Flashback (The Saskia Brandt Series Book Two) (24 page)

The man smiled from the corner of his mouth and said, ‘How do you do?’

As Constantin Wittenbacher, Cory smiled back and said, ‘Very well, thank you.’

Then the young pilot was gone and Bennett called, ‘Mr Wittenbacher, is it? Do come in.’

The Air Vice-Marshal’s office was bright and spacious. The window overlooked the runway. An Avro Lancastrian was chocked up and gleaming in the sun. Men were standing on its wings. In groups of three, they were directing a fuel hose into the tanks.

Don Bennett was a short man who wore a suit with slightly baggy trousers, the English style. He was underweight, too, and Cory had no difficulty imagining him as an anxious and strict director. As Cory approached, Bennett switched from placing his knuckles on his desk to putting his hands on his hips until finally he reached out to shake hands. He was about forty, but his eyes were cynical and the constant motion of his body suggested a man bothered by time.

‘Constantin Wittenbacher,’ said Cory. ‘I am entirely at your service, Air Vice-Marshal.’

‘Please sit down.’

Cory tapped his cane against his shin. ‘I would prefer to stand.’

With an abrupt, interrogative tone, Bennett said, ‘German, are you?’

Cory knew that his worth was being weighed. There was an openness about Bennett’s expression that suggested this was nothing more than, say, an enquiry about Cory’s eligibility for a drinking club. Cory’s augmentations offered a numerical index of Bennett’s credulity by combining blink rate, vocal stress, and skin conductance, but he ignored these data. This came down to tradecraft. He had to win his support. He wove his words from the fictional threads of Wittenbacher, whose half-memories informed his own.

‘Air Vice-Marshal, my name is Colonel Constantin Martin Wittenbacher. I was formerly with fighter squadrons 26, 27 and 44.’

Bennett tipped his head back and opened his mouth as though this exactly confirmed his suspicion. He walked around the desk and stood next to Cory.

‘What did you fly?’

‘The Henschel H-123, Bf 109, and the Messerschmidt Me 262.’

Bennett leaned forward. ‘The 262? There’s a plane I’d like to fly.’

‘I flew it under Nowotny,’ said Cory. ‘It was a beautiful machine.’

‘How many successes, Colonel?’

‘Ninety-nine.’

‘One off a century.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘Well,’ said Bennett. The interest in his eyes had begun to fade. He walked around his desk and collapsed in his reclining chair. ‘What brings you to Buenos Aires?’

‘Some friends connected me with Peron’s associates in Berlin. Apparently, the man wants to build an air force. I was invited here to act as a consultant.’

‘A bit ruddy late for Peron to start up,’ Bennett said. He checked himself, looked for Cory’s reaction, and continued in a more confidential manner. ‘For all the favours we’ve done Argentina over the years, they were too bone idle to help us out when we needed them. Peron is a tricky customer, though. I’ve met him. He needs to learn some manners. Our problem is that Peron is well aware of our island’s taste for Argentine beef.’

‘Indeed.’

Bennett stood. Cory let the haughty eyes of the AVM sweep him from brogues to oiled hair-parting. Bennett did not blink easily. Just as Cory began to fear his Plan B had not worked – perhaps, after all, he would have to fight his way to Harkes and damn the consequences – Bennett opened a drawer and took out a bottle of Glenkinchie and two shot glasses. He poured two fingers’ worth in each.

‘What shall we drink to?’ said Bennett.

‘How about the elephant in the room?’

‘I don’t know the expression.’

‘It means that I hope you will help me with something very important as-yet unsaid.’

‘Go on.’

Bennett looked over his tumbler as he tipped it back. Cory sank the whisky too and released a contented breath. He put the glass on the desk and turned it, absently, one quarter. He drew upon a notion of Harkes, his quarry. Empathy came with surprising ease.

‘A man has followed me from Lisbon. He wishes me dead.’ How fluently the lies ran. How closely they brushed the truth. ‘He is working for a woman, a widow, who believes I killed her husband during the war.’

‘Well?’ asked Bennett.

Cory looked up. Bennett’s eyes had resumed their interested twinkle.

‘We scrapped over Leiden. Both our aircraft were hit, and we made landings less than a mile apart. I found him first and shot him, but not before he had put a bullet in my leg.’ Cory tapped his shin with his cane once more.

‘British?’ asked Bennett.

‘A Pole.’

Bennett sipped his whisky. ‘Tell me more about your pursuer.’

‘The private detective? He is a... a
schrecklich...
a formidable man. He found my hotel this morning. I fled in the clothes I stand in. My one hope is to escape to Chile.’

‘Do you have your passport?’

‘I do not, sir.’

‘Money?’

‘Gold sovereigns inside my belt. I have enough for whatever I need.’

Bennett waved his hand. It was enough to dismiss the thought of a bribe. Clearly, he considered himself above this. He collected the glasses and returned them to the desk drawer.

‘Paperwork is the plumage of bureaucrats, Colonel, and I don’t intend to spend my life preening it for them. A phone call to our Chilean office will work the requisite wonders. Are you prepared to help me in return?’

‘If I can.’

Bennett opened his blotter. He placed a sheet of headed paper on it and began to write.

‘When you reach Santiago,’ he said, not looking up, ‘you will be met by a man called Jack Leche. He’ll take care of you. Nobody, officially, needs to know of your presence aboard CS-59.’

‘Jack Leche?’

‘Let me be quite clear,’ said Bennett. He stopped writing, looking up this time. ‘His Majesty’s government has an interest in Chile. If you were to work for the Chileans in an advisory capacity, perhaps within their military, I’m sure any information you might pass back to us would be viewed appreciatively. I’m aware that you could disappear over there, even buy your way to Brazil, but I judge you to be a man of honour who will consider himself much obliged.’

‘Do you think a man of honour would spy?’

‘That,’ said Bennett, returning to his blotter, ‘is an excellent question.’

Chapter Thirty-Two

Miss Evans was a capable, pretty young woman in a uniform that reminded Cory of the British WAAF. Her designation ‘Star Girl’ - the BSAA equivalent of stewardess - did not match her countenance, which was part matron, part butler. The impression she made on Cory was striking, to be sure, but this impression faded as the pair approached the passenger lounge. Harkes had to be inside. Cory knew that he carried enhancements that were rudimentary compared to I-Core. All things being equal, Cory would best him. But Harkes knew this, and unless he was stupid – which, as a scientist, Harkes was not – he would assume the advantage by other means.

As Miss Evans opened the door to the passenger lounge, Cory rose to the balls of his feet. He made a flash-bulb inventory of the passengers and referenced the passenger manifest he had glimpsed on the rack in the Star Girls’ office.

Miss Evans said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we will be boarding in a few minutes’ time. This means a slight delay, but Captain Cook is confident we can regain the time during flight. Please may I introduce Herr Wittenbacher?’

With a perfect recollection for names, Miss Evans presented each of the passengers. First was a Middle Eastern man silhouetted against the glass wall. His hands were clasped at his back and he nodded to Cory without expression. ‘Mr Casis Said Atalah,’ said Miss Evans. At an upright piano, stroking notes, was a gentleman with playful eyes. ‘Herr Harald Pagh.’ She turned to another who sat in a wicker recliner smoking a drooped pipe. ‘Mr Jack Gooderham.’ A fourth man, ‘Mr Peter Young,’ was playing cards with an elderly woman, ‘Frau Martha Horniche.’

None of the four men resembled Harkes, and Cory, slipping into the infrared, saw no evidence of twentieth-century plastic surgery. Harkes might have altered his appearance before he escaped, but Cory had not been apprised of this during his briefing, and he discounted the possibility.

‘Delighted to meet you all,’ said Cory. He turned to Miss Evans. ‘I do hope we can take off soon. Is the last passenger due imminently?’

Miss Evans blinked. ‘How attentive of you. We are indeed one short. Mr Simpson has special requirements and has already boarded.’

Cory struggled to quell his triumph.
I have him
, he thought. Harkes was waiting on the plane under the alias Simpson.

‘Is anybody else worried that our captain is called Cook?’ announced Pagh, at the piano. ‘It would give my travel plans an awful crimp if we were eaten by the natives upon arrival.’

‘Oh, Harald,’ said Gooderham, ‘you aren’t even drunk yet. Don’t offend.’

‘Whom do I offend? Tell me.’

Harald Pagh looked around the room, but the other passengers ignored him. Pagh raised his eyebrows at Cory. ‘
Herr Wittenbacher, erkennen Sie diese Melodie?
’ He conjured a tune with a melancholic opening followed by a forlorn chord, and a rising cluster of notes, growing hopeful. Pagh’s hands alternated base and treble, systole and diastole, drawing Cory’s thoughts out and in. Cory opened his mouth, ready to gasp, ‘Stop,’ but bile surged up. What was happening to him? He had barely enough time to command his automata to inhibit the nausea. The music ended with a chord unresolved. Concerned hands closed on his shoulders and arms. He allowed himself to be led to the sofa.

‘Harald,’ said Jack, ‘why must you always play the fool?’

‘It’s just a piece of music. Something by Carmichael, I believe. You must know our dear old aeroplane is called ‘Star Dust’ too.
Herr Wittenbacher, was ist los?
’

‘Here, Mr Wittenbacher,’ said Miss Evans. She put a glass of water to his lips.

Cory swallowed. ‘Thank you.’ He tried to smile. ‘I’ve always found that piece of music... rather moving.’

‘You needn’t be concerned about the flight,’ said Miss Evans.

‘I’m not.’

‘That’s the spirit,’ said an unfamiliar voice. Cory turned to see Peter Young, his playing cards held to his chest, leaning over the sofa. ‘There’s no sense being worried in this day and age.’

‘It’s only across the hills,’ agreed Pagh. ‘And I’ve made the trip hundreds of times.’

‘They are not just hills, Mr Pagh,’ murmured Casis Said Atalah. He had not moved from the window. ‘They are the Andes. And this company has already lost two planes.’

‘Please,’ said Miss Evans. She chuckled. ‘We at BSAA enjoy a reputation for safety that is the envy of the world. Now, I believe it is time we embarked.’

Frau Limpert shuffled to face Mr Atalah. Her widow’s clothing reminded Cory of Jennifer beneath the Jacaranda. ‘
Es bringt nichts, sich über das Reisen Sorgen zu machen. Jede Reise hat ihr Risiko.
’

Dismay fell across all faces, even the Star Girl. Cory frowned. Limpert’s words were muddied by a difficult mix of accents. Finally, a meaning broke through.
Jede Reise hat ihr Risiko
: All travel has its risks.

Harald Pagh played Chopin’s funeral march and flourished his elbows. Nobody laughed. Even Jack Gooderham, his companion, turned away. Pagh closed the piano and slapped his own wrist.

~

As the bus came parallel to the Lancastrian
,
Cory saw
sunlight flicker down each of her twenty-five silver yards. Her engines were loud and blaring. Just fore of the cockpit were the words ‘Star Dust’. Her raised nose was open. A ramp led to the gap, through which ground staff passed sacks of mail. There was a crewman visible inside the cockpit. He waved to the man in charge of the chock cable. The man waved back, then indicated the approaching bus with a tick of the head. Cory watched this exchange and envied its camaraderie. Never more intense was the feeling of being shanghaied. He was isolated from the good people at Project Déjà Vu, among whom he had been a favoured son.

Miss Evans parked upwind of the idling engines. She slipped from the vehicle to station herself by the wing. The passenger door was a rounded rectangle in the fuselage covered by the G of the aircraft’s huge registration code, G-AGWH. The door opened and a uniformed officer emerged.

‘Please approach First Officer Cook directly, ladies and gentlemen,’ called Miss Evans.

‘
Zu viele Köche
,’ muttered Harald Pagh, elbowing Cory. ‘
Sie verderben die Suppe
. Mr Atalah, don’t you agree that too many Cooks spoil the broth? You have a similar idiom in Arabic, of course.’

‘I am Chilean, Mr Pagh,’ said Atalah. His coat whipped in the propeller draught and he fussed with the hem. ‘We do have a proverb about cooking, however.
Nunca defeque más de lo que come
.’

Pagh looked at Cory. ‘What did he say?’

‘‘Never shit more than you eat’.’

Pagh gasped, then erupted in laughter that rivalled the Lancastrian’s engines for volume. ‘Is that so, Mr Atalah?’

‘You had that coming,’ said Jack Gooderham.

‘A pen, Jack! It might prove profitable.’

‘
Grässlicher Spruch
,’ observed Martha Limpert. As she dismounted from the bus, she accepted the forearm of Peter Young. The pair drifted towards the aircraft.

Cory noticed that the burly first officer was checking tickets as passengers boarded. Cory opened the slim wallet that a member of the ground crew had passed to him: he found his expedited ticket and baggage check, and a leaflet about onboard entertainment – chess, jigsaw puzzles, poker dice – medicaments and (Cory smiled) ‘works of reference such as the
Railway A.B.C. Guide
’.

‘Do come along, everyone,’ called Miss Evans. She watched Frau Limpert place her feet uncertainly on the steps. ‘That’s it. Warmer inside.’

While Cory waited, he regarded the
Star Dust
. It was still a Lancaster bomber at heart. Though the nose- and tail-guns had been amputated, the fuselage had been polished to the pointless shine of an infantry boot. Once military, always military.