The Strange Land

CHAPTER TWO

It seemed a long drive back to Tangier. I felt tired and sick and dispirited, and the taste of the salt water I had swallowed was like a thick, furry film on my tongue. The man I had pulled out of the water lay slumped in his corner and I sat and stared at him, almost hating him. Why couldn’t it be Kavan? If only one man was going to arrive in that boat, why couldn’t it be … We were on a bend and his eyes suddenly flicked open and he grabbed at me. ‘Look out! Hold on!’ His voice was thick and blurred. He was back on the boat. Then he slumped back in the seat again and his head was lolling and he was mumbling to himself.

I should have realised the significance of his words immediately. But my brain was dulled with the cold and it only came to me slowly. That warning had been shouted to somebody. If in his mind he were back on the boat then he couldn’t have been alone; there would have been no reason in shouting a warning if he were single-handed. In a sudden surge of anger I caught hold of him and shook him and shouted, ‘What happened to Kavan? What have you done with him?’ I was convinced now that Kavan had been on that boat.

But the man was dazed and only half conscious. He mumbled something I couldn’t understand and then his head was lolling again to the movement of the car. The blood was caked on his temple and his face was grey with exhaustion. My mood changed from anger to pity and I leaned back and closed my eyes. I could find out about Kavan later. I was thinking what it must have been like at the helm of that yacht coming down through the Bay of Biscay and along the coasts of Spain and Portugal in winter. And then I began to think about Enfida again and how I had told the chiefs of all the villages about my plans and had persuaded them to send men down to help me build an extension to the house to act as a surgery and dispensary. They would shrug their shoulders and murmur insh’ Allah. But it was a serious blow to my work. And it was no use pretending I should get another doctor. Kavan alone had replied to my advertisements. The salary I was able to offer was too small. I would have been able to stay on here in Tangier and run a few more cargoes. If I had done that…

It was stupid to think like that, but my mind was confused and angry. In my loneliness and isolation I had built too much upon Kavan, upon this idea of getting a doctor out to the mountain villages. I closed my eyes wearily, sinking back into a lassitude of exhaustion, too tired to face the thought of planning for the future again.

And then the taxi stopped and we were at the Hotel Malabata. It was a small, cheap hotel occupying a part of one of those grey blocks of cracking concrete that cling to the escarpment above the Avenue d’Espagne. I pushed open the taxi door and stumbled out. The police jeep had parked behind us and they came and lifted the unconscious man out and carried him into the hotel. As I paid off the driver, an American car rolled quietly down the cobbled street, paused beside the taxi and then drove on. It was Kostos, and in the gleam of the street lighting I saw the hard, inquisitive stare of his eyes.

The hotel was full, but the patrone agreed to let the man share my room and they carried him up the stairs and laid him on the stiff, horsehair couch at the foot of the bed. The police and Customs officers left then with little bows, each of them shaking me by the hand and commending me for having saved the man’s life. ‘We will return in the morning, senor,’ the sergeant said. ‘For the formalities, you understand.’ The Customs officers nodded. ‘Buenas noches, senor.’

‘Buenas noches.’

They were gone and the door shut behind them and I stood there, shivering and staring down at the man on the couch. His eyes were closed and his body trembled uncontrollably with the cold. His skin had a wax-like transparency and the blue veins of his forehead showed through like the marks of an indelible pencil. I felt deathly tired. All I wanted to do was to get into my bed and sleep, and I wished I had ignored his plea and taken him straight to the French hospital. But he was here now and I was responsible for him. I sent Youssef for hot-water bottles and began to strip off his sodden clothing.

Below his oilskin jacket I found a waterproof bag hung by a line round his neck. It had the hard compactness of documents; the ship’s papers presumably and the log. I tossed it onto the bed, making a mental note to have a look at it later. His sodden clothes I piled on the floor where they formed a little pool of water that trickled away across the bare tiles under the bed.

I was struggling to pull off his blue seaman’s jersey when his eyes flicked open. They were incredibly blue. His hair was lank and his beard all grey with salt. Combined with the marble pallor of his face, it made him look like a corpse given back by the sea. He stared up at me. It was a fixed, glazed stare, without expression. His mouth opened, but no sound emerged from the cracked lips. He wiped his hand across his face, slowly, wearily, and then reached out automatically for something he imagined to be hanging above his head. ‘Is it my watch already? I’m just coming.’ His voice was dead and quite toneless.

Then, suddenly, there was consciousness in his eyes as they stared up at me and his forehead creased in a puzzled frown. He pushed himself up on his elbow with a quick-violent movement and stared wildly around the room. ‘Who are you? What am I doing here?’ His eyes had come back to my face and his voice was hard and urgent.

I started to explain and he nodded as though it were all coming back to him. ‘Have the police gone?’

‘Yes.’

‘You were down on the beach, waiting for me, weren’t you?’

‘I was waiting for Kavan,’ I said.

He nodded. ‘Then you must be Philip Latham.’

‘You know my name?’ I stared at him. And then I caught hold of him, gripping his arm. ‘How do you know my name’s Philip Latham? Did Kavan tell you I’d be waiting here for him?’ I shook him violently. ‘What happened to him? He was on the boat, wasn’t he? What happened to him?’

He stared at me. His eyes had a dazed look and he was frowning as though trying to concentrate his noughts.

‘What happened to Jan Kavan?’ I repeated.

‘Nothing.’ His voice sounded dazed, and then in the same flat tone he added, ‘I am Jan Kavan.’

‘What?’ I didn’t understand for the moment. ‘What was that you said?’

His eyes were suddenly wide open and he fought to ruse himself. ‘It’s true, isn’t it? You are Latham?’

‘Yes. What did you mean just now?’ I shouted at him. ‘You said you were Kavan. What did you mean?’

‘Yes. I am Kavan.’ He said it wearily.

‘But — ‘ I stared at him stupidly. ‘You’re not Wade at ill then,’ I heard myself say.

‘No. I told you. I’m Jan Kavan. I’ve come here to act as a doctor …’

‘But you said you were Wade. Down there on the beach — ‘

‘I never said I was Wade,’ he said quickly.

‘But you let Kostos think — ‘ I stopped there. It was so unbelievable.

‘I’m sorry,’ he murmured. ‘I wanted to tell you, but — ‘ He frowned. ‘Who is that man Kostos? What did he want — do you know?’

‘Nothing,’ I said. ‘He was meeting Wade, that’s all.’ It didn’t matter about Kostos. It didn’t matter about anything. Kavan was alive. He was here in my room. ‘Did you check up on trachoma?’ I asked. It was a stupid thing to ask of a man who was so utterly exhausted, but I couldn’t help it. I couldn’t think of anything but the fact that he was alive, that my dream of a doctor at the Mission was coming true. Eye diseases were the bane of the Berber people in their fly-ridden villages.

‘Yes,’ he said wearily. ‘I checked up on everything — all the things I have forgotten.’ He sighed and then said, ‘When do we leave for your Mission?’

‘As soon as you’re fit enough to travel,’ I said.

‘Good.’ He nodded and closed his eyes. I thought for a moment that he had lost consciousness again, but then his eyelids flicked back and he was looking up at me again. ‘Is Kasbah Foum anywhere near your Mission?’ he asked.

‘Kasbah Foum?’ It was an Arab name, meaning fort at the entrance. Probably it was somewhere down in the south, in the kasbah country beyond the High Atlas. ‘No,‘I replied. ‘Why?’

‘I have to go there. It’s important. I have to go to Kasbah Foum.’ He spoke in a whisper, his voice urgent. ‘Wade told me that the Caid’s son …” He stopped there and his eyes closed again.

That mention of Wade brought me back to the problems of the moment. ‘What happened to him?’ I demanded. ‘What happened to Wade?’

But he didn’t answer. His eyes remained closed. It was then I began to get uneasy. The police would have be informed that he was Kavan. And then there would be an investigation. It might take some days … Where’s Wade?’ I asked him again. And when he still didn’t answer, I took hold of him and shook him. ‘What happened to Wade?’ I was certain he wasn’t unconscious, and yet… ‘You’ll have to explain to the police,’ I told him.

‘The police?’ His eyes flicked open again and he stared up at me. There was something near to panic in his face.

‘They’re coming here tomorrow.’

‘Tomorrow.’ He said it as though it were some distant thing like a mountain peak that had to be faced and overcome.

‘It was Wade’s boat,’ I said. ‘You couldn’t have left England without him. He was the skipper. What happened? You must tell me what happened.’

‘Wade’s dead.’ He said it in a flat, toneless voice. There was a sort of hopelessness in the way he said it.

So Wade was dead. Somehow I wasn’t surprised or even shocked. Maybe I was too tired and my senses were dulled. All I knew was that if this was Kavan, then Wade had to be dead. And then I remembered how he’d said he was alone on the boat, that he’d come single-handed from England and an awful thought came into my mind. ‘What happened?’ I asked. ‘For God’s sake tell me what happened.’

He stared at me, his eyes clouded as though he were looking back through time to a scene that was indelibly imprinted on his mind. ‘I don’t know. I don’t know how it happened. He just seemed to jump over the guardrail into the sea.’

There was a pause and then he lifted his head and stared up at me and it all came out of him in a rush. ‘It was off Cape St Vincent. It had been blowing. The seas were terrible; great big seas, but not breaking then. It was night and I remember the St Vincent light was winking at us on the port quarter. There had been a bad storm, but the wind had dropped and it was a clear night. The sea was big and confused and there was a lot of movement. And we were tired. I was just coming on watch to relieve him. We were both of us in the cockpit. Then the jib sheet broke. The sail was flapping about and I had hold of the helm. It was difficult to hold the boat. She was yawing wildly and Wade jumped out of the cockpit to get the sail down. He was tired, that was the trouble. We were both of us tired. He jumped out of the cockpit straight into the sea. That was the way it seemed. He just jumped straight over the guardrail.’

He pushed his hand through his hair and glanced up at me. ‘You believe me, don’t you?’ His voice was agitated. ‘There was nothing I could do. The boat sunk away into a trough and then he was in the water. I saw him reach up to catch hold of the side and a wave came and he disappeared. I threw the lifebelt to him. I think he got hold of it. I don’t know. It was dark. The moon had set. It took me a long time to go about single-handed and I didn’t see him again, though I sailed round and round that area till dawn and for a long time after.’

He lay back, exhausted. ‘That’s all,’ he said. ‘That’s how it happened. There was nothing I could do…’ His voice trailed away. His eyes closed and he drifted into unconsciousness again, or maybe it was sleep. His face was relaxed, his breathing easier and more regular.

Youssef came back then with four wine bottles filled with hot water. I got some underclothes from my suitcase, wrapped them round the bottles and slipped them into the bed. Then we got Kavan stripped and I washed his body with hot water, rubbing hard with a towel to restore the circulation. His back and buttocks were covered with salt water sores, little nodules of suppuration that bled when I rubbed them. Patches of white, scabrous skin flaked away and his feet and hands were soft and wrinkled with long immersion.

‘Is going to die?’ Youssef asked.

‘Of course not.’ I spoke sharply, conscious of the Arab’s fascination at the white European body lying naked and hurt and helpless. We got him on to the bed and I piled the blankets on top of him and then I sent Youssef for a doctor I had known, a Frenchman who had lived just across the Boulevard Pasteur.

Then at last I was free to slip out of my own damp clothes. I put on a dressing-gown and lit a cigarette. I would have liked a bath, but the hotel was inexpensive and Spanish and its occupants were expected to use the public baths or go without. I sat on the bed, thinking of the girl and their meeting on the beach. Of course, they had recognised each other. That was why he had collapsed. It was the shock of recognising her. He had said he was Wade and then she had turned away and disappeared. There was no longer any doubt in my mind. This man lying on my bed really was Jan Kavan. But why had he said he was Wade? That was the thing I couldn’t understand. And he’d been scared of the police. Why?

I dragged myself to my feet and went over to the chair where my clothes lay. Both his letters were in my wallet — his original application and his note saying that he would be sailing with Wade on Gay Juliet.

Youssef returned as I was getting out my wallet. The French doctor had moved. Nobody seemed to know where he now lived. I looked at Kavan lying there on the farther side of the big double bed. His eyes were closed and he was breathing peacefully. It was sleep he needed more than a doctor. I let it go at that and paid Youssef off with two hundred peseta notes. Then I switched on the bedside lamp and checked through the letters.

It was the one in which he had applied for the post of doctor to the Mission that chiefly interested me. I knew it all, of course, but I was hoping that perhaps there was something I had missed, some little point that would now prove significant. I ran through it quickly…

I will be quite frank. I am 38 years old and I have not looked at a medical book since I obtained my degree. Nor have I at any time practised as a doctor. I studied at Prague, Berlin and Paris. My father was a specialist in diseases of the heart, and it was for him I passed my examinations. Already I was primarily interested in physics. All my life since then has been devoted to scientific research.

Normally I would not think of applying for a position as doctor, but I gather from your advertisement that you are in desperate need of one, that you can pay very little and that your Mission is in a remote area amongst backward people. I am a man of some brilliance. I do not think I should let you down or prove inadequate for the task. I am a Czech refugee and for personal reasons I wish to get out of England. I have the need to lose myself in work quite remote …

I folded the letter up and put it back in my wallet. He was a Czech refugee. He had been a scientist. He had personal reasons for wanting to leave England.

There was nothing there I had missed.

He had cabled acceptance of my offer. The final letter had merely announced that the French had given him a visa to work as a doctor in Morocco and that he would be sailing with Wade in the fifteen-ton ketch, Gay Juliet, leaving Falmouth on 24 November, and arriving Tangier by 14 December, all being well. He hadn’t mentioned his wife, or even the fact that he was married. He hadn’t explained his reasons for wanting such remote and out-of-the-way employment and he hadn’t haggled over the ridiculously small salary which was all I had been able to offer him.

Then I remembered the oilskin bag. The answer to some, at any rate, of the things that were puzzling me might lie in the documents he’d salvaged. It’s not a very nice thing to go prying into another man’s papers, but in this case, I felt it was justified. I got up and began searching through the bedclothes. But I couldn’t find it and I was afraid of waking him.

I didn’t persist in the search. It was very cold in the room. North African hotels, with their bare, plaster walls and tiled floors are designed for the summer heat. Also I was tired. It could wait till morning. There was no point in trying to work it out for myself. When he was rested, he’d be able to explain the whole thing. I lay back again and switched off the light, pulling the blankets up round me. The moonlight cast the pattern of the window in a long, sloping rectangle on the opposite wall. I yawned and closed my eyes and was instantly asleep.

But it was only my body that was tired and probably this accounts for the fact that I awoke with such startling suddenness at the sound of movement in the room. The moonlight showed me a figure stooped over the couch at the foot of the bed. ‘Who’s that?’ I called out.

The figure started up. It was one of the Arab hotel boys. I switched on the light. ‘What are you doing in here?’ I asked him in Spanish. ‘I didn’t send for you.’

‘No, senor.’ He looked scared and his rather too thick lips trembled slightly. He looked as though he had negro blood in him; so many of them did who came from the south. ‘The patrone sent me to collect the clothes that are wet.’ He held up some of Kavan’s sodden garments. ‘They are to be made dry.’

‘Why didn’t you knock and switch on the light?’

‘I do not wish to disturb you, senor.’ He said it quickly as though it were something he had expected to have to say, and then added, ‘May I take them please?’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘And you can take my jacket. That needs drying, too.’ I got out of bed and emptied the pockets. Then I ran through Kavan’s things. I thought he might have his wallet in one of the pockets of his windbreaker, but there was nothing but a jack-knife, an old briar, matches — the usual odds and ends of a man sailing a boat. ‘Thank the patrone for me, will you?’ The boy nodded and scurried out of the room. The door closed with a slam.

‘Who was that? What is it?’

I turned quickly towards the bed and saw that Kavan was sitting bolt upright, a startled look on his face. ‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘It was one of the hotel boys. He came for your wet things.’

Relief showed on his face and his head sank back against the pillows. ‘I thought I was back on the boat,’ he murmured. Though he was utterly exhausted, his mind still controlled his body, forcing it to react to unusual sounds, as though he were still at the yacht’s helm. I thought of how it must have been at night out there in the Atlantic after Wade had gone overboard, and I crossed over to the window to draw the curtains and shut out the moonlight.

As I pulled the curtains, I glanced down into the street below. A movement caught my eyes. There was somebody standing down there in the shadow of a doorway on the opposite side of the street, standing quite still, staring up at the window. I could see the pale circle of a face, nothing more. And then the figure moved, walking quickly away, keeping to the shadows of the buildings. It was a European girl and where an alley entered the street, she crossed a patch of moonlight.

It was Kavan’s wife.

She was in the shadows again now, walking quickly. I watched her until she turned at the end of the street, up towards the Boulevard Pasteur. I could have been mistaken, of course. But I knew I wasn’t — the suede jacket and the crumpled skirt, the way she walked, the shape of the face with its high, bony forehead as she had stared up at me from the shadows. What had she wanted? She hadn’t come into the hotel. She hadn’t asked to see him. The natural thing …

‘What is it? What are you staring at?’

I swung away from the window and saw that his eyes were watching me, and there was the same fearful-ness in them that I had seen in his wife’s eyes when she asked me who I was. ‘I’ve just seen your wife,’ I said. ‘She was out there, looking up at the hotel.’

‘My wife?’

‘The girl who was on the beach.’

He stared at me. ‘How do you know she is my wife?’ For the first time I noticed the trace of a foreign accent.

‘She told me,’ I said.

He started to get out of bed then, but I stopped him. ‘She’s gone now.’ And then I said, ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were Kavan down there on the beach? Surely you must have guessed who I was?’

‘How should I? Besides — ‘ He hesitated and shrugged his shoulders. ‘It is not the moment to say who I am.’

‘Because of the police?’ I asked. ‘And then, when you saw your wife …’ I hesitated, wondering how best to put it. ‘She loves you,’ I said. ‘Surely you must know that? Somehow she got out of Czechoslovakia and came here to meet you, and when you saw her you turned your back on her. Surely you could have — ‘

His eyes suddenly blazed at me. ‘For Christ’s sake, stop it!’ he cried out. ‘Stop it! Do you hear? How do I know they don’t arrange for her to come here to Tangier? They may be watching her, trying to follow me. They are there in the background always.’ The words tumbled wildly out of his mouth, and then he steadied himself and pushed his hands up over his face and through his hair. ‘I have not seen Karen for more than four years.’ His voice was gentle, but with a note of bitterness in it. ‘And then suddenly we meet…’ He stared at me. ‘Do you think I like to have to turn my back on her?’ He shrugged his shoulders angrily. ‘I have had too much of this — during the German occupation and after, when the Russians walk in. You don’t understand. You were born British. You don’t understand what it is to be a middle-European — always to be escaping from something, always to go in fear — the knock on the door, the unopened envelope, the glance of a stranger in the street — to have people checking on you, spying on you, coming between you and your work, never to be trusted or to trust anybody. God! If only I’d been born British.’ There were tears of anger and frustration in his eyes and he lay back, exhausted.

‘Why did you leave England then?’ I asked. ‘Why didn’t you become naturalised?’

‘Naturalised!’ He laughed. It wasn’t a pleasant sound, for there was a note of hysteria in it. ‘How can I become naturalised when they…’ He closed his mouth abruptly, his eyes suddenly watchful. ‘Don’t ask me any more questions,’ he said. ‘You want a doctor for your Mission. All right, you have one. I am here. But don’t ask me any questions. I don’t want any questions.’ His voice shook with the violence of his feeling.

I stood for a moment staring at him. I didn’t like it. I knew too little about the man. I’d been prepared for a failure. What else could I expect of a qualified doctor who was willing to come out to North Africa and bury himself in a village in the Atlas? But I hadn’t been prepared for this.

‘All right,’ I said. ‘I won’t ask any more questions.’ And then to ease the tension between us I asked him if he’d like some food.

‘No. No, thank you. A little cognac. That’s all.’

I got some dry clothes from my suitcase, put them on and went down to the Cypriot cafe at the corner. When I returned I found he had been sick. His face was ghastly white and he was sweating and shivering. I poured him a little cognac, added some water and handed it to him. His hands were trembling uncontrollably as he took the tumbler from me. ‘Shall I get a doctor?’ I asked.

He shook his head, quickly and emphatically. ‘No. I’ll be all right in a minute.’ He sipped at the cognac. ‘I’m just exhausted physically.’

But it was more than that. It was nervous exhaustion.

‘Can I have a cigarette please?’

I gave him one and when I had lit it for him, he drew on it, quickly, eagerly, like a man whose nerves are crying out for a sedative. I stayed with him whilst he smoked. He didn’t talk and a heavy silence lay over the room. I watched him covertly, wondering how this odd, excitable man would settle into the quiet, lonely life that I had become accustomed to. It wasn’t lonely, of course. There was too much to do, too many demands on one’s time and energy. But for a man who wasn’t accustomed to it, who wasn’t accepting the life voluntarily … I had been so engrossed in the idea of getting a doctor out there that I hadn’t really given much thought to the fact that he would also be a man, with a personality of his own, a past and all the inevitable human complications and peculiarities. I had thought about it only as it would affect me, not as I and the conditions of life down at Enfida would affect him.

‘Have you ever been to Morocco before?’ I asked him.

He shook his head. ‘No. Never.’

I gave him a little more cognac and then I began to talk about Enfida. I told him how the olives were just being gathered and piled in heaps in the open space outside the auberge and how we would soon be thrashing our own trees to harvest the crop that was part of the tiny income of the Mission. I described the mountain villages to him; how they were flat-roofed, like Tibetan villages, and clung precariously to the sides of great ravines that cut back to the base of the peaks that rose twelve and thirteen thousand feet to form the backbone of the Atlas Mountains. And I tried to give him an idea of what it was like, travelling every day from village to village, sometimes on foot, sometimes by mule, living in the Berber huts and sitting around at night, drinking mint tea and listening to their stories and the gossip of the village.

And then, suddenly, his hand fell limp at the edge of the bed and he was asleep. I got up and took the cigarette from between his fingers and picked up the empty tumbler which lay on his chest. His face had more colour in it now, and it was relaxed. The nerve at the corner of his mouth no longer twitched and his features were smoothed out as though his mind were at rest.

I put his arms inside the bedclothes and then I switched out the light and went out to the cafe for some food. When I returned he was still lying exactly as I had left him. His mouth was slightly open and he was snoring gently. I went to bed by the moon’s light that filtered in through the half-drawn curtains and lay there, wondering about him and about his wife and whether I had bitten off more than I could chew financially, for I would have to get her to join us at the Mission.

In thinking about the Mission, I forgot to some extent the strangeness of his arrival and drifted quietly off to sleep.

I awoke to a tap on the door and a shaft of sunlight cutting across my face. ‘Entrez!’ I sat up and rubbed my eyes. It was one of the hotel boys to say that the police and the douane had arrived. ‘All right. Show them up.’ I got out of bed and slipped my dressing gown on. Kavan was still fast asleep. He didn’t seem to have moved all night. He still lay on his back, quite motionless, his mouth slightly open and his breathing regular and easy. I looked at my watch. It was almost ten o’clock. He had had more than a dozen hours’ sleep. He should be fit enough now to cope with the immigration formalities.

The door opened and they came in. It was the same sergeant and he had with him one of the Customs officers. I glanced back at the bed, wishing that I’d told them to wait. I’d have to wake him now and he’d be suddenly confronted with them. I hoped he’d be clear in his mind what he was going to tell them. He ought to have mentioned Wade’s death to them the night before.

‘Muy buenas, senor.’

‘Muy buenas.’ I gave the sergeant a chair. The Customs officer sat on the couch. They both stared at Kavan. I felt uneasy and only half awake.

‘So, he is still sleeping, eh?’ The sergeant clicked his tongue sympathetically. ‘I am sorry to disturb him, but it is the formalities, you understand.’ He shrugged his shoulders to make it clear that he was not responsible for drawing up the regulations.

‘You want me to wake him?’

‘Si, si — if you please. He is all right, eh?’

‘Yes, he’s all right,’ I said. ‘He was just exhausted. He had a bad trip.’

The sergeant nodded. ‘Of course. And to wreck the ship — terrible. We will be very quick. Then he can sleep again.’

I went over to the bed and shook Kavan gently. His eyelids flicked back almost immediately. ‘What is it?’ And then he saw the police and there was instant panic in his eyes. ‘What do they want? Why are they here?’

‘It’s all right,’ I said. ‘It’s about the immigration details. They said they’d come this morning. Remember?’

He nodded, but all the blood seemed to have drained out of his face so that it looked as white as it had done the previous night.

‘Senor Wade.’ The sergeant had got to his feet.

I started to explain that he wasn’t Wade, but Kavan checked me, gripping hold of my arm. I could feel him trembling. His eyes switched from the police sergeant to the door and then back again to the sergeant. ‘What do you want?’ he asked in fair Spanish and his voice shook slightly and I could feel him trying desperately to get control of himself.

The sergeant was standing at the foot of the bed now. ‘You are captain of the boat that is wrecked last night in the Baie des Juifs?’

Kavan hesitated, glancing up at me, and his tongue licked along the sore edges of his lips. ‘Yes.’ His voice was little more than a whisper. But then he added in a firmer tone, ‘Yes, I’m the captain of the boat.’

‘What is the name of the boat please?’

“Gay Juliet.’

The sergeant had his notebook out now. He was leaning over the end of the bed, his round, rather chubby face with its blue jowls puckered in a frown of concentration as he licked his pencil and wrote down the name of the boat. ‘And you are from where?’

‘Falmouth.’

‘You come direct, senor?’

‘Yes.’

‘And your name is Senor Roland Wade?’

Again Kavan hesitated and then he nodded. ‘Yes.’

‘Just a moment,’ I said, speaking to him in English. ‘This is absurd, you know. You can’t go on trying to pretend you’re Wade.’

‘Why not? Are you going to stop me? Listen.’ He grabbed hold of my arm again. ‘You want a doctor for your Mission, don’t you? It’s important to you. It must be or you wouldn’t be taking somebody you know nothing about.’

‘Yes, it’s important to me.’

‘Well then, you tell these men the truth and you won’t get your doctor. Not me anyway. So you’d better choose. If you want your doctor, don’t interfere. If you do, I’ll get sent back to England and you’ll never see me again.’ Though he was blackmailing me, his face had a desperate, pleading look. ‘It’s only until we get out of Tangier.’ He stared up into my face for a moment and then turned back to the, sergeant. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, reverting to Spanish.

‘You sail here alone?’ the sergeant asked.

‘Yes.’

‘There is nobody with you?’

‘No.’

He looked up from his notebook then and stared at Kavan. ‘Do you know a man called Dr Jan Kavan?’

I heard the slight hissing intake of Kavan’s breath and felt the muscles of his hand tense. ‘Yes.’

‘We were told that he was sailing with you.’

‘Who told you?’ The sergeant didn’t answer, but his small, brown eyes stared at Kavan watchfully. ‘No, he didn’t sail with me,’ Kavan added quickly. ‘He — changed his mind.’

I felt sure that slight hesitation must have been as noticeable to the sergeant as it was to me. But all he said was, ‘Can you tell me, senor, why he changed his mind?’

‘He wouldn’t tell me,’ Kavan said. ‘He came on board the night before I was due to sail. I was leaving with the tide at 4 a.m. and when I woke him, he said he had changed his mind and wanted to be put ashore.’

The sergeant nodded and wrote it all down. ‘So you sailed alone, senor?’

Kavan nodded. His eyes were fixed on the sergeant and little beads of sweat had broken out on his forehead.

‘That was very dangerous, surely, senor — to sail alone? It is a big ship for one man.’

‘I have sailed a great deal — often single-handed.’

The sergeant turned to me ‘Twice last night you asked the senor here about another man. You thought there were two of them on the yacht.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘That’s correct.’

‘Who was the second man? Was it Dr Kavan?’

‘Yes.’

‘Why were you so sure that Dr Kavan was on board the boat?’

‘He wrote to me to tell me he was sailing with Mr Wade.’

‘I see. Do you know of any reason why he should have changed his mind?’

I shrugged my shoulders. ‘No, but there are easier methods of reaching Tangier than by sailing in a yacht.’

‘Of course.’ He nodded towards the bed. ‘Can you confirm the identity of the senor here?’

‘No. I had never seen him before last night.’

‘Si, si, it is understood. So you think Dr Kavan changed his mind?’

I glanced down at Kavan. His eyes were watching me, very blue and with the same expression in them that they’d had when he’d implored me not to take him to a hospital. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I think he must have changed his mind.’

I felt the grip of Kavan’s fingers on my arm relax. ‘Bueno!’ The sergeant closed his notebook. ‘You have the papers for this boat?’ he asked.

Kavan nodded.

‘I would like to have the papers. What is the port of registration?’

‘Southampton.’ Kavan’s voice had dropped to a whisper.

‘Also we would like to have your passport, senor. And if you have the record of the voyage …’ He stopped then, for Kavan had suddenly closed his eyes. He leaned over, clutching at me and retching violently. His hand reached out automatically for the pot, gripped it and the retching sound went on and on — dry, rasping and foodless, a horrible sound in the sullen stillness of the room. And then he dropped the pot and keeled over, his body suddenly limp.

I got hold of him and pushed him back into the bed. He was sweating and his face was ashen. I wiped his lips with my handkerchief. His eyes opened and he stared past me at the sergeant. ‘I’ll bring the papers later,’ he whispered, and then he closed his eyes again and seemed to pass into unconciousness.

I glanced at the sergeant. He was shaking his head and making little clicking sounds with his tongue. ‘He is bad, very bad. I am sorry, senor.’

Til get a doctor,’ I said.

‘Si, si. That is what he need — a doctor.’ He turned to the Customs officer and they began talking quickly, shrugging their shoulders and gesticulating. Several limes they glanced at the man’s body lying there on the bed, and their expressions were sympathetic. At length the sergeant turned to me. ‘Senor. Do you know if he has his passport?’

‘No,’ I said. ‘I don’t know. I think he had some papers with him, but I don’t know what they are. If you like I can bring them down to you?’

The sergeant nodded. ‘Bueno. If you will take them to the office of the douane down by the harbour, senor, they will be stamped. There is no necessity for him to come himself. Also, there is this paper to be completed.’ He handed me the usual immigration form. ‘As soon as he is sufficiently recovered, perhaps you will have him fill it in and bring it with you to the douane.’

‘Very well.’ As I opened the door for them, I asked the sergeant why the police were interested in Dr Kavan.

‘Oh, it is not we who are interested,’ he replied. ‘It is the British Consulate. It is they who ask us to watch for him.’

‘But why?’ I asked. ‘Were you going to arrest him or something?’

‘No. They just wish us to check his papers and report to them. I will inform them that he did not sail after all. Muy buenas, sefior.’

‘Muy buenas.’

I closed the door and turned to Kavan. His eyes were open now and he was listening to the tramp of their feet as they descended the stairs. He was still pale, but his eyes were alert. ‘Were you shamming?’ I said.

‘Ssh!’ He gestured for me to be quiet. ‘Go to the window and check that both of them leave the hotel.’

I walked to the window and pulled the curtains. A jeep was parked down in the street. As I peered out, the sergeant and the Customs officer came out of the hotel and got into it. There was the sound of a starter and then it drove off, turning down towards the plage. ‘They’ve gone,’ I said.

He breathed a sigh of relief and pulled himself up in the bed. ‘Now we’ll fix Wade’s passport. After that everything is straightforward. Will you telephone for a doctor, please?’

He was suddenly calm. He seemed to have no conception of the position he had put me in. I was angry and a little scared. Why couldn’t foreigners behave rationally? And now there was the problem of papers, passports, and official documents. I had committed myself without thinking about that. ‘You know the British Consulate are making inquiries about you?’ I said. And then, when he didn’t answer, I asked him why he’d had to pretend to be Wade. ‘What have you done that you have to hide your own identity?’

He looked at me then and said quietly, ‘I haven’t done anything.’

‘I don’t believe you,’ I said sharply. ‘When you saw the police, you panicked. You must have done something. If you want my help, you’d better tell me—’

‘I have done nothing,’ he repeated. ‘Absolutely nothing. Please, you must believe me. I have done nothing that you or any other British person can object to. I give you my word.’

‘Then why pretend to be Wade?’

He pushed his hands through his hair, which was soil dull and sticky with salt water. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Not yet. Maybe when I know you better — when we are out of Tangier.’ He lifted his head and stared out of the window. ‘I came here to start a new life. I have to sail here because it’s the only way I can get out of England. I am a stateless person, you see. And then the owner is lost overboard, the yacht is wrecked and, when I’m brought ashore, I find the police waiting for me there on the beach and asking me if I am Dr Jan Kavan. And then the man Kostos mistakes me for Wade.’ He looked up at me quickly. ‘What would you do? What would you do if you were in my shoes? It’s a gift from the gods. I accept it.’ His shoulders sagged and his voice fell away to a whisper: ‘And then I find my wife waiting there to greet me also — and she turns away because I have said I am Wade.’

He stared down at his feet, his pale hands gripped convulsively round his knees. ‘Last night -1 thought and thought, trying to find a way out. And then, this morning, I wake up and find the police here, and I’m scared. When you’re scared, the mind works very fast. I suddenly knew this was the only way out. I must be Wade. I must continue to be Wade until I am safe inside French Morocco. If I admit I am Jan Kavan, then there will be an inquiry into Wade’s disappearance and—’

‘Why should that worry you?’ I demanded. ‘You said last night—’

‘I told you the truth,’ he cut in quickly, and then glanced at me nervously as though trying to discover whether I believed him or not. ‘But I can’t tell them the truth,’ he added. ‘Once they know I’m Jan Kavan’ — he hesitated — ‘they will send me back to England. I know they will. I feel it. And I must get to Morocco. I must get to Morocco.’ He looked at me. ‘Please. You want a doctor, don’t you? You want a doctor for your Mission?’

‘Yes, but—’

‘Then you must let me enter French Morocco on Wade’s passport.’

‘But why should they send you back to England? What makes you think—’

‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ he shouted at me. His voice had that upward trend that it had had the night before when he’d been half hysterical with exhaustion. ‘Just leave it at that. Leave it at that.’

‘All right,’ I said, for he was in a desperately nervous state. ‘But if you enter Morocco on Wade’s passport, your own papers will have no entry stamp. You can’t work at the Mission unless your papers are in order.’

‘I understand.’ He nodded, his forehead wrinkled in thought. ‘But that is something we can sort out later. Maybe I lose my papers, maybe I forge the necessary stamp. I don’t know. But first I must get to Morocco. That is the important thing. And I can’t do that except on Wade’s passport.’

‘But, good heavens, man!’ I said. ‘You’re not Wade’s double, surely. There’s the photograph — the description and his signature, too — you’d never get away with it.’

‘Nonsense,’ he said, his tone suddenly more confident. ‘Do you think I learned nothing during the war? I was six years working in the laboratories at Essen and passing information to the British. Besides, don’t forget I have been shipwrecked.’ He dragged himself to his feet, standing a little unsteadily. And then his voice was suddenly agitated again. ‘Where’s the oilskin bag? I had a little oilskin bag tied round my neck. I had all the papers in it — everything. Did you see it? It wasn’t left on the beach, was it?’

‘No, it’s here somewhere,’ I said. I crossed over to the bed, wishing now that I’d had a look at it last night. ‘It’s among the bedclothes. I threw it here last night.’

But it wasn’t on the bed. It had slipped off on to the couch and was lying under the counterpane. He almost snatched it out of my hand as I held it out to him. ‘You’d better have some food,’ I suggested.

But he shook his head. ‘Not until I’ve seen a doctor.’ He suddenly smiled. It was almost as though the feel of that oilskin bag in his hands had given him back his confidence. ‘If he’s a good doctor, he’ll tell me I’m suffering from lack of food and if the police bother to enquire, they will not be surprised if I recover quickly’

Curiously, I found myself liking him. Behind the nervous tension and the almost neurotic fear of the authorities was a man of considerable personality, a man of drive and energy. Whatever he had done, whatever he was afraid of, he had guts. ‘What are you going to do about the passport?’ I asked.

‘Oh, that’s not too difficult,’ he said, shaking the contents of the oilskin bag out on to the bed. ‘Wade was about my build and colouring. He even had blue eyes-He was thinner and more wiry, that’s all.’ He tossed the blue-covered British passport across to me. ‘I’ll have to fix the photograph, of course.’

The passport was slightly damp, otherwise there was nothing to show that it had come through the surf of Jew’s Bay. On the first page there was the man’s name — Mr Roland Tregareth Wade — and on the next his description: Profession — Company director; Place of birth and date — St Austell, 10 April 1915; Residence — France; Height — 5 ft 11 ins; Colour of eyes — blue: Colour of hair — black. I turned the page and looked at the photograph. It showed him to be a rather good-looking man with a square forehead and black hair. But the cheeks were a little heavy, the broad, full-lipped mouth rather too easy-going, and there were link pouches under the eyes. It wasn’t a dissipated face and:: wasn’t a dishonest face, but somehow it wasn’t quite frank — it was the face of a man about whom one would have reservations.

I looked across at Kavan. ‘What about the photograph?’ I asked him.

But it didn’t seem to worry him. ‘They’re not to know that the passport was wrapped in oilskin,’ he said. ‘By the time they get it the pages will be damp and very dirty. The beard helps, too.’ He rasped his hand over his chin.

‘You seem to have it all worked out,’ I said.

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘A kindly Providence worked it all out for me.’

‘Well, I hope Providence realises its responsibility.’ My mind was running over the possible snags, conscious that I was thoroughly implicated in the whole business. I glanced down at the passport again, turning the pages. The visa section showed that Wade had travelled extensively — Germany, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Roumania — most of the satellite countries — and Egypt, as well as Britain and France. He had visas for French Morocco, Algeria and Spanish Morocco, but these were not counter-stamped with dates of entry. The final pages for currency were a mass of entries. I tossed the passport back on to the bed beside him. ‘I’ll go and get the patrone to ring for a doctor,’ I said.

He nodded. He had already picked up the passport and was padding across the room to the wash-basin.

By the time the doctor arrived Kavan was back in bed and the passport, now crumpled and dirty, was drying in the sun by the open window. I checked it through. The ink on Wade’s signature on the first page had run badly, so had the figures giving his height which was a good two inches taller than Kavan, and the upper half of the face in the photograph was almost obliterated by a dirty stain. The yacht’s certificate of registration had been treated in the same way, and Kavan had completed the form which the police sergeant had left, the signature shaky, but not unlike what could be deciphered of Wade’s signature.

The doctor was a young, thoroughly efficient Frenchman. He examined Kavan carefully and, after questioning him about what had happened, wrote a prescription for a tonic and advised a diet of meat broth and steak for the next two or three days. He left with a little bow and a handshake, and I went across to the Cypriot restaurant and got Kavan a tray of food. It was the first hot food he had had for over sixty hours.

The passport was almost dry and I took it, together with the other papers, down to the Customs House. There was no difficulty. The sergeant was there and he only gave a cursory glance at the passport before stamping it. Officially Kavan was now Wade and I walked out into the hot sunshine with a light heart and a feeling of relief. The way was now clear for me to return to Enfida.

It was odd, but I felt no qualms, no sense of apprehension. Just as soon as Kavan was fit to travel, I could shake the dust of Tangier off my feet. That was all I was thinking all out as I walked back to the hotel. Wade was dead. An investigation into how it happened would serve no useful purpose. There remained only the yacht. The waves were still pounding heavily at the sands and one of the Customs officers had told me that the wreck was breaking up fast. The Lloyd’s representative would have to be contacted about the insurance to avert suspicion. After that, the Wade who had arrived in Tangier could simply disappear.

I imagined Kavan would be sleeping after his food, but instead there was the sound of somebody talking beyond the closed door of my room. I hesitated, and then I heard a voice that I recognised say, ‘What you are running is no business of mine. I am interested only in the deeds of Kasbah Foum.’ It was Kostos.

Kavan made some reply that was inaudible, and then the Greek’s voice cut in: ‘You are lying. I know that you visited Marcel Duprez’s lawyers in Rouen. I know that — ‘ He stopped abruptly as I pushed open the door.

Kavan was sitting up in the bed, the blankets pulled rightly round his naked body. Kostos was standing by the couch. They were both looking towards the door as I entered. They were quite still like a tableau, and the tension in the room was something that you could feel. “What are you doing here, Kostos?’ I demanded angrily.

‘Nothing. Nothing that is to do with you. You keep out of this, Lat’am.’ His eyes switched to Kavan. ‘Think it over, my friend.’ He began buttoning up his raincoat. Ali is a fool. I tell him that when I know that in Cairo he arranges for you to act as the contact man. Your reputation is no dam’ good. But you double-cross me and you find yourself out on the Marchan with a knife in your back.’ He fished in the pocket of his waistcoat and flipped a piece of pasteboard on to the blankets on Kavan’s feet. ‘Come to my office as soon as you are recovered. An’ no more nonsense, you see. This is not Europe. This is North Africa, and all out there’ — he waved his hand towards the uncurtained windows — ‘it is an Arab world with only a thin layer of white peoples who tread a careful step.’ He put his hat on, pulling it down with a quick tug at the brim, and then turned to go -

As he passed me, he paused, tapping the side of his nose. ‘Not a sparrow falls. Remember, Lat’am. An’ don’t do nothing silly, eh?’ He pushed past me and went out, slamming the door behind him.

I turned to face Kavan, who was still sitting up in the bed. ‘What’s all this about?’ I demanded. ‘What did Kostos want?’

‘Some papers — a cargo. How the hell do I know? Kostos is a part of Wade’s world.’ He shrugged his shoulders. He wasn’t scared; not the way he had been when the police had been in the room. But there was a tautness in his voice that showed his uneasiness. ‘Wade was a crook,’ he added.

‘Then why in God’s name did you sail with him?’

‘I told you before — because I am a Czech and a refugee and it’s the only way I can get out of England.’

‘But if you knew he was a crook —?’

‘I didn’t discover that till later.’ He lay back and put his hands behind his head. ‘He came and saw me in London and it was agreed that I should sail with him to Tangier’ I knew nothing about him, except that he wanted — ‘ He stopped there. ‘Can I have a cigarette please?’

I handed him the packet and lit one myself. ‘Well, when did you discover he was running something?’ I asked.

‘We ran into a gale off Ushant,’ he said. ‘We could easily have slipped into the lee of the islands through the Chenal du Four and put into Brest. Instead, he stood out into the Atlantic, beating into the teeth of it to clear the coast of France. He said he wasn’t taking any chances. That’s how I knew.’

‘But what about the Customs when you left Falmouth?’

‘We didn’t clear Customs. He said there was no need.’

‘What was he running?’

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Currency, securities — how do I know? When I asked him, he told me to mind my own damn business. He didn’t talk about his own affairs.’

‘Did you know Kostos would be waiting for you when you arrived?’

‘Of course not.’

“But when he came up to you on the beach — why didn’t you tell him you weren’t Wade?’

He pushed himself up on to his elbow. ‘Because the police are there. Because I have to escape from myself, from all the past. Now leave it at that, will you?’ He lay back, breathing heavily. ‘I’m sorry, Latham,’ he murmured. ‘It’s just that I’m tired. As soon as we’re clear of Tangier — ‘

‘But we’re not clear of Tangier yet,’ I reminded him. “What exactly did Kostos say? Had he been here long?’

‘No.’ He hesitated, looking at me uncertainly out of the corners of his eyes. ‘He wanted some documents. He said that I’d been employed by an Arab to get them.

He meant, of course, that Wade had.’ He paused and then asked me if I knew anything about an Arab called Ali d’ Es-Skhira.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘He’s a nationalist; a fanatic. The French deported him from Morocco after he’d caused serious rioting in Marrakech. He lives in Tangier now. Why?’

‘Nothing. It doesn’t matter.’

‘What happened next?’

‘I told Kostos I hadn’t been able to get the documents’, and he got angry and called me a liar. Then you came in.’

‘Did Wade mention these documents to you?’

‘I told you, Wade didn’t talk about his affairs.’

He was trying to hide something. I could sense it. ‘Kostos described them as the deeds of Kasbah Foum.’ He stared at me sullenly, not saying anything. I went over and sat on the bed. ‘Now look here,’ I said. ‘You’re getting yourself mixed up in something dangerous. I know this town. I’ve been part of it — that was what turned me into a missionary. Kostos is not a man to play around with. And if you’re mixed up with Ali d’ Es-Skhira as well…’

‘But I’m not,’ he protested. ‘I don’t know anything about it.’

‘Oh yes, you do. You know all about this place Kasbah Foum. When you regained consciousness in this room last night, one of the first things you asked me — ‘

‘All right. I do know about Kasbah Foum. But it’s nothing to do with you, Latham.’ He was sitting up again and his voice was angry. We stared at each other for a moment and the atmosphere between us had grown suddenly tense. Then he gradually relaxed. ‘I’m sorry,’ he murmured. ‘Maybe later, when we’re out of this place, I’ll explain….’ He lay back and closed his eyes. There was an obstinate set to his mouth.

I hesitated. Maybe I could shock the truth out of him.

‘Tell me one thing,’ I said. ‘Did you get possession of those deeds after Wade went overboard — or before?’

His eyes flicked open and there was a surprised look on his face. ‘You mean — ‘ His mouth stayed open slightly, and then he rolled over in the bed so that he faced me. ‘Now listen, Latham. I didn’t kill Wade, if that’s what you’re getting at. It happened just as I told you.’

‘It was the deeds I asked about.’

‘The deeds?’ He stared at me.

‘When did you get them out of him?’

‘I didn’t get them out of him.’ His voice was angry. ‘How could I? He never had them.’

‘How do you know?’

‘Oh, for God’s sake!’ he shouted at me. ‘Leave it at that, will you? Wade didn’t have them.’

‘All right,’ I said, getting to my feet. ‘But it’s a pity you didn’t bother to convince Kostos of that.’ I stubbed out my cigarette. It was no good worrying about it. The thing to do was to get out of Tangier as quickly as possible. ‘How do you feel?’ I asked him. ‘I see you ate the steak I brought you.’

‘Yes.’ He smiled and added quickly, ‘It was the most wonderful steak I have ever eaten.’

‘And you weren’t sick?’

‘No.’

‘How do you feel then?’

‘Not too bad. A little tired, and my body’s still sore. Otherwise, I’m all right. I think I’ll try and get some sleep.’

‘Do you think you’ll be fit enough to travel tonight? There’s a train at nine thirty-five. We could be in Casablanca tomorrow morning in time to catch the day train to Marrakech.’

‘Is there a sleeper on the train tonight?’

‘Yes. I’ll try and book berths.’

There was a knock at the door. It was one of the hotel boys. The patrone had sent him up for Kavan’s passport. ‘What’s he want the passport for?’ Kavan asked. I explained that it was the custom in Tangier for the hotelier to hold visitors’ passports and he let the boy have it. ‘And bring the senor’s clothes up, will you?’ I told him.

‘Si, si, senor.’

When he had gone, Kavan began rummaging in the oilskin bag and produced a rather battered book that looked something like a ledger. ‘Do you think you could dispose of that for me?‘He held it out to me.

‘What is it?‘I asked.

‘It’s the Jog of the Gay Juliet. I brought it ashore with me as evidence of what happened to Wade. It should be burned now. Do you think you can manage that?’

‘Are you sure you want it destroyed?’ I asked him. ‘I could leave it with a friend of mine — just in case.’

‘No. I’m sure your friend is reliable, but — ‘ He shrugged his shoulders. ‘And I daren’t take it with me, just in case the douane decide to search me. Burn it, will you?’

‘I’ll see what I can do,’ I said. ‘What else did you bring ashore with you?’

‘My own papers and visas. There’s some money, too.’

‘How much?’

He glanced at me quickly. ‘Quite a lot.’

I explained to him then that the regulations only permitted him to take so much in cash into French Morocco. I suggested that I bank the excess for transfer to the Banque d’Etat at Marrakech and he agreed. Altogether there was over four hundred pounds, mainly in English notes. ‘Is this Wade’s or yours?’ I asked., He looked at me hard. ‘Does it matter? Wade wasn’t the sort to have dependants.’

There was a knock at the door and the boy came in with his clothes and my jacket. I slipped the notes into my hip pocket. The boy paused as he was arranging the clothes on a chair. He was staring at the oilskin bag which Kavan still held in his hands. The dark, Arab eyes met mine and then he turned abruptly and hurried out. “You said you’d lived in Tangier,’ Kavan said as the door dosed. ‘You know it well?’

‘Well enough to want to get out of it,’ I answered.

‘Can you find Karen for me then?’ His voice was suddenly urgent. ‘I must get in touch with her before we leave. I must tell her where I’m going. Can you do that for me?’

‘I don’t know.’ Tangier wasn’t a big place, not the European section of it. But there wasn’t much time. ‘The best chance would be through the immigration authorities.’

‘No, no. Don’t do that. Not the authorities. But you must know people here — somebody would know about her in a place like this. Please. Find out where she’s living and give her the address of the Mission. Tell her to write to me there as soon as she’s convinced that she’s not being watched. No, not to me. Tell her to write to you. That would be safer. Will you do that?’

‘I’ll try.’ I got my hat. ‘Better lock the door behind me,’ I said, and left him and went down the stairs and out into the bright sunlight of the streets.

I went first to Cook’s in the rue de Statut and was lucky enough to get two wagon-lit berths on the night train. Then I crossed the Zocco Grande to the British bank in the Siaghines where I arranged for Kavan’s money to be changed into Moroccan francs and transferred to the Mission’s account in Marrakech. It was then past midday and I cut up a side street to a small Italian cafe, and there I sat over my lunch and read Gay Juliet’s log.

Until then I think Wade had appeared to me as an almost mythical character. But he was real enough by the time I had finished his record of that winter voyage out from Falmouth. As a kid I had done a lot of sailing — that was back in the days when my father was alive, before he’d gone bankrupt. I knew enough about the sea to be able to interpret, in terms of physical conditions, such laconic statements as: ‘Wind Force 7, gusting 8. Direction S.W. Waves 20 feet, breaking heavily. Lay to under bare sticks, everything battened down. Jan very sick. Pumping every half hour.’ This was off Ushant and continued for fifteen hours. Sometimes he was less factual, more descriptive, as in the entry for November 30: ‘Light S.E. breeze off the land. Heavy swell with sea oily and black. Moon just lipping horizon. Ghosting along under Genoa — no sound except the grunt of porpoises. They have been with us all night, their movements visible on account of the phosphorescence, which is unusual at this time of the year. Jan fit now and has the makings of a good seaman. Pray God it doesn’t;tart to blow again. Both of us very tired.’

The log was something more than a bare record of speed, course and conditions. It was Wade’s personal record, entered up daily from the chart table data and going back over several voyages: Cannes to Naples,and back — Cannes to Palermo and on to the Piraeus, across to Alexandria and back to Nice by way of Valetta — Nice to Gibraltar. The yachts were all different, so were the crews. Sometimes he sailed single-handed. But always the same flowing, easy handwriting, the same graphic descriptive details running through the Mediterranean voyages and on to the final trip out from England. And then, suddenly, two pages from the last entry, the writing changed, became finer, neater, more exact. ‘Dec. 12 — 0245: Course 195°. Wind S.S.E. Force 3–4. Speed 5 knots. A terrible thing has happened. Roland lost overboard shortly after I relieved him. Time 0205 approx. Heavy swell running. Threw lifebelt to him and gybed to bring ship round…’

Wade was dead and Kavan was writing up his log.

There was a rather touching finality about that abrupt change in the writing. After all those hundreds of sea miles, logged and recorded between the brown board covers of the book, this bald statement that the sea had claimed him.

Whatever else the man had been, he was a fine yachtsman.

I rifled through the remaining twenty or so pages of the book. They were blank, except for the last two which contained odd jottings, reminders of things he had probably planned on the long night watches. They were under port headings, such as Naples — see Borgioli — Ring Ercoli — Votnero 23-245 — Cheaper to slip here and get top sides blown off and repainted (Luigi Cantorelli’s yard) etc. I glanced quickly to the last entry and there, sure enough, was the heading TANGIER and underneath — Michel Kostos, 22 rue de la Grande Mosquee. Tel. 237846. There were several other names and telephone numbers and then a note — Try to contact Ed White. Wazerzat 12 (Lavin, Roche et Lavin).

I sat drinking my coffee and wondering about this last entry. Lavin, Roche et Lavin was obviously the name of a French firm and Wazerzat looked like the phonetic spelling of an Arab town — Ouarzazate, for instance.

I closed the book slowly and finished my coffee. Reading that log had brought the man to life in my mind. Reluctantly, I called the patrone and had him take me through into the kitchen, and there I thrust the book down into the red hot coals of the range. I found myself muttering a prayer for him as it burst into flames. The book should have been consigned to the sea.

Coming back into the cafe, I noticed an Arab sitting in the far corner, by the window. I hadn’t seen him come in. I suppose I had been too engrossed in the story of Wade’s voyages. There was something familiar about his face. I paid my bill and, as I walked out, our eyes met and I remembered that he had been in the bank when I had arranged for the transfer of Kavan’s money. He had quick, intelligent eyes and a hard, aquiline face. His djellaba was of the smooth, grey gaberdine favoured by the richer guides and pimps and he wore brown European shoes.

I turned up into the Arab town, climbing quickly towards the kasbah. I wanted to take a look at Jews’ Bay — and I wanted to quash the suspicion that had suddenly crossed my mind.

ť From the Naam Battery I looked down to the sea and across the width of Jews’ Bay. The sea was blue and sparkled in the sunshine. The water of the bay was faintly corrugated and there was a fringe of white where the swell broke on the golden sand. It was a quiet, peaceful scene, utterly at variance with my memories of what it had been like down there less than twenty-four hours ago. There was no sign of the wreck, but a small motor launch was hovering around the spot where the yacht had struck. I turned and walked back to the Place du Tabor, and there was the Arab I had left sitting in the cafe.

It was just possible, of course, that it was a coincidence. There were always guides hanging around the Place du Tabor. I cut down the rue Raid-Sultan, past the old palace — the Dar el Makhzen — and the treasury and into the labyrinth of alleys that run steeply down to the Zocco Chico. It was cool and quiet, but the roar of the markets drifted up to me on the still air like the murmur of a hive. I reached an intersection where the main alley descended in shallow steps through a tunnel formed by the houses. A narrower passage, leading I knew to a cul-de-sac, ran off at right angles and close by a baby sunning itself in an open doorway. I slipped into the doorway and waited.

Almost immediately I heard the patter of slippers hurrying down to the intersection. It was the same Arab. He hesitated an instant, glancing along the empty passage of the cul-de-sac. Then he dived into the tunnel of the main alley and went flapping down the steps like an ungainly bird.

There was no doubt about it now. I was being followed. The thought that a man like Kostos was now in a position to do this to me made me unreasonably angry. I went on down the alley and came out into the Zocco Chico. The Arab was waiting for me there. His face showed relief as he saw me, and then he looked away. I went straight up to him. ‘Who told you to follow me?’ I asked him angrily in Spanish. He started to walk away, but I caught hold of him by the arm and swung him round. ‘Was it Senor Kostos?’ Recognition of the name showed in his eyes. ‘All right,’ I said. ‘We’re going back to the Hotel Malabata now.’ I let him go and turned up by the Spanish Church, walking fast.

He was close behind me as I entered the hotel. I went straight over to the reception desk where the patrone was sitting and demanded my bill and both our passports.

‘You are leaving Tangier, senor?’ He was a sallow-faced, oily little man with discoloured teeth and a large, hooked nose. I think he was of mixed Arab-Spanish blood. His eyes stared at me inquisitively over the rim of deep, fleshy pouches. His interest made me suspicious. •My bill,’ I said. ‘I’m in a hurry.’

He glanced up at the clock above his head. It was just after three. ‘Already you have missed the train, senor. The next one does not depart until twenty-one hundred thirty-five.’

‘I’m still in a hurry,’ I said.

He shrugged his shoulders and started making out the bill. His eyes kept shifting to my face as he wrote.

They were full of curiosity. Through the open doorway I could see the Arab waiting patiently across the street.

‘There will be a small addition for the other senor.’

‘That’s all right.’

He put down his pen. ‘He can have your room if he wishes.’ He stared at me. ‘Or do you both leave Tangier together?’

‘Give me the bill,’ I said. He met my gaze for an instant and then his eyes dropped shiftily.

I settled the bill and he gave me my passport with the change. ‘It is necessary for you to complete this paper, senor. It is for the police.’ He was smiling at me craftily as he handed me the printed form which I should have filled in on arrival. He knew that the information I had to give included the address of my destination. When I had completed it, all but this one item, I hesitated. Then I wrote in the Pension de la Montagne. It was the pension from which we had seen the yacht being blown into Jews’ Bay. In the old days there had been no telephone there. I handed the form back to him and he glanced at it quickly, almost eagerly. ‘I’d like my friend’s passport, too,’ I said.

But he shook his head. ‘I am sorry, senor. He must collect it himself and complete the paper for the police.’

I nodded. ‘All right,’ I said, and went up to the room. Kavan unlocked the door for me. He had had a wash and was dressed in his underclothes. ‘I’m glad you’re up,’ I said. ‘Get dressed quickly. We’re leaving at once.’

He reacted instantly to the urgency in my voice. ‘Why? What’s happened?’

‘It’s your friend Kostos.’ And I explained how I had been followed. ‘The man’s waiting for us outside now. We’ve got to lose him before we get on that train. And I don’t trust the patrone here either.’

‘Did you find Karen?’ he asked.

‘No. We can do that later when we’ve got rid of this Arab. Come on. Hurry.’ Thank heavens he looked a lot better.

He didn’t argue and when he’d got into his clothes, I sent him down to get his passport while I finished packing my, case. ‘There’s a form to fill in,’ I told him as he was going out. ‘For destination put the Pension de la Montagne. It’s out of town and it’ll take them some time to check that we’re not there.’

He nodded, stuffing the oilskin bag into his pocket. ‘I’ll wait for you downstairs.’

When I went down to join him, I heard his voice raised in altercation with the patrone. It was something to do with the passport and they were shouting at each other in French. ‘Then why did Monsieur Latham tell me to come down here to get it?’ Kavan demanded agitatedly. He caught sight of me then and said, ‘This idiot says he gave you my passport.’

The patrone nodded his head emphatically. ‘Si, si, senor. Did you not ask for both the passports — yours and that of senor here?’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘But you refused to give me his. You said he must collect it personally and fill in the form at the same time.’

‘No, no. It is true about the paper. But I give you the passport.’ He turned to the hotel boy standing by the desk. ‘Did I not give the senor both the passports?’

‘Si, si, si.’ The Arab nodded.

It was the same boy who had come up to my room the previous night to collect Kavan’s wet clothes. And suddenly I knew why the patrone had wanted these clothes. He had been told to check through the pockets. ‘Do you know a Greek called Kostos?’ I asked him.

The man’s eyes narrowed slightly. He didn’t say anything, but I knew I was right. Kostos was at the back of this passport nonsense, too. I sent the Arab boy for a taxi. ‘If you haven’t produced that passport by the time the taxi arrives,’ I told the patrone, ‘I’m going straight to the British Consul.’

He shrugged his shoulders, but there was a frightened look in his shifty eyes.

‘Now come on,’ I said. ‘Hand it over.’

But he shook his head obstinately and reiterated his statement that he’d already given it to me.

‘All right,’ I said. ‘We’ll see what the Consul and the police think of that story.’

Kavan plucked at my arm. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ he whispered urgently. ‘I’ve still got my own papers.’ His face was white and the twitch at the corner of his mouth had started again.

‘That’s no good,’ I said. ‘They’re not stamped as having entered Tangier. You’d never get across the frontier.’

‘But — ‘ His mouth stayed open. He was trembling. I thought he was scared because he was a refugee and in a bureaucratic world; refugees have no existence unless their papers are in order. But it wasn’t that. ‘I’m not going to the Consulate,’ he hissed. ‘Whatever happens, I’m not going to the Consulate. We’ve got to get that passport.’

I glanced at the patrone. His greasy face was sullen and obstinate and frightened. ‘It’s no good,’ I said. ‘Kostos must have some kind of hold over him. We’re not going to get it.’

‘But we must. We must.’

‘If you hadn’t called yourself Wade and got mixed up with Kostos,’ I said angrily, ‘this would never have happened.’ ‘The taxi arrived then and I turned to the patrone, giving him one more chance to produce it. But he only shrugged his shoulders and called on the saints to witness the truth of what he was saying.

‘All right,’ I said, and I got Kavan out to the taxi and bundled him in. The Arab moved towards us from the opposite corner of the street. ‘Le Consulat Britannique,’ I ordered the driver. ‘Vite, vite!’

Kavan caught hold of my arm as the taxi drove off. ‘It’s no good,’ he cried. ‘I won’t go to the Consulate. I won’t go, I tell you.’ He was wrought up to a point of hysteria. ‘Tell him to stop.’ He leaned quickly forward to tap on the glass partition.

But I pulled him back, struggling with him. ‘Don’t be a fool!’ I shouted at him. ‘You wanted to call yourself Wade. Well, now you’ve got to be Wade until we’re out of Tangier. And you won’t get out till we’ve recovered that passport.’

‘There must be some other way. I could slip across the frontier….’ He reached forward to the partition again, but I flung him back into his seat. ‘What are you scared of?’ I demanded, shaking him. I was suddenly furiously angry, fed up with the whole wretched business. ‘Why are you frightened of the Consul? What is it you’ve done?’

‘Nothing. I told you before. I’ve done nothing. Absolutely nothing.’ His voice was trembling. He seemed on the verge of tears he was so wrought up. ‘I promise you. Please. Tell the driver to stop.’

‘No,’ I said, holding him down. ‘I’ve had enough of this.’ My voice sounded hard. ‘We’re going to see the Consul. Either that or you tell me why you’re scared to go there. Did you kill Wade?’

‘No.’ He stared at me, his body shocked rigid. ‘It happened just as I said.’

‘Then what the devil is it you’re scared of? Why did you insist on taking his name? Come on now,’ I added, gripping hold of his arm. ‘If you want any more help from me, you’d better give me the whole story.’

He stared at me, his white, frightened face outlined against the dark leather of the cab. ‘All right,’ he whispered, and his body relaxed under my hand as though a weight had been lifted from him. ‘All right, I’ll tell you.’ He leaned back in his seat as though exhausted. ‘I have told you I am a scientist.’ I nodded. ‘Have you lived here so long in North Africa that you don’t know what that means?’ He leaned quickly forward, his face becoming excited again. ‘It means you have something here — ‘ He tapped his forehead. ‘And because of that your life is not your own any more. It belongs to the State. I am a Czech. If you take me to the Consulate, then I shall be sent back to England, and sooner or later they will get me. Or else life will become so insupportable …’

‘Who will get you?’ I asked.

‘Who? The Communists, of course. The Czech Communists.’

‘But for heaven’s sake!’ I exclaimed. ‘You’re a refugee. You’ve been given political asylum. You were perfectly safe in England.’

‘Safe?’ He laughed. ‘You say that because you are English, because you have never been a refugee! Listen. When I fled to England in 1949, everything was all right. But then, after the Fuchs business, there was a new screening and it was discovered I had been a Communist.’

‘But if you were a Communist — ‘

‘I was not a Communist,’ he declared violently. ‘I have never been a Communist — not in the sense of the word as it is used now. But I joined the Party in 1938, after Munich. A great many of us joined then. It seemed our only hope. And afterwards, when the war was over, I forgot all about it. I didn’t think it mattered after I had fled from Czechoslovakia. I had left my wife to escape the Communists. I thought that was sufficient.’

‘I still don’t see what you’re frightened of,’ I said. ‘Are you trying to tell me that our.people were going to send you back to Czechoslovakia?’

‘No, no, of course not. Oh, God! I knew you wouldn’t understand. The British refused to let me leave the country. That’s why I had to come with Wade in a boat. It isn’t the British I am afraid of. But if I go back there … Listen, please. When I ignored the offers from Prague, they began sending me Party literature as though I were a member, they stopped me in the street, phoned me at the office, sent anonymous letters to the authorities denouncing me as a paid Communist agent. They even sent me letters in code from Prague. Finally they began to threaten. They were going to arrest Karen and my father. They would have been sent to the uranium mines or, worse still, into Russia, to Siberia.’

‘But your wife’s here now,’ I said.

‘I know, I know. But how do I know she is here of her own free will?’ He caught hold of my arm, shaking it excitedly. ‘Please, please, try to understand. If I am sent back to England, it will start all over again. I couldn’t stand it. No man’s nerves could stand it. But here … Wade will disappear and there is nothing, absolutely nothing, to connect an obscure doctor at a Mission in the Atlas Mountains with the scientist who is missing in England.’ He was sweating and his face was all puckered up with the urgency of what he was trying to convey. ‘Please. You must help me. There must be some way out of Tangier. There must be some way.’

The taxi was just turning into the rue d’Angleterre. I could see the arched entrance to the Consulate. ‘Maybe there is,’ I said and leaned forward and slid back the glass partition. ‘Drive down to the Zocco Grande,’ I told the driver. I couldn’t very well do anything else. Half of his fears were probably imaginary, but they were real enough to him. The taxi turned the corner by the entrance to the Consulate and drove on down the hill, and he was suddenly crying. Tears of relief were welling out of his eyes. ‘Thank you,’ he breathed. ‘Thank you.’

Poor devil! I leaned back in my seat, thinking back over the events of the past twenty-four hours. If I hadn’t pulled him out of the sea … But I had and now he was my responsibility. Somehow I’d got to get him out of the International Zone and into Morocco. It was a problem — the sort of problem that required inside knowledge of the working of Tangier. There had been a time …

I glanced at my watch. It was ten past three. Unless they had altered the flight schedules, we could still be at the airport in time to meet the Paris-Casablanca plane. I hesitated, wondering whether Vareau was still a clerk at the airport. Once, a long time back, I had got a man out that way, and his papers had lacked the necessary entry stamp. It was worth trying. ‘We’ll get another taxi in the Zocco Grande,’ I said, more to myself than to him. ‘And we’ll have to hurry. We’ve got to buy you a new suit and be out at the airport before four.’

He gripped my hand. ‘I shall never be able to thank you,’ he said.

‘You haven’t thanked me yet for saving your life,’ I said harshly. ‘Better leave thanksgiving until we’re both of us safely out of Tangier.’