After the Fine Weather (8 page)

“Of course, that’s all surmise,” said Fiennes. “But he’s up to something. Something which depends on getting everybody as worked up as possible. And there’s nothing more calculated to get Austrians worked up than shooting a cardinal bishop.”

“He wasn’t – he didn’t seem to be – a very saintly man.”

“He had rather a rough time in the war. I believe he was one of the few men who was tortured by the Germans and the Russians.”

Laura saw the red hat rolling down the steps. She felt sick. Sick of intrigue; sick of violence; sick of blood.

Fiennes said, “We’ve got two possibilities here. Either the thing was unpremeditated, and Humbold is grabbing his chance with both hands. Or else he organized the whole thing. The chap who’s supposed to have done the shooting – Albin Boschetto – he was only two days out of jail. It wouldn’t have been impossible – either to indoctrinate him or to strike a bargain with him.”

“He didn’t kill the Bishop,” said Laura.

“I was coming to that,” said Fiennes. “You could easily be right. If I’d organized a drunken jailbird to shoot at someone and it was pretty essential for him to hit him, I don’t think I should take his marksmanship for granted. After all, it’d be a thousand pities if he missed. So I think I might have a second gun posted in the wings, just to make sure.”

“Then you believe me?”

“I think so, yes.”

“Thank heavens, someone does.”

“But it doesn’t solve your problem, which is that no one else in Lienz is going to believe you. Every time you open your mouth you’re going to be branded as a dangerous agent of counter-revolution.”

“Don’t worry,” said Laura. She had made her mind up five minutes before. “I’m not going to open my mouth. It’s nothing to do with me.”

Fiennes looked at her curiously.

“You know,” he said, “what you need is a good night’s rest… That sounds like Charles.”

Charles came in, said, “Hullo, Evelyn, so you got here all right. I expect you’ve introduced yourselves.”

“We have,” said Laura.

“I ought to have warned you about Evelyn. He’s got no manners. And he drinks too much.”

“I’ve got other vices as well,” said Evelyn. “But we’ve only known each other for a quarter of an hour.”

“It’s going to be a case of hail and farewell,” said Charles. “She’s catching the midnight train for Rome.”

“But–” said Laura.

“Can he do that?” said Fiennes. “What about diplomatic privilege?”

“I wouldn’t know,” said Charles. “But I’m not arguing about it. It’s an order from the boss. And I think, on this occasion, we’re going to do what we’re told.”

They both looked at Laura.

“Is there really going to be trouble?” she said.

“I don’t know,” said Charles. “But I’m quite sure of this: that whatever does happen, you’ll only aggravate it if you’re here.”

“All right,” she said. “I’ll get packed.”

“Have you got somewhere you can stay in Rome?”

“I’ll be all right.”

As she went out, Fiennes said, “Talking about trouble, it looks as if something’s starting right now.”

From the window they could see, beyond the black bulk of the railway station, red and orange flames and, lit by the flames, a billow of smoke.

“Open the window,” said Fiennes.

The two men stood at the open window and listened. The swelling sound of the mob came clearly to them through the frosty night air. Then a single shot. Then a burst of firing.

“It sounds to me,” said Fiennes, “as if things were hotting up a bit. I’d better go and have a look.”

“Don’t get involved in anything.”

“Don’t worry. There are few people who can run faster than I can.”

Charles sighed, and poured himself a drink.

He and Laura were sitting down to a silent dinner when Fiennes returned.

“Quite a party,” he said. “The crowd started by looting some Italian shops and then set fire to the Italian church. The police seem to have had orders not to interfere – or not to interfere too soon – anywhere. They fired a few shots in the air to show their zeal. A fire engine arrived, and got turned over. The only person who made any real attempt to keep the peace was Radler.”

“The Socialist?”

“I don’t know about his politics. But he’s got a voice like a foghorn. And plenty of guts. He got up on the fire engine and fairly let them have it.”

“What did he say?”

“He told them not to be bloody fools. And to go home before someone really got hurt. Good, sound stuff. The fire was nearly out by then, and it had started to snow. I don’t think there’ll be any more trouble tonight.”

“I hope not,” said Charles. “We’ve got to get Laura to the station.”

There was no trouble of any sort. The snow had stopped. They drove in silence through the empty streets, tyres squeaking occasionally in the thick drifts, which were beginning to pack down as the temperature fell.

In the station waiting-room a small crowd was standing in front of a bulletin board. Charles went across, looked at it, spoke to one of the station officials, and came back.

“Home to bed,” he said. “There are no trains into or out of Lienz.”

“It must have been snowing pretty hard,” said Evelyn, “to block the line to Italy.”

They were in the car and driving back to the flat before Charles answered this. He said, “It isn’t snow that is stopping the trains. A three-span culvert has been dynamited. They reckon it’ll take at least a week to repair.”

“Dear department,” Charles typed, using one finger of each hand and paying careful attention to spacing and alignment, “the situation here has deteriorated since my last telephone communication on Thursday. It is not known yet whether the destruction of the culvert at Garvas was the work of Italian saboteurs from the Trentino, but it is generally attributed to them. This, coupled with the snow which has fallen” – Charles looked out of the window of the consular office – “and is still falling, has isolated Lienz almost completely from the outside world.”

He broke off once more. How was he to record, in the traditional language of the Foreign Service, pruned of all unnecessary adverbs and adjectives, an impression of impending disaster?

“This morning we were informed that Herr Radler, the leader of the Socialist opposition in the Landtag, and his deputy, Herr Hammerle, have both been placed under protective custody. Their offence, apparently, was haranguing the crowd that was burning the Italian church. Further reserve forces have been called up, and camps are being formed near the Italian frontier, ostensibly for road clearance. There is a curfew in the town of Lienz, but movement is not as yet restricted by day. A military tribunal is being set up to try Boschetto. I will add to this despatch from time to time, and will send it by the first available messenger. Yours ever, Consulate.”

There were other points he considered mentioning: the curious difficulty he was experiencing in contacting his diplomatic colleagues, more particularly Dr Pisoni. The fact that all telephone calls from his flat were now quite openly intercepted and listened to. The presence, on the other side of the road, of three gentlemen who took it in turns to watch the door of the house in which his flat stood.

Frau Rosa had pointed them out to Laura, with undisguised contempt. “If I wish that they should be allowed to follow me,” she said, “then I allow them. If I do not wish it, I should not allow.”

“How would you do that?” Laura asked.

“I have friends in this building. There would be no difficulty. On the ground floor, for instance, is the consulting room of Dr Grill. He is Zahnarzt – Dentisten.” Frau Rosa made the gesture of extracting a tooth. “From his kitchen you can go into the kitchen of the restaurant. There is a door in the wall.”

“I don’t expect they’d follow you anyway,” said Laura, “even if you went out of the front door. It’s me they’re after.”

Frau Rosa snorted. It was clear that she did not dislike the idea of being followed by police agents.

The telephone rang.

“For you,” said Frau Rosa.

It was Helmut.

“Miss Hart. Nice to hear your voice. They haven’t deported you yet?”

“They couldn’t. No trains.”

“Of course not. I had forgotten. It’s an ill wind, as they say. I shall be able to implement my promise to you, and show you some of the night life of Lienz.”

“I’m not sure if I’m allowed out,” said Laura.

“Allowed?”

“There’s a man watching the flat.”

“He won’t stop you. His orders will be to follow you. He can sit at the next table and watch us eat. By the way, you are aware that our conversation is being listened to?”

“No?”

“Certainly. Everything we say is being written down. We must be careful not to speak too fast. Dictation speed.”

“Are you sure?”

“The gentleman now listening has asthma. If you listen carefully you can hear him.”

In the silence that followed it did seem to Laura that she detected a faint, and embarrassed, clearing of the throat.

“I shall have to speak rather in riddles, then,” said Helmut. “You remember the lady I was talking about when we had dinner together. The one who had a lighted cigarette end dropped down her back at an Olympic Reception.”

“Her Christian name?”

“Her forename, yes. Let us meet there at eight o’clock this evening.”

“I’ll see if I can,” said Laura.

Charles had pointed out the watchers to her but hadn’t actually said that she was to stay indoors. It wasn’t her fault if the way to the frontier was blocked. She wasn’t breaking any law. She had been told to leave the country, and she would do so as soon as the way was clear. Meanwhile she saw no reason why she should mope about indoors, reading back numbers of The Times.

The local paper had announced that as a result of the prompt measures taken by the chief of police the situation was in hand. The Security Force would be kept mobilized, but as a precaution only, until it was clear that no further outrages were contemplated.

She looked down at the streets. Quite a few pedestrians were scurrying along between the swept piles of snow. A policeman stood at the corner directing traffic, the flaps of his cap pulled well down over his ears. It all looked peaceful enough.

In the consular office, Evelyn was saying to Charles, “The average Lienzer simply doesn’t know what to make of it. The young Austrians are solidly behind Humbold. They’re queuing to join the Security Force. They are issued armbands and truncheons, and go round looking for people to hit on the head.”

“It sounds like Berlin during a putsch.”

“Or London during the general strike? Anyway, the arrest of Radler and Hammerle has shown people that Humbold means business. I don’t think anyone knows quite how far he intends to go.”

“Does he know himself?”

“I’m not sure. He could be a thoroughgoing, Nazi-inspired, Pan-German fanatic, with backing from Munich and the Ruhr. There’s an outfit in Munich which calls itself the Institute for Folk Culture and the Preservation of Historic Institutions in South Tyrol. They’ve got money to spare, most of it subscribed by Ruhr industrialists as a measure of tax evasion. This is the sort of lark they’d back to the hilt.”

“Or else–?”

“Or he might just be mad.”

The telephone rang, and Charles picked up the receiver. It was a one-sided conversation. After three or four minutes Charles managed to say, “I don’t think I should do anything just yet. I’m going to try to get round to all our people this afternoon and this evening, to explain the situation to them.”

“That was Colonel Cracker,” he said. “He’s one of our oldest residents. He tells me that he and his wife have a service rifle each, and a hundred and forty rounds of ammunition. He’d like to use them, too.”

Charles had not reappeared by half past one, so Laura ate a solitary lunch. The snow had stopped falling, and the sky was like a damp, grey blanket. It looked close enough to touch.

“More snow this evening,” said Frau Rosa. “Perhaps you will sleep this afternoon.”

“There doesn’t seem to be much else to do,” Laura agreed. The radiators, now at full blast, had raised the temperature of the flat to an uncomfortable degree, and she had a headache. “I might lie down.”

She was taking her shoes off when she heard the front doorbell ring; then the murmur of voices; then Frau Rosa knocked on the bedroom door.

“A visitor for you,” she said.

Laura put her shoes on again, went out, and found Joe Keller in the drawing-room.

“Am I glad to see you!” she said. “Did you have any difficulty getting in?”

“No difficulty getting in,” said Joe. “That’s the advantage of an apartment block. Anyone can slip in with the crowd.”

“You were right, weren’t you?”

“About what?”

“Your nose for trouble.”

“Oh, that. I have to confess that that wasn’t entirely intuition. We had a tip-off in Rome that there might be trouble when the Cardinal Bishop came down here. He was a hellraiser all right, wasn’t he?”

“He looked a very sincere man.”

“It’s the sincere men who are dangerous,” said Joe. “Give me insincerity and a quiet life.”

“I should have thought this was just the sort of situation you revelled in.”

“Ordinarily, yes. But there are circumstances here I hadn’t taken into account.”

“Such as?”

“Such as all the roads out being snowed up, the only available railroad track being blown up, and the wires being either cut or blocked, and the wireless under state control. You have to hand it to Colonel Julius. He got a security cordon round this state so quick – so goddam quick – you might have thought he’d got it all worked out in advance.”

Laura had not been looking at him. Now she turned her head, and found his blue eyes on her, candid and guileless.

“I suppose,” she said, “that he might have been expecting trouble – in a general sort of way, I mean.”

“It’s feasible,” said Joe. “I don’t believe it myself. But, then, no one pays much attention to what a newspaperman believes. By the way, would you care to tell me your story yourself?”

To her fury she felt the colour creeping up her neck and cheeks.

“I didn’t know it was public property.”

“It’s not as public as all that,” said Joe. “I had to pay a lot of money to get hold of it. It’s a good story. I’d say it’d be front-page news everywhere, if only we could get the damned thing out before it goes flat. What we really need’s a carrier pigeon. A flock of pigeons. Did you actually see the gun?”

“Look here,” said Laura, “I’ve been officially warned to keep my mouth shut. I’ve been unofficially deported. I’d be out of the country now if the railway was working. If I start making statements to the press, there really will be a row.”

“I most solemnly promise you that you won’t be quoted as an authority, at least not until you’re clear of this country. And me too. That’s a promise, Laura.”

She was startled, for a moment, that he should have used her Christian name. Then she recollected that he was an American. She said, “Tell me how much you know already.”

“The story is that you saw someone poke a gun out of a window in the theatre, and time his shots so that he was covered by Boschetto. The big Italian was just a stalking-horse. They needled him into waving his arms and shooting his gun off, but they knew he hadn’t a hope in hell of hitting the right man. So they took care to have someone on the spot who would hit him.”

“If you know that, you might as well know the rest,” said Laura. “When I was getting away from the crowd I saw a man coming out of the theatre. I’m as sure as I can be that he fired the shots.”

“Know him to recognize him?”

“Certainly.”

Joe pondered. “It’s a great story,” he said. “The greatest. It could even be true.”

“What do you mean? Of course it’s true.”

“I was thinking of presentation,” said Joe soothingly. “Not of essential veracity. A great newspaper story hasn’t got to be actually true. It’s got to seem possible.” He reflected. “Once the idea got about that this was a Nazi-backed plot, people’s minds would go right back to Van de Lubbe – the Reichstag fire – you remember?”

“I wasn’t born when that happened. But I know what you mean. It’s not quite as easy as that, though.” She told him about the bullets.

“You could fake evidence like that,” said Joe. “And I don’t mean that you’d have to bribe all these professors. Not necessarily. Suppose you knew beforehand just what gun Boschetto was going to be carrying. He’d been in jail. All right. You know he’s got a gun hidden somewhere. And you know that he’ll go and pick it up as soon as he gets out. Maybe you have the place where he’s hidden it under observation, to make sure he does pick it up.”

“It’s quite possible.”

“But you’ve been there before him. You’ve had the gun out, fired two or three bullets through it, and preserved them. You bury two of them in the frontage of the theatre.”

“How do you know where?”

“You’re organizing the parade. You know where the speaker’s going to stand. He can’t move away from the microphone.”

“How do you know where Boschetto’s going to be standing?”

“A certain amount of control would be needed there. My guess is, they got at his friends.”

“If only someone else had seen the gun,” said Laura.

“Someone else did,” said Joe.

Laura said, “For goodness’ sake–”

“Not a human eye. The eye of a camera. He was being photographed from half a dozen angles, remember. Cine-cameras, ordinary cameras, telescopic lenses, the lot. I had maybe a couple of hundred negatives brought to my office immediately the show was over. They knew I’d give big money for a good one. Most of them were focused sharp on the speaker, but in one of them – it was one of the first batch I looked at – the focus had slipped. The Bishop was a blur – but there was lots of lovely sharp details of the theatre. I didn’t look at it closely, because I hadn’t heard your story, but I remember that one of the windows – it was the lowest window in the left-hand turret – it was open, a small way, at the top, and something was projecting.”

Joe paused, his eyes shut and his mouth half open. He was visualizing the photograph.

“Boy,” he said, and his voice had dropped almost to a whisper, “if we could get that photograph we could put it on every front page in the world.”

“It might be an interesting exhibit at Boschetto’s trial too.”

“It might be that.”

“Can you get hold of it?”

“I’m on the track. Luckily I wrote down the names of all the people who showed me photographs. I got them down in the order they arrived in my office. I know this was one of the first two or three batches. I’ll have to do some legwork here. Everyone’s scared of talking on the telephone.”

“If you find it, what are you going to do with it?”

“I’ll find some way of getting it out,” said Joe. “Come to think of it, though, it mightn’t be a bad idea if you were clear of the country before it appeared in the world’s press.”

“Curiously enough,” said Laura, “the identical thought had already occurred to me.”

Charles had had a busy afternoon. There were about forty English families in and around Lienz, and these he visited in turn, trailed by a Volkswagen containing two large young men in glasses. He found little alarm. The general view was that Humbold had overstepped the mark and that as soon as communications with Vienna had been restored he would be put in his place.

Colonel Crocker was not so sure. He and his wife, a small, fierce, yellow woman of sixty, had set up house together in many strange and unrestful corners of the globe.