took me before I could escape. But I had taken money. I knew the account numbers, dozens of them. I remembered them all. I funnelled and finagled them, united them all into one grand account. Here, take it, take it!’
Babe opened the hand that had been grasping Ned’s. A small fold of paper was clipped between his fingers. ‘Take it. There is money there, perhaps after thirty years it is more than you can spend. The Cotter Bank, Geneva. When they found out that it was missing they came here to question me. I had hidden its trail and they were mad with rage. “Where is it? What have you done with it?” I had been here no more than a month, but Mallo had passed that month jolting my brain with electricity and filling me with drugs. The violence of my behaviour had given him no choice. I had known they would come you see, and I wanted to be ready. When they arrived, I dribbled, I giggled, I simpered, I slobbered and I wept. You would have been proud of me, Ned. I was the maddest of the mad. A ruin of a noble mind. They went away cursing, in the belief that they had destroyed the sanity of the only man that knew where all that money lay. I’d love to know how they explained it to their Minister. Now, read that piece of paper, learn it and destroy it. The Cotter Bank, Geneva. All the money will be yours when you leave here.’
‘Why do you think I want money?’ Ned’s tears still flowed in an endless stream. ‘I don’t want money, I want you! If you die, I will die. You know I will never leave this place.’
‘You
Ned, weeping at this inconsequential madness, took the spoon.
‘Hide it on you, no not there. Not in a damned pocket! Suppose Martin searches you?’
‘Where?’ Ned looked down at Babe in bewilderment.
‘Your anus, man! Push it deep in your anus. I don’t care if it bleeds.’
‘Oh Babe…’
‘Do it, do it now or I swear by almighty Christ that I’ll die cursing you. There! I don’t care if it makes you scream. I don’t care if you bleed like a pig, push it up, push it up! Now, can you stand? Can you sit? Good, good, you’ll do.’
Babe leant back down on the pillow and slowed his breath. ‘Now then,’ he said at last. ‘Now then, Ned. You’ve got the piece of paper. Look at it. The Cotter Bank, Geneva. I dared not write that down. See on the paper. There’s a number, a password phrase and a counter phrase.
Learn them. Repeat them to me… good, and again. Again … once more. Now swallow the paper. Chew it and swallow. Repeat the number … the passwords … the address again.’
‘Why are you doing this, Babe? You’re frightening me.’
‘I owe you the money. Backgammon. You’re a devil at the game. Not much more now, lad. Cast your mind back to last winter. The week before Christmas. The day we talked together about Philippa Blackrow. I had been drawing a circuit diagram for you, do you remember? You kept it, like I told you?’
‘It’s in my room, I suppose. With all my other papers. Why?’
‘It’s Thursday. Paul is on night duty. You get on all right with Paul. Hold him in conversation, ask him about football as he closes you in. You’ll need your wits to time it. Use the teaspoon to catch the lock. There’s so much for you to do. You’ll need all your strength. I’ll go on the morning boat to the mainland. Christ, what’s that I can hear?’
A key rattled in the lock and the door swung open. Martin beckoned to Ned.
‘You come with me now. Leave Babe, come with me.’
‘You said half an hour!’
‘The doctor, he comes to look at Babe. You come.
Ned threw himself down on the bed, his tear-sodden face soaking Babe’s beard.
‘Goodbye, my boy. You have already saved my life. My mind will live forever in yours. Build great things in my memory and to my memory. We have loved each other. For my sake now, stop your howling. Go quietly and pass this last day in remembering. Remember everything. You take my love and memory with you for ever.’
‘Come now!
From the doorway, Ned cast one last look back into the room as Martin pushed him against the wall.
Babe’s eyes were closed tight. All his concentration now was being spent on forcing his heart to beat faster and faster until it might burst in his chest.
An hour after lunch, Martin came to the sun-room with the news that Babe had died.
Ned, sitting alone at the chessboard, nodded. ‘Was he in pain?’
‘No pain,’ Martin’s voice was quiet and almost reverential. ‘Very peaceful. He has quick heart attack once more and was dead fast. Dr Mallo say there was nothing nobody could do,’ he added, with a hint of defensiveness. ‘Not in any hospital in the world.’
‘Would you mind,’ Ned asked quietly, ‘if I spent the rest of the day in my room? I would like to think and…, and to pray.
‘Okay, I take you there.’
They walked in silence to Ned’s room. Martin looked around at the piles of books and papers leaning up against the walls. ‘Babe, he teached you many things, yes?’
‘Yes, Martin. Many things.’
‘Some books in my language here, but you are not speaking.’
‘A little, I can read a little, but not speak very well,’ Ned replied, in halting Swedish.
‘Yes. Your accent is bad. Maybe, now Babe gone, we are better friends,’ said Martin. ‘You teach English, I teach Swedish. You teach music and the mathematics to me also.’
‘That would be nice,’ said Ned. ‘I would like that.’
‘I leave school early. I run from home where my father was beating me. The more you teach, the better friends.’
‘All right.’
‘It’s not necessary you have to be nice with me,’ Martin said, looking awkwardly at the floor. ‘I understand this. Sometimes, I am bad. I have bad feelings in my heart. You must have me in your prayers now.
‘Of course, Ned felt unwanted tears falling down his cheeks again.
‘Okay, Thomas,’ said Martin. ‘I leave now.’
It took almost half an hour for Ned to find the circuit diagram that Babe had drawn and two hours for him to be sure that he had memorised and understood it properly.
Paul came on duty at supper-time and Ned practised without the teaspoon by engaging Paul in brief conversation just as he was pulling the door closed.
‘Oh by the way,’ he said, holding the door by the handle on the inside and talking through the gap. ‘Before you lock up. You couldn’t do me a favour could you? In return for me teaching you the nicknames of all the British football clubs. Just a small thing.’
‘Favour?’ Paul looked worried.
‘You wouldn’t have a piece of chewing gum, would you?’
Paul grinned. ‘Maybe at supper time. I’ll see.’
‘Thanks. Are Trondheim playing today?’
‘Sure they are playing today.’
‘Good luck then,’ said Ned cheerfully, pushing the door closed himself. ‘See you later.’
At nine o’clock Paul came in once more with a mug of hot chocolate and some pills.
‘What’s this?’ Ned was alarmed. ‘I’m not on medication.’
‘Dr Mallo is worried that you are upset about Babe,’
Paul explained. ‘They are not strong. Just to help you sleep.’
‘Okay then,’ said Ned cheerfully, slapping them to his mouth and swallowing. ‘Very thoughtful of the good doctor.’
‘And here is some chewing gum for you.
Ned took the stick of gum and beamed. ‘Hollywood, how glamorous! Paul, you’re a hero.’
‘Good night, Thomas. Have a good sleep.’
‘Oh tell me though,’ said Ned, stopping Paul from closing the door again. ‘How did Trondheim do?’
Ned held the spoon in his right hand, which he held casually against the side of the door. He leaned harder and harder, with only a gap of an inch through which he could talk to Paul, the handle of the spoon pressing against the sprung lock.
‘Three goals to one? A great victory for you,’ he said. ‘Well, I’ll see you in the morning perhaps. Goodnight.’
With one last push, Ned closed the door. The spoon handle projected into the room from the gap between the door and the jamb. As Paul’s footsteps died away down the corridor, Ned pulled at the door, which gave. The spoon was holding back the lock spring. Almost sobbing with relief, Ned returned to his desk, spat out the sleeping pills and for the last time unfolded Babe’s circuit diagram.
At what he judged to be a time somewhere between half past two and three in the morning, he went to his door and pulled it open. The spoon dropped to the floor with a metallic clatter and, cursing himself as the sound rang around the corridor, Ned stooped to pick it up.
No sound came from any part of the building as he walked past the empty sun-room, chewing on his Hollywood gum. Only the clicking of the bones in his bare feet and toes disturbed the huge vacuum of silence that hung over the building like a shroud.
When he reached the door to Mallo’s office, he listened for a minute before entering. Once inside, he switched on the desk light and looked around, blinking at the sudden glare. The curtains were drawn, but there would be a line of light showing under the door. He knew there was very little time to lose. He went straight to a wooden box on the wall, opened it and took out a key. An impulse made him take out another, smaller key and try it in the lock of the small grey filing cabinet against the opposite wall. The key fitted and Ned searched quickly about the rest of the office until he found a plastic shopping bag into which he pushed sheaf after sheaf of papers and files. Tying the top of the carrier bag in a tight knot, he took out the chewing gum, swallowed the small key, popped the gum back in his mouth, switched off
