Lottie Bemans. 23. Blonde. 5’ 9”. München. Checked P.A.D. Chalkokondyli.A. Ident. card expired one month. Two convictions. Trivial.
The colour slide was mounted ready for use in a projector. It was an Agfa film mount. I held it up to the light, remembering Lancing saying that he thought it was the place they wanted. It showed a pair of large iron gates that formed the entrance to a driveway that ran into the background of the picture, disappearing into a thicket of pines, through which just showed the blue of a lake. In front of the gates was a man in blue working overalls, a peaked cap, and smoking a pipe. Running from the sides of the gates were small sections of very tall brick walls, cut by the limit of the film frame on either side. Close to the gate pillar on the left-hand side, there was a narrow niche in the wall which held a figure. I couldn’t make out the details.
On the couple of sheets of paper Lancing had written his notes, which read:
WWK/2.
KKD boshed Kotor monthly report. Follows. Sea most of time. Kalamai – Venice, L.B. run 3 wks gone. This trip cargo lifted: 2 miles off Gulf Traste. Two hrs work, sunken buoy, radar or magnetic. Lead casket 10’ × 3’. Shore leave 2 hrs but unable contact SKD.
Checked per ins. Baldy, cook. Dead right. S.W. transmitter, fitted back of store room fridge. All grins, declares C.I.A. Don’t believe. Fridge fitted 4 months Brindisi.
Spotted A. Party pamphlet gash can.
Mme. V. and new blonde Pomina.
Baldy, me, both playing it too long. F. him. Give me out. Big boy misses nothing.
That was all on the first sheet. On the second, and he’d obviously had a little time in hand while he waited for me, he had written:
C. tell that bastard that like bishop said a man can only go on for so long. Big boy will miss slide and I’ll be gutted.
It was meant only for me, and I knew how he felt. You can only keep a man walking the edge so long – and just at this moment Sutcliffe was probably dining rich somewhere in London and making loud ponging noises about the claret.
I wrapped everything up and put it away in my case. Then I went down on to the hotel lake terrace and sat with a drink, waiting for Vérité to come down. It was a balmy, peaceful evening. Thin scarfs of mist hung low over the lake, and the lines of mountain ridges were cut dark against the star-studded sky which cradled the idle, reclining moon. I thought of Herr Spiegel lying under his bush, cold and stiff, and Frau Spiegel away in Babino Polje. It was going to be some time before any trouble started and by then Vérité and I had to be out of Yugoslavia. I didn’t see it as any great problem. Somewhere Katerina was away on the Komira, and we had a contract, and a contract, I hoped, that was going to be more lasting than the one recently broken with Spiegel.
Vérité did not come down to dinner. She sent a message down to me to eat alone. I had an omelette, half a lobster, and half a bottle of wine, and then the schoolmistresses at the next table insisted that I had my coffee with them and wanted to know whether my fiancée were ill. I said no, she was just tired.
The motor-boat took us across to the far side of the lake at ten, and we went down to Polace in the bus. There were half a dozen other people leaving the hotel and catching the boat. In Polace one of the hotel staff who had come down on the bus with us showed us to our temporary lodgings.
Vérité and I were led up a flight of rough stone steps to a small house on the hillside, just above the landing stage. We were introduced to the woman of the house and the hotel man left us there.
The woman took us through a spotless sitting-room, shining with new, highly varnished furniture, into a large bedroom. There was a new suite of bedroom furniture; a large bed, a wardrobe that rose into the lofty gloom of the ceiling like a polished cliff side, and two chairs that had white cloth covers over their tapestry to preserve them. There were no curtains at the windows, but large sheets of brown paper had been drawing-pinned across them. Against the window was a wash-stand with a yellow bowl and jug.
Within a few moments it became clear that this was the only free bedroom in the house and that the hotel had made a mistake and assigned it to us on a man-and-wife basis. I tried to point this out to the woman. She thought that we had some objection to the room on the score of its furniture or cleanliness. In the end I had to let her retire hurt.
Vérité, who had been quiet ever since we had left the hotel, said, “It doesn’t matter. We’ve only a few hours to spend, and I don’t mean to undress, do you?”
“No. I’ll doss down on the floor.”
She shook her head. “The bed’s big enough for two.”
She went round the bed, slipped off her coat and shoes, and lay down.
I padded over to the oil lamp which stood on the wash-hand stand and turned it out.
I flopped back on the bed and we lay there with a good two feet of neutral ground between us.
I said, “If I snore, just kick me and say, ‘Quiet.’”
She said nothing.
In five minutes I was asleep.
I don’t know how much later it was that I awoke. At first I thought that I had been awakened by the brown paper at the window rattling. One of the windows behind it was slightly open and the night draught was
