Guy spoke to the barman, Albu, a despondent, sober fellow regarded in Bucharest as a perfect imitation of an English barman. Where was everyone? Guy asked.
Albu said: ‘Gone to send news.’
Guy, frowning with frustration, asked Harriet what she would drink. ‘We’ll wait,’ he said. ‘They’re sure to come back. This is the centre of information.’
6
In an upper room of the hotel, Yakimov was roused to reluctant consciousness by the squawks of the newsboys in the square.
The day before, when he handed his British passport to the clerk, he had been asked if he wished to be awakened in the ‘English manner’ with a cup of tea. He had replied that he did not wish to be awakened at all but would like a half-bottle of Veuve Clicquot placed beside his bed each morning. Now, getting his eyes open, he saw the bucket and was thankful for it.
An hour or so later, having bathed, dressed and been served with a little cold chicken in his room, he made his way down to the bar. The bar was now crowded. Yakimov ordered a whisky, swallowed it and ordered another. When the drinks had steadied him a little, he turned slowly and looked at the group behind him.
The journalists were standing around Mortimer Tufton, who sat on the edge of a stool, his old, brown spotted hands clenched on the handle of his stick.
Galpin, noticing Yakimov, asked: ‘Any news?’
‘Well, dear boy, it was quite a party.’
‘I’ll say it was,’ said Galpin. ‘One hell of a party. And the old formula, of course: someone inside creates a disturbance and the bastards march in to keep order.’
Yakimov stared at Galpin some moments before comment came to him, then he said: ‘Quite, dear boy, quite.’
‘I give them twenty-four hours.’ Galpin, sprawled with his back against the bar, was a string of a man in a suit that seemed too small for him. He had a peevish, nasal voice and, as he talked, he rubbed at his peevish yellow, whisky-drinker’s face. Over his caved-in belly, his waistcoat was wrinkled, dirty and ash-spattered. There was a black edging of grease round his cuffs; his collar was corrugated round his neck. He sucked the wet stub of a cigarette. When he talked the stub stuck to his full, loose lower lip and quivered there. His eyes, that he now kept fixed on Yakimov, were chocolate-coloured, the whites as yellow as limes. He repeated: ‘Twenty-four hours. You wait and see,’ his tone aggressive.
Yakimov did not contradict him.
He was bewildered, not only by Galpin’s remarks, but by the atmosphere in the bar. It was an atmosphere of acute discontent.
In a high, indignant voice, Galpin suddenly said to Yakimov: ‘You heard about Miller of the Echo, I suppose?’
Yakimov shook his head.
‘As soon as it happened, he got into his car and drove straight to Giurgiu. He may have got across, and he may not, but he’s not stuck here like a rat in a trap.’
Galpin was clearly speaking not for Yakimov’s enlightenment but from a heart full of bitterness. Letting his eyes stray about, Yakimov noticed the young couple called Pringle whom he had met the night before. There was something reassuring about Guy Pringle’s size and the mildness of his bespectacled face. Yakimov edged nearer to him and heard him say: ‘I still don’t see how the Germans will get here. The Russians have moved into Eastern Poland. They’ve reached the Hungarian frontier.’
‘My good chappie’ – Galpin turned, expressing his bitterness in contempt – ‘the Nazis will go through the Russkies like a hot knife through butter.’
Guy put an arm round his wife’s shoulder and looked into her strained, peaky face. ‘Don’t worry,’ he said to her, ‘I think we’re safe.’
A small man, grey-haired, grey-faced, grey-clad, more shadow than substance, entered the bar and, skirting apologetically round the journalists, handed Galpin a telegram and whispered to him. When the man had gone, Galpin said: ‘My stringman reports: German Embassy claims to have proof the murder was organised by the British Minister in order to undermine Rumania’s neutrality. That gets a laugh.’ He opened and read the telegram and said: ‘So does this: “Echo reports assassination stop why unnews stop asleep query.” So Miller made it! Nice scoop for Miller! And a raspberry for the rest of us.’
Tufton said: ‘There’s safety in numbers. We couldn’t all be flogging the dog.’
Under cover of this talk, Yakimov whispered to Guy: ‘Dear boy, what has happened? Who’s been assassinated?’
It so happened this whisper came out during a moment of silence and Galpin caught it. He turned to Yakimov, demanding in scandalised tones: ‘You mean to say, you didn’t know what I was talking about?’
Yakimov shook his head.
‘You hadn’t heard of the assassination? You didn’t know the frontier’s closed, the international line is dead, they won’t let us send cables, and no one’s allowed to leave Bucharest? You don’t know, my good chappie, that you’re in mortal danger?’
‘You don’t say!’ said Yakimov. Stealthily he glanced around for sympathy but was offered none. Trying to show interest, he asked: ‘Who assassinated who?’
The journalists made no attempt to reply. It was Guy who told him that the Prime Minister had been assassinated in the Chicken Market. ‘Some young men drove in front of his car, forcing him to stop. When he got out to see what was wrong, they shot him down. He was killed instantly. Then the assassins rushed to the broadcasting studios, held up the staff and announced he was dead, or dying. They didn’t know which.’
‘Filled him full of lead,’ Galpin broke in. ‘He clung to the car door – little pink hands, striped trousers, little new patent-leather shoes. Then he slid down. Patches of dust on the side of his shoes …’
‘You saw it?’ Yakimov opened his eyes in admiration, but Galpin remained disapproving.
‘It was seen,’ he added: ‘What the heck were you up to? Were you drunk?’
‘Did have rather a heavy night,’ Yakimov admitted. ‘Your poor old Yaki’s just levered head from pillow.’
Tufton shifted impatiently on his stool. ‘Fortune favours fools,’ he said. ‘We were forced to tarry while he slumbered.’
The hotel clerk entered the bar and announced that cables could now be sent from the Central Post Office. As the journalists jostled their way out, Yakimov imagined his ordeal was over. He was about to order himself another drink, when Galpin gripped his arm.
‘I’ll give you a lift,’ said Galpin.
‘Oh, dear boy, I don’t think I’d better go out today. Don’t feel at all well.’
‘Are you doing McCann’s job or aren’t you? Come on.’
Looking into Galpin’s crabbed, uncharitable face, Yakimov dared not refuse to go.
At the post office he wrote on his form: ‘Very sorry to tell you the Prime Minister was …’ then hesitated so long over the spelling of the word ‘assassinated’ that the office emptied and he was alone with Galpin. Galpin, his face solemn, said: ‘You’ve got the story, of course? Who’s at the bottom of this? And so on?’
Yakimov shook his head: ‘Haven’t a clue, dear boy.’
Galpin tut-tutted at Yakimov’s ignorance. ‘Come on,’ he said more kindly, ‘I’ll give you a hand.’
Taking out his fountain-pen, Galpin concocted a lengthy piece which he signed: ‘McCann’.
‘That’ll cost you about three thousand,’ he said.