Lovers and Liars (40 page)

‘Silence,’ Pascal said. He released her hands, rose, and began pace the room. ‘I think someone wanted to assure their silence .it’s as obvious and simple as that. Appleyard must have known Ibmething. Presumably they thought there was a risk he’d told Itevey. So it was safer if both of them were dead . - - ‘

0 ‘But wh%l like thaff Gini bent her head and covered her face. N they iniended to kill Stevey, why lure him here to do it? Did have to bring him here, make him sit next to the dead body

ymeine he loved? Did they have to paint his face? It’s so tsol . It s monstrous, Pascal.’

-Cruelty is central to this case,’ he said. He crossed back to her, W took her hands again. ‘Gini, you know that, you’ve seen it. Numiliation, subjugation. Sex - and now death. Whoever is behind

this enjoys inflicting pain. Did you doubt that when you saw what they’d done to your apartment? When you listened to the man on that tape? Did you doubt it tonightT

‘No/ Gini replied. ‘I didn’t doubt it, of course not. But when you actually see the evidence. To make that poor boy undress, to fold up his clothes like that. To deface him!’

‘They made him look like a woman. Or like a parody of a woman.’ Pascal’s voice had gone ice-cold. He looked at her closely. ‘Someone here hates homosexuals, hates women, and hates sex too - at the same time as desiring it. Gini, you know the answer. Who does that suggestT

‘Hawthorne?’ ‘I would say so, yes.’

She began to answer him, to argue, but Pascal cut her off.

‘All right, all right,’ he said impatiently. ‘I know all that. Nothing proven, just allegations, sure. But just take a look at the logistics, Gini, if nothing else.’ He rose and began to pace again.

‘Someone is well informed, yes? They knew we’d be working on this story before we did. They knew when your apartment would be empty, and how to enter it easily. They knew we were coming to Venice, and they made sure we could get into that apartment when it suited them. We are being watched and followed and listened to, Gini. There’s no doubt in my mind about that. Now, just who can organize that kind of operation? Who could employ an executioner, so he never needed to set foot in Venice himself? Come on, Gini, who’s the one person who could possibly gain from all thisT

Gini straightened. She took another sip of brandy and tried to think. She still felt as cold as ice.

‘Hawthorne,’ she said eventually. Then: ‘But not only Hawthorne. We still don’t know enough about McMullen. McMullen might have something to gain too. If he is obsessed with Lise, if he wanted to destroy her husband’s future career, their marriage. It could be McMullen, Pascal. You said yourself - a military-style execution, two neat shots in the back of the head.’

‘I accept that.’ Pascal crossed and sat down next to her. ‘Obviously, I’ve thought of that too. But if you’re weighing the two possible candidates, you have to admit, Hawthorne has advantages McMullen can’t possibly have. Would it be as easy for McMullen to organize surveillance? No, it would not. All right, McMullen could conceivably have a personal motivation for blackening Hawthorne’s name. But can you really believe he’d take it as far as murder? 1 certainly can’t. Concoct a sexual slander, smear the man, sure -

actually kill two people? No. I can’t believe that.’ He paused. reas Hawthorne - Hawthorne has a great deal at stake. Look

“hat he stands to lose. His marriage, his sons, his reputation, his r - his whole future … ‘He broke off, and she could see there something more, something he was reluctant to say to her. hat is it, Pascal?’ She looked at him closely. ‘There’s someg else, isn’t thereT

veral things,‘he said after a moment. ‘McMullen’s disappearfor one. I think McMullen knew he was in danger, Gini - and brings us back to the same question. A simple one. Who might discovered McMullen’s plans? Who could have known about nversations with Lise, the fact that he’d gone to a newspaper? can easily employ surveillance? Who can intercept mail, or to phone’ calls, even phone calls made to an apparently safe x? Who can draw on that kind of expertise, Gini? Hawthorne

Now McMullen also has some expertise -he’s an ex-Para, after So he got out fast, he covered his tracks. And I now think he successful. McMullen isn’t dead.’

u’ve changed your n-dnd? WhyT

told vou, Gini. Because we’re being used, you and I. They’re looki’ng for McMullen, and we might lead them to him. While possibility remains we’re useful. The minute we stop being I … ‘ I ie paused. ‘That’ s when they dispense with us. The

e way we saw tonight. We lead them to McMullen - and we’re .1

u can’t mean that, Pascal.’

his morning - no. This evening - yes.’ He turned to her in a en angry way, and took her hands in his. ‘Gini, it’s easy. It n’t have’to be a shot in the back of the head. It can be subtler that - a road accident, a fall from an underground train, a Me contretemps with a lift-shaft.’

k1t can’t be true. It can’t be true.’ Gini gave a little cry and rose O’her feet. She walked over to the window and looked out. Cloud intermittent moon-shine: the water of the canal below was a tt of silver one moment, black the next.

was talking to Hawthorne,’ she swung around with a pleading , ‘I was talking to him only yesterday. All the time he was

0.6k

king I was watching his eyes, his face. There would have ta

, n some sign, some indication.’

Wascal gave an impatient gesture. ‘You think evil is that obvi—

6? You’re wrong, Gini. It isn’t. I’ve met many evil men, I’ve hotographed them. Ex-Nazis, mafiosi, tin-pot generals in Africa,

Arab despots, different races, different ages, different men - and they all had one thing in common. Every one of them had killed without compunction and would do so again. And not in one case

- not in a single one, Gini - did it show in the face.’

‘But that’s difterent/ Gini burst out. ‘Hawthorne isn’t some general, some dictator. He’s an American politician.’

‘Oh sure, sure.’ Pascal’s voice had become sharp. ‘And you met him in a nice drawing-room, with nice civilized people all around, having nice civilized after-dinner drinks. But just think a little, Gini. Think about some of your American politicians, or their English counterparts, for that matter, or Italian, or French. Think about them, Gini.’

‘I am thinking about them - and it’s totally different. All right, they can make a ruthless decision, in wartime, say. They can authorize a bombing raid, they can authorize appalling things, they can lift a finger and a village gets wiped out before lunch. I know that, of course I know that. But that’s a political decision. It’s not a personal one. It’s not killing someone, or harming someone, to save their own skin.’

‘And you’re sure, are you, that no American politician could ever do thatT He looked at her quietly, then with a shrug, turned away. ‘Are they all so pure? Take a look at some of your more recent presidents, Gini, and those close to them. Then tell me you’re so certain about that.’

There was a silence. Eventually Gini said, ‘Very well, I accept that. And the same could be said of politicians, of powerful men, the world over. In Europe, in Africa, in South America, in the Far East … ‘

Pascal sighed. ‘Of course. The braking systems in a democratic country may work more effectively than in others. But the point is, back a certain kind of politician into a comer - so he has everything to lose by doing nothing, and everything to gain if he acts - and he will he and cheat and blackmail, and, yes, even in some circumstances kill. And the one thing you can be certain of is that none of that, none of that, will be apparent in his face.’

There was a long silence after that. Pascal sat quietly thinking, smoking a cigarette. Gini stood by the window, and watched the water move below. She thought about this story, and about aspects of it which, initially, had worried her. She had not been altogether sure, embarking upon it, that it was right to investigate a man’s private, sexual activities. Could some boundary not be drawn between a man’s private behaviour and his public life? How

did it matter if a politician who had, in many respects, a puch

record, proved to be a liar, even a womanizer, when away his work? Did the one not out-balance the other? Could tinction not be drawn?

was certain now that it could not. Lies and deceptions could e

be partitioned off in that way: they were, she thought, like a se, spreading from one limb to the rest of the body, tainting corrupting an entire life. Also - and here she saw that room at Ossorio again - two men were now dead. She remembered her phone call with Stevey: I’ve never been overseas, he had said. He finally made it, his first and his last overseas trip. And as she

lized t6, the anger and the outrage she felt made her oddly m. Turning back, she looked at Pascal.

‘PascaW she began, ‘you have to understand one thing. I’m not ing up on this. Not now. Do whatever you like. Talk to Jenkins you must. Get me taken off this story if you must. I’ll still work rv

it - you can’t stop me, and neither can he. I’ll work on it with ki

jou, or without you. I’ll go on working on it, until I find out the bath. If Hav%,thome is responsible, I’ll finish him.’

She made a small quick gesture of the hand. ‘Choose, Pascal. Oth me or without me. Take your pick.’

IrPascal looked at her in silence. He did not doubt for one moment &t she meant what she said. She had spoken quietly, her face set pale, her eyes never wavering from his face. This was neither

tvado, nor histrionics, but a quality he could recognize for he W once shared it himself. A stubborn and insistent belief that

6uth could be revealed, and that it was the revelation of a truth Ohich was the heart and purpose of their work.

i In that moment, looking at Gini, he saw and heard his own

16unger self. He was reminded how it had been when the work

6 did gave meaning to his life. He felt both shamed and strength—

1hed, though he knew he could not tell Gini that.

‘VRising, he crossed to her. The moonlight made her hair silvery White. Her eves, looking up at him, were huge and dark in the Wlor of her’face. She was still trembling, he saw, and he knew hat what she had seen earlier was still with her. Silently, he took Mr hand in his, and drew her closer. He allowed himself to rest Is hand against her throat, to loosen her hair, and then lift it lack and awav from her face. She gave a sharp intake of breath

he touched her. He allowed himself to catch her against him h’arply, and cradle her head against his chest, although he knew khat would be the consequence if he did.

He held her close, feeling the warmth of his body pass to hers. The immediate and familiar rightness of this passed like a shock through his whole body, and he sensed from her the same response. It was as if they fit, mind to mind, heart to heart, limb to limb ‘ and at once this fitting brought back the desire her closeness had always provoked. He had known, even in memory, how overwhelming that desire had been. But touching her now he understood that the memory, however intense, had been as nothing compared to this.

That she felt this also, he could sense in every line of her body. When she drew back, looked up at him, he could see it in her eyes and face. Switching off the lamp, taking her hand, he drew her across to the bed and they lay down together. Pascal held her quietly in his ar;s; they lay in the semi-darkness watching the moonlight ebb and flow. Pascal stroked her hair. After a while, he began to speak.

He had meant to tell her about their twelve years apart, about those years when he had felt so close to death, about the circumstances of his marriage, and indeed he told her many of those things, Gini lying silently, close beside him. But then he found that he wanted to take her back with him, further back, through the windings of the past. He spoke of their time in Beirut, then he went further back still, and spoke of his childhood, his mother and his long-dead father, that little village in Provence.

Some of this story was new to Gini, other parts of it he had spoken of before, in Beirut, and he could feel that as he was calmed by these memories, she was also. They were both lulled away from the events of that evening; the residual trembling in her body became still, her skin grew warm against his.

After a while, when he paused, she too began to speak. She took him with her, back into her past, her childhood. This she had never before discussed, and he began to see why their weeks in Beirut had ended as they did, long before she explained them herself, and went on, in the same level voice, to tell him how she had felt after leaving him, and how he had remained in her mind during the years since.

Pascal was deeply moved by this. As she spoke, he began to stroke her arm, to trace the vein that ran on the inside of her arm, from elbow to wrist.

Such a deep, feathered, opium calm, to touch her like this. She trembled, and they turned in each other’s arms, so they were closer still, and Pascal could peer into her face. She looked back at him

; he traced the line of her hair, of her brows, her eyes and Irnouth. Gently, he stroked her throat, then her breasts. She

a low moan, and moved against him; pleasure made the es of her face lax. It became soft, then content. Pascal leaned her, and rested his lips against hers. They lay very still, then mouth opened under his.

r mouth tasted of the brandy, a little; her skin and her hair of salt and sea-winds and rain; they made love very slowly, ng their way back to a past place. Pascal felt a multitude of tiny

ries surface in the seas of his mind - this was her gesture, her precise scent, feel and touch. Recognition flooded through when he entered her body, he felt he rediscovered not only man he had loved, but also himself.

erwards, as they lay together, and the intensity of the pleasslowly abated Pascal thought about this act, which past poets, had read, had described as a little death. On this occasion, words were wrong, he felt. There was no sensation of dying; felt as if he had fallen a great distance, travelled a great nce; it felt like a re-birth.