“They torture her, don’t they?”
“Yes, and if that doesn’t work they’ll drag in her parents, too, and torture them right in front of her, and by the end of it she’s singing like a canary, as you Americans say, and when she can’t sing any more they put her on the train for the prison camps.”
Davenport paused to suck on his cigarette. Iris couldn’t speak, couldn’t even ask what happened next. The sun had begun to set behind them, and it turned Davenport’s hair a fiery shade of red.
“Now, it so happens they’ve got a plane coming in two nights hence, a supply drop. They fly in on this ruddy old airplane called a Lysander, dark of the moon, collect the reports and drop off radios and money and cigarettes and that kind of thing. And sometimes personnel, too. Land some fresh agents and cart away the ones that have cracked up or had their covers blown. So Beauchamp’s got a plan. He’s going to rescue this girl from prison and take her to the rendezvous and put her on that plane for England.”
The cigarette was finished. Davenport dropped it in the sea and lit another. “You understand it’s his bloody radio operator, his ears and mouth, and who knows what she’s told the Germans by now. Besides which, someone has to keep an eye out for the Lysander, you know, guide her in with the flashlights, make sure there’s no ambush. So Beauchamp heads out to spring this girl out of Gestapo hands and tells his junior to stay. Junior does as he’s told, heads out of that basement and finds a barn, moves somewhere else the next night, and on the third night he heads out to the landing site nice and early, makes his recon, no Germans. Settles back and waits. Finally he hears the plane. Big loud propeller noise, rackety rackety rackety. He takes out his flashlight, signals them in. Ship’s coming to land. Gunfire.”
“But you said there weren’t any Germans!”
“Oh, I expect they dug in, too, biding their time. By now it’s too late to signal the plane, so the chap takes out his gun and runs toward the commotion.” Davenport paused and closed his eyes, while his thumb jiggled the cigarette up and down. “Long story short. Not only has Beauchamp sprung the girl out of prison, he’s rounded up her parents, too, because the Nazis would’ve taken them next, shot them in the village square pour encourager les autres. Beauchamp takes down the four or five Gestapo waiting at the landing site, all by himself, while the junior hustles that girl and her parents onto the Lysander and waves them off to Blighty.”
“My God,” whispered Iris.
“Quite. Of course that means neither Beauchamp nor his junior can get on the plane themselves, there isn’t room, and two hours later they run smack into a patrol, the same Gestapo patrol sent to find out why their men hadn’t returned from the landing site, and the pair of them wake up on a train to Mauthausen.”
“That’s a prison, isn’t it? A German prison.”
“Austrian, technically. But the damned thing is, Beauchamp springs them out of the prison camp a few months later, along with a few other men, and tracks down some resistance escape line into Switzerland.” Davenport patted his jacket pocket, as if he’d forgotten something. “Though I’m afraid I haven’t heard the details about that one.”
“How do you know all this?”
“Friend of mine, as I said. An old school chum. I say, I wouldn’t mind a little more champagne, would you?”
Iris wouldn’t have minded the entire bottle. She told herself it was the seasickness that made her legs wobble. She turned back to Aunt Vivian and Burgess, who had somehow moved from silkworms to the atom bomb. Burgess claimed to think it was immoral.
“You only think it’s immoral because we’ve got it, and you don’t like Americans,” Aunt Vivian said.
“Not true. I don’t dislike all Americans. I quite like you, Mrs. Schuyler, even though you entertain some bloody stupid ideas.”
“Besides, you weren’t a fighting man, were you? You spent the war sitting pretty at your nice safe Foreign Office desk. Ask Major Davenport here whether he’d like to be fighting hand to hand on some Japanese island right now.”
“I jolly well wouldn’t,” said Davenport cheerfully.
“There you have it. War’s an immoral business to begin with, Mr. Burgess, you can’t get around that. It comes down to how many of yours do we kill so you don’t kill ours.”
“But!” Burgess waved his cigarette. “But the women and children, Mrs. Schuyler! The awful consequences of radiation! How could a civilized nation do such a thing?”
“What about Burma? What about the poor Chinese? I’d say somebody had to give Japan a little of their own medicine.”
“Well, I can’t bear it,” Iris said. “I still can’t think about it.”
Aunt Vivian sent her a pitying look and poured more champagne. “Anyway, it’s done, and at least the damned thing is safely in our hands, as a deterrent to future war.”
Sasha smacked his fist into his palm. “But that’s the trouble! No single country should have the means to destroy the world. Who can stand against us?”
“My God, would you rather see the Soviets with the bomb?”
“Well, why shouldn’t they?” Sasha said recklessly, sloppily, red-faced, and Iris realized he was drunk.
“Sasha—” she started.
“The Soviets have only done what they’ve had to do. If you want to make an omelette—”
“Digby, you ass.” Burgess, sharp voice. “Have another drink and be quiet.”
Sasha’s pink face turned pinker. He stared at Burgess for a moment or two—flung his half-finished cigarette over the edge of the schooner—staggered to the champagne and found an open bottle.
The mood was ruined. The sun set, the Isle of Wight passed laboriously to port. The captain kept swearing at the tides and wind—Iris didn’t understand, she’d never liked sailing—and when Aunt Vivian offered advice, he swore at her, too. Sasha got drunker and drunker and brooded over the side of the boat. Iris tried to talk him out of it, but he snarled back and she retreated to Major Davenport.
Nine o’clock passed, then ten. The air grew chill and damp, and they hadn’t brought any coats. Iris sat on a cushion and wrapped her arms around her chest until Davenport gallantly offered his jacket. Sasha wanted to know what the hell was going on, why hadn’t they reached Abingdon’s place by now. He turned to Burgess, who reclined on the neat teak boards of the deck, smoking endless cigarettes and eating all the potted shrimp.
“You!” Sasha said. “This was your goddamn idea.”
“Seemed like a jolly sort of lark at the time. How was I to know about tides?”
“You pretend to know everything about everything else.”
Burgess shrugged. “Can I help being such a bloody clever chap?”
“Clever, my ass.”
The champagne was finished, all eight bottles. Burgess produced a bottle of gin. Aunt Vivian and Iris gave up on the weather and trooped into the tiny deckhouse, followed by Sasha, who slumped on a bench and closed his eyes.
“Iris, my dear,” said Aunt Vivian, “I’m beginning to think your husband’s some kind of Communist. You don’t suppose he’s an old friend of Mr. Chambers, do you?”
Iris glanced at Sasha. His eyes were still closed, his hands linked at the junction of his ribs. Her brain was too fogged by champagne and by the incessant cigarettes to think properly. “I doubt it,” she said.
“You’re sure about that?” Aunt Vivian looked at Sasha. “What do you think, cousin? Communist spies in the State Department?”
“Don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“I’m talking about this Chambers fellow. Ever meet him?”
“Oh, stop. He’s drunk, can’t you see?”
“Frankly I think Mr. Chambers is a very brave man. I imagine the assassination orders are going down from Moscow Centre as we speak. I hope he’s got a decent bodyguard.”
“Fucking rat,” muttered Sasha.
“I beg your pardon?”