Sion Crossing (7 page)

“What did he say?”

Mitchell bridled slightly. “Well … he gave me the Oxbridge Club in the end, when I pushed him a bit.”

“The Oxbridge?”

“He goes there sometimes, after work. The drinks are marvellously cheap—you wouldn’t know … but they are. David goes there too, as it happens …”

“You went to the Oxbridge last night?”

“Well … yes … I mean, not directly after Fatso’s call—I had to play this dominoes match first, down the pub … and got quite disastrously trounced by those rascally accountants from Procter and Sykes in the Haymarket—at five pence a spot and the drinks. It cost me a small fortune.”

“Why?”

“Well, I think they’ve got a system—”

“Not the damn dominoes! Why … why did you go and check on Latimer? Is that what you did?”

“Yes, damn it! And I’ve been telling you
why
, James: he acted out of character, and that makes me curious. And when I’m curious I want to know more, that’s all. So now I want to know if Fatso’s done anything since he phoned—and that’s all, too!” Mitchell shrugged. “It’s not much to ask. If I’d been on last night I’d already know.” Another shrug. “I already know he phoned in again, this morning. But the log says just ‘routine check’. Was it just a routine check?”

It was Cable who was curious now. “What did you find out at the Oxbridge, Paul?”

“You really want blood, don’t you!”

“If I’m going to break the rules I do—yes. What happened at the Oxbridge?”

Mitchell made a face at him, and swivelled his head as though his neck hurt him and he was exercising tender muscles gingerly. “Exactly … I don’t know …”

“But something
did
happen?” Cable was beginning to worry. “Come on, Paul!”

Mitchell shook his head. “I didn’t want to push things too far … I’m damn certain the Steward there … that’s Wilberforce, who was a college scout at Oxford before he was recruited by the club committee … I’m damn certain he knows more than he’s telling—that was one reason why they took him on, because he knows when to put the telescope to his blind eye, as well as when to hold his tongue… . But you’re right: something odd did happen there last night. And there is one thing that I do know.”

“Which is?”

“Howard Morris was there. And at just about the same time that Fatso phoned us—or … just about the right time
before
he phoned us anyway.”

“Yes?” That was inviting a cause-and-effect conclusion.

“But he was looking for David Audley—that’s what they said at the bar. And there were some rum types swanning about upstairs after that.”

“Rum types?”

“Chaps in ill-fitting dinner-jackets, with bulges in the wrong places. That was all I could get before Wilberforce cut off further communication. ‘Members’ private business is their own’ is his motto … when someone’s slipped a crisp Florence Nightingale into his sweaty palm, of course.” Paul Mitchell gave Cable a jaundiced look. “But David Audley fits very well with Howard Morris. Only …”

“He doesn’t fit with Latimer?”

“He doesn’t fit at all with Fatso. Certainly not well enough to argue about who won the battle of Gettysburg.” Mitchell tried to look innocent. “So what about this morning’s routine call, then?”

“It was just routine. ‘Any Calls? Any red star post?’ That sort of thing. But …” Cable looked as though he was tempted to give evil for good, but only briefly “… he confirmed that letter in Colonel Butler’s in-tray. And he said he’d be unavailable for a few days, but he’d be ringing in at regular intervals.”

“Unavailable?”

They looked at each other.

“Just that.” They both knew that that was another action out-of-character: Oliver St John Latimer was a notorious non-taker of leave, a notorious workaholic. “So what do we do?”

Mitchell thought hard for a moment, frowning with the effort. “We can run a trace on his calls, I suppose.”

“It would have to be logged.”

“Which means he’ll see it? Point taken.” Mitchell smiled. “Why should you stick your neck out for my curiosity? But … I’m in the barrel here on Sunday, and I don’t give a bugger what Oliver St John Latimer sees or doesn’t see. So I’ll run the trace then.” He nodded at his friend. “Probably better so, actually—he’ll keep for twenty-four hours. And no one’ll be able to accuse me of indecent haste.”

Cable stared back at him rather doubtfully. “You think there
is
something, don’t you!”

Mitchell shook his head. “No. No … that would be pitching it too strong by a long way. If it was David … now, David is capable of all sorts of eccentricities—as we both know. But Oliver St John Latimer, he doesn’t stray from the straight and narrow, so the odds are against. Like I said, James, it’s more concern—concern plus hope, I would admit that.”

“Hope?”

“Oh yes … I’d dearly love Fatso to step off the path of virtue, and for me to be the one to catch him—I’d risk running a trace on him for that any day. But …
the American Civil War
, James: all I can smell is verbena and mimosa and magnolia-in-the-moonlight—does magnolia have a smell? And fresh mint in the juleps … no matter how much I’d
like
to smell brimstone and sulphur. I just don’t understand it, that’s all.”

The thing was done, thought Mitchell. One way or another …
it was done!

One way … it was just possible that he’d underrated his friend, and that dear James had seen through his pretended disdain both of Latimer and of Latimer’s promotion, and had glimpsed his genuine fears for his own long-term advancement if Latimer had any say in the matter. But he’d more or less covered that possibility by frankly admitting how much he’d like to see Fatso fall arse over tip. And, with good-men-and-true such as James, such frank admissions were generally disbelieved and discounted, and treated rather as proof of the exact opposite—like the terrified subaltern on the Somme who had admitted to his company commander before the battle that he was scared, only to be rewarded with “Jolly Good! That’s the spirit!”

Well … it might be so. But it was much more likely that dear old James would now want to do The Right Thing—that he would scorn leaving the responsibility to his friend Mitchell (with James it wouldn’t be a matter of taking the credit, that would never even occur to him), and would therefore take the responsibility himself.

And that, in turn, would mean … what?

The lift shuddered, and Mitchell stared for a moment at the closed doors, which were about to open.

In Cable’s place he’d be on the blower now to Colonel Butler, at the very least to get a sight of what was in that envelope, to find out what Fatso was up to, this fine Saturday morning.

And, of course, that might reveal absolutely nothing. Or, worse, something absolutely innocent.

In which case, it would be on poor old James’s head, for he would never peach on his old friend Paul—his old friend who had, anyway, insisted on taking the responsibility!

So his old friend Paul would be in the clear there. Which would be just as well, because his old friend Paul was already regarded by the Colonel with a slightly jaundiced and equivocal eye as an acolyte and graduate-pupil of the egregious David Audley. Mitchell grimaced at himself—at the faint, distorted reflection of himself—in the polished doors. And then they opened.

He stepped out into the passage.

However badly he felt about himself on occasion, and about the way doing-the-right-thing-for-the-wrong-reason didn’t trouble his conscience one bit, he had the most intense feeling that this was one of the times when he wasn’t wrong.

It was almost a physical manifestation. Not a chest pain, or a creeping cold up the back between the shoulders, and least of all the pricking of the thumbs, which David Audley always quoted at him. It was nowhere, and it was everywhere at once.

And it was quite ridiculous, quite irrational. But he had fought it once, and someone he loved had died for that error. So he wasn’t going to fight it now, even though it was that plump, hostile, self-satisfied slug Oliver St John Latimer that was its subject.

Sergeant-Major Gammon was still on the door, picking winners from the newspaper in his little cubicle.

Gammon looked up. “Still here, Mr Mitchell? An’ on a Saturday?” He shook his head, mock-disapproving.

“A-serving of Her Majesty, Mr Gammon.” He could never quite pluck up enough courage to address Gammon as ‘Sar-Major’, as both Butler and Audley did from the eminence of their military service. “The ceaseless, sleepless watch, you know.”

“Oh yes?” Gammon studied the duty book. “But … you’re not on until Sunday midday—?” He looked up again at Mitchell, curious as always about deviations from routine; for that, after all, was one of the things he was paid to do. “How’s that new book of yours comin’ on, then? The 1915 one?”

Mitchell shook his head. “I don’t think much of that is going to get written this weekend.” He felt in his pocket for the paper he had prepared. “This is where I’ll be the next twenty-four hours, where I can be contacted quickly. Okay?”

“Right you are, sir.” Gammon slid the paper under his bulldog clip, his curiosity satisfied, which was neither vulgar nor idle, but purely professional and quite unconcerned.

The thing was done, thought Mitchell again. Now nature had to take its course, for better or worse.

IT WAS HOT
as hell in Atlanta.

And, worse than hot, it was humid—was hell humid? wondered Latimer morosely. Probably it was, since it must be designed for maximum discomfort, and that was a combination undoubtedly achieved here, besides which the very worst that England could manage was laughably temperate. Except that the effort of laughing was beyond him in such an oven.

The heat enveloped him, and three breaths of it were enough—one in disbelief, one in realization and the third only forced on him by the time required to retreat back into the terminus.

From the relative comfort of the interior he took another look around, outside and inside, trying to impose the wretched woman’s face from memory on to any of the faces within range. The snapshot had revealed only head and shoulders, so he didn’t really know whether she was tall or short, thin or fat. Neither plain nor pretty, and certainly neither ugly nor beautiful, was all memory gave him back … although there had been cheekbones … ? High cheekbones, somehow suggesting height and thinness?

He swivelled around, looking for cheekbones, and hoped that she wouldn’t be too tall, to the extent that she would be able to look down on him. There were certainly women enough to choose from, all shapes and sizes and ages, some of them quite good-looking, and some of them—more of them, in fact—decidedly plump, even undoubtedly fat. And the men too … there were some comfortingly tubby men around, beside whose circumference his own excess inches were unremarkable, if not insignificant—

Damn! He was not meant to be studying
men
(but there was another splendid fattie; and the way that tall, heavily armed, uniformed guard filled his immaculate uniform suggested that he was also heading for spectacular bulk)—no, it was a
woman
—

The guard started to turn, and Latimer decided to give up his search before he became a suspicious foreign loiterer, the old instinct for unobtrusiveness asserting itself out of the distant past.

He walked meekly to the nearest bench and sat down, tucking his travelling case beside him. Something had gone wrong, but it was nothing to worry about: simply, the wretched daughter—stepdaughter—was late, and as this was a big airport, with all the traffic which big airports generated (and, no doubt, this being the home of the automobile, even more traffic here, hard though that was to imagine after Gatwick) there was nothing remarkable in that. And, anyway, even if she never turned up, it was of no real importance, for this wasn’t
work
, and was therefore not important. It was, after all, only a favour.

His eye rested on a portly couple chivvying two identically T-shirted children, and wondered what the slogan “
ATLANTA BRAVES
” meant. Atlanta had certainly braved General William Tecumseh Sherman, and had been burned to the ground for its pains. But as he could not read the small print on the shirt, the present danger it was braving was lost on him.

Perhaps it was the temperature outside: that would have to be braved sooner or later. Indeed, if that was the seasonal norm for Georgia in late August and early September, then here was an extra insight into what he had been reading about on the plane, which none of his historians had thought to point out. For it had been just about now—the city had fallen on September 6—that the bone-headed General Hood had contested the place with that egregious hypocrite Sherman, who hated war but was in the direct line from Scipio Africanus at Carthage, via Tilly at Magdeburg and Cromwell at Drogheda, to Hitler at Rotterdam and Coventry and the Allies at Dresden… . But, regardless of his vestigial memory of historical crimes, if that was typical Georgian weather outside, 1860s and 1980s alike, the siege of Atlanta must have been a truly hellish business for the farm boys in blue and grey, from North and South, Union and Confederate … Except that they must at least have been acclimatized from birth to it, with only the fittest surviving—this was Darwin’s own lifetime, after all, and he must have observed nineteenth century human beings long before he had set eyes on those Galapagos finches and turtles… . But … it was one thing to plough and sow, and reap and mow—the blue-coated Northern boys from Illinois and Iowa and Michigan in Sherman’s armies would have done all those things; presumably, some of the boys from Georgia and Carolina had had negroes to do the cotton-picking, but there must have been many more who had done their own hard work… . But, whatever they did, none of them had been trained to march and fight and kill each other in such hellish weather, surely?

That was the mystery which had long eluded him, though not with these strangers from Georgian plantations and Senator Cookridge’s endless corn-belt, but with his own slightly older peers, and their immediate European ancestors:
what was it like, what was it really like, to get out of the trench and to stand up amongst the bullets? And what had nerved them to do it, in that last second, when the legs took chargé, pushing them upwards and forwards against higher reason and lower commonsense alike?