"Tanner’s Virgin" - читать интересную книгу автора (Block Lawrence)Chapter 2On my fourth day in London it rained. It had been doing this more or less constantly since my arrival, sometimes with fog as an accompaniment, sometimes without. I got back to the Stokes’ flat a few minutes after six, rerolled the umbrella that Nigel Stokes insisted I carry, and went into the kitchen. Julia was hovering at the stove, and I hovered beside her, as much for the stove’s warmth as for hers. “I’m just getting tea,” she said. “Nigel’s shaving, I think. It’s desperate out, isn’t it?” “Yes.” “How did it go?” “No luck at all.” She was pouring the tea when her brother joined us. He was in his early forties, some ten years older than Julia. His guards’ moustache, which added several years to his appearance, was a recent addition; he’d grown it for his role in a farce that had opened a few weeks ago in the West End, and planned to shave it off as soon as the play closed. From the reviews it seemed that this would happen rather soon. “Well,” he said. “Any luck?” “None, I’m afraid.” “And bloody awful weather for hunting wild geese, isn’t it?” He added sugar to his tea, buttered a slice of bread. “Where’d you go today? More of the same?” I nodded. “Travel agencies, employment agencies. And I went to half the rooming houses in Russell Square, and I suppose I did have a bit of luck. I found the last place she stayed before quitting London. She had a room around the corner from the museum. The dates fit; she checked out on the sixteenth of August. But she left no forwarding address, and no one there had any idea where she might have gone.” “It seems hopeless,” Julia said. That seemed a concise summation of the state of affairs – it seemed quite hopeless, and I was beginning to wonder why I had let myself be panicked into making the trip in the first place. One reason, of course, was the emotional state of Mrs. Horowitz. Alarm is contagious, and the woman was profoundly alarmed. But it was also true that Phaedra’s letters did nothing to dispel this alarm. There was the last letter from England: I don’t remember what I told Mrs. Horowitz. I calmed her as well as I could, then took Minna back to the apartment, disconnected the telephone, and worked nonstop on the thesis for three days and two nights. I speeded things up by fabricating most of the footnotes. Karen Dietrich paid me my thousand dollars. I cashed her check while the ink was still drying, put the bills in my money belt and the belt around my waist, threw things into a flight bag, boarded a reluctant Minna at Kitty Bazerian’s in Brooklyn, considered and rejected risking a direct flight to London, and caught – with less than ten minutes to spare – an Aer Lingus jet to Shannon and Dublin. The British government has my name on several lists, and I had a feeling they might give me a hard time. The Irish also have me listed as a subversive – I’m a member of the Irish Republican Brotherhood – but they don’t make a fuss about that sort of thing. Since most people are trying to get out of the country, they’ve never been able to take illegal entry very seriously. But all I saw of Ireland was the inside of Dublin Airport. I had breakfast there before catching a BEA flight to London. You don’t have to show a passport to get from Ireland to England. The flight was routine, except for the casual regurgitation of several babes in arms, and in due course I was in London and on my way to Nigel Stokes’ flat in Kings Cross. And I was still there. I had corresponded with Nigel over the years and met him once in New York when a play of his made a brief appearance on Broadway. He was a fellow member of the Flat Earth Society and had been working for years to build an elaborate true-to-scale two-dimensional globe, a project I greatly admired. Julia didn’t. She thought the whole thing was madness. Nigel damn well knew it was madness, and took great delight in it. And now, pouring us each a second cup of tea, he said, “This is madness, you know.” But he wasn’t talking about the shape of the earth. “I know.” “It’s bad enough looking through haystacks for needles, but you don’t really know that it’s a needle you’re hunting, do you? I was thinking about that letter, Evan. Somehow I don’t think a travel agent-” I nodded. “I’ve been keeping busy, that’s all.” “Quite. And employment bureaus – oh, that’s possible, of course, but somehow I don’t think you’ll have much luck. It’s rather a case of going around Robin Hood’s barn, isn’t it?” “It is,” I agreed. Julia drew up a chair and sat down between us. “Have you thought of going to Baghdad?” “That’s ridiculous,” her brother said. “Where would he begin looking in Baghdad?” I closed my eyes. He was right – it would be quite pointless to try looking for Phaedra in Baghdad. And Julia, for her part, seemed able to read minds, because I bad been thinking of doing just that, ridiculous or no. Nigel stroked his moustache. “Perhaps I’ve been seeing too many films, but – Evan, let me see that letter again, will you?” I quoted it to him by rote. “Yes, I thought so. You know, I get the impression of some sort of cloak-and-dagger operation here, don’t you? Spies and such, midnight rides on the Orient Express. What do you think?” “Mmmm,” I said neutrally. The same thought had occurred to me, but I had tried to suppress it. Some time ago I found myself working for a nameless man who heads a nameless U.S. undercover operation. I’m not being coy – I don’t know his name or its. Since then he’s been under the impression that I work for him, and now and then I do. For that reason, thoughts of cloaks and daggers come to mind rather more often than they ought to, and in this case I had discounted them. But- “Evan?” I looked up. “Now here you have a girl who’d come to London, where as far as we know she didn’t know a soul. She might make friends, but-” “But they wouldn’t make her,” I said. “Pardon?” “Nothing. Go on.” “Quite. Now I can’t see MI 5 knocking on her door in Russell Square, can you? Nor do I think she’d have gone the rounds of the employment agencies, and I don’t suppose she had much money-” “Probably not.” “-so I wonder if she mightn’t have answered a Personal in the “No.” I straightened up. “I should have thought of that myself. We would want the issues for the first two weeks in August. I suppose the newspaper offices have them on file, or is there a library that-” “Courtney,” Julia said. “Why, of course,” Nigel said. “Courtney Bede.” He turned to me. “There’s an old fellow who keeps every issue of the The English have certain words that are better than ours. Courtney Bede was daft. He was a short, round man who might have been anywhere from fifty to ninety – it was quite impossible to tell. He performed some backstage function in the theater and lived alone in a basement apartment in Lambeth not far from the Old Vic. There, in four sizable rooms, he existed as a rather orderly version of the Collier brothers. He saved things. He saved string, and empty bottles, and bits of metal, and theater programs, and keys that didn’t fit anything, and all of the items that most people throw out. His collections, which he showed me with more pride than I thought justified, did not really thrill me as much as he felt they should. But he did have newspapers, all right. Ten years’ worth of all of the London papers, stacked neatly in piles by date. “And not one of ’em cost me a ha’penny,” he said, poking out his stomach for emphasis. “ London ’s full of fools and spendthrifts, lad. Men and women what’ll pay sixpence for a paper and throw it away after a single reading. I get all me papers every day, and not one of ’em that costs me a ha’penny.” “And you read all the papers yourself?” “Oh, I’ll give a glance at one now and then. Mondays I’ll generally have a look at Sunday’s I told him the issues we wanted. This August was easy, he said, but if it was two or three Augusts ago we wanted it wouldn’t take ten minutes to dig ’em out for us. He found the issues, and Nigel and I divided them up and went through the long columns of personal ads. There were endless appeals for donations to obscure charities, odd coded notices, occasional sex solicitations by self-styled models, palmists, strict governesses, YOUNG WOMEN – an opportunity for adventure and foreign travel with generous remuneration. Applicants must be unattached, security minded. Apply in person, Carradine, No. 67, Great Portland Street. Discretion expected and assured. “It needn’t be that,” Nigel pointed out. “Might be any of these we checked, you know. ‘Companion wanted for journey to Continent,’ anything of that sort.” “Still…” “Yes, it does look promising. Damn, I’ve got to get to the theater. If you’d like, I’ll go round to Great Portland Street with you in the morning.” “I’ll go now.” “I shouldn’t think they’d be open, actually.” “I don’t even think they exist,” I said. “That’s what I want to find out.” The building on Great Portland Street housed a dealer in coins and medals on the ground floor, with the other four floors broken up into a variety of small offices, all of which were closed for the day. The name Carradine did not appear either on the directory posted on the first floor or on any of the office doors. I waited in the coin and medal shop while a small boy and his father selected several shillings’ worth of small foreign coins. The transaction took an inordinate amount of time, and when it was finally completed the clerk seemed relieved that I didn’t want to buy anything. “Carradine,” he said. “Carradine, Carradine. Would that be a Mr. Carradine, do you suppose, or the name of the establishment?” I told him his guess was as good as mine, if not better. “Carradine,” he said again. “August, you say. First fortnight of August. Would you excuse me for a moment, sir? I’ll ask our Mr. Talbot.” He disappeared into the back, then reappeared a few moments later. “If you’ll step into the back room, sir, our Mr. Talbot will see you.” Our Mr. Talbot was a red-faced man with uncommonly large ears. He sat at a rolltop desk dipping coins into a glass of clear liquid and wiping them on a soft rag. The solution, whatever it was, managed to turn the coins bright and silvery while staining the tips of our Mr. Talbot’s fingers dark brown. “Carradine,” he said. “Never met the gentleman, but I do recall the name. Late summer, I think. Don’t believe he was here long. Have you tried the owner?” I hadn’t. He gave me a name and address and telephone number, and I thanked him. He said, “Not a collector, are you?” I admitted that I wasn’t. He grunted and resumed dipping coins. I thanked the clerk on the way out and called the building’s owner from a booth down the block. A voice assured me the man was out and no one knew when he might be returning. I thought for a moment, then called again and announced that I was an inquiry agent interested in the whereabouts of a former tenant. The same voice introduced itself as the owner. Evidently he’d been avoiding some tenant who wanted his office painted; landlords, after all, are the same the whole world over. He told me what I wanted to know. A Mr. T. R. Smythe-Carson had taken a third-floor office under the name of Carradine Imports in late July, paid a month’s rent in advance, left before the month was over, and provided no forwarding address. For form’s sake, I looked for Smythe-Carson in the telephone directory. He wasn’t there, and I wasn’t surprised. There are some nights when I envy those who sleep. I have not slept since World War 2.1, when a sliver of North Korean shrapnel entered my mind and found its way to something called the sleep center, whereupon I entered a state of permanent insomnia. I was eighteen when this happened, and by now I can barely remember what sleep was like. In the past few years scientists have taken an interest in sleep. They’ve been trying to determine just why people sleep, and what dreams do, and what happens when a person is prevented from sleeping and dreaming. I could probably answer a few of their questions. When a person is prevented from sleeping and dreaming he embraces a wide variety of lost causes, studies dozens of languages, eats five or six meals a day, and uses his life to furnish those elements of fantasy that other men find in dreams. This may not be how it works for every absolute insomniac, but it’s how it works for the only absolute insomniac I know, and for the most part I’m quite happy with it. After all, why waste eight hours a night sleeping when, with proper application, one can waste all twenty-four wide awake? Yet there are times when sleep would be a pleasure, if only because it provides a subjectively speedy way to get from one day to the next when there is absolutely nothing else to do. This was one of those times. Nigel and Julia had repaired to their separate bedrooms. There was no one in London whom I wanted to see. The hunt for Smythe-Carson and Carradine would have to wait until morning. Meanwhile… Meanwhile what? Meanwhile I bathed and shaved and put on reasonably clean clothes and drank tea with milk and sugar and fried up some eggs and bacon and read part of a collection of the Then I read fifty pages of an early Eric Ambler novel, at which point I remembered how it ended. Then I picked up that morning’s copy of the London IF YOU ARE female, under 40, unmarried, intelligent, adventurous, free to travel, opportunity awaits you! Do not mention this ad to others but reply in person at Penzance Export, No. 31, Pelham Court, Marylebone. “Of course it’s Smythe-Carson again,” Nigel said the next morning. “Quite the same sort of message, isn’t it? He’s stopped mentioning the high pay and has-” “And has abandoned Carradine in favor of Penzance,” Julia put in. “And Smythe-Carson for something else, no doubt. And took new offices, but hasn’t left Marylebone. I don’t know just where Pelham Court is, Evan. Julia?” I said, “I was there last night.” “No one home, I don’t suppose?” “No. The building was locked.” I had guessed it would be, but I found the ad around 3:30 and had four hours to kill before Nigel and Julia would get up, and there are times when pointless activity is preferable to inactivity. “So whatever he was doing before-” “He’s doing it again,” I said. “I wonder what it is.” I stood up. “Whatever it is, I’ll find out soon enough. And I’ll find out just what the hell happened to Phaedra, and-” “How?” I looked down at Julia. “Why, I’ll ask him, I suppose.” “But don’t you suppose he’s bent?” I looked puzzled. “I’m sorry, you people say crooked, don’t you?” “Oh.” Two countries, I thought, divided by a single language. “I’m certain he’s working some sort of racket. Oh.” I nodded slowly. For the past few days I had operated on the vague assumption that Phaedra had gone on a tour or taken some form of legitimate employment, after which something went awry. Thus I had shown her photograph to travel agents and employment agencies and had inquired after her by both of her names, in the full expectation of getting an honest answer to an honest question. That line wouldn’t work with Mr. Smythe-Carson. “You might call the police,” Nigel suggested. I thought it over. But if S-C was working a racket, or playing some version of foreign intrigue, it was more than possible that Phaedra was involved to a point where official attention might be a bad idea. Besides, I wasn’t entirely certain how I stood with the police – they might turn out to be displeased with my presence in their country. “I could go round if you’d like,” Nigel went on. “Pass myself off as an inspector from the Yard. I’ve played the bloody part often enough, and the moustache would go well with the role. Or do you think that would just put the wind up him?” “It might.” “Or I could disguise myself as female, under forty, unmarried. Somehow I don’t think that would wash. You might do some sort of exploratory research, Evan. Inquiring about the position on behalf of a female relative, that sort of thing. Give you the feel of the man-” Julia said, “Of course you’ve both overlooked the obvious.” We looked at her. “You ought to send an unmarried female under forty to find out exactly what’s going on. Fortunately I know just the girl. She’s had a bit of acting experience, she’s considered moderately attractive and intelligent, and she’s bloody adventurous.” She stood up, a thin smile on her freshly scrubbed face, a light dancing in her eyes. “I hereby volunteer my services,” she said. So of course we both told her that it was a ridiculous idea, not to say dangerous, not to mention foolhardy. We pointed out that she might compromise herself in any of a number of ways and added that we could not possibly let her risk herself in such a fashion. And, of course, three hours later I was looking through a tea shop window on Pelham Court, waiting for her to return from the offices of Penzance Export just across the street. “It does restore a girl’s confidence,” she said. We were having lunch at a Lyon ’s Corner House a few blocks away from Penzance Export. “One regards oneself as utterly dependent upon the stray pence one ekes out playing chambermaids in bedroom farces, along with the meager income from a legacy and the generosity of one’s brother. At nights I often comfort myself with the thought that I could always turn brass if times went bad, but who would have me?” “I would.” “Oh?” She arched her eyebrows prettily. “You’ll be my first professional client, I promise you.” Her voice turned at once Cockney and sluttish. “Spare a couple of nicker for a short time, guv?” She laughed. “But I digress, don’t I? Mr. Wyndham-Jones has hired me. He seems partial to hyphenated surnames. A low type, I’m afraid. Speaks straight Mayfair, but Whitechapel shines through in spite of all his hard work.” “And he hired you.” “He certainly did.” She grinned suddenly. “I wish you could have been there, Evan. I wish Nigel could have been there. Whenever I’m on stage and he’s in the house I’m just dreadful, and this was the performance of my career. I did a Yorkshire accent” – she demonstrated this – “and I told him my old father had just died and I was quite alone in the world and new in London and I did so want to travel. I made myself the wide-eyed trusting sort, just a shade on the stupid side, but I tried to give the impression that I kept my own counsel and wouldn’t be inclined to confide in anyone.” She sighed. “It worked. I shall be leaving the country at the end of the week for a three-month journey through the Middle East. All of my expenses will be paid and I will receive three hundred pounds at the termination of the trip.” “The Middle East. Phaedra’s card was from Baghdad.” “Yes. The mission’s a lovely one. Shall I tell you about it? Mr. Wyndham Hyphen Jones will be posing as the leader of an archaeological expedition to Turkey and Iraq. An archaeological tour, really. But in actual point of fact, the six or seven girls accompanying him on this trek will not be his passengers but his employees. Or, more precisely, the employees of a we-cannot-mention-the-name mammoth oil company with interests in the area. It will be our vital task to Gather Important Information and Make Necessary Contacts. Isn’t that divine?” “More divine than plausible.” “Quite. I don’t suppose you’ve any idea what his real game is? He knows I’ve no money at all. I read thrillers, so all manner of horrid things have occurred to me, but nothing makes any sense.” “Six or seven pretty but penniless girls. Maybe he’s a sex fiend.” “Just a fiend, I think. I can generally tell when a man responds to me that way. For example, you do, don’t you?” “Uh…” “Why, you’ve gone tongue-tied! If it’s a comfort, I react the same way to you. But Mr. Hyphen – I watched him study me and decide I was attractive without taking the slightest personal interest in the fact. He might enjoy slitting my throat, but I’m afraid that’s the only way I could give him any pleasure.” She shivered, then grinned quickly. “Theatrical response indicating chills and palpitations. Mr. Hyphen strikes me as evil incarnate. Wait until you see him.” “I can’t wait.” “Will tonight do? I’ve a date to meet him at his flat.” “What!” “Color me resourceful. I’d already told him I was penniless, so I thought I’d press it a bit. I hit him up for a tenner on account. He allowed that he’d left his billfold in his other pair of trousers. Quite a transparent fellow – I don’t believe he has another pair of trousers, let alone a spare ten quid. I’m to meet him at his flat at half past eight this evening. He’ll have my ten pounds, along with an employment application for me to fill out.” “You have the address?” “ Old Compton Street in Soho.” “You’re not going, of course.” She rose. “Let’s go back to the flat, Evan. I’m going to Old Compton Street tonight, but my damned brother’s going to voice the same objections as you, and I’d as soon save time by arguing with both of you at once.” The argument wasn’t much of a contest. She had logic on her side, and when Nigel turned out to be easily won over I couldn’t put up much of a fight. I’d planned on keeping the appointment for her, but there was really no reason to presume he would let me in. There was also the chance that he would have company, which would make the odds unfavorable for our side. With Julia running interference for me, we hedged our bets neatly. She could signal to let me know that she was alone, and I could wait in the hallway, prepared to enter when he let her out. Nor would she be in any real danger; whatever his intentions, I’d be lying doggo in the hallway ready to kick the door in if she screamed. Julia said, “But suppose he won’t talk?” We looked at her. “He might not, you know. It would be rather like going to his office and waving pictures under his nose, wouldn’t it?” “Evan will have a gun, dear.” He turned to me. “I can pick you up one from the property department. It won’t shoot, but I don’t suppose you want to shoot anyone. I’ll guarantee that it looks menacing.” “But if he refuses to talk, then what?” “Then Evan will make him talk, love.” “Oh, come now. That’s a line out of the movies. I could believe that of Mr. Hyphen, but Evan’s not a brutal sort.” She put her hand on my arm. “Are you?” I remembered a man named Kotacek, a Slovak Nazi, a doddering invalid who had not wanted to tell me where he kept his lists of the worldwide membership of the Neo-Nazi movement. It took a while, but he told me. I never behaved more inhumanly before or since, but then I’d never been faced with a more inhuman man. “Brutal?” I said. “Everybody’s brutal.” “Oh, Evan, for God’s sake! Everybody’s brutal and each man kills the thing he loves and life is real and life is earnest. But you know what I mean.” Nigel touched her shoulder. His guards’ moustache fairly bristled. “You go too much by manner, love,” he said quietly. “Brutal to him who brutal thinks. I’ve a feeling your Mr. Hyphen will tell Evan anything he wants to know.” |
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