The Confidential Agent (19 page)

‘I don't think so. Hold on.' Even if he couldn't get the coal himself, there must be some way of stopping L. If only he could prove that the murder . . . was a murder. . . .

Rose's voice suddenly said, ‘Who's that?'

He said, ‘The name is Glover.'

‘What do you want? I don't know a Glover.'

‘I live,' he said, ‘at 3, Chester Gardens – nearly next door to the Embassy.'

There was silence at the other end. He said, ‘Of course, if you believe that story – of the suicide pact – you can send the police round to-night. Or if you believe that I am not D. at all.'

She made no reply. Had she rung off? He said, ‘Of course, the girl was murdered. It was ingenious, wasn't it?'

She replied suddenly in a tone of fury, ‘Is that all you care?'

He said, ‘I shall kill whoever did it. . . . I am not sure yet . . . I want the right person. One can't afford to kill more than one . . .'

‘You're crazy. Can't you get out of the country, go home?'

‘They would probably shoot me. Not that that matters. But I shouldn't like L. . . .'

She said, ‘You're too late. They've signed.'

‘I was afraid . . .' He said, ‘Do you know what the contract is? I don't see how they can hope to get the coal out of the ports. There's the neutrality agreement.'

She said, ‘I'll ask Furt.'

‘Has he signed, too?'

‘Yes, he's signed.' Somebody was playing the piano again and singing; it seemed to be an Entrenationo song: the word korda, korda came in a lot. Presently she said, ‘He couldn't do anything else.' She excused him, ‘When all the others signed . . . the shareholders . . .'

‘Of course.' He felt an odd prick of jealousy because she had taken the trouble to defend Forbes. It was like sensation painfully returning to a frozen hand. He didn't love, he was incapable of loving anyone alive, but nevertheless the prick was there.

She said, ‘Where are you? I keep on hearing the oddest sounds . . .'

‘At a soirée,' he said. ‘That's what they call it. Of the Entrenationo School.'

‘You're such a fool,' she said despairingly. ‘Don't you realise there's a warrant out for you? Resisting arrest. Forged passport. God knows what else.'

He said, ‘It seems safe here. We are eating rock buns.'

‘Why be such a fool?' she said. ‘You're old enough – aren't you – to look after yourself.'

He said, ‘Will you find out for me – from Forbes?'

‘You didn't mean that, did you, about killing . . . ?'

‘Yes, I meant that.'

The voice came fiercely and vividly out of the vulcanite: she might have been standing at his elbow, accusing him. ‘So you did love the little bitch?'

‘No,' he said. ‘Not more than all the others. There have been four raids to-day. I daresay they've killed fifty children besides her . . . one has to get one's own back a little.' He suddenly realised how absurd it all was. He was a confidential agent employed in an important coal deal on which the fate of a country might depend; she was a young woman, the daughter of a peer whose coal he wanted, and the beloved, apparently, of a Mr Forbes who also controlled several mines and kept a mistress in Shepherd's Market (that was irrelevant); a child had been murdered by the manageress or Mr K. – acting, presumably, on behalf of the rebels, although they were employed by his own people. That was the situation: a strategical and political – and criminal – one. Yet here they were talking to each other down the telephone like human beings, jealous of each other, as if they were in love, as if they had a world at peace to move about in, and the whole of time.

She said, ‘I don't believe it. You must have loved her.'

‘She was only fourteen I should think.'

‘Oh, I daresay you've reached the age when you like them young.'

‘No.'

‘But you can't do anything of that kind here – killing, I mean – don't you understand? They'll hang you. Only the Irish try that on here – and they are always hanged.'

‘Oh well . . .' he said vaguely.

‘Oh God,' she said. ‘The door's been open all the time.' There was silence; then she said, ‘I've probably given you away. They'll have guessed – after the newspapers. Probably Scotland Yard's listening in now. They could have dialled 999 on the downstairs 'phone.'

‘Who are they?'

‘Oh, the maid or my friend. You can't trust anyone. Get away from there – wherever you are.'

‘Yes,' he said. ‘It's time to move on. Bona nuche.'

‘What on earth's that?'

‘Entrenationo,' he said and rang off.

He opened the door into the waiting-room; there were fewer people about, less buns, the coffee was cooling in the urn. Mr K. stood against the counter grasped firmly in the conversational hold of Miss Carpenter. D. made for them and Mr K. wilted – it occurred to D. that he didn't look like the kind of man you killed. On the other hand he was a traitor and somebody had got to die. It was unsporting, perhaps, but Mr K. might be the easiest – he would be a warning to other traitors. He said to Miss Carpenter, ‘I'm afraid I've got to tear away your escort,' drawing on a pair of gloves he must be careful not to take off again.

‘I won't go,' Mr K. said, and Miss Carpenter pouted delightedly and set a wool bobble swinging.

‘It's really important,' D. said, ‘or, of course, I would never take him.'

‘I don't see,' Miss Carpenter said playfully, ‘that it could be so important.'

‘I have been on to my Embassy,' D. said. His imagination was unbridled, he feared nobody: it was his turn to be feared, and he felt exhilaration like laughter in his brain. ‘We have been discussing the possibility of setting up an Entrenationo centre at home.'

‘What's that?' Dr Bellows asked. He appeared at the buffet with a dark middle-aged woman in pink cretonne. The mild eyes gleamed excitedly. ‘But how – in the middle of a war?'

‘It's no good fighting,' D. said, ‘for a particular civilisation if we don't – at the same time – keep it alive behind the lines.' He felt a very slight horror at his own appalling fluency, a very little regret at the extravagant hopes he had aroused beside the coffee urn, in the dingy office. The old liberal eyes were full of tears. Dr Bellows said, ‘Then some good may come of all the anguish.'

‘So you'll understand if I and my countryman here – we must rush away.' It was the wildest story, but no story is too wild for a man who hopes. . . . Everyone in this room lived in an atmosphere of unreality: high up above Oxford Street in an ivory tower, waiting for miracles. Dr Bellows said, ‘I never thought when I got up this morning . . . so many years . . . this is the birthday of my life. That was what one of our poetesses wrote.' He held D.'s hand: everybody was watching: Miss Carpenter wiped the corner of her eye. He said, ‘God bless you, all of you.'

Mr K. said, ‘I will not go. I will not go,' but nobody paid him any attention. He was hustled out beside D. towards the lift by the lady in cretonne, hauled on his road. . . . In his fear he lost his English altogether – he began to beseech them all to wait and listen in a language only D. could understand. He looked ill, beaten . . . he sought in Entrenationo to express something, anything. He said, ‘Mi korda, Mi korda,' white about the lips, but nobody else was talking Entrenationo now, and then they were together in the lift going down. Dr Bellows' face disappeared: his waistcoat buttons: his boots – he wore boots. Mr K. said, ‘There's nothing you can do. Nothing.'

D. said, ‘You've got nothing to fear if you weren't concerned in her death. Keep close beside me. Don't forget I have that revolver.' They walked side by side into Oxford Street: suddenly Mr K. side-stepped, somebody came in between: they were separated by shop-window gazers. Mr K. began to dart down the pavement, zig-zagging. He was a small man and agile, but short-sighted; he bumped into people and went on without apology. D. let him go: it was no good pursuing him through the crowd. He called a taxi and said to the driver, ‘Go as slow as you can. There's a drunk friend of mine just in front – I've lost him in the crowd. He needs a lift before he gets in any trouble.' Through the window he could watch Mr K.: he was wearing himself down: it all helped.

Mr K. bounded from right to left and back again; people turned round and stared at him. A woman said, ‘Ought to be ashamed,' and a man said, ‘Guinness ain't good for
him
.' His steel spectacles had slipped halfway down his nose, and every now and then he looked backwards: his umbrella got between people's legs, and a child howled at the sight of his little scared red eyes. He was creating a sensation. At the corner of South Audley Street he ran full tilt into a policeman. The policeman said kindly, ‘Hi! You can't behave like that here.' Mr K. stared up at him, his eyes blind above his glasses.

‘Now go home quietly,' the policeman said.

‘No,' Mr K. said suddenly, ‘no.'

‘Put your head under the tap and go to bed.'

‘No.' Mr K. suddenly put his head down and rammed it at the policeman's stomach – ineffectually: a big gentle hand diverted him. ‘Do you want to come to the station?' the policeman asked mildly. A small crowd collected. A man with a high hollow voice in a black hat said, ‘You've no reason to interfere: he was doing no harm.'

‘I only said . . .' the policeman began.

‘I heard what you said,' the stranger retorted quickly. ‘On what charge, may I ask, do you intend . . .'

‘Drunk and disorderly,' the policeman said.

Mr K. watched with an appearance of wild hope: he forgot to be disorderly.

‘Nonsense,' the stranger said. ‘He's done nothing. I'm quite prepared to stand in the witness-box . . .'

‘Now, now, now,' the policeman said indignantly, ‘What's all the fuss about ? I only told him to go home to bed.'

‘You suggested he was drunk.'

‘He is drunk.'

‘Prove it.'

‘What's it to do with you, anyway?'

‘This is supposed to be a free country.'

The policeman said plaintively, ‘What I want to know is – what have I
done
?'

The man in the black hat produced a card and said to Mr K., ‘If you want to charge this constable with slander, I am quite prepared to give evidence.' Mr K. held the card as if he didn't understand. The policeman suddenly flung his arms above his head and shouted at the crowd, ‘Get on there. Move on.'

‘Do nothing of the kind,' the stranger said sharply. ‘You are all witnesses.'

‘You'll make me lose my patience,' the policeman said with a breaking voice. ‘I warn you.'

‘What of? Speak up now. What of?'

‘Interfering with an officer in the performance of his duty.'

‘Duty!' the stranger said sarcastically.

‘But I am drunk,' Mr K. said suddenly, imploringly, ‘I am disorderly.' The crowd began to laugh. The policeman turned on Mr K.. ‘Now you've started again,' he said. ‘We aren't concerned with you.'

‘Oh yes, we are,' the stranger said.

A look of agony crossed the policeman's face. He said to Mr K., ‘Now, why don't you get quietly into a taxi and go home?'

‘Yes. Yes. I'll do that,' Mr K. said.

‘Taxi!'

The taxi drew up beside Mr K. and he grabbed thankfully at the handle, opened the door. D. smiled at him and said, ‘Step in.'

‘An' now,' the policeman said, ‘for you – whatever your name is.'

‘My name is Hogpit.'

‘No more back answers,' the policeman said.

Mr K. backed on to the pavement. He said, ‘Not that taxi. I won't take that taxi.'

‘But my name
is
Hogpit.' Several people laughed. He said angrily, ‘It's no funnier than Swinburne.'

Mr K. struggled to get by.

‘Moses!' the policeman said. ‘You again.'

‘There's a man in that taxi . . .' Mr K. said.

D. got out and said, ‘That's all right, officer. He's a friend of mine. He
is
drunk – I lost him up the road at the “Carpenters' Arms”.' He took Mr K.'s arm and led him firmly back. Mr K. said, ‘He'll kill me,' and tried to flop on to the pavement. ‘Would you mind giving me a hand, officer?' D. said. ‘I'll see he's no more trouble.'

‘That's all right, sir. I'm glad to be rid of him.' He bent and lifted Mr K. as if he were a baby and piled him on to the floor of the taxi. Mr K. cried weakly, ‘I tell you he's been following me . . .' The man whose name was Hogpit said, ‘What right have you to do that, constable? You heard what he said. How do you know he's not telling the truth?'

The constable slammed the door and turned. He said, ‘Because I use my judgment . . . an' now are
you
going to go quietly?' The taxi drove on. The group slipped backwards gesticulating. D. said, ‘You only made yourself look a fool.'

‘I'll break the window. I'll scream,' Mr K. said.

‘If the worst came to the worst,' D. said in a low voice, as if he meant to confide a secret, ‘I'd shoot.'

‘You couldn't get away. You wouldn't dare.'

‘That's the kind of argument they use in stories. It doesn't apply any more in these days. There's a war on: it's not likely that any of us will “get away”, as you call it, for long.'