White Eagles Over Serbia

CHAPTER SIX. Further Perplexities

Carter took him to lunch that day, and afterwards they drove out along the loops of the Sava river with its melancholy avenues of giant willows, talking in desultory fashion about their project. Porson came with them and enlivened the afternoon with his ribaldries, and his accounts of the trials and tribulations of secretaries. By tea-time the bag arrived and Methuen claimed the large cardboard box which contained his fancy dress. There was a note attached to it from Boris which read: “Herewith your cloak of invisibility. Hope you don’t clank.” He carried off this prize to the privacy of Carter’s villa and after locking himself in the bedroom tried out his disguise. “Gosh,” said Carter hovering between admiration and laughter as he saw the progressive stages of Mr. Judson’s transformation. “What do you think?” said Methuen with a touch of self-consciousness. He turned away from the mirror and faced his companion. On his head he wore a stained and moth-eaten fur cap of an unmistakably Serbian cast. His feet were clad in patched riding-boots with the traditional concertina-like frill at the ankles. A dirty shirt and waistcoat and a woollen scarf offset a pair of nondescript breeches cut vaguely after the fashion of jodhpurs. “But this,” he said, spreading the wings of his coat, “this is the masterpiece.” Boris had taken an old blue seaman’s jacket made in heavy duffle. Inside he had fixed two great poacher’s pockets as well as a pistol sling. Together with the inside and outside pockets it would be possible to carry all his small gear on his back. “Clank I probably will,” said Methuen to himself, “but this will help me to move house in a hurry if I need.”

“It really is very good,” said Carter with envy. “Only you can’t start from here looking so darned bucolic. You’ll have to change in the car. There’ll be plenty of room actually.”

“So be it,” said Methuen, starting to resume his formal black chartered accountant’s uniform. The cardboard box was carefully locked away in Carter’s safe against the journey, and Mr. Judson returned to the Embassy to wrestle with the accounts. In fact he spent an exhausting hour with Porson going over the whole journey in detail, and most particularly with that part of it which concerned him most. He was glad that there was a short breathing spell before he undertook the next and most hazardous part of the adventure. He liked to feel his way into the part he was to play, and to let all the available evidence fall into a pattern in his mind.

Having prepared himself as well as he reasonably could for the hazards of the trip he asked Carter to take him out to dinner, and if possible to the opera. He wanted to make a complete break with the subject of his preoccupation: to let it simmer on in the subconscious while he was left free to be, for however short a time, a normal man, enjoying everyday things. But the mind is a capricious thing. Once started along a train of reasoning it is not easy to sidetrack it with lighter distractions; moreover the mind itself, when busy with a problem, is often like a hound on the scent. Without any conscious effort it leads one further and further along the road of inquiry, picking up evidence.

How else can one account for the fact that Methuen, finding he had an hour to spare before the Embassy closed, strolled into the central registry and asked for the master-file containing the despatches written during the last few months. He was simply amusing himself and collecting a little political background material. But idly reading through the despatches, his attention was drawn to one which described the nature and contents of radio broadcasts from Belgrade. After summarizing the various types of programme the report referred to the “apparently endless series of national poems which are broadcast one at a time, after the eight o’clock news every evening by the famous actress Sophia Marie”. Something in the back of his mind told him that there was a clue to be discovered behind this simple observation and it was with a pleasant sense of anticipation that he turned to the files of the BBC monitoring station — that prodigious organization which records almost every radio programme in the world. It was not difficult to turn up the broadcasts in question. The titles of the poems read were neatly listed and Methuen saw, with some emotion, that the little poem, part of which has already been quoted, was the first to be broadcast, and was repeated twice during the first week.

He took this fragment of information along to Carter, who refused to be excited by it. “It is most likely just a coincidence. After all, every schoolboy is given a pretty steady diet of these damned epics and folk-songs. I listen to these recitations you know: my Serbian teacher makes me do it as pronunciation practice. In fact I’m working from the very book that Sophia Marie is reading from; I remember noticing that she is using The National Treasury because she gives the number of each poem at the beginning and end of the transmission.”

“Could I see your copy?”

Carter obligingly ferreted it out from among a stack of papers and Methuen retired once more to the central registry and reopened the monitoring files. The broadcasts had begun about three months previously — in fact just about the time that reports of the first arrests of Royalist “bandits” had begun to be published. If only he could trace the smallest connection between one thing and the other.… Methuen sighed deeply and shook his head as he read through the highly coloured romances of feudal times. What a jumble of Slav imagery to wander through! How could there be any kind of message embedded in all this? Nevertheless he noticed one thing of interest. Several of the poems had been repeated twice by the actress. “Suppose,” he said to himself, “there was some kind of message to be passed. Repeating a poem might draw attention to it. The listener would know that a twice-repeated poem was one containing a message.”

This was all very well; but the poems themselves offered very little foothold for his theory. He was putting away his files when Carter and Porson came down with their red despatch-cases and found him waiting there. “Closing time,” said Porson. “Away with dull care. Carter and I are going to take you out to dinner, old man. You will be allowed to choose it of course.”

“Did you have any luck?” said Carter.

“None at all.”

“Bad luck. I thought there was nothing in it.”

“Nevertheless I’ll take your book home if you don’t mind and re-read the poems I’ve marked as having been twice recited.”

But he was not happy at dinner; his mind was tugging at the problem as if it were on a leash. A curious kind of sixth sense told him that there was something to be made of this jumble of words if only he could find the key.

They dined in one of the only three eating-places available to foreigners: for almost every restaurant in Belgrade had been turned into a canteen where the ragged and half-starved proletariat queued up for its ration of ill-cooked food. Around them in the gloomy ill-lit Majestic Hotel sat the sleek and shaven members of the police and the party, and the fat sleepy members of the intelligentsia — the artists and writers who had given in. An air of desperate, shiftless boredom reigned over everything. Porson made one or two desperate sallies, which fell flat upon the stale air of the place. Then he too fell silent. “I hope”, said Methuen, “that I am not depressing you. The truth is those damned folk-songs and epics are still going round and round in my mind. I feel there’s something very obvious which I have missed there.” Carter smiled and shook his head: ‘False scent,” he said. “I bet you a fiver.”

“My concern”, said Porson, “is gastronomic. This omelette tastes like Stalin’s moustache.”

They walked out into the main square of the town together and Methuen smelt the curious stale smell that the Yugoslav public seemed to carry everywhere with them: sour sunflower-oil and rancid kaimak. It hurt him to see how shabby and frightened everyone looked. He had heard of police terror but this was the first time he had come across anything which permeated the very air of the town. The silence, too, was extraordinary; nobody sang or talked aloud, there were no shouts or whistling. Only the dull clump of boots on the broken and scarred pavements of the town. The scattered street lamps carved great pools of black shadow under the trees. At the door of the opera a crowd seethed, waiting to buy rejected tickets. They made a way for the foreigners and looked at them with a hang-dog air of sheepish envy. At the same time two large sleek limousines drew up at the door and the chauffeurs raced to open the car doors for a small group of high party officials. At once there came a burst of sycophantic clapping which echoed in the hollow street like a burst of machine-gun fire.

The performance of Fidelio was preceded by a speech about its dialectical significance by a young man with wavy hair who spoke with a strong provincial accent. He was very nervous and gabbled out his speech from a typescript. It consisted of a rigmarole about Marxist values and the meaning of art for the people. The audience waited in painful silence for it to end, and Methuen, watching the rows and rows of haggard faces from the box which had been placed at the Embassy’s disposal, felt once more a stirring of pity for the boisterous, good-natured lackadaisical Serbs he had once known. There were a number of smartly dressed officers in the stalls, but what was so striking was the shabbiness of the women. Their clothes looked like the hastily improvised remnants of a jumble sale; they wore no make-up, and there was hardly a head of waved hair. For the most part they wore their hair brushed stiffly back and pinned with a cheap bone slide. “There it is,” said Porson in a whisper, “drink it all in.”

“I am,” said Methuen grimly.

The young man on the stage spluttered to the end of his speech and stood aside; the lights began to tremble down. At this moment a spark of recognition flickered in a pair of dark eyes and Methuen sat up. There was a face he knew. For a moment he could not remember where he had met Vida — all he could remember was her name. And then, as he held her eyes with his and answered her look of recognition he remembered. In Bari at the end of the war she had served on his staff as an interpreter. Her father had been a noted Royalist diplomat and had died abroad. Vida had been brought up in France and had served in the Free French Forces throughout the war. She had been loaned to Methuen, and he had been most concerned to hear that she had returned to Yugoslavia after the liberation. Yet here she was, large as life, sitting with a half-smile of recognition on her face, not ten feet from him.

He turned and whispered to Porson: “I think I see someone I know. Will you lend me your mackintosh and beret at the first interval? I might get a chance to speak to her.” Porson seemed rather startled but he agreed breathlessly. He could not resist adding: “For God’s sake be careful. She may be working for OZNA, you know.” But Methuen had already thought of that. Yet from what he knew of the old Vida, the serious dark-haired child of royalist Serbia, he was sure of one thing: she would not give him away.

She seemed to be alone as she spoke to no one, and from time to time, even in the velvety half-light, Methuen could feel her eyes resting upon him. As the lights went up for the interval he stared hard at her and then rose; in the shadowy space at the back of the box he struggled into Porson’s mackintosh, and once he was in the corridor he put on the old grey beret which appeared to be the sixth secretary’s favourite defence against the rain. It was not ineffective as a disguise, for the mackintosh was old and shabby and hid his neat dark suit. Certainly he was not conspicuous in the shabby crowd which had already filled the foyer with the fumes of acrid cigarette-smoke. He shuffled across the marble floor and took up a position against a pillar, studying some notices of forthcoming productions. He did not as yet know whether Vida would come, and he was quite startled to feel the touch of her hand on his arm and hear her say in a low voice: “Zdravo, Comrade.” He greeted her without turning round, and together they stood examining the notices intently. At their backs stood a small group of students debating something with tolerable loudness; conversation was possible though he could feel from Vida’s tone of voice how afraid she was.

“I need your help,” said Methuen in a low urgent voice. “What have you been doing since last we met?”

“Everything,” she replied. “Now I am working for them, for the OZNA. My family is in a concentration camp.” He glanced sideways and saw once more that proud dark face with its cleanly cut nose and mouth. There are people whose basic truthfulness shines out of their eyes, and looking into hers, Methuen knew that she had not changed. “My dear,” he said, “can’t you get out?” She shook her head. “But I am working for us too,” she added in a passionate whisper. “We must try and overturn this unjust system. Methuen, do they know in England?” A heavily built officer came up and stood beside Methuen to study the notices, shouldering them both aside to do so.

“No,” he whispered.

“Our people admired and loved England. They cannot believe that England is helping these Communists.”

Her eyes flashed and her hands clenched. For a moment Methuen feared she might burst out into a violent denunciation of the régime. He took her hand and pressed it. “The white eagles?” he said, and at the words an extraordinary change came over her.

“You know about us?”

“A little.”

“Can you help us in England? Please, tell all who care for liberty and decency. Please help our cause.” It was the old passionate Vida kindling behind the mask of a prematurely aged woman. “Tell me about yourselves,” said Methuen. “We don’t know enough about you. You distrust us.”

“I know. And with cause! Did you not put our friend into power here?” She nodded towards a portrait of Tito on the foyer wall. A bell rang sourly and people began to stub out their cigarettes before drifting back into the auditorium. “I must go,” she said, “I must go.” “Wait,” he said, “I must talk to you. Can we meet?” Her eyes darkened with fear and she hesitated. “Please,” he said, “I may help you.” She thought for a moment, a prey to confused emotions. Then at last her proud little face hardened again and she said: “Tomorrow at the picture gallery in the Kalemigdan, the Turkish fort. Twelve. No greetings, please.”

She slipped through the doors and was gone. Methuen went back to the box, a prey to conflicting emotions of triumph and uncertainty. If she were working for the OZNA she might report him and cause him trouble. On the other hand if she were really the Vida who had worked with him for two years he could be tolerably sure that she would not give him away — especially if she were really a member of the White Eaglesl Meeting her might turn out to have been a stroke of real luck.

Throughout the rest of the performance he was restless, and unable to concentrate on the music, which pursued its listless course in the semi-darkness like a shallow but noisy river. Long before the end of the last scene he felt he had had enough and, obtaining the consent of his hosts, rose to leave; nor were Porson and Carter sorry to accompany him, for both were eager to hear if his rendezvous had been a success or not. They walked back through the ill-lit streets to the hotel where Porson’s car was parked while he gave them an account of the meeting, and of his plans for the morrow.

“I must say it’s a stroke of luck,” said Carter, “if you feel you can trust her not to give you away.”

“At any rate if I am starting the day after tomorrow I shall not be in evidence here. The OZNA would have to trace me before it can have me followed. Incidentally is one followed here?”

Porson groaned. “Of course.”

“Not inside the theatre.”

“No. But there was a leather man waiting outside for us.”

“I’m getting unobservant,” said Methuen.

“Cars are only followed if they cross a check point on the three roads outside Belgrade unattended by an OZNA car.”

“I shall have to drop off in town somewhere,” said Methuen, “for the meeting tomorrow.”

They returned to Porson’s flat and over a drink discussed the problem anew before they went their ways to bed.

“I think the omens are good,” said the lanky young diplomat with a solemnity and deliberation much heightened by the whisky he had drunk. “Dashed good. We shall probably all get gongs in the New Year Honours List. I shall pass over the head of Marriot into a fine post as Counsellor. What will you choose, Methuen?”

“My pension and a small flat in London,” said Methuen who was apt to take things literally. “But,” he added lamely, “I could have had either these ten years.”

“Ah!” said Porson pointing a scraggy finger. “You are a work mystic. You cannot stop working. Must go on. You will end with ulcers and a knighthood.”

“I don’t know,” said Methuen with a twinkle. “I wouldn’t mind that either.” All of a sudden he felt an immense weariness as he thought of the hills outside there, in the heart of Serbia, with their secret; he heard the echo of the rivers as they bored their way through the gorges, throwing up spray. How beautiful a place it was! Yet sudden death might lurk at every corner. “Me for bed,” he said, though he was unwilling to leave the comfortable arm-chair.

That night Carter was surprised and somewhat touched to find him kneeling by his bed in prayer, dressed in his coarse, faded woollen pyjamas with the brown stripe. “I just came in to see that you were all right,” he said apologetically. “Yes,” said Methuen. “I was just saying my prayers. Always have done it since I was a child. I never sleep well if I don’t.”

“Prayers!” said Carter to himself, getting into bed and switching off the light. “Well, he’ll need some prayers where he’s going.”