The Eldorado Network (20 page)

'That's Mrs Conroy,' he said. 'You promised to deal with her problem this morning.'

Otto came back and looked. 'We did. We got a telegram from Paris. It answered her question.'

'She is still here.'

'So are many others.'

'I don't care about them.'

Otto seemed slightly put out. He looked at the American woman, at the portrait of Adolf Hitler, at his watch. 'Don't you think you are behaving somewhat presumptuously?' he asked.

'I've changed my mind,' Luis said. 'I'm not going to England after all. The weather there is bad for my chest.' He coughed resonantly. Purple echoes lost themselves in the vaulted corners of the rooms.

Otto went over to the official on duty, talked, came back. 'It seems she has another problem, in Brussels. We are dealing with that, too.'

'Good, good. My chest is much better now.' Luis coughed again, just as vigorously. 'Hear the difference?'

'You obviously have an interest in this American lady,' Otto said. 'I suggest you consider your position very seriously before ..." He shrugged. 'Before you involve yourself.'

'She happens to be the daughter of J. Edgar Hoover. A very valuable contact.'

'It's not a joke. Just remember what I said. You have no private life any more; everything about you is the Abwehr's business.'

'May I leave now?'

'Yes, you may.' Otto glanced at Julie Conroy, who was on her feet, talking to the official. 'She is very attractive. Do you know much about her?'

'Not much, no.'

Otto gave her another long glance. 'I'll bet you ten to one that what little you know is all lies.'

'Oh? What makes you say that?'

Otto took his time before replying, and then he gave Luis a sad smile. 'It's wartime, Spain is neutral, and nine out of ten people you meet are spying for the countries at war.'

'Then she is the tenth.'

'The tenth,' said Otto, 'is spying on the other spies.'

Madrid in the early evening was magic.

The sky had softened from its earlier remote, ceramic purity to a warm and gentle blue, like a vast and seamless tent. Against this friendly backdrop the richness of palaces and fortresses, churches and statues, looked more theatrical than ever. It was not possible to believe that all these outbreaks of soaring towers and embroidered facades and wedding-cake extravagance had been built for serious purposes by serious, long-dead men. On a mild May evening they added up to the best free stroll in Europe; especially in 1941, when a great deal of Europe was not free to be strolled in unless a German said so. Madrid was different. Madrid had already had its war and now it was happy to be out of this one. The lights came on like an affirmation of peace, big-city jewellery brought out to help celebrate the night's enjoyment. It seemed that one half of Madrid was sauntering through the streets and squares while the other half watched from windows and balconies and cafe tables.

But not Luis Cabrillo and Julie Conroy. She was temporarily tired of people and he was simply tired. After leaving the embassy she went to her hotel, ordered some ice, took a long bath, made herself a large scotch and ginger ale, and read the airmail edition of the New York Herald-Tribune. He went to his apartment, took an aspirin, and slept for two hours. Outside, Madrid was magic, which was nice for Madrid, but it couldn't compare with the wonders worked by a stiff drink or a soft bed.

They met in the lobby of the Hotel Bristol at 9.30. Luis brought a single long-stemmed red rose, and offered it with a slight bow. 'Terrific,' she said. The doorman and the desk clerk smiled at each other in approval: Mrs Conroy was the brightest part of their day. Luis said: 'I thought it would enhance the beauty of your hair.'

'Genius.' She twirled the rose and they stood and looked at it. 'Now what do I do with it?'

Luis had not considered that. 'Behind the ear?' he suggested.

She tried it. 'I feel like I'm wearing one navigation light,' she said, looking sideways.

'Pinned to the bosom?'

'I don't have one. You've got to be forty to have a bosom. The hell with it, I'll just carry the thing and use it to beat off the Gestapo.'

They walked through the old city to a rambling restaurant called the Dos Amigos. It rambled over two floors and both floors had several levels. This meant that almost everyone could see almost everyone else, as the upper floor was pierced in the middle with a large, round hole. Underneath this a band played. The place was half-full and noisy, the waiters doing a lot of shouting and customers leaning over the upstairs balcony to call down to friends eating below.

As Luis and Julie walked past the band, the trumpet-player (gaunt-faced and greyhaired, with a jaunty stance and insomniac eyes) followed them around with his trumpet. He played a greasy, sleazy little tune, deliberately cracking some notes and ending on a slow downhill phrase like mockery. It won him laughter and applause from a few customers. He acknowledged this with a chirpy little bugle-call as he turned back into his original melody.

'Friend of yours?' she asked when they got to their table.

'I should have explained about the Dos Amigos. It's a little bit unusual. The custom here is to insult everybody. The food is excellent but the waiters, the musicians, even the man who does the washing-up, they all insult the customers. It's a tradition.'

'Uh-huh.'

'The biggest insult is not to be insulted. That means they really don't like you.'

'What do they do when they can't stand the sight of you? Throw money?'

'I'll ask him,' Luis said as the waiter arrived. They talked in rapid Spanish and their talk worked up to a hot exchange, with both men waving their arms in her direction. Eventually Luis pulled the menu from under the waiter's arm, ordered a plate of appetisers and a bottle of wine, and dismissed him. The man went away, making a long and contemptuous remark over his shoulder. The people at the next table stamped their feet and grinned in approval.

'What did he say?'Julie asked.

'At first he said that my tie doesn't go with my shirt. Then he alleged that you aren't worth two pesetas. Also he considers that I ordered a totally unsuitable wine.'

'And what did you say?'

'As to the wine and the tie, those are matters of opinion. However, I strongly denied that you are not worth two pesetas.'

'I bet that stopped him cold.'

'No, he continued to express doubts. It became a point of honour. I swore on my mother's grave that you are, indeed, well worth two pesetas.'

'Gee,' she said thoughtfully, 'you Spaniards really go out on a limb for a girl.'

'It is nothing.'

'It's two pesetas.'

'A man's honour is worth more than two pesetas.'

'It is?' She examined his smile for a moment. 'How much more?'

She leaned back and held the rose at full length, hands resting on the table, and twirled it like a tiny red parasol. Luis enjoyed the smooth and supple line of her arms, the cool hollows shaped by her collarbones, the firmness of her neck, the untroubled balance of her features. During the previous two years he had read a lot of descriptions of a lot of women but none had startled and seized his imagination as much as this reality. She had a measurable "physical effect on him: he could feel his lungs tightening a little, his heartbeat rising slightly; and all the sights and sounds in the restaurant gained in intensity, like a big scene in a film. A small part of his brain told him that it was all to be expected, simply a. necessary biological reaction to ensure that the species reproduced itself, but the rest of his mind was not listening; it was back in the jungle, swinging from tree to tree, delightfully drunk with the prospect of passion . . . Julie stopped twirling the rose. He came to earth. 'A man's honour is beyond price,' he said firmly.

'Yeah? That's the kind of line MGM gives a guy somewhere in the second reel when it knows he's heading for big trouble. Talking of which, here comes the local agent.'

The waiter brought the appetisers and the wine, smiled, and made a short, prepared statement.

'He apologises,' Luis told her. 'He says he spoke in haste, it was not his intention to depreciate you, and after consultation with his colleagues he wishes to make it quite clear that you are not worth four pesetas.'

The waiter spread his hands in a gesture of reconciliation.

'Tell him I accept his apology,' she said, 'and ask him if he always walks like that or did his girl-friend tread on his cojones.'

Luis translated. The waiter did not lose his smile but his smile lost its pleasure. He poured the wine, spilling quite a lot, and went away.

'His acting reminds me a lot of Valentino,' she said. 'Stubby Valentino, played shortstop for the Dodgers.'

'That is a baseball team,' Luis said.

'Well, it's never been completely proved . . . What in the name of Chaplin's bootlace is that?' She forked up something from the appetisers which looked remarkably like a fat bootlace.

Luis ransacked his memory. 'Eel!' he announced triumphantly. 'Is that right?'

'Eel.' She put it back. 'Why the hell can't you Europeans eat food for food? Ever since I came over here people keep offering me this weird and gruesome junk. What have you got against good honest grub?'

'Eel is good.' He fished it out and ate it.

'Squid, they gave me. And cow's heels. Brains. Tripe. Larks, would you believe! How can you do business in a country where they serve hot larks?'

Luis shrugged and munched some radishes. 'A bird is a bird. You Americans are very sentimental, you know. If every chicken could sing like a lark, would you set them all free?'

'Chicken,' she said. 'Now that's genuine food. Do they serve chicken here? Any kind of chicken-- bass, baritone, alto, just as long as it's got good legs. I want a chicken. Tell Valentino I'll cancel his contract if I don't get a chicken. I'll cancel his girl-friend's contract. I'll cancel his cojones' contract.'

'That reminds me . . . Did you solve your problem in Paris? The missing reel of film.'

Her eyelids flickered as her mind rapidly adjusted. 'Oh. Gone With The Wind. Yes, that's all straightened out, thanks.'

'I understand there is now a difficulty in Brussels.'

'Mmm . . .' She drank some wine. 'Second half of Destry Rides Again went astray. Jimmy Stewart and Marlene Dietrich are lying lost and forgotten in some bleak, Belgian warehouse. And them so young. Tragic.'

'They will soon be freed. I asked the embassy to do all it can to help you. They are working on it right now.' Luis spoke easily, concentrating on finding a good olive.

'That's very kind of you.' Julie Conroy was briefly silent; Luis chewed cheerfully on his plump olive and enjoyed his success. 'They must think highly of you in the embassy,' she said at last,

'Well, I am not without influence in the Spanish Government, you see. My family has a tradition of public service.' He ducked his head modestly while he reviewed his family's contributions. 'Communications . . . the arts . . . banking . . .'

'Yeah? The Cabrillos are a big deal, then.'

'I can tell you this in all honesty,' Luis said, and paused again while he found something not-too-dishonest. 'Take any train, to any city. A Cabrillo has been there before you and has left his mark. By the way: have you met James Stewart and Marlene Dietrich? What are they like?'

Just like in the movies. Those legs! Terrific legs, plus that wonderful husky voice. And she isn't bad-looking either.'

Luis gave her a crooked, one-eyed grin. 'I think you have never met them,' he said.

'Okay, go ahead and ask me. Ask me anything about anybody in Hollywood. Just ask me.'

For ten minutes she fascinated Luis with the private lives of the stars. Alan Ladd was so short that sometimes the actress he was doing a scene with had to stand in a hole. Paulette Goddard had a mania for cleanliness and scrubbed her floors three times a day. Errol Flynn drank a bottle of vodka for breakfast. Peter Lorre bred goldfish. Judy Garland really wanted to be a tennis-player and was a terrible bore on the subject. Gary Grant had a curious allergy: he couldn't tolerate anyone with flat feet; it was actually written into his contracts. Groucho Marx once tried to grow a moustache for a bet and failed. Betty Grable ate a dozen oranges a day. Last year Abbott and Costello fell in love with the same girl and the studio had to send her to New Zealand . . .

'How lucky you are to have such an interesting job,' Luis said enviously.

'I don't know. People are people, all over the world.' She watched as a new arrival, a fat and ugly woman, was given a sickly-sweet serenade by the trumpet-player. 'Movie-people aren't real, because movies aren't real, but then people don't want reality, do they? People want to be deluded. Me, I just take care of the hardware, the cans of celluloid.'

'Have you met Bing Crosby?'

'Millions of times. They have to glue his ears back to stop them flapping in the breeze. Listen, I'm hungry. Tell them to take this junk back to Boris Karloff's laboratory and bring us some real food.'

'I think you would like ..." Luis studied the menu.'. . . a little fish, perhaps bacalao a la madrilena, and then perhaps some veal al ajo arinero, that is with a garlic sauce.'

'That's good, is it?'

'Excellent.'

'You have it. I want a steak, a big baked potato, and a huge salad. Order up.'

The waiter openly despised their choice. He wrangled with Luis about the fish and veal, and he sneered at Julie as he wrote down her steak. Then he went off, jerking his thumb at them and calling something to the trumpet-player, who broke into a flattened, dirge-like version of Yankee Doodle Dandy.

'I may kill that man,'Julie said.

'It means nothing. Only the tradition of this place.'

'Then I'll start a new tradition: each customer gets one free shot at the trumpet-player. It's what in the United States we call democracy. The fifth freedom: freedom from musicians with lungs of steel and ears of tin.'

'Spain is different,' Luis said soothingly. 'Here we have no politics any more. Only music. It is much easier, much cheaper, and the newspapers can give more space to futbol.