Operation Pax

by Michael Innes

  Ourglass, while endeavouring to hint civil satisfaction that the brother of his nephew’s betrothed was of responsible and presentable appearance, wondered why he should be regarded as having particular qualifications for finding the missing Geoffrey. But this enigma the Provost illuminated at once.

  ‘A policeman, you know. Many of my old pupils have passed into the hands of the police, I believe. But Appleby is the only one who did so in the special sense of becoming one. And now he’s gone back to the metropolitan people as an Assistant-Commissioner.’

  ‘Dear me!’ Ourglass, although impressed by this peculiar career, was somewhat dismayed. ‘Does that mean what they call Scotland Yard?’

  The man called Appleby nodded. He had a pleasant smile, but the nod was unnervingly incisive. It made Ourglass feel as if he were a short and simple communication that had been rapidly run over and snapped into a file for possible future consideration.

  ‘I haven’t met your nephew,’ Appleby said, ‘and I hope you will tell me something about him. Your view is likely to be a more objective one than my sister’s.’

  ‘I am as much worried on Jane’s behalf as my own. If I may say so, she has stood up to this disconcerting and alarming incident very well. She appears to be a strong-minded girl, and I consider Geoffrey as most fortunate in having gained her affections.’ And Ourglass, having discharged himself of this preliminary civility to his satisfaction, peered at the Assistant-Commissioner much as an anxious relative might peer at an eminent consultant physician straight from the bedside. ‘Do I understand, Sir John, that you take a serious view?’

  ‘I have insufficient information upon which to form a view either way. As a matter of statistics, there are two chances in five that your nephew has suffered a nervous breakdown with total amnesia, one chance that he is in gaol under an assumed name, one chance that he is concealing a course of conduct that is either illegal or immoral, and one chance that he is dead.’

  ‘Dear me! Have you told your sister of these chances?’

  ‘No, I haven’t told Jane.’

  Ourglass was confused. ‘But of course not. You would naturally–’

  ‘There was no need to. She will certainly have looked them up for herself.’

  ‘Bless my soul!’ Ourglass respected the instinct to look things up; he admired persons with the ability to do this in out-of-the-way fields. Nevertheless the thought of his nephew’s chances of survival being investigated in this manner by a fiancée troubled him. ‘This is very shocking,’ he said vaguely, ‘very shocking, indeed. But your sister is, as I say, strong-minded. There is some comfort in that.’

  But this was a line of reflection in which Sir John Appleby appeared to see no special utility; he looked at his interlocutor in a silence that was presently broken by the Provost.

  ‘I had young Ourglass to dinner in his first term. He didn’t seem to me the suicide type – nor any sort of loose fish either.’

  ‘Did it strike you that my nephew might want to write a play?’

  The Provost ignored this incomprehensible interjection. ‘Adventurous, I should say – and perhaps even rash. I got the impression that he had done a lot of courting danger in his time, and found difficulty in doing without it. That’s a common enough type with us here at present. Not that he struck me as a common type. I had a feeling that he was rather remarkable.’ The Provost’s eyes fell on the elder Ourglass as he spoke, and some fresh aspect of the matter seemed to strike him. ‘Odd – eh? But that’s how he struck me.’ He turned to Appleby. ‘And he’s not a boy, you know, John. Older than this young sister of yours by a good way.’

  ‘I’ve gathered as much.’ Appleby looked from the Provost to Ourglass. ‘What was that you said about writing a play?’

  ‘It was something put in my head – perhaps without great seriousness of intention – by Bultitude, there. We were taking – um – a stroll together this afternoon. And when I told him that Geoffrey had last been glimpsed in the country–’

  ‘Now that’s very important,’ the Provost briskly remarked. ‘That’s the last thing about this young man of ours that we have to go upon. It appears that a friend of Ourglass’ – this Ourglass, that is to say – and the Provost thrust a finger without ceremony into Dr Ourglass’ stomach – ‘saw the young man in a car–’

  ‘In the back of a large car,’ Dr Ourglass supplemented, ‘and with several other men–’

  ‘Driving rapidly through some small village called, I think, Milton Porcorum.’

  ‘Precisely. If my informant is to be believed, Geoffrey was last seen in Milton Porcorum. And Bultitude suggested–’

  ‘In Milton Porcorum!’

  All three men turned round. The interruption came from Kolmak. He had been standing behind them in the somewhat perplexed reception of much affability from Bultitude. But evidently he had been paying more attention to their conversation than was in the circumstances altogether proper, and now he was staring at them in some obscure but violent agitation.

  ‘Someone has disappeared – nicht wahr? And in Milton Porcorum?’ Kolmak enunciated this last word in a fashion so Teutonic as to add substantially to the bizarre effort of his interposition.

  ‘Well, yes. We were talking–’

  But as the Provost, looking mildly surprised, began to frame this civil reply, Kolmak appeared to convince himself that he had behaved with marked impropriety. He flushed and rapidly clicked his fingers. ‘Ich bitte mich zu entschuldigen!’ he exclaimed, and bolted from the room.

  ‘Now, that’s a most extraordinary thing.’ The Provost contemplated his vanishing back in some astonishment. ‘Kolmak is commonly a quiet, retiring sort of creature, very difficult to draw out. I sometimes think that his understanding of English is negligible, and that he puts odd misinterpretations…’

  ‘But Kurt is a very good fellow, all the same.’ Bultitude advanced, with a tread that made all the coffee cups in the room tinkle. ‘I have become uncommonly fond of Kurt. Kurt’s uncle–’

  ‘Kurt?’ The Provost was puzzled. ‘I never heard you, my dear Mark, call him that before.’

  Bultitude looked injured. ‘Kurt Kolmak and I, Provost, have been on terms of increasing intimacy for some time. A very nice fellow, as I say. I don’t know what bit him just now. Of course he had been through a great deal of stress. There was a period when, positively, he had to tighten his belt.’ Bultitude, as he made this harrowing announcement, accomplished a reassuring exploration of his own waistline, contriving with an effort that the tips of his fingers should touch just over his watch-chain. ‘His people were liberals, and at the same time members of the old Hungarian nobility. Indeed Kurt’s uncle Nikolaus, as I was about to observe, was the cousin of a very dear friend of mine, the old Gräfin Szegedin. Did you ever know the old lady? I recall her once saying to me…’

  The Provost of Bede’s assumed a resigned expression, and Dr Ourglass one of polite interest. But Sir John Appleby, less socially complacent, lingered only to give Bultitude a professionally analytical glance. Then, murmuring a word in his host’s ear, he slipped from the room.

  Part 4

  Bodley by Day

  Many books

  Wise men have said are wearisom.

  – PARADISE REGAIN’D

  1

  A Complete Alphabetical List of the Resident members of the University of Oxford with Their Addresses is unquestionably the most useful publication of the multifariously active Oxford University Press. This work Sir John Appleby paused to consult in the Bede’s porter’s lodge; he then emerged into Beaumont Street and proceeded to move northwards at a leisurely pace. It was six minutes after nine o’clock. Christ Church, following its immemorial vespertine custom, was in the process of asserting its just hegemony of the lesser academic establishments clustered around it by the simple expedient of uttering a hundred-and-one magistral peals on an enormous bell. Abstraction grew upon Appleby as he walked. He was doubtful of the whole enterprise to which he had agreed to lend himself.


  He was much attached to his youngest sister – only the more so because of the wide disparity between their ages. And Jane, very understandably, was in great distress over the disappearance of the young man to whom she had recently engaged herself. But Appleby had never met Geoffrey Ourglass, and he had a professional distrust of people who vanish. Follow up the sort of person who disappears and you will seldom come upon anything either very exciting or very edifying. Frequently you will be performing no kindness to those whom he has disappeared from.

  And Appleby was equally doubtful about having come in upon the matter himself. Already, and from afar, he had seen to it that much in a quiet way had been done – so much, indeed, that the continued complete blank that Geoffrey Ourglass’ fate presented had begun to take on an aspect of beguilement, of technical challenge, that he had, quite simply, found it very hard to resist. It had been reasonable enough to come up and stay for a night or two by way of fulfilling a promise to his old tutor, now the Provost of Bede’s. And it was equally reasonable to employ the occasion for finding out a little more about Jane’s young man. But he rather regretted the drift that the affair had taken in common room that evening. A fairly substantial acquaintance with the academic classes had not altogether freed him from an early persuasion that dons are by nature so many gossiping old women. And he foresaw the Ourglass affair as possibly gaining more notoriety than he was at all inclined to welcome either on his sister’s behalf or his own.

  On the other hand – and now Appleby quickened his pace. For it was just possible that he had come upon something of real significance right at the start. It was just possible that this Geoffrey Ourglass was authentically the victim of something other than his own weakness or folly. For Jane’s sake Appleby hoped that it might be so. And, after all, he had nowhere come upon any suggestion that the young man was either foolish or weak. These were not characteristics that would attract his sister. Moreover the qualities which the Provost had suspected in the young man had been those of adventuresomeness and rashness. It was perfectly conceivable that these might have led him to press into some situation more hazardous than healthy, and to do this from motives that were wholly reputable. And Appleby thought of a certain graph – one of many graphs in a file that never left his desk in New Scotland Yard. It bore a curve that required explaining. Perhaps he was walking in the direction of an explanation now.

  And this must be the place. He had turned down a side road, passed through a small garden and presented himself before a tall and narrow house of which the arched and carved windows were just visible beneath the night sky. He rang the bell. After rather a long wait a light flicked on above his head, the door opened, and he was confronted by a silver-haired old lady swathed in the faded magnificence of a large Paisley shawl. Appleby took off his hat. ‘Is Dr Kolmak at home?’ he asked.

  The old lady found it necessary to give this question a moment’s consideration. ‘Dr Kolmak came in,’ she said, ‘a few minutes ago. But whether he is at home it is not, of course, for me to say.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Appleby.

  ‘Dr Kolmak is my tenant. Or rather he is my sister’s tenant. We had thought of a system of bells’ – and the old lady made a vague gesture into the darkness – ‘that would make the position quite plain.’

  ‘An excellent idea. It would save you inconvenience.’

  ‘Precisely.’ The old lady appeared delighted with the perceptiveness of this reply. ‘But tradesmen are so difficult nowadays. Lady Bronson has a system of bells. They were installed, however, by her nephew, who is interested in electricity and magnetism. I ought to have such an interest myself’ – the old lady was apologetic – ‘since my dear father was a close friend of Professor Faraday’s.’

  ‘That is most interesting.’

  ‘Yes.’ The old lady seemed a little doubtful on this point. Her communicativeness, it seemed to Appleby, was occasioned less by a preoccupation with the history of science than by uncertainty as to the correct technique for dealing with Dr Kolmak’s visitors. It was to be presumed, therefore, that these were of comparatively infrequent appearance.

  But now the old lady had an inspiration. ‘The name?’ she said interrogatively.

  ‘Sir John Appleby.’

  ‘Please come in. These things are a little difficult. Lady Bronson finds them very difficult. But then her tenants are undergraduates.’

  ‘Ah, yes – a different matter.’

  ‘Precisely. Dr Kolmak – who is of very good family – has recently been appointed to a lectureship at Bede’s. We hope that he may be elected into a fellowship quite soon. There is one step.’

  Appleby successfully negotiated the step and found a precarious foothold on the excessively slippery tiles of a dim, high hall. It was furnished with a number of impossible chairs designed to turn into suicidal stepladders, and embellished with large photographic views of the Roman forum.

  ‘The Kolmak domain – or should I say demesne? – is at the top of the house. Do you know that dear Frau Kolmak’s pianoforte had to be taken in through the roof? She is an exquisite artiste and her playing is a great delight to us. Except, that is, when it clashes with my sister’s Devotional Group. Will you please to come upstairs? I am afraid that the carpet is a little tricky in places. To be quite frank, there are holes in it, and no doubt it should be replaced. But my sister and I are too attached to our dear, shabby old things to be at all willing to part with them.’ Appleby contrived a murmur indicative of the conviction that such sentiments are the prerogative of highly bred persons of fine tastes. ‘The Kolmaks, then,’ he asked, ‘have not been with you long?’

  ‘A little less than two years.’

  ‘And besides Dr Kolmak himself there is just Frau Kolmak?’

  ‘Just so. And you no doubt know that she is really a Baronin. But since coming into exile she prefers the simpler title. It is indicative of her exquisite Gemütlichkeit.’ The old lady produced this word with a fine confidence which quite made up for its being not wholly apposite. ‘We are even fonder of Dr Kolmak’s aunt than of dear Dr Kolmak himself.’

  ‘But you have never met other members of the family?’

  ‘I have not had that pleasure. There was some question, indeed, of our receiving another member of the family – a female.’ The old lady paused significantly. ‘I must confess that my sister and I were a little anxious. The lady’s relationship was, somehow, never very clearly defined. And with foreigners – particularly, I fear, aristocratic foreigners – one is never quite –’ The old lady paused again, and evidently decided that this sentence had better be left in air. ‘But the proposal seemed to “fade out” (as Lady Bronson’s nephew is fond of saying) and I think some other arrangement must have been made. One more flight, and then I can simply set you on your way… But here is my sister.’

  On a landing of modest proportions but lavishly medieval suggestion there stood another silver-haired old lady in another faded Paisley shawl. Appleby’s conductress paused. ‘My dear,’ she said, ‘let me introduce Sir John Appleby, a friend of Dr Kolmak’s. Sir John, this is my sister, Miss Tinker.’

  Miss Tinker bowed to Appleby. ‘May I introduce you to my sister, Miss Priscilla Tinker?’

  Appleby suitably acknowledged the propriety of these proceedings. The landing was small and cluttered on one side with an enormous carved chest and on the other side with a row of prie-dieux. These latter had something of the air of cabs waiting in a rank, and were no doubt brought into requisition during meetings of the elder Miss Tinker’s Devotional Group. Meanwhile, they made things decidedly cramped. And this effect was enhanced by walls crowded with large Arundel prints themselves illustrative of uncomfortably populous fourteenth-century occasions. Perhaps it was the Gothic suggestiveness of the décor that gave Appleby an alarmed sense of the immateriality of the Misses Tinker. They were crowded up against him, and he felt that a single incautious step might take him clean through one or other of them. This would be interesting, but distract
ing – and he had better concentrate on the matter in hand. He therefore edged politely towards the next flight of stairs.

  ‘I hope that you may not find Dr Kolmak unwell.’ It was the elder Miss Tinker who spoke. ‘He came in only a few minutes ago, and I happened to pass him on the stairs. We had not the few words of conversation that commonly pass between us. He appeared to be in some distress. I hope it is not an infection. There is not at present any epidemic in Oxford. But we heard only this afternoon that there is a great deal of bronchitis in Bournemouth.’

  Appleby was now climbing. ‘Please don’t trouble yourselves further,’ he said. ‘I’ll go straight up.’ And he mounted, two steps at a time – aware of the Misses Tinker watching him still from below, like disappointed sirens whose singing has had only a momentary effectiveness. He realized that they would certainly be there when he came down again.

  On the next landing there was a door apparently enclosing an upper staircase. Appleby knocked, but without result. He opened it and climbed higher. There was another doorway, at which he knocked again and waited. From within he could hear strains of music – a faint and uncanny music. If this was the Baronin discoursing on the pianoforte that had to be taken in through the roof then there could be no doubt that she in her turn would prove as ghostly as the old ladies below. The door opened and he was confronted by a handsome woman, old but very erect, who it was safe to guess must be the aunt of the man he was after.

  ‘Good evening,’ he said. ‘Is Dr Kolmak at home?’

  The woman eyed him steadily for a moment without reply.

  Then she opened the door wider and in a manner that invited him to enter. The music came from an aeolian harp set in a window.