The Eldorado Network (27 page)

'It's too early,' Luis began, but then he saw Ryan's expression. 'Sorry, Freddy,' he said. He raised a thumb at the ceiling. 'What does that mean?' he asked.

'I haven't the faintest idea,' Ryan said, 'but whatever it means, I challenge the Gestapo to deny it.'

Halfway down the corridor they met Dr Hartmann coming back. His brow was knitted like spaghetti. He opened his mouth but Ryan spoke first. 'Berlin on the phone for you, Herr Doktor,' he announced cheerfully. Hartmann broke into a run. They went to lunch.

Luis wanted to tell Julie about Freddy Ryan, to share some of the pleasure of his company with her, but he decided that it would be too dangerous. However, he told Freddy Ryan about Julie.

'She sounds delightful,' Freddy said. 'Not a bit like the typical American woman.'

'Really? This is the first one I've met.'

'You've been lucky, old chap. The typical American woman devours her mate immediately after the act of sex. She doesn't eat all of him; that would be bad manners. Spits out the watch and leaves it on the side of the bed. You're not thinking of marrying Julie, I hope?'

Luis wondered. They were down in the embassy basement, practising on the small-arms range. As usual, Freddy was faultlessly dressed and creating an impression of calm strength, like an athlete whose training has peaked at just the right time for a big contest. Freddy encouraged confidence and trust; it was one of the things you took for granted about him; presumably it was what made him such a worthwhile agent. That, and his all-round competence. Despite the fun and games they enjoyed with their tutors, Luis saw again and again that Freddy knew his stuff. He handled all the equipment, from the Morse buzzer to the micro-photography gear to the picklocks, with experienced skill. Now Luis watched him raise and level a silenced automatic and squeeze off a full clip. The shots made a series of little fluffs of sound, neatly and regularly spaced: a man's hand could have covered all the sudden holes in the target. Freddy lowered his arm. 'Isn't that odd,' he said. 'I have a sudden craving for a real American hamburger.'

'You might get a good frankfurter upstairs,' Luis suggested. 'And Frankfurt is close to Hamburg, isn't it?'

'No, no,' said an assistant military attache. 'Hamburg is at least 350 kilometres from Frankfurt.' He went off to change the targets.

'Still, it always seems a lot shorter when you're coming back,' Freddy called after him.

'I'm not thinking of marrying her,' Luis said. 'But I'm also not thinking of not marrying her.'

'An agent should never be married,' Freddy stated flatly. 'Never. It spoils his rest. He's afraid that he'll talk in his sleep. Besides, women always want to help, and that becomes downright embarrassing. I mean to say, good spelling is so important in intelligence.'

'She works for MGM. I think you'd like her.'

'Well, no harm in meeting. How about that spot of tennis we talked about? You could bring her along, and meet my girlfriend too. Angela; she's Italian. Tomorrow evening suit you?'

The Madrid Sporting Club occupied a large estate on the fashionable flank of the city. Its high walls guarded a golf course, a pigeon-shooting range, a swimming pool, two polo fields, and more tennis courts than Luis could count as Freddy drove past them. There was also a palatial clubhouse -- truly palatial, since it had been the palace of a minor duke until he gambled it away -- which was where they parted, Julie and Angela going off to the Ladies' Side while Freddy took Luis into the Gentlemen's Changing Rooms.

'You know, I've never played tennis in my life," Luis said. He thrust a leg into his brand-new shorts. They felt very crisp and looked startlingly white.

'It's easy. Just hit the ball over the net. The important thing is not to make the women look silly. They don't like that, so they burst into tears and accuse us of cheating. Which I suppose we are, really.'

'Are we? I don't know the rules, Freddy.'

'Well ..." Freddy pulled on a sweater which bore the colours and monogram of a distinguished rowing club. 'There are really two sets of rules, Luis: ours and theirs. Theirs are more imaginative than ours. First they have a rule which says they are entitled to win because they're women. Then they have a second rule, which says that if they look like losing, they're allowed to change all the other rules, until they start winning again.'

'Good heavens.'

'Watch Angela, she's an expert.' They went into the sun and sat on a bench in the rose-garden overlooking the courts. "What does Julie think I do for a living?' Freddy asked.

'Same as me. International Red Cross.'

'Fine, fine.' He aimed a stern forefinger at a bee which was hovering in front of him. 'Go away, bee.' The bee went away.

'Freddy . . . Do you mind if I ask you a highly personal professional question?'

'My power over the insect world? I can't explain it.'

'Not that. I keep wondering how you feel about doing this sort of job for the Germans while you're still a British citizen.' Freddy nodded gently, and looked away. 'Forget it,' Luis said, 'it's absolutely none of my business.'

'On the contrary, it's very much your business, if we're going to work together in England.' Freddy got up and played a few easy backhand shots, the air singing softly past the strings. 'It's treason, of course, if you go by what the lawyers say. On the other hand I can claim to have been somewhat betrayed myself. For a start, I was very thoroughly swindled by the crooks in command of one of the most illustrious regiments in His Majesty's Brigade of Guards. You've heard of the Brigade of Guards?'

'Haven't they won a lot of battles?'

'Yes, but that was incidental. The real purpose of the Guards is to lend a spot of tone to what would otherwise be little more than a vulgar brawl. At least, that's what the family always told me. The Ryans have been in the Guards for generations.'

I suppose you were an officer.'

'Yes. It was expensive, but I could just about afford it. Unfortunately somebody else couldn't and he raided the regimental funds. I got the blame. They cooked up a great stew of evidence against me and I had to resign. End of act one. Go away,' he said sternly to the bee, which was back again. 'It thinks I'm a rose, I suppose. Dim creature. Bloody miracle it ever manages to get itself airborne.'

The bee wandered off. 'I didn't think that sort of thing went on in England,' Luis said. 'Did you lose much money?1

'Oh, they cleaned me out. There were about a dozen officers involved, some of them because they'd borrowed money from the man who'd done the embezzling, and some because they'd lent him money in return for favours of a fairly squalid nature. Either way, it was much more convenient for everyone if I could be proved guilty.'

'You were framed.'

'I'm not sure whether I was framed, or stuffed and mounted. What was made clear to me was that if I replaced the money I was supposed to have stolen and quietly resigned my commission. I wouldn't go to jail. It was a very great deal of money, but that just meant that I should go to jail for a very long time, so I sold everything, and behold: the honour of the regiment was saved.'

The evening breeze changed direction and washed a scent of roses over them, so sweet and so strong that both men lifted their heads for a moment. In the distance there was a pleasant plunking of tennis balls. Everything from the sky down to the gravel paths looked clean and healthy and well-behaved. Luis looked around at what money could buy and he approved.

'You don't sound bitter,' he said.

'It was a long time ago.'

'What did you do?'

Freddy gnawed a tennis ball. 'Ugh,' he said, and picked something off his tongue. 'Well, the only trade I knew was soldiering, so I wandered from war to war, South America, Palestine, Manchuria, Ethiopia, wherever they needed a freelance, and ended up in Spain. Here come the girls. I say, what splendid legs! If only their brains were in their bottoms, like dinosaurs.'

Luis and Freddy stood up. 'Now I understand,' Luis said. 'I can see that you have no cause to love your country.'

'Don't misunderstand me. I wouldn't do anything to harm Britain.'

'But surely--'

'No. Surely nothing. Spies have absolutely no effect on wars, Luis. All through the last war both sides spied on each other furiously, and then went ahead and did exactly what they were going to do anyway. This war will be just the same.'

'Good God. So ... if that's right, our trip to England won't make any difference.'

'It'll make a certain significant difference to one man,' Freddy said softly. 'I'm going to blow that stinking embezzler's head off . . . Look, I'm tired of telling you,' he said to the bee, and gently swept it into the roses with a stylish forehand.

The girls reached them smiling, skipping, side-stepping. 'Okay, you Red Cross dummies!' Julie announced. 'This means war! We're gonna pound you two into spaghetti sauce! Isn't that right, Angela?'

'No sheet,' Angela said.

Freddy raised his eyebrows.

'Is what they say all-a-time in MGM,' Angela explained. 'Means yes, big yes! No sheet! Julie says.'

'It wouldn't have done for the Brigade of Guards,' Freddy said. 'Up to the ears in sheet, they were.'

The tennis was an education.

Luis began fearfully and played hopelessly, crashing and thrashing about the court until he was so bad that he could only improve, and then he started watching the others in order to try and find out what he should copy. Julie was his partner. She really didn't need him. Her splendid legs flitted effortlessly and carried her to almost all the shots. Whenever something utterly harmless came over the net, a call so leisurely and innocent that even Luis could take it, she left it for him. Focussing fiercely, Luis struck it as if he were trying to fell a tree with one blow, and hit it ten feet past the baseline.

'Out!' shouted Angela happily.

There you are, Luis, I told you she would cheat,' Freddy called.

It was damn out!' Angela protested.

I didn't say it wasn't, darling. I just said you would cheat, and so you will.' They began to argue in Italian.

'Relax, Luis.' Julie patted him on the backside with her racket. 'Save your lovely muscles. Just knock it over the net, that's all.'

'I tried to win the point,' he explained.

She wrinkled her nose. 'That's overrated. We ought to keep the rally going, not kill it off too soon.'

'Oh. I don't know the rules, you see.'

'I never paid them much attention myself. Have fun, that's the main rule.'

After that he noticed how skilfully Julie and Freddy kept the rallies going. Angela, like Luis, was slim and strong; and like Luis she could hit the ball if she were given good warning that it was coming. Their partners nursed them tactfully so that everybody got a chance to play, and the rallies often went on and on until at last someone fell down laughing. If Angela cheated, Luis couldn't tell the difference. But after half-a-dozen games, when they were beginning to get to know each other, he noticed flashes of true ability from Freddy and Julie: occasionally one of them would lose patience and power a long, low drive that dipped over the net and raced down the sidelines; and the other would cover what seemed an impossible distance to punch back a return which had venom in it. Then a genial lob would allow Luis or Angela back into the game again and the flicker of excitement would be over.

They stopped for a rest, and lay on a lawn so green and smooth it looked as if it had been shampooed and shaved every morning for six hundred years.

'Now Freddy, you play Julie,' Angela said.

'Sure, go ahead,' Luis said. 'Let's see some blood.'

'Good evening, ladies and gentlemen,' boomed a confident voice. They all turned. Colonel Christian, dressed in pale blue seersucker and a straw hat, strolled across the lawn to them, as genial as a dreadnought on a goodwill visit.

Freddy did the introductions, smoothly. He made no mention of the German Embassy.

'You have played already?' Christian asked.

'We knocked a few balls back and forth,' Julie said.

'And who won?'

Freddy laughed. 'Let's say nobody lost.'

Luis felt it was time he said something. 'Are you thinking of becoming a member here?' he asked.

'I am a member,' Christian said.

'Oh.' Luis felt foolish.

'As a matter of fact,' Freddy said, expertly taking the strain off Luis, 'the colonel and I first met here, in the clubhouse.'

'Ah.' Luis nodded, as if that explained everything.

'Well, I'm sorry I missed all the action,' Christian said.

Luis hoped that remark meant Christian was about to go. He was afraid of what Julie might do if she found that he was a German. His English gave her no clue. He might be Scandinavian, or Swiss, or ... Luis looked away from the sky and saw a group of tennis players coming through the rose garden. That man on the left looked like Otto Krafft. By God, it was Otto. And Richard Fischer next to him, and that new cipher expert and . . . Luis turned to get Freddy's attention but Freddy had already Seen them. 'Your party, colonel?' he asked.

'My party, yes. We work hard at the embassy, but we play hard too.'

Luis saw Julie's head come up at the word 'embassy,' and then he knew that she had recognised Otto. As the group arrived, she aimed her racket at Otto. 'We met,' she said.

Otto smiled and bowed. 'And a pleasure it is to meet again, Mrs Conroy.'

'Are you all from the same embassy?'

'All.'

'Ah. I see.' She lay back and smiled at Luis. It was an extraordinary smile, perfectly innocent to any bystander but, to Luis, as menacing as a whiff of cyanide from a cup of cream. He tried to frown and smile at her simultaneously, and regretted it. 'Wouldn't you like to go for a swim?' he asked.

'I'd like to play some tennis.' She stood up. 'How about it, Freddy? You and me against the pick of the embassy.'

'Not sure, old girl.' He got up and limped in a circle, his left leg rigid. 'I've been carrying six pounds of rusty shrapnel in that knee ever since Passchendaele, you know.'