The Broken Penny Read online

  ‘Potentially, potentially.’ But Granz was a little shaken. ‘At any rate we must get out of here, this is no good.’

  ‘The river at the back of the house,’ Garden said. ‘What’s its name? The Molna. Where does it go?’

  ‘One way twenty miles up into the mountains, the other down to Dravina on the coast. But the coast, I don’t like the coast. I told you we have not much support there.’

  ‘Dravina. Wait a minute.’ Garden pulled out Peterson’s wallet from his pocket – was it really less than twenty-four hours ago he had found it? – and read the top name on Peterson’s list: ‘Joseph Lepkin, Street of the October Revolution 14, Dravina.’

  Granz rubbed his chin. ‘I don’t know this Lepkin, I don’t know that I would trust him. But perhaps from there we could get further south. I will speak to Sophie.’

  Arbitzer had been sitting on the bed reading the newspaper. He had seemed perfectly normal this morning, and by general consent they had said little to him. Now he spoke to them in a sharp thin voice. ‘You told me that Katerina was dead. It says nothing about that here, it does not mention her.’

  ‘It doesn’t mention any of us by name,’ Garden said. ‘Don’t you see why? Theodore puts it too strongly when he says they are afraid of you, but it is true that they can never admit a failure or an error. They want us alive, Jacob, for specimens at a State trial, and they will say nothing about us until we are caught.’

  There was a knock on the door, and it opened to reveal the squat figure of Milo. He was a little brown-faced man with slanting eyes that made him look like a Mongol, and a perpetual smile. He answered their questions readily, and even eagerly. The car? He had driven it to some woods near Kotsin, poured petrol over it and set light to it. Whoof! He grinned with remarkably fine teeth. Then he had ridden off on his bicycle, which had been put inside the car, to Kotsin. On the outskirts of the town he had been stopped by the People’s Police, who asked if he had seen anything of a big black car with three men and a woman in it. He had told them of the burning car and – here Milo could hardly contain his mirth – told them also that he had seen four people very much like those they wanted, in a big grey car headed north. They had thanked him and he had gone on to spend the night with his friend in Kotsin, coming back this morning.

  ‘What’s it like in Kotsin?’ Granz asked. ‘What are they saying, what do they think is going to happen?’

  ‘They are saying it is no good. They wish it were some good, but it is no good, the others are too strong for you.’ Milo’s smile did not falter as he said to Garden, ‘You are the Englishman they talk about in the paper, eh?’

  Garden hesitated. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I can always tell an Englishman.’ The little man was delighted with himself. He peered past the three of them at the figure on the bed. The look on his face did not change, but he said, ‘Jesus Christ.’

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  ‘I do not think you should have brought him here. Does Sophie know who he is? You do not have to deny it, I recognise him. So will she – so has she, perhaps. So will others.’ He said to Granz, ‘You are trying her very high. There are rumours that they are searching the town.’

  ‘They would never search this house. Sophie is in a special position.’

  ‘But this is a special case.’ The little man was shaking his head.

  Garden felt a sudden curiosity. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘He is Sophie’s fancy man,’ Granz said with a shade of contempt. ‘He has been hanging round her for years.’

  The little man’s smile grew broader. ‘You see, your question is answered. Sophie is a remarkable woman. She has been very good to me. I am her fancy man. I was also at one time Count Milo Bondi, a representative of our country’s effete aristocracy. In the war I picked the wrong side. I thought the Germans would win. I am still astonished that they did not.’ He broke into an outright laugh. ‘Do not look so shocked, you who are an Imperialist agent and a Trotskyite saboteur. When the war ended I was lucky. I was deprived of my estates and sentenced to three years’ corrective labour. After that I met Sophie and – there you are.’

  ‘Why should you help us?’

  ‘I do not love you, you are right. But I hate the others. If you were in power – a prospect against which in the days when I had my estate and was a betting man I would have laid about a thousand to one – one might talk to you reasonably. You might be inclined to return his estates to a man who wanted nothing more than to live peaceably until the end of his life.’

  ‘Never,’ said Granz.

  ‘Never is a big word. But why should we argue about something that will not happen? Say only that you are men in a trap and I am a man who has been trapped in my time.’

  ‘We mean to get out of the trap,’ Garden said. He leaned forward. ‘What do you think of a boat down the river?’

  ‘Down the river, yes, that might be managed. At any rate it is a chance. Then to one of the coastal islands and back to England.’

  Garden assimilated the casually spoken words with a shock. Back to England, a confession of defeat – was that what he intended? He had thought no further than Dravina, and the address written by Peterson. ‘Perhaps,’ he said. ‘Anyway, a boat and a pilot. Can that be done? Tonight.’

  ‘For money anything can be done. You have money?’ Garden looked at Granz, who nodded. ‘Then I will talk to my friends. We former aristocrats, you know, still have friends. That is our advantage over the Communists, who have only comrades.’

  He had hardly closed the door behind him when Granz began to reproach Garden for putting them in the hands of such an unreliable and reactionary figure as Milo. His harangue was broken by Arbitzer saying, ‘I shall give myself up. I have decided.’

  Granz said angrily, ‘You cannot mean what you are saying. You are a symbol of our resistance. More than that, you are now our only hope.’

  If Arbitzer yesterday had seemed a mere shadow of the guerrilla leader Garden remembered, today he was very much like the ageing, pedantic figure who had talked in his seaside bungalow of peace and freedom. His hands twitched, and he had not bothered to shave. His appearance had that peculiarly degrading shabbiness that is apparent only in neat men who neglect themselves. His soiled collar was particularly noticeable because yesterday it had been so perfectly clean, the badly knotted tie revealing his collar stud was conspicuous because it was of such good quality. Yet there was still something likeable about the wavering smile with which he responded to Granz. ‘You have made it very plain that I can be no kind of symbol to you now, Theodore. I do not complain, it is simply that I am out of date. I have no longer strength for the struggle, nor any desire for it. There is only one thing I can do for you. If they have me perhaps they will not want you, perhaps you can get away.’

  ‘But don’t you see that it’s just what they want,’ Garden said. ‘A State trial, all the apparatus they use for extracting confessions.’

  ‘They would not make me confess,’ Arbitzer said with feeble obstinacy.

  ‘How can you say that? Can you stand up to interrogations carried out in relays by people who are prepared to argue for days on fine philosophical points? Are you stronger than Bukharin, Zinoviev, Rajk, Mindszenty, Slansky? Think what you are saying, Jacob, think how the facts could be represented. You come here to try to overthrow the government, that’s true, isn’t it? You had British assistance, correct?’ A grim smile showed on Garden’s battered red face. ‘Even if the English Trotskyite Garden is not caught his reputation and career will be useful to them. Behind all spies and saboteurs stand their governments, isn’t that so? And wouldn’t the effect of your policies have been to bring your country within the Anglo-American orbit? When you have agreed to all these things, which after all are very near the truth, what do you think the effect will be on the people of this country?’

  ‘If you think these things are near the truth, what are you doing here yourself?’ Arbitzer asked in a tired voice.

  There
was something faintly heroic about Garden as he replied. A light shone in his boiled blue eyes, he wore his shabby clothes like a badge of honour, his voice rang with conviction. ‘Because there is something more important than all this, because it is a quarter truth and three-quarters lies to say that we must be in the Anglo-American or the Russian camp. Because the world needs more than anything else the example of men fighting for a nation’s freedom, of a nation fighting for real social equality and liberty. By the side of that example, our lives are not of much importance.’

  ‘Bravo, bravo.’ Granz was enthusiastic. ‘It’s a good job they haven’t got you in the dock.’ Arbitzer smiled faintly. The girl said nothing. Garden turned to Granz almost savagely.

  ‘Do you really think I should say those things in the dock? Comrade Peplov, or whoever has taken his place would take care I didn’t. That is why we owe it to ourselves not to be captured, not to let our weakness as human beings betray us.’

  ‘Very fine.’ There was no sarcasm in Ilona’s voice. ‘But Jacob’s weakness as a human being is not what you think. He believes Katerina is still alive, and he wants to see her. Isn’t that so, Jacob?’ She went down on her knees and took the old man’s hands.

  ‘The papers, you see, said nothing.’ He whispered the words.

  ‘I swear to you, uncle, that I saw her dead, that Garden and Cetkovitch saw her also, will you believe me?’

  ‘You had only an instant. You might have been mistaken.’ Now they could hardly hear him as he said, ‘We have been together for so many years, you see. I could not leave her to face things alone.’

  ‘I saw her too, Jacob,’ Garden said. ‘I looked at her closely. I am ready to swear she was dead. What do you say to that?’ Arbitzer said nothing to it, but looked down at the floor and would not meet Garden’s eyes.

  Ilona waved a dirty pack of cards at them. ‘I found these outside in the cupboard. Let’s play.’

  They settled down to play skon, a national game which is a cross between brag and poker. The game can be exciting when it is played for money, but they were not playing for money. After half a dozen hands Arbitzer shook his head, ‘You must excuse me.’ He began to read the paper again.

  ‘He is right. Queen of spades, king of hearts, what have we to do with kings and queens?’ Granz took out a toothpick. ‘I still think you were mistaken to trust that Milo. He cares for nothing but his skin.’

  ‘Don’t you see that we are already committed to him? If he wants to tell the police where we are he can do so at any time.’

  ‘I don’t like it. But we must do something, you are right about that. I shall speak to Sophie when she comes up at lunchtime.’

  But at lunchtime it was Milo who came up with the food on a tray. His inevitable grin broadened when Garden asked if he had made contact yet with his friends.

  ‘I have spoken to them, yes. Nothing is decided. You must be patient.’

  ‘But we want to leave tonight.’

  ‘If it is possible, yes. If not’ – the little man hesitated – ‘we shall think of something else.’

  ‘What do the – the girls think of all this?’

  ‘What do you expect? To them it is all the same who wins, who is in power. For them things do not change. Once it was the monarchy and the aristocracy, then the Germans, now the Communists. Perhaps they do not love the Communists, but they do not wish for change. Change is always bad for business.’

  ‘I thought there was a decree abolishing prostitution.’

  ‘A decree, ah yes, but the big Party officials are not worried by decrees. They are much concerned for the morals of the workers, you understand, but their own morals they are prepared to endanger. It is very brave of them.’ His beaming smile broadened, and then he became grave. ‘They are searching the town, the soldiers and the black boys.’

  ‘Is there any resistance?’

  ‘Resistance?’ Milo looked as if he were about to spit. ‘The people are sheep. They say the black boys have found many weapons, mostly rifles. If they had come to take my rifle, I should have used it.’

  ‘You have a rifle?’ The little man nodded, grinning at Garden. Garden grinned back at him. ‘Let us look after it for you. If they come to take it we will make sure it is used.’

  Milo pulled his lower lip. ‘Can I trust you?’ Garden burst out laughing.

  ‘Isn’t the boot on the other foot? A few minutes back Theodore was asking if we could trust you.’

  ‘Ah, yes. I will bring you the rifle.’ He left the room and came back with a Mannlicher rifle, in beautiful condition. He handed it to Garden, who put it under the mattress of Ilona’s bed.

  Granz stopped eating a stew of meat and beans to ask, ‘Where is Sophie?’

  ‘Madame Sophie is out.’

  ‘Tell her when she comes back that I should like to see her.’

  When Milo came up half an hour later to take away the plates he said in answer to Granz’s question that Sophie had not come back yet. The afternoon passed away. Arbitzer lay on his bed and closed his eyes. Granz picked his teeth, bit his nails and looked out of the window. Garden taught Ilona how to play piquet. She held astonishingly good cards. When she had scored three repiques and he had been twice rubiconed they stopped playing. ‘You are too lucky.’

  She protested. ‘No, no, I am a good player. Today I feel happy, very happy. I feel that everything will come right.’

  ‘A queer time to be happy,’ Granz growled from the window.

  ‘Why do you stare out of the window? What is happening?’

  ‘Nothing at all. Nobody in the streets. Soldiers, police, beggars, that’s all. You’d think everybody was dead.’

  They crossed to the window and stood looking out. The street, certainly, was deserted. By craning their necks they could see the soldiers standing at the door of the Central Hotel. Little busy military figures scuttled in and out. A beggar sat in a doorway, carefully picking at his dirty feet. A woman hurrying along with a child almost directly beneath them was challenged by two soldiers. There was a long altercation between them, with much production of documents. Then she was allowed to pass on.

  ‘The day of national celebration,’ Garden said. ‘The day of our revolution. And how do they make a revolution? By staying indoors.’

  ‘Are you out in the streets?’ asked Ilona. Then her breath was indrawn sharply. ‘Look.’

  Out of the Central Hotel came two smart-looking army officers. Between them walked a man with a bandage round his head, who moved with a quick, slightly nervous step to one of the waiting cars, bent to say something to the driver and then jumped in while one of the officers held open the door. The officers got in, the car moved slowly out of their range of vision.

  ‘Peplov,’ Granz said. ‘Just one shot while he was talking to the driver. So simple. What a pity. But it is bad that he is here, eh? Where is Sophie, I should like to know, what is she doing?’

  The day grew darker, more overcast. A big fly buzzed lazily round the room. Garden and Ilona played German whist and then Japanese whist. Granz put a chair in the middle of the room, pushed open the trapdoor leading to the roof and levered himself up until only his waving legs were visible. Then they too disappeared, and they heard his voice. ‘Very fine up here. You can see a long way.’

  ‘Be careful,’ Garden called.

  ‘Don’t worry, I am hidden behind chimney pots. I am exploring, that’s all.’ They heard footsteps, but Granz’s voice died away. Above them was a square of grey sky. They finished their hand of German whist before the footsteps returned. Granz’s long legs appeared, then his body. He dropped lightly on to the chair and closed the trapdoor.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Very well. We go across this roof which is almost flat, over the next which has a little slope and to the next which has what do you think – a fire escape. Almost the whole time we are under cover. Useful perhaps. But where is Sophie? What has she arranged?’

  Garden played another hand of German whist with Ilona, and
lost it. ‘Hopeless,’ he said. ‘It’s hopeless to play against you.’

  Chapter Four

  The day grew darker still, outlines in the room became indistinct. Arbitzer lay staring up at the ceiling with his eyes open. Granz walked up and down, went out to the lavatory and came back, sat on the other bed and looked out of the window. Garden and Ilona sat one on each side of the small table, the cards lying disordered between them, and talked in murmurs. Garden told her about the bungalow and his Uncle George. She talked about her childhood in the north of this country, and recreated for him a picture of the assured, calm material prosperity that he had never known. Her father, a successful doctor, had been killed in a German air raid on the capital; but still he had left a considerable fortune, the Germans had really behaved rather well, Ilona and her mother were able to keep the big house in town, the officers quartered on them were polite, people had little to complain of.

  ‘People,’ Garden asked, ‘or just rich people?’

  ‘I don’t know, perhaps it was only rich people. I was not much more than a child, you understand, it seemed to me nobody who came to our house suffered, there were inconveniences of course but things would have been much better if only the others had not made so much trouble. They were always talking about Uncle Jacob, the officers, more as a nuisance than anything else. “That terrible uncle of yours has been up to his tricks again,” they would say, but they didn’t seem to take it very seriously. I could not understand how anybody could be so foolish.’ Then things had changed with the German retreat from Russia, the Second Front in Europe. Allied air raids became frequent. The officers were a little less polite, they spoke of Uncle Jacob as a traitor to his country, a man who was determined to wreck the New Europe. The air raids got worse, and in one of them her mother was killed. Strangely, although she had been as fond of her father as of her mother, Ilona felt much more bitterness over this second death. Coming after the first, it made the whole of life seem meaningless to her, a feeling that persisted after the Allied victory. She was not really converted to the new regime, even when she fell in love with a young man named Jan Kapelik, who had been fighting with the guerrillas for two years.