Good Morning, Midnight

15

Kay Kafka sat at her computer looking at the Ashur-Proffitt website.

The site designers, alerted to the Junius invasion, had acted quickly and all traces had been removed. But Kay didn’t doubt he’d be back.

When the encroachments first started to occur, she’d looked up Junius in an encyclopaedia. Her motive had been idle curiosity. There she read that the true identity of the writer of the Junius letters had never been established but the most likely suspect was a man called Sir Philip Francis.

“Snap,” she said.

She believed in fate, she believed in various kinds of divination, but she didn’t believe in coincidence.

It had to be him. Not Philip Francis, but Francis Phillips. The coincidence was too great. And Frank certainly had cause to hate Ashur-Proffitt, just as she had cause to hate Frank.

She’d debated whether to share her suspicion with Tony but decided against it. OK, Frank had done her wrong. But that was in another country. And besides, he’d given her the greatest joy in her life and could hardly be held responsible for its greatest pain.

Not that she hadn’t taken revenge from time to time, but its nature was generic rather than particular. From the way Tony had talked this morning, he was no longer all that concerned to discover Junius’s identity but the reaction of some of his associates could be extreme… She pushed the thought from her mind.

Tony had rung a couple of hours earlier, saying the train had been held up, some trouble on the line, God knows how long it was going to take. He had sounded tired and irritable. She had asked him how the meeting had gone. He had snarled something indecipherable except for the words slug and Warlove. Then they’d been cut off, or he’d disconnected.

It sounded bad. She knew how little he’d been looking forward to this trip and if he’d let the slug see the doubts that had been troubling his mind with increasing frequency, it couldn’t have been a comfortable meeting. But her sympathy for her husband was tempered by more personal considerations. His talk of “going home” troubled her. This was home now, all the more so since last night. He must see that. So in a way she and Warlove could find themselves allies in this, neither wanting Kafka to chuck in the towel and head for retirement. And what would he do back in the States anyway?

Write his memoirs, he’d once replied when she’d questioned him.

She prayed he hadn’t hinted that, not even in jest, to Warlove. She had no illusions about the likely consequences of such a threat.

No, she reassured herself. Tony wasn’t stupid. But he was brave and that was sometimes almost as bad.

She switched off the computer, stood up and went into the lounge. Here she sat down, hesitating between the television and the scatter of newspapers on the table by her chair. Finally ignoring both she picked up the chunky volume which lay beside the papers. On its cover was a sketch of an oval-faced woman, lips pursed, mouth slightly askew, hair severe, expression unsmiling. If the artist had caught her well, here was a woman contained, giving nothing away.

Except wisdom to the devotee.

Kay closed her eyes, opened the book, put her forefinger on the page, opened her eyes and read where her finger had rested. 1742 The distance that the dead have gone

Does not at first appear Their coming back seems possible

For many an ardent year. And then, that we have followed them,

We more than half suspect,

So intimate have we become

With their dear retrospect.

Twice she read the poem, her face as unrevealing as the sketch on the cover.

Distantly she heard a door open and close.

She closed the volume, stood up, went to a sideboard on which stood decanters and tumblers and poured two fingers of scotch into one of them.

A moment later the lounge door opened and Tony Kafka came in.

She handed him the drink, which he downed in a single gulp.

“Hi,” he said, handing the glass back for a refill.

“Hi. Hard day?”

“You could say that.”

“You shouldn’t let Warlove get to you.”

“Not just Warlove. I told you, Gedye was there too.”

“So? He’s on our side, isn’t he?”

He finished the second scotch.

“Is he? I’m not sure which side is which any longer. Things have changed back home, but not here, not with guys like Warlove. Business as before. The Brits call nearly all the shots now but you can bet your sweet ass when the shit hits the fan it will be all ‘Tut-tut, old boy, what can you expect from a Yankee business?’”

“You didn’t say this?” she asked, alarmed.

“Not in so many words. Hey, don’t look so worried, they probably got the message, but they don’t kill the messenger any more, not when he’s got scary friends back home. I spoke to Joe on the train, put him in the picture far as I could on an open line. I said I’d ring him again when I got back here, but we agreed we ought to bring forward next month’s strategy meeting, so I’ll be heading home in the next day or so.”

Home, she thought.

She said, “You will be careful, won’t you, Tony? Don’t go too far out on a limb till you’re sure Joe and the others are with you, not sitting on the ground watching Warlove and his friend get to work with a chainsaw.”

“Don’t you worry about me. I’m always the one sitting with my back to the wall so I can watch the saloon door.”

He had filled his glass for the third time and was looking at it doubtfully. Gently she took it from him.

“You’ll need a clear head if you’re going to ring Joe again.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right. I had a few on the train. Fuck all else to do. These fucking trains! The Brits have invented the time machine-you get in and when you get out again centuries have passed!”

“What caused the delay this time? Leaves on the line?”

“Not leaves,” he said. “Flesh. Some sad bastard decided to step in front of us.”

“Jesus. Man? Woman?”

“Who knows? For a change, we were really moving when it happened. I guess they’ll be doing a two-mile jigsaw to put the poor devil together again. Time of the year for suicides, it seems. First Pal, now this. Don’t they say such things go in threes? Who’s next, I wonder?”

She went to him and put her arms around him. He stood quite still in the embrace, neither responding to it nor attempting to move from it.

In the entrance hall the old American long-case clock began to strike midnight. Tonight its brassy chime sounded particularly triumphant, as if to say, At last I’ve got someone to hear.