The Shattered Eye Page 3

  Gaunt—he was aptly named, for his dark face was cadaverous and his limbs seemed to hang as limply as rumpled clothes from his trunk—turned his eyes away from Pim and his tears and fixed them on the young vicar enthusiastically leading the song. White alb and purple stole. Something stirred memory: Purple was the color of Lent, wasn’t it? But it must be Lent, it was March; in any case, Easter would be late this year.

  Not since childhood had Gaunt thought about matters such as Lent or the color of liturgical vestments in the Anglican Church. Why had Pim dragged him to this place on a dull, foggy Sunday afternoon?

  “But you must come,” Pim had said. “Something has transpired.”

  Gaunt, comfortable in his library in the elegant flat he owned off the Marylebone Road, had not wanted to respond to Pim’s telephone call. In the first place, he did not want to be connected to Pim’s strange little network at all, but circumstances and politics inside Auntie had conspired against him. There were always conspiracies in the intelligence branch, and Gaunt felt, with some justification, that he was often made the victim of them.

  “I’m sorry I had to call you,” Pim had said at the remote Lakenheath train station.

  “Had to change trains at Ely,” Gaunt complained.

  “I know, I know. Back of beyond here, only sixty-five miles from London. Difficult to believe, isn’t it?”

  “What dreadful thing has transpired—”

  “Not now, wait till we get into the village.” He had pushed the little Ford Escort down the narrow A highway to the winding high street of Lakenheath, two miles away. As he talked, his breath rose in steamy puffs from his thick red lips. Gaunt could almost read his words like the smoke signals of red Indians.

  “Is the heater broken?”

  “Yes, I’m afraid so, meant to have it repaired but there are too many—”

  “My God, I’m certain Auntie can come up with the necessary funds to finance it if—”

  “Not that,” Pim had said. The words had tumbled out of the roly-poly mouth like clowns on a mat. “Actually, just have time to go up to the church in the village, got myself in a bit of a bind, I’m afraid, you see. I’ve been studying this particular church for weeks now, wanted to get around the vicar. The old vicar was a bit of a curmudgeon, this new one is much better. Really fascinating church, you see, I told the vicar I would attend evensong and he let me have an hour with the brasses.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Brasses. Brass of the De Lacey knight, really superb, though a bit small. Fourteenth-century, been closed for years and—”

  “Brass? Are you speaking of brass rubbings? Is that what this is all about?”

  The irritation had startled Pim, and he had turned to his companion in the cold little car as it chugged into Lakenheath. Pim’s eyes had widened, and his mouth dropped. “Why, of course not. I wouldn’t have called you up here about brass rubbings, Gaunt. That’s just my little hobby, you might say. What do you think this is about, anyway?”

  The response irritated Gaunt into temporary silence. The irritation had begun with the phone call and been compounded by the race across London to the train to Anglia leaving from Liverpool Street Station, and heightened by the five-minute wait at Lakenheath platform.

  The silence encouraged Pim:

  “London doesn’t understand the difficulties in this sort of operation. These people are worse than Russians when it comes to gossip and suspicion; in fact, they’re worse than the Irish…London gave me no methodology on this, only the target. I had to take Felker, for instance, I told you from the first that Med Section had fobbed off Felker onto us…”

  On and on, a mosaic of words that made a crazy-quilt pattern. Until he mentioned Felker a second time, and Gaunt was compelled to interrupt.

  “This is about Felker then?”

  For the second time, Pim turned in the little car and looked at his companion with something like astonishment pasted on the porcine features.

  “Of course, who do you suppose it would be about? I never wanted Felker, I want you to note that. Later, I mean, when we make the report.”

  Felker. The weak link in the whole strange pattern of the operation that had gone on all that winter at Mildenhall, where the American air force maintained its strong operations.

  “Why can’t you tell me now?” Gaunt had pleaded, following the little man into the churchyard and around the broken path to the side door of the Norman edifice, with its squat tower and bleak yet eloquent walls and windows.

  “I saw the pastor. In the high street, I had to agree…he remembered that I had promised…this is such a mess, but it will all be straightened out…” The words had trailed off as Pim led Gaunt into the church and they were made silent by the presence of the others in the little congregation.

  Something had gone terribly wrong. Gaunt knew Pim, and for all the little man’s distracted speech and fluttering ways, he was not a fool. Something had gone terribly wrong with the assignment.

  “And I must say what comfort there is to be found in the words of the Twenty-third Psalm. Because it is not only the boasting of David in the power and majesty of God and in David’s belief that God will uphold the faithful; it is in the certainty that God will surely comfort us in our moment of trouble, as we walk ‘through the valley of the shadow of death.’ What shall we fear? Nothing but our fear of God. Comfort is what He brings us in that terrible hour. Such a cozy word, comfort; it conjures up the image of a friendly fire at the end of a long and damp day in the fields…”

  Gaunt frowned at the words of the vicar, but none would have noticed the frown; his face had few emotional ranges that were not dominated by his thin lips and narrow eyes. If he were to smile, it might be mistaken for a frown. He had large teeth and they were bared—at smile or frown—by the thin layer of lips.

  Rubbish, thought Gaunt. He felt the service would never end. He felt as he had as a child, trapped by the adult conventions of service and worship and meaningless rituals and words that lied. Shall I fear no evil? Of course I shall fear it; it cloaks every step I make in the service; it cloaks the silly chatter of Pim, who prattles about brass rubbings when all he means is that he cannot tell me yet about Felker. What is he waiting for?

  Gaunt looked at Pim in the pew next to him and saw that the porcine features were in repose; the words of the vicar, however hoary, rolled over Pim like comforting waves of heat from that fire crackling in the metaphorical fireplace, waiting for him at the end of a gray, wet day in the fields.

  A day like this Sunday, Gaunt thought.

  “And remember always that the Lord shall be with you, all of you, each in your secret hearts, all the days of your life, and let this comfort you.…”

  But there was no comfort, Gaunt would argue. Accept that there is no comfort and the end of the long gray day in the fields is only darkness and the peace of oblivion.

  Rain began to beat again at the windows, gently, like a stranger knocking at the back door. Cold, mist, rain, wind; there was no comfort in nature or in words or priests. Especially in thoughts of God.

  They rose and sang another hymn, and Gaunt groaned another “My God, Pim” under his breath, but the little man ignored him and sang the hymn in the same surging flat voice as before, rolling like the cold waters in the canals that cut through the farm fields in Anglia. Gaunt had studied the countryside from the window of the first-class compartment of the train up from London. Flat and timeless and dismal, with the flat sky pressing down on the flat earth as though all things had lost a dimension. The fields were turned for spring planting and were black, held down by leaden unmoving clouds that stretched from the Wash down to London and beyond.

  Pim touched his shoulder. He realized he had been daydreaming and the service was over. He moved out of the pew, holding his trilby in hand. The young vicar had moved down to the side door that faced the graveyard. Darkness had fallen. The vicar’s youthful face was bright with good-fellowship and a smile that bespoke gra
titude to the congregation; at least they had come to be comforted.

  “Thank you for attending, thank you, Mr. Pim.”

  “It was a wonderful service, Vicar.”

  “And for bringing your friend…”

  The vicar wanted to talk, to pin them in conversation, but behind them a large woman in a gray coat shoved up to gush at the young minister. “What a beautiful sentiment,” she began.

  Pim escaped with Gaunt into the mist of the graveyard. They stood for a moment and felt the chill seep into their clothing.

  “What now, Pim? Tea at the vicarage?”

  The little man huddled into his mackintosh; his piggish eyes darted up and showed a trace of annoyance. “Yes, Gaunt, that’s all very well. In fact, I met the vicar on the high street scarcely two hours ago, he reminded me about the service, and I had promised him. You don’t seem to appreciate the difficulties in operating—in running any decent sort of operation—in this country. Especially in Suffolk. My God, Gaunt, these people consider a stranger someone who has lived here less than thirty years. We have constrictions in this sort of society, you simply don’t understand, no one at Auntie understands—”

  “All right, all right, what now? What about Felker?”

  “Yes. What about Felker?” The voice was solemn, dirge-like. The rain and darkness closed around them; they were beyond the pale of light coming from the church door, beyond the gaggle of women and elderly men gathered around the young priest.

  “Leave the car, let’s go up to the Half Moon for a warm pint.”

  “Pim…”

  But the little man led the way without words. Again, Gaunt followed him around the bulk of the Norman spire and up the high street, which was merely an extension of the A highway. At the end of the strip of shops squatted the Half Moon with its dark, flinty stone glistening in the damp. To the side of the structure were the outside toilet facilities. The stink of centuries was in the stones and in the damp wood. The green door beckoned with a single lamp above it and a wooden sign that said the proprietor had license to sell beverages on or off premises.

  “Saloon bar,” Pim said, nodding toward the dark inner entrance. They climbed the steps and waited at the bar.

  The proprietor was a middle-aged man with a round bald head and sly blue eyes. The public bar on the other side of the pub was bright and cozy; the saloon bar, albeit more elegant, was cold and empty and dark.

  “Evening,” the publican said.

  “Two pints bitter,” Pim ordered.

  Gaunt interrupted with a stubborn tone. “Large Grant’s, I think, if you have it.”

  “We have it, sur,” the publican said, immediately adopting an air of hostile subservience. His accent was pure Suffolk, the words uttered with a slurred reluctance, each sound born like a breech calf, half strangled through the clenched lips.

  The publican drew the bitter and placed the pint on the bar and then measured a portion of smoky Scotch into the snifter glass.

  “Ice, sur?” the publican said.

  “No thank you.”

  “Americans,” he said.

  Gaunt said, “I beg your pardon?”

  “The American base, sur. Not far from here. At Mildenhall? We get Americans sometimes, not often, they don’t patronize the village shops, have all their goods brought to them in the PX. Even flour. Don’t like our flour, they say. Everything has to be made with ice. And vodka. They don’t fancy whiskey; everything must be vodka.”

  “Yes, isn’t it so?” Pim said brightly. “Ah, well; we have to put up with them.”

  “I don’t mind the ones drink quiet and don’t make a fuss.” The publican furrowed his brow. “The local girls. That’s what I can’t stand. They hitch up to the base every Saturday night, want to get themselves a rich American, I suppose. England isn’t good enough—”

  “Ah, well, just so,” said Pim.

  Gaunt withdrew from the circle of light at the bar. Why did Pim indulge these people? The conversations of rustics were endless, pointless, circles in circles.

  “Mind, I don’t have a prejudice against them. Except the blacks, I can’t abide them in my place.”

  “Yes, yes, feel just the same.”

  “Nothing I like less than to see a black one with one of the local girls. They have no shame.”

  “Who? The blacks?” Gaunt could not resist it; the frustrations of the day were piled in his remark.

  The publican gave him an angry look and turned away, back to the public bar on the far side of the old house. A game of darts was in progress there, and they could hear the steady thunk thunk as the darts embedded themselves in the board.

  “You didn’t have to say that.”

  “My God, sit down, Pim, and give a fill and stop this bucolic tour.”

  “This is my territory, Gaunt; this is my operation. You can’t come la-di-da from Auntie and queer it for me.” The uninflected voice suddenly found its roots in the East End; it was rough, threatening. The little man who had seemed so ridiculous weeping at church seemed dangerous now.

  “Pim, I have been waiting two hours for your fill, and I have endured being prayed over, sung at, and now been the unwilling participant in a blatantly racist conversation that has absolutely no point except to endear you to a half-wit publican and—”

  “Careful. Careful.” Softly, dangerously.

  Gaunt thought of something more to say and then thought not to say it. The two men sat down at a table removed from the bar in the half-darkness and sipped their beverages for a moment. Gaunt tasted the smoky whisky and felt it warm him.

  “Yesterday,” Pim began. “We were supposed to meet at Ely. You see, I had arranged to take some rubbings from the tombs in the cathedral and—”

  Gaunt put down his glass heavily. “Damn your brass rubbings and damn your churches. I want to know about Felker.”

  “As I was saying.” Pim paused. His voice had resumed its toneless quality. Each word was important because it was half hidden, even as it was uttered; each word counted now. “Ely was safe, I could watch his coming and cover him. Felker didn’t arrive. I waited first at the cathedral and then at the fallback in Ely. Then I went to the third fallback, to the safe house. Felker wasn’t coming; something had gone wrong. You see, we were very close to the Opposition man; very close. Much closer than I could signal you in the reports.”

  “Dammit, Pim, I was your control officer.”

  “Yes. But you have to have a feeling for this sort of thing. In the field.”

  “I’ve been in the field.”

  “But you’ve been at Auntie too long. Too long. There was nothing I could explain to you. Not until it happened.”

  Auntie. Contempt was mingled in the utterance of the common, ragging nickname adopted by all the field agents for headquarters of the Ministry for External Affairs (Extraordinary). Auntie was so widespread that the word had shown up from time to time in official correspondences between the minister and department heads; naturally, the minister initiated the use of the word in such exchanges. At one time, the intelligence units for internal and external espionage had been coded MI-5 and MI-6 respectively. After the embarrassment of the Philby spy network inside British intelligence and subsequent revelations of other traitors, a housecleaning had thrown out both bathwater and baby in an attempt to restore the prestige of British intelligence. And so the old MI-5 became Ministry for Internal Affairs (Extraordinary) and foreign intelligence became the preserve of Auntie. No one quite knew why “Auntie” was chosen as a nickname; like all nicknames, it came about spontaneously and it was kept because it seemed to fit perfectly.

  “And so? Pim? What happened?”

  “To Felker, you mean? Why, that’s obvious.”

  “Not to me.”

  “He bolted.”

  There was a long moment of silence. Gaunt felt failure creep around his neck like the chill of the wetlands all around. He brushed at it with his hand and realized he felt choked. It has been his operation, he had been control
officer, and yet, at the critical moment he had not been in control at all.

  “I ran the checks all night.”

  “Through Auntie? Wasn’t that indiscreet? I mean—”

  “No, no. I’m not such a fool. He simply took the ferry at Harwich to the Hook of Holland. Somewhere in the Low Countries now, I should guess. Unless he’s made it to Germany. The funny thing is that he did so little to cover his trail. Do you suppose he wants someone to know he’s gone?”

  “We know.”

  “Not us, Gaunt.”

  Another silence. Speech seemed so difficult now, as though both were learning a foreign language.

  “You should have notified me right away, it was your—”

  “Don’t become tedious.” Again the piggish eyes darted up a warning glance. “By the time I was certain, absolutely rock certain, there was nothing to be done. You see, I thought perhaps Reed had done him in.”

  The Soviet agent. The watcher at Mildenhall who had been the object of the operation. The Soviet agent who seemed so in love with the lifestyle of England. The Soviet agent who whored in Piccadilly with the Soho boys; the Soviet agent who liked fast cars and Savile Row clothes. He had been utterly corruptible. They had meant to turn him, and now Felker, their agent at the point of contact, was gone.

  “And Reed did not?”

  “No. I was certain of that. At the end, I mean. You see, I saw the problem in two ways. If Felker had bolted, there was nothing to be done except to cover the trail. For Auntie and for our Soviet friends. I mean, it would hardly do for the Opposition to think that one of ours could prove less than trustworthy. We’re all done with traitors, ever since the reforms. Auntie says so.”

  “Your sarcasm is misplaced. This is so fantastic, I scarcely believe what I’m hearing.”

  “‘More things in heaven and earth…’”

  “Didn’t you have a clue? I mean, you were the network man. You saw Felker every day.”

  “Not every day, but no, I didn’t. Not a flutter, all this time wasted,” Pim said. For the first time, he sounded tired and a trifle sad.

  “You should have alerted me.”