“You mean go live in Russia forever?”
Sir Arthur regarded him quizzically. “What is forever? Who knows for sure if he’d need to cross the border? Don’t you read your newspapers, young man?”
“Of course I do, sir,” said Basil, refraining from elucidating that he scanned headlines, read the sports scores, occasionally looked to see what new films were opening in the West End, and, time permitting, attacked the crossword.
“Have you been reading between the lines lately?”
“I don’t quite get your meaning.”
“The dangerous innuendo in dispatches received from abroad, especially those from correspondents on the continent. There’ll be a war, Basil, and this will be the most terrible war of all.”
Basil’s palms were damp, and he rubbed them on his trousers.
“Hitler wants the world, he’s a very greedy little man. And, mark my words, he’ll swallow up a large helping of it. A lot of it will be handed to him on a silver platter by the appeasers who are too stupid to understand they too lie in his path of destruction. He wants France and Poland and Czechoslovakia and the Netherlands. And he wants us.”
“England? Great Britain?”
“The Commonwealth. All of it. He won’t do things by halves.”
“Certainly not for our cuisine.”
Sir Arthur chuckled. “That’s a good one. ‘Not for our cuisine.’ I like that. Must tell it to the boys at the club. Ah well, so much for levity. The sober fact is that he’ll soon be on the march, we know that. He’s watching us with the sly cunning of a cat tracking a dickey bird. When Edward abdicates, Hitler will woo him…”
Basil paled. “Abdicate? You know this for a fact?”
“The man’s a pussy willow. No balls. He says he will do this unless he is permitted to marry Wallis Simpson and make her his queen. Can you imagine the two of them enthroned side by side?” He raged, “There’s more logic and substance in Mother Goose!” He was beginning to wonder why there was no word from the person assigned to pick up Hitchcock’s trail in Medwin, now made feasible thanks to Miss Farquhar’s information. “There are devilish things going on in Germany right now; information has been smuggled to us at great risk. Regner knows for a fact that the Germans are constructing a network of internment camps where they mean to destroy millions of Jews. There is one already in operation at Dachau, and that’s only ten miles outside of Munich. Hitler’s reign of terror is underway; you can see it yourself with the refugees pouring into the country, poor buggers. What do we do with them? We’re still suffering from the Depression. The economy is a disaster— and tell me, Basil, what’s your impression of Violet Pack?” The non sequitur didn’t throw Basil. It was a ploy used frequently by Sir Arthur, and Basil was always on the alert for them. They tripped up Nigel Pack usually, but not Basil. “Well, she’s not exactly my cup of tea, sir.”
“Come to think of it, what is your cup of tea? You seem to lead such a circumspect life, isn’t that rather tiresome?”
Basil’s face reddened. “I’m afraid, sir, I’m not much interested in cups of tea. I’m devoted to the firm.”
“I’m delighted for the firm.” He wondered if Basil was homosexual, as he had wondered on occasion in the past, but refrained from expressing his curiosity. Basil was a good man, and good men were hard to find, as dear American Sophie Tucker had sung in her recent engagement at the Palladium. “Now what about Violet Pack?”
“Well, frankly, sir, I don’t quite know what to say. She’s never come up in our conversation before.”
“Never had the opportunity. We so rarely get to natter on our own this way.” Sir Arthur smiled warmly. “It’s quite cozy. We must do it more often. It’s this way. Nigel being one of my favorite people, as you well know.…”
“Yes, sir.” Teacher’s pet, Basil referred to him in private, but not with venom.
“He’s been with us a bit longer than you have, and his performance has been exemplary, and continues to be. But I’ve been harboring the suspicion that all’s not well with them. Has he said anything to you?”
“No, sir.”
“Not even a hint?”
“Not a trace.”
“Well, what do you talk about when you’re together?”
“The firm, mostly.”
“You mean at lunch and tea and over a drink, it’s always shop talk?”
“It is, mostly, sir.”
“How boring.” He was buzzed and picked up the phone. “Yes? Put him through. Now what’s going on, Herbert? Where are you? Still in Medwin?” He looked at his wristwatch. “They must be getting more from the old girl than I thought they would. You’re keeping well hidden, right? Good. Can’t have them recognizing you. Speak to you later.” He hung up the phone and said, “Shop talk.”
“Sorry about that, sir. I say, who’s Herbert? That’s a new one on me.”
Sir Arthur leaned on the desk and removed the pipe from his mouth. “Basil, I’m afraid that’s one thread that has to be left hanging untidily.”
It was more of a lunch than a simple tea that Phoebe Allerton had prepared for them, and Hitchcock plunged into it with trencherman gusto. It was as though he had every intention of expanding all five feet six inches of himself to a fraction of bursting point. Miss Lockwood, declaring she had no appetite, had gone to the piano and, to Hitchcock’s delight and Nancy Adair’s despair, given them a concert. Her voice was reedy, unsteady, and determined. Her piano playing was haphazard at best, her left hand seeming to favor the black keys. She opened with “I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls” and then segued into “After the Ball,” which brought tears to Phoebe Allerton’s eyes. Hitchcock wasn’t
