Wives at War

by Jessica Stirling

  An old armchair, a kitchen chair, a bed, a wardrobe, a table, underclothing tossed in a corner, empty wine bottles propped on a shelf under the window, Emilio seated like a potentate on the sagging sofa with the girl at his feet, the light in the room honey-coloured and warm; small wonder that Polly felt as if she were caught up in a dream.

  She wondered if this was how it was with crooks and spies and all those who lived beyond the law, if unreality eventually became the norm. If so, it would explain a great deal about her husband, her marriage and the loneliness that had driven her into the arms of other men. She was, perhaps, no better than the girl who was seated at the Communist’s feet, a clever little fool who had got in over her head.

  She heard Dominic say, ‘No, I am not going to give you the diamonds.’

  ‘You do not have the diamonds?’

  ‘I do have the diamonds, but I am not going to give them to you.’

  ‘That is very wise of you, Mr Manone,’ the girl translated. ‘I will, however, need to see that you are what you say you are and can do all that has been promised on your behalf.’

  ‘Promised?’ Dominic said.

  ‘Promised by the Americans,’ the girl said. ‘Is it to keep the Americans informed that you have brought along one of them today?’

  ‘This American,’ Dominic said, ‘is my courier. He is a journalist.’

  ‘Ah! Journalist!’ Emilio smiled and raised his hands. ‘Bene, molto bene!’

  ‘His papers will enable him to travel to countries that are barred to you and me,’ Dominic said. ‘I brought him along to answer any questions you may have about the line of distribution.’

  The girl hesitated, frowning. ‘What’s that?’

  Dominic said, ‘The channel, the road by which the money will be brought to you once Signor Emilio is back in Italy. Provided the Americans do not join in the conflict, this man – Signor Christy – will be able to reach you or your generals in Italy.’

  ‘My generals?’ Emilio said in English. ‘No generals.’

  ‘To the comrades who work for you,’ Dom said.

  Emilio did not respond. The girl swung her head and looked up at him, her grey eyes filled with anxiety, as if she feared that he might blame her for his lack of understanding. She stroked his thigh again, scratching at the material of his trousers with bitten fingernails.

  Emilio continued to ignore her. He studied Polly once more but his look this time was calculating, not lascivious.

  ‘This one?’ he asked.

  Nerves fluttered at the top of Polly’s stomach, then the fluttering ceased and anger replaced it. She recalled the night, years ago, in the tenement in Lavender Court when one of Dominic’s gang had threatened Rosie with an open razor and how Bernard had stood up to the thug, recalled too in a sudden, brilliant little flash, how her mother had beaten off creditors and layabouts; remembered suddenly that she had been Lizzie Conway’s daughter long before she had been Dominic’s wife.

  ‘This one,’ Polly heard herself say, ‘is the wife.’

  Emilio smirked and fluttered his eyelashes as if he could see through a lot more than her summer frock and read every selfish, melancholy act that she had ever performed.

  Polly got up from the chair and crossed to the sofa. She batted the girl’s hand away and leaned towards the fat little Communist, leaned so close that her elbows brushed against his belly.

  ‘This one,’ Polly said, in the clear, well-modulated tone she used when addressing Rosie, ‘is the one who buys the diamonds.’

  ‘You government not give you the diamonds?’ Emilio said.

  ‘No,’ Polly told him. ‘I supplied the diamonds. Do you think, signor, that I am just a wife who sits at home and cooks supper for my husband?’

  For an instant it seemed almost as if he intended to reach up and embrace Polly, but there was no warmth in his smile, no trace of amusement in his eyes. He did not like being challenged by a woman, that much was obvious.

  He reverted to Italian and left it to the girl to translate.

  ‘They do not mine diamonds in England.’

  ‘No,’ Polly said, ‘but they do not mine diamonds in Germany either.’

  ‘Do you have a source in Venezuela?’

  ‘My source is not your concern. In England I have a source. I have a source that will keep you in bullets and explosives for years to come.’

  ‘Hoh, she knows how to boast, your wife,’ Emilio said.

  ‘She isn’t boasting,’ Dominic said.

  ‘Show him, Dominic,’ Polly said. ‘Give him the sample.’

  Dominic took his hand from his overcoat pocket. The uncut stones were wrapped in an oilskin tobacco pouch. He unrolled it and spilled a few of the stones into the girl’s cupped hands. Emilio leaned forward, peered at them. He knew no more about diamonds than she did, Polly guessed, and standing by Dominic’s side, folded her arms smugly over her breast.

  ‘How much is contained there, in dollars?’ Emilio asked.

  Polly answered, ‘Five or six thousand dollars worth; in Deutschmarks or lire, much more.’

  ‘I will take them,’ Emilio said.

  ‘No,’ Dominic said. ‘You’ll take the money I give you, not the stones.’

  ‘I can use the gemstones better.’

  ‘Dominic,’ Polly said, ‘let’s get out of here.’

  ‘Pardon?’ the girl said.

  Polly said, ‘He will take the stones and that’s the last we’ll see of him, and our profit will vanish into thin air. Tell him.’

  The girl translated.

  ‘Wrap them up again, Dominic,’ Polly said. ‘Wrap up our diamonds and we’ll do business elsewhere. He’s nothing, this man, nothing but a thief.’

  Dominic caught the girl by the wrist before she could close her fist on the gemstones. He turned her hand around and caught the trickle of diamonds in the flap of the tobacco pouch. He even gave her hand a little shake to make sure that nothing remained. He rolled the pouch up and put it back in his pocket.

  ‘Do you let your wife talk to me like that?’ Emilio said.

  ‘She told you only what I would tell you,’ Dominic said. ‘She is the one who takes the risks in England. She is the one who negotiates with the secret services to allow her to bring the stuff out. She is the one who handles the money. I have my father’s friends to back me in America but my wife works alone.’

  The girl spoke quickly, tripping over the words. She leaned on Emilio’s knees now, looking up into his face, a face that had grown red in the past minute. The last trace of a patronising smile had gone. Polly expected him to hurl himself to his feet in rage but instead he rocked back and forth on the sofa like an old woman in mourning.

  ‘Once I have established myself in Lisbon I’ll sell to whoever pays me the best price,’ Dominic said. ‘I’m not obliged to honour my promises to the British Government. If the Germans outbid the Italians or the Italians outbid the French, I’ll trade with them. How else am I going to make a decent profit?’

  ‘You are no patriot,’ Emilio said.

  ‘I never said I was,’ Dominic told him.

  ‘What about this man, this American?’ Emilio stabbed a finger in Christy’s direction. ‘He says nothing.’

  ‘Me?’ Christy said. ‘I saw what happened to your guys in North Africa. I happen to think you’re all chickens just begging to be plucked.’ He stuck out a hand and waggled his fingers. ‘I want my share, that’s all. I don’t care who pays me. I get a cut from Uncle Sam and another cut from Dominic on the profit he makes on the side. Nice, eh?’

  ‘I thought I would have diamonds,’ Emilio said.

  ‘I know you did,’ said Dominic. ‘You thought wrong.’

  Colour drained from the Italian’s cheeks and the muscles around his mouth relaxed; he seemed satisfied, almost pleased with the exchange. Polly was tempted to glance at her husband but instinct told her that it was almost over, that the Communist had been convinced by their performance.

  Emilio sat back, nod
ding. ‘I will need money soon,’ he said.

  ‘How soon?’

  ‘Three days, four.’

  ‘All right,’ Dominic said. ‘Signor Christy will bring it to you. How much?’

  ‘Three thousand.’

  ‘Lire or dollars?’ Christy asked.

  ‘Dollars, American dollars.’

  ‘I’ll do what I can,’ said Dominic. ‘It might take me a little longer than four days, though. Are you safe here?’

  ‘Safe?’ Emilio said. ‘Yes, I am safe.’ He closed one eye, squinting. ‘Am I safe with your hands, Signor Manone? That is the good question.’

  ‘You’re my money-box, Emilio,’ Dominic said. ‘Is that the good answer?’

  And, not entirely to Polly’s surprise, Emilio agreed that it was.

  * * *

  They reached the level streets behind the square of the Praça do Comercio in the full flush of the evening rush hour. Carts and trams, vans and motorcars flowed along the thoroughfare, and out on the river the ferryboats were thick as gulls on the Tagus’s broad green back. A breeze had got up with the turn of the tide. Polly was glad of it for her lethargy had been replaced by tipsy, carefree excitement. Dominic’s coolness and control had vanished as soon as he’d stepped out of the pension. He had unbuttoned his overcoat and flung it open and had walked with one arm about Polly’s waist and one draped over Christy’s shoulders as if, in the course of that afternoon, they had become boon companions.

  They were looking for a bar to drink to their success in duping the Italian but the arcades around the square were shadowed now and the big, glittering shops that sold the most fashionable goods in Europe were putting up their metal shutters, and some of the lights that turned Lisbon into a fairyland after dark had already been switched on.

  They loitered, uncertain, on the edge of the square.

  The Mercedes slid sleekly out of traffic and stopped by them. Jamie Cameron rolled down the window and stuck his head out.

  ‘Well,’ he asked, ‘did he bite?’

  ‘He bit,’ Dominic answered, laughing. ‘Oh boy, did he bite.’

  ‘I rather figured he would,’ Jamie said, and then to everyone’s consternation drove off again into the traffic without another word.

  * * *

  She lay on her back in the double bed in the darkened hotel room, knees raised and nightdress stretched across her thighs. She was too tense to sleep for now that her part in wooing the Communist was over she felt sure that Jamie Cameron would pack her on to another cargo boat and ship her off home just as soon as he possibly could.

  She didn’t want to go back to the mangled little mansion in Manor Park Avenue yet, to Fin’s shabby office in Baltic Chambers and the shallow life she had been leading in Glasgow ever since Dominic had gone away.

  The glimpse she’d had of an undercover war had thrilled her and that afternoon in the high, honey-coloured room in the Alfama, she’d felt as if she’d been playing a part she’d been born to play. Her life so far had been a series of roles directed by other people: the dutiful daughter, the loyal wife, sister, aunt and mother, lover to three very different men. She had grown so used to role-playing that she no longer knew quite who she was or to whom she owed allegiance – the nation, the family, her children, a husband who had used her, or a lover with whom she had fallen out of love.

  She slid a hand down and cupped her stomach. The rise and fall of her breath and the heat of her body under the sheet were soothing, then she heard the door click open and Dominic enter the room.

  ‘Polly, are you awake?’

  ‘Yes.’

  They had eaten dinner together, the three of them, in the crowded dining room on the ground floor. They had talked about Hitler and air raids, Poland and the desert war, about Babs and Rosie, about New York and the vast continent of North America where her children were happy and secure. They hadn’t talked about the future, though, her future or anyone’s future.

  ‘Where have you been hiding?’ Polly said.

  ‘In the bar.’

  ‘With Christy?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Still talking about the war?’

  ‘No,’ Dominic said. ‘Talking about you.’

  She pressed her hand into her stomach and sat up.

  He lingered by the door, separated from her by acres of brown carpet, his overcoat folded over his arm. He looked, she thought, like a hospital visitor, awkward and perhaps even a little embarrassed, unsure what to say. She reached up and switched on the lamp above the bed.

  ‘What did Christy tell you?’ she said.

  ‘That you turned him down.’

  ‘That I … what?’

  Dominic shifted the overcoat from one arm to the other. ‘He thinks you only took him in because he had a thing going with Babs.’

  Polly leaned back against the bolster, hands above her head. All she needed to say now was ‘Yes’ and Dominic would believe her. Dominic had always wanted to believe her, to turn her lies into loyalty. He would believe her and come to bed, make love to her as if nothing had happened since the last time they had been together in the big gloomy room in Manor Park. What harm could there be in endorsing Christy’s tactful lie? What harm would it do Babs now?

  She linked her fingers together, high over her head.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘I took him in because I wanted him for myself.’

  Far away, as in a dream, she heard accordion music, more Parisian than Portuguese; an exile, a refugee perhaps perched on a stool in a bar across the square or in a cold corner of the railway station, playing to assuage his loneliness.

  ‘Do you know where Christy is right now?’ Dominic said.

  ‘No.’

  ‘He’s in a room three doors down the hall.’

  ‘Is he?’ Polly said.

  ‘Do you want to go to him?’ Dominic asked.

  She unlocked her fingers and let herself fall forward, her back bowed, the light from the bed-lamp shining down on her. She rested her forehead against her knees and closed her eyes.

  ‘I won’t stop you,’ Dominic said. ‘I won’t do anything to stop you.’

  ‘I don’t want to be with Christy.’

  She raised herself up on her hands. He came to the foot of the bed and looked down at her. He wanted her as any man would want her but now there had to be something more, something that at least resembled love.

  She said, ‘I want to be here with you.’

  ‘Why, Polly? Because I’m your last best option?’

  ‘No, because you’re my husband.’

  It sounded too glib and banal to be anything other than a lie.

  She scanned his face anxiously, fearful that he was about to tell her that their marriage was over, that vanity and fickleness had finally caught up with her and that her role as his wife and the mother of his children had been written out at last. She had sense enough to say nothing, though, to meekly await his decision, his forgiveness.

  He tossed the overcoat to one side and seated himself on the bed.

  ‘God, but you can be pretty stupid sometimes, Polly.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘Thank you very much.’

  ‘Why do you think I brought you here?’

  ‘You didn’t bring me here, other people did that.’

  ‘Wrong again, Poll,’ he told her. ‘I went to a great deal of trouble to bring you to Lisbon. Do you think it was easy negotiating with Jamie Cameron, squaring up to the US Intelligence services and the Immigration authorities when, as it were, I didn’t have a leg to stand on?’ He moved closer, his voice as soft as a whisper. ‘If I’d come back to Scotland to fetch you, our Kenny would have had me locked up. Oh yes, there’s quite enough outstanding in Kenny MacGregor’s little black book to bring me to trial and probably convict me. He might be my brother-in-law but he’s a copper first and foremost and he’s never really forgiven me for getting away with murder out at Blackstone Farm.’

  ‘Did you kill my father?’

  ‘Of cours
e I didn’t kill your father. Your father took off, limped off, and that’s the last any one of us has ever heard from him. Is that what you thought? That I was a murderer as well as a crook?’

  ‘What are you doing here, Dominic; in Lisbon, I mean?’

  ‘Making myself useful.’

  ‘As a spy, as an agent of the United States Government?’

  ‘My father’s dying. He won’t last much longer. When he goes, my brother will take over what’s left of the racket in Philadelphia which, these days, is mainly a stranglehold on union labour, protection writ large. I want nothing to do with it, nothing. I’m sick of all the finagling. I’m sick of being known as Carlo Manone’s heir apparent. Jamie Cameron’s offered me a deal, a job if you like, and I’ve accepted it. As of now, Polly, I’m working for the Co-ordinator of Strategic Services, whatever the hell that means.’

  ‘And Christy?’

  ‘Christy too. We’ll be working together here in Lisbon, at least for the next half-year or so.’

  ‘Funding the Italian?’

  ‘Making contacts, trading with the enemy, gathering whatever information we can about all sorts of things: Vichy France, Franco’s manoeuvres to keep sweet with Hitler, the trade in arms that come pouring through so-called neutral ports, anything and everything that might serve the free world.’

  ‘Do you want me to join you, to become a spy too?’

  ‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘I want you to go to New York, settle on Staten Island and look after our kids. I want you there when I come home.’

  ‘New York?’ Polly said. ‘I – I can’t, Dominic. I can’t abandon Mammy and my sisters. My home – our home’s in Scotland, not America.’

  ‘Not now, Polly. Your place is with me and with the children.’

  ‘I thought they’d all but forgotten me?’

  ‘They have,’ Dominic said. ‘And that isn’t right, is it?’

  ‘What about Patricia?’

  ‘Oh, come September she’ll marry Jamie Cameron and be gone.’

  ‘Are you sure about that?’ Polly said.

  ‘As sure as one can be about anything.’