The Eldorado Network (47 page)

'Ah.' Luis adjusted the point of his propelling pencil 'Sex.'

'Yes. Does it exist, has it a future, is there a place for it and why can't that be in our bed?'

'I see what you mean. It has been a rather a long time, 11 suppose.' He scratched his chin.

'It's been a week,' Julie said. 'A whole seven-day week.'

'As long as that? My goodness.'

'Your goodness is exactly what I need, Luis. Dammit every night we stagger home, dead beat, and you fall into bed. And every morning you're up and crashing about, fully dressed, before dawn!'

'Seven o'clock.'

'Same thing. I mean, Seagull and Garlic and all those guys are lovely people, Luis, but none of them has what you have. That is, assuming you still have it.'

'Mmm.' He nodded several times. She looked away There was an awkward silence. 'The work takes up so much time,' he murmured.

'I can remember when we were in Madrid ..." she began. She left it unfinished and went into her office Soon Luis heard her start typing. He sighed and returned to his report.

There was another briefing letter waiting for him at the that afternoon. He scanned it, recognised Richard Fischer's style, and stuffed it into a pocket. That evening they worked until nine, and then went to a restaurant which overlooked the river. The view was deep and dark: blue-black sky and inky water. A few early stars gave depth to the night and the yellow lights of ferries trickled to and from the far shore. There was lobster and watercress salad with a cool white wine. There was every fruit that Julie had ever seen and a few she hadn't, and a waiter who could carve a fat orange into the shape of a perfect waterlily without spilling a drop of juice. The coffee was like molten gold and the port was like molten grapes, except that it was molten grapes-, but by that time Julie was too happy to conduct a careful analysis of her pleasures; she simply enjoyed them. 'You know, Luis,' she said, curling her leg inside his, 'for a dumb Spanish schmuck, you're not such a heel as you might be, even if  you have got crumbs on your moustache.' He reached for his handkerchief, and pulled the letter out with it. 'I forgot to tell you,' he said. 'Madrid is now interested in the economic planning of the British. It looks as if the war might last longer than was first thought. Isn't that encouraging?'

'Sure. What this world needs is another long war.' 'No. I mean it opens up a fresh area for us. I can feed stuff about manpower and raw materials and budgets and .. . .' And sex.' "Well, growth of population is a factor. I mean, look at Russia.'

'Is there much sex in Russia?'

 Luis sipped his port. Julie stroked the inside of his thigh. I wonder,' he said thoughtfully, 'I just wonder if it isn't all a matter of energy,' Tell you what. Let's go and find out.' 'Productive capacity, for instance. You get out what you put in.'

'It's worth trying,' she murmured. 'Who knows, we could be on the verge of a great discovery.

Luis paid the bill and said nothing until they were outside. 'It really is a very promising development, you know, Julie,' he remarked. He was clicking his fingers and hoping from foot to foot as she searched for a taxi.

'Uh-huh,' she said.

'I mean, it offers us so many new opportunities, so many . . .'A taxi stopped. He held the door open while she got in, and he stood for a moment, twisting the handle back and forth. 'I'll tell you what: you go ahead. My mind's full of \ ideas. I'll just pop back to the office for a few minutes and dictate them into the -machine. Otherwise I'm afraid I might forget them.'

'How long are you going to be?'

'Not long. I promise.'

He talked into the Dictaphone for half and hour, and I then glanced through Jasper Stembridge to check a couple of facts. What he read about iron-smelting in the Middles brough district--'By day smoke pours forth from the chimneys of many blast furnaces and steel factories, by night their lurid flames light the whole countryside'--  gave him new ideas about the effects of economic dislocation caused I by black-out restrictions. He looked up Middlesbrough in the 1923 Michelin. It was very close to the North Sea, which made it highly vulnerable to bomber attack from Denmark. What would the British be doing about that? He put a fresh roll in the Dictaphone.

Julie was asleep when he got home; he was astonished to discover that it was three in the morning. Habit awoke him at seven; when he got up she stirred and blinked but fell asleep again. He was eager to be back at work, and he hurried his breakfast. She "half-opened her eyes to see hire getting dressed, and grunted. He paused and looked. 'See you later,' she mumbled. He squeezed her blanketed foot and walked softly away.

It was ten-thirty when she came into the office. The were two Portuguese men behind her, carrying a new diva bed and a package of sheets, pillows and blankets. They put it where she said. She tipped them. They went out. Luis, watched with interest.

Just a little idea I had last night while I was waiting for you to come home,' she said.

Luis tested the springs. 'Very comfortable. What a good idea. If I ever to work really late--'

'I said it was for Bradburn & Wedge, so the store gave me twenty per cent discount.'

He nodded. 'I don't suppose it's a tax-deductible expense, but still ..." She watched him walk all around it. Don't forget to kick the tyres,' she said. He smiled, and picked a loose thread from the mattress. She looked at him while he looked at the bed. Eventually he got up. 'A nice thought,' he said. 'Thank you.' Julie held his gaze for perhaps five seconds. 'I'm pleased you're pleased,' she said, and went into her office. They worked separately for about twenty minutes. Then she called out: 'What's this word "loins"?' He frowned. 'I don't remember writing anything about

'Could it be "groins"?' 'No. Show me.'

She came in, smiling brightly and utterly naked. Her breasts swayed slightly in counterpoint to the easy swing of her hips. She looked very white and very lithe. Luis's head jerked as if someone had tugged his hair. Here it is.' She leaned gently against him and showed the page of notes.

'That' not "loins",' he said. 'That's "dynamite".' Is there a difference?' She walked back to her office, king the long way round. Her buttocks twinkled neatly. Luis took a deep breath and picked up his work, but the words had lost their meaning. One minute later Julie was back. This time she drifted slowly over to his desk, walking on  tip- toe and smoothing the back of her hair while she held a different sheet of paper at arm's length. In the reflected sunlight her skin had a sheen like new satin. 'Look,' she said, placing the paper in front of him. 'It must be jelly, cuz jam don't shake like that.'

She had ringed one word. 'That's "dynamite" again, Luis said.

'Really?' She put her arm around his neck and leaned so that one nipple brushed his cheek and touched his lips 'Dynamite, huh?'

'For God's sake!' Luis roared. He heaved himself out of his chair as she took her paper and walked away. Throwing off his coat and shirt and kicking off his shoes he followed her into her office, where she had already begun typing.

'Sorry if I disturbed you,' she said.

'Forget that," he told her, dragging off his trousers with some difficulty. 'Come to bed.'

She paused with her hands on the keys, while he stood, panting and rampant. 'You do realise that it's not a tax-deductible expense,' she remarked.

'Oh, balls!' he cried.

'Well, if you put it that way,' she said, 'how can a lad\ refuse?'

They ripped open the packets of sheets and covered the bed. The cotton rustled stiffly against their bodies. One of the bed-springs squeaked. 'Did you really think I got this just for when you worked late?' Julie asked.

'Yes,' Luis said defiantly. He tucked his head under the sheet and blew a series of raspberries against her breasts until it made her laugh and and she hugged him to stop it. 'Anyway,' he mumbled, 'when a woman arrives in your office with a bed at half-past ten in the morning, it's not easy to know exactly what to do next.'

'Poor Luis,' she said. 'Still, you seem to be getting the hang of it now, don't you?'

'Beginner's luck,' he said.

Luis slept for half an hour, and woke up to see Julie curled beside him, reading a Portuguese guide book. 'Let's go to Oporto,' she said. 'It's all green and blue up there. Lots of rivers and mountains. Have you ever been to Oporto?' He shook his head. 'Couple of hundred miles north,' she said.

He lay sideways and enjoyed watching her.

'Coimbra looks good too. And Santarem. Nazare. Grandala. Beja. Louie. Terrific old places, built by Moors and Romans. We should go take a look.'

'It would be nice.'

'Well, we can afford a week off.'

Afford the money, yes. What about the time? What about the work?'

It'll still be here when we come back.'

Luis almost laughed. 'Madrid wouldn't be very pleased to hear that the war has been adjourned for two weeks,' he said.

'Can't you cook something up? Tell them that Seagull's got mumps, Knickers got married, Garlic's working double-shifts at the hospital and Eldorado ... I don't know, Eldorado's been run over by a bus.'

'That still leaves Nutmeg.'

Jailed for shoplifting.'

Luis grunted, and looked away. 'They're easy enough to destroy," he said, 'but they're damn difficult to create. In any case, I want to recruit a new man soon.'

Julie slowly raised her head and looked over the top of the guide book. 'Not another sub-agent, for heaven's sake?' she said.

'Certainly. He's a homosexual lecturer at the University of  Birmingham. Code-name "Wallpaper".'

She moved until she was kneeling and sitting on her heels, looking down at him. 'Luis, tell me something. Why are you doing all this?'

He shrugged. 'You know why.'

'No, I don't. I don't mean how did it happen, I mean what's the purpose of this whole damn great operation? Where is it getting you?'

'It's getting me rich, of course. What else?' He made a wide-open gesture.

'But you are rich, now.' She stared at him, determined so make him explain. 'How much do you make per year a: the moment?'

'In dollars? About . . .' He worked it out. 'Maybe sixty or seventy thousand a year. 'That's before taxes and expenses,' he added hurriedly.

'Then I don't understand. What more do you want?'

'It's a business, Julie. You can't stop it growing if the market wants it to grow. All I'm doing is meeting the demand.'

'What the hell are you talking about, Luis? You create the demand! You create all these nobodies! I mean, how many more do you need, for Pete's sake? What are you trying to do: make yourself the first spy millionaire?'

Luis looked at the ceiling and smoothed his moustache.

'Holy cow,'Julie said, in a voice flattened by amazement. 'I just aimed ten feet high and hit the target.'

Luis got out of bed, and stretched. 'Duty calls!' he said.

Luis successfully launched Wallpaper, hinting not only that his homosexuality was the lever which Eldorado had used to recruit him, but also that-- in the decadence of Birmingham University--  it won him access to secret research being done for the War Office. Wallpaper's first report was on experiments with hypnosis to reduce sexual tension among submarine crews. He ran up an impressive bill for entertaining his informants, which Madrid paid without question.

Bradburn & Wedge was also doing well. Julie sold a second consignment of lemonade crystals to the firm of Joachim von Klausbrunner. The degreasing patents which she had taken in payment from the bankrupt dealer lay on her desk for a while, until she advertised them in Diario (Patentes Anti-Lubrificantes -- Grande Uiilidade -- Oportunidade Exceptional). This brought an enquiry from a firm of engineers, who bought a five-year licence on the patents. Her accountant urged her to invest the money in Portuguese Government bonds; instead she spent it all on soap.

'Very American,' Luis said when she told him.

'Listen, you're more American than I am. At least I get some fun out of business. All you ever want to do is make money.'

'All I want to do is succeed. Would you prefer me to fail?'

'Oh, forget it.'

'The money comes afterwards. It's just a measurement of success, that's all.'

'Okay, you're rich! You're successful! So why can't we at least take a weekend in Oporto?'

Luis shook his head. 'We've been over that. You go, if you want to.'

'You're a goddam addict,' she said. 'Any time you're not making money you're afraid you're going to die. The more you get, the more you crave.'

He smiled, and steered her to the door. 'I always know when you're hungry,' he said, 'because that's when you stop making sense.'

It was drizzling and gloomy, so he took her to a restaurant made warm and cheerful by its charcoal fire. They ate grilled chicken made even hotter with piri-piri sauce, drank beer, and said little.

A man walked past their table, stopped, half-turned his head, and then came back. 'Hullo,' he said. 'This is a surprise.'

He was in his mid-thirties, with a plump, friendly face and hair that was thick but surprisingly grey. His suit was a smart and comfortable lovat tweed, and his manner was easy and confident. Luis went on chewing his chicken and looked at him warily. 'Is it?' he said.

'You're Luis Cabrillo. You don't remember me, do you?'

Luis's moustache briefly straightened in a polite smile. 'No, and I'm afraid you are mistaken.'

'You're not Luis Cabrillo?'

Luis handed him a business card. 'My name is Bradburn,' he said, 'and this is my partner, Senhora Wedge.'

'Jolly good.' He didn't even glance at the card. 'The last time we met, I was a very smelly deserter, you were driving a car, and Madrid was getting the daylights shelled out of it.'

Luis leaned back and stared. 'Charles Templeton,' the man said.

'For heaven's sake.' Luis recognised traces of the haggard and ragged figure that he had once watched swigging brandy and chatting over-brightly to the newspapermen. 'Come and sit down. I thought you were dead. You look very well. How on earth did you get out of Spain?'

'The old-boy system, old boy. Met a chap I knew at school.' Templeton sat. 'I take it you're still in the skullduggery business?'