Circus

by Alistair MacLean

  Harper smiled. ‘I wouldn’t like that, sir. And you know better than anyone that the ultimate responsibility for the delivery of the goods doesn’t lie in my hands.’

  ‘I know. Have you formed any personal impression of our latest recruit yet?’

  ‘Nothing more than is obvious to anyone else, sir. He’s intelligent, tough, strong and appears to have been born without a nervous system. He’s a very close person. Maria Hopkins says that it’s impossible to get next to him.’

  ‘What?’ The admiral quirked a bushy eyebrow. ‘That delightful young child? I’m sure if she really tried – ’

  ‘I didn’t quite mean it that way, sir.’

  ‘Peace, Harper, peace. I do not endeavour to be facetious. There are times that are sent to try men’s souls. Although I know we have no option it is not easy to have to rely in the final analysis on an unknown. Apart from the fact that if he fails – well, there’s only one way he can fail and then he’ll be on my conscience for the remainder of my days. And don’t you add to that burden.’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Mind your back is what I mean. Those papers you’ve just stuck – securely, I trust – in your inside pocket. You are aware, of course, what will happen if you are caught with those in your possession?’

  Harper sighed. ‘I am aware. ‘I’ll have my throat cut and end up, suitably weighted, in some canal or river. Doubtless you can always find a replacement.’

  ‘Doubtless. But the way things are going I’m going to be running out of replacements quite soon, so I’d rather not be put to the trouble. You are quite sure you have the times of transmission and the code totally memorized?’

  Harper said gloomily: ‘You don’t have much faith in your subordinates, sir.’

  ‘The way things have been going recently, I don’t have much faith in myself, either.’

  Harper touched the bottom of his medical bag. ‘This postage stamp receiver. You sure you can pick me up?’

  ‘We’re using NASA equipment. We could pick you up on the moon.’

  ‘I somehow wish I was going there.’

  Some six hours after departure the circus train drew into a shunting yard. Arc lamps apart, the darkness was total and the rain very heavy. There, after an interminable period of advancing, reversing, bumping, clanking and screeching of wheels on points – the combination of all of which effectively succeeded in waking up everybody aboard – a considerable number of pre-selected coaches were detached, subsequently to be hauled south to their winter quarters in Florida. The main body of the train continued on its way to New York.

  Nothing untoward happened en route. Bruno, who invariably cooked for himself, had not left his quarters once. He had been visited twice by his brothers, once by Wrinfield and once by Harper but by no one else: known to everybody as a loner, he was invariably treated as such.

  Not until the train had arrived on the quay alongside the container-passenger ship that was to take them to Genoa – selected not so much for its strategic geographical position as the fact that it was one of the few Mediterranean ports with the facilities to off-load the crane-breaking coaches and flat-cars – did Bruno leave his quarters. It was still raining. One of the first persons he encountered was Maria. She was dressed in navy slacks, a voluminous yellow oilskin, and looked thoroughly miserable. She gave him the nearest she would ever be able to come to a scowl and came to the point with what he had now come to regard as her customary straightforwardness.

  ‘Not very sociable, are you?’

  ‘I’m sorry. But you did know where I was.’

  ‘I had nothing to tell you.’ Then, inconsequentially: ‘You knew where I was.’

  ‘I find telephone boxes cramping.’

  ‘You could have invited me. While I know we’re supposed to be striking up some special relationship I don’t go openly chasing after men.’

  ‘You don’t have to.’ He smiled to rob the next words of offence. ‘Or do you prefer to do it discreetly?’

  ‘Very amusing. Very clever. You have no shame?’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘Your shameful neglect.’

  ‘Lots.’

  ‘Then take me to dinner tonight.’

  ‘Telepathy, Maria. Sheer telepathy.’

  She gave him a look of disbelief and left to change.

  They switched taxis three times on the way to the pleasant Italian restaurant Maria had chosen. When they were seated Bruno said: ‘Was all that necessary? The taxis, I mean?’

  ‘I don’t know. I follow orders.’

  ‘Why are we here? You miss me so much?’

  ‘I have instructions for you.’

  ‘Not my dark eyes?’ She smiled and shook her head and he sighed. ‘You can’t win them all. What instructions?’

  ‘I suppose you’re going to say that I could easily have whispered them to you in some dark corner on the quayside?’

  ‘A prospect not without its attractions. But not tonight.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s raining.’

  ‘What is it like to be a romantic at heart?’

  ‘And I like it here. Very pleasant restaurant.’ He looked at her consideringly, at the blue velvet dress, the fur cape that was far too expensive for a secretary, the sheen of rain on her shining dark hair. ‘Besides, in the dark I wouldn’t be able to see you. Here I can. You’re really very beautiful. What instructions?’

  ‘What?’ She was momentarily flustered, unbalanced by the sudden switch, then compressed her lips in mock ferociousness. ‘We sail at eleven o’clock tomorrow morning. Please be in your cabin at eleven o’clock in the evening. At that hour the purser will arrive to discuss seating arrangements, or some such, with you. He’s a genuine purser but he’s also something else. He will make absolutely certain that there are no listening devices in your cabin.’ Bruno remained silent. ‘I notice you’re not talking about melodrama this time.’

  Bruno said with some weariness: ‘Because it hardly seems worth talking about. Why on earth should anyone plant bugs in my cabin? I’m not under suspicion. But I will be if you and Harper keep on behaving in this idiotic cloak-and-dagger fashion. Why the bugging of Wrinfield’s office? Why were two men sent to look for bugs in my place aboard the train? Why this character now? Too many people seeing that I’m debugged, too many people knowing that I can’t possibly be all that I claim to be or that the circus claims that I am. Too many people having their attention called to me. I don’t like it one little bit.’

  ‘Please. There’s no need to be like that – ’

  ‘Isn’t there? Your opinion. And don’t be soothing to me.’

  ‘Look, Bruno, I’m just a messenger. Directly, there’s no reason on earth why you should be under suspicion. But we are – or we’re going to be – up against an extremely efficient and suspicious secret police, who certainly won’t overlook the slightest possibility. After all, the information we want is in Crau. We’re going to Crau. You were born in Crau. And they will know that you have the strongest possible motivation – revenge. They killed your wife – ’

  ‘Be quiet!’ Maria recoiled, appalled by the quiet ferocity in his voice. ‘Nobody has spoken of her to me in six and a half years. Mention my dead wife again and I’ll pull out, wreck the whole operation and leave you to explain to your precious chief why it was your gaucherie, your ill manners, your total lack of feeling, your incredible insensitivity that ruined everything. You understand?’

  ‘I understand.’ She was very pale, shocked almost, tried to understand the enormity of her blunder and failed. She ran a slow tongue across her lips. ‘I’m sorry, I’m terribly sorry. That was a bad mistake.’ She still wasn’t sure what the mistake was about. ‘But never again, I promise.’

  He said nothing.

  ‘Dr Harper says please be outside your cabin at 6.30 p. m., sitting on the floor – sorry, deck – at the foot of the companionway. You have fallen down and damaged your ankle. You will be found and helped to your cabin. Dr Harper w
ill, of course, be there almost immediately. He wishes to give you a full briefing on the nature of the operation.’

  ‘Has he told you?’ There was still a singular lack of warmth in Bruno’s voice.

  ‘He told me nothing. If I know Dr Harper he’ll probably tell you to tell me nothing either.’

  ‘I will do what you ask. Now that you’ve completed your business, we may as well get back. Three taxis for you, of course, rules are rules. I’ll take one straight back to the ship. It’s quicker and cheaper and the hell with the CIA.’

  She reached out a tentative hand and touched his arm.

  ‘I have apologized. Sincerely. How long must I keep on doing it?’ When he made no answer she smiled at him and the smile was as her hand had been, tentative and uncertain. ‘You’d think a person who earns as much money as you do could afford to buy a meal for a working girl like myself. Or do we go Dutch? Please don’t leave. I don’t want to go back. Not yet.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I don’t know. It’s – it’s just one of those obscure – I don’t know. I just want to make things right.’

  ‘I was right. First time out. You are a goose.’ He sighed, reached out for a menu and handed it to her. He gave her an odd look. ‘Funny. I thought your eyes were dark. They’ve gone all brown. Dark, flecked brown, mind you, but still brown. How do you do it? Have you a switch or something?’

  She looked at him solemnly. ‘No switch.’

  ‘Must be my eyes then. Tell me, why couldn’t Dr Harper have come and told me all this himself?’

  ‘It would have created a very odd impression if you two were seen leaving together. You never speak to each other. What’s he to you or you to him?’

  ‘Ah!’

  ‘With us it’s different. Or had you forgotten? The most natural thing in the world. I’m in love with you and you’re in love with me.’

  ‘He’s still in love with his dead wife.’ Maria’s voice was flat, neutral. Elbows on the guard-rail, she was standing on the passenger deck of the MC Carpentaria, apparently oblivious to the chill night wind, watching in apparent fascination but without really registering what she was seeing as the giant dockside cranes, with their blazing attached arc-lamps, swung the coaches inboard.

  She started as a hand laid itself on her arm and a teasing voice said: ‘Who’s in love with whose wife, then?’

  She turned and looked at Henry Wrinfield. The thin intelligent face, chalk-white in the glare of the arc-lamps, was smiling.

  ‘You might have coughed or something,’ she said reproachfully. ‘You did give me a fright, you know.’

  ‘Sorry. But I could have been wearing hobnailed boots and you wouldn’t have heard me above the racket of those damned cranes. Well, come out with it, who’s in love with who?’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘Love,’ Henry said patiently. ‘You were declaiming something about it when I came up.’

  ‘Was I?’ Her voice was vague. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised. My sister says I talk non-stop in my sleep. Maybe I was asleep on my feet. Did you hear any other Freudian slips or whatever?’

  ‘Alas, no. My loss, I’m sure. What on earth are you doing out here? It’s cold and starting to rain.’ He had lost interest in the remark he’d overheard.

  She shivered. ‘Day-dreaming. I must have been. It’s cold.’

  ‘Come inside. They have a beautiful old-fashioned bar aboard. And warm. A brandy will make you warmer.’

  ‘Bed would make me warmer still. Time I was there.’

  ‘You spurn a nightcap with the last of the Wrinfields?’

  ‘Never!’ She laughed and took his arm. ‘Show me the way.’

  The lounge – it could hardly have been called a bar – had deep green leather armchairs, brass tables, a very attentive steward and excellent brandy. Maria had one of those, Henry had three and at the end of the third Henry, who clearly had no head for alcohol, had developed a distinct, if gentlemanly, yearning look about the eyes. He took one of her hands in his and yearned some more. Maria looked at his hand.

  ‘It’s unfair,’ she said. ‘Custom dictates that a lady wears an engagement ring when she is engaged, a wedding ring when she is married. No such duty devolves upon a man. I think it’s wrong.’

  ‘So do I.’ If she’d said he ought to wear a cowbell around his neck he’d have agreed to that, too.

  ‘Then where’s yours?’

  ‘My what?’

  ‘Your engagement ring. Cecily wears one. Your fiancée. Remember? The green-eyed one at Bryn Mawr. Surely you can’t have forgotten?’

  The fumes evaporated from Henry’s head. ‘You’ve been asking questions about me?’

  ‘Never a one and no need to ask either. You forget I spend a couple of hours a day with your uncle. No children of his own so his nieces and nephews have become his pride and joy.’ She gathered her handbag and rose. ‘Thank you for the nightcap. Good night and sweet dreams. Be sure to dream about the right person.’

  Henry watched her go with a moody eye.

  * * *

  Maria had been in bed no more than five minutes when a knock came at her cabin door. She called: ‘Come in. It’s not locked.’

  Bruno entered and closed the door behind him.

  ‘It should be locked. What with characters like myself and Henry prowling around – ’

  ‘Henry?’

  ‘Last seen calling for a double brandy. Looks like a Romeo who’s just found out that he’s been serenading the wrong balcony. Nice chair.’

  ‘You’ve come to discuss décor at this time of night?’

  ‘You allocated this room?’

  ‘Funny question. As a matter of fact, no. There were seven or eight cabins to choose from, the steward, a very nice old boy, offered me my pick. I took this one.’

  ‘Like the décor, eh?’

  ‘Why did you come, Bruno?’

  ‘To say good night, I guess.’ He sat beside her, put an arm around her shoulders and held her close. ‘And to apologize for snapping at you in the restaurant. I’ll explain to you later – when we’re on our way home.’ He rose as abruptly as he had sat down, opened the door, said: ‘Lock it!’ and closed the door behind him. Maria stared at the door in total astonishment.

  The Carpentaria was big – close on thirty thousand tons – and had been built primarily as a bulk ore ship capable of immediate conversion into a container vessel. She was also capable of carrying nearly two hundred passengers, though hardly in transatlantic passenger line style. Her two front holds were at the moment taken up by twenty circus train coaches, animal and crew member coaches mainly, while the contents of a dozen others had been unloaded on the quay and carefully stowed away in the holds. The flat-cars were securely clamped on the reinforced foredeck. In Italy they were to be met by a sufficiency of empty coaches and a locomotive powerful enough to haul them across the mountains of central Europe.

  At six o’clock on the following evening the Carpentaria, in driving rain and a heavy swell – she was stabilized to reduce roll to a minimum – was seven hours out from New York. Bruno was stretched out on a settee in his cabin – one of the very few rather sumptuous staterooms available on the vessel – when a knock came to the door and a uniformed purser entered. To Bruno’s total lack of surprise he was carrying a thick black brief-case.

  He said: ‘Good evening, sir. Were you expecting me?’

  ‘I was expecting someone. I suppose that’s you.’

  ‘Thank you, sir. May I?’ He locked the door behind him, turned to Bruno and tapped his case. ‘The paperwork for a modern purser,’ he said sadly, ‘is endless.’

  He opened the brief-case, extracted a flat, rectangular metal box, liberally covered with dials and controls, extended an antenna from it, clamped on a pair of earphones and began, slowly, to traverse first the stateroom and then the bathroom, assiduously twirling his controls as he went. He looked like a cross between a mine detector and a water diviner. After about ten minute
s he divested himself of his equipment and stowed it away in his brief-case.

  ‘Clear,’ he said. ‘No guarantee, mind you – but as sure as I can be.’

  Bruno indicated the brief-case. ‘I know nothing about those things but I thought they were foolproof.’

  ‘So they are. On dry land. But on a ship you have so much iron, the hull being used as a conductor, magnetic fields from all the heavy power cables – well, anyone can be fooled. I can. So can my electronic friend here.’ He put out a hand to a bulkhead to steady himself as the Carpentaria, apparently forgetting all about its stabilizers, gave an unexpected lurch. ‘Looks like a nasty night coming up. Shouldn’t be surprised if we have a few sprains and bruises this evening. First night out, you know – people haven’t had time to find their sea-legs.’ Bruno wondered if he had seen a wink or not, it could have been imagination and he had no means of knowing how much the purser was in Harper’s confidence. He made a noncommittal remark to the purser, who thanked him politely, unlocked the door and left.

  Precisely at six-thirty Bruno stepped out into the passageway. It was, fortunately, quite deserted. The foot of the companionway was only six feet away. Half-seated, half-lying, he arranged himself as comfortably as possible in the most suitably uncomfortable-looking position on the deck and awaited developments. Five minutes passed, and he was beginning to develop an acute cramp in his right knee, when a couple of stewards appeared and rescued him from his misery. To the accompaniment of much tongue-clucking they assisted him sympathetically to his stateroom and lowered him tenderly to his settee.

  ‘Just you hang on a minute, guv’nor,’ one of them said. He had a powerful Cockney accent. ‘I’ll have Dr Berenson here in a jiffy.’