The Hairless Mexican

♦

‘Do you like macaroni?’ said R.

‘What do you mean by macaroni?’ answered Ashenden. ‘It is like asking me if

I like poetry. I like Keats and Wordsworth and Verlaine and Goethe. When you

say macaroni, do you mean spaghetti, tagliatelli, vermicelli, fettuccini, tufali,

farfalli, or just macaroni?’

‘Macaroni,’ replied R., a man of few words.

‘I like all simple things, boiled eggs, oysters and caviare, truite au bleu, grilled

salmon, roast lamb (the saddle by preference), cold grouse, treacle tart, and rice

pudding. But of all simple things the only one I can eat day in and day out, not

only without disgust but with the eagerness of an appetite unimpaired by

excess, is macaroni.’

‘I am glad of that because I want you to go down to Italy.’

Ashenden had come from Geneva to meet R. at Lyons and having got there

before him had spent the afternoon wandering about the dull, busy and

prosaic streets of that thriving city. They were sitting now in a restaurant on the

place to which Ashenden had taken R. on his arrival because it was reputed to

give you the best food in that part of France. But since in so crowded a resort

(for the Lyonese like a good dinner) you never knew what inquisitive ears were

pricked up to catch any useful piece of information that might fall from your

lips, they had contented themselves with talking of indifferent things. They had

reached the end of an admirable repast.

‘Have another glass of brandy?’ said R.

‘No, thank you,’ answered Ashenden, who was of an abstemious turn.

‘One should do what one can to mitigate the rigours of war,’ remarked R. as

he took the bottle and poured out a glass for himself and another for

Ashenden.

Ashenden, thinking it would be affectation to protest, let the gesture pass, but

felt bound to remonstrate with his chief on the unseemly manner in which he

held the bottle.

‘In my youth I was always taught that you should take a woman by the waist

and a bottle by the neck,’ he murmured.

‘I am glad you told me. I shall continue to hold a bottle by the waist and give

women a wide berth.’

Ashenden did not know what to reply to this and so remained silent.

He sipped his brandy and R. called for his bill. It was true that he was an

important person, with power to make or mar quite a large number of his

fellows, and his opinions were listened to by those who held in their hands the

fate of empires; but he could never face the business of tipping a waiter without

an embarrassment that was obvious in his demeanour. He was tortured by the

fear of making a fool of himself by giving too much or of exciting the waiter’s

icy scorn by giving too little. When the bill came he passed some hundred–

franc notes over to Ashenden and said:

‘Pay him, will you? I can never understand French figures.’

The groom brought them their hats and coats.

‘Would you like to go back to the hotel?’ asked Ashenden.

‘We might as well.’

It was early in the year, but the weather had suddenly turned warm, and they

walked with their coats over their arms. Ashenden knowing that R. liked a

sitting–room had engaged one for him, and to this, when they reached the

hotel, they went. The hotel was old–fashioned and the sitting–room was vast. It

was furnished with a heavy mahogany suite upholstered in green velvet and

the chairs were set primly round a large table. On the walls, covered with a

dingy paper, were large steel engravings of the battles of Napoleon, and from

the ceiling hung an enormous chandelier once used for gas, but now fitted with

electric bulbs. It flooded the cheerless room with a cold, hard light.

‘This is very nice,’ said R., as they went in.

‘Not exactly cosy,’ suggested Ashenden.

‘No, but it looks as though it were the best room in the place. It all looks very

good to me.’

He drew one of the green velvet chairs away from the table and, sitting down,

lit a cigar. He loosened his belt and unbuttoned his tunic.

‘I always thought I liked a cheroot better than anything,’ he said, ‘but since the

war I’ve taken quite a fancy to Havanas. Oh well, I suppose it can’t last for ever.’

The corners of his mouth flickered with the beginning of a smile. ‘It’s an ill

wind that blows nobody any good.’

Ashenden took two chairs, one to sit on and one for his feet, and when R. saw

him he said: ‘That’s not a bad idea,’ and swinging another chair out from the

table with a sigh of relief put his boots on it.

‘What room is that next door?’ he asked.

‘That’s your bedroom.’

‘And on the other side?’

‘A banqueting hall.’

R. got up and strolled slowly about the room and when he passed the

windows, as though in idle curiosity, peeped through the heavy rep curtains

that covered them, and then returning to his chair once more comfortably put

his feet up.

‘It’s just as well not to take any more risk than one need,’ he said.

He looked at Ashenden reflectively. There was a slight smile on his thin lips,

but the pale eyes, too closely set together, remained cold and steely. R.’s stare

would have been embarrassing if Ashenden had not been used to it. He knew

that R. was considering how he would broach the subject that he had in mind.

The silence must have lasted for two or three minutes.

‘I’m expecting a fellow to come and see me tonight,’ he said at last. ‘His train

gets in about ten.’ He gave his wrist–watch a glance. ‘He’s known as the Hairless

Mexican.’

‘Why?’

‘Because he’s hairless and because he’s a Mexican.’

‘The explanation seems perfectly satisfactory,’ said Ashenden.

‘He’ll tell you all about himself. He talks nineteen to the dozen. He was on his

uppers when I came across him. It appears that he was mixed up in some

revolution in Mexico and had to get out with nothing but the clothes he stood

up in. They were rather the worse for wear when I found him. If you want to

please him you call him General. He claims to have been a general in Huerta’s

army, at least I think it was Huerta; anyhow he says that if things had gone

right he would be Minister of War now and no end of a big bug. I’ve found him

very useful. Not a bad chap. The only thing I really have against him is that he

will use scent.’

‘And where do I come in?’ asked Ashenden.

‘He’s going down to Italy. I’ve got rather a ticklish job for him to do and I want

you to stand by. I’m not keen on trusting him with a lot of money. He’s a

gambler and he’s a bit too fond of the girls. I suppose you came from Geneva

on your Ashenden passport?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’ve got another for you, a diplomatic one, by the way, in the name of

Somerville with visas for France and Italy. I think you and he had better travel

together. He’s an amusing cove when he gets going, and I think you ought to

know one another.’

‘What is the job?’

‘I haven’t yet quite made up my mind how much it’s desirable for you to

know about it.’

Ashenden did not reply. They eyed one another in a detached manner, as

though they were strangers who sat together in a railway carriage and each

wondered who and what the other was.

‘In your place I’d leave the General to do most of the talking. I wouldn’t tell

him more about yourself than you find absolutely necessary. He won’t ask you

any questions, I can promise you that, I think he’s by way of being a gentleman

after his own fashion.’

‘By the way, what is his real name?’

‘I always call him Manuel. I don’t know that he likes it very much, his name is

Manuel Carmona.’

‘I gather by what you have not said that he’s an unmitigated scoundrel.’

R. smiled with his pale blue eyes.

‘I don’t know that I’d go quite as far as that. He hasn’t had the advantages of a

public–school education. His ideas of playing the game are not quite the same

as yours or mine. I don’t know that I’d leave a gold cigarette–case about when

he was in the neighbourhood, but if he lost money to you at poker and had

pinched your cigarette–case he would immediately pawn it to pay you.

If he had half a chance he’d seduce your wife, but if you were up against it he’d

share his last crust with you. The tears will run down his face when he hears

Gounod’s Ave Maria on the gramophone, but if you insult his dignity he’ll

shoot you like a dog. It appears that in Mexico it’s an insult to get between a

man and his drink and he told me himself that once when a Dutchman who

didn’t know passed between him and the bar he whipped out his revolver and

shot him dead.’

‘Did nothing happen to him?’

‘No, it appears that he belongs to one of the best families. The matter was

hushed up and it was announced in the papers that the Dutchman had

committed suicide. He did practically. I don’t believe the Hairless Mexican has a

great respect for human life.’

Ashenden, who had been looking intently at R., started a little and he

watched more carefully than ever his chiefs tired, lined, and yellow face. He

knew that he did not make this remark for nothing.

‘Of course a lot of nonsense is talked about the value of human life. You

might just as well say that the counters you use at poker have an intrinsic value.

Their value is what you like to make it; for a general giving battle, men are

merely counters and he’s a fool if he allows himself for sentimental reasons to

look upon them as human beings.’

‘But, you see, they’re counters that feel and think and if they believe they’re

being squandered they are quite capable of refusing to be used any more.’

‘Anyhow, that’s neither here nor there. We’ve had information that a man

called Constantine Andreadi is on his way from Constantinople with certain

documents that we want to get hold of. He’s a Greek. He’s an agent of Enver

Pasha and Enver has great confidence in him. He’s given him verbal messages

that are too secret and too important to be put on paper. He’s sailing from the

Piraeus, on a boat called the Ithaca, and will land at Brindisi on his way to

Rome. He’s to deliver his dispatches at the German Embassy and impart what

he has to say personally to the ambassador.’

‘I see.’

At this time Italy was still neutral; the Central Powers were straining every

nerve to keep her so; the Allies were doing what they could to induce her to

declare war on their side.

‘We don’t want to get into trouble with the Italian authorities, it might be

fatal, but we’ve got to prevent Andreadi from getting to Rome.’

‘At any cost?’ asked Ashenden.

‘Money’s no object,’ answered R., his lips twisting into a sardonic smile.

‘What do you propose to do?’

‘I don’t think you need bother your head about that.’

‘I have a fertile imagination,’ said Ashenden.

‘I want you to go down to Naples with the Hairless Mexican. He’s very keen

on getting back to Cuba. It appears that his friends are organizing a show and

he wants to be as near at hand as possible so that he can hop over to Mexico

when things are ripe. He needs cash. I’ve brought money down with me, in

American dollars, and I shall give it to you tonight. You’d better carry it on your

person.’

‘Is it much?’

‘It’s a good deal, but I thought it would be easier for you if it wasn’t bulky, so

I’ve got it in thousand–dollar notes. You will give the Hairless Mexican the

notes in return for the documents that Andreadi is bringing.’

A question sprang to Ashenden’s lips, but he did not ask it. He asked another

instead.

‘Does this fellow understand what he has to do?’

‘Perfectly.’

There was a knock at the door. It opened and the Hairless Mexican stood

before them.

‘I have arrived. Good evening, Colonel. I am enchanted to see you.’

R. got up.

‘Had a nice journey, Manuel? This is Mr Somerville, who’s going to Naples

with you, General Carmona.’

‘Pleased to meet you, sir.’

He shook Ashenden’s hand with such force that he winced.

‘Your hands are like iron, General,’ he murmured. The Mexican gave them a

glance.

‘I had them manicured this morning. I do not think they were very well done.

I like my nails much more highly polished.’

They were cut to a point, stained bright red, and to Ashenden’s mind shone

like mirrors. Though it was not cold the General wore a fur coat with an

astrakhan collar and with his every movement a wave of perfume was wafted

to your nose.

‘Take off your coat, General, and have a cigar,’ said R.

The Hairless Mexican was a tall man, and though thinnish gave you the

impression of being very powerful; he was smartly dressed in a blue serge suit,

with a silk handkerchief neatly tucked in the breast pocket of his coat, and he

wore a gold bracelet on his wrist. His features were good, but a little larger than

life–size, and his eyes were brown and lustrous. He was quite hairless. His

yellow skin had the smoothness of a woman’s and he had no eyebrows nor

eyelashes; he wore a pale brown wig, rather long, and the locks were arranged

in artistic disorder. This and the unwrinkled sallow face, combined with his

dandified dress, gave him an appearance that was at first glance a trifle

horrifying. He was repulsive and ridiculous, but you could not take your eyes

from him. There was a sinister fascination in his strangeness.

He sat down and hitched up his trousers so that they should not bag at the

knee.

‘Well, Manuel, have you been breaking any hearts today?’ said R. with his

sardonic joviality.

The General turned to Ashenden.

‘Our good friend, the Colonel, envies me my successes with the fair sex. I tell

him he can have just as many as I if he will only listen to me. Confidence, that is

all you need. If you never fear a rebuff you will never have one.’

‘Nonsense, Manuel, one has to have your way with the girls. There’s

something about you that they can’t resist.’

The Hairless Mexican laughed with a self–satisfaction that he did not try to

disguise. He spoke English very well, with a Spanish accent, but with an

American intonation.

‘But since you ask me, Colonel, I don’t mind telling you that I got into

conversation on the train with a little woman who was coming to Lyons to see

her mother–in–law. She was not very young and she was thinner than I like a

woman to be, but she was possible, and she helped me to pass an agreeable

hour,’

‘Well, let’s get to business,’ said R.

‘I am at your service, Colonel.’ He gave Ashenden a glance. ‘Is Mr Somerville a

military man?’

‘No,’ said R., ‘he’s an author.’

‘It takes all sorts to make a world, as you say. I am happy to make your

acquaintance, Mr Somerville. I can tell you many stories that will interest you; I

am sure that we shall get on well together. You have a sympathetic air. I am very

sensitive to that. To tell you the truth I am nothing but a bundle of nerves and if

I am with a person who is antipathetic to me I go all to pieces.’

‘I hope we shall have a pleasant journey,’ said Ashenden.

‘When does our friend arrive at Brindisi?’ asked the Mexican, turning to R.

‘He sails from the Piraeus in the Ithaca on the fourteenth. It’s probably some

old tub, but you’d better get down to Brindisi in good time.’

‘I agree with you.’

R. got up and with his hands in his pockets sat on the edge of the table. In his

rather shabby uniform, his tunic unbuttoned, he looked a slovenly creature

beside the neat and well–dressed Mexican.

‘Mr Somerville knows practically nothing of the errand on which you are

going and I do not desire to tell him anything. I think you had much better

keep your own counsel. He is instructed to give you the funds you need for

your work, but your actions are your own affair. If you need his advice of

course you can ask for it.’

‘I seldom ask other people’s advice and never take it.’

‘And should you make a mess of things I trust you to keep Mr Somerville out

of it. He must on no account be compromised.’

‘I am a man of honour, Colonel,’ answered the Hairless Mexican with dignity,

‘and I would sooner let myself be cut in a thousand pieces than betray my

friends.’

‘That is what I have already told Mr Somerville. On the other hand, if

everything pans out O.K. Mr Somerville is instructed to give you the sum we

agreed on in return for the papers I spoke to you about. In what manner you

get them is no business of his.’

‘That goes without saying. There is only one thing I wish to make quite plain;

Mr Somerville understands of course that I have not accepted the mission with

which you have entrusted me on account of the money?’

‘Quite,’ replied R. gravely, looking him straight in the eyes.

‘I am with the Allies body and soul, I cannot forgive the Germans for

outraging the neutrality of Belgium, and if I accept the money that you have

offered me it is because I am first and foremost a patriot. I can trust Mr

Somerville implicitly, I suppose?’

R. nodded. The Mexican turned to Ashenden.

‘An expedition is being arranged to free my unhappy country from the

tyrants that exploit and ruin it and every penny that I receive will go on guns

and cartridges. For myself I have no need of money; I am a soldier and I can live

on a crust and a few olives. There are only three occupations that befit a

gentleman, war, cards, and women; it costs nothing to sling a rifle over your

shoulder and take to the mountains–and that is real warfare, not this

manoeuvring of battalions and firing of great guns–women love me for myself,

and I generally win at cards.’

Ashenden found the flamboyance of this strange creature, with his scented

handkerchief and his gold bracelet, very much to his taste. This was far from

being just the man in the street (whose tyranny we rail at but in the end submit

to) and to the amateur of the baroque in human nature he was a rarity to be

considered with delight. He was a purple patch on two legs. Notwithstanding

his wig and his hairless big face, he had undoubtedly an air; he was absurd, but

he did not give you the impression that he was a man to be trifled with. His

self–complacency was magnificent.

‘Where is your kit, Manuel?’ asked R.

It was possible that a frown for an instant darkened the Mexican’s brow at the

abrupt question that seemed a little contemptuously to brush to one side his

eloquent statement, but he gave no other sign of displeasure. Ashenden

suspected that he thought the Colonel a barbarian insensitive to the finer

emotions.

‘I left it at the station.’

‘Mr Somerville has a diplomatic passport so that he can get it through with

his own things at the frontier without examination if you like.’

‘I have very little, a few suits and some linen, but perhaps it would be as well if

Mr Somerville would take charge of it. I bought half a dozen suits of silk

pyjamas before I left Paris.’

‘And what about you?’ asked R., turning to Ashenden.

‘I’ve only got one bag. It’s in my room.’

‘You’d better have it taken to the station while there’s someone about. Your

train goes at one ten.’

‘Oh?’

This was the first Ashenden had heard that they were to start that night.

‘I think you’d better get down to Naples as soon as possible.’

‘Very well.’

R. got up.

‘I’m going to bed. I don’t know what you fellows want to do.’

‘I shall take a walk about Lyons,’ said the Hairless Mexican. ‘I am interested in

life. Lend me a hundred francs, Colonel, will you? I have no change on me.’

R. took out his pocket–book and gave the General the note he asked for. Then

to Ashenden:

‘What are you going to do? Wait here?’

‘No,’ said Ashenden, ‘I shall go to the station and read.’

‘You’d both of you better have a whisky and soda before you go, hadn’t you?

What about it, Manuel?’

‘It is very kind of you, but I never drink anything but champagne and brandy.’

‘Mixed?’ asked R. dryly.

‘Not necessarily,’ returned the other with gravity.

R. ordered brandy and soda and when it came, whereas he and Ashenden

helped themselves to both, the Hairless Mexican poured himself out three

parts of a tumbler of neat brandy and swallowed it in two noisy gulps. He rose

to his feet and put on his coat with the astrakhan collar, seized in one hand his

bold black hat and, with the gesture of a romantic actor giving up the girl he

loves to one more worthy of her, held out the other to R.

‘Well, Colonel, I will bid you good night and pleasant dreams. I do not expect

that we shall meet again so soon.’

‘Don’t make a hash of things, Manuel, and if you do, keep your mouth shut.’

‘They tell me that in one of your colleges where the sons of gentlemen are

trained to become naval officers it is written in letters of gold: There is no such

word as impossible in the British Navy. I do not know the meaning of the word

failure.’

‘It has a good many synonyms,’ retorted R.

‘I will meet you at the station, Mr Somerville,’ said the Hairless Mexican, and

with a flourish left them.

R. looked at Ashenden with that little smile of his that always made his face

look so dangerously shrewd.

‘Well, what d’you think of him?’

‘You’ve got me beat,’ said Ashenden. ‘Is he a mountebank? He seems as vain

as a peacock. And with that frightful appearance can he really be the lady’s man

he pretends? What makes you think you can trust him?’

R. gave a low chuckle and he washed his thin, old hands with imaginary soap.

‘I thought you’d like him. He’s quite a character, isn’t he? I think we can trust

him.’ R.’s eyes suddenly grew opaque. ‘I don’t believe it would pay him to

double–cross us.’ He paused for a moment. ‘Anyhow we’ve got to risk it. I’ll give

you the tickets and the money and then you can take yourself off; I’m all in and

I want to go to bed.’

Ten minutes later Ashenden set out for the station with his bag on a porter’s

shoulder.

Having nearly two hours to wait he made himself comfortable in the

waiting–room. The light was good and he read a novel. When the time drew

near for the arrival of the train from Paris that was to take them direct to Rome,

and the Hairless Mexican did not appear, Ashenden, beginning to grow a trifle

anxious, went out on the platform to look for him. Ashenden suffered from

that distressing malady known as train fever: an hour before his train was due

he began to have apprehensions lest he should miss it; he was impatient with

the porters who would never bring his luggage down from his room in time

and he could not understand why the hotel bus cut it so fine; a block in the

street would drive him to frenzy and the languid movements of the station

porters infuriate him. The whole world seemed in a horrid plot to delay him;

people got in his way as he passed through the barriers; others, a long string of

them, were at the ticket–office getting tickets for other trains than his and they

counted their change with exasperating care; his luggage took an interminable

time to register; and then if he was travelling with friends they would go to buy

newspapers, or would take a walk along the platform, and he was certain they

would be left behind, they would stop to talk to a casual stranger or suddenly

be seized with a desire to telephone and disappear at a run. In fact the universe

conspired to make him miss every train he wanted to take and he was not

happy unless he was settled in his corner, his things on the rack above him,

with a good half–hour to spare. Sometimes by arriving at the station too soon

he had caught an earlier train than the one he had meant to, but that was

nerve–racking and caused him all the anguish of very nearly missing it.

The Rome express was signalled and there was no sign of the Hairless

Mexican; it came in and he was not to be seen. Ashenden became more and

more harassed. He walked quickly up and down the platform, looked in all the

waiting–rooms, went to the consigne where the luggage was left; he could not

find him. There were no sleeping–cars, but a number of people got out and he

took two seats in a first–class carriage. He stood by the door, looking up and

down the platform and up at the clock; it was useless to go if his travelling

companion did not turn up, and Ashenden made up his mind to take his

things out of the carriage as the porter cried en voiture; but, by George! he

would give the brute hell when he found him. There were three minutes more,

then two minutes, then one; at that late hour there were few persons about

and all who were travelling had taken their seats. Then he saw the Hairless

Mexican, followed by two porters with his luggage and accompanied by a man

in a bowler–hat, walk leisurely on to the platform. He caught sight of Ashenden

and waved to him.

‘Ah, my dear fellow, there you are, I wondered what had become of you.’

‘Good God, man, hurry up or we shall miss the train.’

‘I never miss a train. Have you got good seats? The chef de gare has gone for

the night; this is his assistant.’

The man in the bowler–hat took it off when Ashenden nodded to him.

‘But this is an ordinary carriage. I am afraid I could not travel in that.’ He

turned to the stationmaster’s assistant with an affable smile. ‘You must do

better for me than that, mon cher.’

‘Certainement, mon général, I will put you into a salon–lit. Of course.’

The assistant stationmaster led them along the train and opened the door of

an empty compartment where there were two beds. The Mexican eyed it with

satisfaction and watched the porters arrange the luggage.

‘That will do very well. I am much obliged to you.’ He held out his hand to the

man in the bowler–hat. ‘I shall not forget you and next time I see the Minister

I will tell him with what civility you have treated me.’

‘You are too good, General. I shall be very grateful.’

A whistle was blown and the train started.

‘This is better than an ordinary first–class carriage, I think, Mr Somerville,’

said the Mexican. ‘A good traveller should learn how to make the best of

things.’

But Ashenden was still extremely cross.

‘I don’t know why the devil you wanted to cut it so fine. We should have

looked a pair of damned fools if we’d missed the train.’

‘My dear fellow, there was never the smallest chance of that. When I arrived

I told the stationmaster that I was General Carmona, Commander–in–Chief of

the Mexican Army, and that I had to stop off in Lyons for a few hours to hold a

conference with the British Field–Marshal. I asked him to hold the train for me

if I was delayed and suggested that my government might see its way to

conferring an order on him. I have been to Lyons before, I like the girls here;

they have not the chic of the Parisians, but they have something, there is no

denying that they have something. Will you have a mouthful of brandy before

you go to sleep?’

‘No, thank you,’ said Ashenden morosely.

‘I always drink a glass before going to bed, it settles the nerves.’

He looked in his suit–case and without difficulty found a bottle. He put it to

his lips and had a long drink, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and lit

a cigarette. Then he took off his boots and lay down. Ashenden dimmed the

light.

‘I have never yet made up my mind,’ said the Hairless Mexican reflectively,

‘whether it is pleasanter to go to sleep with the kisses of a beautiful woman on

your mouth or with a cigarette between your lips. Have you ever been to

Mexico? I will tell you about Mexico tomorrow. Good night.’

Soon Ashenden heard from his steady breathing that he was asleep and in a

little while himself dozed off. Presently he woke. The Mexican, deep in

slumber, lay motionless; he had taken off his fur coat and was using it as a

blanket; he still wore his wig. Suddenly there was a jolt and the train with a

noisy grinding of brakes stopped; in the twinkling of an eye, before Ashenden

could realize that anything had happened, the Mexican was on his feet with his

hand to his hip.

‘What is it?’ he cried.

‘Nothing. Probably only a signal against us.’

The Mexican sat down heavily on his bed. Ashenden turned on the light. ‘You

wake quickly for such a sound sleeper,’ he said.

‘You have to in my profession.’

Ashenden would have liked to ask him whether this was murder, conspiracy,

or commanding armies, but was not sure that it would be discreet. The General

opened his bag and took out the bottle.

‘Will you have a nip?’ he asked. ‘There is nothing like it when you wake

suddenly in the night.’

When Ashenden refused he put the bottle once more to his lips and poured a

considerable quantity of liquor down his throat. He sighed and lit a cigarette.

Although Ashenden had seen him now drink nearly a bottle of brandy, and it

was probable that he had had a good deal more when he was going about the

town, he was certainly quite sober. Neither in his manner nor in his speech was

there any indication that he had drunk during the evening anything but

lemonade.

The train started and Ashenden again fell asleep. When he awoke it was

morning and turning round lazily he saw that the Mexican was awake too. He

was smoking a cigarette. The floor by his side was strewn with burnt–out butts

and the air was thick and grey. He had begged Ashenden not to insist on

opening a window, for he said the night air was dangerous.

‘I did not get up, because I was afraid of waking you. Will you do your toilet

first or shall I?’

‘I’m in no hurry,’ said Ashenden.

‘I am an old campaigner, it will not take me long. Do you wash your teeth

every day?’

‘Yes,’ said Ashenden.

‘So do I. It is a habit I learned in New York. I always think that a fine set of

teeth are an adornment to a man.’

There was a wash–basin in the compartment and the General scrubbed his

teeth, with gurglings and garglings, energetically. Then he got a bottle of

eau–de–Cologne from his bag, poured some of it on a towel and rubbed it over

his face and hands. He took a comb and carefully arranged his wig; either it had

not moved in the night or else he had set it straight before Ashenden awoke.

He got another bottle out of his bag, with a spray attached to it, and squeezing a

bulb covered his shirt and coat with a fine cloud of scent, did the same to his

handkerchief, and then with a beaming face, like a man who has done his duty

by the world and is well pleased, turned to Ashenden and said:

‘Now I am ready to brave the day. I will leave my things for you, you need not

be afraid of the eau–de–Cologne, it is the best you can get in Paris.’

‘Thank you very much,’ said Ashenden. ‘All I want is soap and water.’

‘Water? I never use water except when I have a bath. Nothing can be worse for

the skin.’

When they approached the frontier, Ashenden, remembering the General’s

instinctive gesture when he was suddenly awakened in the night, said to him:

‘If you’ve got a revolver on you I think you’d better give it to me. With my

diplomatic passport they’re not likely to search me, but they might take it into

their heads to go through you and we don’t want to have any bothers.’

‘It is hardly a weapon, it is only a toy,’ returned the Mexican, taking out of his

hip–pocket a fully loaded revolver of formidable dimensions. ‘I do not like

parting with it even for an hour, it gives me the feeling that I am not fully

dressed. But you are quite right, we do not want to take any risks; I will give

you my knife as well. I would always rather use a knife than a revolver; I think

it is a more elegant weapon.’

‘I dare say it is only a matter of habit,’ answered Ashenden. ‘Perhaps you are

more at home with a knife.’

‘Anyone can pull a trigger, but it needs a man to use a knife.’

To Ashenden it looked as though it were in a single movement that he tore

open his waistcoat and from his belt snatched and opened a long knife of

murderous aspect. He handed it to Ashenden with a pleased smile on his large,

ugly, and naked face.

‘There’s a pretty piece of work for you, Mr Somerville. I’ve never seen a better

bit of steel in my life, it takes an edge like a razor and it’s strong; you can cut a

cigarette–paper with it and you can hew down an oak. There is nothing to get

out of order and when it is closed it might be the knife a schoolboy uses to cut

notches in his desk.’

He shut it with a click and Ashenden put it along with the revolver in his

pocket.

‘Have you anything else?’

‘My hands,’ replied the Mexican with arrogance, ‘but those I dare say the

Custom officials will not make trouble about.’

Ashenden remembered the iron grip he had given him when they shook

hands and slightly shuddered. They were large and long and smooth; there was

not a hair on them or on the wrists, and with the pointed, rosy, manicured nails

there was really something sinister about them.

Ashenden and General Carmona went through the formalities at the frontier

independently and when they returned to their carriage Ashenden handed

back to his companion the revolver and the knife. He sighed.

‘Now I feel more comfortable. What do you say to a game of cards?’

‘I should like it,’ said Ashenden.

The Hairless Mexican opened his bag again and from a corner extracted a

greasy pack of French cards. He asked Ashenden whether he played écarté and

when Ashenden told him that he did not suggested piquet. This was a game

that Ashenden was not unfamiliar with, so they settled the stakes and began.

Since both were in favour of quick action, they played the game of four hands,

doubling the first and last. Ashenden had good enough cards, but the General

seemed notwithstanding always to have better. Ashenden kept his eyes open

and he was not careless of the possibility that his antagonist might correct the

inequalities of chance, but he saw nothing to suggest that everything was not

above board. He lost game after game. He was capoted and rubiconed. The

score against him mounted up and up till he had lost something like a

thousand francs, which at that time was a tidy sum. The General smoked

innumerable cigarettes. He made them himself with a twist of the finger, a lick

of his tongue and incredible celerity. At last he flung himself against the back of

his seat.

‘By the way, my friend, does the British Government pay your card losses

when you are on a mission?’ he asked.

‘It certainly doesn’t.’

‘Well, I think you have lost enough. If it went down on your expense account

I would have proposed playing till we reached Rome, but you are sympathetic

to me. If it is your own money I do not want to win any more of it.’

He picked up the cards and put them aside. Ashenden somewhat ruefully

took out a number of notes and handed them to the Mexican. He counted

them and with his usual neatness put them carefully folded into his

pocket–book. Then, leaning forward, he patted Ashenden almost affectionately

on the knee.

‘I like you, you are modest and unassuming, you have not the arrogance of

your countrymen, and I am sure that you will take my advice in the spirit in

which it is meant. Do not play piquet with people you don’t know.’

Ashenden was somewhat mortified and perhaps his face showed it, for the

Mexican seized his hand.

‘My dear fellow, I have not hurt your feelings? I would not do that for the

world. You do not play piquet worse than most piquet players. It is not that. If

we were going to be together longer I would teach you how to win at cards.

One plays cards to win money and there is no sense in losing.’

‘I thought it was only in love and war that all things were fair,’ said Ashenden,

with a chuckle.

‘Ah, I am glad to see you smile. That is the way to take a loss. I see that you

have good humour and good sense. You will go far in life. When I get back to

Mexico and am in possession of my estates again you must come and stay with

me. I will treat you like a king. You shall ride my best horses, we will go to

bullfights together, and if there are girls you fancy you have only to say the

word and you shall have them.’

He began telling Ashenden of the vast territories, the haciendas and the mines

in Mexico, of which he had been dispossessed. He told him of the feudal state

in which he lived. It did not matter whether what he said was true or not, for

those sonorous phrases of his were fruity with the rich–distilled perfumes of

romance. He described a spacious life that seemed to belong to another age and

his eloquent gestures brought before the mind’s eye tawny distances and vast

green plantations, great herds of cattle and in the moonlit night the song of the

blind singers that melted in the air and the twanging of guitars.

‘Everything I lost, everything. In Paris I was driven to earn a pittance by giving

Spanish lessons or showing Americans–Americanos del Norte, I mean–the

night life of the city. I who have flung away a thousand duros on a dinner have

been forced to beg my bread like a blind Indian. I who have taken pleasure in

clasping a diamond bracelet round the wrist of a beautiful woman have been

forced to accept a suit of clothes from a hag old enough to be my mother.

Patience. Man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upward, but misfortune

cannot last for ever. The time is ripe and soon we shall strike our blow.’

He took up the greasy pack of cards and set them out in a number of little

piles.

‘Let us see what the cards say. They never lie. Ah, if I had only had greater

faith in them I should have avoided the only action of my life that has weighed

heavily on me. My conscience is at ease. I did what any man would do under

the circumstances, but I regret that necessity forced upon me an action that I

would willingly have avoided.’

He looked through the cards, set some of them on one side on a system

Ashenden did not understand, shuffled the remainder and once more put

them in little piles.

‘The cards warned me, I will never deny that, their warning was clear and

definite. Love and a dark woman, danger, betrayal and death. It was as plain as

the nose on your face. Any fool would have known what it meant and I have

been using the cards all my life. There is hardly an action that I make without

consulting them. There are no excuses. I was besotted. Ah, you of the Northern

races do not know what love means, you do not know how it can prevent you

from sleeping, how it can take your appetite for food away so that you dwindle

as if from a fever, you do not understand what a frenzy it is so that you

are like a mad–man and you will stick at nothing to satisfy your desire.

A man like me is capable of every folly and every crime when he is in love, si,

Señor, and of heroism. He can scale mountains higher than Everest and swim

seas broader than the Atlantic. He is god, he is devil. Women have been my

ruin.’

Once more the Hairless Mexican glanced at the cards, took some out of the

little piles and left others in. He shuffled them again.

‘I have been loved by multitudes of women. I do not say it in vanity. I offer no

explanation. It is mere matter of fact. Go to Mexico City and ask them what

they know of Manuel Carmona and of his triumphs. Ask them how many

women have resisted Manuel Carmona.’

Ashenden, frowning a little, watched him reflectively. He wondered whether

R., that shrewd fellow who chose his instruments with such a sure instinct, had

not this time made a mistake, and he was uneasy. Did the Hairless Mexican

really believe that he was irresistible or was he merely a blatant liar? In the

course of his manipulations he had thrown out all the cards in the pack but

four, and these now lay in front of him face downwards and side by side. He

touched them one by one but did not turn them up.

‘There is fate,’ he said, ‘and no power on earth can change it. I hesitate. This is

a moment that ever fills me with apprehension and I have to steel myself to

turn over the cards that may tell me that disaster awaits me. I am a brave man,

but sometimes I have reached this stage and not had the courage to look at the

four vital cards.’

Indeed now he eyed the backs of them with an anxiety he did not try to hide.

‘What was I saying to you?’

‘You were telling me that women found your fascinations irresistible,’ replied

Ashenden dryly.

‘Once all the same I found a woman who resisted me. I saw her first in a

house, a casa de mujeres in Mexico City, she was going down the stairs as I went

up; she was not very beautiful, I had had a hundred more beautiful, but she had

something that took my fancy and I told the old woman who kept the house to

send her to me. You will know her when you go to Mexico City; they call her La

Marqueza. She said that the girl was not an inmate, but came there only from

time to time and had left. I told her to have her there next evening and not to

let her go till I came. But I was delayed and when I arrived La Marqueza told

me that the girl had said she was not used to being kept waiting and had gone.

I am a good–natured fellow and I do not mind if women are capricious and

teasing, that is part of their charm, so with a laugh I sent her a note of a

hundred duros and promised that on the following day I would be punctual.

But when I went, on the minute, La Marqueza handed me back my hundred

duros and told me the girl did not fancy me. I laughed at her impertinence.

I took off the diamond ring I was wearing and told the old woman to give her

that and see whether it would induce her to change her mind. In the morning

La Marqueza brought me in return for my ring–a red carnation. I did not know

whether to be amused or angry. I am not used to being thwarted in my

passions, I never hesitate to spend money (what is it for but to squander on

pretty women?), and I told La Marqueza to go to the girl and say that I would

give her a thousand duros to dine with me that night. Presently she came back

with the answer that the girl would come on the condition that I allowed her to

go home immediately after dinner. I accepted with a shrug of the shoulders. I

did not think she was serious. I thought that she was saying that only to make

herself more desired. She came to dinner at my house. Did I say she was not

beautiful? She was the most beautiful, the most exquisite creature I had ever

met. I was intoxicated. She had charm and she had wit. She had all the gracia of

the Andalusian. In one word she was adorable. I asked her why she had treated

me so casually and she laughed in my face. I laid myself out to be agreeable. I

exercised all my skill. I surpassed myself. But when we finished dinner she rose

from her seat and bade me good night. I asked her where she was going. She

said I had promised to let her go and she trusted me as a man of honour to

keep my word. I expostulated, I reasoned, I raved, I stormed. She held me to my

word. All I could induce her to do was to consent to dine with me the following

night on the same terms.

‘You will think I was a fool, I was the happiest man alive; for seven days I paid

her a thousand silver duros to dine with me. Every evening I waited for her with

my heart in my mouth, as nervous as a novillero at his first bull–fight, and every

evening she played with me, laughed at me, coquetted with me and drove me

frantic. I was madly in love with her. I have never loved anyone so much before

or since. I could think of nothing else. I was distracted. I neglected everything.

I am a patriot and I love my country. A small band of us had got together and

made up our minds that we could no longer put up with the misrule from

which we were suffering. All the lucrative posts were given to other people, we

were being made to pay taxes as though we were tradesmen, and we were

exposed to abominable affronts. We had money and men. Our plans were

made and we were ready to strike. I had an infinity of things to do, meetings to

go to, ammunition to get, orders to give, I was so besotted over this woman that

I could attend to nothing.

‘You would have thought that I should be angry with her for making such a

fool of me, me who had never known what it was not to gratify my smallest

whim; I did not believe that she refused me to inflame my desires, I believed

that she told the plain truth when she said that she would not give herself to

me until she loved me. She said it was for me to make her love me. I thought

her an angel. I was ready to wait. My passion was so consuming that sooner or

later, I felt, it must communicate itself to her; it was like a fire on the prairie

that devours everything around it; and at last–at last she said she loved me. My

emotion was so terrific that I thought I should fall down and die. Oh, what

rapture! Oh, what madness! I would have given her everything I possessed in

the world, I would have torn down the stars from heaven to deck her hair; I

wanted to do something to prove to her the extravagance of my love, I wanted

to do the impossible, the incredible, I wanted to give her myself, my soul, my

honour, all, all I had and all I was; and that night when she lay in my arms I

told her of our plot and who we were that were concerned in it. I felt her body

stiffen with attention, I was conscious of a flicker of her eyelids, there was

something, I hardly knew what, the hand that stroked my face was dry and

cold; a sudden suspicion seized me and all at once I remembered what the

cards had told me: love and a dark woman, danger, betrayal, and death. Three

times they’d said it and I wouldn’t heed. I made no sign that I had noticed

anything. She nestled up against my heart and told me that she was frightened

to hear such things and asked me if So–and–so was concerned. I answered her.

I wanted to make sure. One after the other, with infinite cunning, between her

kisses she cajoled me into giving every detail of the plot, and now I was certain,

as certain as I am that you sit before me, that she was a spy. She was a spy of the

President’s and she had been set to allure me with her devilish charm and now

she had wormed out of me all our secrets. The lives of all of us were in her

hands and I knew that if she left that room in twenty–four hours we should be

dead men. And I loved her, I loved her; oh, words cannot tell you the agony of

desire that burned my heart; love like that is no pleasure; it is pain, pain, but the

exquisite pain that transcends all pleasure. It is that heavenly anguish that the

saints speak of when they are seized with a divine ecstasy. I knew that she must

not leave the room alive and I feared that if I delayed my courage would fail

me.

‘“I think I shall sleep,” she said.

‘“Sleep, my dove,” I answered.

‘“Alma de mi corazon” she called me. “Soul of my heart.” They were the last

words she spoke. Those heavy lids of hers, dark like a grape and faintly humid,

those heavy lids of hers closed over her eyes and in a little while I knew by the

regular movement of her breast against mine that she slept. You see, I loved

her, I could not bear that she should suffer; she was a spy, yes, but my heart

bade me spare her the terror of knowing what must happen. It is strange, I felt

no anger because she had betrayed me, I should have hated her because of her

vileness; I could not, I only felt that my soul was enveloped in night. Poor thing,

poor thing. I could have cried in pity for her. I drew my arm very gently from

around her, my left arm that was, my right was free, and raised myself on my

hand. But she was so beautiful, I turned my face away when I drew the knife

with all my strength across her lovely throat. Without awaking she passed

from sleep to death.’

He stopped and stared frowning at the four cards that still lay, their backs

upward, waiting to be turned up.

‘It was in the cards. Why did I not take their warning? I will not look at them.

Damn them. Take them away.’

With a violent gesture he swept the whole pack on to the floor.

‘Though I am a free–thinker I had masses said for her soul.’ He leaned back

and rolled himself a cigarette. He inhaled a long breathful of smoke. He

shrugged his shoulders. ‘The Colonel said you were a writer. What do you

write?’

‘Stories,’ replied Ashenden.

‘Detective stories?’

‘No.’

‘Why not? They are the only ones I read. If I were a writer I should write

detective stories.’

‘They are very difficult. You need an incredible amount of invention. I devised

a murder story once, but the murder was so ingenious that I could never find a

way of bringing it home to the murderer, and, after all, one of the conventions

of the detective story is that the mystery should in the end be solved and the

criminal brought to justice.’

‘If your murder is as ingenious as you think the only means you have of

proving the murderer’s guilt is by the discovery of his motives. When once you

have found a motive the chances are that you will hit upon evidence that till

then had escaped you. If there is no motive the most damning evidence will be

inconclusive. Imagine for instance that you went up to a man in a lonely street

on a moonless night and stabbed him to the heart. Who would ever think of

you? But if he was your wife’s lover, or your brother, or had cheated or insulted

you, then a scrap of paper, a bit of string or a chance remark would be enough

to hang you. What were your movements at the time he was killed? Are there

not a dozen people who saw you before and after? But if he was a total stranger

you would never for a moment be suspected. It was inevitable that Jack the

Ripper should escape unless he was caught in the act.’

Ashenden had more than one reason to change the conversation. They were

parting at Rome and he thought it necessary to come to an understanding with

his companion about their respective movements. The Mexican was going to

Brindisi and Ashenden to Naples. He meant to lodge at the Hotel de Belfast,

which was a large second–rate hotel near the harbour frequented by

commercial travellers and the thriftier kind of tripper. It would be as well to let

the General have the number of his room so that he could come up if

necessary without inquiring of the porter, and at the next stopping–place

Ashenden got an envelope from the station–buffet and made him address it in

his own writing to himself at the post–office in Brindisi. All Ashenden had to

do then was to scribble a number on a sheet of paper and post it.

The Hairless Mexican shrugged his shoulders.

‘To my mind all these precautions are rather childish. There is absolutely no

risk. But whatever happens you may be quite sure that I will not compromise

you.’

‘This is not the sort of job which I’m very familiar with,’ said Ashenden. ‘I’m

content to follow the Colonel’s instructions and know no more about it than

it’s essential I should.’

‘Quite so. Should the exigencies of the situation force me to take a drastic step

and I get into trouble I shall of course be treated as a political prisoner. Sooner

or later Italy is bound to come into the war on the side of the Allies and I shall

be released. I have considered everything. But I beg you very seriously to have

no more anxiety about the outcome of our mission than if you were going for a

picnic on the Thames.’

But when at last they separated and Ashenden found himself alone in a

carriage on the way to Naples he heaved a great sigh of relief. He was glad to be

rid of that chattering, hideous, and fantastic creature. He was gone to meet

Constantine Andreadi at Brindisi and if half of what he had told Ashenden was

true, Ashenden could not but congratulate himself that he did not stand in the

Greek spy’s shoes. He wondered what sort of man he was. There was a

grimness in the notion of his coming across the blue Ionian, with his

confidential papers and his dangerous secrets, all unconscious of the noose

into which he was putting his head. Well, that was war, and only fools thought

it could be waged with kid gloves on.

Ashenden arrived in Naples and, having taken a room at the hotel, wrote its

number on a sheet of paper in block letters and posted it to the Hairless

Mexican. He went to the British Consulate, where R. had arranged to send any

instructions he might have for him, and found that they knew about him and

everything was in order. Then he put aside these matters and made up his

mind to amuse himself. Here in the South the spring was well advanced and in

the busy streets the sun was hot. Ashenden knew Naples pretty well. The

Piazza di San Ferdinando, with its bustle, the Piazza del Plebiscito, with its

handsome church, stirred in his heart pleasant recollections. The Strada di

Chiara was as noisy as ever. He stood at corners and looked up the narrow

alleys that climbed the hill precipitously, those alleys of high houses with the

washing set out to dry on lines across the streets like pennants flying to mark a

feast–day: and he sauntered along the shore, looking at the burnished sea with

Capri faintly outlined against the bay, till he came to Posilippo, where there was

an old, rambling, and bedraggled palazzo in which in his youth he had spent

many a romantic hour. He observed the curious little pain with which the

memories of the past wrung his heart–strings. Then he took a fly drawn by a

small and scraggy pony and rattled back over the stones to the Galleria, where

he sat in the cool and drank an americano and looked at the people who

loitered there, talking, for ever talking with vivacious gestures, and, exercising

his fancy sought from their appearance to divine their reality.

For three days Ashenden led the idle life that fitted so well the fantastical,

untidy, and genial city. He did nothing from morning till night but wander at

random, looking, not with the eye of the tourist who seeks for what ought to be

seen, nor with the eye of the writer who looks for his own (seeing in a sunset a

melodious phrase or in a face the inkling of a character), but with that of the

tramp to whom whatever happens is absolute. He went to the museum to look

at the statue of Agrippina the Younger, which he had particular reasons for

remembering with affection, and took the opportunity to see once more the

Titian and the Brueghel in the picture gallery. But he always came back to the

church of Santa Chiara. Its grace, its gaiety, the airy persiflage with which it

seemed to treat religion and at the back of this its sensual emotion; its

extravagance, its elegance of line; to Ashenden it seemed to express, as it were

in one absurd and grandiloquent metaphor, the sunny, dusty, lovely city and its

bustling inhabitants. It said that life was charming and sad; it’s a pity one hadn’t

any money but money wasn’t everything, and anyway why bother when we are

here today and gone tomorrow, and it was all very exciting and amusing, and

after all we must make the best of things: facciamo una piccola combinazione.

But on the fourth morning, when Ashenden, having just stepped out of his

bath, was trying to dry himself on a towel that absorbed no moisture, his door

was quickly opened and a man slipped into his room.

‘What d’you want?’ cried Ashenden.

‘It’s all right. Don’t you know me?’

‘Good Lord, it’s the Mexican. What have you done to yourself?’

He had changed his wig and wore now a black one, close–cropped, that fitted

on his head like a cap. It entirely altered the look of him and though this was

still odd enough, it was quite different from that which he had borne before. He

wore a shabby grey suit.

‘I can only stop a minute. He’s getting shaved.’

Ashenden felt his cheeks suddenly redden.

‘You found him then?’

‘That wasn’t difficult. He was the only Greek passenger on the ship. I went on

board when she got in and asked for a friend who had sailed from the Piraeus.

I said I had come to meet a Mr George Diogenidis. I pretended to be much

puzzled at his not coming, and I got into conversation with Andreadi. He’s

travelling under a false name. He calls himself Lombardos. I followed him

when he landed and do you know the first thing he did? He went into a

barber’s and had his beard shaved. What do you think of that?’

‘Nothing. Anyone might have his beard shaved.’

‘That is not what I think. He wanted to change his appearance. Oh, he’s

cunning. I admire the Germans, they leave nothing to chance, he’s got his

whole story pat, but I’ll tell you that in a minute.’

‘By the way, you’ve changed your appearance too.’

‘Ah, yes, this is a wig I’m wearing; it makes a difference, doesn’t it?’

‘I should never have known you.’

‘One has to take precautions. We are bosom friends. We had to spend the day

in Brindisi and he cannot speak Italian. He was glad to have me help him and

we travelled up together. I have brought him to this hotel. He says he is going

to Rome tomorrow, but I shall not let him out of my sight; I do not want him to

give me the slip. He says that he wants to see Naples and I have offered to show

him everything there is to see.’

‘Why isn’t he going to Rome today?’

‘That is part of the story. He pretends he is a Greek business man who has

made money during the war. He says he was the owner of two coasting

steamers and has just sold them. Now he means to go to Paris and have his

fling. He says he has wanted to go to Paris all his life and at last has the chance.

He is close. I tried to get him to talk. I told him I was a Spaniard and had been

to Brindisi to arrange communications with Turkey about war material. He

listened to me and I saw he was interested, but he told me nothing and of

course I did not think it wise to press him. He has the papers on his person.’

‘How do you know?’

‘He is not anxious about his grip, but he feels every now and then round his

middle. They’re either in a belt or in the lining of his vest.’

‘Why the devil did you bring h

Date: 2016-01-14; view: 816