Tamar (5 page)

Turning to Dart he said, “I sent my last transmission from here almost exactly a year ago. I never expected to come back.”

“How does it feel, being here again?”

Tamar’s eyes shifted to the yellow light shining up through the trapdoor. He seemed about to answer, then merely shook his head. “Let’s check the equipment.”

He went to a lopsided chest of drawers that was shoved into the angle of roof and floor and dragged it a little way into the room. On his knees, he rummaged in the exposed thatch and produced a small tan suitcase, a car battery, and a metal box wrapped in lengths of green and black wire. He set all three things on the table. The suitcase transceiver was thick with dust. Tamar wiped it off with his sleeve and opened it.

“Look,” he said, pointing to the beams overhead. “See those six hooks? For your antenna.” He unwound the black wire and handed it to Dart. “The battery should be charged up. Now, are you all right to check this out while I go and see how Koop’s doing?”

“Sure,” Dart said, unravelling the power leads. “Shouldn’t take long. I’ll come and find you.”

The boy led Tamar down to ground level. At the foot of the stairs, he turned to face the agent and stood his lantern on a ledge. Having done that, he didn’t seem to know what to do with his hands. Eventually he folded his arms and shoved his fingers under his armpits. He looked up at Tamar; below the peak of the cap, his eyes were dark pools reflecting the lamplight.

“They told us only ‘Tamar.’ I prayed it would be you. I begged God to let it be you.”

Tamar said, “There was no way I could let you know.”

“No. But when I saw you get out of the car with Koop, I almost fainted.”

Tamar let go of the stair rail and came down the last step. They were very close now.

“Has anything changed?”

Tamar smiled. “Many things.”

“No. You know what I mean. Between us. Do you —”

“Yes,” Tamar said, and something inside him opened, something he’d kept locked for a long time. “I still love you. I haven’t stopped thinking about you. It’s been like living with a part of my body missing.”

He reached out and gently removed the cap, releasing a fall of dark hair that came almost to the narrow shoulders, framing the pale oval face in which the eyes now closed. He put his hands under the hair, cupping her head. He tried to say her name, but his throat was tight and he had to try again.

“Marijke. Dear God. Marijke.” It was the first time in almost a year he had spoken the word.

Their two monstrous shadows, thrown by the lamp onto the far wall of the barn, merged into one and became motionless. Then Marijke spoke, but her face was pressed into his chest and he could not make out the words. He held her away from his body slightly. “What?”

“I didn’t even know if you were dead or alive,” she said, almost angrily.

“Nor did I.”

From above them came a muffled creaking. Marijke pulled away, taking the cap from Tamar’s hand. “I must go to the house,” she said, glancing up to where light was brightening at the head of the stairs. “My grandmother will be very anxious by now.”

“How is she?”

“The same. She will probably cry when she sees you.” She stepped away from him, then paused. “Are you still Christiaan Boogart?”

“Yes.”

She smiled for the first time. “Good. I liked him.”

She was across the barn and through the door by the time Dart began to descend the stairs.

“Tamar? Tamar, are you all right?”

Tamar drew in a long breath, as if he were about to dive into cold water, then turned to look up at Dart. “Yes. Fine. Is the set up to scratch?”

“It works perfectly. I thought you were going to see how Koop was doing.” The upward light from the lantern he carried turned Dart’s face into a yellow-and-black mask that was both comical and sinister.

“Yes. I just stopped to get my breath.”

“Well, it’s been quite a night, one way or another.”

Tamar almost laughed. “That is something of an understatement, my friend.”

At the door of the barn, Tamar hung both lanterns on nails hammered into the wall. Then he extinguished them. The two men stood, invisible to each other, waiting for their eyes to adjust to the darkness.

The journey to the Mendlo Mental Asylum took twenty minutes but seemed much longer on the narrow back roads. Dart saw a line of massive plane trees just before the car swung right between two tall brick gateposts. Then an impression of dark windows in a long brick wall. Ahead of them, the ambulance turned right again and vanished. Wim brought the German car to a halt beside what looked like a greenhouse. Koop was now very anxious about the nearness of dawn. Like a vampire, Dart thought. He even looks a bit like one.

A glass door was opened by a nun. She called softly, “Dr. Lubbers?” Dart went up two steps to the door and shook the hand she held out to him. “I am Sister Agatha. Please come in.”

She led him into a conservatory, where silvery-green plants cast complicated moon shadows. Oskar followed them, carrying two small black suitcases that he set down on the floor.

“Dr. Veening is catching up on some sleep,” Sister Agatha said. “He asked me to wake him when you arrived. You’ll probably be more comfortable waiting in here.”

She opened a door. Dart followed her through into complete darkness. Then there was the scratching of a match and a sudden blossoming of pale yellow light. He was in a large room containing nothing but an assortment of dilapidated chairs. He sat down on the one nearest him and instantly felt unbelievably tired. Sister Agatha fiddled with the lamp until its flame was steady. In the yellow light, her face looked as if it had been carved out of wax. Then she melted into the darkness.

Dart had been sitting for less than a minute when he heard the German car start up and drive off. Once again he felt that events were out of his control. His reception committee had gone, and he had not been able to say goodbye or wish them luck. He fought against an aching desire for sleep. The muscles in the back of his neck could hardly hold his head up.

He woke when he heard a chair scrape on the bare floor. He was being studied by a pair of ice-bright blue eyes set in a crumpled and stubbly face. The man was about sixty. He wore a grey dressing gown over a shirt and dark trousers. Wire-framed spectacles hung from a cord around his neck and rested on his chest.

“Good morning.”

Dart straightened up in the chair. “Dr. Veening?”

“Do you know,” the other man said, “I think I would commit murder for a cigarette.”

“What? Oh, right . . .” Dart fumbled in a pocket and produced a creased pack. The older man took a cigarette, ran it under his nose for the aroma, then lit it from the oil lamp. He exhaled a sigh of pleasure in a blue cloud.

“It’s over two weeks since I had a smoke,” he said. “Scrounged it off a bloody German while he was checking my papers. He knew damn well who I was, too.”

“You are Dr. Veening?”

“We are colleagues, so naturally we will use first names. You are Ernst; I am Albert.” He extended a hand, and Dart shook it. “Welcome to the madhouse, Ernst Lubbers. Since you must be out of your mind, doing what you are doing, you should fit in very nicely.” He drew on his cigarette. “You look almost as tired as I feel. When I finish this, I’ll show you to your room. It’s on the first floor, well away from the wards. The wailing and so forth won’t reach you there. Sleep as long as you like. I imagine you’ve had an eventful night.”

Dart shook himself out of his dazed state. “Dr. Veening. Albert, sorry. I can’t sleep yet. I have to make a transmission in”— he checked his watch —“Christ, in just less than an hour. I have to set the equipment up.” He looked about the room anxiously. “Where’s my stuff?”

“Sister Agatha took your kit bag to your bedroom.”

“Is that where I set up?”

Albert Veening looked almost hurt. “Certainly not. We’ve got a special hidey-hole for that. We’ve made a rather neat job of it, though I say so myself. I hope you’ll be impressed. And if you’re not, I hope you’ll pretend you are.”

He put his cigarette out under his foot, then bent and picked up the stub and dropped it into the pocket of his dressing gown. He stood and lifted the lamp. “Your, er, technical equipment is already up there. Shall we go?”

They went through a panelled door into an impressive hallway. Its three tall windows were barred on the inside. Dart saw that the sky was paler now, a blue-grey slate sprinkled with chalky stars. Veening led him up a wide zigzag staircase with a dark mahogany banister. On the second landing they turned right, through a reinforced door. A corridor, more stairs, two turns. Dart remembered an earlier night walk with a Luger pressed against his skull.

Veening said, not looking round, “I know what you’re thinking. Bloody maze, this place. The architect must have been a lunatic. Right. Here we are.”

They were in a passageway that ended at a black panelled door. Veening produced a large bunch of keys attached to his belt loop by a length of string. With some difficulty he separated one key from the rest and handed it to Dart. “Don’t lose it,” he said. “It’s the only spare. Go on, open up.”

Dart put the heavy key into the lock. There was some resistance, but eventually the door swung open.

“This is the old dispensary, where they doled out whatever weird and wonderful potions they hoped might do some good a hundred years ago. It hasn’t been used for God knows how long.”

The room, with its counter, resembled a shop. An elaborate set of scales had gathered equal amounts of dust in its tarnished brass pans. Behind the counter, along two walls, were many rows of small drawers, each labelled with flaking gold lettering. Along the third wall, dusty-shouldered flasks of coloured glass sat on shelves. Next to these shelves was a door, its varnish like diseased skin. Veening lifted a hinged section of the counter, and Dart followed him through it. Veening opened the scabby door to reveal a walk-in cupboard. Dart’s two black suitcases sat on the floor next to a rusty bucket and a broom. Four iron hooks were screwed to the back wall.

“Now then,” Veening said. “Watch.” He went into the cupboard and tugged the third hook from the left. It came away from the wall, attached to a short length of cord. He leaned his shoulder against the wall and it swung open.
“Voilà!”
he said, unable to keep the pride from his voice. “Do come in.”

It was a room about three metres square, containing an ancient bureau, a chair, and a sort of couch covered in a green blanket. In one corner, close to a small leaded window, stood a gadget that looked like a bicycle converted into a device for torture. It had neither wheels nor handlebars; the saddle was perched on top of a triangular metal frame. The chain connected the pedals to a dynamo, from which dangled two electrical cables with crocodile clips at their ends.

“A battery recharger,” Dart murmured. “My God.” He raised the lamp and looked around the room. “This is fantastic, Albert.”

“It’s acceptable, is it? This used to be the dispenser’s office. The fake cupboard is something Sister Agatha and I cobbled together. Carpentry is one of her many skills, I’ve discovered.”

“You must have worked incredibly fast. I’m amazed.”

Albert Veening looked slightly embarrassed. “Actually,” he said, “we did most of this six months ago. For another young man like you. But he didn’t make it.”

“What happened to him?”

“I’ve no idea. Now then, there’s a battery under the bureau, see? And just outside that window there’s a lightning conductor. I understand that the kind of antenna you’ll be using can be hooked up to it.”

“You seem well up on these technical matters, Albert.”

“Not at all. I had a call from a mutual friend the other day. We discussed what you would need. I’m glad that it’s suitable.”

Dart fetched in the two suitcases. He lifted one onto the bureau and opened it. From the left-hand compartment he took out the headset, the Morse key, and the leads. He looked at his watch again.

“Albert, I don’t want to seem rude, but it’s probably best if you’re not here when I do this.”

“Of course. I’ll wait outside. I imagine you’ll want me to guide you back.”

“God, yes.”

“Fine,” Veening said. “I’ll take the lamp. There are two just like it in the right-hand bottom drawer of the desk, along with notepads and pencils.” He turned to go.

Dart said, “Albert? You said just now you’d had a call from a mutual friend. Do you mean a telephone call?”

“Yes.”

“You’ve got a phone here? One that works?”

Veening grinned. “Oh, yes. I’ll show you tomorrow. It’s a work of art.” He closed the concealed door behind him.

Dart found the lamps and lit them both, placing one either side of the transceiver. He connected the Morse key and the battery leads and clipped the antenna to the lightning conductor. He switched the set on. The voltage meter lit up, its needle swinging across the dial all the way to fifteen. From his coat pocket he took a crystal disguised as an ordinary two-pin electrical plug and slotted it into the transmitter. Then he tuned the aerial, using the most delicate of touches. Good.

He switched off, removed his wristwatch, and put it on the desk. He took a second watch from his trouser pocket and laid it next to the first, checking that both gave him exactly the same time. After a bit of anxious fumbling, he found the loose stitching in the hem of his coat and pulled out the squares of silk. He studied the one headed
TRANSMISSION PLAN
and tuned the crystal to twelve megacycles. Using a notepad, he covered all but the bottom row of letters on a second silk and used them to encode his brief message. He double-checked it, then took from the inside pocket of his coat a small wallet made of scuffed crocodile skin. It contained a comb, tweezers, nail scissors, and a file. He used the scissors to cut off the bottom line of the silk, then held the strip of material with the tweezers and set light to it with his cigarette lighter. He rehearsed the Morse in his head. At six forty-seven he switched the set on and made tiny adjustments to the transmitter. Then he rubbed his hands together vigorously with his fingers extended, like a pianist about to begin a recital. When the second hand of both watches touched twelve, he placed the second finger of his left hand on the Morse key and tapped out his identity checks, followed by a sequence of five-letter groups.