“I share your dreams,” he said slowly, flooding his voice with sincerity, “but that’s all the more reason for us to take decisive steps right now, before the situation deteriorates any further.”
Ogilvie sighed. “I haven’t gone soft, Tommy. I have no objection to you turning your Leopards loose on the rabble at Number Three—but it can’t be done when there are outside observers present. The logical first step is to get them out of the country.”
“But you’ve just given permission for them to go right into the mine.”
“What else could I do? Snook was right when he said the whole world is watching us.” Ogilvie suddenly relaxed and smiled. He took his cigar box from the desk and offered it to Freeborn. “But the world soon grows tired of watching one part of Africa after another—you should know that as well as I do.”
Freeborn accepted a cigar. “And in the meantime?”
“In the meantime I want you—unofficially, of course—to make life difficult for our little scientific community from abroad. Don’t do anything obtrusive or newsworthy, just make life difficult for them.”
“I see.” Freeborn felt a resurgence of confidence in the President. “How about the Press Association man, Helig? Is he to be put out of business?”
“Not now—it’s too late to correct that particular mistake. Just watch him in future.”
“I’ll look after things.”
“Do that. And there’s something else—we’ll have to refuse entry to any further foreign visitors. Find some valid reason to cancel all entry permits.”
Freeborn frowned in thought. “Smallpox outbreak?”
“No, that could interfere with trade. It would be better if there was a military emergency. Say, an attack by one of our long-established neighbours. We’ll discuss the details over lunch.”
Freeborn lit his cigar, inhaled deeply, then smiled with something approaching genuine pleasure. “The Gleiwitz technique? I have a few awkward prisoners in reserve.”
President Ogilvie, the image of a corporation executive in his conservative blue suit, nodded his assent. “Gleiwitz.”
Freeborn’s smile developed into a chuckle. He had never been a student of European history, but the name of Gleiwitz, a speck on the map close to Germany’s border with Poland, was familiar to him because it had been the scene of a Nazi operation which both Ogilvie and he had emulated more than once in their own careers. There, in the August of 1939, the SS Gestapo had staged a fake Polish attack on the German radio station and—as visible evidence of the crime by their neighbours—had strewn the area with the bodies of men whom they had dressed in Polish army uniforms and then shot. The incident had been used in propaganda as justification for the invasion of Poland.
Colonel Freeborn regarded it as an exemplary piece of military tactics.
Snook’s mind was still seething with suspicion about President Ogilvie’s reactions when he got out of the taxi at the Hotel Commodore. It was almost noon, and the sun was hanging directly overhead like an unshaded lamp. He plunged into the prism of shadow beneath the hotel canopy, went through the split-level foyer—ignoring a signal from the desk clerk—and straight into the bar. Ralph, the senior barman, saw him coming and without speaking took a quarter-litre glass, half filled it with Tanqueray’s gin and topped it up with ice water.
“Thanks, Ralph.” Snook sat on a stool, cushioned his elbows on the puffy leather facing of the bar and took a long therapeutic drink from his glass. He felt its coolness travel all the way to his stomach.
“Rough morning, Mister Snook?” Ralph put on the look of rueful sympathy he always used with hangover sufferers.
“Grim.”
“You’ll feel better after that.”
“I know.” Snook took another drink. He had enacted the same little tableau, with exactly the same dialogue, many times before and he drew comfort from the fact that Ralph had sufficient empathy never to vary the routine. It was about the only kind of communication Snook enjoyed.
Ralph leaned across the bar and lowered his voice. Two people over there waiting to see you.”
Snook turned in the indicated direction and saw a man and a woman regarding him with dubious expectancy, and the phrase ‘the beautiful people’ sprang into his mind. They were a well-matched couple—both young, immaculate and with finely chiselled, fair-skinned good looks—but it was the woman who held Snook’s attention. She was slim, with intelligent grey eyes, full-lipped, cool and sensuous at the same time; and to Snook came a sudden fear that his entire way of life had been a mistake, that this was the sort of prize he might have won had he opted for life in the glittering cities of the Occident. He lifted his glass and went towards their table, disturbed at the pang of jealousy he felt towards the man who rose to meet him.
“Mister Snook? I’m Boyce Ambrose,” the man said as they shook hands. “We spoke on the telephone.”
Snook nodded. “Call me Gil.”
“I’d like you to meet Prudence Devonald. Miss Devonald is with UNESCO. Actually, I think she wants to talk business with you, too.”
“This must be my lucky day.” Snook spoke the words automatically as he sat down, his mind busy with the realisation that the couple were not marriedj as he had somehow assumed. He saw that the girl was giving him a look of frank appraisal and, for the second time that day, became conscious of the fact that his clothing was barely passable and even then only because the material was indestructible.
“It isn’t your lucky day,” Prudence said. “In fact, it could be quite the reverse. One of the things I have to do in Barandi is check up on your teaching qualifications.”
“What qualifications?”
“That’s what my office would like to know.” She spoke with a direct unfriendliness which saddened Snook and also goaded him into his standard pattern of reaction.
“You work for an inquisitive office?” He met her gaze squarely. “Do you report to the desk or the filing cabinet?”
“In English,” she said, with insulting sweetness, “the word “office” can also mean the staff who work there.”
Snook shrugged. “It can also mean a lavatory.”
“I was just about to get us a couple more Homosexual Harolds,” Ambrose said quickly to Snook. “You know…Camp Harrys. Would you like another drink?”
“Thanks. Ralph knows my tipple.” While Ambrose went to the bar Snook leaned back comfortably, looked at Prudence and decided she was one of the most beautiful women he had ever met. If there was anything short of perfection in her face it was that her upper teeth had a very slight inwards slope, but for some reason this served to enhance the aristocratic impression she created in his mind. / want you, he thought. You’re a bitch, but I want you.
“Perhaps we should start over again,” he said. “We seem to have got off on the wrong something or other.”
Prudence almost smiled. “It’s probably my fault -1 should have guessed you’d be embarrassed to answer my questions with a third party present.”
“I’m not embarrassed.” Snook allowed himself to sound mildly surprised at the notion. “And, just for the record, I won’t be answering any of your questions.”
Her grey eyes triangulated on him angrily, but at that moment Ambrose arrived back at the table with the Camparis and gin. He set them down and examined the accompanying sales slip with a puzzled expression.
“There seems to be a mistake here,” he said. “This round cost three times as much as the last one.”
“That’s my fault.” Snook raised his drink in salute. “I order my gin by the beer glass to save trotting backwards and forwards to the bar.” He glanced at Prudence. “I get embarrassed.”