“I ought to have known that you’d find a use for me, sooner or later; even if it was only as a decoy duck. You always find a use for everybody, don’t you? If I’d landed up in prison it’d have damn’ well served me right.”
“William, I give you my word of honour, I never …”
“I won’t pretend,” I continued, “that I care a damn what happens to Kuno. If he’s fool enough to let himself in for this, he does it with his eyes open… . But I must say this, Arthur: if anybody but Bayer had told me you’d ever do the dirty on the Party, I’d have called him a bloody liar. You think that’s very sentimental of me, I suppose?”
Arthur started visibly at the name.
“So Bayer knows, does he?”
“Of course.”
“Oh dear, oh dear… .”
He seemed to have collapsed into himself, like a scarecrow in the rain. His loose, stubbly cheeks were blotched and pallid, his lips parted in a vacant snarl of misery.
“I never really told van Hoorn anything of importance, William. I swear to you I didn’t.”
“I know. You never got the chance. It doesn’t seem to me that you’re much good, even as a crook.”
“Don’t be angry with me, dear boy. I can’t bear it.”
“I’m not angry with you; I’m angry with myself for being such an idiot. I thought you were my friend, you see.”
“I don’t ask you to forgive me,” said Arthur, humbly. “You’ll never do that, of course. But don’t judge me too harshly. You’re young. Your standards are so severe. When you get to my age, youll see things differently, perhaps. It’s very easy to condemn when one isn’t tempted. Remember that.”
“I don’t condemn you. As for my standards, if I ever had any, you’ve muddled them up completely. I expect you’re
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right. In your place, I’d probably have done just the same.”
“You see?” Arthur eagerly followed up his advantage. “I knew you’d come to look at it in that light.”
“I don’t want to look at it in any light. I’m too utterly sick of the whole filthy business… . My God, I wish you’d go away somewhere where I’ll never see you again!”
Arthur sighed.
“How hard you are, William. I should never have expected it. You always seemed to me to have such a sympathetic nature.”
“That was what you counted on, I suppose? Well, I think you’ll find that the soft ones object to being cheated even more than the others. They mind it more because they feel that they’ve only themselves to blame.”
“You’re perfectly justified, of course. I deserve all the unkind things you say. Don’t spare me. But I promise you most solemnly, the thought that I was implicating you in any sort of crime never once entered my head. You see, everything has gone off exactly as we planned. After all, where was the risk?”
“There was more risk than you think. The police knew all about our little expedition before we’d even started.”
“The police? William, you’re not in earnest!”
“You don’t think I’m trying to be funny, do you? Bayer told me to warn you. They’ve been round to see him and make inquiries.”
“My God… .”
The last traces of stiffness had gone out of Arthur. He sat there like a crumpled paper bag, his blue eyes vivid with terror.
“But they can’t possibly …”
I went to the window.
“Come and look, if you don’t believe me. He’s still there.”
“Who’s still there?”
“The detective who’s watching this house.”
Without a word, Arthur hurried to my side at the window and took a peep at the man in the buttoned-up overcoat.
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Then he went slowly back to his chair. He seemed suddenly to have become much calmer.
“What am I to do?” He appeared to be thinking aloud rather than addressing me.
“You must clear out, of course; the moment you’ve got this money.”
“They’ll arrest me, William.”
“Oh no, they won’t. They’d have done it before this, if they were going to. Bayer says they’ve been reading all your letters… . Besides, they don’t know everything for certain yet, he thinks.”
Arthur pondered for some minutes in silence. He looked up at me in nervous appeal.
“Then you’re not going to …” He stopped.
“Not going to what?”
“To tell them, wellereverything?”
“My God, Arthur!” I literally gasped. “What, exactly, do you take me for?”
“No, of course, dear boy … Forgive me. I might have known… .” Arthur coughed apologetically. “Only, just for the moment, I was afraid. There might be quite a large reward, you see… .”
For several seconds I was absolutely speechless. Seldom have I been so shocked. Open-mouthed, I regarded him with a mixture of indignation and amusement, curiosity and disgust. Timidly, his eyes met mine. There could be no doubt about it. He was honestly unaware of having said anything to surprise or offend. I found my voice at last.
“Well, of all the …”
But any outburst was cut short by a furious volley of knocks on the bedroom door.
“Herr Bradshaw! Herr Bradshaw!” Frl. Schroeder was in frantic agitation. “The water’s boiling and I can’t turn on the tap! Come quick this moment, or we shall all be blown to bits!”
“We’ll discuss this later,” I told Arthur, and hurried out of the room.
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CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Three-quakters of an hour later, washed and shaved, I returned to Arthur’s room. I found him peering cautiously down into the street from behind the shelter of the lace curtain.
“There’s a different one there now, William,” he told me. “They relieved each other about five minutes ago.”
His tone was gleeful; he seemed positively to be enjoying the situation. I joined him at the window. Sure enough, a tall man in a bowler hat had taken the place of his colleague at the thankless task of waiting for the invisible girl friend.
“Poor fellow,” Arthur giggled, “he looks terribly cold, doesn’t he? Do you think he’d be offended if I sent him down a medicine bottle full of brandy, with my card?”
“He mightn’t see the joke.”
Strangely enough, it was I who felt embarrassed. With indecent ease, Arthur seemed to have forgotten all the unpleasant things I had said to him less than an hour before. His manner towards me was as natural as if nothing had happened. I felt myself harden towards him again. In my bath, I had softened, regretted some cruel words, condemned others as spiteful or priggish. I had rehearsed a partial reconciliation, on magnanimous terms. But Arthur, of course, was to make the advances. Instead of which, here he was, blandly opening his wine-cupboard with his wonted hospitable air.
“At any rate, William, you won’t refuse a glass yourself? It’ll give you an appetite for supper.”
“No, thank you.”
I tried to make my tone stern; it sounded merely sulky. Arthur’s face fell at once. His ease of manner, I saw now, had
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been only experimental. He sighed deeply, resigned to further penitence, assuming an expression which was like a funeral top-hat, lugubrious, hypocritical, discreet. It became him so ill, that in spite of myself, I had to smile.
“It’s no good, Arthur. I can’t keep it up!”
He was too cautious to reply to this, except with a shy, sly smile. This time, he wasn’t going to risk an over-hasty response.
“I suppose,” I continued reflectively, “that none of them were ever really angry with you, were they, afterwards?”
Arthur didn’t pretend to misunderstand. Demurely he inspected his finger-nails.
“Not everybody, alas, has your generous nature, William.” It was no good; we had returned to our verbal card-playing. The moment of frankness, which might have redeemed so much, had been elegantly avoided. Arthur’s orientally sensitive spirit shrank from the rough, healthy, modern catch-as-catch-can of home-truths and confessions; he offered me a compliment instead. Here we were, as so often before, at the edge of that delicate, almost invisible line which divided our two worlds. We should never cross it now. I wasn’t old or subtle enough to find the approach. There was a disappointing pause, during which he rummaged in the cupboard.