The Memory Trap (4 page)

‘Uh-huh.’ Mitchell annexed Audley’s own useful multipurpose non-committal grunt for himself. ‘The elusive major himself—‘ He nodded ‘—only, as they apparently haven’t found him themselves they’re being nicer to us now—God!’

Audley’s knees hit the dashboard painfully as the little car decelerated fiercely. ‘What—?’ He could hardly think for the noise.

‘Some mad bastard—that mad bastard—‘ Mitchell stabbed a finger ahead ‘—has just cut in ahead of me.’ He looked up at his mirror. ‘They’re all mad—stark, staring mad, David—‘ He frowned ‘—or … I hope they are, anyway—‘

Audley massaged his bruises. He couldn’t keep shouting ‘What?’, he had to find a more sensible question. ‘If no one knows where Richardson is … what makes you think he’s safe?’

The car burst into sunlight. ‘Safe—?’ For a moment he didn’t seem to have heard the rest of the question. ‘That’s why I think he’s safe: because no one knows where he is.’ He peered into the mirror again. ‘I just hope the same applies to us, now that I’ve lost our escort somehow—‘

Audley looked around. What was certain was that he didn’t know where he was. But this was one bit of Italy where, on a clear day like this, that ought to be easily rectified once a sufficient gap in the buildings on his left opened up.

‘Ah! There he is—phew!’ Mitchell grinned relief at him. ‘Sorry, David. Really, I quite enjoy driving in Italy. It’s the nearest thing to stock-car racing I know. But keeping in with our escort rather spoils it, that’s all … But, as I was saying—what was I saying?’

Audley gave up trying to spot Vesuvius. ‘Richardson is safe. But you don’t know where he is.’

‘That’s right.’ Mitchell sounded almost cheerful. ‘So he knows where he is.’

Audley could see another nightmare tunnel ahead. ‘What d’you mean?’

‘I mean that he got in touch with us. The major-domo did his stuff, evidently. So now the Major’s calling the shots, David. And we’re going to meet him.’

After Berlin that was an unfortunate choice of words. But the tunnel closed in on them before Audley could react. And this time, with an enormous sixteen-wheeler thundering beside them, no further words were possible, and even thought wasn’t easy.

Light returned at last, yet Vesuvius was still hidden behind buildings. Except, by now they must be beyond it, with Amain” still an hour or more ahead. But now he had thought of what he had been going to say. ‘You know about Kulik, Mitchell.’

‘Not a lot.’ Mitchell sniffed. ‘Does anyone know more than that?’ He glanced at Audley quickly. ‘Have you pulled the’ rabbit out of the hat again, Dr Audley—
Professore
—
?
’

‘No.’

Mitchell flickered another glance at him. ‘You’re about to remind me that Kulik also called the shots—day, time and place—are you?’

Audley winced at the repetition of “shots”. But, having talked to both Jack Butler and Elizabeth, Mitchell had it all pat, evidently. And meanwhile the car was beginning to slow down again.

‘And it didn’t do him a lot of good—is that it?’ This time Mitchell didn’t bother to look at him. ‘Don’t worry, David. I haven’t forgotten that. It’s at the very top of my list that I’m your minder.’

Audley was about to look away in exasperation. But then he caught a glimpse of the sea beyond Mitchell’s profile.

The sea at last!
“
The sea! The sea!
”
—
the cry of Xenophon
’
s ten thousand fellow-Greeks had been dinned into him so thoroughly at school by old Wimpy long ago that the words always came back to him at every first sight of it, at first almost triumphantly, and then almost sadly as he became conscious of the length of years which now separated him from that first-learning!

‘What is it, David?’ Mitchell sat bolt-upright. ‘What have you seen?’

‘Just the sea.’ The man was a bag of nerves. ‘That’s all.’

But it wasn’t all. And it wasn’t just the sea—it was the Bay of Naples … Old Wimpy’s Bay of Naples—no, not Naples, but
Neapolis
, with Pompeii and Herculaneum close at hand, and Paestum just down the road: the happy hunting-ground of every Classics-master who had ever had to hammer irregular verbs into—

The sea
—
? This time he also sat bolt-upright. ‘What the hell—?’

‘What—?’ Mitchell’s nerves had been jarred again.

Audley looked around as best he could within the maddening constraint of his safety belt and the ridiculous little car itself. ‘The sea’s on the wrong side. This isn’t the way to Amalfi.’

‘
What
?’ Mitchell’s voice cracked with exasperation.

‘Where the hell are we?’ He fumbled with the window-winder: if the sea was on
that
side—where were they going?

‘We’re in a traffic jam, is where we are—what d’you mean, “the wrong side”—?
For Christ
’
s sake, David! Don
’
t do that
—
get your head in
—
‘
The rest of the command was drowned by a cacophony of horns behind them.

Audley could see the jam of cars. But it was about all he could see: with one pantechnicon behind them and another trying to push them off the road, wherever Vesuvius might be, it could be anywhere. But they were undoubtedly in a traffic jam: they were on the approach to some sort of Italian clover-leaf junction, and that seemed to be a
sauve qui peut
invitation to every driver to assert himself, according to his courage if not the size of his vehicle.

‘Get your head back in please, David.’ Mitchell ignored the noise behind him and recovered some of his cool. ‘
Please
, David
—
‘

The very coolness turned Audley back towards Mitchell, because of its underlying panic: it caught exactly the final desperation of that Royal Sussex corporal on the grenade-throwing primary training exercise long ago, when Trooper Arkwright in front had held on to his live grenade between them, instead of throwing it out of the drill-trench—

‘Throw it.’ (Matter-of-fact, the corporal. Almost conversational.) ‘
Throw it
—
‘ (No longer matter-of-fact: frozen-faced, rather—was that the face? But he couldn’t remember the face: faces sometimes eluded him.) ‘THROW IT—!’ (Memory blanked out at that point, as the Royal Sussex corporal and Trooper Audley had hit the dirt in the bottom of the trench, in an attempt to reach Australia before the grenade exploded)—

He found himself smiling as he turned. Time had quite washed away the sick horror of that moment, leaving in memory only the comedy of their undignified survival after Arkwright’s belated throw, and then the wondrous flow of the corporal’s invective, unleashed after a matching moment of speechlessness. But then he stopped smiling as he saw the half-drawn pistol in Mitchell’s hand.

‘Put the window up, David.’ Mitchell wasn’t looking at him.

Just ahead of them, weaving between the gaps in the cars in the other lane, were a couple of Neapolitan urchins carrying trays of cigarettes and assorted junk.

‘For God’s sake, Paul! They’re only—‘

‘
Put the window up
.’ Mitchell didn’t-take his eyes off the urchins.

‘
Throw it!
’

Audley wound the window up.

‘Only kids.’ Mitchell slid the pistol back under his armpit before completing his sentence.

The car moved again, leaving the children behind.

‘Only kids.’ Mitchell nodded. ‘But that’s the way it’s done. Beirut … the West Bank … Belfast one day, I shouldn’t wonder. All you need is a traffic jam in the usual place. Or, if not, they can easily cause one … And then a bit of carelessness, like an open window. And then, just pop a grenade in, and run.’

‘A—‘ The coincidence with his own recent thought chilled Audley into silence. As of now, that would never be a jolly anecdote again. But meanwhile he had to reassure himself. ‘Aren’t you being a bit over-cautious?’

‘Probably.’ Mitchell breathed out heavily as they shook themselves free of the traffic jam, turning under the autostrada on to what looked like a minor road. ‘Maybe I’m a bit twitchy.’

Too long in the trenches
, thought Audley critically. Mitchell’s problem was the reverse of Elizabeth’s. And it was one thing (and a good one) to give Research and Development types like Elizabeth a bit of field-experience, but another (and a very bad one) to over-stretch them just because they showed an aptitude for that too.

In fact, seconding Mitchell to Henry Jaggard’s Dublin operation was like chartering Concorde to fly relief food to Ethiopia: when he finally over-shot some inadequate runway—when his already-threadbare academic cover finally split under the pressure—all bloody-Jaggard’s sincere regrets wouldn’t put the clock back.

Mixed metaphors
, he thought, also critically. But, trenches and Concordes and threadbare clocks aside, he must be gently encouraging now—

‘I didn’t mean that, Paul.’ He could see the sea again. ‘I know you’re just obeying Jack Butler’s orders.’ But not the sea: this was Wimpy’s Bay of Naples, still—it had to be. And … and there was even a road sign ahead—

Baia
—
Bacoli
—
Miseno
—

Not just Wimpy’s bay: Wimpy’s ancient
Misenum
, from which Admiral Pliny had heroically taken his fleet to succour the Vesuvius disaster-survivors of Pompeii and Stabia—

Damn!

‘What I meant … I don’t see how anyone can know that I’m here—‘ He almost added ‘whereever I am’. But now he knew where he was, even if he didn’t know why he was so far from Amalfi—‘except Peter Richardson—?’

‘And the Italians.’ Mitchell accelerated after the police car in front. ‘And the entire staff of the
Palazzo
Richardson—? And Uncle Tom Cobleigh and All, thereafter?’ He nodded at Audley without taking his eyes off the police car. ‘But chiefly Major—
Peter
—
Richardson … yes.’

Suddenly everything was turned on its head, upside-down, in a way which he’d never even considered. But which, of course, Mitchell had quite naturally taken as a possibility from the moment he’d been saddled with his orders. ‘Peter Richardson isn’t a traitor, Paul.’

‘No?’ Slight shrug. ‘Well … if you say not, David.’ This time he managed a quick glance. ‘After fifteen years—or more, would it be—?’ Now he was on the
Miseno
road. ‘Are you willing to bet your life on that—never mind mine … which I still rather value—?’ Another shrug.

Audley waited.

‘You’re the boss.’ Mitchell finally remembered the rest of his orders, but with an unconcealed air of resignation. ‘And the expert.’

There was more. And Audley wanted to hear it.

Shrug. ‘Just so you remember that Kulik must also have reckoned no one knew where he was, David.’

That was the opening. ‘I haven’t forgotten that. But you told me that Peter Richardson is arranging this meeting. And you also told me not to worry, Paul.’

The police car ahead showed its brake-lights, and then turned off the road.

‘So I did.’ Mitchell followed suit. ‘And so
he
has … more or less—yes.’

“More-or less” was like “yes-and-no”: as unsatisfactory as it was imprecise. Only now they were running out of road—quite literally running out of it, as the final narrow stretch of tarmac ended and they bumped on to a pot-holed sand-swept track. And he could see the sea again, between a scatter of beach-cafes and kiosks, with a few parked cars and a jetty ahead: they had not only run out of road, they were running out of land, too.

Mitchell parked beside the police car, right on the foreshore.

‘This is where we change horses, David. But you stay here for a moment.’

‘Why?’ The next horse had to be a boat. But there was no craft in view belonging to the police or the customs, let alone the Italian navy. Indeed, what he could see from here suggested that this wasn’t one of the Baia-Miseno peninsula’s more fashionable anchorages.

‘Because I say so.’ Mitchell started to open his door, but then stopped. ‘How much did Jack Butler tell you about Berlin, David? Apart from Kulik.’

Audley could guess what was coming. ‘He said we lost a man.’

‘That’s right. Name of Sinclair—Edward Sinclair. I met him once.’ Mitchell nodded. ‘Big chap. Not specially bright. But big. And a fluent German-speaker. That was why Ted was in Berlin, probably.’

Audley couldn’t place Edward Sinclair. But that merely confirmed what Butler had said. ‘So what?’

‘Big like you, David.’ Mitchell paused, and looked around. ‘Elizabeth will tell you in more detail. But when she got to the rendezvous, Kulik was already there, sitting at a table all by himself.
And so was the man who shot him
.’ He stared at Audley. ‘Do you get the picture? He was waiting for
you
, David.’

Audley stared back at him as the picture formed in his mind.

‘Okay.’ Mitchell nodded again. ‘So I’m just going to have a quick look round. And then we’ll take a boat trip. And we’ll just hope Major Peter Richardson has got his act together properly, and that he hasn’t forgotten all he was taught. Okay?’

If there was one thing they could rely on, it was Peter Richardson’s memory, thought Audley. But at that moment it also looked as if it was the only thing. ‘Where are we going?’

Mitchell grinned suddenly. ‘We’re going to be end-of-season tourists, David.’ He swung his door open. ‘How would you like to visit old Tiberius’s villa on Capri, eh?’

FOR A MOMENT
, as he examined the 18-hour stubble on his chin in the mirror of the motor-cruiser’s Lilliputian lavatory, Audley forgot about the dead. But then they crowded back into his thoughts, uninvited but insistent.

“It’s bad luck, thinking of the dead”: who had said that—?

The question, no sooner treacherously asked, was instantly answered by memory: it had been “Daddy” Higgs—Troop Sar’-Major Higgs himself, no less, of course—of course! Old Daddy Higgs!