At the other end of the road there was a taxi rank. He stood there bowed against the wall, a sick man, until Cholmondeley came out.
He said, 'Follow that taxi,' and sank back with a sense of relief, moving back up Charing Cross Road, Tottenham Court Road, the Euston Road where all the bicycles had been taken in for the night and the second-hand car dealers from that end of Great Portland Street were having a quick one, before they bore their old school ties and their tired tarnished bonhomie back to their lodgings. He wasn't used to being hunted; this was better: to hunt.
Nor did the meter fail him. He had a shilling to spare when Mr Cholmondeley led the way in by the Euston war memorial to the great smoky entrance and rashly he gave it to the driver: rashly because there was a long wait ahead of him with nothing but his hundred and ninety-five pounds to buy a sandwich with. For Mr Cholmondeley led the way with two porters behind him to the left-luggage counter, depositing there three suitcases, a portable typewriter, a bag of golf clubs, a small attache case and a hat-box. Raven heard him ask from which platform the midnight train went.
Raven sat down in the great hall beside a model of Stephen-son's 'Rocket'. He had to think. There was only one midnight train. If Cholmondeley was going to report, his employers were somewhere in the smoky industrial north; for there wasn't a stop before Nottwich. But again he was faced with his wealthy poverty; the numbers of the notes had been circulated everywhere; the booking clerks would almost certainly have them. The trail for a moment seemed to stop at the barrier to Number 3 platform.
But slowly a plan did form in Raven's mind as he sat under the 'Rocket' among the bundles and crumbs of sandwich-eaters. He had a chance, for it was possible that the ticket-collectors on the trains had not been given the numbers. It was the kind of loophole the authorities might forget. There remained, of course, this objection: that the note would eventually give away his presence on the north-bound tram. He would have to take a ticket to the limit of the journey and it would be easy enough to trace him to the town where he alighted. The hunt would follow him, but there might be a time lag of half a day in which his own hunt could get nearer to his prey. Raven could never realize other people; they didn't seem to him to live in the same way as he lived; and though he bore a grudge against Mr Cholmondeley, hated him enough to kill him, he couldn't imagine Mr Cholmondeley's own fears and motives. He was the greyhound and Mr Cholmondeley only the mechanical hare; but in this case the greyhound was chased in its turn by another mechanical hare.
He was hungry, but he couldn't risk changing a note; he hadn't even a copper to pass him into the lavatory. After a while he got up and walked the station to keep warm among the frozen smuts, the icy turbulence. At eleven-thirty he saw from behind a chocolate machine Mr Cholmondeley fetch his luggage, followed him at a distance until he passed through the barrier and down the length of the lit train. The Christmas crowds had begun; they were different from the ordinary crowd, you had a sense of people going home. Raven stood back in the shadow of an indicator and heard their laughter and calls, saw smiling faces raised under the great lamps; the pillars of the station had been decorated to look like enormous crackers. The suitcases were full of presents, a girl had a sprig of holly in her coat, high up under the roof dangled a bough of mistletoe lit by flood-lamps. When Raven moved he could feel the automatic rubbing beneath his arm.
At two minutes to twelve Raven ran forward, the engine smoke was blowing back along the platform, the doors were slammed. He said to the collector at the barrier: 'I haven't time to get a ticket. I'll pay on the train.'
He tried the first carriages. They were full and locked. A porter shouted to him to go up front, and he ran on. He was only just in time. He couldn't find a seat, but stood in the corridor with his face pressed against the pane to hide his hare-lip, watching London recede from him: a lit signal box and inside a saucepan of cocoa heating on the stove, a signal going green, a long line of blackened houses standing rigid against the cold-starred sky; watching because there was nothing else to do to keep his lip hidden, but like a man watching something he loves slide back from him out of his reach.
2
Mather walked back up the platform. He was sorry to have missed Anne, but it wasn't important. He would be seeing her again in a few weeks. It was not that his love was any less than hers but that his mind was more firmly anchored. He was on a job; if he pulled it off, he might be promoted; they could marry. Without any difficulty at all he wiped his mind clear of her.
Saunders was waiting on the other side of the barrier. Mather said, 'We'll be off.'
'Where next?'
'Charlie's.'
They sat in the back seat of a car and dived back into the narrow dirty streets behind the station. A prostitute put her tongue out at them. Saunders said, 'What about J-J-J-Joe's?'
'I don't think so, but we'll try it.'
The car drew up two doors away from a fried-fish shop. A man sitting beside the driver got down and waited for orders. 'Round to the back, Frost,' Mather said. He gave him two minutes and then hammered on the door of the fish shop. A light went on inside and Mather could see through the window the long counter, the stock of old newspapers, the dead grill. The door opened a crack. He put his foot in and pushed it wide. He said,'
'Evening, Charlie,' looking round.
'Mr Mather,' Charlie said. He was as fat as an eastern eunuch and swayed his great hips coyly when he walked like a street woman.
'I want to talk to you,' Mather said.
'Oh, I'm delighted,' Charlie said. 'Step this way, Mr Mather. I was just off to bed.'
'I bet you were,' Mather said. 'Got a full house down there tonight?'
'Oh, Mr Mather. What a wag you are. Just one or two Oxford boys.'
'Listen. I'm looking for a fellow with a hare-lip. About twenty-eight years old.'
'He's not here.'
'Dark coat, black hat.'
'I don't know him, Mr Mather.'
'I'd like to take a look over your basement.'
'Of course, Mr Mather. There are just one or two Oxford boys. Do you mind if I go down first? Just to introduce you, Mr Mather.' He led the way down the stone stairs. 'It's safer.'
'I can look after myself,' Mather said. 'Saunders, stay in the shop.'
Charlie opened a door. 'Now, boys, don't be scared. Mr Mather's a friend of mine.' They faced him in an ominous line at the end of the room, the Oxford boys, with their broken noses and their cauliflower ears, the dregs of pugilism.
'Evening,' Mather said. The tables had been swept clear of drink and cards. He plodded down the last steps into the stone-floored room. Charlie said, 'Now, boys, you don't need to get scared.'
'Why don't you get a few Cambridge boys into this club?' Mather said.
' Oh, what a wag you are, Mr Mather.'
They followed him with their eyes as he crossed the floor; they wouldn't speak to him; he was the Enemy. They didn't have to be diplomats like Charlie, they could show their hatred. They watched every move he made. Mather said, 'What are you keeping in that cupboard?' Their eyes followed him as he went towards the cupboard door.