SS-GB Page 15

  ‘Light!’ yelled Huth again. ‘Light, damn you!’ a style of order which Douglas had come to recognize. There was a brief babble of German, a couple of attempts to start the generator, and a cry and curses as it backfired.

  Bewildered, Douglas moved forward a fraction. Below him he saw the flashlights of the soldiers. The frame of the house creaked, and there was enough wind to hum in the telephone wires that were draped across the charred room beams. Then, with a cough, a stutter and a roar, the generator started, but the lights did not come on; neither the one in Huth’s hand nor the floodlights the engineers had erected in the garden below.

  ‘Did anyone ever tell you that the Germans are an efficient race?’ Huth inquired of Douglas.

  ‘It’s all a question of priorities,’ said Douglas. As he said it, the arc lights spluttered into life, their beams cutting through the night like steel scalpels as they sought a meeting place. Douglas closed his eyes and turned away from the glare before he was able to focus his eyes on the bed and its occupant.

  He was dressed only in tattered bloodstained underclothes, hands wired to the bed-frame, head bowed, face bloody; like a Christ, as the men who’d tortured him intended he should be.

  ‘Jimmy Dunn!’ said Douglas.

  ‘You’ve seen a dead man before, Superintendent,’ said Huth.

  ‘Poor Jimmy!’

  ‘On an errand for you?’

  ‘Investigating the murder,’ said Douglas.

  Huth reached forward and, using a stick, he prodded at the large piece of cardboard that was wired across the dead man’s chest. ‘I was an English hunting dog, working for the German huntsmen,’ said the crudely written sign.

  ‘Poor little Jimmy.’ So Harry Woods had proved right. It was too dangerous for an inexperienced young policeman and now Douglas tormented himself with responsibility for his death.

  ‘The gallant British patriots!’ said Huth. ‘Are you proud of them?’ Douglas turned away. ‘Oh, no you don’t!’ said Huth, trying to turn him back to face the floodlit body with the cuts and burns that marked the young policeman’s last tormented hours. The two men struggled there atop the rubbish heap, until Douglas punched hard enough to produce a grunt of pain. Then Douglas broke free and began to pick his way down through the wreckage.

  Behind him came Huth. He said, ‘So at last, a flicker of emotion! I thought I’d never see it.’

  ‘Jimmy was a good copper,’ said Douglas.

  ‘And that’s the ultimate accolade in your book, is it?’

  ‘I sent him.’

  ‘And your friends of the Resistance murdered him.’ Huth stumbled but found his balance again. ‘But you punch me,’ he said.

  ‘My wife is somewhere under this lot,’ said Douglas by way of explanation but there was no note of apology in his voice.

  ‘I know, I know,’ said Huth.

  ‘When did it happen?’

  Huth jumped down from the last of the rubble. ‘An army foot patrol found it up there at 22.47 hours. There are two hours between each patrol…regular patrols! These army idiots will never learn how to deal with partisans.’

  The two men walked towards the vehicles. ‘This is an announcement that they intend to kill you,’ Huth said softly. ‘You realize that, don’t you?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  As they reached the cars, Huth turned to a young SS officer who was hovering nearby, with stiffened body and robotic face, anxious only for a word of command. ‘Let the photographer go up there,’ said Huth. ‘I want this grotesque tableau dismantled, and out of sight before daybreak.’ To Douglas he said, ‘You’d better go home and get out of those ridiculous clothes.’ Douglas looked down to see the dinner suit revealed by his flapping raincoat.

  ‘Take a car,’ added Huth. His face was drawn and deeply lined and his chin unshaven. He rubbed his face and paused as if waiting to sneeze, but no sneeze came. ‘I’m about all in,’ he said, in one of his rare admissions of human weakness.

  ‘You’re getting Jimmy down now?’

  ‘Go home,’ said Huth. ‘That’s not “Jimmy;” that’s a carcass.’ Huth followed Douglas’s gaze and added, ‘We’ve cleared all the houses as far as the railway station. None of your one-time neighbours will have seen anything.’

  Huth had some perverted talent for discovering the workings of Douglas’s mind. And he made Douglas despise himself because of them. What should Douglas care if those neighbours saw the things these people had done to Jimmy, and why should Douglas feel guilty about it? And yet he did.

  ‘No feelers yet?’ asked Huth. ‘Nobody asked you subtle questions about how you like working for the Huns?’

  ‘No!’ said Douglas. To say yes would be enough to have Huth screening every guest at the Garin party, and threatening and pushing until the clandestine meeting was uncovered. ‘No,’ said Douglas again with less emphasis.

  ‘Curious.’ He sniffed, and wiped his nose with a coloured handkerchief. ‘Very curious,’ he told the handkerchief. ‘I expected some whining and sniffing round you by this time.’

  ‘I’ll get back home,’ said Douglas. ‘Perhaps there will be a carrier-pigeon waiting for me.’

  ‘Save the humorous asides for Harry Woods,’ said Huth. ‘Sergeants have to laugh at their superior’s jokes.’ He blew his nose. ‘These are dangerous people, my friend. Don’t try to play both ends against the middle.’

  Douglas opened the door of the Volkswagen car.

  ‘Do you know any remedy that will help my sinus?’ said Huth.

  Surprised, Douglas said, ‘An inhaler to put in your nose?’

  Huth smiled. ‘I’ve got too much up my nose already. Take this officer home,’ he told the driver.

  * * *

  Wind chased away the cloud and revealed a dark blue night. And as they reached central London, dawn ruled red lines across the eastern sky. Douglas let the latch close softly, so as not to wake the house but Mrs Sheenan heard the car.

  ‘Is that you, Mr Archer?’

  He tiptoed upstairs. From the oil-shop came the smells of freshly chopped firewood, and paraffin. By now he’d grown used to it and it was like a welcome home.

  ‘Sorry to wake you, Mrs Sheenan.’

  ‘I’m having tea. Would you like some?’ Since taking in her two lodgers, she had slept in the front room above the shop. Now Douglas found her sitting up in bed, a thick knitted cardigan wrapped tightly round her, sipping tea.

  ‘Get a cup and saucer from that cupboard, would you?’ With two young children in the house, Mrs Sheenan had gathered into this tiny room all the fragile memories of her married life. Here were china dogs that barked Margate and Southsea, a young sepia bride, a chipped Staffordshire teapot, the pocket-watch engraved with her father’s name and best wishes from his employer after 25 years’ service, two tinted photos of her husband and all four of his POW-camp postcards.

  She poured tea for Douglas. ‘Is it raining?’

  ‘No. And the fog is all gone.’ He sipped the tea. ‘This is good.’

  ‘There’s one spoonful of real tea added to the ersatz. I always wake up about four, and I never really go back to sleep again.’

  ‘You don’t look very well, Mrs Sheenan; there’s a lot of influenza about.’

  She noticed the dinner suit he was wearing under his raincoat but she did not comment on it. ‘Do you think I’ll ever see Tom again, Mr Archer?’ She stirred her tea with unnecessary care and attention. ‘The boy keeps asking me, you see, and I just don’t know what to tell the child.’

  She looked up, and Douglas realized that she’d been crying. He knew she had no living relatives and the responsibility for her son weighed heavily on her. ‘Tom will come back, Mrs Sheenan.’

  ‘We only hear every two or three months. Even then he’s only permitted to send a printed card that says he’s well.’

  ‘Better than a long letter to say he’s ill,’ said Douglas.

  With some effort, she smiled. ‘Of course, you’re right.’

  ‘The
armistice gives no date, but the Germans have promised to return the prisoners of war as soon as possible.’

  ‘What do the Germans care?’ she said bitterly. ‘German mothers and wives got their men back months ago. What do they care about our lads? – They’re using them as cheap labour. What can our government offer in exchange?’

  Douglas could find no arguments to counter her reasoning. At present the Germans promised that one British POW would come home in exchange for every ten workers who volunteered for German factories. It would be a long wait for Tom. ‘Don’t let your son see that you are unhappy, Mrs Sheenan. It could affect him more than having his father away from home.’

  ‘At school they have a new teacher who told them that Churchill – and all the British soldiers – were criminals. My boy came home and asked me why.’

  ‘I’ll speak to him,’ said Douglas, ‘and tell him that his father is a fine man.’

  ‘They are told to report parents who go against the propaganda.’

  ‘These Germans have brought evil ideas with them.’

  ‘My son thinks the world of you, Mr Archer.’

  Douglas finished his tea, and stood up.

  ‘I don’t know what we’d do without you, Mr Archer. And I don’t mean just the ration card and the money.’

  Douglas looked embarrassed.

  ‘Oh, I forgot to tell you about the parcel,’ Mrs Sheenan went on quickly.

  ‘What parcel?’ said Douglas.

  ‘The printed label says it’s from Scotland Yard. I thought perhaps Sergeant Woods had sent it. I know he loves your Douggie like a father.’

  ‘A parcel for you?’ said Douglas.

  ‘No, for your Douggie. To Douglas Archer Junior, like they say in those American films, you know.’ She saw the fear on his face. ‘I put it in your room. I didn’t do wrong, did I?’

  ‘No, no, no,’ said Douglas. ‘I’ll look at it.’ But she heard him going up the stairs very hurriedly.

  Douglas studied the parcel very carefully. The HSSPf label and the Scotland Yard rubber stamp looked authentic, and the typewriting had all the characteristics of the new Adler machines that the Germans had installed in their offices. The postage had been paid, not with ordinary postage stamps but with the special Dienstmarken adhesives that prepaid all official German mail.

  Douglas picked up the parcel and decided that it wasn’t heavy enough for a bomb. He was in fact too tired to take all the usual precautions, and he cut the string and wrappings off with his penknife. Inside there was a model motor car from the Schuco toy factory in Nuremberg. It was beautifully made, and complete with gear lever, miniature steering, differential and a front that opened to reveal a detailed engine. A compliments slip accompanied the gift and, in General Kellerman’s fine penmanship, bore the message, ‘To Douglas Archer, a brave boy – for his birthday. With fondest love, Fritz Kellerman.’

  Douglas knew that his son would adore it, and treasure it all the more for the signed note. Yet it made him uneasy.

  Douglas put the elaborate toy back into the box and refolded the wrappings. His son’s birthday was not for another three weeks. By then the whole world could have changed.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Douglas scarcely slept before thoughts of Jimmy Dunn intruded upon his sleep enough to make him awaken. What had happened to the photo in the brown envelope that had formed the basis of Dunn’s inquiries?

  Douglas sat up in bed, now fully awake. Where would I conceal an addressed envelope, he asked himself. There was one excellent place to hide it – the nearest post-box. It was a long shot, but Douglas knew he would not rest until he checked it. He looked at his bedside clock. It was already too late to intercept it at the sorting office. By now it would be on its way for delivery.

  There was something forbidding about Mafeking Road, where the younger Spode brother had lived. The military success that, at the beginning of the century, added to British dictionaries a new word for joyous celebration, had no echo here; but the name dated the grimy little brick houses.

  There was no gate. It had been taken during one of the scrap metal collections that had grown more demanding month by month. In the ruins of the bombed house next door cabbages had been planted, but now, as the crop ended, weeds were strangling the decaying brown plants.

  Douglas could not find a doorbell, so he rapped loudly on the boarding that was nailed across the front-room window. It took nearly five minutes to get a response, but eventually a fat, unshaven man in soiled undervest and corduroy trousers opened the door. He yawned, hoisted the straps of his braces and said, ‘Yeah? What?’

  ‘I was here before,’ said Douglas. ‘The schoolteacher upstairs – Spode.’

  ‘What now?’

  ‘I’ll have to come inside,’ said Douglas.

  ‘You’d better tell me what it’s about,’ insisted the fat man without yielding an inch.

  Douglas put a hand on the man’s belly and pushed. His hand had almost disappeared in the soft flesh before the man moved. ‘Don’t worry your pretty little head what it’s all about, sleepy head,’ said Douglas. ‘Just curl up and go back to sleep.’

  ‘I’ve been up for hours,’ said the fat man. Douglas pushed past him, went along the corridor and opened the door of the warm well-lit little sanctum from which the fat man had come. It smelled of unwashed bodies and old cabbage. Douglas looked round the room. The big dresser housed a mixed collection of plates, cups and saucers, unpaid bills, a half-used strip of aspirin tablets, a glass tumbler containing the pieces of a broken pocket-watch, a tin-opener and a legion of dead flies. Propped on the top shelf there was a fly-specked calendar, folded to reveal a coloured view of Mount Snowdon, and the month of October 1937.

  In the corner of the room there was an unmade bed, without sheets, and with a coloured cushion to replace the pillow. On it there was a copy of Dandy comic. On a chair, within reach of the bed, a tray showed the remains of a hearty breakfast; smears of egg and half a dozen bacon rinds. Only a small table was clean and tidy; with pens and pencils arranged alongside a sheet of blue blotting paper. Behind the telephone there was a box file labelled ‘Contributions Mafeking Street 1941’. And yet, dominating this chaotic room there was the blazing coal fire. Such a conflagration was seldom seen in these hard times.

  ‘Bloody cold out there this morning, eh, Sergeant?’ said the fat man.

  ‘Superintendent,’ said Douglas. ‘Detective Superintendent Archer from Scotland Yard.’ From the wireless set with its fretsawed rising sun loudspeaker there came the sounds of a repeat ‘In Town Tonight’ interview. Douglas switched it off.

  The fat man belched, and summoned up enough energy to rub his bare arms briskly before he tested the door again, to be quite sure that it was tightly shut against draughts from the corridor. ‘Superintendent…yes, that’s what I meant; Superintendent.’

  ‘Anyone been to look at the room upstairs?’ said Douglas while he looked to see if there was any sign of the morning’s mail. For this man was one of the ‘block-wardens’. The Germans had used the Air Raid Precautions organization to provide themselves with a network of Nazi Party officials along the lines of the ones they had in Germany. Through such men as these the Nazis distributed supplementary food coupons, mail from POW camps, winter relief and soup vouchers for the very needy. In return for the power and influence such ‘wardens’ were granted, they were expected to cooperate against ‘antisocial elements’. A scrutiny of their neighbours’ mail would be an essential part of that cooperation.

  ‘Certainly not. That room is closed, just as the police ordered.’

  ‘Don’t give me the old-soldier stuff,’ said Douglas flipping open the Mafeking Road contribution file. ‘This is a murder investigation.’

  ‘Well, don’t think I’d protect the little bastard,’ said the fat man indignantly. Douglas looked at him. He couldn’t imagine the fat man protecting anyone. ‘Bloody aristocrat!’ said the fat man. ‘Throwing his weight about, with his fancy accent, and lah
-di-dah bloody orders about emptying the rubbish.’ The fat man followed Douglas round the room. ‘No time for bloody aristocrats – not now, not under this regime, eh?’

  Douglas said, ‘Belching and farting and eating two or three eggs and half-a-dozen rashers for breakfast, in a room hot enough to stay in your underwear!…A lot of aristocrats would like to know where to find such luxury!’

  ‘Ah. Well now. In a badly bombed house like this, you’ve got to try to keep the damp out.’

  ‘Postman been yet?’

  The fat man opened a drawer and consulted a tin alarm clock. ‘Any time now, Superintendent,’ he said with a trace of sarcasm.

  Douglas went to the dresser and looked through the picture-postcards and undelivered letters. They were addressed to other people. ‘I collect stamps,’ explained the fat man. ‘My neighbours give them to me.’ He went to the cupboard under the dresser. ‘Would you fancy a little something to keep the cold out, Superintendent?’

  ‘What is it, a mink coat?’

  He chuckled. ‘You’re a caution, you are.’ He found a rum bottle, uncorked it noisily and poured a measure into the tea he was drinking from a cup marked ‘Savoy Hotel’. Having decided that Douglas’s reply was in the negative, he replaced the rum and sat down with a loud sigh.

  A few minutes later there came the rattle of the letterbox. The man started to get to his feet but Douglas pushed him back into the soft armchair with a heavy hand on the shoulder. ‘You’ve done enough hard manual work for one day, warden,’ he said. ‘I’ll get your mail for you.’ As he went out of the room Douglas helped himself to the key to Spode’s apartment, that was hanging on the key-board.

  Douglas’s long shot paid off. Jimmy Dunn’s last act before being kidnapped was to throw into the mail the large manila envelope marked ‘Photos do not bend’. He picked it up and took it upstairs. In the room where Douglas and Jimmy Dunn had found the false arm in the kitchen table drawer, Douglas stood for a moment before opening the envelope.