Mediterranean Nights

by Dennis Wheatley

  ‘I tried as tactfully as I could when the waiter was inside to let her know how splendid I thought she was in working for the King, and how my sympathies were all with him. You see, by my gaff about the police I had given it away already that I knew the contents of the book, but she wouldn’t open up.

  ‘After lunch she went inside to telephone while I paid the bill; when she came back I handed her the book. Ten minutes later the Hispano roared up the hill and stopped outside the gate. I walked down the slope with her just to see her off, but I didn’t attempt to suggest another meeting. By that time I was silent and dejected, and I knew it was no good. I felt completely squashed.

  ‘When we reached the gate I did summon up the courage to say: “I’m afraid I’ve been an awful bore and behaved very badly, but if you were me you’d know just how I felt.”

  ‘Suddenly she changed completely and became human for the first time. Her eyes filled with delicious laughter, and she gave me the most glorious smile. “Poor Englishman,” she said, “I have punish you, but you are rather a sweet! Goodbye.”

  ‘Before I could say another word she was in the car and it was racing up the hill, while I stood there gaping in the dust.

  ‘When I’d collected my wits a bit, I began to wonder what to do. On the one hand I was fed up with Barcelona, and was thinking of clearing out next day—on the other I wanted terribly to see the golden girl again. By the time I’d driven back to the town I’d made up my mind to stay. That marvellous hair made her such a striking figure that there must be people in the town who knew her, and I thought it a likely line to try the barbers’ shops.

  ‘The idea was a good one, and my third shot brought me luck. Her barber was a gay dog—his eyes fairly twinkled as he told me what he knew about her. She was Donna Cazalia D’Avila, and her father was a marquis. They had both gone into exile with the King, and she had come back quite recently when things had quieted down; she was living in their big villa outside the town.

  ‘I got the address, then I rushed off and bought the loveliest basket of flowers I could find. I wrote on a card, “From a very repentant Cavalier”, and slipped it in. She could take that which way she liked, you see, then I had it sent off by special messenger.

  ‘A couple of hours later I went in to have a look at the Thé Dansant, and I hadn’t been sitting there more than ten minutes when in she came. She was with a fat, unwholesome-looking dago, and I wondered if there would be trouble, if I sent over and asked her for a dance. It seemed queer that she was there at all, really, because as I’ve told you, no respectable girl ever goes. I felt certain that it must be some secret service business that brought her there—perhaps she was pumping the dago chap. He looked a most unpleasant brute.

  ‘I decided that it would be better not to risk it, for she must have seen me. All the same, I slipped out for five minutes and wrote a note—just asking if she wouldn’t take pity on me and dine that night or lunch next day. I added my room number as well as my name in case she telephoned, so that there could be no mistake.

  ‘I didn’t send it over by the waiter, but kept it in my hand and took a chance as they went out. The dago stopped to settle his bill at the caisse, as is the custom there, and she walked past him into the hall. I was beside her in a moment, and pressed the note into her hand.

  ‘ “Those flowers, they were glorious, but you should not have sent them,” she said in a quick whisper, then she turned away. I went upstairs with my heart fairly bounding in my chest—I really felt that I was gaining ground. After that I sat tight in my room for a bit, hoping she would ring up or send a reply to my note. I was far too excited to settle down to a book, and just fidgeted around.

  ‘It must have been about nine o’clock when there came abruptly a quick double knock on my door. I thought it might be a page with a message, so I ran to open it, but it wasn’t a page—it was the girl herself.

  ‘She pushed past me and shut the door, then she leant against it panting. I guessed at once that something must have gone seriously wrong; she was quite white under her golden tan, and there was a scared look in her lovely eyes.

  ‘ “Quick!” she gasped. “Hide me—they have found out what I do here. I was mad to come to the hotel. You are English—Royalist, too, you say—you will not give me up?”

  ‘Was it likely that I’d give her up—not for all the Communists in Spain! “Come on,” I said, “in here,” and seizing her by the arm I pushed her into the big wardrobe—the hanging part where all my suits were kept.

  ‘There was a chorus of excited voices outside in the corridor, and then a knocking on the door. I opened it again, and a floor waiter, two policemen, a manager, and the fat dago came in. They were chattering together in Spanish like a lot of parrots. The manager asked me if I’d seen the girl, and of course I looked completely blank, so they hurried off to search the other rooms.

  ‘The girl came out of the wardrobe as I locked the door, and I handed her the key. She had recovered from her fright and smiled divinely as she thanked me. She began to tell me the trouble she was in.

  ‘Her voice was as golden as her hair, and she spoke English with only the faintest trace of accent, which made it sound the most adorable language.

  ‘She told me that the dago she’d been with was a big boy in the new Catalonian Government, and a terrific Red; she’d been playing him up in the hope of getting certain information, but it hadn’t come off.

  ‘They had gone upstairs to the lounge after they’d left the Thé Dansant, and while they were sitting there a packet of papers had been brought to him from his office. She had felt certain that among them was the thing she wanted, so when he went over to speak to a friend she pinched it. He spotted her—she lost her head and bolted up the stairs. By this time they would know that she was a Royalist agent.

  ‘I asked her what would happen if she were caught, and she looked pretty glum. “Five years,” she said, “five years in a fortress—I think I would rather die!”—and with a little shudder she sat down on the sofa.

  ‘I felt pretty useless as I stood there looking down on her lovely golden head. What the dickens could I do to help her? I hadn’t got the faintest idea.

  ‘ “Look here,” I said quickly, “you’ll have to get out of the country. How? Lord alone knows, but you can count on me in any way you like.”

  ‘She caught my hand and pressed it. “I know,” she said, “I know,” and then she went on to say how sorry she was that she’d been rude to me the day before.

  ‘Of course I told her that I thoroughly deserved it, and asked what she meant to do next. She said that she must think about it, and that somehow she would find a way, but that I must go downstairs to dine. I suggested that I should order dinner upstairs, and that then she could share it, hiding in the bathroom while the waiter was in the room. But she would not have it; she thought it might look suspicious, and that it was better for me to go down.

  ‘I didn’t want to go a bit, but I’d had to agree; I asked her if she thought she’d be all right till I came back.

  ‘She told me she would lock the door, and perhaps later, when all was quiet, she might be able to slip out quietly and gain the street.

  ‘ “Better not—there are sure to be people still looking for you,” I told her. “It will be safer for you to stay here for tonight. I’ll sleep in the bathroom, then tomorrow morning I will get you some different clothes.”

  ‘ “I will think of it,” she said gravely. “You are very kind, but go now, please, or they may suspect.”

  ‘It was agreed that when I came up I should give three raps on the door, which she locked behind me. I dined in the restaurant, and all sorts of plans were racing through my mind. I was worried, though, for I hadn’t really much faith in my suggestion for the following day. You could try any disguise you liked, but that hair would give it away every time.

  ‘After I’d finished dinner I sat in the lounge for a bit, in case anyone was watching me, then I went upstairs. I gave the s
ignal we’d agreed on, but she didn’t let me in. I tried again, and then a third time, but I couldn’t hear a sound, so I turned the handle. The door opened—she had disappeared.

  ‘The room looked as if it had been ransacked by a burglar. My bags had been gone through, all the drawers turned upside down, and my clothes scattered about the bed. I walked over to the dressing-table and there, on the floor, were all those lovely golden curls!

  ‘I guessed at once what Cazalia had done—cropped that telltale hair, stolen one of my suits, and slipped out of the hotel dressed as a man. I was right—my blue lounge suit was missing—shirt, collar, tie, socks, shoes, and the soft black hat that I wear in the evening when I’m abroad. I chuckled, thinking what a lot of pluck the girl had got, but I was worried when I found that my passport had disappeared. I thought it might be difficult to get another.

  ‘Then I found her note—she had left it pinned on my pillow; I snatched it up and I can remember the contents now.

  ‘ “Dear Englishman,

  ‘ “Thank you for your kindness and generosity. Forgive please that I do not stay to make my thanks. Without your help I might have paid with my life for my devotion to the cause of S. M. el Rey.

  ‘ “Calalia d’Avila”

  ‘I collected every piece of her lovely hair, and put it in my collar-box; then I tidied up and went to bed, but I didn’t sleep for a long time.

  ‘Would she ever get across the frontier, I was wondering. Perhaps she might slip through with my soft hat well pulled down over her eyes; she had a boyish figure and was just about my height. There was something similar, too, in the shape of our chins, but there the resemblance ended. Perhaps if she caught the night train she would stand a chance; they would probably be watching for her at the station but hardly at the frontier yet, and gone was that fatal mark of identity—the lovely golden curls. I wondered if I should ever see her again. I hoped she might endeavour to return my clothes—if she did, that would give me the chance to get in touch with her, perhaps; with that slight hope I dropped off to sleep.

  ‘In the morning, while I was still in bed, I received a visit from the manager, and I got a nasty shock. It seemed that the police were convinced that Cazalia was still in the hotel—or, if not, had changed her clothes in some room before she bolted. The rooms in my corridor were to be searched.

  ‘I only had a second, while he spoke to someone in the corridor, but the collar-box with Cazalia’s hair in it was on the table by my bed. I picked it up and chucked it on top of the wardrobe, then I opened the drawer where I had put all the clothes that she had left behind and seized the lot, hoping to get them out of sight before the police came in—it was too late; they caught me good and proper with the bundle in my hands.

  ‘Of course, after that I couldn’t say a thing; they searched and rummaged into everything I had, and nearly the first thing they came across was her letter—that did it! I couldn’t even say she’d gone off in my clothes without my knowledge, which was the truth, as she’d talked about my help and her devotion to the King.

  ‘I dressed myself while they stood round, and directly I’d finished they handcuffed me and marched me off to prison. I realised that I had landed myself in an appalling mess.

  ‘That prison was the devil. Only an hour’s exercise a day, no books or papers, filthy food and so full of garlic that it nearly made me sick, and, of course, no baths.

  ‘The British Consul came along to see me; he seemed a decent chap, but he looked pretty grim. You see, I’d been caught out assisting in a Royalist conspiracy, and the fact that I was a Briton didn’t make much odds. It looked as if I was in for a couple of years, at least. The Consul got a lawyer who came to see me several times, but he said he couldn’t get me off—he could only try for a minimum sentence, and if things went really badly I might get seven years!… I was in the deuce of a stew.

  ‘I wonder you didn’t see the case in the papers, because of course it got into the Press. I thought I should go dotty when I’d been there a week, and the only relief I had from thinking was when people came to see me. I will say they were decent about that. The people that I’d stayed with in Madrid came to Barcelona, and I was allowed to see them as often as I liked; they used to come at all hours, and the warder brought them straight to my cell. There was no rotten business of being separated from visitors by an open space, and two wire fences with a warder in between, as we have here, but of course the Spanish prison system is thoroughly old-fashioned! They have bolts the size of battering-rams, and a sentry on the gate, but only about one jailer to every fifty prisoners, and they’re so casual they’ll even let you walk down the passage to the wash-place on your own.

  ‘I knew, though, that when my trial came on I should be sent off to a fortress or a penal settlement, and mixed up with all the other felons. It was a frightful prospect, but somehow I couldn’t blame the girl. The more I thought of her the more adorable she seemed, and idiotic though I know it sounds, I felt that the hardest thing about my imprisonment was the fact that I should stand no chance of seeing her again for years.

  ‘I was wrong there. I did see her again, and quite soon, too. When I’d been in that foul prison nine days I was taken to the Superintendent’s office one morning, and there she was—just as devastatingly beautiful as ever. She was dressed in girl’s clothes again, and her hair was as curly as ever, but not quite such a lovely shade of gold. Of course I knew it must be a wig, but most people wouldn’t have noticed the difference, I suppose.

  ‘At first I thought that she’d failed to get out of Spain, and had just been captured, but that wasn’t it at all. She had read in the papers of my arrest, and come back to give herself up.

  ‘I wasn’t given much chance to talk to her, but that was the gist of it, and for the moment I was too staggered to think clearly. She took entire responsibility, and as I was a foreigner they accepted her assurance that I wasn’t really mixed up in the conspiracy. They gave me a pretty sharp lecture on the error of my ways and let me go.

  ‘I didn’t know whether to be glad or sorry. I was almost stupid with relief at the thought of the horrors I had escaped; but there was Cazalia, and she’d have to go through that hell instead.

  ‘Think of the courage of that girl coming back and giving herself up deliberately to get me off! She knew, too, that she would get five years at least—just think what five years in prison would mean to a girl like that: the food and the filth and the other women—ghastly creatures—the dregs of Barcelona. I darn’ nearly broke down when I got back to the hotel.’

  Oliver was silent for a moment. ‘Poor kid,’ I said, ‘how long did she actually get?’

  He laughed suddenly, and laid his hand on the casket. ‘She didn’t get anything—the hair saved us.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘When I got back to the hotel,’ Oliver said slowly, ‘I managed to secure my old room; the collar-box was just where I left it, and when I was looking at that lovely hair I got an idea.’ He paused.

  ‘Yes,’ I said impatiently, ‘go on.’

  ‘I did a bit of shopping, and I dashed off to Anita—the little girl I’d picked up at the Thé Dansant. I knew she was in need of money and had Royalist sympathies as well. It was an old-fashioned prison, so we planned the thing in the good old-fashioned way. Anita was allowed to see Cazalia—she gave her my parcel, and Calalia tied her up. Five minutes later, we were driving like the devil for the mountains. We ditched the car a couple of miles from the frontier, and crossed into France on foot that night. It was a risky business, but we pulled it off.’

  ‘But the guard,’ I exclaimed. ‘How on earth could they confuse her with Anita?’

  ‘Why, her hair, of course,’ laughed Oliver. ‘The police didn’t know she had a wig. I sent in a black one—they never recognised her without her golden curls! Out you go, my boy, I’ve got to change—I’m dining with her at half past eight.’

  STORY XIII

  ANOTHER little episode from the activitie
s of ‘The Man with the Girlish Face’ in the early days of the Second World War.

  Hampstead is a long cry from Monte Carlo, but in 1939 its population was almost as cosmopolitan. I lived nearby in St. John’s Wood, and the majority of foreigners who then frequented those parts could hardly claim to have distinguished themselves by their exquisite politeness.

  Why is it, I wonder, that so many foreigners in exile display such appalling manners? Even in Germany, where I have travelled extensively, apart from the comparatively small caste of Prussian officers who were deliberately educated to push civilians off the pavements if they did not get out of the way in time, the bulk of the people were by no means impolite. I suspect that much of this aggressive boorishness is begotten by an inverted inferiority complex arising as the natural reaction to prolonged and often intensive persecution; so I suppose we should be as forbearing as we can with these unbidden and, one only hopes, transitory guests. In any case, London was unexpectedly relieved of most of the strangers within her gates in September 1940; they set out once more upon their tragic odysseys as soon as the bombs began to fall.

  An episode in this story shows that when I wrote it the war had hardly become a war.

  DEATH IN THE FLAG

  VIVIEN PAWLETT-BROWNE—or plain V. Brown as he was on the register of Sir Charles Forsyth’s department—thought that he had never seen his chief look grimmer. It was Sir Charles’s chill manner as much as his snow-white hair that had earned him the name of ‘Frosty’, and this morning he was as icy as a Finnish blizzard.

  ‘Seen that?’ he asked, pushing a newspaper-cutting across his desk. And Vivien read:

  CASE OF BUBONIC PLAGUE REPORTED IN NORTH LONDON

  Miss Sara Neilson, employed as a housemaid at 104 Maresfield Gardens, N.W.3, was suddenly taken ill yesterday and the Hampstead Fever Hospital have diagnosed the case as one of Bubonic Plague. Miss Neilson was removed at once to the isolation ship in the Thames estuary. Cases of this terrible disease are rare in England. The last…