‘H-hurry,’ Carter said, ‘You’ve got to h -hurry.’
Wormold lowered the whisky. ‘What did you say, Carter?’
‘I said drink it up quick.’
‘Oh no, you didn’t, Carter.’ Why hadn’t he noticed that stammered aspirate before? Was Carter conscious of it and did he avoid an initial ‘h’ except when he was preoccupied by fear or h-hope? ‘What’s the matter, Wormold?’
Wormold put his hand down to pat the dog’s head and as though by accident he knocked the glass from the table.
‘You pretended not to know the doctor.’
‘What doctor?’
‘You would call him H-Hasselbacher.’
‘Mr Wormold,’ Dr Braun called down the table.
He rose uncertainly to his feet. The dog for want of any better provender was lapping at the whisky on the floor.
Wormold said, ‘I appreciate your asking me to speak, whatever your motives.’ A polite titter took him by surprise he hadn’t meant to say anything funny. He said, ‘This is my first and it looked at one time as though it was going to be my last public appearance.’ He caught Carter’s eye. Carter was frowning. He felt guilty of a solecism by his survival as though he were drunk in public. Perhaps he was drunk. He said, ‘I don’t know whether I’ve got any friends here. I’ve certainly got some enemies.’ Somebody said ‘Shame’ and several people laughed. If this went on he would get the reputation of being a witty speaker. He said, ‘We hear a lot nowadays about the cold war, but any trader will tell you that the war between two manufacturers of the same goods can be quite a hot war. Take Phastkleaners and Nucleaners. There’s not much difference between the two machines any more than there is between two human beings, one Russian or German -and one British. There would be no competition and no war if it wasn’t for the ambition of a few men in both firms; just a few men dictate competition and invent needs and set Mr Carter and myself at each other’s throats.’
Nobody laughed now. Dr Braun whispered something into the ear of the Consul-General. Wormold lifted Carter’s whisky-flask and said, ‘I don’t suppose Mr Carter even knows the name of the man who sent him to poison me for the good of his firm.’ Laughter broke out again with a note of relief. Mr Mac Dougall said, ‘We could do with more poison here,’ and suddenly the dog began to whimper. It broke cover and made for the service-door. ‘Max,’ the headwaiter exclaimed. ‘Max.’ There was silence and then a few uneasy laughs. The dog was uncertain on its feet. It howled and tried to bite its own breast. The headwaiter overtook it by the door and picked it up, but it cried as though with pain and broke from his arms. ‘It’s had a couple,’ Mr Mac Dougall said uneasily.
‘You must excuse me, Dr Braun,’ Wormold said, ‘the show is over.’ He followed the headwaiter through the service-door. ‘Stop.’ ‘What do you want?’
‘I want to find out what happened to my plate.’
‘What do you mean, sir? Your plate?’
‘You were very anxious that my plate should not be given to anyone else.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Did you know that it was poisoned?’
‘You mean the food was bad, sir?’
‘I mean it was poisoned and you were careful to save Dr Braun’s life not mine.’
‘I’m afraid, sir, I don’t understand you. I am busy. You must excuse me.’ The sound of a howling dog came up the long passage from the kitchen, a low dismal howl intercepted by a sharper burst of pain. The headwaiter called, ‘Max!’ and ran like a human being down the passage. He flung open the kitchen-door. ‘Max!’
The dachshund lifted a melancholy head from where it crouched below the table, then began to drag its body painfully towards the headwaiter. A man in a chef’s cap said, ‘He ate nothing here. The plate was thrown away.’ The dog collapsed at the waiter’s feet and lay there like a length of offal. The waiter went down on his knees beside the dog. He said, ‘Max mein Kind. Mein Kind.’
The black body was like an elongation of his own black suit. The kitchen-staff gathered around.
The black tube made a slight movement and a pink tongue came out like toothpaste and lay on the kitchen floor. The headwaiter put his hand on the dog and then looked up at Wormold. The tear-filled eyes so accused him of standing there alive while the dog was dead that he nearly found it in his heart to apologize, but instead he turned and went. At the end of the passage he looked back: the black figure knelt beside the black dog and the white chef stood above and the kitchen-hands waited, like mourners round a grave, carrying their troughs and mops and dishes like wreaths. My death, he thought, would have been more unobtrusive than that.
‘I have come back,’ he said to Beatrice, ‘I am not under the table. I have come back victorious. The dog it was that died.’
Chapter 4
Captain Segura said, ‘I’m glad to find you alone. Are you alone?’
‘Quite alone.’
‘I’m sure you don’t mind. I have put two men at the door to see that we aren’t disturbed.’
‘Am I under arrest?’
‘Of course not.’
‘Milly and Beatrice are out at a cinema. They’ll be surprised if they are not allowed in.’
‘I will not take up much of your time. There are two things I have come to see you about. One is important. The other is only routine. May I begin with what is important?’
‘Please.’
‘I wish, Mr Wormold, to ask for the hand of your daughter.’
‘Does that require two policemen at the door?’
‘It’s convenient not to be disturbed.’
‘Have you spoken to Milly?’
‘I would not dream of it before speaking to you.’
‘I suppose even here you would need my consent by law.’
‘It is not a matter of law but of common courtesy. May I smoke?’
‘Why not? Is that case really made from human skin?’ Captain Segura laughed. ‘Ah, Milly, Milly. What a tease she is!’ He added ambiguously, ‘Do you really believe that story, Mr Wormold?’ Perhaps he had an objection to a direct lie; he might be a good Catholic. ‘She’s much too young to marry, Captain Segura.’
‘Not in this country.’
‘I’m sure she has no wish to marry yet.’
‘But you could influence her, Mr Wormold.’
‘They call you the Red Vulture, don’t they?’
‘That, in Cuba, is a kind of compliment.’
‘Aren’t you rather an uncertain life? You seem to have a lot of
enemies.’
‘I have saved enough to take care of my widow. In that way, Mr Wormold, I am a more reliable support than you are. The establishment it can’t bring you in much money and at the moment it is liable to be closed.’ ‘Closed?’
‘I am sure you do not intend to cause trouble, but a lot of trouble has been happening around you. If you had to leave the country, would you not feel happier if your daughter were well established here?’ ‘What kind of trouble, Captain Segura?’
‘There was a car which crashed never mind why. There was an attack on poor Engineer Cifuentes -a friend of the Minister of the Interior. Professor Sanchez complained that you broke into his house and threatened him. There is even a story that you poisoned a dog.’
That I poisoned a dog?’
‘It sounds absurd, of course. But the headwaiter at the Hotel Nacional said you gave his dog poisoned whisky. Why should you give a dog whisky at all? I don’t understand. Nor does he. He thinks perhaps because it was a German dog.
You don’t say anything, Mr Wormold.’
‘I am at a loss for words.’
‘He was in a terrible state, poor man. Otherwise I would have thrown him out of the office for talking nonsense. He said you came into the kitchen to gloat over what you had done. It sounded very unlike you, Mr Wormold. I have always though of you as a humane man. Just assure me there is no truth in this story.’
‘The dog was poisoned. The whisky came from my glass. But it was intended for me, not the dog.’