The Dark Frontier (10 page)

The smell of Zovgorod was always the main impression of the city carried away by those 19th century travellers who had the curiosity to visit it. Nature, so provident in the matter of Zovgorod’s prevailing winds, made no ready provision for sewage disposal. The Kuder might have been induced to serve the purpose, but before the electric power concession was granted to a Swiss syndicate who built a dam across it, it was a nuisance of a river, alternately flooding the cellars of the city and dwindling to a sluggish typhoid incubator. When Carruthers arrived it had been for years a fairly inoffensive stream steadily bubbling down from the sluices higher up the valley. But the old quarters still smell. Only the modern city centered upon the Presidential (formerly royal) Palace, the ministry of Defence, the police barracks and the Chamber of Deputies enjoys the privilege of main drainage. In the modern city, too, are the apartments and offices of the great Ixanian middle business class of traders and commission men as well as the town houses of the landed families (tobacco, essential perfume oils, wolfram mines) and the old nobility, those, according to Groom, who counted. The Ixanian peasant is no lazier and no more lacking in moral fibre than his counterpart in other countries. He has, in addition, the ability to cultivate from the hides of his beloved hogs some of the finest brush bristles in the world, and, until recently, a major business in Zovgorod was the provision of a buying, selling and distribution service of unrivalled dishonesty, rapacity and inefficiency
to handle these and other products of the peasants’ industry. Every young Zovgorodian aspired to be a business man. That is, unless he belonged to the officer caste. In that case too, the peasants supported him; but through the more formal machinery of taxation.

All this and more Carruthers had learned from occasional conversations at mealtimes with Groom. At other times he saw little of him.

They had taken rooms at the Hotel Europa. As Groom pointed out, almost its only advantage was that it was situated in the centre of the city and was therefore readily accessible. Groom occupied the Royal suite; so called, it seemed, because it included a sitting-room. Carruthers had an adjoining bedroom along the corridor and the luxury of a bathroom.

Soon after they arrived Groom had intimated that it would be unlikely that the services of his technical adviser would be required for the moment and that Carruthers might consider his time his own.

As far as Carruthers could see, Groom spent most of his time receiving an assortment of furtive-looking visitors in his sitting-room. These he presumed were Groom’s agents in Zovgorod. From their purposeful looks as they left the Royal suite, he concluded that Groom was making generous promises.

For his own part, he decided that he could not do better than sustain his role of amateur photographer. Camera in hand, therefore, he wandered about the city taking an occasional photograph. Much of his time he spent in the Kudbek, the main street of the city, sitting at a café and attempting to decipher, with the help of an Ixanian-French dictionary he had bought, Zovgorod’s leading newspaper. He was thus occupied on his fifteenth day in Zovgorod when an incident occurred which was to have an important sequel.

The Kudbek, so called because it contains a small bridge across the Kuder, is one of two or three wide thoroughfares in
the city. Most of the buildings in it are offices, with cafés and shops below them. The Chamber of Deputies scars the horizon at one end; facing it at the other is the Presidential Palace. Carruthers was sitting at a café near the Chamber of Deputies end. He was in a despondent mood. He had discovered nothing of value and had no prospect of doing so. He seemed as far away from accomplishing his purpose as when he boarded the ferry at Southampton. The significant happenings, the coincidental encounters, the fortuitously overheard plans that had always kept Conway Carruthers active before, were unaccountably absent. The incident in Bâle had certainly seemed true to form: but what was it? Nothing but a furtive meeting between a business man and a corrupt official. True, there had been a second watcher and the corrupt official had been murdered, but it was all so logical. Everybody connected with the business seemed to be behaving with such baffling directness and practicality. There was no cunning with which to grapple. He could not even listen to Groom’s conversations with his agents; there was no connecting balcony between the windows. He had no more idea of where Kassen and his laboratory were than when he started. If he knew even that, at least it would be something to work on.

He sighed and looked out across the wide pavements of the Kudbek. There were the usual chattering passersby, the usual green-uniformed police, the usual seller of lottery tickets. Then his eye was caught by the more unusual sight of an Ixanian farm cart ambling slowly along the tram-lines.

It was a two-wheeled vehicle, its contents completely shrouded by a large tarpaulin. The driver was slouched over the reins sucking a straw. Slowly it drew across the road until its wheels obstructed both tram tracks.

Two trams were coming in opposite directions. The drivers of both trams rang their bells. The cart stopped. The trams slowed down, their drivers shouting. The driver of the cart
seemed to be asleep. The trams pulled up with a squeal of brakes.

Suddenly, the tarpaulin was thrown back. Two youths sprang from under it. Shouting defiantly, they gathered up bundles of leaflets from the floor of the cart and began to scatter them wildly in the air. Borne by a slight breeze, the leaflets fluttered about in all directions until the street was littered with them. Carruthers secured one that alighted near him.

Pandemonium broke loose. The whistles of the police and the aimless shouting of the crowd which immediately gathered were punctuated by the cries of the young men in the cart and the angry ringing of the tram bells.

With equal suddenness it all ceased. A squad of police at the run with revolvers drawn dispersed the terrified crowd, while others dragged the agitators, still shouting, from the cart. One who resisted was ruthlessly clubbed. All three were removed in a hastily commandeered private car.

Carruthers looked at the leaflet he held. It was in Ixanian. He managed, after a little difficulty, to translate.

It was, he gathered, a manifesto from a body calling itself the Young Peasants’ Party, exhorting the people of Ixania, a trifle vaguely, to take “action.” What the contemplated action comprised and what it would accomplish were left apparently to the imagination and personal taste of the recipient. The Young Peasants’ Party, Carruthers opined, was all things to all men.

He was contemplating the effusion with some amusement when a voice behind him said “Pardon me.” He turned. It was his American acquaintance of the train.

Carruthers greeted him with some restraint. He had not forgotten the other’s curious behaviour on the train. The American drew his chair up to Carruthers’ table and smiled disarmingly.

“I guess I owe you an apology, Professor,” he said gracefully.

Carruthers raised his eyebrows.

“You see,” explained the other, “my name’s Casey—Bill Casey of the
Tribune
.”

“How do you do, Mr. Casey,” said Carruthers politely. Casey looked crestfallen. “Never heard of me, I guess. You see, Professor, when we got talking on the train and you started asking about Zovgorod, I was thinking you might be a British newspaper man.”

Carruthers smiled.

“I gather that you have taken steps to find out that I am not.”

“Sure, it cost me a quarter at the Europa.”

“I always thought that newspaper men had a sort of Freemasonry of their own.”

“Oh, we get together as a rule. But this time it’s a bit different. Somebody got a hunch that a big story was due to break in Zovgorod pretty soon. That’s why I’m here. And that’s why I’m not particularly anxious to have any more of the boys around.”

Carruthers was thinking hard. He would not give himself away a second time. He leant back in his chair and nodded amiably.

“Very nice of you to mention the matter at all,” he said.

Casey was clearly hoping for a more interested reception of his information.

“Have a drink,” he invited.

Carruthers accepted. The drinks were ordered. There was a pause.

“Curious about that guy on the train,” said Casey chattily. “Who was he, do you know? The one who got shot?”

“His name was …” Carruthers broke off and shrugged. “I’ve forgotten,” he said.

Casey glanced at him for a moment.

“They didn’t publish it,” he said briefly.

Carruthers was silent. Casey lit a cigarette. He went on as
though Carruthers had volunteered a relevant comment on the subject.

“Any idea why they bumped him off?”

“None at all, Mr. Casey; have you?”

“Yes,” said Casey.

“You ought to tell the police.”

The drinks arrived. Casey raised his glass.

“Well, here’s to Ixania.” He looked up from his glass. “Do you know the Countess Schverzinski?”

Carruthers sipped his drink.

“Never heard of the lady.”

“You were talking to her soon after you left Paris.”

“Really? It’s amazing the curious people one meets in trains.”

Casey grinned.

“OK, you win, Professor.” He leant across the table.

“I suppose,” he said earnestly, “you wouldn’t care to make a statement.”

Carruthers looked mystified.

“What about?”

Casey ignored the question.

“Naturally,” he went on persuasively, “I wouldn’t use it until I had your OK.”

“I can’t imagine …”

“Sure, I know,” interrupted Casey grimly; “you’re just here on holiday taking snapshots.”

“Exactly,” said Carruthers.

“Now, now, Professor,” said the
Tribune
man reproachfully, “no kidding. Listen. Someone gets a hunch that there’s going to be trouble in this part of the world. Fine!
Tribune
’s ace foreign correspondent dashes to scene of impending trouble. What does he find? Exhibit A: member-of-Ixanian-Government Rovzidski rubbed out by Red Gauntlet mob three hours after arrival in country of his fathers. Exhibit B: Ixanian Government
fail to take action against slayers and killing reported as accidental in Ixanian press. Exhibit C: bird named Groom, big shot munition boss, receiving local gunmen in hotel apartment. Exhibit D: well-known and respected scientist in retinue of said big shot, doing … doing what?”

“Is that all you know, Mr. Casey?” said Carruthers, amused.

“No,” said Casey promptly.

Affecting to consider this intelligence, Carruthers was silent for a moment or two. Casey clearly possessed information that would be useful to him. He must not miss the opportunity of getting it.

“Have another drink, Mr. Casey,” he said.

Casey accepted with an expectant air. Carruthers lit his pipe.

“Now, Mr. Casey,” he said heavily, “what do you want to know?”

The other leant forward again.

“Firstly,” he said briskly, “why was Rovzidski killed? Secondly, what are Cator & Bliss after in Zovgorod?”

Carruthers examined the bowl of his pipe. He prepared to lie convincingly.

“I can’t answer your first question, Mr. Casey, because I don’t know. I can answer the second, though in absolute confidence. I warn you, if you publish this information it will be denied.”

“OK, shoot,” said Casey.

“Cator & Bliss are selling field guns to the Ixanian Government. I am here as consultant on questions of ballistics.”

Casey’s eyes hardened. Slowly he put his hand in his pocket and produced a bundle of papers. He singled out one.

“Your record, Professor,” he explained curtly. “New York cabled it to me a week ago.” He started to read: “Henry Barstow, Fellow of the Royal Society, Doctor of Science, etcetera, etcetera, what’s all this? University of so-and-so Chair of Physics:
Fellow of Royal Society, 1925: ah! here we are: publications:
An Examination of the Atomic Theory, Collected Papers on the Lorentz Transformations, An Examination of Einstein Dynamics
, author of essay on ‘Atoms, structure of,’ in
Encyclopaedia Universalia
, new edition. Well, well, well! nothing about ballistics here, Professor.”

Carruthers laughed, not very comfortably.

“You’re a very thorough man, Mr. Casey.”

“Thorough enough to know, Professor, that Cator & Bliss’s ballistics technician is Major-General Lanceley-Pinton. He used to be in the British army.”

“Interesting, Mr. Casey, but I fail to see …”

“And the Ixanian Government aren’t buying field guns. They placed an order with Skoda three months ago.” He rose to his feet. “I’ll be seeing you, Professor,” he said, and was gone.

Carruthers looked after him down the street with mixed feelings. True, he was now free of Casey’s questioning, but, equally, he had failed to get the information he sought. Besides, his estimate of Casey had convinced him of one thing; that the
Tribune
’s foreign correspondent would not be content to abandon the Professor altogether as a possible source of information. He might even discover his, Carruthers’, impersonation and use the threat of exposure as a lever to secure the story he sought. There was only one aspect of the interview that gave him the least cause for satisfaction. Groom’s boast that he was unknown to the press of the world was, to say the least of it, an exaggeration.

The gentleman in question was already at dinner when Carruthers returned to the hotel. He appeared less preoccupied and a trifle more self-satisfied than at any other time since Rovzidski’s murder. Carruthers seized the opportunity to inquire after his progress.

Groom did not resent the question. “I can understand your
impatience, Professor. Zovgorod is not an entertaining city. I think I can promise you that I shall soon be in a position to enlist your help. I am in touch with the right people. I shall know within two or three days whether my efforts have been successful or not.”

He hailed with unqualified approval the arrival of the
wiener schnitzel
he had ordered.

“At any rate, Professor,” he said, selecting the German mustard from the tray of condiments held before him, “they do know how
wiener schnitzel
should be cooked. Just a few more capers and thirty seconds less in the oil and it would be perfect. A German cook, thank heaven. Whoever originated the notion that French chefs were the best in the world didn’t know good German cooking.”