The Other Side of Silence

SEVENTEEN

The subject of the tape was printed on the box, which now lay on the refectory table beside the tape machine. “Interview with Guy Burgess, May 28th, 1951, SS Pamyati Kirova.” I carefully threaded the leader onto the Grundig, lit my fifth cigarette of the day, poured some coffee from the brightly polished silver pot that Ernest the butler had brought for me, and, under the eye of a tomato-colored nude by Renoir, sat down to await Maugham’s delayed arrival in the elegant drawing room. On the lawns the garden sprinklers were already spinning around like dervishes and the chauffeur had washed the car again. The nude was a bit too pink and chubby for my taste; she only lacked a lollipop and a Teddy bear to be wholly unsuitable. I was tired but in an almost pleasant way, suffering a little with the equivalent of a hangover from an excess of sex, if such a thing is possible for a man living alone. My balls felt like they’d spent the night on a beer-hall billiard table. I closed my eyes for a moment and opened them again as Robin Maugham came into the room and sat down heavily, more like an old housewife after a day trailing around the shops instead of a man wearing a blazer who had only just finished breakfast. He smelled strongly of cloying cologne and false courtesy. I sensed that he had started to dislike me almost as much as I disliked his cologne.

“My uncle is going to be another five or ten minutes. He had an uncomfortable night. The heat, you know.”

“I had a bit of a rough night myself.”

“Well, I always say, there’s nothing quite like a bit of rough.” Robin smiled at his own little joke. “Anyway, he’s just getting dressed.”

I nodded. “Fine.”

“You know, every time I open a door in this house these days it seems you’re there, Walter. Why is that?”

“Does that make you nervous?”

“No. It makes me wonder, that’s all. I mean, what’s in it for you, that kind of thing. What do you want from this house, Walter?”

“You asked me to come here. To play bridge. Remember?”

“No, what I mean is, why are you helping my uncle now?”

“Because he asked me to.”

“Oh, come on, Walter. I’m not a fucking idiot. Everyone wants something from the old boy. What’s your angle?”

“Would it make you feel a little more comfortable if you thought there was money in it for me?”

“Yes, I suppose it would. I mean, it’s like Dr. Johnson says about being a writer: No man but a blockhead ever wrote except for money. Well, surely the same is doubly true for a man who used to be a private detective like you.”

“Who told you that?”

“What?”

“That I used to be a private detective?”

“I suppose my uncle must have mentioned it.”

“No, he didn’t. I asked him to remain silent about it. And he gave me his word he wouldn’t mention it to anyone.”

“He and I have no secrets. You should know that by now.”

“That’s not true, either. I’m not sure your uncle Willie trusts you as much as you think he does, Robin. Plus, your uncle Willie’s word actually means something. Which means someone else mentioned it to you.”

“Like who?”

“Why don’t you tell me? Who knows? You might appreciate a little confession. No?” I smiled patiently. “Besides, I am getting paid. That’s what’s in it for me. Since you ask. Your uncle promised me five thousand dollars. Or maybe he didn’t tell you that, either.”

“That was to handle the money transfer at the hotel. But you’ve done that. This tape business seems to be a lot more complicated.”

“All part of the same Grand Hôtel concierge service.”

“Yes, I suppose one could look at it that way.”

“I do.”

“Good of you. Thanks.”

“Will you be joining us to listen to the tape?” I asked.

“Yes. Of course. I wouldn’t miss it for the world. Have you listened to it, yourself?”

“Not yet. It’s really none of my business. And it seemed more courteous to wait until your uncle was present. He’s the one who’s been asked to pay two hundred thousand dollars for the tape, after all. Besides, I’m not sure any of it will mean very much to me. My English is good but it’s not perfect. I still have a problem working out what any of you people really mean. English is very different from German in that respect. In German people say exactly what they mean. Even when they would prefer to say something else.”

“Oh yes. Of course.”

It was time for me to play out a hunch I had.

“Maybe this is a good opportunity for us to talk frankly, Robin.”

“About what?”

“I was hoping you might volunteer something about this whole dirty business.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Sure you do.”

Robin smiled and feigned patience even as he fidgeted with his gold cuff links, nervously. “No, actually, old boy, I don’t.”

“By all accounts your uncle’s old friend and companion Gerald Haxton had some quite substantial gambling debts. At the casino in Nice, it turns out. I checked with a friend of mine who was the manager there for a while. Gerald was up to his gills in debt.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. About Gerald, that is.”

“Previously it was Gerald who put Louis up to blackmailing your uncle. To make some money for them both.”

“Yes, perhaps. Louis wasn’t my friend, exactly. He was Gerald’s.”

“Nevertheless you also went to bed with Louis. At least according to your uncle. Gerald as well, probably.”

“What of it?”

“Only this: I think Gerald gave or perhaps sold you some letters and photographs before he died. As a sort of legacy or insurance policy, I don’t know. And you decided to copy his example and use them as a way of making a bit of extra money now and then. When you needed to raise a bit of cash for a new toy like that Alfa Romeo you’re driving.”

“Are you suggesting what I think you’re suggesting?”

“Didn’t I make it clear? You’re a blackmailer, too, Robin.”

“Nonsense. I’m a writer. And I make a good living as a writer. A few years ago I wrote a novel called The Servant, which has done very well—look, I don’t have to sit here and be insulted by you.”

“You do unless you want me to tell your uncle exactly what you and Harold Hebel were arguing about the first time I saw you both at La Voile d’Or.”

Robin Maugham paused, blushing to the edge of his handmade shirt collar, and then lit a cigarette, trying to affect a nonchalance that plainly wasn’t there. “No secret there,” he said. “I should have thought that was bloody obvious. He had a compromising photograph involving my uncle and I was rather keen to get it back.”

“In my experience people don’t normally behave like that with a blackmailer.”

“Is there a correct way to behave? Don’t be absurd.”

“Usually people are very meek because they’re afraid.”

“Possibly because they’re the ones being blackmailed.”

“According to the manager at the Voile you and Hebel met for a drink. More than once. Your name is in Hebel’s address book. And his diary. I searched his room at the Grand the other night. I think it was Hebel who told you that I was a private detective. And I think your argument was because you were very anxious to know exactly how he came by that photograph.”

“From Louis Legrand, of course.”

“No. That’s what Hebel said. But it’s just not possible. You see, Louis Legrand has been in prison in Marseilles for several months. I checked with the police, in Nice. Hebel couldn’t possibly have met your little friend Loulou.”

“I don’t like your tone.”

“I don’t like it myself. You’re right. It makes me sound like a queer. Like a bitch. Maybe I should paint my toenails, buy a silk shirt—then I could fit right in at the Villa Mauresque. Either way I don’t think your uncle will have any trouble believing me. Even without lipstick I can make an attractive argument about this to him.”

Robin Maugham sighed and then stared up at the ceiling as if hoping he might find the answer hanging off the dusty wooden chandelier. The French windows were none too clean either; bright sunlight showed up cobwebs like giant fingerprints on more than one pane of glass, and in the lost domain that was one corner under the refectory table was a champagne glass containing a cigarette end. Maybe I did belong somewhere like that; I wasn’t exactly gleaming myself.

“Don’t get me wrong, Robin. I’m no better than you. In many ways I’m worse. Long ago I concluded I don’t have a soul of my own. Not anymore.”

“Look, if I tell you the truth, will you promise not to tell my uncle?”

“Perhaps. I don’t know. It all depends on what you tell me.”

“I’ll pay you to keep silent about this.”

“I think you’re mistaking me for another double-dealing bastard, Robin. I’m not a blackmailer. And I agreed to help your uncle, not help someone else to put the squeeze on him.”

“Look, I’ve made mistakes. I’m only human. But you must believe me, I’d never do anything to hurt my uncle Willie.”

“Not consciously, perhaps. So. Why don’t you tell me? How did Harold Hebel come to be in possession of this photograph?”

Robin Maugham got up and went to close the drawing room door. Then he lit a cigarette, quite forgetting there was one already burning in the ashtray, and walked around the room nervously for a few seconds before sitting down again. It wasn’t yet eleven but already he was sweating profusely.

“I’m not exactly sure, to be honest.”

“Take your time. I’m in no hurry. I took the whole morning off.”

“There’s a man in London who used to be a friend of my uncle’s. Chap named Blunt, Anthony Blunt. He’s queer, too.”

“Blunt’s one of the naked men in the photograph that was taken here at the Villa Mauresque, right?”

“The one taken in nineteen thirty-seven, yes.”

“Go on.”

“He’s now a very prominent art dealer. Very well connected. Surveyor of the Queen’s Pictures. Director of the Courtauld Institute of Art. Anyway, I was a bit short of cash and so the last time I was in London, Anthony and I met for lunch at my club and I offered to sell him the photograph and some letters from him to Gerald. You see, Blunt’s a friend of this fellow Guy Burgess, too. In fact, I think they even shared a house during the war. Naturally, it would mean that Blunt would have to resign from all his offices if that picture ended up in the newspapers. Under the circumstances, it wasn’t a fortune I was asking. Just a thousand pounds, that’s all. Cheap at the price in view of how much Hebel is asking for it.”

“So what happened after you started blackmailing Blunt?”

“Steady on, old boy. I wouldn’t call it blackmail, exactly. I mean, I never threatened to send the letters and the picture to the newspapers or anything like that. You might even say I was trying to help the poor fellow out. To stop them from falling into the hands of anyone else. To give him peace of mind. Yes, I could have destroyed them, but then he might always have wondered what became of them, and if one day they might come back to haunt him. You do see the difference.”

“You’re a much better blackmailer than you think you are, Robin.”

Robin Maugham leaned forward and stubbed out his cigarette with fury, as if he wished the ashtray had been my eyeball.

“Fuck you, Walter,” he said.

“I’d rather you didn’t. So, then; Blunt bought what you were offering so very cheaply. Prints, negative, letters, the whole package wrapped with a nice pink ribbon. Cash?”

“Yes. Cash. He moaned about it quite a lot but yes, eventually, he paid. So, naturally I was more than a bit surprised when this fellow Hebel turned up here with the photograph asking for fifty thousand dollars. I mean, fifty thousand dollars? Jesus. That rather puts my amateur effort in the shade.”

“Have you spoken to Blunt about this?”

“Yes. He says the photograph was stolen from his flat at the Courtauld Institute soon after I sold it to him.”

“Do you believe that?”

“Yes. Maybe. His place is always full of rent boys. Any one of them could have pinched it. Besides, I can’t see why he would hand the picture to someone who might easily blackmail him. It strikes me that Anthony Blunt has as much to lose as my uncle.”

“But a lot more to gain, perhaps. Is Blunt rich?”

“No, not especially. I mean, he has some rather valuable pictures, and some rich friends, but not much money of his own.”

“So, not as rich as your uncle Willie?”

“Lord, no. Not many people are.”

“So then. Has it occurred to you that Blunt and Hebel might be in this together? After all, Blunt could hardly threaten to send the picture to the newspapers himself. Your uncle would never believe he would risk doing that. But he would believe someone else was capable of it. Someone like Hebel, with nothing to lose. This might also explain how Hebel came to be in possession of this tape recording of Guy Burgess. Perhaps the friendship between Blunt and Burgess extended to more than just sharing a flat. We don’t know for sure that it was recorded on this Russian ship and not at a flat in London.”

“Yes, I suppose it’s possible. I can see Blunt using a picture in the way you describe. But this tape is something else again. My uncle will only buy it if the secret service is prepared to underwrite the cost of the purchase. And they won’t buy it without listening to it themselves. Which still leaves Blunt in the shit because of the photograph, I’d have thought.”

“Not really. Your uncle has the photograph now.”

“Yes, he does, doesn’t he?”

“So, unless Anthony Blunt’s name is on that tape, he’s in the clear. More or less.”

“Anthony Blunt?” Somerset Maugham came into the room and helped himself to some coffee. “What’s Anthony got to do with any of this?”

Robin Maugham blushed again, this time to the roots of his dyed hair, and stammered an answer. “I was just telling Walter that Blunt used to share a flat with Guy Burgess in London. And that now and then you had him bid for pictures at art auctions in London. Isn’t that right?”

“Yes, that’s right. Old Masters are his special thing. Poussin, Titian, not really my cup of tea. And too damned expensive. But over the years he’s spotted a couple of good buys for me. Impressionists, mainly. He has a good eye, Anthony.”

“And yet he didn’t seem to notice he was sharing a flat with a Russian spy,” I said.

“You didn’t know Guy Burgess,” said Maugham. “He was a very charming rogue and a most unlikely spy. Everyone thought so.”

“That’s the thing about the English,” I said. “You think charm excuses almost anything, including treachery and treason.”

“Yes,” said Maugham, lighting a pipe. “That’s quite true. It’s a failing of ours, to find excuses for people. Of course, charm only works for Germans when it seems to have been divinely conferred.”

“When was the last time you saw Guy Burgess?” I asked.

Maugham paused for a moment. “Probably Tangier in nineteen forty-nine. Got himself into a bit of a scrape in Gibraltar beforehand, I seem to recall. But that was the thing about Guy; he was always getting into scrapes. Frankly, his behavior made him a most improbable spy. Often drunk and outrageously homosexual—when he defected, nobody could quite believe how he managed to pull it off for so long. I suppose you might say it was the perfect cover, to seem so indiscreet that people couldn’t possibly think you might be a spy.”

Maugham set his coffee cup down and moved to a chair.

“Are you ready?” I asked.

“As I’ll ever be.”

I stood up and walked over to the Grundig. In its green Tolex carry case, the tape machine resembled the forgotten layer of an old wedding cake. I twisted the gold switch and slowly the two reels began to turn.