Thinking about that, Smedley began to sweat. How long could a man go without speaking? It would be like solitary, but solitary in the middle of a crowd. Voluntary Coventry? Never speaking, never admitting that you could understand? Hour after hour. Day after day. It would crack a man. If Exeter wasn't already off his rocker, the strain of pretending to be would make it so. Playing crazy, he'd go crazy!
Smedley realized with a shock that he hadn't been weeping or even twitching. Just lying there, thinking and wishing for a Player's. The Exeter puzzle had given his mind something to chew on.
He had a strange jumpy feeling, not altogether unpleasant. He wasn't going to be in any personal danger. Hell, he could paint his face green or dance hornpipes on the piano and no one would do anything more than sigh and write a note on his file.
The danger would be to Exeter. If Smedley got caught showing interest in the mystery man, then someone might put two and two together. If anyone ever made the Fallow connection, then the jig would be up. Which might be why Exeter was keeping his mouth shut instead of spinning a yarn. An Englishman's voice would place him within a county. Or his school. Put Professor Higgins on the case and he'd say, “Fallow!” in two shakes.
Smedley awoke with a blast of terror, sweating torrents and choking back a scream. He had been asleep! Without a pill! Jolly good! First time since ... since never mind. Snores to the right of him, snores to the left of him, volleyed and thundered. So he hadn't actually shrieked aloud. He had slept! Perhaps he was getting a little better, just a little? Please, Lord?
He tried to see his watch and couldn't. Still, it felt like time to go. He swallowed the ashtray taste in his mouth and eased back the blankets.
Dressing one-handed was bad enough in daylight. From now on he'd have his suits made with flies that buttoned on the left. He had thought to pull his shoes off without untying them, but getting them on again was harder. Neckties were an invention of the devil.... Hairbrush...
One wan bulb lit the corridor, invoking vast shadows. He set off on tiptoe, thinking of the poor sods in the trenches in Belgium, going over the top. At least in the artillery he'd never had to do that. Primary target: the linen closet down the hall. Pray it wasn't locked.
It was. Hellfire!
In two weeks he had snooped everywhere in Staffles—upstairs, downstairs, in any chamber he was allowed into—hoping he was doing it from boredom and because it was better than sitting still, frightened he was doing it because his loose brains were looking for bogeys.
Secondary target: one of the doctors’ rooms.
He found a doctors’ cubbyhole that was not locked, that did have a white coat hanging behind the door. Some kind saint had even left a stethoscope in the pocket. Now that was really shockingly careless! Take that man's name, Sergeant.
His fingers were shaking so much he could barely fasten the buttons. Nelly! He hung the stethoscope around his neck like a gas mask. He tucked a pencil behind his ear and his stump in his pocket and a clipboard under his arm. Then he stiffened his upper lip and marched off boldly in the direction of the west wing.
The house was dim and silent. It stank of disinfectant and the eternal stench of stale cigarette smoke.
A real doctor was the worst danger, and there would be one on duty somewhere. A nurse might be overawed by the stethoscope. Guards...
One guard, reading a newspaper.
"Don't get up!” the doctor said, and walked right by him.
It would not have worked in a proper hospital, but Staffles was not a proper hospital. The night nurses were not sitting out at a duty desk where they could view the corridor. Light pouring from an open door was the best they could manage, and apparently no one noticed the white shape flit past. The west wing had been servants’ quarters—low ceilings, painted plaster walls. Feeling the guard's eyes boring into his backbone, Smedley chose a room at random.
There were two beds crammed in there. One was empty. The man in the other was bandaged beyond recognition, but he sounded asleep.
Would the guard register that the doctor had not turned on the light?
Smedley waited a couple of minutes, about two thousand heartbeats.
Then he peeked cautiously. The guard was back in his newspaper. The light from the duty room shone unobstructed.
The next room was not the right one either.
Nor the next.
The next was.
A fair-haired head. Asleep. Just a kid, but lying on his back and breathing noisily. Exeter's black hair on the other pillow.
Suddenly Smedley was back in Paris, three years ago, staying at Uncle Frank's on his way to Crete, sharing a room with Exeter. His heart twisted in his chest. Ye gods and little fishes, man! How can you still look so young?
He left the door open. To close it would attract attention if a nurse had to pass by. He squeezed in between the bed and the wall, on the right side. He knelt down, dropping the clipboard. He laid his hand over Exeter's mouth.
A wild reaction almost blew the gaff. Bedsprings creaked. Arms and legs flailed; a hand grabbed his wrist so hard he thought it would crack.
"Shush, you idiot! It's me. Smedley. Julian!"
A grunt. A groan. Exeter subsided. The kid in the other bed paused in his breathing—and then resumed. Smedley's heart crawled back where it belonged.
He leaned close. “I know who you are,” he whispered. “This is on the level. No one put me up to this. I swear that! I want to help."
The blue eyes were silver gray in the dark, even with his, staring at him from the pillow.
"Ginger Jones came calling today."
Exeter sucked in a long breath and sighed it out again. He was drugged and still mostly asleep. Dopey, trying not to show any reaction.
"I don't believe you killed—I don't think Bagpipe's death was your doing. Ginger doesn't, either. I know you disappeared mysteriously from a hospital. Can you disappear from this one?"
Pause. Very slightly, Exeter shook his head.
That was a very deniable shake. Why wouldn't he trust an old friend?
"Can you talk?"
An almost imperceptible nod.
"You won't fool them for long, Edward! Do you want help getting out of here?"
A stronger nod. More blinks, as if Julian Smedley might not be the only man in the world with eye troubles.
"Can you tell me what's going on?” Smedley begged.
Another faint shake.
"For God's sake, man! Trust me!” He felt his cheek beginning to twitch. Any minute now the tears would start. Then where would trust go?
He waited stubbornly, sweating, gritting his teeth, fighting against twitching and weeping. He thought he wasn't going to get an answer. Then it came, a tenuous sound, like a whisper from beyond the grave and yet so close that he could smell the breath that brought it.
"You couldn't believe me."
"From the rumors I've heard, I can believe anything."
A shake: no.
"Look, I'm not going to be here much longer. I don't know how to get you out of here, and I don't know where I could take you that would be safe. Have you any ideas? Any suggestions? Anyone who needs to be told?"
Exeter's fingers reached out and took the pencil from behind Smedley's ear.
Smedley fumbled awkwardly to retrieve the clipboard. It had slipped under the bed. He passed it up. Exeter turned over the top sheet and wrote on the back of it. He handed them both back.
Smedley took the pencil in his left hand and tried to take the clipboard with his stump.
"Oh, my god!"
Exeter had spoken aloud, almost shouted. The kid on the next bed fell silent. Smedley crouched down low, out of sight. He was shaking. He must get out of here before he had an attack of the willies! In a moment the slow breathing resumed.