Rage - Smith Wilbur (читать книги онлайн без сокращений .TXT) 📗
He will show you photographs and ask you to identify the people you meet." 'All right, Lothie - but I've told you twice already how much I miss you, while you, you swine, haven't said a word." 'I have thought about you every day since you left,' Lothar said.
'You're beautiful and funny and you make me laugh." 'Don't stop,' Isabella pleaded. 'Just keep talking like that." Adrian Van Vuuren was a burly avuncular man, who looked more like a friendly Free State farmer than a secret service man. He took her up to the ambassador's office and introduced her to His Excellency who knew Shasa well and they chatted for a few minutes.
His Excellency invited Isabella to the races at Ascot the coming Saturday but Colonel Van Vuuren intervened apologetically.
'Miss Courtney is doing a little job for us at present, Your Excellency. It might not be wise to make too much public display of her connections to the embassy." 'Very well,' the ambassador agreed reluctantly, 'But you will come to lunch with us, Miss Courtney - not often we have such a pretty girl at our gatherings." Van Vuuren gave her the short tour of the embassy and its a treasures, which ended in his office on the third floor. 'Now, my dear, we have some work for you." A pile of albums was stacked on his desk, each full of head-an shoulder photographs of men and women. They sat side by side or Van Vuuren flicked through the pages, picking out the mug shots the people she had met at the Lord Kitchener Hotel.
'You make it easier for us by knowing their names,' Van Vuurc remarked, and turned to a photograph of Phineas, the hotel recei tionist.
'Yes, that's him,' Isabella confirmed, and Van Vuuren looked u his details in a separate ledger. 'Phineas Mophoso. Born 194 Member of PAC. Convicted of public violence 16 May 1961. Violate bail conditions. Illegal emigration late 1961. Present location believe U.K." 'Small fry,' Van Vuuren grunted, 'but small fry often shoal wit big fish." He offered to provide an embassy car to drive Isabella bac to the Dorchester.
'Thank you, but I'll walk." She had been alone at Fortnum & Masons and when she got bac to the hotel Michael was frantic with worry.
'For heaven's sake, Mickey. I'm not a baby. I can look arte myself. I just felt like exploring on my own." 'Mater is giving a party for us at the Lord Kitchener this evenin She wants us there before six." 'You mean Tara, not Mater - and the Lardy, not the Lord Ki!
chener. Don't be so bourgeois and colonial, Mickey darling." At least fifty people crowded into the residents' lounge of the Lord for Tara's party, and she provided unlimited quantities of draugh bitter and Spanish red wine to wash down the Irish cook's unforgett able snacks. Michael entered into the spirit of the occasion. He wa at all times the centre of an arguing gesticulating group. Isabell backed herself into a corner ai the lounge and with a remote and ic' hauteur discouraged any familiar approach from the other guests while at the same time memorizing their names and faces as Tan introduced them.
After the first hour the smoky claustrophobic atmosphere, and th volume of conversation lubricated by Tara's Spanish plonk, became oppressive and Isabella's eyes felt gritty and a dull ache started ir her temples. Tara had disappeared and Michael was still enjoyin himselfi 'That's my patriotic duty for tonight,' she decided, and sidled to.
wards the door taking care not to alert Michael to her departure.
As she passed the deserted reception desk, she heard voices from behind the osted glass door of Tara's tiny office, and she had an attack of conscience.
'I can't just go off without thanking Mater,' she decided. 'It was an awful party, but she went to a lot of trouble and I am one of the guests of honour." She slipped behind the desk, and was about to tap on the panel of the door when she heard her mother say, 'But, comrade, I didn't expect you to arrive tonight." The words were commonplace, but the tone in which Tara said them was not. She was more than agitated she was afraid, deadly afraid.
A man's voice replied, but it was so low and hoarse that Isabella could not catch the words, and then Tara said, 'But they are my own children. It's perfectly safe." This time the man's reply was sharper.
'Nothing is ever safe,' he said. 'They are also your husband's children, and your husband is a member of the fascist racist regime. We will leave now and return later after they have gone." Isabella acted instinctively. She darted back into the lobby and out through the glass front doors of the hotel. The narrow street was lined with parked vehicles, one of them a dark delivery van tall enough to screen her. She hid behind it.
After a few minutes, two men followed her out of the front entrance of the hotel. They both wore dark raincoats but their heads were bare. They set off briskly, walking side by side towards the Cromwell Road and as they came level with where she leaned against the side of the van, the street light lit their faces.
The man nearest to her was black, with a strong, resolute face, broad nose and thick African lips. His companion was white and much older. His flesh was pale as putty and had the same soft amorphous look. His hair was black and lank and lifeless. It hung on to his forehead, and his eyes were dark and fathomless as pools of coal tar - and Isabella understood why her mother had been afraid. This was a man who inspired fear.
Colonel Van Vuuren sat beside her at his desk with the pile of albums in front of them. 'He is a white man. That makes life a lot easier for all of us,' he said as he selected one of the albums.
'These are all white,' he explained. 'We have got them all in here.
Even the ones safely behind bars, like Brain Fischer." She found his photograph on the third page.
'That's the one." 'Are you sure?" Van Vuuren asked. 'It's not a very good photo." It must have been taken as he was climbing into a vehicle, for the background was a city street. He was glancing back, most of his body obscured by the open door of the vehicle, and movement ha blurred his features slightly.
'Yes. That's him all right,' Isabella repeated. 'I could never mistaN those eyes." Van Vuuren referred to the separate ledger. 'The photograph w taken in East Berlin by the American CIA two years ago. He is wily bird, that's the only picture we have. His name is Joe Cicer( He is the secretary general of the South African Communist Par!
and a colonel in the Russian KGB. He is a chief of staff of tl: military wing of the banned ANC, the Umkhonto we Sizwe." Va Vuuren smiled. 'And so, my dear, the big fish has arrived. Now w must try and identify his companion. That will not be so easy." It took almost two hours. Isabella paged through the alburr slowly. When she finished one pile, Van Vuuren's assistent broug in another armful of albums and she began again. Van Vuuren st patiently beside her, sending out for coffee and encouraging her with a smile and a word when she flagged.
'Yes." Isabella straightened up at last. 'This is the one." 'You have been wonderful. Thank you." Van Vuuren reached fc the ledger and turned to the curriculum vitae of the man in th photograph.
'Raleigh Tabaka,' he read out. 'Secretary of the Vaal branch PAC and member of Poqo. Organizer of the attack on the Sharpeviii police station. Disappeared three years ago, before he could b detained. Since then there have been rumours that he was seen i: training camps in Morocco and East Germany. He is rated as trained and dangerous terrorist. Two big fish together. Now, if w could just find what they are up to!" Tara Courtney waited up long after her party had broken up. Th last guests had staggered through the glass doors, and Michael ha( kissed her goodnight and gone off to try and pick up a late cruisinl taxi in the Cromwell Road.
