by Nigel Dennis
“What do we do now?” Morgan asked, hoping faintly that they would return to the car and peacefully drive away again. “It’s possible that he’s just gone out to the john,” said Divver, narrowing his eyes like a detective. “But he’s got his private john right here, Max.” “True, true; a sound point,” said Divver: “well then, he may have gone down to the bar, or somewhere. We had best stick around quietly for a hour or so and see if he comes back. I’ll stay in this room. You go sit behind the bedroom door.” “And hold the knob?” “Don’t be a dope. How’s he going to get in if you won’t let him?” “Oh, sure, excuse me.” “And stay alert,” said Divver.
Morgan took the uncomfortable gold chair on which he had once hung his evening clothes, pulled it behind the door and sat on it. The engineer’s bed was as it had been a few hours ago, except for more ash on the undersheet and no occupant in the blue pyjamas. He lit a cigarette and sat puffing gloomily, a bored warden of democracy. “No smoking,” said Divver’s voice, “he may smell.” Morgan dropped the cigarette on the red carpet and watched it burn its way into the heart of a rose before he moodily smeared it out. You will probably never be a sane man again, he said to himself.
Fortunately, Divver’s patience ran out before an hour was up. “Let’s get moving,” he said, “we’re probably just wasting valuable time—more of what I wasted all this summer. We might find the little bastard in the bar; he’s a great boozer. Come on.” Divver was looking more outraged than ever: he said: “I’ll find him if I have to tear the whole place apart”; and he stalked quietly down the passage, Morgan following like the tail on a mad dog.
In the bar, Divver exclaimed “Ah-ha!” and pointed to a fancy bottle of cordial, standing out with an empty jigger beside it. “I’ll bet he’s been here and that this was the only thing left to drink.” He pushed through the wicket gate and ran his finger over the bottles: they teetered and fell to the floor with a crash. “—— it!” said Divver, wincing, “but that’s what it is, I’m positive. Now, let’s see—what sort of place would that sort of a man be likely to go on to from here? Where would he wait to receive his Nazi friends?”
“He might hide in the cathedral,” said Morgan, picturing the car outside it and hoping that seeing the car might distract Divver from searching.
“Sanctuary, huh? Yes, a likely choice,” said Divver, nodding grimly. “O.K. let’s go—and quietly. Fortunately, once it gets dark we won’t have to sneak around like Indians.”
“How long do you think we should search?”
“Until we find the little creep. He’s not likely to have left town on foot.”
“Do we search the whole town?”
“If necessary.”
As they came out, the clock hands touched the hour of four. The figures appeared on their roundabout; God struck the Devil three clanging strokes and then suddenly desisted, his club poised; the two green images stood in the sun stock-still, waiting to be wound up again. The big hands of the clock continued into the minutes as usual, with strict, peremptory jerks. “What a hideout!” said Divver.
They stepped through a side door and stared into the huge dark body of the church, its twelve little domes swelling around the topless central cupola.
But the engineer was not in the pews, or the side chapels, or the seats of the choir. The further they searched the more fanatically exacting Divver became, raising the lids of cushioned seats to peer into hollows that could scarcely have contained a child, descending into the vaults with a huge wax candle, climbing the narrow stairs to the belfry, where the swollen spring of the chimes tinkled loosely on its pivot. He opened each little side-door into each of the tiniest retreats, his energy mounting with each disappointment. At the end of a long stone passageway, he opened an arched door, peered through and said: “Here’s one jaloppy they never thought to take,” and Morgan saw faded hoops of flowers over the rear-end of the old green car, and, beyond, the metal door which divided the garage from the square. This view of a familiar thing from an unexpected point-of-view gave him quite a shock. “I’m just about done in,” he said, looking hopefully at Divver.
But Divver’s face reminded him of his own when, seized by terror, he had almost lost its cause in unquenchable determination to follow an exact method. Divver seemed almost to have forgotten what he was looking for and to be searching for the sake of search alone. “It will be dark in half an hour,” he said, “and then we’ll comb the cafés, one by one.”
They proceeded to do so, Morgan pausing to cram his empty stomach with stale rolls. As the hours passed, a complete exhaustion overcame him; he followed along without seeing anything but Divver’s advancing back, noticing only that Divver gradually dropped every attempt to be silent, until finally he was pounding on doors with his fists, and shouting. “I’m through,” he told Divver: “I’ll go on searching in the morning if you insist, but I have to sleep now.” “There’s a couch in the lobby,” said Divver, disappearing down the stairs of a cellar: “we’ll meet there.” Morgan stumbled away over the square and up the hotel steps—and there indeed was a big leather couch, to which he staggered with outstretched arms, blind, deaf and dumb.
*
It was light when he heard someone come in, and awoke from the deepest sleep of his life to see Divver approaching. This grim sight made his heart sink: he wanted only to be allowed to go back to sleep, or to hear far away the peal of trumpets and know that the Nazis had come to save him from his friend.
But as Divver came nearer, he saw defeat written all over him. Divver’s knuckles were raw from hammering on doors, his fingernails were split, he was covered with the grime and dust of innumerable backrooms. He lurched up, steadied himself with one hand on the couch, and said simply: “We’ll have to give up. There’s still hundreds of places he might be in. The further I go, the less hope I have of getting anywhere.” His surrender aroused a gleam of his old, natural anger—a gleam which threw a shadow of his old, upright attitude, his simple opinion that if the wicked are not clearly stamped with marks of punishment, how may the world recognize the righteous? “What burns me up,” he said, hoarsely, “is that probably while I have been scouring the town, the little Nazi has been sitting around right under my nose, just as he did all summer. Meanwhile, in Tutin, that recruiting-sergeant has probably written me off as a dilettante. Can you think of any obvious place to look?” His words said this, but his tone asked: Can you think of one place that will give me an excuse to walk out on the rest?
“The hotel rooms,” said Morgan; “we … I … never went over them … The manager’s private rooms … all the back part of the hotel; the back stairs where the kitchens were and the girls slept …”
“That’ll do,” said Divver, pulling himself straight. “You check the manager’s place; I’ll do the back stairs. Meet back here in fifteen minutes. O.K.?”
Morgan was sure that they were both performing a merely nominal exercise; but when he opened the manager’s door he felt afraid. He threw his eyes blindly around the first little room and quickly backed out again; then he felt ashamed and went back to examine the place properly, nervously opening the empty closets and looking under the beds. He was thankful to be able to leave empty-handed, and he went out and sat on the sunny steps of the hotel, looking at his watch. Divver was already overdue.
He fidgeted impatiently and let his head nod sleepily.
A few minutes later he heard footsteps, and looked up. He saw a figure crossing the square toward the cathedral. He stared at it for some seconds before he realized that it was not Divver but the engineer, walking quickly but calmly toward the ministerial car.
He sprang up indignantly, shouting “Hi! Hi!”
The engineer, who was neatly dressed, turned his head with the air of one who has been rudely accosted, and proceeded on his way.
Morgan shouted: “Max! He’s here!” and began to run like mad.
But before he had covered half the distance, the engineer had entered the car and started the moto
r: when Morgan reached the cathedral the car was far down a side-street, moving the opposite direction of Tutin.
Divver’s jacket had been tossed to the ground, and Morgan went to pick it up. Carrying it sternly over one arm, and disgusted with the ignominious slowness he had shown, he went to the kitchen entrance and shouted for Divver. He was already fearful of Divver’s anger, already framing the best possible story. When no answer came, he cursed, and started up the stairs.
He came out again, running, a few minutes later, his eyes dilated, shouting: “Help! Murder! Murder! Help!” He ran across the whole square, still shouting hysterically, still clinging to Divver’s jacket. At the far end of the square, he stopped, stood erect for a moment, and then gave a loud cry and fell to the ground, so rigidly that his hands stayed stiff at his sides and his forehead hit the cobbles.
*
When he returned to a sort of consciousness, he felt pain, but he did not associate it with himself, because he had no idea of his existence. He observed the colour blue, without knowing that he was seeing or that the sky was above his eyes.
The next time he woke up, he had some idea of his being a person. He knew that he was undergoing pain, and that he was upheld by something solid and not uncomfortable. He also knew that his only duty was to go to sleep, and that himself and sleep were the only important things.
At his next waking, the sun was shining straight into his eyes. He recognized the sun and the blue sky; he knew that he was a stuffed shell with a few sensitive parts He even vaguely realized that he was in some way ill, that the illness was familiar, and that over the side of it would be a leaning object and a habitual voice. He felt rather dispirited by the pain and a sense of hollowness, but at the same time he could feel a comforting pull of drowsiness and inertia. The whole state was familiar enough to give him a feeling of being in the right place, a place that he connected with the idea of home, and of having done all that was required of him. He turned on his side to avoid the sun, and snuggled back into sleep.
He woke up again later very abruptly, with the notion that something unusual had taken place. His eyes travelled over some pieces of stone and were stopped by a limp object that he recognized as a jacket. There was nothing odd about this: he was at once much more concerned by the dreadful pain in his head: this was what had happened. He put up his hand to feel the pain, drew his fingers away with a wince and saw that they were smeared with dirty brown spots and varnished streaks of drying blood. He began to think: I would almost believe I had had a seizure, if I were not sure that I had not.
He moistened his lips and felt familiar pains in his tongue: he sighed, and thought: Yes, possibly I have had one, but of course only a mild one. And I’ve broken the crystal of my watch. And I feel like hell; I feel disgusted; I want to vomit; I’m sick and tired of everything. This has happened to me again, why always again and again, haven’t they had enough of me: it’s going too far: a few times, I’ll put up with; but not over and over again … That’s Max’s jacket: he could at least say a word to me, to make me feel less humiliated. He remembered with some relief that a terror which he had been expecting had now come at last; now it was gone, and he was still alive.
He noticed the surrounding houses and realized that he was in Mell, but it took him some time to puzzle out what Mell was. His mind at last grasped his first impression of it, his first morning out alone, Divver lying gloomily in bed and saying: “Next time, tell me where you are going: I’m supposed to be looking after you.” Then he saw himself running full-tilt down the corridor—and again, Divver’s sullen face as he bickered with the manager. The manager changed his position and appeared on the hotel steps clad in enveloping furs … He put his hand to his head, and said to himself: Max was up in the belfry with a huge candle: I know it’s absurd but I am sure he was. There was something very important …
He sat up. The houses twirled about him like a merry-go-round, and he lay down again. A cat approached him, purring, and he said, aloud: “I know you are a nice cat, but leave me alone right now.”
He then noticed that the cat was the only living thing in sight, and he was conscience-stricken at having dawdled in carrying out his important duty. He saw the hands of the clock pointing to ten, and he was sure that he had missed an appointment. He remembered that he had been told to go to the consulate, and that the consulate was in Tutin. After thinking carefully, he remembered what and where Tutin was.
He got up and stood shakily, looking at all the dirt on his creased clothes: I shall have to invent some convincing story, he thought. He picked up Divver’s jacket, and the effort so made his head swim that he felt angry with Divver for leaving his belongings to be picked up by ill young men who ought to be in bed. He wandered about in eccentric directions, hoping that he was on the way to Tutin.
When he found himself beside the stone garage, he remembered the first time he had seen it, and felt so dismal that he was ready to cry. He also recalled, with what seemed to him a brilliant feat of memory, that there was a car for him and Divver standing nearby; but as soon as he looked around for it he remembered that someone had taken it … Why, everyone has gone, he thought: of course, all evacuated.
He looked at the garage door, and thought: Perhaps it’s still here; perhaps nobody will mind: I’ll pay damages if they insist; I still have plenty of money. He looked in his pocket to make sure. Then, he put his hand down to the base of the door and pulled it up.
He had to lean on the old car for a moment to steady himself, but he was made proud and much stronger by the fact that his memory, which he had always considered sluggish and unreliable, was in the best working order. He could remember to the last detail the stages of starting the car. He saw the long hook in the ceiling to attach the hood to; but it was a long time before he found the mechanic’s little bottle of gasoline, standing on a ledge. He remembered the dowdy priest’s handkerchief in the mouth of the carburetter, and he went through all the right procedure, thinking with satisfaction of what courage and presence of mind he was showing—and I, a sick man who ought to be in bed with whiskey and moaning women.
But when he pushed in the crank, and felt the weight of the engine like a wall against his fist, he lost all his pride in the most dismal despair. It was all he could do to so much as turn the engine a trifle; and he would have abandoned the car if he had not felt that he would be severely punished if he hung around any longer in Mell. Between rests, vomiting and crying, his spirits rising and falling uncontrollably, he struggled with the crank, until he heard the motor kick and collected his strength for a great effort. Next moment he was standing in triumph, pouring with sweat, panting in whistling gulps, his head swimming, while the engine roared, the dust and petals scurried around his feet and the steering-wheel danced like mad before his eyes.
He climbed behind the wheel and drove out into the sun, detouring sedately from one side of the road to the other, skinning the fenders on intruding houses. When he curved on to the Tutin road at ten miles an hour, he felt that he had made a daring gesture. Potato fields and empty wheatfields crawled past him at their own sluggish pace, and crows flew up out of the stubble at his approach. Very soon, a sparkling flash signalled to him from behind a pinewood; the road pulled him on a long curve and introduced him to the endless expanse of the ocean, appearing from nowhere and shining marvellously in the sun. He followed the coastline, obeying the road and clinging to the wheel in a dull way, and noting occasionally some dogs and chickens and puzzled human faces.
Nobody stopped him until he reached the Tutin waterfront. Here, an armed policeman put his hand against the front of the car and brought it to a halt. He was short but firm with the policeman and insisted that he must reach the American consulate. He left the car, and the policeman pointed to an immense queue whose tail curved away into invisibility. At the entrance, he showed his passport and climbed a flight of stairs into a big room. He saw looks of astonishment on the faces of the typists and officials as they beheld his bloody fa
ce, and simultaneously he was struck aghast by remembering the message he was supposed to deliver. To the secretary who leaned over from the far side of the counter, he said hoarsely: “I have to report a murder.”
He heard cries and exclamations; he dropped his head on the counter while the murmuring went on. He heard a man’s voice say: “We’d better get him to the rest-room, as a start”; and soon he was lying on a padded couch and felt a marvellous trickle of alcohol firing its way through his body. An elderly lady washed his face and said, in a friendly but irritating technical way, “Only abrasions and contusions, I think.” It was like being at home. He opened his eyes and sat up.
A young man came in, looking very upset, and asked: “Is your name Max Divver? I presume this is your coat? … No, I see you have a coat on. How do you come to be here? Who are you? James Morgan? Have you registered with the consul? Pardon me while I check.”
The man returned with a folder that contained half-a-dozen cables. “Is your home in Magister, New York? Ah, so you’re the one. You have given us a lot of trouble. Were you attacked by Polish refugees? If you feel well enough, do you mind coming into the office; this is the powder-room.”
He was helped to a small room from which he could see out over the harbour. The sun poured in; he felt hot and faint; he thought of Divver, and promptly vomited on somebody’s arm. After quite a long wait the harrassed young official hurried in with some papers and cables, followed by a girl with a notebook. “As you can imagine,” he said, “we are all at sixes and sevens, thanks to Mr. Hitler et al. If it’s just a visa you want … My God, your clothes are a mess. Were you beaten up? I’m sorry this room is so warm: of course the whole place should be air-conditioned—but you know what the State Department is,” and he gave a naughty wink.
An older man came in. He was red and beefy; he said: “O.K., Tom, I’ll take care of this,” and the young official nodded obsequiously and left the room. Morgan saw him go with a feeling of despair: he thought miserably of the story he had to tell and the impossibility of telling it truthfully. He collected the last of his strength—to pour into a great, last lie.