The Sultan of Lanchap, the Sultan of Dahaga, the Crown Prince of Lapar, the Raja of Ayut, the Regent of Anchok, various kathis, muftis and imams, Middle East oil sheikhs, kings of Arab lands (some soon to be deposed, one assassinated) and a man from the Mosque at Woking, England — these were already in Dunia Town when the Times of Dunia gave, in a note at the foot of the second of the two pages devoted to astrology, the reason for The Honourable Mr. Tomlin's sudden repatriation. Mr. Tomlin had, for a long time, been suffering from slight deafness; now the condition was deteriorating and, on medical advice, he was going home. Everybody — said the Times of Dunia — wished him a speedy recovery from his deafness and a happy retirement. Everybody would probably miss his charming wife and daughter. He had done good work for the State, asserted, without specification, the Times of Dunia. No photograph, no departing message. Mr. Tomlin had flown back at last to reality.
Lydgate read through the paper impatiently, sitting, after hours, in his office. He was waiting for Dunia Airways to ring him back about flights to Aden. Many of the regular passenger flights had been cancelled, the negro clerk had said, because the Government had chartered so many aircraft for the distinguished visitors. These were to be flown to the mines and to various other places of interest in the territory. If, however, Mr. Lydgate could obtain a chit from the U.N.Adviser's Office testifying that he was travelling to Aden on official business, then some private person's flight could be cancelled and he could be found a seat on one of the regular passenger flights.
"No," Lydgate had said. "This is not official business. Ring me back." Then he fretted for an hour over the Times of Dunia. Some disaffected person had written a poem in heroic couplets, beginning:
"Dunia, the little world of the misled,
A deadly living for the living dead.
All mortal sins are venal here; the least
Of public works officials is a priest
Ordained by the traditions of his tribe
For one sole rite — the blessing of the bribe. . . .”
The clerk rang back. "I do not understand, Mr. Lydgate. The Government has already booked a passage in your name for tomorrow."
"Impossible."
"Your name is Mr. Lydia Lydgate?"
"No."
"Oh, I see, sorry, there must be some mistake. I will ring you again."
And then Carruthers Chung came in, together with Sebastian Hup, cheerfully solemn, ready to shake hands. Carruthers Chung had the same James Joyce beard. A late afternoon Dunia cloudscape drifted gravely across his glasses. "Do not be aflaid, Mr. Lydgate," he said. "We come as fliends." They both sat down, Sebastian Hup leaning forward, grinning in costive pain.
"I wonder if it will lain," said Carruthers Chung. "We play for lain but lain does not come. Our sin must be velly gleat. And soon the flogs will be going to war."
"The frogs?"
"Yes, the gleen flogs and the blown flogs. They some-times fight duling the dly season. Over the possession of a stleam or water-hole."
"Well?" said Lydgate.
"Well, Mr. Lydgate, I am so much happier that you are now so much happier a man. My whole gloup is happier, too. You look happier, as if you had shed a gleat load. Pelhaps we were plemature before. Pelhaps that was not yet the time for you to confess evelything. But now you have confessed, and you are happier fol it."
"Confessed what?" said Lydgate cautiously. "Who's been talking about my confessing things?"
"Oh, nobody," smiled Carruthers Chung. "Except that Sebastian Hup here said that you looked so much more peaceful, so I assumed, as did he, that you had thlown off a gleat load. One can always tell," he nodded, smiling, Sebastian Hup nodding, smiling, too. "But you must not be aflaid, Mr. Lydgate," said Carruthers Chung. "We are your fliends. And we can be perfectly flank with one another."
"What," asked Lydgate, still cautious, "am I supposed to have confessed?"
"Bigamy," said Carruthers Chung promptly. "It must be bigamy, because it cannot be anything else. We thought of murder, then of lobbely, then of other sins, but then that velly pletty girl flom the London School of Economics suggested bigamy. We discussed that and we all agleed it must be something like that."
Lydgate tried not to show surprise, admitting nothing.
"It was a velly long and instluctive discussion, Mr. Lydgate. The whole blidge gloup was plesent. However, you must not wolly. It is not the quidditas or the quantum of the sin that counts, but the extent of the guilt and the sincelity of the lepentence. I gather, Mr. Lydgate, that you are going to leave Dunia."
"How do you know that?"
"It is velly obvious. You have sold your car. The man you sold it to has sold it to the Government for thlee times the plice. They need many cars now for their distinguished visitors. You have also cashed valious cheques with diffelent people. You have no tlaveller's cheques. That means you are going to some place with no lestlictions on the import of foleign cullency. Where are you going, Mr. Lydgate?"
"That would be telling."
"You wolly too much, Mr. Lydgate. But I suppose you are like Olestes, you have to keep moving on."
"Olestes ?"
"Olestes, the Gleek tlagical chalacter. But you need more money, pelhaps. We played blidge the other night, leal contlact blidge, and all winnings were pooled and given to me to plesent to you. Here they are. Not velly much, but it will help." He gave Lydgate about twenty ten-buck notes.
Lydgate was touched. He said, "Why do you do this for me?"
"We are not intelested in justice, Mr. Lydgate. We do not understand light and wlong. Clime and punishment mean nothing to us. We know sin, we know guilt, we know lepentance. That is all. You still have much punishment to come. But not flom law-courts, not in plison."
"I've been punished enough," said Lydgate.
"When you say that," said Carruthers Chung, "that is a sure sign that you have not been punished enough." The telephone rang. "But you will be punished enough," promised Carruthers Chung. Lydgate picked up the receiver. The two visitors stood up to go. Sebastian Hup was acting the part of a man whose vocal cords had been cut out by men of the Mau Mau: he opened his mouth as if in pain, nodding and grinning.
"Don't go," said Lydgate. "Wait. We'll have a drink or something."
"No, no," smiled Carruthers Chung. "We have things to do. There are more blidge parties to be allanged. There are many new sinners in the town." He waved at Lydgate, going towards the door. Sebastian Hup made pathetic dumb noises.
"Thanks," said Lydgate. "Thanks very much."
"Mr. Lydgate?" said the voice from Dunia Airways.
"Francis Burroughs Lydgate," said Lydgate. "Well?"
"We can give you a seat on Tourist Flight LX571. 1405 hours, the day after tomorrow."
"That," said Lydgate, "will do very well. I'll come round in the morning and pay. Thank you." He put down the receiver. He felt, at least, reasonably safe. He had an exit permit from the Astana (a trip to Shurga, he had told the Caliph's Private Secretary, to buy fairy lamps for the Sailing Club, Dunia shops having sold out); his passport was in order; he had enough money; he had a seat on a plane. A few days in Aden, and then to Bombay, where Jock Wragg and Pilsby would be able to help. After that?
He locked the office and walked down the dirty stone stairs to the raging African afternoon. Flags, kites, posters, holiday crowds already. Tomorrow the Caliph's birthday parade, after that the Circumcision Ceremony for the two young princes, after that the opening of the Mosque. If, of course, they could free the minaret of its infidel incumbent. Lydgate looked for a taxi, then remembered that all taxis had been loaned (three hundred bucks a day) to the Government. He saw one now, its yellow top sprayed green to match the body, its number-plates covered with stencilled boards — H.H. SULTAN OF LANCHAP. In it a Chinese youth cheerfully catalogued the arithmetic of the town to an old man with a waving turban and a dropped jaw — His Highness. The Chinese youth recognised a former patron and democratically waved to Lyd-gate. Then he spat out of the window and went on. Lydgate had a long walk home. He proposed to break it briefly at the Dunia Hotel.
Flags, banners, pennants, streamers, triumphal arches, holiday crowds, sun, no sign of rain, fire engines pumping up water to the upper floors of the Dunia Hotel. And in the lobby of the Dunia Hotel an agitated crowd of many colours, George Lim interpreting like mad, Forbes of Marmion crying, "And I'll hit the bastard again, just you let me get at him, just you tike your bleeding hands off, let me get up those fliming stairs to the bastard." Eileen his wife weeping, many tongues braying and chittering, hands eloquent, arms — including those of Nando Tasca — holding Forbes of Marmion.
"It was all a mistake, he had no idea of his identity —"
"Now you come a with a me, ave a one drink, you a feel better —"
"Let me get at the sod, the big nasty black bastard —"
"He does not know what he is saying. He has no idea it is so important a man —"
"Ilahumma! Astaghfiru'llah!"
"Keisatsu-sho made dono kurai arimasuka'!"
"He says he wants the police station. We don't want any bloody police in here."
"All I want is bleeding justice. Let me get up there and mike a butcher's shop of the bastard."
"You not a be a bloody fool. That a very big a man. E ave a your ead cut a off."
"Hee-ai-lung-tee-kio ma-tah."
"What's going on?" asked Lydgate. "Who's done what to whom?" A small brown man, neat in a suit from a Karachi tailor, said smiling:
"This Australian gentleman was looking for his wife and some stupid black boy directed him upstairs to the room of one of these important men from the Middle East — his name I know not — and there most unfortunately —" "Yes, yes," said Lydgate, "I see." Then the police came, led by a worn Bishopspawn chewing his underlip through to the gum.
"I'm not going to be bleeding arrested. I've done nothing wrong. It was that bastard upstairs—"
"All right, all right, just a few questions, that's all."
"Tike your hands off me, I tell you."
And, in a corner, stood Eileen weeping, poor little kiddy, in her right hand a bundle of strange green banknotes covered with squiggles, an unrecognisable numeral of denomination above the portrait of a fat brown cunning man with a moustache. All flesh the same, and all money.
Previous chapter | Next chapter