Could this possibly, I wondered, be Monsieur Dambreuse, the gallant lover who had kept two mistresses in the same hotel? If he was alive, then perhaps Curran was alive too. It was as though my aunts crooked world were destined to a kind of immortality only my poor father lay certainly dead in the smoke and rain of Boulogne. I admit that a pang of jealousy struck me because on this voyage I had not been my aunts companion. It was to others that she now recounted her stories.
Forgive us coming in without ringing, Mr. Pulling, said Detective-Sergeant Sparrow. He stood back to allow Inspector Woodrow to precede him according to protocol into the sitting-room. The inspector was carrying his umbrella, which looked as if it hadnt been opened since I had seen him last.
Good afternoon, Inspector Woodrow said stiffly. It is just as well we have found you here.
The door being open Sergeant Sparrow said.
I have a search warrant, Inspector Woodrow told me before I could ask him, and he held it out for my inspection. All the same we prefer a member of the family to be present at a search.
Not wishing to make a commotion, Sergeant Sparrow said, which would be disagreeable to all, we were waiting in our car across the street till the manager closed the bar, but then seeing you come in, we thought we could do things on the quiet[230] without even the manager knowing. Much nicer for your aunt because there would have been a lot of gossip in the bar tonight, you can be sure of that. You cant trust a barman not to talk to his locals. Its like husband and wife.
While he spoke the inspector was busy examining the room.
Looking at her mail, eh? the sergeant asked me. He took the card out of my hand and said, Panama. Signed A.D. Now you wouldnt have an idea who A.D. is?
No.
You see, it might be an alias. Interpol doesnt get much cooperation in Panama, the sergeant said, except in the American zone.
Keep the card, Sparrow, the inspector said, nonetheless.
What have you got against my aunt?
You know, sir, we err on the side of kindness, Sergeant Sparrow said. We could have charged her over that Cannabis affair, but seeing what an old lady she was and the coloured man taking off to Paris like that, we let her be. The case wouldnt have stood up well in court anyway. Of course we didnt know a thing then about this undesirable connection of hers.
What connection?
I wondered if they had arranged their two parts beforehand: the sergeant being told to keep me occupied while the inspector searched the flat, as he was now doing.
This man Visconti, sir. An Italian as you might surmise with a name like that. Hes a viper.
All this glass, the inspector said. Curious stuff. Its like a museum.
Venetian glass. My aunt worked once in Venice. I expect a lot were gifts from her clients.
Very valuable? Collectors pieces?
I wouldnt have thought so.
Works of art?
Its a matter of taste, I said.
Miss Bertram knew a lot about art, I daresay. Any pictures?
I dont think so. Only a photo of Freetown in the spare room.
Why Freetown?
Wordsworth came from there.
Whos Wordsworth?
The black valet, Sergeant Sparrow said. The one who took off to France when we found the pot.
They trailed from room to room and I followed them. I thought that Woodrow was less thorough in his search than Colonel Hakim. I had the impression that he expected nothing and was only anxious to make a formal report to Interpol that every effort had been made. Every now and then he tossed me a question without looking round. Has your aunt ever mentioned this fellow Visconti?
Oh yes, many times.
Is he alive, would you say?
I dont know.
Any idea if they are still in contact?
I wouldnt think so.
The old viper would be over eighty by now, Sergeant Sparrow said. Nearer ninety, Id guess.
It seems a bit late to be chasing him even if he is alive, I said. We had left my aunts room and entered Wordsworths.
Thats one of the troubles of Interpol, Sergeant Sparrow said. Too many files. Its not real police work they do. Not one of them has ever been on the beat.[231] Its a civil service. Like Somerset House[232].
They do their duty, Sparrow, Woodrow said. He took down the photo of Freetown harbour and turned it over. Then he hung it up again. Its a good-looking frame, he said. Cost more than the photograph.
Italian too from the look of it, I said, like the glass.
Perhaps given her by the man Visconti? Sergeant Sparrow asked.
Theres no indication on the back, the inspector said. I had hoped for an inscription. Interpol havent even a specimen of his signature leave alone fingerprints[233]. He consulted a piece of paper.
Have you ever heard your aunt mention any of these names Tiberio Titi?
No.
Stradano? Passerati? Cossa?
Shes never spoken to me very much about her Italian friends.
These werent friends, Inspector Woodrow said. Leonardo da Vinci?
No.
He began to go through the rooms all over again, but I could tell that it was only for forms sake. At the door he gave me a telephone number. If you hear from your aunt, he said, if you ever do, please ring us at once.
I promise nothing.
We only want to ask her a few questions, Sergeant Sparrow said. Theres no charge against her.
Im glad to hear it.
It is even possible, Inspector Woodrow said, that she might be in serious personal danger. From her unfortunate associations.
Particularly from that viper Visconti, Sergeant Sparrow chimed in.
We only want to ask her a few questions, Sergeant Sparrow said. Theres no charge against her.
Im glad to hear it.
It is even possible, Inspector Woodrow said, that she might be in serious personal danger. From her unfortunate associations.
Particularly from that viper Visconti, Sergeant Sparrow chimed in.
Why do you keep on calling him a viper?
Sergeant Sparrow said, Its the only description Interpol has given us. They havent so much as a passport photo. But he was once described as a viper by the Chief of Police in Rome in 1945. All their war records were destroyed, the chiefs dead, and we dont know now whether viper was a physical description or what you might call a moral judgement.
At least, the inspector said, we now have a postcard from Panama.
Its something for the files, Detective-Sergeant Sparrow explained to me.
When I double-locked the door and followed them, I was left with the sad impression that my aunt might be dead and the most interesting part of my life might be over. I had waited a long while for it to arrive, and it had not lasted very long.
Part II
Chapter 1
While the ship was tugged out into the yellow tidal rush and the untidy skyscrapers and the castellated customs house jerked away, as though they rather than the ship were at the end of the rope, I thought of that distant days depression and of how wrong my fears had proved. It was eight on a July morning and the sea-birds wailed like the cats in Latimer Road and the clouds were heavy with coming rain. There was one break of sunlight over La Plata which gave the dull river a single silver streak, but the brightest spot in the sombre scape of water and shore was the flames from gas pipes flapping against the black sky. There were four days ahead of me, up the Plata, the Parana and the Paraguay, before I joined my aunt, and I left the Argentine winter for my overheated cabin and began to hang up my clothes and arrange my books and papers into a semblance of home.
More than half a year passed after my encounter with the detectives before I received any news of my aunt. I had become convinced of her death by that time, and once in a dream I was badly frightened by a creature crawling across the floor towards me with broken legs which swung like a snakes tail. It was going to pull me down within reach of its teeth, and I was paralysed with terror like a bird before a snake. When I woke I remembered Mr. Visconti, though I believe it is a cobra and not a viper which is supposed to paralyse birds.
During that empty time I received one more letter from Miss Keene. She wrote in her own hand, for a clumsy servant had broken the keyboard of her typewriter. I was just going to write, she said, how stupid and clumsy these blacks are, and then I remembered how you and my father had discussed racialism one night at dinner and I felt as though I were betraying our old house in Southwood and the companionship of those days. Sometimes I fear that I am going to be quite assimilated. In Koffiefontein the Prime Minister no longer seems the monster we thought him at home: indeed hes criticized here sometimes as an old-fashioned liberal. I find myself when I meet a tourist from England explaining apartheid so convincingly. I dont want to be assimilated, and yet if I am to make my life here The broken sentence sounded like an appeal which she was too shy to make clear. There followed the gossip of the farm: a dinner party to neighbours who lived more than a hundred miles away, and then one paragraph which I found a little disturbing: I have met a Mr. Hughes, a land surveyor, and he wants to marry me (please dont laugh at me). He is a kind man in his late fifties, a widower with a teen-age daughter whom I like well enough. I dont know what to do. It would be the final assimilation, wouldnt it? Ive always had a silly dream of one day coming back to Southwood and finding the old house empty (how I miss that dark rhododendron walk) and beginning my life all over again. I am afraid of talking to anyone here about Mr. Hughes they would all be too encouraging. I wish you were not so far away, for I know you would counsel me wisely.
Was I wrong to read an appeal in that last sentence, a desperate appeal in spite of its calm wording, an appeal for some decisive telegram come back to Southwood and marry me? Who knows whether I might not have sent one in my loneliness if a letter had not arrived which drove poor Miss Keene right out of my mind?
It was from my aunt, written on stiff aristocratic notepaper bearing simply a scarlet rose and the name Lancaster with no address, like the title of a noble family. Only when I read a little way into the letter did I realize that Lancaster was the name of an hotel. My aunt made no appeal; she simply issued a command, and there was no explanation of her long silence. I have decided, she wrote, not to return to Europe and I am giving up my apartment over the Crown and Anchor at the end of the next quarter. I would be glad if you would pack what clothes there may be there and dispose of all the furniture. On second thoughts, however, keep the photograph of Freetown harbour for me as a memento of dear Wordsworth and bring it with you. (She had not even told me where to come at that point of the letter or asked me if it were possible.) Preserve it in its frame, which has great sentimental value because it was given me by Mr. V. I enclose a cheque on my account at the Credit Suisse, Berne[234], which will be sufficient for a first-class ticket to Buenos Aires. Come as soon as you can, for I get no younger. I do not suffer from gout like an old friend whom I met the other day on a packet boat, but I feel nonetheless a certain stiffness in the joints. I want very much to have with me a member of my family whom I can trust in this rather bizarre country, not the less bizarre for having a shop called Harrods[235] round the corner from the hotel, though it is less well stocked, I fear, than in the Brompton Road.