ICaptain Crosbie came out of the bank with the pleased air of one who hascashed a cheque and has discovered that there is just a little more in hisaccount than he thought there was.
Captain Crosbie often looked pleased with himself. He was that kind ofman. In figure he was short and stocky, with rather a red face and a brist-ling military moustache. He strutted1 a little when he walked. His clotheswere, perhaps, just a trifle loud, and he was fond of a good story. He waspopular among other men. A cheerful man, commonplace but kindly2, un-married. Nothing remarkable3 about him. There are heaps of Crosbies inthe East.
The street into which Captain Crosbie emerged was called Bank Streetfor the excellent reason that most of the banks in the city were situated4 init. Inside the bank it was cool and dark and rather musty. The predomin-ant sound was of large quantities of typewriters clicking in the back-ground.
Outside in Bank Street it was sunny and full of swirling5 dust and thenoises were terrific and varied6. There was the persistent7 honking8 of motorhorns, the cries of vendors9 of various wares10. There were hot disputesbetween small groups of people who seemed ready to murder each otherbut were really fast friends; men, boys and children were selling everytype of tree, sweetmeats, oranges and bananas, bath towels, combs, razorblades and other assorted11 merchandise carried rapidly through the streetson trays. There was also a perpetual and ever renewed sound of throatclearing and spitting, and above it the thin melancholy12 wail13 of men con-ducting donkeys and horses amongst the stream of motors and pedestri-ans shouting, “Balek—Balek!”
It was eleven o’clock in the morning in the city of Baghdad.
Captain Crosbie stopped a rapidly running boy with an armful of news-papers and bought one. He turned the corner of Bank Street and came intoRashid Street which is the main street of Baghdad, running through it forabout four miles parallel with the river Tigris.
Captain Crosbie glanced at the headlines in the paper, tucked it underhis arm, walked for about two hundred yards and then turned down asmall alleyway and into a large khan or court. At the farther side of this hepushed open a door with a brass14 plate and found himself in an office.
A neat young Iraqi clerk left his typewriter and came forward smiling awelcome.
“Good morning, Captain Crosbie. What can I do for you?”
“Mr. Dakin in his room? Good, I’ll go through.”
He passed through a door, up some very steep stairs and along a ratherdirty passage. He knocked at the end door and a voice said, “Come in.”
It was a high, rather bare room. There was an oil stove with a saucer ofwater on top of it, a long, low cushioned seat with a little coffee table infront of it and a large rather shabby desk. The electric light was on and thedaylight was carefully excluded. Behind the shabby desk was a rathershabby man, with a tired and indecisive face—the face of one who has notgot on in the world and knows it and has ceased to care.
The two men, the cheerful self-confident Crosbie, and the melancholy fa-tigued Dakin, looked at each other.
Dakin said, “Hallo, Crosbie. Just in from Kirkuk?”
The other nodded. He shut the door carefully behind him. It was ashabby looking door, badly painted, but it had one rather unexpectedquality; it fitted well, with no crevices15 and no space at the bottom.
It was, in fact, soundproof.
With the closing of the door, the personalities16 of both men changed everso slightly. Captain Crosbie became less aggressive and cocksure. Mr.
Dakin’s shoulders drooped17 less, his manner was less hesitating. If anyonehad been in the room listening they would have been surprised to findthat Dakin was the man in authority.
“Any news, sir?” asked Crosbie.
“Yes.” Dakin sighed. He had before him a paper which he had just beenbusy decoding18. He dotted down two more letters and said:
“It’s to be held in Baghdad.”
Then he struck a match, set light to the paper and watched it burn.
When it had smouldered to ashes, he blew gently. The ashes flew up andscattered.
“Yes,” he said. “They’ve settled on Baghdad. Twentieth of next month.
We’re to ‘preserve all secrecy19.’”
“They’ve been talking about it in the souk—for three days,” said Crosbiedrily.
The tall man smiled his weary smile.
“Top secret! No top secrets in the East, are there, Crosbie?”
“No, sir. If you ask me, there aren’t any top secrets anywhere. Duringthe war I often noticed a barber in London knew more than the High Com-mand.”
“It doesn’t matter much in this case. If the meeting is arranged for Bagh-dad it will soon have to be made public. And then the fun—our particularfun—starts.”
“Do you think it will ever take place, sir?” asked Crosbie sceptically.
“Does Uncle Joe”— thus disrespectfully did Captain Crosbie refer to thehead of a Great European Power—“really mean to come?”
“I think he does this time, Crosbie,” said Dakin thoughtfully. “Yes, I thinkso. And if the meeting comes off—comes off without a hitch—well, it mightbe the saving of—everything. If some kind of understanding could only bereached—” he broke off.
Crosbie still looked slightly sceptical. “Is — forgive me, sir — is under-standing of any kind possible?”
“In the sense you mean, Crosbie, probably not! If it were just a bringingtogether of two men representing totally different ideologies20 probably thewhole thing would end as usual—in increased suspicion and misunder-standing. But there’s the third element. If that fantastic story of Carmi-chael’s is true—”
He broke off.
“But surely, sir, it can’t be true. It’s too fantastic!”
The other was silent for a few moments. He was seeing, very vividly21, anearnest troubled face, hearing a quiet nondescript voice saying fantasticand unbelievable things. He was saying to himself, as he had said then,“Either my best, my most reliable man has gone mad: or else—this thing istrue….”
He said in the same thin melancholy voice:
“Carmichael believed it. Everything he could find out confirmed his hy-pothesis. He wanted to go there to find out more—to get proof. Whether Iwas wise to let him or not, I don’t know. If he doesn’t get back, it’s only mystory of what Carmichael told me, which again is a story of what someonetold him. Is that enough? I don’t think so. It is, as you say, such a fantasticstory…But if the man himself is here, in Baghdad, on the twentieth, to tellhis own story, the story of an eyewitness22, and to produce proof—”
“Proof?” said Crosbie sharply.
The other nodded.
“Yes, he’s got proof.”
“How do you know?”
“The agreed formula. The message came through Salah Hassan.” Hequoted carefully: “A white camel with a load of oats is coming over the Pass.”
He paused and then went on:
“So Carmichael has got what he went to get, but he didn’t get away un-suspected. They’re on his trail. Whatever route he takes will be watched,and what is far more dangerous, they’ll be waiting for him—here. First onthe frontier. And if he succeeds in passing the frontier, there will be a cor-don drawn23 round the Embassies and the Consulates25. Look at this.”
He shuffled26 amongst the papers on his desk and read out:
“An Englishman travelling in his car from Persia to Iraq shot dead—sup-posedly by bandits. A Kurdish merchant travelling down from the hillsambushed and killed. Another Kurd, Abdul Hassan, suspected of being acigarette smuggler27, shot by the police. Body of a man, afterwards identi-fied as an Armenian lorry driver, found on the Rowanduz road. All ofthem mark you, of roughly the same description. Height, weight, hair,build, it corresponds with a description of Carmichael. They’re taking nochances. They’re out to get him. Once he’s in Iraq the danger will begreater still. A gardener at the Embassy, a servant at the Consulate24, an offi-cial at the Airport, in the Customs, at the railway stations… all hotelswatched…A cordon28, stretched tight.
Crosbie raised his eyebrows29.
“You think it’s as widespread as all that, sir?”
“I’ve no doubt of it. Even in our show there have been leakages30. That’sthe worst of all. How am I to be sure that the measures we’re adopting toget Carmichael safely into Baghdad aren’t known already to the otherside? It’s one of the elementary moves of the game, as you know, to havesomeone in the pay of the other camp.”
“Is there anyone you—suspect?”
Slowly Dakin shook his head.
Crosbie sighed.
“In the meantime,” he said, “we carry on?”
“Yes.”
“What about Crofton Lee?”
“He’s agreed to come to Baghdad.”
“Everyone’s coming to Baghdad,” said Crosbie. “Even Uncle Joe, accord-ing to you, sir. But if anything should happen to the President—while he’shere—the balloon will go up with a vengeance31.”
“Nothing must happen,” said Dakin. “That’s our business. To see itdoesn’t.”
When Crosbie had gone Dakin sat bent32 over his desk. He murmured un-der his breath:
“They came to Baghdad….”
On the blotting33 pad he drew a circle and wrote under it Baghdad—then,dotted round it, he sketched34 a camel, an aeroplane, a steamer, a smallpuffing train—all converging35 on the circle. Then on the corner of the padhe drew a spider’s web. In the middle of the spider’s web he wrote aname: Anna Scheele. Underneath36 he put a big query37 mark.
Then he took his hat, and left the office. As he walked along RashidStreet, some man asked another who that was.
“That? Oh, that’s Dakin. In one of the oil companies. Nice fellow, butnever gets on. Too lethargic38. They say he drinks. He’ll never get anywhere.
You’ve got to have drive to get on in this part of the world.”
II
“Have you got the reports on the Krugenhorf property, Miss Scheele?”
“Yes, Mr. Morganthal.”
Miss Scheele, cool and efficient, slipped the papers in front of her em-ployer.
He grunted39 as he read.
“Satisfactory, I think.”
“I certainly think so, Mr. Morganthal.”
“Is Schwartz here?”
“He’s waiting in the outer office.”
“Have him sent in right now.”
Miss Scheele pressed a buzzer—one of six.
“Will you require me, Mr. Morganthal?”
“No, I don’t think so, Miss Scheele.”
Anna Scheele glided40 noiselessly from the room.
She was a platinum41 blonde — but not a glamorous42 blonde. Her paleflaxen hair was pulled straight back from her forehead into a neat roll atthe neck. Her pale blue intelligent eyes looked out on the world from be-hind strong glasses. Her face had neat small features, but was quite ex-pressionless. She had made her way in the world not by her charm but bysheer efficiency. She could memorize anything, however complicated, andproduce names, dates and times without having to refer to notes. Shecould organize the staff of a big office in such a way that it ran as by well-oiled machinery43. She was discretion44 itself and her energy, though con-trolled and disciplined, never flagged.
Otto Morganthal, head of the firm of Morganthal, Brown and Shipperke,international bankers, was well aware that to Anna Scheele he owed morethan mere45 money could repay. He trusted her completely. Her memory,her experience, her judgement, her cool level head were invaluable46. Hepaid her a large salary and would have made it a larger one had she askedfor it.
She knew not only the details of his business but the details of hisprivate life. When he had consulted her in the matter of the second Mrs.
Morganthal, she had advised divorce and suggested the exact amount ofalimony. She had not expressed sympathy or curiosity. She was not, hewould have said, that kind of woman. He didn’t think she had any feel-ings, and it had never occurred to him to wonder what she thought about.
He would indeed have been astonished if he had been told that she hadany thoughts—other, that is, than thoughts connected with Morganthal,Brown and Shipperke and with the problems of Otto Morganthal.
So it was with complete surprise that he heard her say as she preparedto leave his office:
“I should like three weeks’ leave of absence if I might have it, Mr. Mor-ganthal. Starting from Tuesday next.”
Staring at her, he said uneasily: “It will be awkward—very awkward.”
“I don’t think it will be too difficult, Mr. Morganthal. Miss Wygate isfully competent to deal with things. I shall leave her my notes and full in-structions. Mr. Cornwall can attend to the Ascher Merger47.”
Still uneasily he asked:
“You’re not ill, or anything?”
He couldn’t imagine Miss Scheele being ill. Even germs respected AnnaScheele and kept out of her way.
“Oh no, Mr. Morganthal. I want to go to London to see my sister there.”
“Your sister?” He didn’t know she had a sister. He had never conceivedof Miss Scheele as having any family or relations. She had never men-tioned having any. And here she was, casually48 referring to a sister in Lon-don. She had been over in London with him last fall but she had nevermentioned having a sister then.
With a sense of injury he said:
“I never knew you had a sister in En gland49?”
Miss Scheele smiled very faintly.
“Oh yes, Mr. Morganthal. She is married to an Englishman connectedwith the British Museum. It is necessary for her to undergo a very seriousoperation. She wants me to be with her. I should like to go.”
In other words, Otto Morganthal saw, she had made up her mind to go.
He said grumblingly50, “All right, all right…Get back as soon as you can.
I’ve never seen the market so jumpy. All this damned Communism. Warmay break out at any moment. It’s the only solution, I sometimes think.
The whole country’s riddled51 with it—riddled with it. And now the Presid-ent’s determined52 to go to this fool conference at Baghdad. It’s a put-up jobin my opinion. They’re out to get him. Baghdad! Of all the outlandishplaces!”
“Oh I’m sure he’ll be very well guarded,” Miss Scheele said soothingly53.
“They got the Shah of Persia last year, didn’t they? They got Bernadottein Palestine. It’s madness—that’s what it is—madness.
“But then,” added Mr. Morganthal heavily, “all the world is mad.”
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收听单词发音
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1
strutted
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| 趾高气扬地走，高视阔步( strut的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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situated
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| adj.坐落在...的，处于某种境地的 | |
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swirling
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| v.旋转，打旋( swirl的现在分词 ) | |
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varied
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| adj.多样的，多变化的 | |
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persistent
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| adj.坚持不懈的，执意的；持续的 | |
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honking
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| v.（使）发出雁叫似的声音，鸣（喇叭），按（喇叭）( honk的现在分词 ) | |
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9
vendors
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| n.摊贩( vendor的名词复数 )；小贩；（房屋等的）卖主；卖方 | |
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wares
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| n. 货物, 商品 | |
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assorted
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| adj.各种各样的，各色俱备的 | |
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melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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wail
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| vt./vi.大声哀号，恸哭；呼啸，尖啸 | |
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brass
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| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
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crevices
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| n.（尤指岩石的）裂缝，缺口( crevice的名词复数 ) | |
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personalities
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| n. 诽谤，（对某人容貌、性格等所进行的）人身攻击； 人身攻击；人格, 个性, 名人( personality的名词复数 ) | |
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17
drooped
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| 弯曲或下垂，发蔫( droop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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decoding
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| n.译码，解码v.译（码），解（码）( decode的现在分词 )；分析及译解电子信号 | |
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secrecy
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| n.秘密，保密，隐蔽 | |
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ideologies
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| n.思想（体系）( ideology的名词复数 )；思想意识；意识形态；观念形态 | |
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vividly
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| adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地 | |
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eyewitness
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| n.目击者，见证人 | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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consulate
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| n.领事馆 | |
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consulates
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| n.领事馆( consulate的名词复数 ) | |
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shuffled
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| v.洗（纸牌）( shuffle的过去式和过去分词 )；拖着脚步走；粗心地做；摆脱尘世的烦恼 | |
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smuggler
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| n.走私者 | |
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cordon
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| n.警戒线，哨兵线 | |
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eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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30
leakages
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| 泄露； 漏( leakage的名词复数 )； 漏出； 漏出物； 渗漏物 | |
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31
vengeance
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| n.报复，报仇，复仇 | |
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bent
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| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
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blotting
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| 吸墨水纸 | |
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sketched
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| v.草拟（sketch的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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converging
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| adj.收敛[缩]的，会聚的，趋同的v.（线条、运动的物体等）会于一点( converge的现在分词 )；（趋于）相似或相同；人或车辆汇集；聚集 | |
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underneath
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| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
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query
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| n.疑问，问号，质问；vt.询问，表示怀疑 | |
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lethargic
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| adj.昏睡的，懒洋洋的 | |
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grunted
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| （猪等）作呼噜声( grunt的过去式和过去分词 )； （指人）发出类似的哼声； 咕哝着说 | |
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40
glided
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| v.滑动( glide的过去式和过去分词 )；掠过；（鸟或飞机 ） 滑翔 | |
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platinum
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| n.白金 | |
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glamorous
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| adj.富有魅力的；美丽动人的；令人向往的 | |
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43
machinery
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| n.(总称)机械，机器；机构 | |
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discretion
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| n.谨慎；随意处理 | |
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45
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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46
invaluable
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| adj.无价的，非常宝贵的，极为贵重的 | |
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merger
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| n.企业合并，并吞 | |
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48
casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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gland
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| n.腺体，(机)密封压盖，填料盖 | |
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50
grumblingly
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| 喃喃报怨着，发牢骚着 | |
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51
riddled
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| adj.布满的；充斥的；泛滥的v.解谜，出谜题(riddle的过去分词形式) | |
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52
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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53
soothingly
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| adv.抚慰地，安慰地；镇痛地 | |
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