The Age of Exodus Page 14

  “I have no confederate, Dr. Forrester,” said Theresa Palmer calmly. “You have been privileged to witness something extraordinary – be thankful.”

  And before he could respond, the campus police arrived.

  * * *

  As Mrs. Palmer had predicted, no one in the room was found with the effigy, and no evidence of anything untoward was found in the projection booth. Worse still, from the point of view of the conveners of the conference, there were several journalists in attendance, and even the most academically oriented of them realised this was a story that would get their byline in the evening editions.

  In the cab back to the Waldorf Astoria, Forrester tried to come up with a rational link between what had just happened, the death of Charles Templar, the attempt to kill Ernest Bevin, the attack on him and the disappearance of Billy Burke from the Queen Mary. But by the time he found Lanchester not only had he not come up with any answers but it was clear all the security chief was concerned about was making sure Ernest Bevin would be safe when he appeared at the United Nations the next day, and stolen Sumerian effigies did not figure largely in these concerns.

  So having made his report, Forrester, feeling slightly deflated, telephoned the hostel where Gillian was staying on Long Island and invited her to join him for the evening.

  She agreed at once, and an hour and a half later, when she arrived in the hotel lobby and flung her arms around him, Forrester simply basked in the physical pleasure of her slim body against his, the smell of her hair and the gentle cadences of her voice.

  And then they began to walk together through the night-time wonder of New York.

  During the war, he knew, the famous lights of the city had been dimmed against the remote possibility of German attack from the sea; indeed, there had been U-boats lurking out beyond The Narrows. But now the lights of New York were back to their full glory, flashing and flickering into the night, so Broadway was every inch the Great White Way of legend. The roof club of the Astor blazed ecstatically, the eternally cascading electric waterfall in Times Square poured down beside the tossing heads of the electric Budweiser horses and a shower of electric peanuts seemed to pour perpetually down on the passing crowds. Huge, exuberantly chromed town cars slid sinuously through the steam emerging like ectoplasm from the manhole covers, while on one of the skyscrapers the New York Times Motogram, powered by fifteen thousand electric bulbs, announced that the United Nations Organisation would tomorrow be discussing the future of Palestine.

  “First of all I’d like to go to Keens Steakhouse and see stereo colour pictures of the food,” said Gillian.

  “I see you’ve been reading the guidebooks,” said Forrester.

  “Feasting on them,” said Gillian firmly. “And after Keens I want to see the wooden nightingale covered in silver in the RCA building.”

  “A wooden nightingale?” said Forrester.

  “Absolutely,” said Gillian. “The book says it sings every hour.” Then she saw a brightly lit shop window and stood mesmerised. “Nylons,” she said, awed. “A shop full of nylons!” But almost immediately her eye fell on the window next door, which displayed an array of fountain pens with Lucite barrels as richly coloured as tropical fruit. Made to write dry with wet ink said the sign.

  “When the shops open tomorrow,” said Forrester, “I’m going to buy you a Parker 51 and as many stockings as I can afford.”

  “Just two will be enough,” said Gillian. “One for each leg.”

  “But in the meantime,” said Forrester, “I thought we might go up to the top of the Empire State Building.”

  “Are you trying to seduce me?” she said, looking up at him. Forrester met her eyes and grinned, just a little wryly.

  “No,” he said. “I’m trying to distract you.” That was what he said, but it was not exactly what he meant. The person he was really trying to distract was himself.

  Like all the elevators in New York those in the Empire State Building were provided with operators, and this one gave them a running commentary as they rose steadily up the floors. “Elevators in this city carry seventeen million people every day, ladies and gentlemen,” he said, “and if you added up all those journeys they would take you halfway to the moon. When the secretary ladies in the offices on the top floor drop the mail down the mail chutes it travels so fast it would burst into flames if we didn’t keep those chutes cool with great blocks of ice.” The passengers emitted murmurs of awe at this piece of information. “And did you know there are more radio stations in New York City than anywhere else on earth?” the elevator man continued relentlessly. “And more radios too?” With each passing floor he came out with a new and more startling statistic, a positive fountain of civic pride. And why not, thought Forrester. He had something to be proud of.

  When they finally emerged onto the viewing platform there was the vast sea of lights that spread out below them, and, glimmering westwards, the glow of the Jersey Shore and the vast continent that stretched away to the Pacific. A kid in a red cap with earflaps stood beside them, wearing a catcher’s mitt on one hand. He looked defiantly at Gillian as he caught her watching him, and then she smiled like a fellow conspirator and he nodded, as if satisfied the password had been given, and moved away. Gillian took Forrester’s hand.

  “Thank you,” she said. “This is perfect.”

  Afterwards, when Keen’s Steakhouse turned out to be fully booked, they wandered through the tree-lined streets west of Times Square and chose a picturesque Italian restaurant in a basement from which they could look up at the people passing in the street. As they ate, Forrester told her what had happened since they had parted that morning at Pier 90.

  “What extraordinary fun you’ve been having,” she said. “Whereas I have merely been learning how to use a pair of headphones and talk clearly and crisply into a microphone.”

  “Which should hopefully leave your mind clear to tell me what you make of all the madness,” said Forrester. Even as he asked her the question, he was surprised what a relief it was to put it to her, to know that instead of the mystery going round and round in his brain, it was now also being considered in that neat, wise, beautifully shaped head. Gillian wound her spaghetti carefully around her fork while she considered.

  “It is odd,” she said, “that so many of the people who might have killed Charles Templar have turned up here in New York, but I suppose the question you have to worry about is whether any of them also wants to do away with poor old Ernie Bevin.”

  “What do you make of the Sumerian demon?” said Forrester. “How do you think he fits in?”

  “The only connection I can see is that he comes from the Middle East,” said Gillian. “Which is the source of so many of Mr. Bevin’s troubles, isn’t it?”

  “Fair point,” said Forrester. “Although Iraq is rather a different part of the Middle East from Palestine.” And suddenly he remembered Washington’s remark that Edward St. John Townsend had been present when Narak was originally found, and resolved to try to find out where Townsend was now. Hadn’t Eban said he was in Saudi Arabia, selling oil concessions to the Americans?

  “You don’t believe there is an actual Sumerian demon, do you?” Gillian was saying. “Gathering up those seals till he becomes all-powerful?”

  “Certainly not,” said Forrester firmly. “What happened today at Columbia had to be a very clever illusion.” Although one which would have required the co-operation, he knew, of a significant number of people, some of whom must already have been in New York.

  Theresa Palmer had arrived here at the same time as he did; there was no way she could have set it up in those few hours without someone local helping her. He was beginning to consider the question of who those local contacts might be when Gillian had another thought.

  “What about Sir Jack Casement? Even if he wasn’t the one who tried to throw you off the ship, I think Mrs. Palmer was right about him. A bad egg, if ever there was one.”

  “I’m inclined to agree, but somehow i
t doesn’t seem his style. I can easily believe him trying to kill me on the Queen Mary, or throwing Billy Burke overboard, and I can believe he might want to get Charles Templar out of his way, but I can’t see him bothering with a lot of Sumerian mumbo jumbo.”

  “What if he’d got someone else to kill Charles Templar, and they’d come up with the mumbo jumbo?”

  Forrester considered this. It was hard to imagine Casement involving himself, even at arm’s length, with Aleister Crowley and his associates, but not impossible. He hadn’t, after all, thought of Casement having anything to do with the struggle to create a homeland for the Jews in Palestine, but according to Matt Hausen he might. What if Theresa Palmer and Aleister Crowley were both working for him?

  “All right,” said Forrester, “let’s assume for a moment that Casement did use Crowley’s people to get rid of Charles Templar in London. We then have to ask ourselves, why has he brought them to New York?”

  “Perhaps because he’s going to use them to do something to Mr. Bevin,” said Gillian.

  Forrester paused. “Well, if Casement is secretly sympathetic to the Jewish campaign for a homeland, Bevin, at present, is the chief obstacle.”

  “There you are then,” said Gillian.

  “But people at the Foreign Office seem convinced Casement is on their side,” said Forrester.

  “Well, that’s Charters and Caldicott for you,” said Gillian. “Isn’t it?”

  “Charters and Caldicott?”

  “Your Foreign Office people, Priestman and Thornbottom, I can never remember their names. But they always remind me of those two scallywags in The Lady Vanishes. You know, the two silly diplomats who only cared about the cricket scores for the Test match?”

  “Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne,” said Forrester, grinning as he remembered the absurd pair bumbling their way through Central Europe in Hitchcock’s comic thriller. “Barbara and I went to see that not long after we met. I always remember the Caldicott character saying, ‘We wouldn’t have missed the train in Hungary if you hadn’t insisted on standing up for the National Anthem.’”

  “And Charters saying back,” said Gillian, “‘It’s always been my contention that the Hungarian Rhapsody is not their national anthem.’” Forrester laughed, and Gillian laughed, and they looked at each other, and suddenly her eyes were full of tears.

  “She took me to see it as well. When I was at boarding school. She came and got me an exeat one afternoon.”

  Forrester reached his hand across the table and put it over hers.

  “I know,” he said. “She told me. She told me about you being so excited you choked on a coconut cream.” Gillian smiled through her tears.

  “I did,” she said. “I did. Oh my goodness, I do miss her.”

  “Yes,” said Forrester, “me too.” And then a waiter came along and asked them if they wanted any dessert and Gillian wiped her eyes and asked what they had, and when she had chosen a Neapolitan ice cream, Forrester raised his glass.

  “To Barbara,” and Gillian raised hers and clinked it against his.

  “I think she’d be glad we’re here,” she said, and Forrester just nodded, because there was something in his throat that made it difficult to speak.

  But he wondered about Crispin Priestley and Richard Thornham, and reminded himself not to leave them, or any of their Foreign Office colleagues, out of the equation.

  As they passed through Times Square again on the way to find her a cab, they glanced up at the Motogram. POLICE HUNT FOR STOLEN EFFIGY ran the headline. SUMERIAN DEMON ON LOOSE IN NEW YORK?

  * * *

  The next day saw Forrester at Flushing Meadows on Long Island, site of the 1939 World’s Fair. Conceived as Nazi storm clouds were gathering over Europe, the fair had been intended to promote the World of Tomorrow and peace between nations. When it closed in 1940, peace between nations had evaporated into history, but what a show it had been while it was at its height. Forrester remembered seeing newsreel footage of the great Westinghouse Time Capsule, supposed to stay closed for five thousand years, which contained a Mickey Mouse watch, a Gillette safety razor, a kewpie doll, copies of Life magazine, the writings of Albert Einstein and a pack of Camel cigarettes. Then there was the seven-foot tall golden robot called “Elektro the Moto-Man”, who talked, smoked and boasted a brain consisting of an incredible forty-eight electric relays.

  He had read about how when the fair was over, the building housing an exhibit about the Municipal Agencies of New York City was converted into a recreation centre for the newly created Flushing Meadows Park: the north side of the building became a roller skating rink and the south side was devoted to ice skating. Then, when the city won the honour of becoming the home of the newly created United Nations Organisation, the skaters were banished and their rinks covered to create an appropriately large, dramatic space where representatives of the fifty-one founding nations of UNO could meet in General Assembly.

  As the car carrying Forrester approached the temporary UN headquarters he saw a forest of flags in front of a long white building fronted by an impressive row of dark granite colonnades. Behind the colonnades were vast stretches of glass brick, and at each corner were massive limestone blocks. The place may have begun life celebrating the municipal bureaucracies of New York, but it certainly looked like the headquarters of a world organisation now.

  Moments after presenting his credentials he was walking into a huge hall with a vast stylised map of the world behind the dais. It made Forrester think of some global war room, an impression reinforced by row after row of delegates wearing the kind of headphones he had last seen used at the Nuremberg war crimes trials. At a long desk above the speakers’ lectern sat the plump Norwegian Secretary General of the United Nations, Trygve Lie. Looking down on it all, through glass panels that would not have looked out of place in cinema projection booths, were the translators. Forrester looked along them for Gillian, but the glare obscured the occupants.

  Then he concentrated on examining every face he could see for anyone he recognised from his days in Palestine, but the only one he knew for certain was Aubrey Eban, and he knew that Lanchester had the representatives of the Jewish Agency under close observation already.

  “Not that I actually expect them to do anything,” he’d said. “But you never can tell. Your job is to spot the lone wolf.” So every few minutes Forrester made eye contact with Lanchester from wherever he was in the hall, letting him know everything was still clear. Then, without warning, a voice spoke beside him.

  “I rode a camel here in 1939,” said Jan Loppersum, emerging from the Dutch contingent. Forrester looked at him, puzzled. “My boat was in harbour, and camels were one of the big attractions at the fair. As well as the ladies with no clothes on in the Surrealist Pavilion.”

  Forrester grinned: he was pleased to see the big Dutch skipper again.

  “I gather there was even a talking robot.”

  “For some reason,” said Loppersum, “I was more interested in the naked ladies. But I’ve heard the robot is still stored here, in a disused pavilion. Those fellows, on the other hand, look as if they would have preferred to see the camels.”

  He directed Forrester’s gaze towards the desks at which the Arab delegates sat, dressed in their traditional flowing robes and keffiyehs, talking to one another in low voices.

  “That is the traditional dress of the desert warrior,” said Forrester.

  “But those men are no desert warriors,” said Loppersum. “They represent the owners of the land on which the Arabs of Palestine live in wretched poverty. If the Jews are allowed to create their own state there they’ll bring prosperity to the whole region. The Arabs should welcome them.”

  “The problem is,” said a broad Australian voice, “that if you let the Jews into Palestine those poor old Arab peasants of yours’ll be out on their ears inside five years. The Jews are just too smart for them.”

  Loppersum turned to the newcomer. “Allow me to introduce the honourable memb
er from the Black Stump,” said the Dutchman, as a small, wiry man appeared beside him. “Brian Cross, meet Duncan Forrester. Duncan was on the boat with me when your fellow delegate disappeared.”

  “That was a rough go,” said Brian Cross. “First time on the Queen Mary and the poor bugger falls right off the back. I didn’t see eye to eye on a lot of things with Billy, but I wouldn’t have wished that on him.”

  “I was wondering whether he did fall off,” said Forrester, “or if somebody pushed him.”

  “Like that ratbag Jack Casement,” said Cross, going straight to the point. “I wouldn’t put it past him. He took all Bill’s money back in the day, so why wouldn’t he take everything else?” He gestured up at the public area on the balcony. “And there he is again, come to see the fun.” Forrester followed his look, and there indeed was Jack Casement, reading the New York Times. Cross turned to Loppersum.

  “So I suppose you Dutch’ll be voting to hand Palestine over to the Jews, eh?”

  “No – my vote, to be fair to both sides, would be to divide Palestine into separate Arab and Jewish areas.”

  Cross shook his head dismissively. “The Brits are never going to let that happen. They’re too much in hock to the Arabs.”

  “Or perhaps they simply see the Arab point of view,” said a voice, and they turned to see one of the robed delegates standing beside them. “Greetings, Mr. Cross,” he said. “It is good to see you again.”

  “Good to see you too, Sheikh,” said Cross. “Forrester, Loppersum, this is Sheikh Hammad bin Hassan, a good friend of mine.”

  Hassan inclined his head gravely, and addressed himself to the Dutchman.

  “I could not help overhearing your remarks about the poverty of the Arabs living in Palestine,” he said. Loppersum opened his mouth to reply, but Hassan forestalled him. “Much of what you say is true, and I myself see much room for land reform and improved agricultural techniques. But let me ask you this, sir, would you see the solution to any social or economic problems in your country as the importation of an entire population of foreigners?”