Betrayals

21

J anet felt no intrusion having David Baxeter in her room. Rather she felt a continued relief at having someone to do something for her. She sat in the only easy chair while he perched on the edge of the bed, which was conveniently near the telephone. The man appeared to be switched through several different numbers and extensions at the main telephone exchange, sometimes announcing himself to be a journalist and other times not, as he sought to trace the anonymous number. It was an hour from the time he started when he smiled up towards her.

“A public kiosk on Ayios Prokopios: it’s the road that leads towards the Troodos Mountains,” he announced.

“Oh,” Janet said.

“Why disappointment?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know: I was just expecting something different.”

“If whoever it is really knows something, they’re hardly going to deal from their homes, are they?”

“No,” Janet said, cheering up. “I wasn’t thinking.”

“Call it,” Baxeter insisted. “There’s got to be some demand, obviously. Say you need time to think about it and that you’ll ring back. That’ll give us time to talk it through.”

They exchanged places and Janet dialed, feeling for the first time vaguely self-conscious at getting involved in a negotiation in front of someone else. She sat looking directly at him while the number rang, without any response. After several minutes Janet said, hand cupped unnecessarily over the mouthpiece: “No reply.”

“Put it down,” he suggested.

Janet did so and said: “What now?”

“Wait a few minutes: then we’ll try again.”

It became very quiet in the room, and Janet wished there were something else she could do. There were the calls to her father and Partington, she remembered: and at once decided against making them in front of the man.

“Now?” she said, finally.

“It’s been less than five minutes,” Baxeter said. “But OK, try it again.”

This time the receiver was lifted on the third ring. A voice, in English, said: “This is a public telephone box.”

“I was told to call it,” she said.

“Janet Stone?”

“Yes.”

“Glad you called.”

“The message said you knew something to my advantage.”

“We do.”

“What?”

“We know where to look.”

“Look where?”

“Here, in Cyprus. And from there where to look in Beirut.”

It was all so familiar. She said: “What do you want?”

“A thousand.”

At least the rate was going down, she thought wearily. Following Baxeter’s suggestion she said: “I want to think about it.”

“No tricks.”

“What do you mean, no tricks?”

“We’re not dealing with the police.”

“No police,” she promised.

“How long?”

“Thirty minutes.”

It took much less than that for Janet to recount the complete conversation to Baxeter, who listened with his head intently to one side. As she finished the account Janet said: “It’s a con, isn’t it? It’s got to be.”

“It sounds like it,” agreed Baxeter. “And I supposed you had to expect it, after all the publicity and the fact that a lot of people now know you’re at this hotel…” He hesitated. “On the other hand, can you afford to ignore it?”

“Can I afford, literally, to try to negotiate?” came back Janet. “I know Zarpas has my bank account under permanent watch. The counter clerk would keep me waiting, and by the time I got the money he’d be behind me, asking what I was going to do.”

“Yes,” Baxeter said. “He would.”

“So it’s pointless: the whole thing’s pointless.”

“Why don’t I let you have the money?”

“You!” echoed Janet.

“The magazine then.”

“But why should you!”

“Magazines and newspapers pay all the time for stories and articles,” he pointed out. “And we already agreed that if this came to anything I’d be able to write exclusively about it after John got out

…” He smiled. “Actually,” he added. “At the going rate,?1,000 is very cheap.”

She’d been offered much more in Washington, at the beginning, remembered Janet. “But what if it is a con and you lose your?1,000?”

“I can’t,” said Baxeter, simply. “When you call back say that you’ll need time to collect the money. Ask for…” He paused, trying to decide upon a period. “… ask for three hours. In that time I can ensure that all the bank note numbers are recorded. If it’s a genuine call, leading to something, I’ll have wasted a cashier’s time. If it is a fraud, then I report it to the police, with the numbers, and the money becomes valueless. Where’s the risk?”

“It seems almost easy,” Janet conceded, reluctantly.

“Where can it go wrong?”

Janet thought for several moments, wanting to find the flaw. Eventually she said: “I can’t find one.”

“Remember,” Baxeter urged. “Three hours. Agree to whatever hand-over arrangements they want: it doesn’t matter.” He got up and left.

There were still a few minutes before the second call, and Janet remained staring at the door through which Baxeter had gone. She supposed a lot of people would have sneered at the professional cynicism of his becoming involved but Janet couldn’t be one of them. She sincerely believed he would hold back on the publication of anything that might endanger John, and Baxeter seemed able to think quickly and clearly about possible pitfalls. At the moment, it was an incredible comfort to have someone upon whom she felt she could rely: someone who didn’t react to everything she did as if she were mentally defective. OK, so maybe that was just more professional cynicism, someone behaving as he had to behave to do his job. Janet decided she couldn’t give a damn. It was just good not to be entirely alone any more.

Her call was answered on the third ring.

“I agree,” she said.

“You didn’t have any choice, did you?” the man said.

“No,” Janet said. “No choice at all.” There was a satisfaction in knowing there was no way the gloating bastard could cheat her: or rather, cheat David Baxeter.

“Do you know the walled part of Nicosia?”

“No.”

“To the west there is the Paphos Gate. That’s where we want the money brought.”

“I need time to get it,” Janet said.

“Two hours.”

“Not enough. I need three.”

“That’s too long.”

“I can’t do it in two.”

“The deal’s off then.”

“All right, it’s off.”

“You don’t mean that.”

“Goodbye.”

“Wait!”

Janet believed she detected a muffled conversation with other people around the man to whom she was talking.

The voice returned to the line. “Three then.”

“What do I do when I come to the Gate?”

“Nothing. We’ll recognize you: you’re a well-known lady.”

“I want to know what I’m getting for my money.”

“I told you before, where to look.”

“I’ll want proof.”

“There’ll be a photograph. And remember, no tricks.”

Janet thought again of the other calls she had to make but she did not immediately redial. Who to call first? She decided upon England. Her mother answered, gabbling off the moment she recognized Janet’s voice. The woman complained that the television and still pictures from Beirut had made her look simply terrible, as if it had been a long-arranged photocall for which Janet had days to prepare, and demanded to know what Janet imagined she was doing getting on a boat with such men in the first place. It took Janet several attempts to cut across the babble and get her father to the telephone. He began in much the same way as her mother, and it was difficult again to stop him.

In the end she shouted. “I know what you did!” she yelled.

“What?” her father said.

“You telephoned Partington and told him you wanted me stopped, any way that was possible,” said Janet, still shouting. “You want to know how it happened! That’s how it happened. Partington and the local CIA man set me up to be robbed and cheated and made to look stupid, so I’d have to come home like the silly little girl you think I am. You happy now? You happy that I almost got raped and that the man I stabbed might still die: that I was being shipped off to become a gang-banged whore in some back-street shed…!” The fury was pouring out of her, and she had to stop, breathless. When she did so it was very easy for her to hear that her father was crying.

“… Love you,” he sobbed. “Did it because I loved you…”

The answer-a lot of answers-came to Janet but she didn’t bellow them back at the man because there wasn’t any anger, not any more. Instead, quiet-voiced now, she said: “Just leave me alone, OK? Don’t interfere any more.”

“Come home!” he pleaded. “Please come home.”

“I can’t now,” Janet said. “There’s the court hearing.”

“You’re only a witness: you could come back and then return to Cyprus when it was necessary for you to give evidence.”

“I don’t want to come back, not yet,” Janet said stubbornly.

“Don’t try to do anything else,” her father said, still pleading.

“I am not going to try to do anything else,” Janet lied. Would Baxeter want to come to the Paphos Gate meeting with her? She was at first surprised at the thought but then accepted it because it wasn’t surprising at all. She would have some protection, some safety, if he did.

“I’m sorry,” her father said. “So very sorry. I didn’t know how…” He stumbled to a halt. “… couldn’t have…”

“Stop it, Daddy,” said Janet, knowing the blur of tears herself now. “I’m OK. The police accept the stabbing as justifiable self-defense and say that it didn’t happen in their jurisdiction anyway. I’m not hurt: not physically anyway.”

“Can you forgive me?”

No! thought Janet at once: not completely, she could not forgive him. Didn’t know if she ever could. She said: “Of course I forgive you.”

“I really am…”

“… You told me that,” Janet stopped him. “Look after mummy.”

“Please come home,” he said.

“We’ll talk about it another time.”

“Do that!” her father said. “Keep in touch. Don’t stop keeping in touch!”

“I said I’ve forgiven you.” She felt no difficulty, no discomfort, in lying to her father, even though she could not ever recall lying to him before. She decided that everyone was cynical to achieve a purpose when the need arose.

“I love you,” he said again.

“I love you, too,” Janet said. Was that a lie, too, a response fitting the circumstance of the moment? Of course not. She’d have to be careful not to become too cynical, naive though she’d been until now.

She should have done it differently, Janet knew at once. The confrontation and the anger should have been directed at Partington, who’d triggered everything, and not at an old man whom she loved-of course she loved him-who’d done something he thought was best without any idea of what his action might bring about. Could Partington have had any conception, either? No matter. She should have vented her anger upon the embassy official and not her father, because now she felt drained, too drained to shout at anyone else. She wouldn’t bother with Partington until the following day.

Where was Baxeter? Janet realized she was anxious for the man to get back and was at once surprised at the awareness. Why the hell should she worry about the return of a man she hardly knew! Because of John. The answer presented itself at once, and Janet openly smiled at it. Of course that was the reason. Despite her apprehension about the Paphos Gate meeting there was always the chance that it might-just might-be genuine, and so the sooner Baxeter came back the sooner they would discover whether or not it was worthwhile. That was it.

Janet hurried to the door when he knocked. She smiled and Baxeter smiled back: one of his teeth, to the left, was crooked, but not unpleasantly so.

He put a carefully wrapped bundle on the side table and said: “Well?”

“They didn’t want to agree to three hours but finally they did,” reported Janet. “The Paphos Gate. He promised there would be a picture.”

“Of what?”

“He didn’t say.”

“Easy to get lost inside the walls,” Baxeter said, reflectively.

“It’s the divided sector,” Janet said. “Arabs would not be able to move freely inside, would they?”

Baxeter shrugged his shoulders. “Depends on how well they know their way around.”

“What about the money?”

Baxeter nodded towards the package and at the same time took a long, narrow strip of print-out paper from his inside pocket. “Every number carefully recorded,” he said.

“I really am most grateful for everything you are doing.”

“I’ve got a professionally vested interest: if this leads to anything it will be as much to my advantage as to yours,” he said.

“I actually think I’ve got more to gain than you,” disputed Janet. “And I’m still grateful.”

“We’ve time for a drink downstairs before we go,” said Baxeter. “That OK with you?”

“You’re coming with me, then?”

“Didn’t you expect me to?”

Janet let her hands come up and fall in uncertainty. “I didn’t know,” she said.

“Let’s talk about it downstairs.”

Janet brushed past the man as she left the room and she was aware of his cologne. It was strong. John had never gone in for things like that, Janet remembered.

Janet asked for coffee. Baxeter chose scotch. Janet watched the barman pour, caught by a familiarity but unable to think what it was. Glenfiddich, she saw, remembering: she and John had drunk Glenfiddich that first night, in Nathan’s. She physically shifted in her seat, uncomfortable with the memory. Somehow it seemed wrong when she was with another man, which she acknowledged to be a stupid feeling but one she had, nevertheless. She said: “The person I spoke to kept on about not involving the police: no tricks was how he put it. I asked how I would recognize him and he told me I wouldn’t. That he’d recognize me.”

“You’ll have to make the actual meeting by yourself,” agreed Baxeter. “They’ll be watching, obviously. They won’t approach if I’m with you.”

“Where will you be?”

Janet hadn’t intended to sound nervous. Baxeter became serious and reached across the table for her hand, as he had over the luncheon table. “Don’t worry!” he said. “I’ll be right there, very close. Nothing bad is going to happen to you, not this time.”

“Thank you,” Janet said, not looking back at him. She shifted her fingers away from his touch.

“Sorry,” he said, withdrawing his hand.

“There’s nothing to apologize for.”

“The Paphos Gate is a clever choice,” resumed Baxeter, briskly. “There’s a main highway directly outside, and three other major roads forming other good escape routes. I’ll stay in the car directly opposite the Gate, so I’ll be able to watch you all the time.”

“What if…” Janet straggled to a halt. Forcing the question she said: “What if they do make a grab at me?”

“Scream,” said Baxeter at once. “Scream and run back towards me. They’ll want to see the money, so we’ll loosen the package. If they go for you, drop it so the money breaks out: it’ll deflect them.”

“But they’ll get the?1,000!”

“But they won’t get you,” said Baxeter. “And the money’s useless anyway.”

“I…” Janet stopped again.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Janet said, brisk herself now. “We’d better get going.”

They had driven to lunch in Janet’s hired car, but this time Baxeter led the way to his vehicle. When Janet saw it she faltered, glad he was slightly in front and didn’t see her reaction. It was a Volkswagen. Unlike John’s, this one was dirty and there was a dent in the rear wing: it must have been a long-ago accident because it was already rusting. Baxeter let her in before walking around to the driver’s side and while he was doing so Janet saw that the car was uncared for inside, as well. A sweater and some very old newspapers were discarded on the rear seat, and the ashtray overflowed with chocolate bar wrappings. Baxeter saw her looking when he got into the car and said: “I gave up smoking six months ago. Now all I do is eat sweets: the risk isn’t lung cancer any more, it’s diabetes.”

The man drove familiarly towards the old part of the capital, joining up with the road system that looped entirely around the walls. “That’s the museum,” Baxeter identified, as they went by the building, “and up ahead is the Post Office block. That’s where I’m going to park. The Paphos Gate is right opposite…” He hesitated, looking sideways at her. “I won’t be more than twenty yards away at any time.”

“I wouldn’t have thought it would have affected me so much as this,” Janet said, embarrassed.

“I would have been surprised if it hadn’t,” said Baxeter. He stopped outside the telecommunications complex and pointed across to the meeting place. “There,” he said. “I’m very close.”

“Yes,” Janet agreed.

“You all right?”

“Fine.”

Baxeter had driven with the parceled-up money on the floor beneath his legs. He lifted it on to his lap and peeled away the tape holding the package together. He offered it to Janet and said: “Pull the paper back from the top, like that. Then they’ll be able to see the money.”

Janet took it: “Wouldn’t it be wonderful if it worked! If this really were something!”

“Wonderful,” Baxeter agreed.

Janet got out of the Volkswagen and wedged the parcel under her left arm: with the tape loosened the package felt unsteady and she put her other hand across her body, frightened of dropping it and scattering money everywhere. She had to time her crossing of Egypt Avenue to dodge the approaching cars. People thronged the area directly in front of the Gate and Janet hoped she would not be lost from Baxeter’s view among the crowd. Although it was mid-evening there were still some fruit stalls loaded for business and groups of souvenir vendors and postcard sellers stood at either side of the Gate itself. Janet slowed when she reached the Gate, standing first to the right and then crossing over to the far side. She pretended interest in a copperwork stall, which was a mistake because the bent, claw-fingered man began trying to thrust bracelets and necklaces upon her. To escape Janet went across to the other side of the Gate. She wanted to check the time but didn’t because it would have meant turning her arm to see her watch and risking dropping the money. She wished she had gone to the toilet before leaving the hotel. She looked back towards the Post Offfice complex: she could make out the Volkswagen, but not as clearly as she would have liked. Baxeter would be able to see her, Janet thought, in self-assurance: she was sure he was absolutely dependable.

“Right on time.”

Janet gasped in surprise, half turning. Illogically Janet had expected the man to come from outside the old part, towards her, but he had emerged from the inside, through the gate. He wore a loose qumbaz, a robe going right down to the ground and so voluminous it was impossible to tell if he were a thin or fat man, and around his head and concealing his lower face was wrapped a red and white Bedouin kaffeyeh. He’d spoken English, and Janet could not detect the sort of intonation she would have expected from an Arab. “What is it you have?” Janet demanded.

“That the money?”

“Yes.”

“Let me have it.”

“I want what you have first.”

“Let me see it.”

Janet parted the wrapping as Baxeter had shown her, determinedly closing it after a few moments. “Now you.”

From beneath his robe the man brought an envelope, holding up but away from her. “Here!” he said.

“All I can see is an envelope.”

Still keeping it away, the man reached inside, half pulling out what appeared to be some sheets of paper and a glossy print. “It’s all here.”

Janet felt the jump of excitement deep in her stomach. “What’s the photograph of?”

“The house.”

“What house?”

“Where he is, in Beirut.”

The excitement grew, flowing through her. Trying to control it she said: “What else?”

“The address, where to go here. Where you’ll get the address in Beirut.”

“I don’t understand why you’re doing it this way,” she protested.

“No tricks, remember,” said the man. “If you’ve involved the police-if I’m jumped upon-then I won’t telephone the house where I’m sending you, to say everything is all right. If they don’t get a call within five minutes, they’re going to leave. The same if the money is phony, when I’ve a chance to look at it closer. Cautious, eh?”

“Very,” Janet agreed. It seemed a reasonable explanation for what the man was doing.

“Give me the money,” the man demanded.

“The envelope,” Janet insisted.

He offered it, tentatively, and Janet matched his movement, holding out the package, but to receive it he had to give her the envelope, freeing both his hands. He grabbed at it, turning as he did so, scurrying back into the walled city.

Janet was moving fast, too. She ran back across Egypt Avenue, careless of the cars this time, and darted inside the Volkswagen.

“Let me see!” He tugged the material from inside the envelope, spreading it out on his lap, nodding but not looking at Janet as she recounted the conversation. He studied the map and the directions more than the photograph. “It’s right around the other side of the citadel,” he said. “In the Palouriotissa district…” He handed the map across to her and said: “I’ll drive, you map read.”

Janet held everything up close in front of her face, trying to work out where they were going, as Baxeter turned the car, reached the junction, and began skirting the walls along Stasinos Avenue. “It says it’s a two-story house,” she read. “Number 11, in the cul-de-sac off Mareotis.”

“I know Mareotis,” said Baxeter.

“I think this really is something!” said Janet. “I’ve got a feeling about it!”

Traffic clogged ahead of them. Baxeter pumped the horn and said: “Come on! Come on!”

It took almost thirty minutes to complete the loop and come up to King George Square, from which Mareotis fed off. Baxeter slowed now, traveling the entire length until he reached Kapotas, where he said: “Damn!” and jerked the car around, to retrace their route.

“There!” pointed Janet, head close to her map again.

It was a narrow, rutted spur of an alley, without any proper lighting. Baxeter had to stop the car and get out to calculate the consecutive numbering. Back inside the car he edged slowly forward, counting off the houses as he did so.

“… Seven… nine…” His voice trailed off and he stopped the car, not saying anything.

“It’s a mistake: it’s got to be a mistake!” Janet said, gazing at the completely empty lot where number eleven would have had to be. “We’ve miscounted. Let’s do it again.”

Baxeter got out of the car to check the numbering on both sides and then knocked at the entrance to nine. In the light behind the occupant, a fat, sag-busted woman, Janet was able to see a lot of gesturing although she could not hear what was said. There was a slowness about Baxeter’s return to the car.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “Really sorry.”

“Tell me!”

“There isn’t a number eleven: there never has been.” He switched on the interior light, looking closely at the photograph. He said: “I don’t even think this is Beirut. The background looks far more like Cyprus than Beirut.”

Janet broke down.

The weeping this time was different from the way she had cried in Beirut. This time there was a mix of emotions, of regret and of disappointment and of frustration. She felt Baxeter’s arm around her and she allowed herself to be pulled into his shoulder and she sobbed against him, letting it happen. There was some relief in weeping.

“Why!” she said, her voice unsteady. “Why does it always have to be like this!”

“Easy,” he said. “We always had our doubts, didn’t we?”

“I wanted so much for it to be right this time!”

“Something could still come up.”

Janet pulled away from him but only slightly. She said: “Your money’s gone.”

“You know that’s protected.”

“I still feel responsible.”

“Don’t be silly.”