The German Numbers Woman (31 page)

He laughed. ‘I'll bring him back in one piece, never fear. I'll be driving, so shan't drink much. Never do, in any case.'

‘Oh, I know you'll take care of him.'

‘Why don't you come as well? You're certainly welcome to.'

The offer was tempting. ‘I have things to do.' The response was a little too sharp, so she added: ‘Reading, mostly. I like to keep up.'

Show an interest. ‘Oh, on what?'

‘It's a funny Kingsley Amis novel. I'll read it to Howard when I've done. He'll like that. I read him books from time to time because he prefers my voice to an actor on tape. I suppose I've become quite good at it.'

He had no doubt that she could act tragedy to good effect, wanted her to go on talking, would rather listen to her than hear what Howard had to say. But here he was, a kiss for Laura, and they were on their way down the hill.

Driving towards the coast, Richard was too preoccupied to describe the scenery, as he had heard was Laura's custom, while Howard was happy to interpret winds and smells drifting through the open window, enjoying the rush of air as the road turned inland. Richard seemed anxious in his silence, in a hurry either to eat or talk.

The unseeing figure beside Richard seemed more like an exhibit meant for an art museum than a person of flesh and blood. At the most he might be a wise Buddha too all-knowing to speak. The phenomenon made him feel more alone in the car than if he'd been on his own, and he said when approaching Rye: ‘Be there in a few minutes.'

‘Going northeast, I think.' He moved from arms folded to hands on knees. ‘It's a long time since I was in Rye. Another of the Cinque Ports. Crossing the Rother, are we?'

‘That's right. We'll soon be at the trough.'

‘Makes me hungry, this sea air.'

Small talk was necessary to start with, though there was no saying how small it could ever be with Howard.

‘Up the cobbles, and onto the High Street,' he said.

‘You know it, then?'

‘Laura's brought me here a time or two, though not lately. The place pullulates on market day, and in the summer holidays.'

‘Here we are.' A few steps to the door, and Richard cleared a path to the bar, feeling strange being a blind man's minder. ‘A pint first, and then to eat. Will that suit you?'

Howard gave a little laugh, almost feminine. ‘More than all right. You get thirsty, living in the dark.'

They sat by the window, light gleaming in. ‘I must say, you're a skilful listener at that wireless of yours, the wonderful things you pull in.'

Howard drank, wiped his mouth, an unnecessary motion but it kept his tone neutral, surprised the subject had come up so soon. ‘I'm glad you think so.'

‘I do. It's been a real treat, getting your morse letters. I always look forward to 'em.' It was like talking to someone dumb as well as blind. Must be living with him that makes Laura so noble and enigmatic, though a woman of few words would seem that way.

Howard said something at last. ‘I think you know Rye much better than I do.' The voice was unfamiliar, almost caressive, as if not certain of being heard, putting the onus on whoever he was talking to. ‘I expect you've made a few trips, in and out.'

‘One or two.'

Silence again, until sitting at the table over their pâté and toast, when Howard said: ‘I don't know what I've done to be taken out and treated so handsomely. I'm certainly enjoying it.'

‘No special reason. But I did think it was about time we talked at our leisure, without the inevitable morse code between us.'

A touch of mischief wouldn't come amiss. ‘You mean with no one else to listen?'

He seemed uneasy. ‘Maybe.'

‘I'm not very good at conversation,' Howard put in. ‘I sometimes wonder whether it's because I'm a wireless operator, or because I'm blind. It could be both. A wireless operator listens all the time, so doesn't have time to talk, or feel the inclination to. A blind man can't see, and so has less to talk about what he's heard, which often isn't much, and he's not supposed to reveal most of it, in any case. A blind man has only what's inside himself to draw on, and he sometimes finds great difficulty in doing so because it's too complicated to disentangle.' He pushed his plate aside with a laugh. ‘You seem to have got me talking, and maybe that's what a friend's most valuable for.'

You're not saying much, all the same, Richard said to himself.

A little more than you, so far. Howard went on: ‘I could ask you, of course, what it is you want me to talk about.'

‘Anything that comes to mind. What else?'

Richard was a man who always lit a cigarette between courses. Or was it only now, with Howard, who wasn't surprised that so much was on his mind. ‘And if nothing does?'

‘I know, it takes two to talk. The only thing that's happened to me recently is that my wife's left me.'

‘Oh, I'm sorry.'

Or was he? There was a slight envy in his tone, at the ups and downs of other men, of men who could see and had to take all that was thrown at them. ‘Don't be. She'd been meaning to do it from the first moment she saw me and, since I'd been waiting for it, it came as no surprise. Life's calmer, which is no bad thing.'

‘Is that the truth?' Howard said. ‘Has she really gone?'

‘Ah, here's our steak and chips.' He pressed out his cigarette. ‘She certainly has. Nothing like it for clearing the decks. I'd been dreading it every minute for years, but now it's happened I feel light-headed with freedom. The only thing is, if I get too happy I might not do my work so well. I could get careless.'

‘I shouldn't think there's any chance of that with you,' Howard said. ‘Happiness takes more care of a man than misery.'

‘Ah! You think so? In my trade it's better to have neither one thing nor the other. Nothing to think about except your work.'

‘Do you have much these days? Will you pass me the salt? If I search for it myself I might knock it for six.'

‘A certain amount. Time goes by when there's nothing, and suddenly the big trip is on. Shall I put the salt on for you?'

‘I can do it. You'll be going far?'

‘Maybe. It's a millionaire's yacht, a hundred-and-fifty footer, with good engines, and I'll be part of the crew.'

He was a quick eater, Howard surmised. ‘It sounds a good life, but I suppose dangerous at times.'

‘I'm used to it. But you're right, though I wouldn't want to do anything else. Nothing else I'm fitted for.'

‘That's a blessed state. At least you're fixed in your purpose, and know where you stand.'

Howard felt him smile. ‘You could say that. I'm handy of course with the radio on such trips, and you can understand how they appreciate it.'

‘You mean using beacons for navigation?'

‘Oh, all sorts of things. I listen out for the good and the bad, you might say.'

‘If I'd had my sight I might well have gravitated to the same sort of work. I'd certainly give at least one of my arms to do what you do.'

Richard felt pity for him, though only for a moment. ‘Are you sure about that?'

‘As much as I can be sure of anything.'

‘You'd have been good at it, no doubt about it, with all those juicy items you pick up.'

Time again for a little silence, Howard decided, even if only to eat. He turned his head as if to look around the room, then concentrated on getting food from plate to mouth. The room seemed full, which explained Richard's low tone while talking. He wanted no one to overhear. Well, neither did Howard, who felt comfortable in the controlling role of the conspirator.

‘For instance,' Richard said at last, ‘these women you were hearing.'

‘Judy?'

‘You seem to base a hell of a lot on that contact.'

‘Well, I got in on the picture, didn't I? But you had my report, and know as much as I do.'

Richard seemed to think about it. ‘Perhaps. But it was like a story you made up.'

Howard laughed. ‘Exactly. That's what I told myself, and yet it all dropped into place. I imagine you would have come up with the same story, based on the evidence I got. Your intuition would have led you onto the same track.'

‘Maybe. But how right would I have been?' He tapped his glass. ‘Another drink? I'm having one.'

You're going to need it more than me. ‘Half a pint, then.'

He went to the bar and, while waiting, Howard surmised he was being looked at, so went on eating as if knowing he wasn't.

‘But how much of a story do you think it was?' Richard put the tankard into his hand.

Howard set it down, quite capable of picking it up himself. ‘Don't think I told you one half.'

Richard's pint clicked against his plate. ‘You mean you could make up an even more fantastic tale?'

‘Certainly. One which might get a good deal closer to the truth than fantasy. The more my mind worked on it, that is.'

‘I wish I'd waited till your next letter then. It would have made another of my days.'

‘I dare say it would. It might have made several.'

‘Well, tell it to me, if it won't wait.'

‘Oh, it will wait right enough. Me having so little meat to put in my letters, I prefer to spin them out. That was certainly a nicely cooked steak. And the chips were just how I like them. You picked a good place.'

‘I sometimes come here with the crew, when we're back from a trip.'

So he'd been more than a few times to Rye, and bringing in what? ‘You can read me the dessert menu, if you would.'

He seemed glad of a hiatus in their indeterminate chatter. ‘I can recommend the hot apple pie and mince tart, with cream.'

‘I'm ready when you are.' Howard was also calm, and happy to wait for confirmation of his ideas about the future. He tasted his beer while Richard gave the order. Soon enough there would be time to tell Richard what he knew, or thought he knew, which was the same, or it would be in the end. Loud talk came from the door, and a clash of cutlery from the bar.

‘I need another drink,' Richard said. ‘But that will be my last. How about you?'

‘I could run to the same again.' Maybe he couldn't, but he lived on two levels as far as drink went, alcohol kept in one compartment and clear faculties in another. Unless he had too much, which he never would. To be abstemious about his drink might bring suspicion, or distrust. All the same, much of him regarded Richard as a friend, a fellow sparks, a comrade in arms who'd had the generosity to invite him out, and who in the last months had made his life more interesting, probably more so than since he had been blasted into sightlessness. He liked him as much as you could like someone you would never fully know, and probably never be able to trust. A certain density of friendship had settled around them, in a situation so fraught with unknowingness that it could only strengthen the connection.

He put the glass into Howard's hand. ‘Here's to your health.'

‘And yours.'

They forked at their dessert. ‘I have a liking for sweet things,' Howard said. ‘And this is delicious.' Certainly more palatable than Laura's often too health-conscious food. ‘It must have been good, coming here when you had landed, after all that salt water.'

Richard laughed. ‘Yes, we had plenty of that, smack in our faces at times. But about this woman talking to her girlfriend?'

‘There's no more to tell than I've let on already. She was on a boat called the
Daedalus
. You know who Daedalus was, in the old Greek mythology?'

‘I've forgotten.' He hadn't. ‘A blacksmith?'

‘Something like that. Artificer. He had a son called Icarus, and he made them both a pair of wings to fly to Italy. The father told the son not to go too close to the sun in case the wax melted. Of course, the bloody silly youth did, and he falls into the drink. Father flies on. I love those old legends.'

‘So her boat was called
Daedalus?
'

‘That's right.'

‘You're sure of that?'

‘Still is. I must have heard her say it fifty times. And the other woman was – is – the
Pontifex
. Which means pope or priest. But what's in a name? Judy and Carla had a natter every night, until recently. They were sweet on each other, you might say. But from the few hints I got they were involved in some very funny business, going from one place to another.'

‘What business, do you think?' He had finished his dessert, and lit a cigarette. ‘Did you get any idea?'

‘You seem to like the story. It's got you hooked.'

‘I'm just interested.'

‘So was I. Who wouldn't be? You can see how it would grab me, can't you?'

‘Here, have one of mine.' He passed a cigarette, and held the match. ‘The whole thing sounds fascinating, just the sort of storybook thing to talk about over lunch. And you said you weren't very good at conversation!'

‘The thought of boring people horrifies me.'

‘You'd never do that. But what business did you decide they were in?'

‘It isn't what I decided. It's what I gathered.'

‘But not definite?'

‘Oh, definite enough for me. They go smuggling, from one place to another. Unloading stuff from Turkey and the islands. The cargo comes from Russia and places in central Asia. Or maybe from the Far East. The Golden Triangle, isn't it called?'

The silence was heavy, didn't last, though long enough for Howard to know that he had scored: a bull's-eye, with buckshot.

‘That's a lot to assume, all the same.'

‘You wouldn't have thought so if you'd heard what I heard.'

‘But what, exactly?'

He shifted in his seat, as if to get closer. ‘Unfortunately, I didn't have my tape recorder on, otherwise I would play it so that you could hear why I knew they were working the rough powder trade. Opium maybe, mostly.'