by John Kerr
Stroking her chin, Marnie said, ‘She didn’t look well. I was sure something was wrong but couldn’t tell what. When I told her I had a note from you, she looked like she’d seen a ghost.’
‘I don’t get it,’ said Hamilton. He absently glanced at a framed photograph of Hard Ridden, one of Sir Philip’s four Epsom derby winners. The phone rang and he said, ‘I’ll get it’, moving quickly toward the desk.
‘No,’ said Marnie. ‘You’re not thinking.’ She picked up the phone and said, ‘Sassoon residence.’
‘It’s Evelyn, Marnie. May I speak to Tom?’
‘Just a moment.’ Cupping her hand over the mouthpiece, Marnie said quietly, ‘It’s her. I’ll leave you alone.’
Hamilton walked over and picked up the phone. ‘Evelyn?’ he said, as Marnie disappeared down the hall.
‘Hello, Tom,’ she said, trying her best to sound cheerful. ‘Are you all right?’
‘Yes, I’m fine.’
‘I was worried about you. From what Marnie said—’
‘I need to explain. In fact there’s quite a lot I need to tell you. When can I see you?’
Seated at the desk in her living room, Evelyn massaged her forehead as she stared vacantly at the worn Persian rug. ‘I don’t know,’ she said quietly, her attempt to sound cheerful having failed utterly. ‘I just don’t know.’
‘Evelyn? Are you all right?’
‘Tom, this is probably a terrible mistake. You’re in some kind of trouble. You shouldn’t have come back.’
‘I need to explain. I should have explained it before, but well … I didn’t. Is there some place we can talk privately?’
‘You should leave, Tom,’ she said wearily. Leave, she thought, closing her eyes. Before it’s too late.
‘I’m not leaving.’ What had come over her? He had assumed, perhaps naively, that she would be anxious to see him. ‘Listen, Evelyn,’ he said, ‘you made me promise to come back, and now that I’m here—’
‘All right,’ she said with a sigh. ‘We can talk by the pool. No one will know.’
‘But how…?’
‘There’s a gate at the back. Take a taxi to the street behind the house. A tall green gate.’
‘When?’
Evelyn thought about her tattered robe and unwashed hair. ‘Give me an hour,’ she said. ‘Take a taxi. You don’t want to be recognized. Wear a hat or something.’
‘Bye, Evelyn. I can’t wait to see you.’
She hung up gently.
After rattling the ice in his glass and taking a sip of his drink, Sir Harry Oakes smiled and said, ‘Your move.’
Seated across from Oakes at an elaborately inlaid card table, Sherwood ‘Woody’ Bascomb, his florid face in his hands, stared at the glass balls on the Chinese checkers board. ‘Dammit, Harry,’ he said at last. ‘You got me.’
‘Concede?’
‘Yeah,’ said Bascomb, interlocking his thick fingers and cracking his knuckles. ‘I concede.’ One of Bascomb’s obligations as a house-guest was to humour his host’s penchant for gin rummy, backgammon, and Chinese checkers, the latter being Oakes’s favourite.
‘OK,’ said Oakes, ‘rack ’em up and we’ll play another game.’
‘Ah-hem.’ Jenkins, the English butler, coughed deferentially as he stood in the doorway. ‘Excuse me, sir.’
‘Yes?’ said Oakes, looking up. ‘What is it?’
‘Mr Katz, sir.’
‘Want me to clear out, Harry?’ asked Bascomb.
‘No, you can stay. Send him in,’ Oakes instructed the butler. ‘And while you’re at it, I’ll have another drink. Woody?’
‘Sure,’ said Bascomb.
Within minutes Jenkins returned to the study with Charley Katz. Wearing a shiny green double-breasted suit and a loud tie, Katz sauntered across the polished parquet, holding his fedora in one hand. ‘Afternoon, Harry,’ he said brightly, reaching out to shake his boss’s hand, as Jenkins lowered a tray to the card table with the drinks.
‘Charley,’ said Oakes, ‘you remember Mr Bascomb?’
‘Sure, I remember. How ya doin’, Woody?’ He gave his hand a quick shake.
‘Pull up a chair,’ said Sir Harry. ‘Need a drink?’
‘Nah,’ replied Katz. ‘I’m on duty, remember?’ he added with a chuckle.
‘OK, Charley,’ said Oakes in a businesslike tone, with a glance at Jenkins, who retired silently. ‘I understand you’ve got something.’
‘Correct,’ said Katz. ‘On the Shawcross dame.’ He fished in his pocket for his cigarettes and eased one from the pack. ‘She paid a call on her pal Ericsson the other night.’ Taking a box of matches from his jacket, he lit the cigarette and waved the match in the air. ‘Just the two of them.’
‘How can you be sure of that?’ asked Oakes.
‘I followed her to the dock, where she gets on the boat all by herself. Nice boat, by the way. Off they go, and about two hours later, she’s back. All by her lonesome, no other guests.’
‘Then what?’ asked Oakes.
‘I followed her home. That’s it.’ Taking a deep pull and rounding his lips, Katz expelled a perfectly formed smoke ring that drifted up toward the ceiling.
‘Sorry,’ said Bascomb meekly. ‘But I’m not sure I get it.’
‘Ericsson’s up to something on Hog Island,’ explained Sir Harry. ‘Something big. And this Englishwoman, named Shawcross, is mixed up in it. So we’ve been keeping an eye on her.’
‘I see,’ said Bascomb with a sombre expression.
‘Do you have any idea what that Swedish bastard is building?’ Oakes asked.
‘No way to get close enough,’ said Katz, balancing his hat on his knee. ‘The place is crawling with guards and patrol boats. So I’ve been down to shantytown, to see what the locals will tell me.’
‘Go on,’ instructed Oakes.
‘Most of ’em play dumb, too scared to talk. So I sprinkled a little cash around, and some booze, and managed to get a couple of these boys to say what they’re working on. Pouring a lot of concrete for some kind of big building, like an airplane hangar. And digging this canal across the island.’
‘I don’t like it,’ said Oakes with a frown. ‘The guy’s supposedly tied in with the Nazis,’ he said to Bascomb. ‘And what about Hamilton?’ he asked, turning back to Katz. ‘Any sign of him?’
‘Nope,’ said Katz. ‘Not a trace.’
‘Hamilton?’ said Bascomb.
‘Remember that fellow from Texas?’ asked Oakes. ‘Showed up last time you were here, with a lot of big talk about building a hotel and a casino?’
‘Oh, yeah,’ said Bascomb. ‘I remember.’
‘Well, I’ve made up my mind to move ahead with that project myself. When the war’s over, gambling could make this place. Put in a first-class hotel and casino, and Nassau would be swarming with tourists.’
‘Yeah,’ agreed Bascomb, ‘but what about the mob? You think Lansky would let anybody horn in on his territory?’
‘This ain’t Miami, Woody,’ said Oakes. ‘There’s room enough for Havana and Nassau. Anyhow, I can deal with Meyer Lansky. Right, Charley?’
‘Right,’ said Katz doubtfully, stubbing out his cigarette.
‘OK,’ said Oakes, lifting his glass. ‘Keep an eye on Mrs Shawcross, Charley. And keep a lookout for Hamilton. Meanwhile, I intend to pull the trigger on that tract of land, Woody. I’ll call the note, and next thing you know, that property’s mine.’
‘Ah-hem.’
Sir Harry glanced up at Jenkins in the doorway. ‘What is it?’
‘The nanny wishes me to advise you that Master Sidney has disappeared.’
‘Sidney? Where to?’
‘She couldn’t swear to it, sir, but believes she observed him leaving with the Count de Marigny.’
‘What!’ said Oakes, slamming his glass on the table and jumping up from his chair. ‘Sorry, boys, but I’ve got to deal with this. Goddamn French sonofabitch,’ he muttered under his breath.
Oakes’s b
lack Rolls Royce Phantom cruised slowly through an older section of Nassau inhabited by the more prosperous local merchants and transplanted Englishmen. Tapping a knuckle on the glass partition, he called to the chauffeur, ‘See that yellow house, on the right?’ The driver slowed and pulled over. ‘I’ll be right back,’ said Oakes, as he climbed out. He adjusted his Homburg, straightened his jacket and strode up the walk to the modest two-storey house. As he lifted his hand to knock, he heard the sound of music. He gave the door a sharp rap, hoping that his daughter and not the despised de Marigny would answer. There was no response. Dammit, he thought, turn off that phonograph. He knocked again, even louder. After a few moments, he knocked a third time, and finally heard the thump of feet on the stairs followed by a man’s irritated cry: ‘All right, I’m coming!’
Throwing open the door, Alfred de Marigny gaped at Oakes. ‘What?’ exclaimed de Marigny, his shirt unbuttoned to his waist. ‘Sir Harry?’
Glaring past de Marigny into the hall, Oakes could hear the music, a popular dance tune, much louder now. ‘Where is he?’ he demanded.
De Marigny took a step backward, gesturing to Oakes to come in. ‘What?’ he said. ‘Where is who?’
‘You know who,’ said Oakes. ‘Sidney!’ he bellowed.
‘Oh, little Sidney,’ said de Marigny, fumbling with the buttons of his shirt.
Glancing at de Marigny’s bare feet, Oakes seemed to notice his appearance for the first time. ‘Jesus,’ he said. ‘Do you always run around without any clothes on? Sid-ney!’ he called out again.
Oakes looked up and saw Nancy on the stairs, clinging fearfully to the banister, wearing only a thin cotton shift. With her uncombed hair, she looked like a child on Christmas morning. ‘Where’s Sidney?’ he demanded.
‘Sidney?’ said Nancy, her voice trembling. ‘Why, he’s—’
‘You don’t have any right to come barging in,’ fumed de Marigny, ‘banging on the door – boom, boom, boom!’
‘You …’ said Oakes, his voice quivering. ‘I told you I didn’t want Sidney around here.’
‘The boy’s lonely,’ said de Marigny dismissively. ‘What’s a lad of fourteen to do all by himself on that estate of yours? Besides, he misses his sister.’
‘He does, Daddy,’ said Nancy as she crept timidly down the stairs. ‘With Mommy away, we’ve only got each other.’
‘Look at you,’ said Oakes, his eyes darting from de Marigny, on whose aquiline face a smirk had settled, to his young daughter, who was wearing little more than a nightgown. ‘I get it,’ he growled. ‘You sonofabitch,’ he added, glaring at de Marigny.
‘Stop it, Daddy,’ pleaded Nancy, running down the last few steps and tugging on her father’s arm. ‘Freddie’s my husband.’
‘Good God, child,’ said Oakes, brushing her hands from his arm. ‘You’ll just wind up pregnant again.’ There was a sudden halt in the music. As the three turned to look, a gangling youth appeared from the next room, hanging his head and dragging his feet.
‘Come here, Sidney,’ said Oakes. ‘Didn’t I tell you not to come to this house?’
‘Yes, Papa,’ said the boy, looking up mournfully.
‘Don’t listen to him,’ said de Marigny, placing a hand on the boy’s shoulder. ‘You should come here whenever you please. It is your sister’s home.’
‘Oh, yeah?’ said Sir Harry wrathfully. He reached over and grabbed the boy by the scruff of his thin neck. ‘C’mon,’ he said. ‘I’m taking you home.’ With Sidney in tow, he turned toward the door, only to find the tall figure of de Marigny blocking his path. ‘Out of my way,’ said Oakes in a voice loud enough to be heard by a woman strolling along the sidewalk.
‘I should teach you a lesson,’ said de Marigny, clenching his fists.
‘Go to the car,’ said Oakes, half shoving Sidney out the door as Nancy began wailing. The woman on the sidewalk was joined by another curious neighbour.
‘Get out of my house,’ yelled de Marigny, ‘before I smash your ugly face!’
‘Oh, yeah,’ said Oakes, raising his fist. De Marigny grabbed Oakes by both shoulders and shoved him onto the path, where he just avoided falling, his Homburg dropping to the grass.
‘Don’t ever come back!’ cried de Marigny. ‘Do you hear me? Or I’ll kill you!’
‘You!’ said Oakes, his breaths coming in ragged gasps. ‘You’re nothing but a sex maniac!’
‘Get out!’ said de Marigny as Nancy cowered in the doorway.
Looking older than his sixty-seven years, Oakes stooped down to retrieve his hat and then staggered toward the waiting automobile, where Sidney, with an expression of intense shame, stood beside the horrified onlookers.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
AS THE JITNEY rolled into town, Hamilton pulled his hat low and slumped down on the seat. After days sequestered at Eves, he gazed with a mixture of pleasure and trepidation at the pastel hues of Nassau. When the fortifications of Government House came into view, he leaned forward and instructed the driver to turn on a side street where, halfway down the street, he could see a tall green gate. ‘Over there,’ he said, pointing to the gate amid a bamboo grove. Exiting the cab, Hamilton cast a furtive glance down the empty street and hurried to the gate, where he could see the blue water of the Greycliff pool through cracks in the painted boards. Turning the handle, he gave the gate a gentle shove.
The blue mosaics glittered beneath the still surface of the water, which mirrored the graceful overhanging boughs and bougainvillea spilling over the pale pink walls. The late afternoon sun suffused the pool and patio in an evanescent glow, like the light, Hamilton considered, in a Maxfield Parrish painting. He began walking toward the cabana at the end of the pool, inhaling the sweet bouquet of the garden, mingled with another, more exotic fragrance. He closed his eyes. Pois de Senteur. Evelyn’s perfume.
‘Hello, Tom….’
She was standing by the cabana in a simple pink dress, staring expectantly. Hamilton went to her and leaned down for a kiss, but she threw her arms around him and held him tight. ‘Oh, Tom,’ she murmured, ‘Tom …’
‘Evelyn,’ he said, pulling away and gently lifting her chin. As she raised her eyes to meet his, her lips began to tremble and tears welled. ‘Hey, it’s OK,’ he said, as he brushed them away. ‘There,’ he said. ‘That’s better. Why don’t we sit down?’
Taking his hand, Evelyn nodded and, with his arm encircling her waist, they walked slowly to a wrought-iron bench and sat beside the pool. ‘It seems like a long time ago,’ he began, ‘when I came for a swim and lunch.’
‘It seems forever.’
‘I wish we could go back, and start over.’
‘Do you? I’d rather leave things just as they were.’
‘Evelyn,’ said Tom, looking in her eyes, ‘there are things I wish I’d told you.’
‘Sometimes we’re better off not knowing,’ she said softly. There’s so much, she considered grimly, that he would never, never, know. Hamilton gave her a questioning look. ‘At any rate,’ she said, ‘I found your note rather mysterious.’
‘Unfortunately,’ he said, resting his arms on his knees, ‘I can’t let anyone know that I’m back in Nassau.’
Thank God, she thought. ‘Why?’ she asked. ‘You must have done something bad.’ The attempt at humour falling flat, she quickly added, ‘Seriously, Tom, it sounds as though you’ve put yourself in danger. Why did you come back?’
‘To see you, of course,’ he answered without hesitation, which was more than half true. ‘You made me promise.’
‘Yes, I did.’ She silently cursed her selfishness.
Hamilton stared into the shadows beyond the pool, trying to decide how to begin. ‘To be honest,’ he said at last, ‘I was sent back. By the man I work for.’
‘I thought you worked for yourself, with your oil wells and cattle ranches—’
‘Don’t rub it in. Though there’s a fair amount of truth in that.’
‘Then who do you work for?’
‘A man name
d Donovan,’ he said evenly. ‘He runs the Office of Strategic Services.’
‘You must be a spy.’
‘Well … not exactly. But I am in intelligence. You know, like your husband. The difference is, I work undercover.’
‘So all that rot about staying out of the war….’
He hung his head and nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said, staring at the flagstones. ‘All that rot.’
‘Well,’ she said, ‘I don’t know why you should feel ashamed. Scarcely anyone in this quaint little outpost of British civilization, as you once put it, is who they seem to be. They’re all pretending, aren’t they? The duke would be the king, Wallis is a duchess, de Marigny’s a count, Videlou’s a marquis—’
‘Oakes is a baronet,’ said Hamilton with a smile.
‘I don’t know about Sir Philip,’ said Evelyn.
‘Oh, he’s the real thing,’ replied Hamilton.
‘Yes, but what else is he?’
Hamilton gave her a rueful look ‘Everyone’s pretending,’ he said, gazing into her blue eyes, ‘everyone, that is, but you.’ She stared back at him, her face a blank slate. ‘But what I really want to know,’ he continued after a moment, ‘is who is Nils Ericsson, and what is he up to?’
‘Oh, I should think you could read him like a book. It’s transparent, if you ask me.’
‘Is it? Wealthy industrialist from neutral Sweden, champion of world peace, comes to the Bahamas and embarks on economic development projects for the good of the populace?’
‘Something like that. It sounds as though you’ve been reading his press dispatches. Is that what you’ve come to talk about? Nils Ericsson?’
‘In a way, yes.’ Hamilton stood up abruptly and began pacing beside the pool. ‘Or, in reality,’ he said thoughtfully, ‘is the man a front for the Nazis? Building a base for their Caribbean U-boat fleet?’
‘Surely, Tom,’ said Evelyn, her heart pounding, ‘you can’t believe—’
He stopped and stared at her. ‘I need your help, Evelyn. That’s why I’m here.’
She took a deep breath, trying to seem relaxed. ‘What help can I possibly be?’