“And if not?”
“Say the deal’s off.”
“It sounds rather alike,” Avery objected. “If the line’s bad, I mean. ‘Off’ and ‘Come off.'”
“Then say they’re not interested. Say something negative. You know what I mean.”
Avery picked up the empty scuttle. “I’ll give this to Pine.”
He passed the duty room. An Air Force clerk was half asleep beside the telephones. He made his way down the wooden staircase to the front door.
“The Boss wants some coal, Pine.” The porter stood up, as he always did when anyone spoke to him, at attention by his bed in a barrack room.
“I’m sorry, sir. Can’t leave the door.”
“For God’s sake, I’ll look after the door. We’re freezing up there.”
Pine took the scuttle, buttoned his tunic and disappeared down the passage. He didn’t whistle these days.
“And a bed made up in his room,” Avery continued when Pine returned. “Perhaps you’d tell the duty clerk when he wakes up. Oh, and a towel. He must have a towel by his basin.”
“Yes, sir. Wonderful to see the old Department on the march again.”
“Where can we get breakfast around here? Is there anywhere nearby?”
“There’s the Cadena,” Pine replied doubtfully. “But I don’t know whether it would do for the Boss, sir. We had the canteen in the old days. Slingers and wadge.”
It was quarter to seven. “When does the Cadena open?”
“Couldn’t say, sir.”
“Tell me, do you know Mr. Taylor at all?” He nearly said “did.”
“Oh yes, sir.”
“Have you met his wife?”
“No, sir.”
“What’s she like? Have you any idea? Heard anything?”
“Couldn’t say, I’m sure, sir. Very sad business indeed, sir.”
Avery looked at him in astonishment. Leclerc must have told him, he thought, and went upstairs. Sooner or later he would have to telephone Sarah.
Three
They breakfasted somewhere. Leclerc refused to go into the Cadena and they walked interminably until they found another cafe, worse than the Cadena and more expensive.
“I can’t remember him,” Leclerc said. “That’s the absurd thing. He’s a trained radio operator apparently. Or was in those days.”
Avery thought he was talking about Taylor. “How old did you say he was?”
“Forty, something over. That’s a good age. A Danzig Pole. They speak German, you know. Not as mad as the pure Slav. After the war he drifted for a couple of years, pulled himself together and bought a garage. He must have made a nice bit.”
“Then I don’t suppose he’ll—”
“Nonsense. He’ll be grateful, or should be.”
Leclerc paid the bill and kept it. As they left the restaurant he said something about subsistence, and putting in a bill to Accounts. “You can claim for night duty as well, you know. Or time in lieu.” They walked down the road. “Your air ticket is booked. Carol did it from her flat. We’d better give you an advance for expenses. There’ll be the business of having his body sent and that kind of thing. I understand it can be very costly. You’d better have him flown. We’ll do a postmortem privately over here.”
“I’ve never seen a dead man before,” Avery said.
They were standing on a street corner in Kennington, looking for a taxi; a gasworks on one side of the road, nothing on the other: the sort of place they could wait all day.
“John, you’ve to keep very quiet about that side of it; about putting a man in. No one’s to know, not even in the Department, no one at all. I thought we’d call him Mayfly. Leiser, I mean. We’ll call him Mayfly.”
“All right.”
“It’s very delicate; a question of timing. I’ve no doubt there’ll be opposition, within the Department as well as outside.”
“What about my cover and that kind of thing?” Avery asked. “I’m not quite …” A taxi with its flag up passed them without stopping.
“Bloody man,” Leclerc snapped. “Why didn’t he pick us up?”
“He lives out here, I expect. He’s making for the West End. About cover,” he prompted.
“You’re traveling under your own name. I don’t see that there’s any problem. You can use your own address. Call yourself a publisher. After all you were one. The Consul will show you the ropes. What are you worried about?”