Bagley, Desmond - The Tightrope Men Page 2

  There was something else odd about his nose and his cheeks and that double chin. They had a rubbery feel about them. Not ever having had any' excess fat on his body he did not know whether this was normal or not. And, again, Meyrick's face had grown a little stubble of hair which he had shaved off, but the bald temples were smooth which meant that whoever had lifted his hairline had not done it by shaving.

  The only part of his face Denison recognized were his eyes -- those had not changed; they were still the same grey-green eyes he had seen every morning in the mirror. But the expression was different because of the droop of the left eyelid. There was a slight soreness in the outer corner of that eye which aroused his suspicions but he could see nothing but a tiny inflamed spot which could have been natural.

  As he ate voraciously he glanced through The Times. The world still seemed to be wobbling on its political axis as unsteadily as ever and nothing had changed, so he tossed the newspaper aside and gave himself up to thought over a steaming cup of black coffee. What could be the motive for spiriting a man from his own bed, transforming him bodily, giving him a new personality and dumping him in a luxury hotel in the capital of Norway? No answer.

  The meal had invigorated him and he felt like moving and not sitting. He did not yet feel up to encountering people so he compromised by going through Meyrick's possessions. He opened the wardrobe and in one of the drawers, underneath a pile of underwear, he found a large travelling wallet. Taking it to the dressing-table he unzipped it and went through the contents.

  The first thing to catch his eyes was a British passport. He opened it to find the description of the holder was filled out in his own handwriting as was Meyrick's signature underneath. The face that looked out of the photograph on the opposite page was that of Meyrick, who was described as a civil servant. Whoever had thought up this lark had been thorough about it.

  He flipped through the pages and found only one stamped entry and his brow wrinkled as he studied it. Sverige? Would that be Sweden? If so he had arrived at a place called Arlanda in Sweden on a date he could not tell because the stamping was blurred. Turning to the back of the passport he found that the sum of £1,500 had been issued a month earlier. Since the maximum travel allowance for a tourist was £300 it would seem that H. F. Meyrick was operating on a businessman's allowance.

  At the bottom of a pocket in the wallet he found an American Express credit card, complete with the ubiquitous fake signature. He looked at it pensively, flicking it with his fingernail. With this he could draw money or traveller's cheques anywhere; he could use it to buy an airline ticket to Australia if he felt the urge to emigrate suddenly. It represented complete and unlicensed freedom unless and until someone put a stopper on it at head office.

  He transferred it to the small personal wallet along with the driving licence. It would be better to keep that little bit of plastic available in case of need.

  Meyrick had an extensive wardrobe; casual clothing, lounge suits and even a dinner-jacket with accessories. Denison investigated a small box and found it contained personal jewellery-studs, tiepins and a couple of rings -- and he realized he probably held a thousand pounds' worth of gold in his hand. The Patek Philippe watch on his wrist would cost £500 if it cost a penny. H. F. Meyrick was a wealthy man, so what kind of a civil servant did that make him?

  Denison decided to get dressed. It was a sunny day so he chose casual trousers and a sports coat. The clothing fitted him as though made to measure. He looked at himself in the full-length mirror built into the wardrobe door, studiously ignoring the face on top of the body, and thought crazily that it, too, had probably been made to measure. The world began to spin again, but he remembered the small scar on his shin that belonged to Denison and that helped him to recover.

  He put his personal possessions into his pockets and headed for the door, key in hand. As the door swung open a card which had been hung on the outer handle fell to the floor. He picked it up and read: vennligst ikke forstyrr -- please do not disturb. He was thoughtful as he hung it on the hook inside the door before locking the room; he would give a lot to know who had hung out that sign.

  He went down in the lift with a couple of American blue-rinsed matrons who chattered to each other in a mid-West twang. 'Say, have you been out to Vigeland Park? All those statues -- I didn't know where to look.' The lift stopped and the doors slid open with a soft hiss, and the American ladies bustled out intent on sightseeing.

  Denison followed them diffidently into the hotel lobby and stood by the lifts for a while, trying to get his bearings, doing his best to appear nonchalantly casual while lie took in the scene.

  'Mr Meyrick . . . Mr Meyrick, sir!'

  He turned his head and saw the porter at the desk smiling at him. Licking lips that had suddenly gone dry he walked over. 'Yes?'

  'Would you mind signing this, sir? The check for the meal in your room. Just a formality.'

  Denison looked at the proffered pen and laid down the room key. He took the pen and scribbled firmly 'H. F. Meyrick' and pushed the slip across the counter. The porter was hanging the key on the rack but he turned and spoke to Denison before he could slip away. The night porter put your car away, sir. Here is the key.'

  He held out a key with a tag on it and Denison extended his hand to take it. He glanced at the tag ana saw the name, Hertz, and a car number. He cleared his throat. "Thank you."

  'You sound as though you have a cold coming on,' said the porter.

  Denison took a chance. 'Why do you think that?'

  'Your voice sounds different.'

  'Yes, I do feel a bit chesty,' said Denison.

  'The porter smiled. Too much night air, perhaps' Denison took another chance. 'What time did I get in last night?'

  'This morning, sir. The night porter said it was about three o'clock.' The porter offered Denison a man-of-the-world smile. 'I wasn't surprised when you slept in this morning.'

  No, thought Denison; but I was! He was growing bolder as he gained confidence. 'Can you tell me something? I was having a discussion with a friend about how long I've been here in Oslo and, for the life of me, I can't remember the exact day I booked in here. Could you check it for me?'

  'Certainly, sir.' The porter moved away and began to run through cards in a file. Denison looked at the car key. It was thoughtful of Hertz to put the car number on the tag; he might even be able, to recognize it when he saw it. It was also thoughtful of the night porter to put the car away -- but where the hell had he put it?

  The porter returned. 'You checked in on the eighteenth of June, sir. Exactly three weeks ago.'

  The butterflies in Denison's stomach collided. Thank you,' he said mechanically, and moved away from the desk and across the lobby. An arrow pointed the direction to the bar and he glanced sideways and saw a dark, cool cavern with a few drinkers, solitary or in couples. It looked quiet and he desperately wanted to think, so he went in.

  When the barman came up, he said, 'A beer, please.'

  'Export, sir?'

  Denison nodded absently. June 18. He had reckoned he had lost a week so how the devil could he have booked into the Hotel Continental in Oslo three weeks earlier? How the hell could he have been in two places at the same time?

  The barman returned, poured the beer into a glass, and went away. Denison tried to figure where he had been on June 18 and found it difficult. Three weeks was a long time. Where were you at 6.17 on the evening of June 18? No wonder people found it difficult to establish alibis. He found it extraordinarily difficult to focus his thoughts; they flicked about, skittering here and there wildly out of control. When did you last see your father? Nuts!

  A vagrant thought popped to the surface of his consciousness. Edinburgh! He had been to Edinburgh on the 17th and the 18th he had taken off as a reward for hard work. There had been a leisurely morning and he had played golf in the afternoon; he had gone to the cinema in the evening and had dined late in Soho, getting back to Hampstead fairly late.

  He -
- as Giles Denison -- had dined in Soho at about the same time as he -- as Harold Feltham Meyrick -- had dined in Oslo. Where was the sense of that?

  He was aware that he was looking at bubbles rising in amber liquid and that he had not touched his beer. He lifted the glass and drank; it was cold and refreshing.

  He had two things going for him -- two things that kept him sane. One -- Giles Denison's scar on H. F. Meyrick's shin -- and two -- the change in the timbre of Meyrick's voice as recognized by the hotel porter. And what did that imply? Obviously that there were two Meyricks; one who had booked in on June 18, and another -- himself -- who had just been planted. Never mind why and never mind how. Just accept the fact that it was done.

  He drank some more beer and rested his chin in his hand, feeling the unaccustomed flab of his jowl. He had lost a week of his life. Could so much plastic surgery be done in a week? He added that to the list of things to be checked on.

  And what to do? He could go to the British Embassy and tell his story. Mentally he ran through the scenario. 'What can we do for you, Mr Meyrick?'

  'Well the fact is I'm not Meyrick -- whoever he is. My name is Giles Denison and I've been kidnapped from London, my face changed, and dumped into an Oslo hotel with a hell of a lot of money and an unlimited credit account. Can you help me?'

  'Certainly, Mr Meyrick. Miss Smith, will you ring for a doctor?'

  'My God!' said Denison aloud. 'I'd end up in the loony-bin.'

  The barman cocked his head and came over. 'You wish something, sir?'

  'Just to pay,' said Denison, finishing his beer. He paid from the loose change in his pocket and left the bar. In the lobby he spotted a sign saying garage, so he went through a door and down a flight of stairs to emerge into a basement car park. He checked the number on the Hertz key and walked along the first row of cars. It was right at the end -- a big black Mercedes. He unlocked the door.

  The first thing he saw was the doll on the driver's seat, a most curious object made of crudely carved wood and rope. The body was formed of rope twisted into a spiral and coming out in the form of a tail. His feet were but roughly indicated and the head was a round knob with a peg nose. The eyes and a mouth twisted to one side had been inked on to the wood, and the hair was of rope teased out into separate strands. It was a strange and somehow r epulsive little figure.

  He picked it up and discovered a piece of paper underneath it. He unfolded the deckle-edged note-paper and read the scrawled handwriting: Your Drammen Dolly awaits you at Spiraltoppen. Early morning. July 10.

  He frowned. July 10 was next day, but where was Spiraltoppen and who -- or what -- was a Drammen Dolly? He looked at the ugly little doll. It had been lying on the driver's seat as though it had been deliberately left for him to find. He tossed it in his hand a couple of times and then thrust it into his pocket. It made an unsightly bulge, but what did he care? It was not his jacket. The note he put into his wallet.

  The car was almost new, with just over 500 kilometres on the dock. He found a sheaf of papers relating to the car hire; it had been rented five days earlier, a fact which was singularly devoid of informative content. There was nothing else to be found.

  He got out of the car, locked it, and left the garage by the car entrance, emerging on to a street behind the hotel. It was a little bewildering for him; the traffic drove on the wrong side of the road, the street and shop signs were indecipherable and his command of Norwegian was minimal, being restricted to one word -- skal -- which, while being useful in a cheery sort of way, was not going to be of much use for the more practical things of life.

  What he needed was information and he found it on the corner of the street in the form of a bookshop. He went inside and found an array of maps from which he selected a map of central Oslo, one of Greater Oslo, and a motoring map of Southern Norway. To these he added a guide to the city and paid out of the slab of Norwegian currency in Meyrick's wallet. He made a mental note to count that money as soon as he had privacy.

  He left the shop intending to go back to the hotel where he could study the maps and orient himself. He paused on the pavement and rubbernecked at the corner of a building where one would normally expect to find a street name -- and there it was -- Roald Amundsens Gata.

  'Harry!'

  He turned to go in the direction of the hotel but paused as he felt a hand on his arm. 'Harry Meyrick!' There was a note of anger in the voice. She was a green-eyed redhead of about thirty and she was flying alarm flags -- her lips were compressed and pink spots glowed in her cheeks. 'I'm not used to being stood up,' she said. 'Where were you this morning?'

  Momentarily he was nonplussed but remembered in time what the hotel porter had thought about his voice. 'I wasn't feeling well,' he managed to get out. 'I was in bed.'

  There's a thing called a telephone,' she said angrily. 'Alexander Graham Bell invented it -- remember?'

  'I was knocked out by sleeping pills,' he protested. With a small portion of his mind he noted that this was probably a true statement. 'Perhaps I overdid it.'

  Her expression changed. 'You do sound a bit glued-up,' she admitted. 'Maybe I'll forgive you.' There was a faint American undertone to her English. 'It will cost you a drink, darling.'

  'In the hotel?' he suggested.

  'It's too nice a day to be inside. We'll go into the Studenterlunden.' She waved her arm past a passing articulated tramcar towards the gay umbrellas in the gardens on the other side of the street.

  Denison felt trapped as he escorted her across the street, but he also realized that if he was to learn anything about Meyrick then this was too good a chance to pass up. He had once been accosted in the street by a woman who obviously knew him but he did not have the faintest idea of who she was. There is a point of no return in that type of conversation after which one cannot, in decency, admit ignorance. On that occasion Denison had fumbled it, had suffered half an hour of devious conversation, and they had parted amicably without him finding out who she was. He still did not know. Grimly he thought that it was good practice for today's exercise.

  As they crossed the street she said, 'I saw Jack Kidder this morning. He was asking about you.'

  'How is he?'

  She laughed. 'Fine, as always. You know Jack.'

  'Of course,' said Denison deadpan. 'Good old Jack.'

  They went into the outdoor cafe and found an empty table with difficulty. Under other circumstances Denison would have found it pleasant to have a drink with a pretty woman in surroundings like this, but his mind was beleaguered by his present problems. They sat down and he put his parcel of maps on the table.

  One of them slipped out of the packet and his main problem prodded at it with a well-manicured forefinger. 'What are these?'

  'Maps,' said Denison succinctly.

  'Maps of where?'

  'Of the city.'

  'Oslo!' She seemed amused. 'Why do you want maps of Oslo? Isn't it your boast that you know Oslo better than London?'

  'They're for a friend.'

  Denison chalked up a mental note. Meyrick knows Oslo well; probably a frequent visitor. Steer clear of local conditions or gossip. Might run into more problems like this.

  'Oh I' She appeared to lose interest Denison realized he was faced with a peculiar difficulty. He did not know this woman's name and, as people do not commonly refer to themselves by name in conversation, he did not see how he was going to get it, short of somehow prying into her handbag and looking for identification.

  'Give me a cigarette, darling,' she said.

  He patted his pockets and found he had left the cigarette case and lighter in the room. Not being a smoker it had not occurred to him to put them in his pocket along with the rest of Meyrick's personal gear. 'I'm sorry,' he said. 'I don't have any with me.'

  'My!' she said. 'Don't tell me the great Professor Meyrick has stopped smoking. Now I will believe in cancer.'

  Professor!

  He used the pretext of illness again. 'The one I tried this morning taste
d like straw. Maybe I will stop smoking.' He held his hand over the table. 'Look at those nicotine stains. Imagine what my lungs must be like.'

  She shook her head in mock sorrow. 'It's like pulling down a national monument. To imagine Harry Meyrick without a cigarette is like trying to imagine Paris without the Eiffel Tower.'

  A Nordic waitress came to the table; she looked rather like Jeanette MacDonald dressed for an appearance in White Horse Inn. Denison raised his eyebrows at his companion. 'What will you have?'

  The usual,' she said indifferently, delving into her handbag.

  He took refuge in a paroxysm of coughing pulling out his handkerchief and only emerging when he heard her giving the order. He waited until the waitress left before putting away the handkerchief. The woman opposite him said, 'Harry, that's a really bad cough. I'm not surprised you're thinking of giving up the cancer sticks. Are you feeling all right, darling? Maybe you'd be better off in bed, after all.'

  'I'm all right,' he said.

  'Are you sure?' she asked solicitously.

  'Perfectly sure.'

  'Spoken like the old Professor Meyrick,' she said mockingly. 'Always sure of everything.'

  'Don't call me Professor,' he said testily. It was a safe enough thing to say regardless of whether Meyrick was really a professor or whether she was pulling his leg in a heavy-handed manner. The British have never been keen on the over-use of professional titles. And it might provoke her into dropping useful information.

  All he got was a light and inconsequential, 'When on the Continent do as the Continentals do.'

  He went on the attack. 'I don't like it.'

  'You're so British, Harry.' He thought he detected a cutting edge to her voice. 'But then, of course, you would be.'

  'What do you mean by that?'