The Sun Chemist (22 page)

I’d thought of something else while waiting, probably the best in the circumstances. No watchful eyes to worry about while booking in, or at breakfast, or while booking out. I found a taxi and told the driver Gower Street.

The curtains were drawn, and I saw that he must have left at nighttime. I closed the door behind me, and looked round the Spartan little place. Something about its early-Victorian
plainness
appealed to him; also, of course, its proximity to the School for Slavonic and East European Studies. I had a look in the bedroom to see that the curtains were drawn there, too. Then I double-locked the door and left the key in, so that nobody could surprise me – not that it was likely. He wasn’t due back himself till after the weekend, and he complained often at the lack of service; the place was unkempt and rather dirty.

I’d barely eaten anything all day, but I wasn’t hungry or even tired. I felt simply flat. I put the case down, sat myself down, and looked at it. It didn’t seem surprising to me now, or even odd, that I’d got the stuff. A Lancashire lad had found his dearest fancy in the face belonging to old Nancy, and the world could start to change now. The moment should have been large and exhilarating, but it wasn’t. I probably needed a drink.

The floorboards creaked as I crossed the room to get one. I found I was tiptoeing, and realized I’d been doing it since
entering
the flat. Not a soul in the world knew I was here. This was ‘obviously a fine thing, but there was nobody to tell. I seemed to have stepped sideways out of the human race, and wouldn’t be reappearing in it again till the morning.

I’d promised to give the clerk at flight reservations the phone number, and I was actually dialing when I thought again, and stopped. Why do it?

Connie was a different matter, a world away, so, phone in hand, I called her at home. Again one of those bewildering immediate connections.

‘Igor – darling – you – sound – so – close! Where are you?’ There was a crowd in the background.

‘In London.’

‘Is it – is it okay?’

‘Yes, it’s okay.’

‘You mean, you got it?’

‘Yes.’

‘Oh, my God. What time do you get in?’

I told her and heard her repeating it. ‘You mean it’s really all there?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I think so.’ I was almost whispering. It seemed half the world must hear the howling at the other end.

‘It is too fantastic! You remember how we sat and read through those papers and found Pickles?’

‘Yes, yes,’ I whispered. ‘I remember it all, Connie. Good night.’

‘Wait. Listen, Igor. Where are you?’

‘I’m here, you know, getting ready.’

‘Caroline is okay?’

‘Fine, fine.’

‘It’s really incredible – just two days ago they started work with that bacterium on those sweet –’

I hung up right away, sweating. Creaking was going on. The whole damned house was creaking. Door okay; key in lock. I reached for the bottle and had one. I had two. I had the impression she’d stood with a megaphone in Gower Street, roaring the good news to everyone.

Over the second drink I thought about the post office in the morning. I was too near my own flat in Russell Square to go looking for one in the vicinty. I’d have to call a cab to the house; and early, so that we could go to some outlying post office. Yes, and then have to get from this outlying post office, probably
through outlying traffic jams, to the airport. Yes, quite. I poured myself another: small one, as Hopcroft would say. I remembered his state of mind when he’d said it. He’d been frightening himself looking out the window at darkening and emptying streets.

Quite dark now – pitch black, in fact. I couldn’t actually hear anybody in the street. Curtains well drawn; no light showing. Nobody knew I was here. Certain resemblances seemed to be showing up between Hopcroft’s state of mind and mine. I pulled myself together.

To get to the airport at nine-thirty, I’d call a cab for eight-thirty – earlier if we were going looking for a post office. With the further point that who knew if post offices were open then? Very probably they weren’t. Which meant running about at the
airport
looking for one. While panicking about the copy still sitting in the baggage office, which had to be got out of there and
transferred
to my case.

There were all the makings here of a fluid situation. And with what object? The object was to separate the copies. Rehovot didn’t need two copies. I suddenly thought of another way of separating the copies.

I could leave one here.

It was such a sound thought that I nodded at it, and tiptoed over to the bottle again. I’d have to hide the thing away tonight, anyway, just in case …

Glass in hand, I inspected the flat. In the living room, a desk, a few chairs, ancient sofa, bookshelf. The only decorations were a steel engraving of the death of Nelson, which seemed to go with the place, and two small framed photos, one of Marx and the other of me at the age of ten in my Pioneer uniform.

I had a look in his desk: nothing except a few rubber bands, paper clips, a musty smell. He never left papers here, always a secretive man – perhaps the secret of his survival. No secret
drawers
, anyway, and I hardly knew why I was looking; a certain headiness coming on after three whiskies on an empty stomach.

I began to explore more earnestly: bathroom, kitchen,
bedroom
. Bedroom promising. A massive mahogany wardrobe stood in it, sunk deep in the carpet. It was possible to see, round its
edge, the original color of the carpet, which was mauve. The rest was now gray.

I had a look at the back. A long thin batten supported the rear panel, a good half-inch of dust on it. Yes. I tiptoed back and opened my case and returned with the envelope. I couldn’t quite get a hand in the gap, poked the thing in sideways, and saw it cutting a groove in the dust. It sat securely enough, slanted against the wall; impossible to see unless you knew it was there.

I had another drink after this, considerably elated, and thought I should eat something. I found biscuits and cheese and had a cup of coffee. Then I made preparations for the morning. A taxi rank was listed in a little phone directory on the bookshelf. The alarm clock was in working order. I set it for seven o’clock. Just for the record, this was the night of Wednesday, April 17, 1974.

I was watching through the curtains in the morning when the cab arrived. Everything was now as I’d found it: bed made, ashtrays and dishes cleaned. I collected my case, unlocked the door, turned off the light, and went downstairs.

I’d only had coffee, unable to eat. I felt slightly sick and
momentous
. The everyday world, when I opened the door, had that somewhat crystallized look that it bears during moments of private stress or after a lengthy fast, its very humdrumness novel. Gower Street grayly reared, its long terraces distinctly mortared together. Early starters were pacing briskly along it on their way to work. The taxi shuddered slightly by the curb, the driver’s face a face of the utmost archetypal cabbiness – all so ordinary on this extraordinary day.

‘Was it you for the airport?’ he said soberly.

‘That’s right.’

I got in and we took off.

There wasn’t anybody you could actually give a Nobel Prize to. Some muck had got into one of the retorts in a basement laboratory in Manchester seventy years ago. A refugee scientist had crazily diverged from his set task about thirty years after. A serious young man, intent on nourishing underfed Africans,
had been sent packing for some piece of meretricious political nonsense. And an old marked Jew, life fast ending, had looked forward and backward.

Well, he couldn’t have it. All the same, he had been the one to discern the fresh pattern, glimmering among the maze of patterns. Like Ziegler, the German, he had spotted what a bit of muck could do. But Ziegler’s legacy was a world littered with polyethelene bags. Chaimchik’s looked like bringing some changes in the starch belts.

*

It was a busy time at the airport, loudspeakers steadily booming. ‘T.W.A. announces …’ ‘K.L.M. announces …’ I made a beeline through the crowds to the baggage office. The sick feeling hadn’t left me. I kept the ticket in my pocket till it was my turn, and then handed it over. The grip had sat quietly there all night: no nonsense.

I took it right away to the toilets; found a lavatory, locked myself in, and took out the packet

All present and correct. I licked my dry lips, transferred the packet to the executive case, and let myself out.

An El-Al flight was due to leave before mine, and I was glad I hadn’t got it. The Israelis preferred their national carrier: the hijacking risk was less. Hundreds of them were in line for the security check.

I checked into mine. Even with the overflow from the Israeli plane there were only forty or fifty people traveling. I hung grimly on to the executive case, got to the checkpoint, and showed the grip.

‘Is this going with luggage, sir?’

‘Yes.’

‘Please open it.’

A quick shuffle through.

‘And is that your hand baggage?’

‘Yes, nothing in it, just papers.’

They didn’t make me open it. Then I was at the desk, and booked in, and the grip was gone. Only the case to hang on to now.

I passed through to the transit lounge, light-headed. I felt empty, but when I bought a cup of coffee, I couldn’t drink it. The duty-free bays were a seething mass and I stayed well away.

Ten-thirty. Another half-hour.

A surprising amount of Hebrew was being spoken. The three million of Israel seemed constantly awing, inveterate travelers, keen smugglers. A good deal of swapping was going on, not for the benefit of the customs at the other end. At a quarter to eleven El-Al announced a delay in its flight. Only a small groan from the Israelis, and fresh hurried departures to the duty-free shops.

Eleven o’clock. Nothing.

Eleven-ten. A further delay from El-Al.

Eleven-fifteen. My flight. Gate 12.

I streamed bonelessly along to it. Flight card. A very long corridor.

An extra security check for flights to Israel, and further
shuffling
as overburdened Israelis reopened their luggage. They did it willingly, cheered by the precautions.

‘What’s in the case, sir?’

‘Papers only.’

‘Just walk through the light.’

I walked through it, into another check. A body frisk; a
hand-held
detector. The detector came up with a ping.

‘Carrying much metal, sir?’

‘No. Only keys.’ I handed over the keys. The detector still pinged.

‘Please open the case.’

Damn it. I got my keys from him and opened it. He brushed aside the lab-book sheets and volume 15; fumbled, smiled. Razor.

‘Right you are, sir.’

We were led to a long room with benches, again kept separate from other flights. A fresh delay here till everyone was in, and the door closed. Security men were about. The indefatigable
Israelis were still swapping duty-free goods; one couple evidently had bought up half the world, Macy’s, Selfridge’s. The female of the two, amply clad, had further clothing over her arm, and was trying to exchange perfume. Her mate was similarly
overloaded
. He managed to get rid of a bit here and there, then unfortunately saw me and addressed me in Hebrew.

‘I said, ‘I’m sorry –’

‘Oh.’ The winning smile went, at this unpromising lack of Hebrew. Still. ‘I see you don’t carry your allowance of drinks. If it wouldn’t be a trouble –’

‘I’m afraid it would.’

‘A single bottle?’ He had four of them, Chivas Regal. ‘My son is waiting at the airport. The moment we –’

‘I’m sorry, I can’t.’

He wasn’t offended, and immediately off-loaded one on a rather indignant old lady a few places along the bench; his wife was doing a complicated perfume deal with a bearded man who had a problem with several bags of smoked salmon. Then we were moving, and with the strangest churned-up feeling I got up, and the perfume woman, now with a bag of smoked salmon, turned and almost immediately went full length over my feet. She fell heavily, smoked salmon and perfume skidding in all directions.

‘Oh, I’m most terribly –’

‘Elsa!’ Her husband was there.

Several of us levered her up and got her onto the bench. She was practically speechless. They closed the exit doors again, and general pandemonium ensued for a few minutes. I picked up my case and hung on to it as the Israelis crowded round, giving advice. She tried to stand, wincing, and a nurse was brought in. We started moving during this, and I was in the first busload out to the plane.

Done it. Barring an attack by armed terrorists, I was practically there now. I hugged the thing all the way to the plane, went up the steps, strapped myself in, and sat with it somewhat tensely on my knee. The only thing needed was an engine failure. But no engine failure. The Israelis sorted out their luggage, doors were closed, jets howled, the plane lumbered to the takeoff position;
and paused there, straining at the leash. A sudden increase in the howl, and we were moving again, faster, faster … Off.

I’d done it now. I’d really done it.

*

‘Shall I take that case away, sir?’

‘No, thanks.’

‘It’ll be in your way.’

‘No, it won’t,’ I said, and ate a rather cramped meal, the little let-down table hard against the case, and the case hard against my knee; which was where it stayed.

*

I saw Connie as soon as I entered the airport building. She was in the restricted immigration hall with a security man. The man took my passport and got it stamped right away; he also saw to it that the grip was first off. Ze’ev was waiting in the car, and we took off immediately.

We hadn’t spoken much. Connie had given me a kiss, but the black butterfly eyes had noticed the strain. Barely twenty minutes later, we were turning in to the Institute gates, and driving directly to Meyer’s.