by Len Deighton
‘I understand,’ I said. ‘Go on.’
‘Well the constable has a penceiver—that’s a little thing like a fountain pen that I can make a buzzing noise on if I press that key there—I’ll press it now.’ She pressed it with an exaggerated show of strength to make it clear to me. ‘Now that makes the penceiver buzz. Now the constable knows that you are ready to receive a message from him. Of course I didn’t know you would actually be up here on the switchboard so I was going to switch the call through to whatever line you came in on.’ A white light came up on the board. ‘That’s his acknowledgement,’ Bessie said. There was nothing to do then except hang around talking to Bessie until the Special Branch constable was able to get near a telephone and call us.
‘Next year,’ said Bessie, ‘they are going to have some satellite receivers and we will be able to draw lines on a map to show where the penceiver is transmitting from.’
‘Very Dick Tracy,’ I said.
‘No,’ she said. ‘In America they have much more advanced things than this.’
‘So I hear,’ I said. ‘How’s Ossie?’ Bessie Butterworth’s husband Austin did freelance jobs for us from time to time.
‘Not too well,’ said Bessie. ‘He’s not getting any younger, you know. I said to him the other day you’re not getting any younger, Austin. Now that the children have grown up and left us we can manage on my money, but he likes to work now and again. I suppose it’s the same with all of us. You get to be good at your job, to take a pride in it, and then you find it’s difficult to give up. He’s been working since he was fifteen. Well, it’s natural to him now, like breathing.’
‘Planned your holiday?’
‘Imperial Hotel Torquay. We always go there. As Austin says, they know us and we know them. We always go there. Every year. Sometimes I’d like a change but they know us and we know them, so Austin likes it.’
‘Yes,’ I said. The buzzer went.
Bessie said, ‘This will be him. This number is only for him. Yes. I’ll put you through. Exchange greetings. Remember this is an open line.’
I said, ‘Rita Hayworth.’ The voice at the other end said, ‘Love goddess,’ then he said, ‘Suspect answers to the description of Harvey Newbegin. He is now driving south.’
Quite calmly I said. ‘And you’ve let him drive away.’
The constable said, ‘Don’t be alarmed, sir. This isn’t a bicycle-and-notebook job. We have two cars with him as well as another constable with me on foot.’
‘I thought I was being very restrained under the circumstances.’
‘Yes sir,’ said the constable. ‘It’s quite a conspicuous car to follow, sir. One of those little bubble cars. A Heinkel I think.’
‘Conspicuous in what way?’
‘Well in the first place it’s pillar-box red. Secondly, it has a sign in the front that says “This is a transistorized Rolls Royce” and thirdly, someone has written “Learn how to park, you berk” in the dust on the rear window.’
When I told Bessie that there was a car following the Heinkel, she connected us to the Metropolitan Police Information room and we heard the police car reporting Harvey’s driving right through central London, over Waterloo Bridge, Waterloo Road, Elephant and Castle. Bessie wrote down the address outside which Harvey had parked.
Bessie handed it to me with a puzzled expression. ‘That’s your…’
‘My address,’ I said. ‘Yes, exactly where I would be right now if there hadn’t been a call for me.’
I got back to my flat and Harvey was still ringing the doorbell and a plain-clothes constable was talking to Harvey and complaining about how late I was. As I arrived, the plain-clothes policeman said something about collecting some papers, but I told him they wouldn’t be ready till morning.
‘Good thing,’ said Harvey. ‘That guy being here to collect documents. That’s how I knew you were due back any moment.’
I grunted and wondered whether Harvey believed it. I fixed coffee for him while he went poking through my bookshelves. ‘The Fall of Crete. Histoire de L’Armée Française. Buller’s Campaign. Weapons and Tactics. What are you, some kind of nut about soldiers?’
‘Yes,’ I answered from the kitchen.
‘Crazy stuff to read,’ said Harvey. ‘Haven’t you got any books that a bum like me can understand?’
‘Wouldn’t have them in the house,’ I said and took him a cup of coffee.
‘I’ve left my wife,’ Harvey said. ‘I’m never going back.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘At least I won’t have to worry whether I can afford to send the kids to camp.’ He gave a forced chuckle. ‘You know I’ve cleared out of the Midwinter set-up?’
‘Yes, I know.’
‘Would your people…’ He was searching his pockets, ‘Would your people…’ He looked up.
‘Would my people what?’
‘Give me a home.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘English homes have American landlords.’
‘I’d pay rent. I’d give them details of the Midwinter Group UK. Photos—everything.’
I said, ‘I’ve already taken details of the Midwinter Northern Europe Group. Photos…everything.’
‘So,’ said Harvey. ‘Midwinter taught you how to collect data and pictures over a phone line from the Compuscan. I see, well in that case you can bust up the whole group any time you like. Are they looking for me?’
‘You are a source of embarrassment to my masters, Harvey. They don’t want to employ you and they don’t want to arrest you. They just want you to vanish.’ Harvey nodded.
‘But when you go,’ I continued, ‘let me arrange things, the Military and the Ministry are in on the act now. One of their people gets a little overkeen and…’ I shrugged and made a nasty noise.
‘OK,’ said Harvey. ‘I’ll let you know.’ He stood up. He was wearing one of those very English tweed suits that they sell only in America. He searched his pockets, sifting through keys, credit cards and screwed-up paper money and pushing it back again. He said, ‘Do you ever have that feeling, I have it sometimes, that all the men in the world are moving so fast that they are burning up. Thinking. All the women are standing still and you are whizzing past them at a tremendous speed, you know, burning up with thinking.’ He stopped and I didn’t speak. Soon he began again, not caring very much if I was listening. ‘They will all be here, just as static, having babies and setting their hair. Still. Very still. Like grass just before a storm. Other men will be here, moving at the same sort of speeds and also burning themselves out; but the women will be still.’ He began to search through more junk. ‘What do they do with all that money?’ he asked. ‘My wife swallows money like salted peanuts; can’t get enough of it. Money money money; that’s all she ever thinks about.’
‘What’s that?’ I asked.
‘Rabbit’s foot. It’s supposed to be lucky,’ said Harvey. It was a poor shrivelled piece of fur and bone.
‘Tell that to the rabbit.’
Harvey nodded. He found the wrinkled photo of Signe and looked at it to assure himself that she existed. ‘I’ve got to talk to her again,’ he said. He twitched the photo round to show me who he meant. ‘She says she doesn’t love me any more but I know she does. I’m seeing her again in Helsinki. I’ll persuade her.’
I nodded unenthusiastically.
‘You don’t understand,’ said Harvey. ‘Something like this only happens once in a lifetime. Look at her: the texture of her hair, soft hands, her skin. She has youth.’
‘We all had that once,’ I said.
‘Not like that.’
‘Well I…’
‘I’m serious,’ said Harvey. ‘Very few people have this quality, this secret quality. It frightens me. She’s soft and trusting and vulnerable; like an injured animal. It was weeks after I first saw her that I ever had the nerve to speak to her. I used to go home at night and say please God make her love me. Please God I’ll never ask you for anything again if you make her love me. Even n
ow when I see her, I stand staring at her like a Hoosier among the tall buildings. I first saw her coming out of a shoe shop. I followed her to the office where she worked. I hung around at lunch time and finally one evening in a restaurant I spoke to her. Even now I just can’t believe that she loves me. I can’t believe it.’ Harvey sipped at his coffee and I thought, so much for Dawlish’s guess, and felt pleased that I was right, so far. ‘Innocence,’ said Harvey. ‘That’s what she has, you see. To an innocent anything in the world is possible, because there’s no experience programmed into the memory to tell you that things aren’t possible. You see…innocence is the knowledge that you can do something and experience is the knowledge that you can’t.’
‘Experience is a method of endorsing prejudices,’ I said.
‘No,’ said Harvey. ‘When did you last call upon your experience? When you doubted your chances of success, that’s when.’
I said, ‘Have some more coffee.’ It was no good having a normal sort of discussion with Harvey. I said, ‘You are manic-depressive, upward phase, Harvey.’
‘That’s it,’ said Harvey. ‘And I’m a little sick.’
‘Are you?’ I said.
‘You’re smiling, but I have a temperature of one hundred and two.’
‘How do you know?’
‘I carry a thermometer, that’s how I know. Do you want me to take your temperature?’
‘No, why the hell should I?’
‘It’s a good thing you are fit and well. Just in case something happens to me.’
‘If you are really sick I’ll call a doctor.’
‘No, I’m fine, fine. I’m really fine.’ The way he said it, it meant ‘I’d rather die in harness’.
‘Just as you prefer,’ I said.
‘You can collapse with a thing like I’ve got. It can be nasty.’ He picked up a bottle of Long John and looked at me and I nodded and he poured out half a tumbler of Scotch for each of us and drank half his own in one gulp. ‘This girl,’ he began again. ‘You don’t know what she’s been through.’
‘Tell me,’ I said.
‘Well,’ said Harvey, ‘although he has never had proper international recognition, Signe’s father was the brains behind the invention of the atomic bomb. After the war it affected him. He felt guilty and became very morose and all he wanted to do was to listen to Sibelius. Well they were quite a wealthy family so he could afford to have an orchestra along to this enormous house they had in Lapland and he would just sit and listen to Sibelius all day and all night. Sometimes there would be nothing to eat in the house and this orchestra would still go on playing. It must have been terrible for Signe because her mother was in an iron lung. Can you imagine that?’
‘Easily,’ I said. ‘Easily.’
Harvey stayed talking and drinking his way through my supply of whisky. At nine o’clock I suggested that we might go out and eat.
‘Boil an egg,’ he said. ‘I don’t want much.’ I fixed some steak and pizza from the freezer while Harvey tried his hand on my old Bechstein. Harvey only knew a few songs and they were a strange collection: ‘Two little girls in blue’, ‘The Wearing of the Green’, ‘I’ll take you home again, Kathleen’ and ‘I don’t want to play in your yard’. He sang and played each of them all through with care and concentration. During the difficult chord progressions his eyelids drooped and his voice sank to a whisper, rising again to a lusty bellow during the simpler parts. When I took the food into the sitting-room Harvey balanced the plate on the piano and hit a few chords while talking and munching. ‘I want to ask you a couple of favours,’ he said.
‘Go ahead.’
‘First, can I sleep on the sofa tonight? I think I was being followed today.’
‘You haven’t brought a tail here?’ I said in alarm. ‘You haven’t led anyone right here to my flat?’ I got up and walked around in neurotic agitation. The performance must have reassured Harvey. He said, ‘Good God no. I got rid of them all right. Don’t worry about that. I lost them OK, but they know my hotel now. If I go back there I’m being tailed again.’
‘OK,’ I said grudgingly. ‘If you are sure you weren’t followed here.’
‘It’s probably only one of Midwinter’s people anyway,’ said Harvey. ‘I mean they know where you live, so what’s the difference.’
‘It’s a matter of principle,’ I said.
‘Yes,’ said Harvey. ‘Well thanks.’
‘I’ll have to go out before eleven o’clock tonight,’ I said. ‘I’ll be working all night.’
‘What on?’
‘Duty officer,’ I lied. ‘They put me on it while I was away. It’s always us part-time people who get the worst duties. I’ll be back around midday. You’ll still be here?’
‘I’d like to stay two or three days.’
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘I would like that.’
Harvey hit a minor chord.
‘It’s about Signe,’ Harvey said. ‘She’s high on you, you know.’ I said nothing. Harvey said, ‘I wish you’d come to Helsinki with me. To help me talk her into coming away with me. With you to help me I’m sure I’d make it.’
It was going too well. It was too easy and I mistrusted it, or perhaps I was seeing my role in a new light.
‘I don’t know, Harvey,’ I said.
‘I won’t ask you any more favours,’ Harvey said. ‘Not ever. And we’ll make you godfather of our first child.’ He played the opening bars of the Wedding March.
‘OK Harvey,’ I said. ‘We’ll go to Helsinki together.’
Harvey played a little trill.
Chapter 23
I left Harvey in the flat. I felt sure that he wouldn’t want to go anywhere without me. But I didn’t feel so sure about it that I called off the man who was still watching the flat. From the car I phoned the office. Harriman and the duty officer would meet me. Chico was the duty officer.
I phoned Dawlish and told him that I wanted to seal off the MRE thefts at once. I suggested that we let the Porton Security people grab the agent who was working inside the Experimental Establishment when he arrived next morning, but I would deliver Pike into custody myself.
‘Have someone who can take Pike from me between two and three A.M.,’ I said. ‘He’ll have a written statement ready by then.’
‘What sort of story?’
‘One with a beginning,’ I punned clumsily.
‘That’s exactly the sort of story one wants for a few days,’ Dawlish said. He laughed, he liked puns.
I went out to Pike’s place in the country with Harriman and Chico. It was a cold night and the wind buffeted the car like a riot mob. Ralph Pike’s house was in darkness, but the driveway of Doctor Felix Pike’s mansion was crowded with motor cars of all shapes and sizes and every light in the house was on. The downstairs windows had the curtains open and yellow light fell across the lawn. Inside a crowd in evening dress were drinking and talking and beyond them on the far side of the room couples were dancing to the music of an elaborate gramophone and six loud-speakers. The Spanish manservant opened the door until he noticed we weren’t in evening dress. ‘It’s not good where you have parked the car.’
I said, ‘It’s not good anywhere around here,’ and we eased our way in without further ceremony. ‘Where’s Dr Pike?’ I said.
The manservant said, ‘He perhaps is busy. My master…’ ‘Get going,’ I said roughly. He spun round and headed into the smoke and noise. Harriman and Chico were sniffing at the engravings and waving away trays full of drink. Pike appeared in a dinner-suit, maroon with silk facings and shoulders padded like he’d left the hanger in. He smoothed his brocade waistcoat and held his smile tight enough to prevent the lower half of his face falling off. ‘Dempsey,’ he exclaimed, meeting my eye suddenly as though he hadn’t been watching me from across the room. ‘To what do we owe this honour?’ I said nothing.
Harriman said, ‘Doctor Pike, Doctor Rodney Felix Pike?’
‘What’s the trouble?’ said Pike. He gripped the knot of his bo
w tie and pushed it hard against his thyroid.
‘Are you Doctor Pike?’ said Harriman.
‘Yes,’ said Pike. ‘But you can damn well…’
‘I think we had better go somewhere where we can talk,’ said Harriman speaking at the same time as Pike but slightly louder. They stared at each other in silence for a moment.
‘Very well,’ said Pike. He turned and began to walk up the stairs. ‘Johnson,’ he called over his shoulder, ‘send champagne and chicken for four up to the study.’ Only Pike would think of calling his Spanish servant Johnson.
The study was the sort of room that doctors keep in their private houses for tax purposes. There was just the light of the standard lamp shining on the oak panelling and on sabres and flintlock guns lined up over the fireplace. On the antique writing-table there were copies of Country Life and three Bristol glass decanters. We all sat down in the Queen Anne chairs, except Pike, who walked across to the door to make quite sure it was closed. ‘Perhaps you’ll tell me who the devil you are,’ he said finally.
‘Inspector Simpson, Special Branch, sir,’ said Harriman. ‘This is Sergeant Arkwright,’ he indicated Chico.
‘What about this fellow?’ said Pike pointing to me.
‘I’ll be coming to him, sir,’ said Harriman. There was a knock at the door and the white-jacketed man came in with a bottle of champagne, four glasses and a plateful of sandwiches. He said, ‘It’s nicely chilled, sir. Will you be wanting the ice-bucket?’
‘No, that’s all right,’ Pike said. He was standing in front of the glass-fronted bookcase twisting the key in the lock absent-mindedly. When the waiter had gone Harriman pointed at me. ‘We have this man in custody in connexion with the theft of certain public stores from the Microbiological Research Establishment at Porton, said premises being a prohibited place in the meaning of the Official Secrets Act,’ Harriman looked at Pike. ‘I must caution you, sir, that anything you say may be used in evidence.’
Downstairs the gramophone played mambo. Pike was looking at the books in his bookcase. ‘I’d like to see your warrant cards,’ he said. They gave them to him and I said, ‘They’ve got us, Pike. It’s no good your thinking that you’re going to get away with it while I go to prison for twenty years.’ Pike studied the cards and handed them back as though he hadn’t heard me, then he walked across to the telephone. His way was blocked by Chico. Harriman said, ‘I wouldn’t advise that yet. Not yet I wouldn’t. After all you have a lot of guests downstairs. We are being very civilized. You don’t want us to go downstairs and interview your friends.’