Hellquist bent down and found an abandoned champagne glass at the side of the bench. ‘Pour,’ he said.
Wilde poured. ‘I think we should make a toast,’ he said. ‘To the end of the war.’
Hellquist shook his head. ‘No, the end of money.’ He laughed, then they clinked glasses.
‘I thought you liked money.’
‘Then you don’t know me very well. I want money, because I need it for the life I desire. But I despise it all the same.’
‘I can lend you a couple of quid if you’re short.’
‘A couple of quid? That’s funny. I need a lot more than that. Try a couple of thousand and you might be getting close. Can you lend me two thousand, Wilde?’
Two thousand pounds? ‘That’s quite a sum. What is it, gambling debt?’ Wilde knocked back his drink. The whisky was talking tonight. Best keep his own mouth shut.
‘No, no. Think of it as an investment. Perhaps I could persuade Paul Birbach to stay. I could pay you back very soon. Birbach and I, you know, we can be very rich if we continue to work together. He has found a way . . .’ he tailed off. ‘It means nothing to you.’
‘Try me. Is this about fission?’
‘Well, he’s a clever guy. He’s seen a short cut, a simple way to turn it into usable energy.’
‘Or a bomb?’
Through the bloodshot gauze of his eyes, Hellquist looked at Wilde and frowned. He put his left index finger to his lips. ‘Shh.’
They sat together in silence. It was the early hours now, and the band was still playing, deep, maudlin blues with dancers shuffling in circles on the lawn, holding each other up.
‘No bomb, Mr American. Just power. Plenty of power for the whole wide world. If you were to lend me two thousand pounds I would be able to pay you back a millionfold. Energy is money. Look at the coal barons, the oil tycoons. I will be the first atomic billionaire.’
Wilde patted him on the back and laughed. ‘And Birbach can do this for you?’
Hellquist’s glass was empty, He dropped it and it shattered on the stone paving. ‘Paul can do anything. Anything. Did you see him with that woman?’
‘Who is she?’
‘I don’t know. A cleaner or a maid, I suppose. They always are. I’m pretty sure he pays them. Maybe his mother was a cleaner and abandoned him – isn’t that what the psychiatric guys would conclude?’ He looked beneath the bench and found another glass, intact. ‘But, you know, when a man has a brain like Paul Birbach, you can forgive him things, yes?’
I wouldn’t judge him anyway, Wilde thought. We all have our vices. And what might Torsten Hellquist’s vice be that he was short two thousand pounds? Or maybe he really did just want to use it to pursue his dream of dazzling riches. He would not be the first man with such an ambition. Wilde poured a slug of single malt into Hellquist’s new glass, then drained the bottle down his own throat.
‘But there is one thing I can never forgive Birbach. He doesn’t play chess! What sort of mathematician or physicist does not play a good game of chess, Mr American?’
Wilde rose unsteadily from the bench. Clarissa was walking his way. Not walking, sashaying; her dress shimmering in the light of the hurricane lamps dotted around the lawns.
CHAPTER 15
O’Gara cut the paddle into the water with care to avoid noise. Across the river, lights burned in the windows of the college that he knew, from his map, to be Magdalene. There was no other traffic on the water, but nor could he afford to be heard from the banks. He had untied the canoe at the quayside, to the east of the bridge and slipped away downriver into the darkness.
The great chimney of the power station loomed, black against the charcoal sky, no more than a hundred yards away. A couple of rowing boats and a large motor launch were tied up beneath its walls, at the foot of a flight of stone river stairs.
He lashed the canoe to one of the rowing boats, then picked up his bag from the belly of the canoe and climbed across to the steps. He grasped the metal handrail and, with only the slightest hesitation, climbed up into the main yard of the power station.
It was dark and quiet. A couple of coal lorries were parked. To his right, he could see the gatehouse, dimly lit, with a pair of heads just visible, unmoving. Perhaps they had nodded off. Well, he’d wake them soon enough. Loudest alarm call they’d ever have.
Now then, where to plant the bastard of a bomb for biggest impact? He liked the idea of bringing down the chimney, but he didn’t have sufficient explosives for that. How about putting it by the coal pile? Perhaps it would catch fire. Couldn’t guarantee it.
A dimly lit doorway beckoned to his left. He could slip in there, find the turbine room and plant the bomb to damage its blades. It was a tempting thought, but that wasn’t the point of this operation. The chances were he would be spotted. If he was caught now, he would be incarcerated in the Scrubs or Dartmoor and be of no use to anyone. He had to stay free.
He was aware, of course, that he had been followed here. He had been shadowed ever since the Eagle. So they had been there after all, but had not thought fit to make contact. Perhaps that was wise, but it irritated him all the same. How could they be sure he would not mistake them for English agents, and either lose them or shoot them?
‘Hey, you!’
A guard. Too late. No time to set the fuse. Then the sound of a whistle. O’Gara looked around. He couldn’t go back the way he had come; a canoe on the river would be too slow. His only hope was to run. The lights of an approaching coal lorry lit the front gateway, which was gaping wide. Sidestepping the guard who was hurrying in his direction, he gripped his bag of explosives tight in his arms, and ran.
*
The music had long since stopped. Half of the guests had gone home or slipped off to find a bedroom. Wilde was lost in a whisky-fuelled embrace with the woman the whole world wanted.
To the east, the night sky had turned to pre-dawn pink. She took his hand and tried to lead him towards the French windows into the house. Through a fog of whisky, Wilde realised it was time for him to make his excuses and leave. Whisky kills conscience stone dead. Not remorse, though. That would be there come morning if he didn’t go now.
‘Good night, Miss Lancing,’ he said. ‘It has been a pleasure to make your acquaintance.’
‘Don’t you want some breakfast?’
‘I’m spoken for.’ What a strange, old-fashioned choice of words. What did it mean – married, engaged, courting? Anyway, there were times recently when he wasn’t at all sure that he was spoken for.
‘So that means you can’t eat breakfast?’
‘Breakfast?’
‘Of course. What else were you thinking of?’
He laughed and followed her.
In the hall, the great staircase beckoned momentarily, but instead she manoeuvred him towards the front entrance.
‘I thought you said breakfast.’
‘Yes, but not here.’
Clarissa stopped on the front steps, whispered something to a footman, then turned and slid her silken arm under Wilde’s, folding her slender silken body into his side. Her perfect nose tipped up towards his face and her eyes met his, and then closed as she kissed him on the lips.
*
In the back of the Hispano-Suiza, she sank into his shoulder as the driver pulled away. He seemed to know where he was going without any orders being given.
Wilde’s first instinct had been right, of course. He should have just left her there and then on the lawn. But breakfast it would be. Where was the harm in that?
Within a few minutes, they had pulled off the main highway and were bumping along a poor road towards a couple of single-storey buildings with flat roofs. Beyond them, Wilde could see a small aeroplane. And, a little further on, a small corrugated hangar, with a wide entrance leading into a gloomy interior where he thought he recognised her brother’s yellow Sopwith fighter, a relic of the Great War.
The driver braked slowly outside the first of the smaller buildings, th
en climbed out and opened the rear door on his mistress’s side. Clarissa squeezed Wilde’s hand. ‘Your aeroplane awaits you, Mr Wilde.’
‘Oh no,’ he said, his head still a fog.
‘You’re not one of the little people, are you, Tom?’
‘Maybe I am.’
‘I don’t think so. I really don’t think so. Come on.’ She was tugging gently as she backed out of the car. ‘You don’t strike me as yellow.’
A rusting sign over a doorway announced that this was Boldbourne Airfield. Inside the squat building, the chauffeur took a leather flying coat down from a hook. ‘This should fit over your dinner jacket amply, sir.’ He held it open and assisted Wilde to slip in his arms.
‘Are you the pilot?’
‘Madame will be flying you, sir. To breakfast, I believe.’ He brushed down the sleeves on the nicely weathered leather coat. ‘Perhaps the Ritz?’
When Clarissa reappeared on the concrete apron, she was attired in trousers, boots, short leather jacket and with goggles up on her forehead, her hair flowing down around her shoulders.
‘Ready, mister? Let’s fly.’
The whisky was playing havoc with his stomach and brain. Flying didn’t seem like a good idea in the circumstances, but what the heck? ‘Let’s fly,’ he echoed.
They strode across the apron to a green biplane with a two-seat cabin and a single airscrew. A mechanic in an oily blue boiler suit was standing to attention beside a small set of steps, and the prop was already turning, the engine idling. Someone at Old Hall must have called ahead to have the little aircraft prepared for take-off.
‘All ready for you, ma’am. Full tank.’
‘Thank you, Harry.’ She turned to Wilde. ‘Shall I be pilot or you?’
‘Have you flown a plane before?’
‘Of course. Geoff and I were brought up with them.’
‘Well, then you have the edge over me. Are you sober enough?’
‘We’ll just have to find out, won’t we? Anyway, there’s not a lot of traffic up there. Nothing to crash into.’
Wilde wasn’t convinced; there was plenty of terra firma to collide with.
She held his face in her hands and kissed his lips. Her lips were perfect. She pulled back slowly and met his gaze with her own knowing eyes. ‘I knew you weren’t yellow,’ she said. ‘You’re a warrior, Professor Wilde. Just my type.’
Within minutes, they were settled into their seats; the chocks had been removed, the coolant temperature, magnetos and oil checked. A short taxi to the far end of the airfield, a turn, and then they were bumping across the turf and gathering speed into the wind. She looked sideways at him, grinned, then opened the throttle and, within thirty bone-rattling seconds, they were in the air.
The sun was to their left, just peeping over the horizon and the sky was cloud-free. The whole of England seemed to open up beneath them, a patchwork of lush greens, of empty roads and thin rivers.
There was no turbulence and Wilde was relieved to discover he was not nauseous. Perhaps he might just get through this flight in one piece. Clarissa seemed to know what she was doing at the controls. ‘Are you going to tell me now, or must our destination remain a mystery?’
‘Oh, I like mysteries, don’t you? Fear not, it’ll be worth it, Professor.’
‘What is this thing?’
‘De Havilland Hornet Moth DH87B. Lovely little two-seater flyabout.’
‘Geoff’s been up in Spitfires.’
‘I know. Flashy little bugger. Actually, he’s my darling boy. I love him to bits.’
‘I think he’s rather besotted with you, in a fraternal sort of way.’
She laughed. ‘Oh, I drive him mad. Rather think I made his boyhood a misery. He was well rid of me when I went to Hollywood and now I’m back, upsetting poor Geoffrey’s quiet little life.’
They were both silent for a while. The engine droned, the countryside opened up below them. Wilde was beginning to feel the effects of the whisky wear off, and it wasn’t a pleasant sensation. He thought back to the night before and his encounter with the owner of the house, Milt Hardiman.
‘Tell me about the Hardimans. I met him briefly, but not his wife.’
‘They’re friends. What more can I say? Milt is rich. Peggy is his chatelaine. She organises his life, and looks after the little boy, Theodore.’
‘Is Hardiman a politician?’
‘He has politics. Who doesn’t? Politics is part of being alive. Even for dumb blonde screen goddesses. Or perhaps you think we should stick to lipstick and diamonds . . .’
‘He called Roosevelt Rosenfeld.’
She was smiling. ‘Really?’
‘I don’t think it’s funny.’
‘Don’t be so dry, Mr Wilde. It’s rather a good joke. You should lighten up. Are you strapped in? Yes? Good.’ Smoothly, she eased back the joystick and the little Hornet Moth began rising in a sharp arc, struggling to gather speed as it hit vertical. And then, momentarily, they were hanging upside down, with the world where the sky should be, and Wilde’s breath taken away. And then, just as quickly, the plane was going down, down, down – and levelling out. The loop completed.
‘Thanks for warning me.’
She was laughing wildly. ‘Well, at least I made sure you were strapped in. Sorry if I woke you.’
‘I almost lost the contents of my stomach.’
‘Oh, that’s nothing. Wait till I try a roll or two.’
‘Lucky I haven’t had breakfast yet.’ He looked from the window. From the position of the sun, he deduced they were heading southwards. She was flying low, skimming the ground at little more than a couple of hundred feet so that he almost felt he could lean out of the cockpit and touch the tops of the trees with his fingers. ‘I guess we’re on our way to London. Claridge’s perhaps?’
‘Keep on guessing. The Hornet Moth has a range of more than six hundred miles, so I suggest you just sit back and relax.’ She reached into her flying jacket and pulled out a silver cigarette case. She opened it and was about to take one, but then looked at Wilde’s reproachful eyebrow and snapped the case shut. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘I’ll let you off.’
‘Thank you.’
The cabin was cramped but had a hint of luxury, with sprung leather seats, inlaid facings, lush carpet underfoot. Wilde closed his eyes, but the nausea was kicking in, so he forced them open again.
Half an hour later, the vast urban sprawl of London appeared beneath them. ‘A nice gentle landing, please, Miss Lancing. My stomach won’t take any more aerobatics.’
‘Are you working up a good appetite, Professor Wilde?’
‘Not yet.’
‘You will.’
She flew on, and ten minutes later, they were almost past London and heading on southwards with no sign of making a descent. Wilde said nothing. When you have absolutely no control of a situation, panic or complaint are worthless responses. He’d find out their destination when it suited her. In another half hour or so, they were at the coast. From the panorama of the distant shoreline to the south, Wilde guessed they were somewhere near Dover.
‘Do you see the white cliffs? Down there is the pretty little resort of St Margaret’s Bay. Have you been there, Professor Wilde?’
‘No.’
‘I have many fond memories of St Margaret’s. We used to go on holidays there every summer until . . .’ she tailed off.
‘Until what?’
‘Oh, it’s a long time ago . . . it must have been the last year of the war. We had a nanny called Tobin. Mrs Victoria Tobin. Geoff and I loved her dearly. But she’d lost her husband at the first battle of Ypres and she was – troubled. One day we went for a walk along the cliffs. We stopped for a picnic. Geoff and I were playing; Tobin was at the cliff’s edge, looking out to sea. I looked up just as she stepped out into thin air. I watched her plunge to her death.’
‘My God!’
‘I can still see it in my mind’s eye, Professor Wilde. It affected Geoff and me for quite some t
ime.’
‘That’s simply ghastly. That poor woman! And for you two to have witnessed it . . .’
Clarissa gave Wilde a wan smile. ‘I’m sorry. I should never have brought it up. Please don’t ask me anything more about it. As I said, it was a long time ago.’ She brightened. ‘After all, this is supposed to be a day of fun and laughter!’
Wilde looked sideways at her, held his counsel.
Soon they were over the open sea, the Channel, and then over France.
‘Let me take another stab,’ said Wilde. ‘Paris?’
‘Well done! Just another hundred and fifty miles or so, travelling at, let me see, just over a hundred knots.’ She looked at her watch. ‘Estimated arrival time eight forty-five GMT, then a dash to the Rue Royale. How does Eggs Benedict sound?’
‘I don’t suppose they do kippers?’
‘I doubt the French even know what a kipper is.’
‘Then Eggs Benedict will have to do. But there’s a problem, Miss Lancing. I don’t have my passport.’
She opened a small handbag and pulled out a card. He was speechless.
‘May I ask how you got your hands on it?’
‘A little light burglary by my driver, Professor Wilde. No harm done.’
‘You’re simply appalling, Miss Lancing.’
‘You don’t know the half of it.’
*
The plane’s landing at Le Bourget aerodrome was bumpier than the take-off had been, but perhaps Wilde was simply sobering up. A liveried driver was waiting for them beside an open-topped Bentley, engine running.
They stopped off at the customs and passport shed, where she was recognised and fawned over. When the passport officer asked her the reason for her visit, she said, ‘Breakfast with my friend, the professor.’ The official smirked and waved them through.
As Wilde settled beside her in the back seat of the car, he wondered what in God’s name he was doing here. He had to see his undergraduates, he had to prepare for the imminent arrival of a refugee German scientist, and he had to make contact with Colonel Flood at the US War Department. No, on second thoughts, cancel the third of those chores. Before that, he needed to check in with Jim Vanderberg at the US Embassy in London.
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