was an answer because, after all, it was irritating not to know
--not to have any idea what all this was about.
He tried to recall not the girl at the airport but his sister
Pamela's face. A long time since her death. He remembered
her. Of course he remembered her, but he could not somehow picture her face. It irritated him not to be able to do so.
He had paused just when he was about to cross one of the
roads. There was no traffic except for a car jigging slowly
along with the solemn demeanour of a bored dowager. An
elderly car, he thought. An old-fashioned Daimler limousine,
He shook his shoulders. Why stand here in this idiotic way,
lost in thought?
He took an abrupt step to cross the road and suddenly
with surprising vigour the dowager limousine, as he had
thought of it in his mind, accelerated. Accelerated with a 'sudden astonishing speed. It bore down on him with such
swiftness that he only just had time to leap across on to the
opposite pavement. It disappeared with a flash, turning
round the curve of the road further on.
'I wonder,' said Sir Stafford to himself. 'Now I wonder.
Could it be that there is someone that doesn't like me? Someone
following me, perhaps, watching me take my way home,
waiting for an opportunity?'
*
Colonel Pikeaway, his bulk sprawled out in^lis chair in the small room in Bloomsbury where he sat from ten to five
with a short interval for lunch, was surrounded as usual by an atmosphere of thick cigar smoke; with his eyes closed,
only an occasional blink showed that he was awake and
not asleep. He seldom raised his head. Somebody had said
that he looked like a cross between an ancient Buddha and
a large blue frog, with perhaps, as some impudent youngster , had added, just a touch of a bar sinister from a hippopotamus in his ancestry.
The gentle buzz of the intercom on his desk roused him.
He blinked three times and opened his eyes. He stretched
forth a rather weary-looking hand and picked up the receiver.
'Well?' he said.
His secretary's voice spoke.
The Minister is here waiting to see you.'
40
'Is he now?' said Colonel Pikeaway. 'And what Minister
is that? The Baptist minister from the church round the
corner?'
'Oh no. Colonel Pikeaway, it's Sir George Packham.'
'Pity,' said Colonel Pikeaway, breathing asthmatically. 'Great
pity. The Reverend McGill is far more amusing. There's a
splendid touch of hell fire about him.'
'Shall I bring him in. Colonel Pikeaway?'
1 suppose he will expect to be brought in at once. Under
Secretaries are far more touchy than Secretaries of State,'
said Colonel Pikeaway gloomily. 'All these Ministers insist
on coming in and having kittens all over the place.'
Sir George Packham was shown in. He coughed and
wheezed. Most people did. The windows of the small
room were tightly closed. Colonel Pikeaway reclined in his
chair, completely smothered in cigar ash. The atmosphere
was almost unbearable and the room was known in official
circles as the 'small cathouse'.
'Ah, my dear fellow,' said Sir George, speaking briskly
and cheerfully in a way that did not match his ascetic and
sad appearance. 'Quite a long time since we've met, I think.'
'Sit down, sit down do,' said Pikeaway. 'Have a cigar?'
Sir George shuddered slightly.
'No, thank you,' he said, 'no, thanks very much.'
He looked hard at the windows. Colonel Pikeaway did
not take the hint. Sir. George cleared his throat and coughed
again before saying:
g 'Er--I believe Horsham has been to see you.*
'Yes, Horsham's been and said his piece,' said Colonel' Pikeaway, slowly allowing his eyes to close again.
!'I thought it was the best way. I mean, that he should
call upon you here. It's most important that things shouldn't
get, round anywhere.'
'Ah,' said Colonel Pikeaway, 'but they will, won't they?'
'I beg your pardon?'
They will,' said Colonel Pikeaway.
'I don't know how much you--er--well, know about this
last business.'
'We know everything here,' said Colonel Pikeaway. 'That's
what we're for.'
'Oh--oh yes, yes certainly. About Sir S.N.--you know
who I mean?'
'Recently a passenger from Frankfurt,' said Colonel Pike- way.
'Most extraordinary business. Most extraordinary. One 41
wonders--one really does not know, one can't begin to
imagine . ..'
Colonel Pikeaway listened kindly.
'What is one to think?' pursued Sir George. 'Do you know
him personally?'
'I've come across him once or twice,' said Colonel Pikeaway.
'One
really cannot help wondering--'
Colonel Pikeaway subdued a yawn with some difficulty.
He was rather tired of Sir George's thinking, wondering,
and imagining. He had a poor opinion anyway of Sir George's
process of thought. A cautious man, a man who could be
relied upon to run his department in a cautious manner. Not
a man of'scintillating intellect. Perhaps, thought Colonel Pikeaway,
all the better for that. At any rate, those who think
and wonder and are not quite sure are reasonably safe in
the place where God and the electors have put them.
'One cannot quite forget,' continued Sir George, 'the disillusionment
we have suffered in the past.'
Colonel Pikeaway smiled kindly.
'Charleston, Conway and Courtland,' he said. 'Fully trusted,
vetted and approved of. All beginning with C, all crooked
as sin.'
'Sometimes I wonder if we can trust anyone,' said Sir George
unhappily.
'That's easy,' said Colonel Pikeaway, 'you can't.'
'Now take Stafford Nye,' said Sir George. 'Good family,
excellent family, knew his father, his grandfather.'
'Often a slip-up in the third generation,' said Colonel
Pikeaway.
The remark did not help Sir George.
'I cannot help doubting--I mean, sometimes he doesn't
really seem serious.'
'Took my two nieces to see the chateaux of the Loire when
I was a young man,' said Colonel Pikeaway unexpectedly.
'Man fishing on the bank. I had my fishing-rod with me, too.
He said to me, " Vous rfetes pas un pecheur s6rieux. Vous avez
des femmes avec voiis" '
'You mean you think Sir Stafford--?'
'No, no, never been mixed up with women much. Irony's
his trouble. Likes surprising people. He can't help liking to
score off people.'
'Well, that's not very satisfactory, is it?'
'Why not?' said Colonel Pikeaway. 'Liking a private joke
is much better than having some deal with a defector.'
42
'If one could feel that he was really sound. What would
you say�your personal opinion?'
, 'Sound as a bell,' said Colonel Pikeaway. 'If a bell is
sound. It makes a sound, but that's different, isn't it?' He
smiled kindly. 'Shouldn't worry, if I were you,' he said.
Sir Stafford Nye pushed aside his cup of coffee. He picked
up the newspaper, glancing over the headlines, then he turned
it carefully to the page which gave Personal advertisements.
He'd looked down that particular column for seven days
now. It was disappointing but not surprising. Why on earth
should he expect to find an answer? His eye went slowly
down miscellaneous' peculiarities which had always made
that- particular page rather fascinating in his eyes. They
were not so strictly personal. Half of them or even more
than half were disguised advertisements or offers of things for
sale or wanted for sale. They should perhaps have been put
under a different heading but they had found their way here
considering that they were more likely to catch the eye that
way. They included one or two of the hopeful variety.
'Young man who objects to hard work and who would
like an easy life would be glad to undertake a job that
would suit him.'
'Girl wants to travel to Cambodia. Refuses to look after
children.'
'Firearm used at Waterloo. What offers.'
'Glorious fun-fur coat. Must be sold immediately. Owner
going abroad.'
'Do you know Jenny Capstan? Her cakes are superb.
Come to 14 Lizzard Street, S.W.3.'
For a moment Stafford Nye's finger came to a stop. Jenny
Capstan. He liked the name. Was there any Lizzard Street?
He supposed so. He had never heard of it. With a sigh, the
finger went down the column and almost at once was arrested
once more.
'Passenger from Frankfurt, Thursday Nov. 11, Hungerford
Bridge 7.20.'
Thursday, November llth. That was�yes, that was today.
Sir Stafford Nye leaned back in his chair and drank more
coffee. He was excited, stimulated. Hungerford. Hungerford
Bridge. He got up and went into the kitchenette. Mrs Worrit
was cutting potatoes into strips and throwing them into a
large bowl of water. She looked up with some slight surprise.
"Anything you want, sir?'
43
^
'Yes,' said Sir Stafford Nye. 'If anyone said Hungerford
'Where should I go?' Mrs Worrit considered. 'You mean
if I wanted to go, do you?'
'We can proceed on that assumption.'
'Well, then, I suppose I'd go to Hungerford Bridge,
wouldn't I?'
'You mean you would go to Hungerford in Berkshire?'
Where is that?' said Mrs Worrit.
'Eight miles beyond Newbury.'
'I've heard of Newbury. My old man backed a horse
there last year. Did well, too.'
'So you'd go to Hungerford near Newbury?'
'No, of course I wouldn't,' said Mrs Worrit. 'Go all that
way--what for? I'd go to Hungerford Bridge, of course.'
'You mean--?'
'Well, it's near Charing Cross. You know where it is. Over
the Thames.'
'Yes,' said Sir Stafford Nye. 'Yes, I do know where it is
quite well. Thank you, Mrs Worrit.'
It had been, he felt, rather like tossing a penny heads or
tails. An advertisement in a morning paper in London meant
Hungerford Railway Bridge in London. Presumably therefore
that is what the advertiser meant, although about this particular
advertiser Sir Stafford Nye was not at all sure. Her
ideas, from the brief experience he had had of her, were
original ideas. They were not the normal responses to be
expected. But still, what else could one do. Besides, there
were probably other Hungerfords, and possibly they would
also have bridges, in various parts of England. But today,
well, today he would see.
It was a cold windy evening with occasional bursts of thin
misty rain. Sir Stafford Nye turned up the collar of his
mackintosh and plodded on. It was not the first time he had
gone across Hungerford Bridge, but it had never seemed
to him a walk to take for pleasure. Beneath him was the
river and crossing the bridge were large quantities of hurrying
figures like himself. Their mackintoshes pulled round
them, their hats pulled down and on the part of one and all
of them an earnest desire to get home and out of the wind
and rain as soon as possible. It would be, thought Sir Stafford Nye, very difficult to recognize anybody in this scurrying
crowd. 7.20. Not a good moment to choose for a rendezvous
of any kind. Perhaps it was Hungerford Bridge in Berkshire.
Anyway, it seemed very odd.
He plodded on. He kept an even pace, not overtaking
those ahead of him, pushing past those coming the opposite
way. He went fast enough not to be overtaken by the others
behind him, though it would be possible for them to do so
if they wanted to. A joke, perhaps, thought Stafford Nye.
Not quite his kind of joke, but someone else's.
And yet--not her brand of humour either, he would
have thought. Hurrying figures passed him again, pushing
him slightly aside. A woman in a mackintosh was coming
along, walking heavily. She collided with him, slipped, dropped
to her knees. He assisted her up.
All right?'
'Yes, thanks.'
She hurried on, but as she passed him, her wet hand, by
which he had held her as he pulled her to her feet, slipped
something into the palm of his hand, closing the fingers
over it. Then she was gone, vanishing behind him, mingling
with the crowd. Stafford Nye went on. He couldn't overtake
her. She did not wish to be overtaken, either. He hurried on
and his hand held something firmly. And so, at long last it
seemed, he came to the end of the bridge on the Surrey side.
A few minutes later he had turned into a small cafe and
sat there behind a table, ordering coffee. Then he looked
at what was in his hand. It was a very thin oilskin envelope.
Inside it was a cheap quality white envelope. That too he
opened. What was inside surprised him. It was a ticket.
A ticket for the Festival Hall for the following evening.
Chapter 5
WAGNERIAN MOTIF
Sir Stafford Nye adjusted himself more comfortably in his
seat and listened to the persistent hammering of the Nibelungen,
with which the programme began.
Though he enjoyed Wagnerian opera, Siegfried was by
Oo means his favourite of the operas composing the Ring. Rheingold and Gotterdammerung were his two preferences. the music of the young Siegfried, listening to the songs
the birds, had always for some strange reason irritated
45
him instead of filling him with melodic satisfaction. It might
have been because he went to a performance in Munich in
his young days which had displayed a magnificent tenor of
unfortunately over-magnificent proportions, and he had been
too young to divorce the joy of music from the visual joy of
seeing a young Siegfried that looked even passably young. The
access of boyishness had revolted him. He was also not
particularly fond of birds and forest murmurs. No, give him
the Rhine Maidens every time, although in Munich even
the
Rhine Maidens in those days had been of fairly solid proportions.
But that mattered less. Carried away by the melodic
flow of water and the joyous impersonal song, he had not
allowed visual appreciation to matter.
From time to time he looked about him casually. He had
taken his seat fairly early. It was a full house, as it usually
was. The intermission came. Sir Stafford rose and looked
about him. The seat beside his had remained empty. Someone
who was supposed to have arrived had not arrived.
Was that the answer, or was it merely a case of being excluded
because someone had arrived late, which practice still
held on the occasions when Wagnerian music was listened to.
He went out, strolled about, drank a cup of coffee, smoked
a cigarette, and returned when the summons came. This
time, as he drew near, he saw that the seat next to his was
filled. Immediately his excitement returned. He regained his
seat and sat down. Yes, it was the woman of the Frankfurt Air
Lounge. She did not look at him, she was looking straight
ahead. Her face in profile was as clean-cut and pure as he
remembered it. Her head turned slightly, and her eyes passed
over him but without recognition. So intent was that nonrecognition
that it was as good as a word spoken. This was a
meeting that was not to be acknowledged. Not now, at any
event. The lights began to dim. The woman beside him turned.
'Excuse me, could I look at your programme? I have
dropped mine, I'm afraid, coming to my seat.'
'Of course,' he said.
He handed over the programme and she took it from him.
She opened it, studied the items. The lights went lower.
The second half of the programme began. It started with the
overture to Lohengrin. At the end of it she handed back
the programme to him with a few words of thanks.
'Thank you so much. It was very kind of you.'
The next item was the Siegfried forest murmur music.
He consulted the programme she had returned to him. It
46
was then that he noticed something faintly pencilled at
the foot of a page. He did not attempt to read it now. Indeed,
the light would have not been sufficient. He merely
closed the programme and held it. He had not, he was
quite sure, written anything there himself. Not, that is, in
his own programme. She had, he thought, had her own
programme ready, folded perhaps in her handbag and had
already written some message ready to pass to him. Altogether,
it seemed to him, there was still that atmosphere of secrecy,
of danger. The meeting on Hungerford Bridge and the envelope
with the ticket forced into his hand. And now the silent
woman who sat beside him. /He glanced at her once or twice
with the quick, careless glance that one gives to a stranger
sitting next to one. She lolled back in her seat; her highnecked
dress was of dull black crepe, an antique torque of gold
encircled her neck. Her dark hair was cropped closely and
shaped to her head. She did not glance at him or return any
look. He wondered. Was there someone in the seats of the
Festival Hall watching her--or watching him? Noting whether
they looked or spoke to each other? Presumably there must he,
or there must be at least the possibility of such a thing.
She had answered his appeal in the newspaper advertisement.
Let that be enough for him. His curiosity was unimpaired,
but he did at least know now that Daphne Theodofanous
--alias Mary Ann--was here in London. There were possibilities
in the future of his learning more of what Was afoot. But the plan of campaign must be left to her. He must follow
her lead. As be had obeyed her in the airport, so he would
obey her now and--let him admit it--life had become suddenly
more interesting. This was better than the boring
conferences of his political life. Had a car really tried to
run him down the other night? He thought it had. Two
attempts--not only one. It was easy enough to imagine that
one was the target of assault, people drove so recklessly
nowadays that you could easily fancy malice aforethought
when it was not so. He folded his programme, did not look at
it again. The music came to its end. The woman next to him
spoke. She did not turn her head or appear to speak to him,
but she spoke aloud, with a little sigh between the words as
though she was communing with herself or possibly to her
neighbour on the other side.
The young Siegfried,' she said, and sighed again.
The programme ended with the March from Die Meister^nger. After enthusiastic applause, people began to leave
their seats. He waited to see if she would give him any lead,