The Memory Trap (12 page)

Zimin shook his head suddenly. But he was no longer looking at Audley.

Audley turned, just in time to observe Chunky straightening his ill-fitting suit-jacket.

‘Goodbye, Dr Audley.’

The words and Zimin himself passed him together.

‘Goodbye, Colonel—‘

When they had gone he was ashamed to discover that his hands were shaking. So he grasped the railings and admired the Bay of Naples far below him. It would have been a very long drop. But the first outcrop of cliff below him would have silenced whatever sound he might have made.

Then he started thinking about Peter Richardson again.

Between the Russians and the Mafia, Peter had been betrayed somehow. But maybe that wasn’t so very surprising. And it was what Peter would do next that mattered now, anyway.

He began to think about the old days: it was in his memory of them that his only hope now lay.

JUST LIKE THE OLD DAYS

‘I AM NOT
… ‘ he had carefully told Elizabeth ‘ …
as young as I once was.
’
So, as they approached the centre of London, she wasn’t surprised when he appeared to doze off. He had been through a lot, after all. And that made it easy, when a red light caught them in the Bayswater Road, to be out of the car before either Elizabeth or the driver knew what was happening: it was just like the old days!

‘David! What on earth are you doing?’ She threw herself across the seats, her consternation emphasized by the mixture of fatigue and the unnatural light of the street lamps which dawn hadn’t quite cancelled, which together gave her a three-day corpse look. ‘Where are you going—?’

‘Sir!’ The driver added his pennyworth of desperation to hers, all too aware that he was trapped by the lights in the outer lane. ‘We’re to go directly—‘

‘It’s all right.’ He closed the door on them both as the lights changed, flattening himself against the side of the car to let a delivery van pass on the inside lane. ‘Don’t worry.’

A muffled sound from within turned into words as she tried to open the door again, only to have it shut again on her as an early-morning taxi hooted angrily behind. But other vehicles were following the van—damn!

‘David!’ She had the window down. But there was a gap coming up—

‘It’s all right.’ He judged the approaching gap carefully. It would never do to push his luck again so soon after Capri. Tell Sir Jack that I won’t be long—don’t worry, my dear.’

Just like the old days! And no shortness of breath
—
only relief at being able to stretch his legs again. (Don
’
t run! Never run, unless you have to!)

Just like the old days, of course: not many pedestrians around, as yet; but the good morning smell of London—London with its streets not yet fully charged with carbon monoxide: he could breathe it in gratefully, with his country-boy’s memory of it going all the way back to exciting recollections of even older days—even to childhood forays, from steam-trains into Waterloo and on to Hamley’s and a museum before lunch.

But now he was safe enough, anyway—safer after that last turning, after having re-crossed the road, and done all the necessary things which would have been no damn good at all in less advantageous circumstances: poor Miss Loftus and her driver had been not so much out-smarted as out-ranked, and Jack wasn’t the man to penalize them for that, anyway. So he didn’t have to worry about them … only about his own chickens properly coming home to roost.

Now he actually knew where he was, too: he’d jinked to reach Cato Street, which he’d imprinted in his memory long ago because of its famous conspirators … so a quick
right
down and across the Edgware Road, and then
left
into Kendal Street … and then he’d be close to Matthew—?

Always supposing Matthew was at home today—and this early? And one difference between the
old
days and
these
days was that he wasn
’
t absolutely sure which day of the week it was, after so many
alarms
and
excursions
, from one continent across another, and back: did Matthew still keep an eye on his bank mid-week (give or take a day), now that his sons and grandsons and nephews ran it?

He pressed the
Fattorini
button:
now he was going to find out
.

‘Hullo there! Who is that?’

Audley turned his back on Hyde Park. ‘It’s David Audley. Can I come up please?’ He felt himself relax. ‘Please?’

‘
David
—
?
’
From having been slightly foreign, and more than slightly outraged at so early an intrusion, the voice welcomed him immediately, and the door clicked. ‘David!’

‘David!’ As always (or, since he had never called on her at dawn, as he had always imagined her, anyway), Marie-Louise had stepped out of one of her French magazines. ‘You have come for breakfast—at last!’

‘Lady Fattorini—Marie-Louise!’ For the first time since Washington, Audley felt safe. ‘Whatever’s on the menu, you look good enough to eat.’ Safe, but smelly, he thought belatedly as she advanced to embrace him. ‘But don’t hug me, darling: I’m jet-lagged and unfit for civilized company.’

‘Mmm … ‘ The years had augmented Marie-Louise not too much, just comfortably ‘ …
mmm
… I agree! But Matthew is just coming out of the bathroom, I think—‘

‘Matthew has come out of his bath—prematurely.’ The chairman of Armstrong Fattorini Brothers materialized behind his wife, clad in thick grey-black hair and a towel. ‘So you can have my bath, like in the old days. Or you can run another … because you’re not going to get my breakfast.’

‘Hullo, Matt.’ He extricatd himself unwillingly from Marie-Louise: more even than the sight of her, her smell was of safety from an outside world which promised nothing but danger now. ‘I don’t want your bath—or your damn breakfast. I just want to make a couple of phone-calls, that’s all.’

‘Oh yes?’ Sir Matthew Fattorini lifted up one fold of his towel to rub his hairy chest. ‘You’re in trouble, then?’

‘In trouble?’ It was no good lying to Matthew. ‘Of course I’m in trouble.’ Then something more than old aquaintance spiked him. ‘Why should I be in trouble—more than usually?’

Matt considered him briefly. ‘Get the man his breakfast, dear.’ The look focused on Marie-Louise. ‘Put the door on the chain, and don’t answer any more callers.’ The look came back to Audley. ‘And lock up your jewellery and silver.’ The re-directed look concentrated. ‘Or … on second thoughts, my dear … phone up Sands, and tell him to bring the car round to the back.
Then
lock up the silver—
bien entendu
?’

‘Yes, dear.’ Marie-Louise had been a child in Normandy long ago, when Audley’s tank had passed five miles from her family home. So, while she didn’t believe all her husband was telling her, she believed some of it. ‘Matthew is enjoying his fish day, because it is Friday, David. But would you prefer bacon-and-eggs, not kippers—?’

‘Give him the bacon.’ Matthew dismissed her sharply, waiting until she’d gone before continuing. ‘”Jet-lag”, you said—?’

Audley had been thinking hard through Matthew’s warning signals, of which there were altogether too many to take lightly. ‘I’ve been in America, Matt. So what’s the matter?’

Matthew Fattorini’s expression hardened. ‘You just dropped in for breakfast—after all these years—?’ Matthew frowned at his own questions. ‘Well … I suppose, if I must give you the benefit of the doubt—though God only knows why … ‘ He shook his head. ‘But … there’s this major terrorist alert out, David. Isn’t that up your street—the safety of the realm?’

‘Uh-huh?’ The non-committal grunt came naturally now.

‘Didn’t you see the soldiers at the airport? If you’re jet-lagged—‘ Matthew looked at him suspiciously. ‘One of our fellows coming back from Brussels said they had tanks at Heathrow.’

‘I came in through RAF Brize Norton.’ He bought time with a lie. ‘It’s probably just an exercise, Matt.’

Matthew nodded. ‘Yes—that is the official explanation: a “Scheduled Unspecific Routine Exercise”. “
SURE
”
for short. The newspapers are full of it.’

‘So it’s just an exercise then.’ But the suspicion was still there, that he could see. ‘So what’s new?’

‘What’s new?’ Incredulity displaced suspicion. ‘Doesn’t the Russian bit of it count as new? What that idiot on TV described as “double-SURE” last night—anti-terrorist cooperation being just another bit of Glasnost?’ Matthew shook his head. ‘The word in the City yesterday was that they’d started cracking down on all their ports and airfields hours before anything happened in the West. Not “co-operation”—more like cause-and-effect … But you don’t know anything about this? You’re just in one of your own fifty-seven varieties of trouble?’

‘I don’t.’ Being able to answer the first question quickly and fairly honestly gave Audley five seconds’ rest on what had suddenly become a slippery rock-face before he tackled the second. ‘As regards my present predicament, Matt … I wasn’t looking for information, just for a nice safe telephone, that’s all.’

‘Of course, my dear fellow!’ Matthew hitched up his towel with one hand and pointed with the other. ‘In my study there. No scrambler, of course. But I think it’s safe enough … And then breakfast?’ He produced his merchant banker’s smile. ‘And my driver will then take you wherever you want to go after that—within reason. Go on, then.’

‘Thanks, Matt.’ Neither that interest nor those suspicions were surprising: Matt knew too much about the old days,
via
the adventures of his brother Fred as well as because of friendship and certain mutual favours traded in those days. And he was himself an unashamed operator in a business where the smallest piece of reliable inside information could always be made to pay handsomely somehow. What was surprising was that neither Jack nor Paul had mentioned the Russian dimension of the supposed emergency.

He picked up the receiver and pressed the buttons. (Maybe Paul hadn’t known. But Jack surely would have done—wouldn’t he?)

He heard the ringing note—

(Captain Cuccaro would have now. And so had Zimin!)

Cover story first, just in case, though.

‘Hullo?’ Faith answered properly for once, neither giving her name nor her number. ‘Who is that?’

‘It’s me, love.’ Also he simply wanted to hear her voice.

‘David! Are you in trouble?’

‘What?’ Everyone seemed to know too-bloody-much: he hadn’t even had time to lie—and as far as she knew he was still safe in Washington. ‘What do you mean—am I in trouble?’ All the half-truths he’d marshalled turned their backs on him mutinously, looking for escape. But he grabbed the slowest of them. ‘I was just phoning to say I’m back.’

‘Yes. I know you’re back. And now you’re going to tell me that you won’t be coming home just yet.’

‘What? How do you know?’

‘I’ve just put the phone down on Jack Butler. He told me to tell you—to tell you
if you
phoned me—to come in at once.’

The rest of the half-truths were running for cover now, having thrown away their shields and spears. ‘Oh?’

‘And he didn’t sound too pleased.’

And Faith herself didn’t sound too pleased, either. ‘No?’

‘No. And I’ve been given protection, David,
if
you’re interested.’ No one transmitted displeasure down the phone better than Mrs Audley. ‘A very nice young man. Who thinks the world of you. Although I can’t think why.’

‘No?’ There was a set of Low cartoon originals on the wall of Matthew’s study. But it didn’t include the famous 1940 one, in which an embattled British Tommy shook his fist against the dark clouds of impending defeat, facing it alone. And that omission switched his own control from
Defence
to
Offence
.
‘
Well, don
’
t forget to get his name, love
—
he
’
s obviously ready for promotion. But meanwhile
…
give me some bad news: tell me something awful.
’

‘What?’ The tables were turned on that word.

‘Tell me something awful.’ What was awful? ‘Mrs Mills is pregnant again—and the washing-machine has gone wrong … And Cathy’s fallen in love with the boy who delivers the papers—
anything
.’

‘
What
—
?
’
Suddenly her voice changed.
‘
You mean it
—
don
’
t you!
’

‘I mean it—yes!’ There was just an outside chance that all this was going on tape somewhere. But, as Jack wasn’t the man to squander his resources eavesdropping on someone he trusted, it was on the far outside.

Several seconds ticked away. ‘Cathy wants to go to India for her year off before University as a nursing auxiliary. And I’ve said no.’

Audley agreed with her. ‘Change your mind—say yes.’

‘What d’you mean? They catch the most awful diseases—‘

‘I know. But “yes” will buy us time. “No” will only make her more determined. Just leave it to me.’ He began to feel guilty. But then the genuine awfulness registered, and he didn’t. ‘Goodbye, love! I’ll call you again … when I can—‘

He put the phone down, and then picked it up again and punched in the well-remembered numbers of the Saracen’s Head public house by the river.

‘Saracen.’

Teenage female voice. ‘Get the boss, dear.’

‘Dad’s ‘avin’ ‘is breakfast. You’d better call back later.’

There had been a child in the background at the Saracen’s Head long ago, he remembered. ‘Just tell him it’s a friend of Mr Lee’s, dear.’

‘’E won’t like it—‘

‘He won’t like it if you don’t tell him. Go on! A friend of Mr Lee’s.’

There was a moment’s silence. ‘Oh—all right! But ‘e won’t like it.’