‘I know nothing of what you say. How you know killed?’
Peter stopped and faced him. ‘I was there. I watched …’ He looked away and swallowed, then back. ‘I saw your agent shoot her.’
Burenko cleared his throat twice. ‘You saw her killed you say?’
‘Shot. Above the city of Neuchâtel. On a mountain path. The mist was very thick. He shot her once with a silenced pistol, Mr Burenko, and she fell. Down the side of the mountain. Before he went, he took her money and threw her bag after her.’
‘And you know to be there, at very spot? How?’
‘The maid where she lived told me Dinah had gone there to meet me. A man had telephoned and gave her a message for Dinah he said was from me.’
‘Mr Hill. It is not believable you stood and watched. Let him do this.’ For a second Peter had the oddest feeling Burenko was spurring him on. ‘Not believable. This woman you loved.’
Two figures in the mist. And voices. There had been voices. And a business card. Peter locked every thought away but for the two figures in the mist. ‘But that shot solved all my problems. You had what you wanted. I knew my mother would be free. And she will be, won’t she, Mr Burenko?’
Burenko was fanning himself urgently. They were walking in silence, turning back towards the top of the hill. Burenko’s shoes were slipping on the wiry grass and he headed for the path.
‘When you say this happening?’
‘Just over a week ago.’
‘That explains why news not reach me. You saw man, but he has not seen you?’
‘The mist was very thick. He had his back to me and was concentrating on her.’
‘You saw he shot her dead?’
‘A single shot.’
‘You would know him? How he looked?’
‘I would not know him again, I promise you. He had his back to me. Afterwards I moved away as quickly as I could.’
‘And he took her money.’
‘She carried all her money. In case she needed to move on.’
They reached the summit in silence and were looking over the city. Burenko took Peter’s arm and wrung his hand. ‘Now over. I know this cannot be easy for you. This was one woman you loved. But will be many others for such young man as you. You were loyal son and soon mother will be at your side again. I, Burenko, promise that. You can live easy. Your word was good and we will not forget. Now, may I propose cup of tea? I have something—’
He stopped. Rising up over his voice, the air-raid sirens filled the air, a banshee howling from across the city beneath them. In the silence that followed its dying away, a woman said, ‘I suppose we should take cover.’ Another replied, ‘It’s such a lovely day and we haven’t had our tea yet.’ A man added, ‘We’re safe enough up here.’ From lower down the slope a woman called, ‘By the time you get there, yids will have taken the best places.’
Peter and Burenko watched as a half-hearted exodus began. Parents shouted at their children to come or ran to grab them. Determined not to miss their afternoon in the sun, a number shrugged and stayed. Some picnickers began to gather their cups and plates and to roll up their rugs; others went on eating and drinking in a dogged manner. The hubbub died down, people speaking quietly as if afraid of giving themselves away. From the top of the hill, the sky to the south-east was empty. A young man said, ‘Another false alarm.’ His girlfriend giggled.
The soldier from the Worcestershire Regiment said dully, ‘Wait a bit.’ On the city’s furthest horizon, a black cloud had appeared, heavy, slow moving. Around it the sky was in agitation, flashes of silver darting ahead, up and round. The cloud became bigger, solid, immense, fraught with menace for the sunlit city beneath. The girlfriend said, ‘Oh my Lord, them’s Jerry bombers.’ ‘And them’s fighters,’ the soldier muttered. Banter had stopped. The group on the hilltop were frozen. Picnickers rose to their feet as the double-beat of German bomber engines, hundreds of them, reached their ears. The beat became a roar as the leading bombers peeled away, their loads dropped over the river, the docks, the packed dwellings of the East End. ‘I must get to my hospital.’ The girlfriend set off down the hill, running.
Columns of dense black smoke rose into the sky, the undersides glowing red. Constant explosions became a long, dull, drawn out reverberation, like the beating of bass drums. How the western front had sounded in the Great War, Peter thought. Even at a distance, the air on the hill seemed to tremble. Puffs of white smoke dotted the black cloud as anti-aircraft guns opened up. A barrage balloon collapsed in a welter of flame, and another.
Burenko said, ‘I must return to delegation. We have ship in docks. Please call me. I would very much like to talk again.’
He set off down the hill, then turned and came back, fishing a little book out of his jacket pocket. ‘This for thanks to you, my dear Mr Hill. You have shown yourself true Soviet friend.’
‘Thank you, Mr Burenko. My mother?’
‘She will be with you soon. Call please.’ He scurried away.
Peter watched him slipping and sliding across the grass but his mind was with Dinah. He tried to see the limits of the bombing, the smoke and jets of flame. Was Finsbury safe? She’d said Podger had taken over a shelter; if so she’d be looked after. He glanced at the book, old, in brown calf covers, the corners worn, the pages gilt-edged. He opened it. JACQUES LE FATALISTE ET SON MAITRE. 1797. Inside the front cover was a bookplate with a coat of arms and on the flysheet three lines in faded ink, crabbed Cyrillic handwriting. The fruit of a noble family’s ransacked library? He would ask Rozalia to translate.
‘Those poor people round the docks.’ A tearful voice recalled him to the unfolding tragedy. The bombing was going on and on. RAF fighters were darting at the formations, spiralling in a mêlée with the German escorts, up, down, round. A plane fell, smoke billowing, impossible to tell whose. And another.
Tongues of fire licked up into the clouds of smoke, joining to become sheets of flame. An acrid breeze drifted over the hilltop – rubber, coal tar, wood, petrol. Though he could hear snatches of incredulous conversation around him, he had an impression of indescribable noise, a fearful cacophony—the bombers, the drum roll of explosions, the clatter of anti-aircraft fire.
****
The sky was empty of planes. Only the thickening blanket of fiery smoke to the south-east told of the raiders. He found a tearoom open in the little cluster of shops below the hill. The All Clear hadn’t sounded but it was “business as usual” for the two middle-aged ladies who owned the tearoom. And that seemed true of life in the rest of the street, though the foul acrid smell had sharpened and a brown haze was colouring the sky.
As he turned the pages of Jacques, he mulled over the conversation with Burenko. He’d followed Nick’s precept on sticking close to the truth: what he’d told the Russian could so easily have been true. If true, making everything so much easier. If he’d hung back for a moment … been relentless, as they were.
He pictured the fat Russian climbing the hill in his white suit and black shoes; stopping to fan himself while the sharp little eyes took every one in. Chekhov? The landowner who held the promissory notes. He’d played into Burenko’s view of human nature and had been rewarded with “Live easy”. Translation? “Kindly make life easy for your executioner”? Wouldn’t they want to clear the whole account?
He fingered the book. It smelled of old libraries, like the shop in The Hague, or the one in Zürich probably. He was pretty certain he’d been talking to the same bookseller. He’d imagined the tasselled hat. A tiny birch leaf was caught in the fold between two pages. Someone had been reading Jacques under a tree in spring and picked a leaf to mark the place. Peacefully on his estate in the country. Interrupted by the doctor calling, or a neighbouring landowner—looking like Burenko.
Putting whimsy aside, what was the meaning of Burenko’s having the Diderot, bringing it for him? Strangely, he’d felt something almost paternal in the Russian’s manner as the man sympathised, said this hadn’t been easy. W
as that part of the deception? Or had the Russian meant it when he wanted to talk? Seeing Peter Hill as his future agent, hooked by his complicity in her assassination? Equally plausible. He recalled the conversation between Burenko and Steiner. So easy to assume Burenko was giving him orders. Burenko might just as easily been trying to persuade Steiner of something.
This was staring into the dark, its shadows and masses. But “When they seem most reasonable, they are deceiving you”, and how he wished Rozalia was sitting there now. Steiner? He must presume he was Steiner’s prey. Steiner had shot Elisabeth with the gun in his left hand. Possibly he now had to use his right. He couldn’t be completely healed yet.
The “All Clear” at last. Not long afterwards, perversely – why did he think it perverse? They’d made their point – the ladies announced they were closing. The pall of smoke was even thicker and the acrid smell stronger, but at least Jerry had had his fun for the day. Back to the West End. A bus would be best, if they were running. He’d eat, go to the pictures.
****
The soundtrack died and the image on the screen froze. The house lights came half on. A man in a dinner jacket walked down the centre aisle and climbed on to the stage. He cleared his throat. ‘Ladies and gentlemen, patrons, I have been informed that the air-raid sirens are sounding in the south and east. Unfortunately, another bombing raid is expected and in the interests of safety I regret I must ask you to disperse. I apologise that we are not able to finish this showing of Gaslight. I hope you will be able to enjoy it in a Gaumont cinema on another occasion. Please use all exits.’
As he started to leave the stage, a man shouted from the circle: ‘Finish the film.’ A woman in the stalls called, ‘We’re not going nowhere till we’ve seen what we paid for.’ The audience began stamping and shouting. ‘Finish the film.’ The manager was waving his arms and saying helplessly, ‘Please go quietly. For your own safety.’
A naval officer went up on to the stage and the audience quietened. He said to the manager, ‘You can’t ask us to leave just as the climax is coming. It’s not much longer now. Nazi bombers haven’t hit the West End. Hitler can wait while we see the film through. How can you ask me to go back to sea wondering what happened?’
A wave of cheers and laughter followed. The house lights flashed. The manager shook the officer’s hand, then turned to the audience. ‘Please leave the theatre the moment the film is over. The organ will not be played again tonight.’ To a round of applause, he waved at the projection box. The lights dimmed again.
While the house lights were up and all attention was on the stage, Peter had taken a look at the latecomers. One he’d seen before. Middle-aged man, fat, narrow black moustache, blazer and light grey trousers. With him on the bus from Primrose Hill. Now staring fixedly at the screen. “See the same new face twice, start to worry.”
****
As the film ended, the audience surged out before the credits and Peter lost sight of the fat man even though the street was so light. For a moment the brightness surprised him, then he saw the lurid glow in the east, orange and red flames still reaching up into the dark cloud swelling against the night sky.
Up some steps gave him a better view. Pencils of light were probing another mass of raiders, the white smoke of anti-aircraft shell-bursts following them, what looked like parachutes falling. White flashes dazzled, followed by leaping tongues of fire, and then the sound: the thud and rumble of bombs dropping, the bark of A-A guns. Two attacks in a single day. What a rotten time for the East Enders. He worried for Ella, driving her ambulance into the maelstrom or taking her sketchpad into the thick of it.
The Royal Oak beckoned. People drinking the raids away packed the bar, swapping stories of the docks and the East End. What destruction that terrible afternoon—and such a beautiful afternoon too. A raid such as no one had witnessed never; so many bombers, so long an attack. Now another. Would the West End catch it this time? Did it mean invasion? This was no ordinary pub-going, he felt. An edge of hysteria pulsed in the drinkers, a desperate attempt to joke and sing their underlying funk away. “Roll out the barrel, we’ll have a barrel of fun.” Better convivial in familiar surroundings than cower in a shelter. This could be how the world ended. A bang not a whimper.
He took his drink outside, to stand with others on the pavement, looking into the volcanic blaze. The fat man had followed him to the pub, but not come in, going a little way down the street to a phone box. To call the outraged husband, no doubt.
****
The air compressed in his ears and the ground vibrated under his feet. Bombs had begun to fall in a series of huge explosions only a mile or so away. In the nearby park, anti-aircraft guns opened up with ear-splitting din. Peter had turned into a web of side streets, confident that Raymond Steiner was not far behind and, in the blackout, must keep close. With Jerry going for the West End, this raid was the chance to avenge Pornic, wipe the slate clean. And the way would be clear.
Flashes of light bright as day struck at his eyes. Smoke began to eddy down the street. As he pressed on, the bombing became a drawn-out roar while shrapnel from the anti-aircraft shells whistled down, a vicious shower of splinters rattling on the road, making him wish he had his tin hat.
In the moments of intense blackness that followed a flash, he stepped into a narrow mews, standing just inside the gateway by the first cottage. With another flash, he saw Steiner pass the entrance, then pause, his right hand at his side, the barrel of the silenced pistol along his trouser seam.
The white peignoir had been patterned with red. Violence uncurled. He hit Steiner with the left hand forearm blow to the side of the neck and right-hand kidney punch. Steiner’s convulsed gasp was lost in the whistle of falling bombs. Glass shattered, masonry splintered as he pulled Steiner’s head back, locking it under his armpit and dragging him down. He jammed his forearm across the man’s chin and tried to steady himself to snap the spine but had no purchase. His feet were being pulled away. The road was rolling under him. His eyes were being sucked out, his ears hit with a great hammer. He put up his hands to protect his head.
He could hear the rush and roar of the sea as it came in over the beach and up on to the headland where he was walking with Dinah and Elisabeth under the blue, blue sky, the two of them hand in hand. The wind was blowing so hard but they were walking with that long, loose stride of theirs towards the sea as it reared high up, high over the headland. He tried to shout over the roaring of the sea that they should turn back, but they went on, their arms round each other. A giant hand picked him up and threw him up and over, diving into the sea, dark and cold. He must struggle to find Dinah and Elisabeth, struggle to find them in the dark.
Chapter Fourteen
He turned his head. In an ashtray on a bedside table was a stubby pipe, a vague column of blue smoke rising from it. He studied it for a moment, then turned back and looked up at a magnolia-coloured ceiling. Shadows moving. Leaves. He breathed in: disinfectant and cabbage.
‘Hello old chap. Good to see you awake. Can you hear me?’ A face came into his field of vision. Nick’s. Looking concerned.
He struggled to speak, but his tongue was sticking to the roof of his mouth and seemed to be coated in cement. His lips felt like balloons.
‘Here, try some water. I’ll lift you.’ Nick put an arm under Peter’s shoulders and propped him against his pillows. He filled a glass with water and held it to Peter’s lips. ‘One sip at a time.’
‘Which hospital am I in?’
‘Canadian Military.’
‘Could they manage a cup of tea?’
‘I’ll go and ask matron.’ He picked up the stubby pipe and went out.
Peter looked around. An iron hospital bed, red curtains half-drawn, shifting slightly in the breeze through the partly-open window, a picture of the Ottawa parliament building at sunset, hospital pyjamas, a hand basin, a cupboard, an oxygen cylinder and a mask. How on earth did he get here? How long had he been here? What was Nick doing here? Was
Dinah all right? He experimented with moving. Every part seemed too stiff.
Matron returned with Nick. A large-breasted, blonde young Canadian. ‘Tea?’ Smilng, she turned to Nick. ‘Buried alive, out for the count, and wakes up demanding tea, commander.’ She took Peter’s pulse. ‘Rock steady. I’ll do blood pressure. Then I’ll see about tea.’ The blood pressure was ‘fine’. ‘Something to go with your tea? Toasted waffles, perhaps?’ As she went out, she spoke to Nick. ‘I must tell the commandant the dog man’s awake.’
‘Commander Harry?’
‘It helps with the access.’
‘I would have been more, even more, respectful if I’d known. What did she mean by “dog man”?’
‘A dog sniffed you out – you were under a blitzed house, buried in the cellar. The owner said the place was empty when it was bombed, so it wasn’t searched. Too much on elsewhere, with raids every night. Then a young woman was walking past with her dog, and he broke free, ran into the rubble and started barking and scratching. Absolutely wouldn’t move – snapped at anyone trying to get him. She insisted someone must be down there and the rescue team was brought in. The dog got more and more excited. There you were. A beam had shielded you but you were still out for the count and pretty well flattened. You must have been down there for … what? Four days?’
‘Extraordinary dog. Thank goodness.’
‘Just as extraordinary the lady should have been walking with her dog along that side street. Someone’s looking after you. An unexploded had blocked the main road. Anyway, with the hospitals so full and raids every night, when the emergency ward saw you were a Canadian diplomat, they sent you here.’
Peter was silent. A nurse brought in tea and waffles. ‘Welcome back, sir. Well done.’
He waited until she’d closed the door. ‘Did they find anyone with me?’
Innocence To Die For Page 48