“That’s right.”
“I work the older, better educated types, the ones who might recall or even care that Curzon was once viceroy of India — from 1899 to about 1905, I believe. Take that one over there — to your left.”
I had looked to where an elderly type in a dinner jacket had been sitting for some time with a woman of about his own age.
“He’ll be off to drop his penny in a moment,” Tamil had said. “I suggest that you go first, sit yourself down, and then you can hear it all, even if you won’t be able to see it”
“Okay,” I had said and a few moments later I had found myself sitting on a toilet seat behind the closed door of a stall in the men’s room of the Ritz Bar.
Tick-Tock had started the conversation in his impeccable accent. “I say, aren’t you Sir John Forest?”
“No,” I had heard the elderly gentleman say. “I’m afraid I’m not.”
“Oh, I am sorry. There’s such an extraordinary resemblance, but I suppose you’re accustomed to it, being taken for him, I mean. I knew Sir John’s son at school. You do know Sir John, don’t you?”
“No. I don’t know him.”
“Extraordinary resemblance.” There had been a pause and then Tick-Tock had said, “Oh, damn. I wonder if I’m running late? Do you have the time?”
“Quarter past nine.”
Tick-Tock had chuckled. “Well, once more this old watch of mine is right and I’m wrong. But I don’t really think that it’s been more than a few seconds off since Lord Curzon gave it to Grandfather.”
“Curzon?”
“Yes. When he was viceroy, you know. There’s rather a touching inscription on the back, if you’d care to see it.”
“Well, yes, I’d rather like that.”
The elderly gentleman had read it out. “‘To his most royal highness from his most loyal friend. Curzon.’ Well. Your grandfather, you say. Then you must be—”
Tick-Tock had interrupted. “Yes, I am, although I’m trying to be incognito, for tonight, at least. But this American reporter has tracked me down and I simply can’t shake him. Perhaps you noticed him at the bar?”
“Can’t say I did.”
“Actually, the reason that I’ve gone to ground, so to speak, is not because of the American, but because of this blasted watch.”
“Oh, really?”
“Yes. In point of fact, a chap from the British Museum has been after me night and day. They seem to want it most desperately and this chap was even so cheeky as to offer me a thousand pounds for the thing.”
“A thousand pounds, eh?”
“I was tempted, if only to get rid of him. But I sent him packing, of course.”
“Of course.”
“Then there was this private collector who offered me five thousand for it. But he was Greek and you know what they’re like.”
“Damned rascals, most of them.”
“Well, I must be going. This American reporter wants to do a story for his paper — The New York Times, I believe — on my London. It’s, well, it’s the London that you and I know, of course. Most Americans don’t often see it.”
“No,” the old gentleman had said. “I doubt if they would. Or perhaps should.” He had chuckled at his small joke and so had Tick-Tock.
“But I’m afraid that the chap from the British Museum is going to be on my trail tonight. He simply won’t take no for an answer. He keeps telling me that the watch isn’t really priceless, but I don’t think that one can place price on sentiment, do you?”
“Of course not.”
“I say, I have an idea. I know I’m going to put this wretchedly,” Tick-Tock said, but he didn’t. He had put it as smoothly as any proposition I’ve ever heard. It was his idea that the old gentleman should keep the watch for him, but only for the night. Tick-Tock would drop round to get it the next morning.
The old gentleman had protested, of course, but Tick-Tock had already thrust the watch upon him. When the old gentleman had made his final feeble protest, Tick-Tock struck. He had said that if it would make him feel more secure, the old gentleman could put up a pledge of perhaps fifty pounds. Caught between greed and flattery, the old gentleman had agreed.
There had been an exchange of names and addresses and telephone numbers and then they had made their good-byes. I had rejoined Tick-Tock in the bar shortly thereafter. The old gentleman and his wife had just been leaving. Tick-Tock had raised his glass in salute. The old gentleman had nodded and smiled, but a little nervously, I’d thought.
Tick-Tock had tossed me a small card on which a name, an address, and a telephone number were written. “He gave me a wrong address, a phony telephone number, and a phony name.”
“How do you know?”
Tick-Tock had smiled at me and he had looked very much like Tyrone Power all made up to look like an Indian maharaja. “Because that’s my business, mate,” Tick-Tock had said. “To know.”
Chapter Seventeen
As I mentioned, Tick-Tock had changed in the more than ten years since I had last seen him. He didn’t look like Tyrone Power anymore. He looked more like Gandhi.
“I know you,” he said. “I remember you. You’re Saint-something-or-other.”
“St. Ives.”
“Yes. St. Ives. What do you want?”
“Maybe he wants a party, Tick-Tock,” the girl said.
“Shut up,” he said. “What do you want?”
“Information.”
He stared at me with dark eyes that had lost their flash and sparkle. All that remained in them was a kind of dead cunning. He had been not quite plump when I had last seen him, with quick and graceful movements, but now he was stick thin and when he moved, he jerked. He no longer wore a turban and what little hair he had left was egg-shell white and his dark skin, once smooth and supple, was dry and stretched with tiny deep wrinkles that gave him the tight, drawn look of a poorly done mummy. Tick-Tock was a mess and he was not quite forty.
“Information, is it? Well, come in.”
We went into a sitting room that opened onto a primitive-looking kitchen. The sitting room was furnished with some old chairs and couches that seemed to have been rescued from a rescue mission. There was a four-color print of Jesus on one wall and in two of the chairs were sprawled two more young girls, one a blonde, the other a brunette. They both wore see-through blouses. The blonde wore a short skirt. The brunette wore pants. They smiled at me professionally.
“If you want one of these cunts, it’s five quid for short time upstairs,” Tick-Tock said in a mechanical tone. “Or you can have all three of them for a tenner.”
“No thanks.”
“Get out,” he said to the girls. The two blondes and the brunette shrugged and left through the door that led to the kitchen.
“Want a drink?” he said.
“All right.”
“Whisky?”
“With water.”
“Whisky’s seventy-five pence.”
“All right.”
He went over to a chest, took out a bottle of whisky, poured some into a smeared glass, and added water from a pitcher. He handed it to me. I gave him a pound. “Thanks very much,” he said and made no move to give me the change.
“Want anything else?” he said.
“What have you got?”
He shrugged. “I’ve got hash and I’ve got pot. I’ve got cocaine. I’m fresh out of heroin.”
I shook my head. “What the hell happened to you, Tick-Tock?” I said. “I thought you were into gold.”
“What happened to me?” he said. “Two years in Dartmoor is what happened to me. And a cunt. God, I hate cunts. When was the last time I saw you?”
“Almost a dozen years ago.”
“I remember now. It was in the Ritz, right?”
“Right.”