Blame The Dead

by Gavin Lyall

  I'd been looking at my new identity. Apart from the fact that it was about a man of roughly my age, it fitted me as well as a halo did. He was two inches shorter, with different-coloured eyes and hair, and the photograph showed glasses.

  'I hate to quibble, Dave, but somehow this just isn'tme, if you know what I mean.'

  'Doesn't matter, Major. Could be for a performing bear and nobody would know. The courier hands it up with twenty-four others, they count twenty-five heads, twenty-five passports, bingo, you're through. On these tours half the old berks would lose their passports if you let 'em keep them for themselves.'

  'Is that how you came by this one?'

  'Not quite. This one lost his life, too. There're always some, every year. Run a coach over a cliff, caught in an avalanche, hotel burns down, or they just freeze to death waiting for it to be built. The Army's got nothing on these tours, Major. And if the passport's still with the courier or. hotel, well, who can prove it?'

  And there's always somebody to remember there's a market for these things. In some countries, of course, it's a state monopoly: the KGB could make them, all right, but an agent's too valuable to risk with a forged passport that needs only a single check to show its number was never issued, or to a different name. It takes longer to pin down a real one, even if the owner's dead; how many widows remember it's their duty to turn hubbie's passport in once he's planted?

  I nodded. 'And after that, what?'

  'Once you're on the boat you're on your own. Use your own passport – you've got it, haven't you? – to get off at Dunkirk. No problem.'

  'And nobody cares that I've gone AWOL from the tour?'

  'It's no crime, even if anybody noticed. Same thing for the passport control over there: they get twenty-four passports, they count twenty-four heads. Just don't wiggle your hips at any rich widows in the coach: they might start asking what happened to the nice man with the military manner.'

  'I'll try and remember, Dave.'

  'Fine. This Sunday work knocks hell out of me. Care for a quick one?'

  Before I could answer he'd lifted the bottle out of the deep file drawer on the right of the desk – just like the classic private detective. So? So you get plenty of people behaving like the popular image of themselves, including judges and politicians as well as private eyes and sergeant-majors. It keeps their clients reassured.

  It was a very pale single-malt Scotch; good, maybe too good for me. I still prefer my whisky soaked in soda. There had to be a good reason why the Cards left Scotland.

  We toasted each other. Outside in the main office the phone rang and got answered, the typewriter clattered, a drawer in a filing cabinet screeched.

  Tanner said, 'There's just the sordid business of money, Major.'

  'Of course.' I took out my wallet and dealt him a double flush in fivers. He collected them slowly and stacked them on one side by the desk intercom, and asked, "You're sure you don't mind about it being France?"

  'I'll survive.'

  'I expect so. Did you have time to get some protection into your luggage, or d'you want to borrow something? Hire it, I mean."

  I smiled a little bleakly. 'No thanks, Dave. I'm all right.' At any rate I wasn't going to land in France carrying an extra, and unfamiliar, pistol. The derringer on my arm was risk enough.

  'Okay. You heading anywhere in particular?'

  'Norway.'

  'Again?' But he didn't press it. 'Had you thought of hiring us totry and clear things up for you so's you can come back?'

  'Not yet. I think things'll just blow over.'

  'You ought to know.'

  'That's what I keep telling myself.'

  We had one more drink and it got to be after half past four. He stood up. 'The wife's got people coming in, and you'd better not be late, either.* I gulped the last of my Scotch and then waited while he locked and double-locked the office door behind us. Every serious private detective has files he doesn't want his employees to see, and maybe particularly the employees junior enough to land the Sunday-evening switchboard watch. There's more than one way to the top in private detection.

  I picked up my suitcase from near the door and followed him downstairs. We shook hands before we left – separately, just in case. I had to walk right down to Theobald's Road before I caught a taxi.

  Thirty-four

  Victoria coach station late on a winter Sunday was a draughty parade ground with a sketchy pretence at a glass roof. A few dark buses stood around like abandoned hulks, and little clumps of shivering passengers huddled against the walls below posters for Italy and the Devon coast and waited for the overnight to Scunthorpe.

  One of the two lit buses had denniston's in big flowing script down the side, yellow on green. It already looked crowded and most of the windows were solidly steamed up.

  A busy little man in a quilted anorak pounced on me. 'Are you Mr Evans?'

  Was I? Christ, yes. 'That's me.' The driver appeared, snatched my case, and hurried it round to the back. I heard the hatch slam.

  'You're the last,' the courier said, ticking me off on a typed list. 'Got your passport?'

  I handed it over. He skimmed it quickly, nodded, and shoved it into a sort of satchel slung from his shoulders. 'If anybody in the coach asks you, I should say you belong to the firm. Just hitching a ride to Dunkirk. That'll help explain it when you scarper.'

  'Good idea.' I climbed aboard and he followed.

  A few seconds later and we were on our way.

  We had the road pretty much to ourselves and made as good a time as I've ever done to Dover. The seats were good – high-backed, airliner-style – but so they'd ruddy well better be; the other poor sods were going to sit in them for forty-five hours out of the next eighty.

  The bloke next to me was a widower in his fifties, as quiet and dull as I'd hoped when I chose to sit by him. I asked if he'd been to Belgium or Holland or Germany before and he said. 'Yes, the hard way.' It turned out he'd been a gunlayer on a Cromwell in the Third Armoured Division from late 1944, so we talked about tanks most of the way.

  At Dover docks the immigration boys came aboard, did a quick head count and a shuffle through the stack of passports, and we were allowed out for twenty minutes' drinking and leaking, no more, dinner to be served aboard the boat itself.

  I stuck to my gunner in the terminal bar, although it cost me a double Scotch. He was useful cover – two men look far less conspicuous than one solitary drinker. We were all back in the bus in a bit over twenty-five minutes, and it drove on board soon after.

  The courier gave us a little lecture about getting back into the bus before we docked, and turned us loose – for nearly four hours on that route. I made sure I was last off.

  'Nice to have had you with us – Mr Evans,' he said insincerely. Or maybe not – he'd be earning more from me than anybody else on that tour, and probably only for the cost of typing up a second set of papers.

  'What about my case?'

  'Oh, God, of course. Where's Harry?' But there wasn't any Harry with the luggage-hatch key. 'Pick it up when we come back on, right?'

  I didn't exactly have a choice. I nodded and found the stairs up to the main decks.

  I tried to shake off my co-tourists immediately, though it wasn't too easy since the boat was anything but crowded; over half the vehicles below were loaded trucks or brand-new cars going for export. In the end I simply skipped dinner and then roosted in the bar; they weren't likely to be expense-account drinkers if they were going on this sort of holiday.

  Halfway across there was the usual announcement about passengersnot with cars or suchlike going to the passport office to pick up a landing ticket. So now I went back to being James Card again, although I didn't like it, not going into France. But hell – I wasn't that important; Arras could never have got a permanent look-out set up for me, even if they'd thought I might be stupid enough to come back so soon.

  I had no trouble at the office, anyhow.

  We docked about a quarter o
f an hour late, just on midnight. I was one of the first down to the bus and this time Harry the driver was around with his key. My case had been last in, so there wasn't any problem to hauling it out. I carted it back up to the deck where the mere pedestrians were waiting.

  In the cold blue light at the bottom of the gangway there were four gendarmes and two other officiais. One had a submachine gun. Just slung from his shoulder, but still not the normal way to greet innocent ski-parties and coach tourists who don't want to see more than five capitals in four days, if that much.

  A bunch of schoolboys went down first and were let through – but their master was stopped and his passport checked. A couple of women went through without any trouble. And that was enough for me. I broke some sort of record back down two flights of stairs and up to Denniston's Tours bus; Harry was just starting the engine.

  The courier gave me a look of genuine home-cooked fright and held out a hand to stop me swinging back on board.

  I said, 'I'm coming off with you, after all.'

  'You can't!'

  'We can but try. Get my case out of sight.'

  He reached and pushed it away behind him, in a sort of a cubby-hole behind the driver's seat. Then he started to protest again.

  I soothed him. 'You've still got the Evans passport. Use it. You're not risking any more than I am.'

  That really got through to him. 'I'm not riskinganything.'

  'Yes you are, chum. If anybody asks, I did this deal directly with you. No Dave Tanner, no middlemen at all. Swing, swing together – is that how the Eton Boating Song goes? I wasn't ever there anyway – were you?'

  Harry the driver, who must have overheard at least some of this, growled, 'For Chrissake – dosomething: I've got to move.'

  The bus lurched forward a few feet, waved on by a sailor controlling the unloading.

  The courier flapped his hand in small circles and squawked, 'But what can we do? If they're looking for you, they'll see you.'

  'Then I'll stand up here beside you and you explain I'm learning the trade. They won't mistrust your nice honest face.' But I pulled off my sheepskin and slung it into the rack along with all the plastic bags of duty-free booze and cigarette cartons; that had been in my Arras description. The bus moved forward in whining jerks.

  Behind me, most of the interior lights were out and most of the passengers dozing; it was after midnight and they weren't going to sleep anywhere else tonight. We followed a short queue of cars up the ramp and out across the cold, neon-lit concrete towards the passport control.

  Suddenly, sooner than I'd expected, a gendarme swung up on to the step and sang out,'Les passeports, s'il vous plaît, et les noms des passagers.'

  Silently, the courier gave him the stack of passports and a typed list – the right one, I hoped. Then he nodded nervously to me and said,'Je vous présente Monsieur Evans. Il est en train d'apprendre le métier.'

  The cop shook hands without really bothering to look at me, and went on shuffling passports. I asked,'Cherchez-vous quelqu'un en particulier? '

  'Un Monsieur Card.'Then, to the courier.'Est-te que. quelqu'un d'autre, est monté dans le car depuis l'embarquement?'

  'Non, non. Personne.'

  The cop nodded briskly, handed over the paper and passports, and hopped off.

  "There, you see?' I said. 'It wasn't so bad, was it?'

  He looked back at me with a sick expression. Half an hour later, we were in Belgium.

  They dumped me off outside the Gare Central in Brussels at half past five, with a bloodshot dawn breaking behind the Palais de la Nation and a nagging cold wind scouring the empty streets. The courier didn't even bother to wave, and Harry nearly made the bus stand on its hind legs getting away from me. I knew I must have BO by now, but I didn't think it wasthat bad.

  I had a few coffees in the station itself and when I came out, the Aérogare opposite was open, so I booked on the eight-fifteen Sabena flight for Copenhagen and then a Danair connection to Bergen. Out at the airport I found a chemist shop open and bought a razor and blades, and spent most of the flight standing straddle-legged in the toilet of a Caravelle, balancing against the air pockets and trying to shave a face roughly smeared with perfumed airline soap.

  At Copenhagen I got my case back just long enough to snatch a fresh shirt out of it and hand it back for the Bergen flight. And to find out that while it had been supposedly shut up in the back of Denniston Tours' bus, somebody had worked open the locks and taken the log of the Skadi.

  Thirty-five

  I climbed on to the plane in a daze, my jaw waggling loosely as I nodded back to the stewardess's 'Good morning, sir.' I'd've nodded just as willingly if she'd asked 'Are you smuggling a thirty-eight Special copy of the Remington forty-one derringer up your left sleeve, sir?'

  But after a time, the numbness wore off. I'd still got the photo-copies; I'd still got Willie as witness to its existence and what it said. And Iwasn't in Arras jail, was I? And it hadn't been BO but guilty conscience that made Denniston Tours leave me at such speed. Which reminded me, so I went back to the toilet and changed my shirt.

  Beside the washbasin there was a small bottle of lime-green after-shave lotion and for a moment I wondered what it tasted like, and, if so, I might fill my KGB flask with it. Which must prove something about how I still felt. But at least I was thinking Nygaard. It might help me find him.

  The Friendship whistled down into Bergen at a quarter to one, just five minutes behind time – and guess what? – it was raining. I tried to ring Kari, couldn't get her, and left a message to say I'd be lunching at the Norge. So then I caught the airport bus and got myself hauled to the terminal in the hotel itself.

  She was there to meet me, and even offered to carry my case, so maybe I looked as bad as I felt. But I decided to leave it at the terminal; I didn't yet know where I'd be for the night anyway.

  'Any news?' I asked it just for the record, though her face was as long as an Arctic night.

  She shook her head.

  'You've tried the hospitals and police stations?'

  'Ja, ja.'So it wasn't so likely that he was dead under a bush somewhere, unless he'd gone right out of Bergen – and why should he?

  'You asked Mrs Smith-Bang?'

  'She is very worried also.'

  Til bet. Just when did he go missing?'

  'He left the Home on Saturday morning, before midday.'

  'Forty-eight hours by now. Well…' It wasn't too long for a practising alcoholic. Amnesia's a normal part of the game at this stage, so he could still be under somebody's table thinking that Saturday was taking a long time to go past. 'Well,' I said again, 'I've got to eat or die. D'you want to lunch here?'

  The short answer was No, though she spun it out a bit. I don't know if she really didn't want that size of lunch, whether she was scared of the flossy great dining-dancing room with its thirty-two Japanese lanterns, or whether she thought I was suggesting she pay for it herself. Anyhow, she obviously preferred to go out for a coffee and a sandwich, so I made a date for a quarter past two and gave her a cable to send off to Willie, reassuring him that I wasn't in jail – yet. No mention of the Skadi's log, though.

  After lunch I had time to ask at the desk about Maggie Mackwood – but she'd left for London two days before.

  Kari's Volkswagen hadn't gone to its Great Reward yet – not quite – so we started down at the Home itself. After a fair bit of ringing and knocking the door was opened by a character who'd sailed as cabin boy on the first Ark. He thought young Herr Ruud was out, and as for Nygaard – who?

  I don't think he was hiding anything; it was just that his mind hadn't touched harbour for ten years and Nygaard had only been around for the last four months.

  Still, it reminded me to ask Kari, 'Did you try asking any of the other sailors here?'

  'Oh, ja. But they did not know where he had gone. He went in the morning and they do not get up so early always.'

  'Had Nygaard said he was going away?'

 
; 'No.' She seemed pretty definite about that. 'What can we do now?' She just stood there in the rain, wearing her dark blue anorak again, only with its hood up, and looking expectantly at me.

  'Well,' I said feebly, 'I suppose we could go and see Mrs Smith-Bang again. And come back here later.'

  I was surprised how easily she took the idea. Maybe she really thought I knew what I was doing.

  The house was high on a suburban hill north-east of the town and – on that day – barely below cloud level. It was a rambling modern split-level affair in what looked like creosoted wood, backing into a gully of spindly pines. A pale green Volvo 145 station wagon was parked in front; Kari put the Volkswagen in behind it.

  An elderly bloke in a grey apron opened the door and listened gravely to Kari's fast spiel. It didn't seem to be doing us any good until a voice yelled, 'Who's there? Jim Card, is it? Come on in, son."

  I peered politely at the butler or whatever and we passed on in. Kari seemed to know the way.

  It was a big room, a female room, but not a feminine one. All cheery blues and yellows and knotty pine and fluffy bright rugs and colourful plates and vases. I could imagine the cold polite look on Lois Fenwick's face if I'd led her in. Then I shivered and remembered why I was here.

  Mrs Smith-Bang was shaking Kari's hand, then mine. 'Howdy, son. Nice to see you again so soon. Glad to see you know young Kari here. Great girl, she's been doing great things for old Nygaard. I guess you heard about him, huh?'

  I nodded. 'That's more or less why-'

  'You wouldn't have a certain book for me, would you?'

  'It's safe in London. I had to leave in a sort of a rush. Sorry.' I wasn't in a truth-telling mood right then. 'Anyway, the bloody thing's no use without Nygaard to swear to it, is it?'

  She looked at me rather seriously. T guess. So – sit down, sit down. It's about him, huh? I was getting pretty worried myself. It's two days now, isn't it?'

  Kari nodded.

  'I guess he could still have gone on a real dinosaur of a toot and he's still shacked up in some bar. Hell, my second husband climbed aboard a bottle one night in Tampico and it wasten days before they-'