We have to do it this way. There isn't a choice. Take care yourself.'
The words of each seemed comfortless and empty to the other.
It was almost dark when Massinger reached the house. He let himself into the ground floor hallway, and began climbing the stairs. He had studied Hyde's new papers at the club, had sat at an eighteenth-century writing desk jotting down everything he had been told, and everything he knew and could remember concerning Pavel Koslov. And he had booked his seat on the British Airways morning flight to Vienna, and a room at the Inter- Continental Hotel. The ascent seemed to become steeper as he mounted the stairs, as if a weight of guilt and reluctance pressed against his head and body. Margaret was there, waiting for him. She would have begun preparing dinner; supervising the housekeeper but preparing the sauces and the dessert herself. There was a hard lump in his chest which would not disperse.
He fumbled his key into the latch and pushed open the door. He listened, but there were no noises, no wisps of conversation from the kitchen. He opened the door of the drawing-room.
Margaret and Babbington were both sitting, apart yet somehow subtly united, facing the door. Babbington's face was serious to the point of being forbidding. The man was charged with the electricity and danger of disobeyed authority. He was still wearing his overcoat. Massinger had passed his hat and gloves unnoticed on the hall stand.
Margaret's face was angry. Betrayed, flushed. Her eyes were hard, accusing.
She knew — somehow she knew…
Babbington had told her.
Told what?
He was acutely aware, like some schoolboy pilferer, of the evidence of Hyde's new papers in the breast pocket of his coat.
CHAPTER FOUR:
Into Exile
After the initial shock, it was the tense, unaccustomed silence that struck Massinger. There was so often music in this room; records Margaret might be listening to, Margaret doodling at the piano, even singing—
Music and the idea of it brought back the 'Hunt' quartet over the telephone and the guilty knowledge of Hyde and the palpable bulk of the package.
Then she burst out; 'Paul, where have you been?' It was matronly yet somehow desperate. Babbington had introduced her to subtle nightmares. 'What's going on, Paul?' she continued. 'Andrew's been telling me all sorts…' She looked down, then, her voice trailing into silence. She sensed herself as part of a conspiracy against him. He saw Babbington watching her with what might have been an eager hunger — a suspicion of some former relationship between them stung him inappropriately at that moment — then the man looked up at him. His eyes were satisfied.
'What's the matter, darling?' he asked as soothingly as he could.
Her face had hardened again when she looked up. 'You know what's happening!' she accused. 'Andrew didn't want to tell me — I made him…' She was ashamed at that. 'You're still trying to help that man!'
'My dear,' he said, moving towards her. Her knuckles were white against the velvet of the arms of her chair. She was wearing only her engagement ring and narrow gold wedding ring. Babbington's face indicated that he had been sufficiently warned, that the consequences were now of his making. 'How can I have been helping him? At the club, at my stockbroker's?' The lies came fluently. He turned to Babbington. 'Andrew — would you explain this, please? How have you upset Margaret?'
'I'm not upsetl I hate that man!'
'For God's sake, Margaret!' His eyes never moved from Babbington's face. The directorships, the Quangos, the circles that might have admitted him, the respect — they all paled. This was Babbington's real power — this … a woman in tears, almost hysterical with fear and anger and hate. Babbington could, he was amply demonstrating, poison Margaret's mind incurably.
Castleford—
He was made aware once again of how many pictures of her father this room, other rooms, contained. The portrait watched from the wall. Castleford was here, in the room with them, assisting Babbington. He felt nausea and guilt sourly together in his throat.
Then he remembered Aubrey. The pictures stared at him, the portrait watched. Aubrey, in the back of his awareness, pleaded for, demanded help.
Aubrey—
'My dear,' Babbington murmured, touching Margaret's hand, his large fingers tapping at the two rings, at the knuckles of her left hand. Massinger clenched his fists at his sides. 'My dear, go and calm down a little. I think I may have — well, let me talk to Paul about this… mm?'
She looked at Babbington, nodded, sniffed, and got up. It was mesmeric, a further demonstration of Babbington's power over her mind. She left the room. Massinger pulled off his overcoat, careful of the package as he folded it and placed it across the back of a chair. The wall lights appeared gloomy, the room large and vacant.
'Well?' he accused Babbington. 'What the hell are you up to, Andrew?'
He stood over Babbington, who did not attempt to rise.
'What the hell are you doing, Paul? It's my right to ask, I think, not yours. What are you doing, man?' Even then, his hand indicated the door by which Margaret had left. It was as if he had struck her. 'What were you doing in Earl's Court, at Hyde's address? Who did you talk with — his landlady? Why, man? What were you doing at the Imperial War Museum, with Shelley? Why did Shelley have to throw off surveillance in order to meet you?' His eyes glinted, but Massinger suspected that he had no answers to his questions, using them as he was simply in the form of accusations. Please don't let him know, he thought, and realised the weakness of his position. He and Shelley and Hyde. The sum total… Inadequate.
'I—' Careful, careful, he told himself, trying to rid himself of images of his wife, trying to press down upon his anger, create a mood of apologetic explanation. Not too weak, not too quick, but start to give in. 'I don't see what it has to do with you, Andrew. I really don't think it needs you to come here and poison my wife against me—' He had walked away from Babbington soon after he began speaking, and now he turned to face him. Deliberately, the whisky decanter in his hand as he did so. 'Do you?' he finished.
'Poison?' Babbington smiled. 'You never possessed much sense of proportion, Paul, did you? I'm not poisoning Margaret against you. I'm just trying to establish what you think you're engaged upon, that's all.' The remark invited explanation.
Not too quickly, Massinger instructed himself, pouring a large whisky without offering one to Babbington. Margaret kept intruding, tightening his chest with a physical pain. It was difficult to concentrate on fending off Babbington. 'Do I owe you any explanation, Andrew?'
'I think you do, yes. You don't even know this man Hyde. Of what interest is he to you?'
'I—' Massinger looked thoughtful, slightly guilty; almost determined. 'Aubrey asked me to check…'he admitted slowly.
'What?'
'Aubrey asked me to check,' he blustered. 'It's as simple as that. He wanted to know whether Hyde had been heard from. Does that satisfy you?'
Enough bluster, too much—? Had he hooked Babbington, used the man's poor enough opinion of him? Dodged and paltered enough to be dismissed?
Babbington smiled. His eyes almost seemed to form words — errand-boy, pet dog… Babbington's contempt for him was evident. Massinger wondered whether the man might not destroy his happiness simply out of amusement?
'Aubrey asked you,' he repeated with heavy sarcasm. 'And what, pray, did you find out?'
'His landlady hadn't heard from him.'
