The Broken Penny

by Julian Symons

  ‘Yes. We can try the mountains. We can reach them in two hours, three hours, in the car. But we have no food, no friends, one of us cannot walk long distances. It doesn’t seem a good prospect.’

  ‘It is suicide,’ Granz said simply.

  ‘I think so too. Now, Theodore, is there anywhere near here a friend who would hide us? I don’t mean an active member of your organisation who will be on the police list. I mean some rich secret backer, or a political boss who has a grudge against the regime – somebody who can help us without much risk to himself.’

  ‘There are such people, perhaps, a few, but nobody I could trust.’ Granz sounded dispirited. ‘Such people will work with the regime in power, they have no sense of loyalty, there is no personal link to bind them.’ Suddenly he threw back his great head and roared with laughter. ‘A personal link, yes, that is good. There is somebody I have thought of, somebody who has helped me before, not once but often.’

  ‘Reliable?’

  ‘I think so, yes.’ Granz began to laugh again. ‘She is certainly not a Communist. Anyway it is a very good chance, the best chance.’

  ‘A woman?’

  ‘Very much so, very much so. Oh, undoubtedly a woman.’ Granz glanced at Ilona and burst out laughing again, apparently in the highest spirits.

  ‘And she is not openly identified with your people?’

  ‘This woman is identified with nobody but herself. She is a friend of my boyhood.’ Granz rocked with laughter. ‘We must go there. There is no time to waste.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘It is not at all necessary that you should understand.’ Granz turned the car back in the direction from which they had come. ‘Back to Baritsa.’

  Chapter Two

  The house stood in one of the three streets that ran off the central square, a long narrow building which from the outside looked as dead as the rest of the town. Granz drove round to the back, where a narrow street was flanked on one side by the River Molna that straggled through the town. He said to Garden, ‘You come, the other two stay.’ They went through an iron gate and up half a dozen worn steps. Granz rang a bell.

  ‘Back and front entrances,’ Garden said.

  ‘Yes. The front is for public customers, the back for particular friends.’

  ‘Public customers.’ Garden understood. ‘A brothel.’

  ‘Have you any objection? You think the little bitch out there will be shocked, eh?’

  Garden was surprised. ‘Why should I worry about that?’ Granz did not reply.

  The door opened, and a man’s figure appeared in it. The light that glimmered behind him was faint, so that Garden could see nothing more than the outline of a short, thickset man. The man said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘I wish to see Madame Sophie.’

  ‘Madame is engaged.’ The door began to close.

  ‘Tell her it is Theo. Hurry.’

  The man did not reply, but merely closed the door. Granz muttered something and pressed the bell again. This time the wait was a little longer before the door opened and a woman stood there. Again Garden could see nothing more than a mass of hair and a blurred white face. Her voice when it came was remarkably rich and deep. ‘Theo,’ she said. ‘It’s been such a very long time.’

  ‘Let us in, Sophie.’ Granz fairly pushed past her in his eagerness and Garden, moving after him, found himself brushing against a silk dress. The contact, in the semi-darkness of this passage with its one dim light at the far end, was oddly disturbing. Granz was talking now in an urgent whisper. ‘Somewhere to stay, Sophie. The room at the top. Not for long, a few days at most.’

  She threw back her head and laughed. Garden saw the whiteness of her throat. ‘I might have known you wouldn’t come without wanting something. I suppose I should be complimented you ask me to provide bed and board, but the black boys have been doing a good job tonight from all I hear. There’s no one left but Sophie, is that it? And you know I have always been a fool for you. What about your friend – you want me to take him too?’

  ‘There are two more outside, a young woman and an old man.’ Granz still spoke in the whisper and now for the first time she whispered back.

  ‘Four is too many. What are you trying to do to me, Theo? The assistant police chief here, you know Baltnik that little rat of a man, was in last night. He told me something big was coming off in the next few days. I can’t get mixed in too far, I’ve got my reputation to think of.’ She gave a throaty chuckle. ‘Now listen, I’ll take you two here, the two others find somewhere else.’

  ‘There is nowhere else. They’ve made a clean sweep of our people here. If you don’t take us we’re done for.’

  Garden was standing so close to the woman that he could feel the bodily warmth that came from her. He heard her heavy breathing and then she laughed again, almost gaily. ‘I said I was a fool, Theo. I’ve never let you down, have I? You’ve let me down, but I’ve never let you down, that’s the way I am.’

  Granz’s voice at once matched this jocularity. ‘You’ve never let me down, Sophie.’

  ‘All right. Bring them in.’

  Almost conversationally now Granz said, ‘There is another thing. The car, big, black, American style. It is a danger to us.’

  ‘Milo will see to it.’ She said ironically, ‘Is that all?’

  Granz chuckled. ‘That is all, Sophie. I will get the others.’ When he came back with them Arbitzer’s head was almost completely hidden in the scarf.

  ‘Come,’ the woman said. They passed the squat man and she murmured something to him. She led them up three flights of thickly carpeted stairs, opened a cupboard door and pushed aside some books to reveal another door inside the cupboard. She opened this door and pressed the light switch. A small bare room was revealed, with two truckle beds in it. There were two hard chairs, a small table, a washstand and a tiny window. A trapdoor led to the roof. ‘Two of you on the beds, the other two on the floor.’ She looked at the girl and added, ‘Unless, of course, there’s any sharing going on. You’ll be safe enough. Nobody will come up here except Milo and you can trust him.’

  ‘If he or anyone else asks questions–’ Granz began. She checked him.

  ‘Nobody asks questions of Sophie.’ In the light she was revealed as a bony woman in her late thirties, with the remains of beauty. Now her dyed red hair showed dark at the roots, her mouth had a downward curve, her black dress was slit deep in front to reveal the swell of breasts. She was loudly and deliberately vulgar, yet Garden seemed to sense behind the sharp calculation of her glance as it moved from Granz to Garden, rested thoughtfully on the girl for a moment and flicked past Arbitzer, an inner recklessness that was eager to find expression, a generosity kept, perhaps for years, under unwilling control.

  ‘Is this the best you can do?’ the girl said to Granz, and the red-haired woman burst out furiously:

  ‘Yes, my girl, this is the best he can do, the best I can do. And I am not doing it for you, believe me. There is nothing I should like better than to see you downstairs with my other girls. Except that I doubt if you would earn your keep. Most of the men like something with a bit of flesh on it.’

  Granz was looking gloomily down at the floor. ‘Sophie, Sophie,’ he muttered. ‘This is not like you. The girl means nothing, she is tired, we are all tired.’

  ‘But grateful,’ Garden said, and smiled.

  ‘You are not one of us?’

  ‘English.’

  ‘An Englishman, eh. I once had an Englishman hiding here in the war for three months. The Germans looked for him everywhere else, but not here. Shall I tell you why? Because I am sensible, I co-operate, I am on their side, you understand. I have no politics. Politics is all–’ She used an impolite word. ‘Some people I do not like, then I am on the side of the Germans, or today on the side of the Communists. Some people I like, and then nothing is too much to do for them. I like Theo. He used to like me.’

  Granz looked up. ‘Sophie, you are talking too much. The car
.’

  She snorted contemptuously. ‘I spoke to Milo as we came up the stairs. He is out of the town by now. He will drive to near Kotsin ten miles away, abandon it and stay with friends in Kotsin. Tomorrow morning he will come back. You see I don’t forget things. Now, are you hungry? What do you want – sandwiches, coffee?’

  When she had gone Ilona said, ‘What did she mean about the girls, about being with her other girls?’ Granz told her. She blushed, but said nothing.

  Granz said, ‘Jacob, get into bed, cover yourself up. I don’t want her to see your face. It is good to be able to trust somebody, but better to have no need for trust.’

  With a kind of mild, bewildered obedience the old man began to take off his clothes. Then he stopped. ‘Where are my pyjamas?’

  ‘Our bags were lost when there was that trouble at Cetkovitch’s, uncle. Perhaps you can sleep without pyjamas for tonight. Just take off your trousers and get into bed.’

  ‘But Katerina packed them,’ Arbitzer said fretfully. ‘I know she did, it is not the kind of thing she forgot. How very careless to leave them at Cetkovitch’s. I shall certainly say something when she brings them tomorrow.’

  Ilona sat by him and put a hand on his forehead. ‘You must pull the things up over your face. It won’t do for you to catch a chill.’

  Arbitzer looked up at her slyly. ‘Are you sure that you don’t want to stop the people from seeing their President?’ Nevertheless, he allowed her to pull up the bedclothes so that only a small fraction of his face was showing. When Sophie came back with a tray of sandwiches and a pot of coffee he presented to her only the back of his head. She put down the tray on the other bed.

  ‘Listen to me, you heroes. This part of the house is mine. Clients and girls hardly ever come into it, but we cannot afford to take chances. Wash in here – I will bring you towels. There is a lavatory on the half-landing below. Be very careful when you use it. Trust me and Milo, nobody else. What are your plans for getting away?’ Granz and Garden looked at each other. ‘You are relying on Sophie for that too? What a valuable woman she is to be sure. You will be safe here for a day or two while we think of something. Now Theo, and you Englishman, come with me.’

  They followed her downstairs to a bedroom with pink-striped wallpaper, a mushroom-coloured carpet, an enormous double bed with red tassels hanging from each of the four corners and a dressing-table covered with make-up jars and bottles of lotion, and a large mirror above the bed. Sophie stopped just inside the door and surveyed the room with candid admiration. ‘Nice, eh? I don’t ask Theo, he remembers it too well, but don’t you like it, Englishman? Don’t be afraid, I’m not going to eat you. Bedclothes you wanted, here they are.’ They went through into a bathroom where she unlocked a great cupboard. The top shelves were full of monogrammed and coloured sheets, and damask tablecloths. Below them were wonderfully soft blankets and eiderdowns. They stood and gaped. ‘You wonder how I got them? I will tell you. I kept my eyes open and my mouth shut. I never put my hand into the fire and I never played with politics. I was always on good terms with the men who matter. I gave them what they wanted and listened to the things they said – oh, not when they were being clever and trying to make a fool of me, but at those other times when they were relaxed enough to tell me real secrets. Once it was about the stock market, then about troop movements, now it is spies, conspiracies. Such information turns itself into these things. Well, Englishman, why are you looking at me like that?’

  ‘I was thinking that you were a dangerous woman.’

  She was delighted. ‘The Englishman knows how to pay a compliment, eh, Theo? It is a pity you have forgotten. What else? Mattresses, yes.’ She opened the door of another cupboard which contained half a dozen mattresses. They took one each and, staggering under their loads, went up the stairs again. From below Madame Sophie watched them, hands on hips.

  When they got back Ilona put a finger to her lips. ‘He is asleep.’ She bit into one of the sandwiches.

  Granz stood scratching his head. ‘What do you make of him?’

  ‘Shock. He’ll be all right in the morning,’ Garden said with a confidence he did not feel. He began to eat a cold pork sandwich, and realised he was hungry.

  ‘Will he ever be any good again, do you think?’

  ‘He will never lead a guerrilla movement again, or fight in the mountains, no. For him those days are over, Theodore.’

  ‘And our revolution, the seizure of power, you think that is finished too?’

  ‘If they have acted as efficiently everywhere as they did tonight in Lodno and Baritsa, yes, it is finished. For the time being.’

  Granz put down his coffee cup on the floor. ‘Where did it go wrong? For years we have worked and prepared, and now all that has gone. One enemy agent sticks his dirty nose among us and ruins it all, is that possible? The best of us taken or killed, and our President, the symbol of our movement, our great asset–’ Granz cast a look of mingled scorn and pity at the figure on the bed with its head turned to the wall. ‘But even today three-quarters, seven-eighths of the people are on our side. They are on our side – and what can we do about it?’ He sat with arms hanging loosely, a picture of despair.

  ‘Time to go to bed,’ said Garden. He spoke to the girl: ‘We will stand outside the door. Call us when you are in bed.’ She nodded. The two of them stood outside the door without speaking, in the small cupboard, until they heard a murmur from inside the room. Ilona was in bed, her hair as bright as metal on the pillow, her face turned away from them. They made up the mattress on the floor and took off jackets and trousers. Garden turned off the light. As he groped his way in darkness the girl spoke.

  ‘Open the window. We shall all stifle in here.’ He found the tiny casement window and opened it. She spoke from a place just at his side. ‘Garden.’

  ‘Yes.’

  She said in English, ‘I am sorry if I have been a nuisance. I am not a very nice girl, I am afraid. I will try to be better in future.’

  ‘Future is a good word,’ Garden said. He bent down to a bright patch and kissed it under the impression that it was her head. His lips touched the bar at the end of the bed. He heard a laugh, quickly suppressed. A hand caught hold of his arm and drew him down. Her lips as they met his were soft and cool.

  Chapter Three

  At half past nine on the following morning Sophie brought up breakfast, and an hour later she came up with the newspapers. At this second visit she said nothing but looked thoughtfully at Arbitzer, who was sitting on his bed with his hands clasped together. Granz read the paper and Garden looked over his shoulder. It was, of course, a State-controlled newspaper, since no others were permitted. The girl was making up her face with things from her handbag with as much care as if she had been getting ready for a dinner date. ‘What does it say?’

  The whole of the front page was taken up by thick black headlines. Garden read:

  ANGLO-AMERICAN PLOTTERS ARRESTED

  Attempt To Sabotage Socialist Reconstruction Foiled

  President Warns ‘On Guard Against Wolves And Hyenas Of Reaction’

  Granz muttered indistinctly and turned to the inside pages. Here there were pictures of the attack on Cetkevitch’s house. Matchek, Udansky and some others were being led away by the People’s Police. There was a long report describing the arrest of the conspirators who were called ‘Trotsky-Imperialist-TitoistCosmopolitans’ in the pay of the Western powers. Brief biographies followed. Cetkovitch was described as ‘a well-known shyster lawyer who had wormed his way into the confidence of unworthy officials’. Other descriptions were equally pungent. Matchek was ‘a notorious receiver of stolen goods and associate of criminal elements’, Udansky ‘a so-called critic, companion of the lowest riff-raff of Western decadents and spies’. There seemed to be little that they did not know. Cetkovitch was dead, and so were some of the others. The captured plotters were said to have admitted that their plan was to kill the President and the leading ministers and then conclude a treaty bind
ing the country to the Anglo-Americans. Peplov was not mentioned. There was nothing about Arbitzer or Granz, but there was an indirect reference to Garden, which did not mention him by name. ‘Incontestable proof of the fact that the saboteurs were backed by the Anglo-American brigands is given by the presence of a certain well-known English Trotskyite, who had flown over specially to direct the plot.’ There followed an account of this figure’s activities as a wrecker in Spain and his career as a spy giving information to the Germans when part of an Allied mission during the war. There were brief notes on the arrest of plotters in other towns and a quotation from the President promising a thorough investigation of the whole State apparatus. Telegrams from the chiefs of all the armed forces pledged their loyalty to the regime.

  Reading the newspapers raised Granz’s volatile spirits immensely. ‘You see what it means, eh, Charles? They do not mention any of us by name. They are still afraid of us, afraid of what we can do. If they once admitted Jacob was in the country the people would rise.’

  ‘Come now, Theodore, be a little realistic.’

  ‘We must get away from here.’ Granz began to pace the room with long strides. ‘Somehow, I don’t know how, we must get down further south. There we have many fine contacts, we print thousands of leaflets, Jacob shows himself, the President has returned. When the match is struck it may yet light the fire.’

  ‘You’re living in a dream, man. What about the army?’

  ‘The army would never move against a rising led by Jacob. The army belongs to us.’ Noting the expression on Garden’s face he added, ‘Potentially at least.’

  ‘Come here,’ the girl called. She was standing at the casement window on tiptoe, peering out. Standing beside her they could look out along the road into the square. The day was overcast, but it was not raining. Far below them, looking like toys, a hundred or so soldiers were being harangued by an officer. What was he saying? They could not distinguish words, but plainly the officer was speaking with some passion. A sprinkling of townspeople stood watching and listening. Words of command were barked. The troops divided into four columns and marched away down each of the four streets. They passed below the watchers at the window, efficient-looking and neat in their grey uniforms. ‘They do not look as if they belong to you,’ the girl said.