After the Cabaret (16 page)

‘He seems very acute,' Greg said. ‘But, of course, I can't assume that what he tells me is accurate.' He decided to take a step forward. ‘He mentioned something about Sally's going to France on a secret mission.'

‘To see von Torgau,' Pym said absently. The music ceased. ‘Turn the record over and pour me another drink,' Pym called over to Ivan, who, apparently understanding, did so. ‘Why the hell write a book about Sally?' Pym asked. ‘She was nobody, you know, nothing and nobody.'

Pym was not going to discuss Sally's French venture, Greg suspected. He observed that his host was getting drunk. The music started up again, bold and dramatic.

‘It's a method of approach,' Greg told Pym. ‘A story that hasn't been told and perhaps never will be, fully and
completely, but I plan to add piece after piece to it, using Sally as my centre.'

‘You'll never get away with it,' Pym said blurrily. ‘And if you did you'd get it all wrong.' There was a pause. Then he declared, suddenly, ‘You'd better go. But before you do just you remember this, Mr Innocent American, that – that … ' he groped for his thought ‘… that, silly tart as she was, Sally Bowles was no political virgin. What do you imagine she was doing in Berlin all that time, nearly a year after war'd been declared? She was a “stay-behind”, wasn't she? A lot of people were persuaded to stay abroad when war looked increasingly likely. God knows who she was working for by the end of the war. I don't suppose she knew herself. I'll never know how much she had to do with us, at the end, with all of it …' His voice trailed off and his head sank sideways. In alarm, Greg looked towards Ivan, back on the floor by the door. Ivan shrugged, nodded towards the door.

‘Come back tomorrow,' came Pym's slurred voice. ‘Might as well get it straight … shtraight.'

Greg got up and went quietly to the door. He said goodbye to Ivan, who was on his feet now and moving towards Pym. ‘He said I should come back tomorrow,' he said to Ivan, trying to speak clearly.

‘Yes, sure. Tomorrow. You phone – OK?'

‘OK,' said Greg, handed him a few dollars and left him bending over Pym's frail and shrunken form. He went, unsearched, down the stairs and out into the cold, grey, darkening Russian afternoon.

Later he met Alistair for dinner in one of Moscow's new luxury restaurants. The short walk through the darkness
from their hotel had been disconcerting due to the beggars, buyers and sellers, lurkers in doorways. Now, warm and well seated, as a girl in traditional dress went from table to table playing the balalaika, Greg looked across the restaurant to see a gaunt face peering in through the window, and said, ‘It's like a Muscovite New York.'

‘They always said the USA and the Soviet Union had more in common than anyone thought,' Alistair remarked comfortably.

‘There's a lot of poverty,' Greg ventured, although he knew that this was not a word men like Alistair wished to hear.

‘Of course. Teething troubles of capitalism,' he said.

‘It looks more like a serious illness.'

‘Well, that's not for us to comment on, is it?' Alistair said. ‘Internal problems, not our affair. We can only do what we can to set them straight, get them on board. So how did your meeting with Pym go? What's he like?'

‘Old and frail but still very bright. He's attended by a devoted young soldier.'

‘Not the first young soldier Pym ever met, I suppose.'

‘Maybe the last, though.'

‘Well, if he dies in the arms of a soldier I suppose you could say that's how he would have wanted to go. He tell you anything good?'

‘He started, then he got drunk and sent me away, said I could go back tomorrow.'

‘Not a bad beginning, though,' said Alistair, loading a piece of thin toast with caviare. ‘Yum, yum, yum,' he said. ‘God, I love caviare. Have some?'

But Greg had decided to skip it. He had a bad head after his afternoon's drinking.

‘So, you asked him a few things,' Alistair continued. He took a swig of vodka. ‘Did he ask you anything?'

Greg stared at him. The question seemed to indicate that Alistair was a jump ahead, but he decided not to reveal that Pym had asked for help in his campaign to be repatriated. He told Alistair, ‘I was supposed to be interviewing him.'

‘I know,' said Alistair, ‘but Hugh told me he was wondering if the old bugger was going to reopen his bid to spend his last years under an apple tree in Kent, kindly provided by the British Government. It's obvious he might approach you to help fix it for him.'

‘Yeah?' said Greg. ‘Well, it's an interesting thought.' Just because you're paranoid it doesn't mean they aren't out to get you, he thought. In these days of economic warfare whose side was Alistair on, apart from his own?

‘Only I wouldn't get involved,' Alistair went on. He looked up, ‘Goodie, here's the food. Look,' he said, ‘I'm sorry about this but I've only got time for one course. Something came up unexpectedly this afternoon and I have to go back to the hotel to see a man. It's a bore, but tonight's the only time I can catch him. He's leaving Moscow early tomorrow.' He began on his Stroganoff. ‘You stay, of course. I'll take care of the bill.'

‘No,' said Greg, who had ordered the same dish. ‘This'll do me. I'll go when you do.'

‘Nonsense! Get stuck in, enjoy the experience.'

‘I'll go back to the hotel and do some reading.'

‘Just as you wish,' Alistair said, not pleased.

‘Business going well?' Greg enquired.

‘So-so,' replied Alistair. ‘Everything's clogged over here. It's like ploughing a swamp. I'm only here to open the conversation and try to assess the risks against the advantages.'

‘Do you really think you'll set up in Moscow?'

‘God knows,' Alistair said. ‘I wouldn't like the job, that's for sure.'

‘I should say it would be like opening a branch in Dodge City.'

‘That's about right,' Alistair agreed.

‘But people did it.'

‘They certainly did.'

Back at the hotel Greg left Alistair in the bar and went upstairs. First he lay thinking, his arms behind his head, then fell asleep. He was awoken later by a dispute outside his door. He got out of his clothes, put on his Walkman, went back to bed and fell asleep again. At some point in the night he got rid of the headphones and woke early next day to see snowflakes drifting thickly past his window, like a moving white curtain.

Alistair was not at breakfast, had perhaps not been in the hotel overnight. Greg spent the morning sightseeing in the snow, ate lunch, smoked fish, in a basement café, then went to Pym's flat.

Upstairs Ivan, still in his threadbare uniform, barred the door, looking big.

‘I've come for my appointment with Mr Pym,' Greg explained, pointing towards the interior of the flat.

‘No, he is sick.' Ivan touched his Adam's apple and
coughed, to indicate the nature of the illness. He produced a sheet of paper and handed it to Greg. ‘From Mr Pym,' he said. He waved a hand dismissively. Greg stood still. Ivan repeated the gesture. ‘Go.'

With no Russian and no alternative, Greg went out into the snow. Outside the building he leaned against the wall and opened the piece of paper. ‘Dear Mr Phillips,' it read, in a clear, though weak, hand, ‘I regret I'm unable to see you at present. I will telephone your hotel at four.'

It was three thirty. Greg floundered away, peering through the stinging snow. The street was wide, with only a single car crawling by and a few pedestrians, heads down, forcing their way along. As he found himself at the verge of the park two men, stale-smelling, arrived suddenly, one at either side of him. At the same moment each of them grasped one of his forearms. Since he was almost opposite the house containing Pym's flat, Greg considered wrenching himself free, and getting into the lobby. Then he saw himself being murdered there, out of sight of the street.

He saw headlights in the road, slowly approaching on his left. Greg, who had been designated the most valuable player of his college football team for two years, knew how to move forward under restraint. He walked, boots and trousers soaked and freezing, heaving both men into its path. They were strong but surprised by the sudden movement. The car approached, ludicrously slowly, as in a dream. Greg reckoned the men had a few seconds, no longer, to bludgeon him down and rob him before the car was forced to pull up. Or would it steer round the episode? Why not? To his right, now, he heard the engine of another
car, the swishing of tyres in snow. Trapped between the two approaching vehicles, he guessed the muggers were uncertain what to do. He wrenched his shoulders forward, sending one of his attackers lurching away. He turned his head and saw him blundering slowly through the snow, in the direction of the park. Then the other released him. The car pulled up in front of Greg and the driver, scarcely visible behind a windscreen where the wipers cleared, then cleared again, the snow driving against it, put his finger on the horn. Opposite Greg the other car slowed. He made out a sign on it that indicated it was a taxi. He went over, opened the door and got in.

A few minutes later, still a little shaken, he went up the hotel's stairs, and entered his room. The phone was ringing. He grabbed it. ‘Mr Phillips, Greg, dear boy,' came Adrian Pym's voice, unaffected by any cold or fever as far as Greg could hear, ‘I'm afraid it's a little inconvenient to see you now. Well, actually – ever. I don't want to go into details but it's been mentioned to me that I shouldn't talk to you. I feel it would be inadvisable to ignore the advice I've received. Things are very different here, as I'm sure you'll appreciate. I'm terribly sorry, after you've come all this way, but then, of course, you didn't warn me of your arrival …'

‘Yes, sir,' Greg said, who had done this deliberately. ‘What I can't understand, though, is who or why—'

‘It's better if you don't know,' Adrian Pym said. ‘As I say, Russia is different. And, these days, ever-changing. All is flux, dear boy. I really must ask you not to demand anything of me. The consequences could be quite serious, believe me. But that other matter …'

Greg sighed, depressed. ‘Trust me,' he said wearily, struck that he was still exchanging the word ‘trust' with Pym, the traitor.

‘I hope I can, dear heart,' Pym said, then broke the connection.

‘Shit,' said Greg. He looked round at his luxurious room, steaming hot, at the reproduction of a painting of a group of tough-looking medievals in furs and jewels on the wall. ‘Shit,' he said again. He hadn't even had the chance to ask Pym what he had meant when he called Sally a ‘stay-behind'. What was that?

He was stripped and standing in a pool of his soaking clothes when Alistair came in, in a thick coat and fur hat, snow clinging to him.

‘Hi,' he said cheerfully, sitting down on an upholstered chair by the window. He took a bottle of Scotch from his pocket. ‘You look cold. Drink?'

‘Why not?' said Greg. He got dressed and Alistair handed him a glass.

‘I'm happy,' he said. ‘What a good day. What a good night as well. Russian girls, Russian girls. She had long, thick blonde plaits, like bell-ropes. Reminded me of my sister's schoolfriends – early stirrings – “Oh, Alistair, you beast.'” He paused, then said, ‘What of Pym?'

‘He's been warned off, couldn't see me,' said Greg. ‘Who the hell would be doing that?'

‘Secret service,' said Alistair. ‘They're still in work, even getting paid, unlike nearly everyone else. They know where the bodies are buried and knowledge is power. It could be very complicated, Greg.'

‘Lay off?'

Alistair said, ‘That would be my advice.' He sounded grave.

‘Some guys tried to mug me, or worse,' Greg said, and told him what had happened.

‘I don't suppose it had anything to do with Pym,' Alistair said, ‘though it might have – this place is a minefield. I suppose we'll never know. So what now?'

‘I'll try to rearrange my flight and go back,' Greg said. ‘There's no point in hanging around here spending more money. I'll cut my losses. I got something, even if it was only confirmation of what Bruno, my other contact, told me. And I saw Pym. I guess that's not bad.'

‘I suppose it isn't,' said Alistair. ‘This is getting quite interesting, isn't it?'

Greg was able to bring his return flight forward a day or two, but still had time to kill in Moscow. He spent the next few days in solitary contemplation of paintings, icons, churches, great buildings. All was bold, wild and strange.

At La Vie the sound of the bombardment silenced the band. The basement walls shook. Cora was sitting at her table, drinking brandy imperturbably with a venerable politician in a wing collar. ‘I can hear my poor old hotel up there shaking like a jelly,' she told him. ‘It's high time it stopped.'

‘I've been meaning to mention it to Herr Hitler,' said her companion.

Vi was under a table, clinging to an air commodore and gripping Sally with her free hand. She said, ‘Jack's at home with Ted, but Ted's got to go off on early shift.'

‘He won't leave Jack in the middle of a raid,' Sally said. ‘They can't keep it up that long, anyway.'

‘Can't they?' said Vi.

‘They only have so much fuel,' the air commodore said, ‘then they have to turn back. Of course,' he added, ‘they can send a second wave.'

‘And a third,' said Vi grimly.

‘We'll drive them off, never fear,' he told her.

‘It's all right, dear, you don't have to try to cheer me up,' Vi assured him.

In Pimlico Ted Simcox was on the stairs with his arm round the young woman from one of the two flats downstairs. His little brother Jack was asleep on a pile of blankets at the foot of the stairs. An elderly woman, who had come up from the basement holding a tin tray with a teapot, milk, sugar and cups on it, stepped past him and said, ‘Here we are.'