The Tamarind Seed (2 page)

The taxi driver talked throughout the journey, but with an accent so thick it made him unintelligible. Judith couldn't understand more than a few words. And then the sea was visible; sapphire blue with snow-white running surf. Palm trees soared into the sky. The hotel was another surprise. It was a series of small cottage bungalows, surrounded by the rich tropical gardens she had seen everywhere during the drive from the airport.

An aquamarine swimming pool shimmered in the centre of a paved patio, banked by brilliant flowers; small tables clustered round it topped by striped umbrellas, blooming like crazy mushrooms, and a coal-black barman stood behind the bar, rattling a shaker as if he were playing the maraccas.

She registered; now she was feeling very hot. Her clothes were sticking to her, and when she saw herself in the glass across the reception desk, she realised with surprise that the pale, exhausted face, framed in lank brown hair, was how she really looked.

She looked round the little bungalow; it was bright, with white walls and brilliant chintzes, a balcony overlooking the beach, and a bedroom with an air conditioner. She was pleased to find a tiny kitchen, completely equipped. She went into the bathroom, stripped and got under the shower, letting the water soak her head and body. Her skin was unattractively white, compared with the brown figures she had seen lying round the pool. The water beat against her, battered her face and poured in a torrent between her breasts. The sense of nakedness brought unwelcome memories back. She wrenched the tap to ‘off' and wrapped herself in a towel. Making love to Richard Paterson was the last thing she could afford to remember. She dried, and wandered into the bedroom. The sun was going down, and the sky had a deep, grey line coming up as if someone were slowly pulling a blind from below. It would soon be dark. She felt so tired that she dropped back on the bed; remembering the wet towel, she threw it off, and covered herself with the sheet. Later, she could ring down and have something sent up, a sandwich, some coffee.

She was still deciding what to order when she fell asleep.

When she woke, it was pitch dark, and the luminous hands on her watch said 2 a.m.

There was a man in the adjoining bungalow, but he had not been sleeping. He saw the light flash on from the dark windows on his right, and stay on, making a yellow beacon in the night. He had given up trying to read, long after he had abandoned the attempt to sleep, and gone out to sit on his balcony and smoke. It was noisy outside; the sea pounded on the beach only twenty yards away, and a small, persistent noise shrilled from the trees growing along the sandy shore line. It sounded like a kind of bird. He identified the crickets, with their tiny chirping roar, and the prosaic hum of outside air conditioners. It was the second night he hadn't been able to sleep. Sleep always eluded the pursuer. All his life he had suffered from periods of insomnia; without warning, and unassociated with stress, he would find it impossible to sleep for several days. Just as abruptly the cycle would break. He had learned to accept these occurrences without recourse to drugs.

He had never been to the West Indies before; it amused him to choose what was described as a capitalist playground, sustained by the sweat of the black proletariat, because he had an ironic twist of mind. It was a choice which was certain to offend others, only too eager to criticise. He had always thrown bones of contention to his enemies, and walked away while they fought over them. He sat in the darkness, smoking and waiting, staring upwards at the glittering fragmentation of stars in the sky. Men had travelled through the infinite space and proved it finite; they had hurtled past the stars and found them empty, ugly. The enormous white moon had been violated by the spaceman's boot. He thought that it would never be the same again. Nothing remained immutable in that old phrase applied to the stars. Everything changed; the wise welcomed it and stuck out to swim with the stream.

Others resisted, damming progress with human bodies. It was no less true, because it was so bitterly ironic, that the children of revolutionary change, became the stiffest of reactionaries. Backwards. That was where the current was turning, and he felt it taking this direction, well below the surface, but with increasing force. He could have taken a woman with him; he hadn't wanted one. At thirty-nine his body was as tired as his sleep-starved brain. He could have women whenever he wanted them. Too easily, meaning nothing. The bungalow adjoining his was empty; he hadn't realised until the lights went on that there was someone in it. He heard noises; he had well tuned ears. They picked up the sound of someone moving round inside, a door opened and shut. Light broke out, turning the balcony yellow. The doors slid back and a woman walked through and towards the rail, where she leaned for a moment, looking out over the black sea where the broad, rippled track of moonlight narrowed into the horizon. The figure was straight, with young lines; long hair hung down to the shoulders. He couldn't see her face. He stayed still in the darkness, watching, keeping the red glow of his cigarette hidden at his side. She turned, still with her back to him, and went inside. He was sorry. It made his insomnia less lonely knowing that at that hour someone was awake and near.

Then he heard the door of her bungalow shut, and thought in surprise that she had gone outside. Minutes later there was a splash. Of course. She had gone to the swimming pool.

Down by the patio one yellow light was burning over the shuttered bar. There was no need for it. The huge white moon hung in the sky, surrounded by stars. Looking up, Judith found every cliché speeding through her mind. The moon was like a pearl, the stars like diamonds; the palm trees waved and the crickets sang. It was all so corny and impossible until one saw the reality. Then it could never be described without using a coinage of words which had become debased. She dived into the pool, and started swimming, up and down, very lazily, her mind occupied with playing the game of metaphors, trying to think of ways to describe the night.

‘Evenin'. Lovely evenin'.' It was the same odd accent, less exaggerated than the taxi driver's speech, but unmistakable. She turned and saw a man standing by the pool's edge. He wore a cloth cap, which he took off.

‘Good evening,' Judith said. ‘Are you the night watchman?'

‘Yes, Mam.'

‘I'm staying here,' she said. ‘I couldn't sleep. It's so lovely and warm.'

‘Yes, Mam,' the man said. ‘Right warm it is.' He put his cap on again, saluted her with a torch and moved away. Judith went on swimming.

The man had come quietly round the edge of the building, where he could see the figure slipping through the lighted water, without being seen. He stood and watched her, until she climbed out, and then he got a look at her under the yellow light, as she dried her legs and rubbed her body with a towel. She was young. She had a pretty face. He went back and let himself into his bungalow before she came up the path. He had a bottle of whisky in his sitting room. That was one American habit he had picked up. He drank Scotch in preference to vodka. Some people would have said that was when the rot had started. He smiled to himself, filled a glass half full and went back to his balcony. The light next door went out.

In a specially equipped dark room on the lower ground floor of the Soviet Embassy on 1125 16th, Washington D.C., a roll of microfilm was being developed and enlarged. The process took some time, and it was watched by two Embassy officials. The film covered thirty pages of typed foolscap, with some handwritten insertions; the enlargements carried headings in thick type, and some of the letters were from the State Department, others originated in the British Embassy, and there were several copies of memos from the White House. The shorter and older of the two officials leaned over the developing tanks and read a little of what was on the print.

‘Excellent,' he said. ‘Another one of major importance.'

The second man was his junior assistant, a lieutenant in the Army, who was officially an attaché. He was very junior and he stayed three paces to the rear of his superior.

‘It'll be copied out and assembled in the “Blue” file, General.'

‘Excellent,' General Golitsyn said again. He looked at the luminous watch on his wrist. ‘I must go. I have an appointment with the Hungarian Ambassador. You will stay here until all the prints are ready. The “Blue” file must be on my desk in the morning, at nine.'

He went out of the room; the lieutenant saluted him, an assistant rushed to open the door to let him out. The General went upstairs to his rooms to change into his uniform. Unlike the Western diplomats who wore civilian clothes, the members of the Soviet Embassy who were serving officers declined to follow this custom. The General liked his uniform; there was a patchwork of medals across the left breast, awarded for a life of service to his country, and including several foreign decorations. He was thinking of the ‘Blue' file as he got ready to go out. Nominally he was the head of the Mission; he held the rank of General, he was an old, revered member of his country's political hierarchy. But because of the absence of his section's real superior, he had got the first look at the information passed to them by the most important Soviet agent in the Western Hemisphere.

‘Good morning.'

‘Good morning.' Judith was used to finding her neighbour on his balcony when she came out to eat her breakfast. For the first two days he hadn't spoken; she had hardly noticed him, and spent most of the time lying on the beach, or reading on her own balcony. The hotel was full of people enjoying themselves; couples paired off with others and became noisy little groups who clustered round the bar and monopolised the swimming pool. Judith had resisted several attempts to draw her into joining them. She avoided the pool except at night; she still woke in the small hours and went out alone in the dark to swim. She had talked more to the night watchman than to any of the hotel guests.

She had never seen her neighbour standing in the shadow by the bungalow every night, watching her. The fact that he hadn't said more than good morning established him as harmless. He didn't mix with anyone either. He took his meals at a single table; she had resisted the manager's attempt to put her with another pair of women, Canadian matrons staying on a hen holiday.

Until that morning Judith hadn't really looked at him.

‘It seems hotter this morning.' It was quite unexpected when he continued the conversation.

‘Yes,' Judith answered. ‘I think it is.'

‘Perhaps we will have rain. I see some clouds over there.'

‘Perhaps. It doesn't matter, it never lasts long.'

‘You know not to shelter under those trees?'

She put her book down. ‘No? What trees?'

He was younger than she had supposed. Dark and thin featured; it was a nervous face, with light coloured eyes and a mouth that twisted at one side.

He was looking at her with an intentness that made it impossible to pick up her book without being rude. ‘Those dark green trees there. They have a curious name, I can't pronounce it. But if the rain comes and you stand beneath them, the water will burn your skin. They are' very poisonous. They should have told you about it.'

‘I haven't given them much chance,' Judith said. ‘I haven't spoken to anyone since I arrived.'

‘The same for me,' he said. ‘I came here to get away from people. And you also?'

‘Yes,' Judith said. ‘I'm afraid the last thing I've felt like was a jolly gathering at the bar.'

‘You are not American? Canadian, perhaps?'

‘I'm English,' she said. ‘Maybe I have a slight accent; I've been working in the States for three years.'

‘What is your work?'

‘I'm with the United Nations,' she said. ‘You're Russian, aren't you?'

‘Feodor Sverdlov.' He got up; his body was tanned a dark brown. He was a long, lean man in a pair of shorts, his feet in old-fashioned lace up canvas shoes. He leaned across and held out his hand. Judith stretched and shook it briefly. She had met with the Russian mania for shaking hands. It was a sign of goodwill if they pumped your arm at intervals, before doing it all over again as you said goodbye. If they didn't shake hands with you, as Western diplomats knew, it meant the knives were really out.

‘I am also in America. I'm with our Embassy in Washington. You must know Washington.'

‘Oh, yes,' she said. ‘Yes I know it.' It was as if her mind were a stage and all this time, for four days and nights, Richard Paterson had been waiting in the wings. At the mention of Washington he was right on centre. She got up quickly.

‘I'm going to swim,' she said. ‘Before it rains.'

‘That is a good idea,' the Russian answered. ‘I will come with you.'

There was nothing she could do to stop him.

When it did rain they stayed in the sea, swimming out and coming back on the crest of the frothing little waves. There were patches of coral which could cut the feet to ribbons. He warned her about them, and she found herself obeying him and swimming clear. Judith began to tire; the man swam like a professional, with long strokes of great power. He was obviously very fit. She lay on her back and floated. The brief shower slackened and died off. Immediately the sun poured out, the sky turned back to a hot blue, and the sunbathers reappeared on the beach like wasps coming down on a picnic.

‘Machineel,' Sverdlov swam up to her. ‘That is the name of it.'

‘The name of what?'

‘The tree that is poisonous. Will you come back now, and have some coffee with me?'

As they stepped out of the water, he got hold of her arm and pulled her to one side.

‘That is coral there. You must buy some shoes. I will drive you into the town before lunch. There is a shop where I got mine.'

‘No thank you, I'd rather sit on the beach,' Judith said. He had let her go, and was walking beside her. He was taking too much for granted. She needed shoes, but she wasn't going into Bridgetown with him. She hadn't come to Barbados to pick up with another man.