The Light of Day (19 page)

Just to be on the safe side, in case anyone took it into
his head to go through my things, I hid the radio on top of the wardrobe. Then I went down, out through the rear-door and skirted the front courtyard to the drive.

It was so dark there under the trees that I couldn't really see where I was going, and after I had gone a hundred yards or so I turned back. Miss Lipp, Harper, Miller and Fischer were coming out on to the terrace again when I reached the courtyard, and Hamul was lighting candles on the tables.

Along the side of the courtyard it was quite dark, and the weeds made it easy to move quietly over the gravel. At the entrance to the stable yard I stopped by the wall to see if I could hear anything they said.

I must have waited there for twenty minutes or more before I heard anything but an indistinct mumble. Then one of the men laughed loudly—Miller it was—and I heard him saying seven words as if they were the climax of a joke.

‘Let the dogs be fed and clothed!’ he cackled, and then repeated it. 'Let the dogs be fed and clothed!'

The others laughed with him, and then the mumbling began again. I went on in and up to my room.

I made the bed as comfortable as I could with the blankets, and then shaved to save myself the trouble of doing so in the morning just before eleven, I took the radio out of its case, opened the back and turned the small switch. All I got was a hissing sound. I waited. I did not trouble to use the earphone, because I did not see any reason to then. I had not even shut the windows.

On the stroke of eleven, the set made a harsh clacking noise. A moment later, a voice crackled through the tiny loudspeaker at such a high volume level that I could feel the whole set vibrating in my hands. I tried to turn the thing down, but, with the V.H.F. on, the control seemed to have no effect. All I could do was stuff the set under the blankets. Even there it seemed like a public address system. I scrambled to the windows and shut them. The loudspeaker began repeating its message:

'Attention
period report. Attention period report. New arrival is Leopold Axel Miller. Belgian passport gives following data: age sixty-three, described as importer, place of birth Antwerp. Data now also received concerning Tekelek
 
S.A., a Swiss corporation registered in Berne. Nominal capital fifty thousand Swiss francs. Directors are
K. W.
Hoffman, R. E. Kohner, G. D.
Bernadi and L. A. Mathis, all of whom are believed to have personal numbered and secret accounts at
Banque Crédit Suisse,
Zürich.
Business of Tekelek said to be sale of electronic accounting machines manufactured in West Germany. Urgent you report progress. Attention period report . . .'

I fumbled under the blankets, turned the V.H.F. switch off and replaced the back on the set. Then I tuned in a Turkish station hi case anyone had heard the noise and came to investigate.

Nobody did.

‘Urgent you report progress.'

I had a cigarette packet with two cigarettes left in it. I
lit
one, put the other in my pocket and went to the bath' room for a piece of toilet paper.

When I returned I locked the door and sat down to write my progress report. It was quite short
.

Cook, caretaker and local fishermen
au
believe suspects to
be Russian spies.
I
folded the toilet paper, put it inside the cigarette packet, crumpled the packet and put the result in my

pocket ready for disposal in the morning. I felt I had done my duty for that day.

CHAPTER SEVEN

I woke up very early in the morning and with that nasty sick feeling that I used to have when it was a school day and I hadn't done my homework properly the night before.

I got the cigarette packet out of my pocket and had another look at my toilet paper report. It really was not good enough. Unless I could think of something else to say,
Tufan
would think that I was trying to be funny. I went and had an extremely uncomfortable cold bath, collected some more sheets of toilet paper and started again.

Period report heard. Attempts to check door contents frustrated. Will try again today,
I wrote.

I thought about the 'today'. Fischer had ordered the car for eleven o'clock. With that instruction to rely upon, it would be perfectly natural for me to go and fill up the car with petrol without asking anyone's permission; and, as long as I didn't keep them waiting, I could take my time about it If, when I got back, they objected to my having taken the car out by myself or wanted to know why I had been so long, I could say that I had been to buy razor-blades or something, and be the injured innocent.

It was six-forty-five by then and in a few
minués
I would have to get ready for the seven o'clock radio contact. Two other things occurred to me that I might add to my report

Will telephone you from garage after inspection if time and circumstances allow, or will add to this report. During conversation Lipp
—
Miller yesterday name
'Giulio'
was mentioned in connection with a boat. No other details.

Then I added the bit about the Russian spies. It didn't look quite so bald and stupid now.

I hid the report under the lining paper of one of the drawers, shut the french windows tight and got the radio ready with earphone attachment plugged in. Promptly at seven the car began transmitting.

'Attention period report. Attention period report. Advice
received from Swiss source that no passports have been
legaüy
issued to Harper and Lipp. In view Miner contact and Tekeiek papers with Harper, possibility mast be considered that correct names of Harper and Lipp are Hoffman and Kohner or vice versa. Miller may be Mathis. Imperative you report progress.'

As the voice began repeating I switched off. When I had packed the set away, I got the report out and added five words.

Hoffman, Kohner and Mathis names noted.

At least, I ought to get an 'E' for Effort. I put the new report in the cigarette packet, burnt my earlier effort and started to get dressed. As I did so, I heard the
Lambretta
start up and then go whining off down the drive. About twenty minutes later, I heard the sound of
it
returning. I looked out of the window and saw it disappearing into the stable yard with a bundle of partially-wrapped loaves strapped to the rear seat.

Geven was back in the kitchen when I went down. He gave me a sullen look and did not answer when I said 'good morning’. He was probably hung over as well as disgusted with me; but he looked such a mess anyway that it was hard to tell

There was a pot of coffee on the range and I looked from it to him inquiringly. He shrugged, so I got a cup and helped myself. He was slicing the bread by hacking at ft with a heavy chopping knife. From the neat way the slices fell I knew that the chopping knife was as sharp as a razor. As I had no desire to lose any fingers, I waited until he had put it aside before taking a piece of bread.

The coffee did not taste much like coffee, but the bread was good. I considered attempting to heal the breach by offering him the use of my bathroom; but I only had one towel and the thought of what it would look like by the time he had finished with it kept me silent. Instead, I offered him a cigarette.

He took it and motioned to a basket of apricots on the table. I
dont
like apricots, but it seemed as well to accept the offer. Soon he began to mutter about the breakfasts which had to be served, each on a separate tray to the four 'lords and ladies’ above. I offered to lay the trays and, although he waved away the offer, friendly relations seemed to be re-established. After a while Mr and Mrs Hamul arrived and were introduced. Mrs Hamul was a small, stout, sad-looking old woman with the black dress and head-scarf of the conservative Turkish matron. As neither she nor her husband spoke a word of anything but Turkish, the formalities were brief. I lingered there, though, and had another piece of bread. The best time to leave without attracting attention, I had decided, would be while Harper and the rest were having their breakfasts.

As soon as the trays started going up,
I toíd Geven
that I had to buy petrol and asked if
diere
was anything I could get for him while I was in town. At once he wanted to come with me. I got out of that by saying that I had to go immediately in order to be back at the time for which the car had been ordered. I left him, sulking, picked up the Phillips screwdriver from my room and went to the garage.,

The Lincoln was a quiet car, and I knew that all they would probably hear of my going would be the sound of the tyres on the gravel of the courtyard; but I was so afraid of Harper or Fischer suddenly appearing on one of the bedroom balconies and yelling at me to stop that in my haste to reach the drive I almost hit the basin of the fountain. As I went on down the drive I broke into a sweat and my legs felt weak and peculiar. I wanted to stop and be sick. That may sound very stupid, but when you are like I am, the bad things that
nearly
happen are just as hard, in a way, as the bad things that do actually happen. They are certainly no easier to forget. I always envied those characters in
Alice
who only felt pain before they were hurt. I seem to feel things before, during and after as well; nothing ever goes completely away. I have often thought of killing myself, so that I wouldn't have to think or feel or remember any more, so that I could rest; but then I have always started worrying in case this after-life they preach about really exists. It might turn out to be even bloodier than the old one.

The Peugeot was back on duty again. I drove towards Sariyer for about half a mile, and men turned left on to one of the roads leading up to the forest It was Sunday morning and families from Istanbul would soon be arriving at the municipal picnic grounds to spend the day; but at that early hour the car-parking areas were still fairly empty, and I had no difficulty in finding a secluded place under the trees.

I decided to try the same door again. I had scratched the leather on it once already; but if I were very careful it need not be scratched again. In any case, as long as I drove the car, scratches would be less noticeable on that door than on the others. The earlier attempt had taught me something, too. If I removed all the screws on the hinge side of the door first and only loosened the others, I thought it might be possible to ease the panel back enough to see inside the door without taking the whole panel and electric window mechanism completely away.

It took me twenty minutes to find out that I was right about the panel, and a further five seconds to learn that I had been completely wrong about the stuff having been removed. There it still was, just as I had seen it in the photographs
Tufan
had shown me at
Edirne. In
this particular door there were twelve small, paper-wrapped cylinders—probably grenades.

I screwed the panel back into place, and then sat there for a while thinking. The Peugeot was parked about a hundred yards away—I could see it in the mirror—and I very nearly got out and walked back to tell the driver that I had found. I wanted badly to talk to someone. Then I pulled myself together. There was no point in talking to someone who wouldn't, or couldn't, usefully talk back. The sensible thing would be to obey orders.

I took my report out of the cigarette packet and added
to it.

9.20
a.m. inspected interior front door driver's side. Material still in place as per photo. In view of time absent from villa and inability to add to this report, will not telephone from garage now.

I replaced the toilet paper in the packet, tossed it out of the window and drove back on to the road. I waited just long enough to see a man from the Peugeot pick up the report, then I drove into Sariyer and filled the tank. I arrived back at the villa just before ten.

I half-expected to find an angry Fischer pacing the courtyard and demanding to know where the hell I'd been. There was nobody. I drove the car into the stable yard, emptied the ash-trays, brushed the floor carpeting and ran a duster over the body. The Phillips screwdriver in my pocket worried me. Now that I knew that the stuff was still in the car it seemed an incriminating thing to have. I certainly did not want to put it back in my room. It might be needed again, so I could not throw it away. In the end, I hid it inside the cover of an old tyre hanging on the wall of the garage. Then I went and tidied myself up. Shortly before eleven o'clock I drove the car round to the marble steps in the front courtyard.

After about ten minutes Harper came out. He was wearing a blue sports shirt with blue slacks, and he had a map in his hand. He nodded in response to my greeting.

'Are we all right for gas, Arthur?'

'I filled it this morning,
sir.'

'Oh, you did?' He looked agreeably surprised. "Well, do you know a place called Pendik?"

'I've heard the name. On the other side somewhere, isn't it' There's supposed to be a good restaurant there, I think.'