obsessively worried about Seagull's travelling expenses. To provide an extra touch of authenticity, he itemised these in pounds, shillings and pence; but every time he totalled them he got a different result. It was infuriating. Already he had given it far more time than it justified. Bloody British currency!

  'Anyway, I reckon I'm worth more than fifty bucks,'Julie said, picking at a hangnail.

  'It's out of the question.'

  'I mean, look at the hours.'

  Luis flung down his pencil. 'Have you any idea how much it costs me to run this business? Look at this. Just bringing Seagull down from Liverpool to London for a lousy meeting at the Strand Palace Hotel comes to . . .'He glanced at his crossed-out sums. 'Comes to a hell of a lot,' he mumbled.

  'Why put him up at the Strand Palace, for God's sake?' she asked.

  'I like the name,' Luis said curtly.

  'Well, it won't impress the Germans. Go somewhere that has a bit of style. Go to the Connaught.'

  'How much is that for a single room?'

  'With bath? Call it five pounds.'

  'Five pounds? What are you trying to do, bankrupt me?'

  'Luis,'Julie said. 'For Christ's sake. It's not your money. You don't pay these expenses; the Germans do. Who cares what it costs? Give the guy the Ritz bridal suite for a week and send the bill to Hitler.'

  Luis stood in the middle of the room, shoulders slumped, toes turned in, face as tired as a wrung-out rag. 'What's wrong with me?' he muttered. He heaved a great, shuddering sigh. 'I keep getting a strange feeling inside my head. It's as if a glass shutter comes clown. I can see the next thought, but I can't reach it.'

  'You've been working too hard,' she said. 'You've got to learn to take it easy, Luis.'

  'Yes. Yes.' He nodded, frowning. His eyes kept drifting sideways, seeking something which was always escaping. 'You're right. I've got to stop worrying.'

  'Now.'

  'I'll tell you what.' He braced his shoulders and rotated his head, loosening the weary neck muscles. 'Seagull can stay at the Connaught. Yes.'

  'Good decision,' Julie said. 'If you ask me, the fellow deserves it, the way he's been working his ass off.'

  Luis smiled, and the smile triggered off a chuckle. 'He has, hasn't he? I'm very proud of Seagull. D'you know, I think I'll get him a raise.'

  'Okay. 'Julie came over and took his hands. 'Now let's get something else straight. Seagull doesn't exist. He doesn't get his pay and he doesn't run up his expenses. All the money comes to you and stays with you.'

  Luis nodded.

  'And if you want to know what makes me worth fifty bucks a week,' she said, 'it's not just my brilliant typing, it's also the way I keep you out of the funny-farm.'

  Luis nodded again.

  'Fine.' She kissed him and slapped him on the backside. Now let's go and get thoroughly smashed.'

  They got moderately smashed in a succession of bars, and eventually found themselves in a stately establishment with much engraved glass and dark wood. They were about to leave when the head waiter appeared, benign as a bishop. Julie explained that they were looking for the Connaught Hotel. He smiled at her, delightedly, and said he had a brother in Phoenix, Arizona. Luis told him that Julie herself came from Indiana which was in California and therefore virtually indistinguishable from Phoenix. They shook hands and stayed for dinner: partridge soaked in port, extremely rich. As soon as the plates had been cleared away, Luis fell asleep. A waiter fetched a taxi. Luis fell asleep again in the taxi, and again as soon as they got home. She took off most of his clothes and steered him into bed. He looked as if he had been sandbagged.

  But next morning he was as
good as new again: fresh, full of energy, his face clear and his eyes alert. Julie, who was feeling slightly rusty, marvelled, and asked him how the hell he did it. 'Simple,' he said. 'It's my royal blood. You see, at birth I was exchanged by gypsies. By rights, I should now be king of Albania.'

  'Oh yeah? I've seen the king of Albania. He wasn't so fast on his feet.'

  'Exactly. The wrong man grew up to get the job.' Luis stepped into his shoes and picked up his jacket. 'If you're coming with me--'

  'Sit down a minute and listen. I've been thinking some more about your crazy Eldorado operation.'

  'It's not crazy as long as it works.'

  'Well, that's what bothers me. Have you ever stopped to think that you might some day give the krauts a piece of secret information which is not only valuable but true? I mean, really true?'

  Luis sat down. 'By mistake,' he said.

  'Sure, accidentally. A coincidence.'

  'I invent something which actually happens.' He shrugged. 'Does it matter if there really is a Commando school in north Wales? The Luftwaffe can't bomb north Wales, it's too big. In fact the British would sooner they bombed north Wales than--'

  'How about convoys?' Julie asked.

  Luis got up and poured himself more coffee. 'Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear,' he muttered.

  'You invent a convoy. Size, route, sailing-date, the lot. When the U-boats turn up, there is a convoy, smack in their sights.'

  'It couldn't happen.'

  'Maybe it's happened already. You don't know.'

  'All right, it's not impossible. But on balance--'

  'Luis, stop kidding yourself. On balance you're likely to get steadily better at guessing what the British are doing, so on balance you're going to become more and more--'

  'All right! Yes, fine, I understand, you make it very clear.' He scowled into his cup. 'So now you want me to stop. You want me to abandon the business.'

  'Not necessarily. But I certainly think you should go to the British and tell them what you're doing.'

  'I went to the British once, in Madrid.'

  'And?'

  Luis brooded over the memory. 'They kept giving me tea. I had to pee in the bath.' He wandered out to the balcony and emptied his coffee into a pot of geraniums. 'I'll tell you the truth,' he said, 'but I don't care if you don't believe it. Sometimes when I was with Freddy Ryan I wasn't sure if I believed it myself. After a while Freddy could make you believe that down was up, and sometimes now I think maybe he was right, that down is up, and the law of gravity is just a regulation invented by all those dull, heavy people who can't fly and want to make it illegal for everyone else to get up off the ground, the way Freddy Ryan could.'