"He can go back to Venice," said Craig, "li he does anything stupid, we know how to reach him."
"Yes," said the old man. "You're in a very dirty business." Craig drank his whiskey. "You trump up charges that wreck an old woman's life so that you can blackmail her stupid, clever, homosexual son into coming into your clutches. The one thing with guts in it poor Mark ever did. And for what?"
"To prevent a massacre," said Craig.
Swyven sighed. "Never argue with Intelligence. They always have the last word," he said. "Look ah—er—No good asking your name, I suppose?"
"I'd only he to you."
"Yes. Well. Can he have a few days with us—with his mother?"
"Yes," said Craig. "He can do that. He mustn't leave the house."
"I'll guarantee that," said Swyven.
"Yes, sir," Craig said. "He'll be watched anyway. There's nothing I can do about that."
"I beheve you," Swyven said. "You want a word with his mother?"
Craig said at once, "No, sir. Just pass the message
on."
"I will," Swyven said, then, with an old man's delight in his memory outweighing everything else: "I remember you."
"I don't think so," said Craig.
"You went on a raid to Andraki. Had to shoot the schoolmaster—he was a Resistance leader until the Gestapo got him. You killed a lot of Germans that night. I doubt if you were nineteen years old."
"I think you're mistaken, sir," said Craig. The old man hesitated.
"Of course I'm mistaken," he said. "Nothing's what it seems to be anymore. I'll show you out."
He took Craig past the drawing room and Craig had a sudden glimpse of a man kneeling by a chair, weeping, while an old woman stroked his hair. He kept on going. Outside there were a couple of Special Branch men, Detective Chief Inspector Linton's squad. He got into the Jaguar and drove off to Regent's Park.
· · *
When he got there, Pia was giving a party. The room swarmed with actors and agents of the kind to be found in the Pickwick, or Gerry's, or the Buckstone, sleek people, successful people, witty people, the people who had made it, or who were on the way there, or who were simply seen around, and in the middle of them Pia in gold lame pants just that essential bit too tight and a frilled and frothy blouse in explosive red, looking as Italian as minestrone soup.
"John," she screamed. "Angel," and dashed across to him, embraced him, dragged liim into his own flat as if he were an unwilling guest. "John," she said, "this is Howard and Margot and Eddy and Alan and Rachel and—oh, you'll soon know everyone. Somebody give John a drink please.
"Here," said Eddy, a plump, durable producer. 'Try some of this."
Craig looked at the glass of champagne.
"Nasty spumante," said Eddy.
"We must be celebrating," said Craig.
"Indeed we are. Pia's just signed with us for a thirteen-part TV series. The Woman in the Case. She's going to be great."
"I'll say she is," said Rachel, "and believe me I should know. I'm her agent. Who are you with, darling?" "I don't act," said Craig.
"Don't you, darling? I thought you might be a stunt-man. You look like a stuntman." I'm in nuts and bolts."
"What hell for you, darling. So uncomfortable."
Craig drank his Italian champagne, and went to look for more. There was plenty of it, and no shortage of clever, witty people who knew all sorts of clever, witty things to
IDS HAPPY B
169
about nuts and bolts, and Craig was glad when the first b kle toward dinner began, round about eight o'clock. About nine, Rachel took him by the arm, and led him into a corner, lx>ked at him with the shrewd, appraising eye that agents and producers share with butchers and judges of catde shows.
T want a word with you," said Rachel. "About Pia." A lady television director made her famous, swooping exit, cannoned into Rachel and sent her sprawling into Craig's arms. He righted her neatly, easily, like a deft postman handling a messy parcel.
"Christ, you're a hard bastard," Rachel said.
"Are you working round to thumping me?" Craig
asked.
"In a way, sweety. In a way. I want you to give Pia up." Craig made a silence. "You're not helping her, you know. She wants to run after you the whole time. That won't help her career."
Craig said: "Are you telling me she's got a career?"
"Believe me, darling," said Rachel, "our Pia can act. I saw her tests, and she's good. That's why I'm her ■gent. I only take the good ones. She's going to go a mile high."
"She was never any good before," Craig said.
"And now she's bloody marvelous. Something must have happened to her. Have you any idea what it is?"
Craig thought of the two of them cooped up in the cell like battery hens, of the frantic terrible fights with D\-ton-Blease, the agony of loving in his cabin in Naxos's yacht.
"Not the slightest," he said.
"That girl is going to go so high," said Rachel, "unless you're going to be nasty. You know, I think you ought to leave her alone for a bit. Let her work. I don't want to threaten you, darling, but—"
"No, don't do that," Craig said. T might burst into
tears."
"Well then," said Rachel.
"Quite so," said Craig, and Rachel frowned.
"Don't laugh at me, darling," she said. "I'm serious."
"If only," said Craig, "you had a whip."
At 9:30 only Eddy and Rachel were left, and Eddy cleared his throat and turned to Craig. Rachel said: "I've had a word with him," and Eddy looked happy and took Rachel out to dinner.
"What scrumptious friends you have," Craig said.
"You're not angry with me, darling?" said Pia.
"Should I be?"
"Of course," she said. "Look at the mess I made in your flat."
"You let me stay for the party. What's for supper?"
"I found an Italian restaurant three doors away; they make the most marvelous spaghetti Bolognese. I'll get some."
She ordered, and the food sent up was splendid. Craig began to relax.
"You've had more work," said Pia. "Does it show?"
"Not to others. I know you very well. Something has happened?"
"The past caught up with me," said Craig. "Italy?"
"Greece," he said. "I was eighteen and a half years old. You would have been four I suppose—making big eyes at G.I.'s for chocolate."
She climbed into his lap.
"Tell me," she said.
"No," said Craig. "It's over. Finished. Let's talk about you. I hear you quit the espionage business."
She stiffened then, tried to get up, but Craig's arm came round her so tightly that she gasped, forcing her back to him.
"Don't be silly," he said. "Loomis hired you to keep an eye on me, didn't he? He was worried because I was a lush. Isn't that right?"
Her face burrowed into his coat. "That morning you had the orange juice and champagne already mixed—you remember—wasn't that a test for poor old Craig? And you tried to stop Tavel beating me up. Right?"
"I didn't know you then," she whispered, "but how did you find out?"
"You did a job with Grierson," Craig said. "It made me think about all sorts of things."
"I thought there was nothing else for me," Pia said. "I really thought I had no talent for acting. And if that was true, I had nothing. Then Grierson came to Rome and talked to me. What's wrong?"
Craig laughed aloud.
"Nothing," he said. "I always forget how professional Grierson is. No wonder he was embarrassed that day on Naxos's yacht." His hands grew tender. "You saved me from that suntan oil. Ill never forget that."
"And now I can act, after all that happened," Pia said. Her voice was tentative.