City of Gold. Len Deighton

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СКАЧАТЬ lecturers had said that Homo sapiens survived, and came to control the planet, only because he’d adapted more completely and more quickly than had other species to changing climates and environments. Percy took that lesson to heart.

      Now he looked at Sergeant Smith without admiration. Smith’s hair was dark, wavy and somewhat dishevelled; Percy’s hair was fair, bleached by the sun, and cut short in military style. The sergeant was at least ten pounds over-weight; Percy was slim and athletic. Percy’s khaki shirt was starched and ironed; Smith’s shirt was marked by a few drips of lemonade. For Smith the abundance of native labour meant that he could change his shirt as many times as he liked, and such marks and stains were of no importance. But Percy was fussy about his clothes and often ironed them himself.

      There had been a long silence. Sergeant Smith said, ‘All good things come to an end, Percy.’ And as if savouring his own keen wit he gave a brief smile.

      ‘It is your loss,’ said Percy. His voice was throaty and his English had that hard accent that was not unlike the one that distinguished many of the South Africans, especially the ones from the farms. ‘I thought a family man like you would want a nest egg for after the war.’ He drank some beer. It was local beer, little more than chilled coloured water, but that suited him. He had to keep a clear head.

      ‘Who told you I was a family man?’ said Smith, as though a dark secret had been unearthed.

      ‘It was a manner of speaking,’ said Percy. He was unruffled and his cane armchair creaked as he sat well back in it, his legs extended in front of him as if he had not a care in the world.

      ‘You don’t mind, then?’

      Percy put his hand into his shirt. After unbuttoning a secret pocket, which he’d sewn there, he brandished a bundle of paper money. ‘What is it we owe you, nine hundred Egyptian? I have it written down somewhere.’

      ‘What’s it matter how much money?’ said Smith, and a note of anxiety came into his voice. ‘I can’t get the bloody stuff back to England. I’m up to my ears in Egyptian money. The sergeant in the cashier’s office promised to fix it, but suddenly he’s scared shitless.’

      ‘Is that the problem? Getting the money back to England?’ Percy leaned forward and passed the money to Smith.

      Smith took it. ‘I told you. I don’t want any more deals. We’ve got a new young officer. Instead of just signing the inventory on the dotted line, he wants to see everything he’s signing for.’ Smith shuffled the money in his hands, as though counting it. Then he slipped it inside his paybook, but he didn’t put it away. He shuffled the money around in the pages of his paybook as if comparing the two, weighing the bundle of money as if still trying to make up his mind.

      ‘Because I might be able to get your money to England.’

      Smith looked up suddenly. ‘Are you listening to me, you prick? Every item! My officer wants to see every item before he signs. If he goes raking through all my stores, he’ll soon discover that half the stuff is missing.’

      ‘But that is no trouble. You can write it off as damaged, or lost to enemy action or beyond local repair or whatever.’

      Smith was angry now. ‘Not tons and tons and bloody tons of “warlike stores” … not in the week or so I’ve got before he signs the inventory.’

      ‘Pull yourself together, Smith!’

      ‘Don’t tell me to pull myself together, you ugly little bastard. I just don’t want to do business with you people, that’s at the root of it. I don’t trust you. Where is all this stuff going? Who are you selling it to?’ He sniffed and pushed out his legs on the bed. ‘South African, are you? You sound like a bloody German to me.’ He still held the money on his lap, holding it tightly enough to reveal that he was not as indifferent to it as he pretended.

      Percy said nothing.

      Percy’s silence made Smith more angry. He thought he saw a look of amused contempt on the younger man’s face. For two pins he’d pick up this fellow bodily and shake the life out of him. Although Smith’s affluence had encouraged him to put on weight, it was not so long since he’d been a heavyweight on the railway boxing team. On one memorable occasion he’d knocked out the reigning champion from the locomotive works. The loco men were big brawny fellows, and this one had weighed in seven pounds heavier than Smith.

      ‘Let me tell you a little secret,’ Smith said. ‘Last time we met, I was a little late getting here, remember? The reason being, I was taking a closer look at that truck of yours. I took a note of the engine number. You changed the licence plate number, but you didn’t think of the engine number, did you? Back at the depot I got my corporal to look that number up in the records. Stolen: well, I expected that. When stolen it was loaded with small generators. Generators are like gold dust round here, everyone knows that. But what I wasn’t ready for, was hearing that the driver was killed, murdered; the truck ran right over him.’ He looked Percy full in the eyes. ‘Run over! The death certificate said the cause of death was “accidental”, but no one explained how he came to lay himself down in the road and run over himself. Any ideas?’

      Percy made no response.

      Smith bared his teeth. ‘Now perhaps you see why I don’t want to do any more business with you.’

      ‘You took a long time deciding,’ said Percy. The variety of objections that Smith had offered had still not convinced Percy; there was something else. ‘What is your real reason? Forget the bullshit for a minute or two. Tell me the real reason.’

      Smith gritted his teeth. He’d been bursting to tell the real reason, and now he could no longer resist it. ‘You’re selling all this gear to the Jews, aren’t you?’ His smile was fixed and challenging.

      ‘Jews?’

      ‘Come off it, you little bastard. This stuff is all going to the Jew boys in Palestine. They’re getting ready for the big show-down with the Arabs. That’s where the money is, and you lot know where the dough’s to be got.’ And then he looked down at the notes and said it again. ‘You know where the money is, all right. What I get is probably just a spit in the ocean.’

      Percy looked at him soberly and without expression.

      ‘I was stationed in bloody Haifa, mate,’ Smith said. ‘I know what they are up to. Those Jews are worse than the bloody Arabs. They’ll skin you alive for a handful of small change. Don’t lie to me; I’ve heard them all. One of my mates was beaten up by a gang of them –…’

      There was a tentative knock at the door. ‘Come in!’ called Percy. Now was the time when Percy had to make his decision. Could Smith be made to see reason, or had he gone off the rails? A malicious blabbermouth could betray them all.

      The young Tunisian girl came in with a brass tray. On it was a pot of mint tea and a selection of small oriental pastries, over which rose water and thin dribbles of honey had been poured. She wore ornamental slippers and a brightly patterned cotton cloth that was tucked in and held only by the shape of her body. She eyed the two men with placid curiosity. She did not seem frightened or intimidated. Working for Lady Fitz had shown her men in all their many moods and tempers. It would be hard to surprise her. She put the tray on the bedside table and poured two cups of tea. She gave one to Percy. He nodded to her, and she gave a slight movement of the head that acknowledged his signal. Then she offered the other cup of tea to Smith, wafting the steam towards him with the side of her hand, inviting him to smell the fragrance of the mint. Smith СКАЧАТЬ