There were more shots and cries and a heavy pelting of feet. Faces seemed to press against the glass and stay there a moment, like wet leaves, before disappearing. Then the train began to move. People ran beside it, gesticulating, their mouths opening and shutting, but there was no hope for them. Something – a stone, probably – struck the window beside Yakimov. He let the blind drop and gave his order to the waiter. When he had eaten, he rose to find his berth and found that the door into the rest of the train was locked. He appealed to the waiter, but no one was empowered to open it. At last, weary of argument, he returned to his seat, put his head down on the table and slept.
The return journey took even longer than the outgoing one. The express had been due into Bucharest next morning. It actually reached the capital as darkness fell. Yakimov had had to spend the whole time in the dining-car, again taking meal after meal, paid for with Freddi’s money.
At Bucharest station, there were no porters. No one collected tickets. The place was deserted except for the newly arrived passengers who remained at the entrance, whispering together, reluctant to emerge. Yakimov looked out. The street, usually swarming at this hour and adazzle with flares, was deserted, but he could see nothing to fear. The worst of it was there were no taxis or trǎsurǎs. Another long walk! He hung around awhile, hoping someone would explain their apprehensions, but no one spoke to him and nothing happened. He decided to set out. He went alone.
The stalls of the Calea Grivitei were shut and abandoned. The pavements were empty. Occasionally he saw figures in doorways, but they slid back out of sight before he reached them. The town was unnaturally silent. He had never before seen the streets so empty.
At last, at the junction of the Calea Victoriei, he came on a group of military police with revolvers at the ready. One of them ordered Yakimov to stop. He dropped his bag in alarm and put up his hands. An officer came forward and sternly asked what he was doing out of doors. The question frightened him; he realised that his fellow-passengers had known something he had not known. He started to explain in German – the safest language these days – how he had arrived on the Orient Express and was walking home. What was wrong? What had happened? He received no reply to his questions but was ordered to produce his permis de séjour. He handed it over with his passport. Both were taken under a lamp-post and examined and discussed, while a soldier kept him covered. The discussion went on for a long time. At intervals one or other of the men turned to stare at him, so he feared he would be arrested or shot out of hand. In the end his papers were restored to him. The officer saluted. Yakimov might proceed, but must make a detour to avoid crossing the main square.
Obediently he went down a side street into the Boulevard Breteanu and, adding about half a mile to his walk, reached the Pringles’ block, still very agitated. The hall was in darkness. The porter had been conscripted some time before and not replaced. As Yakimov made his way up in the lift, he was suddenly convinced that the invasion had begun. The city not only seemed empty, it was empty. People had fled. He would find the Pringles had gone with the rest.
At the thought he might find himself deserted in a German-occupied country, he almost collapsed. To think he could have stayed on the express and been carried right away to safety! His self-pity was acute.
He was shaking so he could scarcely get his key into the lock. The flat, when he entered it, was in darkness, but there were voices inside. Reassured at once, he switched on the sitting-room light.
‘Put that light off, you damned fool,’ someone whispered from the balcony.
He switched the light off, but the moment’s illumination had shown him Harriet standing against the jamb of the balcony door and Guy and David Boyd lying on the balcony floor, peering out through the stonework of the balustrade. It was David who had spoken.
Yakimov tiptoed in. ‘Whatever is going on, dear boy?’ he asked.
In reply, David said: ‘Shut up. Do you want them to take a pot at us?’
Yakimov crouched against the doorway opposite Harriet, and looked out into the square. At first he could see nothing. The square, like the streets, was deserted, the lights shining on cobbles and stretches of tarmac bare of everything but the marks of tyres. The palace was in darkness.
After a long interval of silence, Yakimov whispered to Harriet: ‘Dear girl, do tell Yaki what is happening!’
She said: ‘The army has been called out. They’re expecting an attack on the palace. If you look over there’ – she pointed to the entrance to the Calea Victoriei – ‘you can see the tip of a machine-gun. There are soldiers all over the place.’
Peering out, he began to see a movement of shadows among shadow. The first shop in the Calea Victoriei was visible and from its doorway heads were stretched. There were other movements among the scaffolding and half-demolished buildings in the square. These movements were all made cautiously, in silence. He heard a distant sound of singing.
‘Who is going to attack the palace?’
Yakimov spoke piteously, feeling that no one wanted to tell him anything.
‘We don’t know,’ Harriet answered. ‘We think it must be the Iron Guard, but there’ve only been the usual rumours and confusion.’
‘It couldn’t be the revolution, could it?’
‘It could be anything. There was a lot of shouting for the King to abdicate, then the police went round clearing the streets and the military came out. David came in and said there was this rumour of an attack on the palace. That’s all we know.’
‘The King won’t abdicate, will he?’
Overhearing this question, David snuffled gleefully. ‘You wait and see,’ he said.
Yakimov picked up his bag and went into his bedroom. He sank down on to his bed, weary yet unable to contemplate rest. His consternation came not only from Hadjimoscos’ predictions of anarchy and the guillotine, but from the fact that the word ‘revolution’ had always fluttered him. Revolution had destroyed his family fortunes and sent his poor old dad into exile. He had grown up with his father’s stories of the downfall of the Russian monarchy and the appalling end of the Russian royal family. Yakimov imagined that in a short time now, perhaps in an hour or two, the workers would abandon trains, planes and ships. The military would requisition petrol. They would all be stuck.
Freddi had warned him not to linger in Bucharest and Freddi had said that Rumania was next on the list.
Everyone had always said that the Germans could not afford trouble here. A rising would be the signal for an immediate German occupation. It occurred to Yakimov that in casting suspicion on Guy – rather meanly, he realised, but he had no time for compunction now – he could have brought trouble on himself, for here he was, one of a discredited household, and he might not get time to prove he had not been implicated.
His thoughts went to the Orient Express which he had just left, and which always stood at least an hour in the Bucharest station. Why not hurry back to it? He had walked safely here, and could as safely return. And, for once, with Freddi’s money on him, he was ‘well heeled’.
Saying: ‘Now or never, dear boy,’ he jumped up and began pulling out the oddments of clothing that were left in the drawers. He stuffed his bag full.
He did everything quietly. He felt a need to keep his departure secret, not from any fear of being detained, but from a nervous sense of shame that, having given old Guy away, he was now himself doing a bolt. Were he to try and explain his going, he might somehow betray his betrayal.
His window opened on to the balcony. As he crept about, he could hear David Boyd whisper: ‘Here they come. Now we’ll see something.’ There was a noise outside. He moved across to the window and looked into the square. A line of soldiers stood blocking each end of the road which ran from it. Their rifles were poised to fire.