The Damnation Game Part 32

51

Raglan was an expert at the fine art of forgery. Two telephone calls located him, and Marty struck a deal with the man. The appropriate visa could be forged in a pa.s.sport for a modest fee. If Marty could bring along a photograph of himself the job could be done in a day; two at the most.

It was the fifteenth of July: the month was simmering, a few degrees off the boil. The radio, blaring from the room next door, had promised a day as faultlessly blue as the one preceding, and the one preceding that. Not even blue; white. The sky was blind white these days.

Marty set out for Raglan's house early, partially to avoid the worst of the heat, and partially because he was eager to get the forgery made, buy his ticket, and be away. As it was, he got no further than Kilburn High Road Tube Station. It was there, on the cover of the Daily Telegraph that he read the headline: MILLIONAIRE RECLUSE FOUND DEAD AT HOME. Beneath it, a picture of Papa; a younger, beardless Whitehead, snapped at the height of his looks and influence. He bought the paper, and two others that carried the story on their covers, and read them standing in the middle of the pavement, while harried commuters nudged and tutted at him as they surged down the stairs into the station.

"The death was announced today of Joseph Newzam Whitehead, the millionaire head of the Whitehead Corporation, whose pharmaceutical products had, until recent falls, made it one of the most successful companies in Western Europe. Mr. Whitehead, sixty-eight, was found at his hideaway sanctum in Oxfords.h.i.+re in the early hours of yesterday morning by his chauffeur. He is believed to have died of heart failure. Police say there are no suspicious circ.u.mstances. For Obituary; see page seven."

The obituary was the usual amalgam of information gleaned from the pages of Who's Who, with a brief outline of the fortunes of the Whitehead Corporation, plus a spicing of conjecture, mostly concerning the corporation's recent fall from financial grace. There was a potted history of Whitehead's life, though the early years were skimpily reported, as though there was some doubt as to the details. The rest of the design was there, albeit threadbare. The marriage to Evangeline; the spectacular rise in the boom years of the late fifties; the decades of consolidation and achievement; then the withdrawal, after Evangeline's death, into mysterious and unilluminating silence.

He was dead.

Despite all the brave talk, all the defiance, all the contempt for the machinations of the European, the battle was lost. Whether it was indeed a natural death, as the papers reported, or Mamoulian's doing, Marty could not know. But there was no denying the curiosity he felt. More than curiosity, grief. That he had a capacity for sorrow at the old man's death came as a shock; perhaps more of a shock than the sorrow itself. He hadn't counted on the ache of loss he felt.

He canceled the meeting with Raglan and went back to the flat, there to study the newspapers-over and over again, squeezing out every drop from the text about the circ.u.mstances of Whitehead's death. There were few clues, of course: all the reports were couched in the bland and formal language of such announcements. Having exhausted the written word he went next door and asked to borrow his neighbor's radio. The young woman who occupied the room, a student, he thought, took some persuading, but she eventually relinquished it. He listened to the half-hourly bulletins from midmorning on, while the heat rose in his room. The story had some prominence until noon, but thereafter events in Beirut and a drugs coup in Southampton claimed the bulk of the time, the report of Whitehead's death steadily slipping from a major story to news-in-brief, and thence, by mid-afternoon, into invisibility.

He returned the radio, declining a cup of coffee with the girl and her cat, the smell of whose uneaten food hung around the narrow room like the threat of thunder, and returned to his own quarters to sit and think. If Mamoulian had indeed murdered Whitehead-and he didn't doubt that the European had the skill to do it undetected by the acutest pathologist-it was indirectly his fault. Perhaps, had he remained at the house, the old man would still be alive. It was unlikely. Far more likely, he too would be dead. But the guilt still nagged.

For the next couple of days he did very little: entropy had poured lead into his bowels. His thoughts were circular, almost obsessional. In the private cinema of his skull he ran the home movies he'd accrued; from those first, uncertain glimpses of the private life of power to his later memories-almost too sharp, too detailed-of the man alone in a gla.s.sfloored cage; the dogs; the dark. Through most, though not all, the face of Carys appeared, sometimes quizzical, sometimes careless: often sealed from him, peering up between the bars of her downcast lashes as if envying him. Late at night, when the baby had fallen asleep in the flat below, and the only sound was the traffic on the High Road, he'd rerun those most private moments between them, moments too precious to be conjured up indiscriminately for fear their power to revive him wane with repet.i.tion.

For a time he had tried to forget her: it was more convenient that way. Now he clung to thoughts of that face, bereft. He wondered if he would see her again.

The Sunday newspapers all carried further reports on the death. The Sunday Times gave over the front of its Review section to a thumbnail sketch Of BRITAIN'S MOST MYSTERIOUS MILLIONAIRE, written by Lawrence Dwoskin, "longtime a.s.sociate and confidant of England's Howard Hughes. " Marty read the piece through twice, unable to scan the printed words without hearing Dwoskin's insinuating tone in his ear . . . he was in many ways a paragon, " it read, ". - . though the almost hermitlike history of his latter years gave rise, inevitably, to reams of gossip and t.i.ttle-tattle, much of it hurtful to a man of Joseph's sensibilities. Through all his years in public life, exposed to the scrutiny of a press that was not always beneficent, he never hardened himself to criticism, implied or explicit. To we few who knew him well he revealed a nature more susceptible to barbs than his outward show of indifference would ever have suggested. When he found rumors of misconduct or excess being circulated about him, the criticism bit deeply, especially as, since his beloved wife Evangeline's death in 1965, he had become the most fastidious of s.e.xual and moral beings. "

Marty read this simpering cant with a bitter taste in his throat. The canonization of the old man had already begun. Soon, presumably, would come the biographies, authorized-and then bowdlerized-by his estate, turning his life into a series of flattering fables by which he would be remembered. The process nauseated him. Reading the plat.i.tudes in Dwoskin's text he found himself fiercely and unpredictably defensive of the old man's foibles, as though everything that had made him unique-made him real-now stood in danger of being whitewashed away.

He read Dwoskin's article to its maudlin end and put it down. The only detail in its length that was of interest was mention of the funeral service, which was to be held in a small church at Minster Lovell the following day. The body was then to be cremated. Dangerous though it might be, Marty felt the need to go and pay his last respects.

52

In fact the service attracted so many onlookers, from casual observers to diehard scandal-sniffers, Marty's presence went entirely unnoticed. The whole event had an unreal air to it, as if contrived to have the entire world know that the great man was dead. There were correspondents and photographers from all over Europe in addition to the clan from Fleet Street; and among the mourners some of the most famous faces in public life: politicians, professional pundits, captains of industry; even a smattering of movie stars whose only claim to fame was fame itself. The presence of so many celebrities attracted dedicated Peeping Toms in their hundreds. The small church, the yard around it, and the road around that were overrun. The service itself was relayed to those outside the building via loudspeakers; a curious, dislocating detail. The voice of the presiding clergyman sounded tinny and theatrical through the sound system, his eulogy punctuated by an amplified percussion of coughs and shufflings.

Marty didn't like hearing the service this way, any more than he liked the tourists, ill-dressed for a funeral, who lolled on the gravestones and littered the gra.s.s, waiting with barely suppressed impatience for this tiresome interruption in their stargazing to be concluded. Whitehead had encouraged a dormant misanthropy in Marty: it now had a permanent place in his worldview. Looking around the graveyard at this heat-flushed, dull-eyed congregation he felt contempt well up in him. He itched to turn his back on the farrago and slip away. But the desire to see this final scene played out overwhelmed the desire to leave, so he waited in the throng while wasps buzzed at children's sticky heads and a woman with the physique of a stick insect flirted with him from the top of a tomb.

Somebody was now reading the lesson. An actor, to judge by the self-regarding tone. It was announced as a pa.s.sage from the Psalms, but Marty didn't recognize it.

As the reading was drawing to a close, a car drew up at the main gate. Heads turned and cameras clicked as two figures emerged. A buzz spread through the crowd; people who'd taken to lying down stood up again to see what could be seen. Something roused Marty from his lethargy, and he too stood on tiptoe to glimpse the latecomers: it was quite an entrance they were making. He peered between the heads of the crowd to catch a look; caught sight, then lost it again; said "no," quietly to himself, not believing; then pushed his way through the crowd trying to keep pace as Mamoulian, a veiled Carys at his side, glided down the pathway from gate to porch and disappeared into the church. "Who was it?" somebody asked him. "Do you know who it was?"

h.e.l.l, he wanted to answer. The Devil himself.

Mamoulian was here! In broad daylight, sun on the back of his neck, walking with Carys arm in arm like man and wife, letting the cameras catch him for tomorrow's edition. He had no fear, apparently. This late appearance, so measured, so ironic, was a final gesture of contempt. And why did she play his game? Why didn't she throw off his hand and denounce him for the unnatural thing he was? Because she'd gone willingly into his entourage, the very way Whitehead had told him she would. In search of what? Someone to celebrate that strain of nihilism in her; to educate her in the fine art of dying? And what might she give in return? Ah, there was the p.r.i.c.kly question.

At long last the service came to an end. Suddenly, to the delight and outrage of the congregation, a raucous saxophone broke the solemnity, and a jazz rendering of "Fools Rush In" was blaring over the loudspeakers. Whitehead's final joke, presumably. It earned its laughs; some of the crowd even applauded. From inside the church there came the clatter of people rising from their pews. Marty craned to get a better view of the porch, and failing, threaded his way back through the press of people to a tomb that offered a view. There were birds in the heat-drooped trees, and their pursuits distracted him, catching him up in their swooping play. When he looked back the coffin was almost parallel with him, shouldered, among others, by Ottaway and Curtsinger. The plain box seemed almost indecently exposed. He wondered what they'd dressed the old man in at the last; if they'd trimmed his beard and sewed his eyelids shut.

The procession of mourners followed on the heels of the pallbearers, a black cortege that parted the candy-colored sea of tourists. To right and left the shutters tutted; some d.a.m.n fool called, "Watch the birdy." The jazz played on. It was all gratifyingly absurd. The old man, Marty guessed, would be smiling in his box.

Finally Carys and Mamoulian emerged from the shade of the porch into the brilliance of the afternoon, and Marty was sure he caught the girl cautiously scanning the crowd, fearful that her companion would notice. She was looking for him; he was certain of it. She knew he'd be there, somewhere, and she was looking for him. His mind raced, tripping over itself in its turmoil. If he made a sign to her, however subtle, there was every chance Mamoulian would see it, and that was surely dangerous for them both. Better to hide his head then, painful as it was not to lock glances with her.

Reluctantly, he stepped down off the tomb as the clump of mourners came abreast of him, and spied what he could from the shelter of the crowd. The European scarcely raised his head from its bowed position, and from what Marty could glimpse between the bobbing heads Carys had given up her search-perhaps despairing of his being there. As the coffin and its black tail wound out of the churchyard, Marty ducked away and over the wall to watch events precede from a better vantage point.

In the road Mamoulian was speaking to one or two of the mourners. Handshakes were exchanged; commiserations offered to Carys. Marty watched impatiently. Perhaps she and the European would separate in the throng, and he'd get a chance to show himself, if only momentarily, and rea.s.sure her of his presence. But no such opportunity presented itself. Mamoulian was the perfect guardian, keeping Carys close to him every moment. Pleasantries and farewells exchanged, they got into the back of a dark green Rover and drove away. Marty raced to the Citroen. He mustn't lose her now, whatever happened: this was perhaps his last chance to locate her. The pursuit proved difficult. Once off the small country roads and onto the highway the Rover accelerated with insolent ease. Marty gave chase as discreetly as the twin imperatives of tactics and excitement would allow.

In the back seat of the car Carys had a strange, flickering thought. Whenever she closed her lids to blink or shut out the day's glare, a figure appeared: a runner. She recognized him in seconds: the gray track suit, a cloud of steam emerging from the hood, named him before she glimpsed his face. She wanted to glance over her shoulder, to see if he was, as she guessed, behind them somewhere. But she knew better. Mamoulian would guess something was going on, if he hadn't already.

The European looked across at her. She was a secret one, he thought. He never really knew what she was thinking. She was, in that regard, her mother's child. Whereas he had learned, with time, to read Joseph's face, Evangeline had seldom let a glimmer of her true feelings show. For the s.p.a.ce of several months he'd a.s.sumed her to be indifferent to his presence in the house; only time had told the true story of her machinations against him. He sometimes suspected Carys of similar pretenses. Wasn't she simply too compliant? Even now she wore the faintest trace of a smile.

"It amused you?" he inquired.

"What?"

"The funeral."

"No," she said lightly. "No, of course not."

"You were smiling."

The trace evaporated; her face slackened. "It had some grotesquerie value, I suppose," she said, her voice dull, "watching them all play up to the cameras."

"You didn't trust their grief?"

"They never loved him."

"And you did?"

She seemed to weigh the question up. "Love . . ." she said, floating the word on the hot air to see, it seemed, what it would become. "Yes. I suppose I did."

She made Mamoulian uneasy. He wanted a better grip on the girl's mind, but it refused his best endeavors. Fear of the illusions he might evoke for her had certainly given her a veneer of obsequiousness, but he doubted they'd truly made a slave of her. Terrors were a useful goad, but the law of diminis.h.i.+ng returns pertained; each time she fought him he was obliged to find some new, more awesome fright: it exhausted him.

And now, to add insult to injury, Joseph was dead. He had perished-according to the talk at the funeral-"peacefully in his sleep." Not even died; that vulgarity had been exorcised from the vocabulary of all concerned. He had pa.s.sed on, or over, or away; he had gone to sleep. But never died. The cant and sentimentality that followed the thief to the grave disgusted the European. But he disgusted himself more. He had let Whitehead go. Not once, but twice, undone by his own desire to have the game concluded with due attention to detail. That, and his concern to persuade the thief to come willingly into the void. Prevarication had proved his undoing. While he had threatened, and juggled visions, the old goat had slipped away.

That might not have been the end of the story. After all, he possessed the facility to follow Whitehead into death, and bring him out of it, had he been able to get to the corpse. But the old man had been wise to such an eventuality. His body had been kept from viewing, even by his closest companions. It had been locked in a bank safe (how appropriate!) and guarded night and day, much to the delight of the tabloids, who reveled in such eccentricities. By this evening it would be ash; and Mamoulian's last opportunity for permanent reunion would have been lost.

And yet . . .

Why did he feel as if the games they'd played all these years-the Temptation games, the Revelation games, the Rejection, Vilification and d.a.m.nation games-were not quite over? His intuition, like his strength, was dwindling: but he was certain that something was amiss. He thought of the way the woman at his side smiled; the secret on her face.

"Is he dead?" he suddenly asked her.

The question appeared to flummox her. "Of course he's dead," she replied.

"Is he, Carys?"

"We just saw his funeral, for G.o.d's sake."

She felt his mind, a solid presence, at the back of her neck. They had played this scene many times in the preceding weeks-the trial of strength between wills-and she knew that he was weaker by the day. Not so weak as to be negligible, however: he could still deliver terrors, if it suited him.

"Tell me your thoughts . ." he said, so I don't have to dig for them."

If she didn't answer his questions, and he entered her forcibly, he'd see the runner for certain.

"Please," she said, making a sham of cowardice, "don't hurt me."

The mind withdrew a little.

"Is he dead?" Mamoulian inquired again.

"The night he died . . ." she began. What could she tell but the truth' No lie would suffice: he would know. ". . . The night they said he died felt nothing. There was no change. Not like when Mama died."

She threw a cowed look at Mamoulian, to reinforce the illusion of servility.

"What do you construe from that?" he asked.

"I don't know," she replied quite honestly.

"What do you guess?"

Again, honestly: "That he isn't dead."

The first smile Carys had ever seen on the European's face appeared. It was merest hint, but it was there. She felt him withdraw the horns of his thought and content himself with musing. He would not press her further. Too many plans to plan.

"Oh, Pilgrim," he said under his breath, chiding his invisible enemy like a much-loved but errant child, "you almost had me fooled."

Marty followed the car off the highway and across the city to the house on Caliban Street. It was early evening by the time the pursuit ended. Parked at a prudent distance he watched them get out of the car. The European paid the driver and then, after some delay unlocking the front door, he and Carys stepped into a house whose dirtied lace curtains and peeling paintwork suggested nothing abnormal in a street whose houses were all in need of renovation. Alight went on at the middle floor: a blind was drawn.

He sat in the car for an hour, keeping the house in view, though nothing happened. She did not appear at the window; no letters were thrown, wrapped in stones and kisses, out to her waiting hero. But he hadn't really expected such signs; they were fictional devices, and this was real. Dirty stone, dirty windows, dirty terrors skulking at his groin.

He hadn't eaten properly since the announcement of Whitehead's death; now for the first time since that morning, he felt healthily hungry. Leaving the house to creeping twilight, he went to find himself sustenance.

53

Luther was packing. The days since Whitehead's death had been a whirlwind, and he was dizzied by it. With so much money in his pocket, every minute a new option occurred to him, a fantasy now realizable. For the short term at least he'd decided to go home to Jamaica for a long holiday. He had left when he was eight, nineteen years ago; his memories of the island were gilded. He was prepared to be disappointed, but if he didn't like the place, no matter. A man of his newfound wealth needed no specific plans: he could move on. Another island; another continent.

He had almost finished his preparations for departure when a voice called him from downstairs. It wasn't a voice he knew.

"Luther? Are you there?"

He went to the top of the stairs. The woman he'd once shared this small house with had gone, left him six months ago taking their children. The house should have been empty. But there was somebody in the hall; not one but two people. His interlocutor, a tall, even stately man, stared up the stairs at him, light from the landing s.h.i.+ning on his wide, smooth brow. Luther recognized the face; from the funeral perhaps? Behind him, in shadow, was a heavier figure.

"I'd like a word," said the first.

"How did you get in here? Who the h.e.l.l are you?"

"Just a word. About your employer."

"Are you from the press, is that it? Look, I've told you everything I know. Now get the h.e.l.l out of here before I call the police. You've got no right breaking in here."

The second man stepped out of the shadows and looked up the stairs. His face was made-up, that much was apparent even from a distance. The flesh was powdered, the cheeks rouged: he looked like a pantomime dame. Luther stepped back from the top of the stairs, mind racing. "Don't be afraid," the first man said, and the way he said it made Luther more afraid than ever. What capacities might such politeness harbor?

"If you're not out of here in ten seconds-" he warned.

"Where is Joseph?" the polite man asked.

"Dead."

"Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure. I saw you at the funeral, didn't I? I don't know who you are-"

"My name is Mamoulian."

"Well, you were there, weren't you? You saw for yourself. He's dead."

"I saw a box."

"He's dead, man," Luther insisted.

"You were the one who found him, I gather," the European said, moving a few silent paces across the hallway to the bottom of the stairs.

"That's right. In bed," Luther replied. Maybe they were press, after all. "I found him in bed. He died in his sleep."

"Come down here. Furnish the details, if you would."

"I'm fine where I am."

The European looked up at the chauffeur's frowning face; felt, tentatively, at the nape of his neck. There was too much heat and dirt in there; he wasn't resilient enough for an investigation. There were other, cruder methods, however. He half-gestured toward the Razor-Eater, whose sandalwood presence he smelled close.

"This is Anthony Breer," he said. "He has in his time dispatched children and dogs-you remember the dogs, Luther?-with admirable thoroughness. He is not afraid of death. Indeed he enjoys an extraordinary empathy with it."

The pantomime face gleamed up from the stairwell, desire in its eyes.

"Now, please," Mamoulian said, "for both our sakes; the truth."

Luther's throat was so dry the words scarcely came. "The old man's dead," he said. "That's all I know. If I knew any more I'd tell you."