The Twenty-Third Man (9 page)

‘They are most interesting. Did you know that the Señor Emden, who was staying at the Hotel Sombrero, told us that he proposed to go and live there?’

‘In the caves?’

‘Yes, in the caves.’

‘Impossible, Señora.’

‘Why so?’

‘It is unknown to dwell in the caves for anybody but
habitante de las cavernas
.’

‘I don’t see why.’

‘
Los trogloditas
’, said Pepe earnestly, ‘are not of our world. They are
primitivos
. They do not conform. Only visitors and priests go to see them. They are
piojosos
. You understand?’

‘Only too well. But perhaps Señor Emden is interested in anthropology – and in lice.’

‘I believe, Señora, that Señor Emden is dead. He is in the cave of dead men. I have it from Tio Caballo. There is no doubt about the matter.’

‘You think that the bandits have murdered him?’

‘Oh, no! Oh, no! Tio Caballo is a good man. He murders nobody except his enemies. How could Señor Emden be his enemy? He has lived at the hotel only since two months. Besides, we do not make enemies of the tourists. It is not good business.’

‘All the same, Señor Emden seems to have stirred up trouble.’

‘Yes,’ admitted Pepe, suddenly gritting his teeth. ‘Pilar tells me so. But that I know her to be a virtuous girl, and not a
coqueta
, I would not marry her. But Tio Caballo had no quarrel with Señor Emden. How could he? He has no women in his life. One cannot consider his elderly mother.’

The driver of the hired car, who had joined them and was moodily kicking the front wall of an unoccupied cave, turned his head and said abruptly:

‘The Señor Emden is a pig. He gives no gratuities.’

As this observation did not help in any way, Dame Beatrice ignored it, but Pepe said:

‘You have reason, my friend. Those who give no gratuities are without a soul. They are of the nature of the beasts.’

‘I am anxious to discover what has happened to this man without a soul,’ said Dame Beatrice.

‘Without doubt, he is in the cave of dead men,’ declared Pepe. ‘That is for certain. Tio Caballo has told me so, and he is an honourable man who would not deceive even his mother-in-law, if he had one.’

Dame Beatrice was convinced, by this time, that there was no news to be obtained from the troglodytes. She was about to get into the car when it was surrounded by a bevy of girls who had just climbed the hill. Laughing, and pushing one another, they crowded round her. One begged for a brooch she was wearing, another for her watch. Half a dozen voices demanded handkerchiefs. The voices were good-humoured and vociferous. The eyes were vulpine.

Dame Beatrice, like a conjurer, began producing handkerchiefs. They fluttered from the ends of her sleeves, from the pockets of her silk jacket, from her handbag, from the inside of her sunshade. A breeze on the hillside carried them, and the girls ran shrieking after them. Dame Beatrice, having dispersed the company, went to the door of the next cave. Another elderly woman stood here.

‘You need make no more inquiries for the gentleman you seek. He is not here. Nobody new has come to the caves,’ she said civilly, in quiet tones, and in Spanish flavoured only slightly by the island
patois
. ‘There was a mad Englishman who came, like yourself, to make a visit here, and who offered me much money to hide him, but I like not to associate with those who hide from their enemies. If the enemies find out, they make trouble.’

‘Can you describe him?’

‘No. I did not take notice. He spoke Spanish from a little book, and, even so, very badly. I think he went from me to Aroja Pieta, and I think she promised to hide him until a ship called. But he has gone now. Are you his grandmother?’

‘No, we are not related. We were fellow-guests at the hotel. I heard that he wished to live here, and I was interested to find out whether he liked the caves.’

‘I cannot tell you. No, I cannot help you at all. Aroja Pieta lives in the fourth cave from this one. You could speak with her.’

Aroja Pieta turned out to be a middle-aged woman with much coarse black hair and an expression of surprise due to the fact that she had plucked her eyebrows. Her skirts were kilted to display a petticoat made from a blanket, and she flourished a brush which, at the moment when Dame Beatrice called, was dripping whitewash over the earthen floor of her cave.

‘I shall sell you no pottery,’ she announced. ‘It is rubbish. I have here Roman lamps and coins. Antiques. Very good. Not like the pottery, which is rubbish. Also I have trinkets. I have ivory, jade, a silk shawl, a bell for your he-goat. What would you like?’

Dame Beatrice settled for a necklace of which none but the largest bead was of ivory, and then referred to the object of her visit.

‘The señor from Reales? The Englishman? A strange person, for who would inhabit a cave when he could command the best house in Reales? Believe me, he is in
trouble
with his enemies. Myself, I care nothing for his past, no, not an unripe fig, so, when the Señor offers me money to be permitted to hide in my cave until a ship comes for him from England, I say to myself, “Why not?” Who sent him to me? That she-ass Serafina Todos. She thinks much of herself because she was born in La Linea. What a place! The streets stink. She would like to know all my business, that one!’

‘And the Englishman?’

‘Do I not tell you? I am whitening the walls against fleas, as he has requested me to do, but he does not come back any more. If he had fallen down the mountain, I should have heard. He has not, therefore, fallen down the mountain. Where, I ask myself, has he gone? You are sure he has left the hotel?’

‘Yes, I am certain. That is, if we are speaking of the same man.’

‘There could not be two. This man comes at the hour of siesta. He goes to Serafina Todos who is fool enough to be proud of herself. He comes to me from her and makes much talk of money if I will whitewash the walls against fleas. What are fleas? We call them little brothers. So I say to the Englishman that I whitewash the walls tomorrow. You see how I keep my word.’

She slopped whitewash about her in a freehanded, haphazard manner to prove her point. Dame Beatrice stepped out of range. She knew the Spanish, inconsequential, vague ‘tomorrow’. She knew, too, that the islanders (and this, she felt certain, was also true of the troglodyte islanders) had no sense of time. The only day of the week they seemed able to name with any certainty was Sunday and the only dates they seemed able to remember were those of the
fiestas
. It would be useless, and also misleading, to attempt to find out from Doña Aroja on which day the Englishman had made his appearance.

‘Did you never see him again after that first time?’ she asked. Aroja Pieta paused in the whitewashing.

‘Never again. He comes. He makes the arrangements –
honourably,
as I think. He goes. He comes not yet. I still expect him. It is not with the English as with some others. If they make an arrangement it will be honoured. Unless he is dead, he will come. Now you will give me money, because you have taken my time, but, unless you are related to him, I do not understand why you seek him. You should not believe a young man’s promises of marriage. Young men do not want to marry old women except for their money. Are you rich?’

‘Not rich enough to tempt a young man into marriage. Your other supposition would appear to be more reasonable.’

‘So. You are his grandmother.’

‘I want to know whether we are speaking of the same young man. Describe him to me.’

‘How can I?’

‘Was he dark or fair?’

‘He had a pale face, very handsome, very white. Eyes of a libertine.’

‘His hair?’

‘He was wearing a big hat like a peasant hat. He carried also a blanket, like the mountain shepherds, but it was clean. He was afraid. His eyes went this way, that way. He spoke out of a little book. It was difficult to understand him. Now tell me truthfully why you have come here today.’

‘I wished to see why he should come to live in the caves.’

‘Ah, that! You shall come tomorrow, and I may have news for you. Now you would like to give me a little more money, not for trade; for the love of God.’

‘Next time.’

‘
A mañana!
’

‘
A mañana!
’

Dame Beatrice returned to the car and so to the Hotel Sombrero, driven at breakneck speed along Pilar’s good road, Ignacio removing his hands from the wheel at one or two hairpin bends in order, by using graphic gestures,
to
feature various accidents he had witnessed on that very mountain-side. Dame Beatrice mused philosophically upon the Mohammedan theory of Kismet. It began to emerge as a reasonable doctrine and one extremely soothing to the nerves.

Mrs Angel met her on the terrace.

‘Well?’ she said. ‘Did you find out about my Talkie?’

‘You mentioned it before. Pray elucidate.’

‘My bird.’

‘Then nothing came out about it.’

‘What did you think of the caves?’

‘I did not find them worth a visit, but the cave-dwellers did find my visit worth while.’

‘Rapacious creatures!’

‘I take it that they are very poor, so I paid as graciously as I could.’

She went into the hotel and met Peterhouse at the foot of the wide stone stair. He wagged a playful finger.

‘So you went to the caves! I wish now that I had gone with you. How did you get on?’

‘I was mulcted of much cash.’

‘Undoubtedly. That is why you would have been better off with an escort who knew the ropes. I do wish I had thought of it. What a pity you did not suggest it! However, I am to blame.’

‘It is gallant of you not to reproach me. All the same, I found out what I went to find out.’

‘The habits of a troglodyte people? But, from what you told me before you went, I gathered that you knew something of their way of life already.’

‘I went to find out whether Mr Emden had gone there to live.’

‘Emden? I have studied him closely since he came to stay at the hotel, and I would not be surprised at anything he did. The man is crazy. There you have it in a nutshell.’

‘It seems as though the man has disappeared.’

‘Disappeared? What gave you that idea. Dame Beatrice? Do you mean voluntarily or involuntarily?’

‘More than one otherwise inexplicable circumstance gave me the idea. As for your second question …’

‘Well, he was a beastly sort of fellow, I am sure. It may be a very good thing if he has gone.’

‘That may well be so. Nevertheless, I feel sufficiently interested to have made up my mind to trace all his movements up to the time he was last seen, which, it turns out, may or may not have been at the caves.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘I mean that Mr Emden may have been seen there by his murderer, and that his murderer is unlikely to have been one of the troglodytes, Mr Peterhouse.’

IT WAS NO
easier than Dame Beatrice had imagined it would be to obtain information leading to an understanding of Emden’s disappearance. Tentative and tactful soundings led nowhere, and it was not until the disappearance excited general comment that anything helpful was forthcoming.

The first news that others besides Dame Beatrice (and these for more personal reasons) were interested in Emden’s fate came by way of Pepe Casita. He turned up at the hotel one morning in response to a message from Ruiz.

‘You have a party to go to the cave of dead men? You wish to have a guide? But none of the guides will go,’ said Pepe flatly.

From their seats in the lounge and on the veranda, the guests could hear the argument which ensued.

‘Not to go? And why? Are they all millionaires that they are able to turn down a party of eleven of my guests, new by air yesterday, who wish to visit the cave? Am I to lose my little-enough share in the profits because of these lazy pigs? Go back at once and say that I want two guides, nine mules, and two small docile asses to be ready in one hour from now at Ychos. Do not reply, but go.’

‘Understand me, Señor. When I say the guides will not go, I mean it. Nothing will move them. They say the cave is a bad place now. Even the bandits do not like it.’

‘What is there for them to do today? I speak of the guides, not the bandits. Is it, I ask, a day of fiesta? Is it a day on which they mourn their grandmothers? Or is it that they are emigrating to the island of apes where live their kindred? Stop being a fool, or you will never work with me again.’

‘I tell you, Señor Ruiz, I tell you, Don Jorge, that the cave is bewitched.’

‘
Cincuenta diablos! Maldito amuleto de apóstata! Encantar la caverna de los hombres muertos – Santo Pedro! Una risotada inflada!
’

‘Truly, it is nothing to laugh at, Señor. I, Pepe, assure you that the guides will not go. I myself am not superstitious, as you know. I am not an ignorant man. But even I do not care to go near the ghost of Señor Emden. It is a bad ghost, owing money to all the wine-shops in Reales, yes, and inheriting the curses of fathers, brothers, husbands, lovers. Oh, it is a bad place now, the cave of the dead men.’

‘Señor Emden? He is dead? Then the
niño did
speak the truth when he said he saw twenty-four bodies!
Madre de Dios!
What misfortune will this bring upon me and my hotel?’

‘Emden dead!’ One hotel guest muttered it to another, and the word was passed round. Those who were feeling slightly bored by the lack of excitement they had experienced so far in the island capital, with its meagre and mediocre gaieties, hitched their chairs closer to catch the rest of the conversation, but apparently it was over, for Pepe’s voice was heard no more, and Ruiz, followed by his daughter Luisa, came into the lounge, Luisa carrying a large black book, the hotel ledger.

The guests began to chatter.

‘It can’t be so very serious,’ said Mrs Angel, betraying by this example of wishful thinking that she suspected the reverse to be the truth. ‘I mean, people disappear for the strangest reasons.’

‘He’s probably gone over to one of the other islands,’ said Peterhouse. ‘I don’t really think we need worry.’