The Night Manager полностью

"Go out on a limb for old Daniel. Break a fellow's neck one day, save my boy's the next. You robbed Meister, why don't you rob me? Why don't you ask me for money?" He sounded almost deprived. "I'd pay you. I don't care what you've done; you saved my kid. No limit to my bounty where the boy's concerned."

"I didn't do it for money. You've patched me up. Looked after me. Been good to me. I'll just go."

"What languages y'got, anyway?" Roper asked, reaching for a sheet of paper, looking it over and tossing it aside.

"French. German. Spanish."

"Fools, most linguists. Damn all to say in one language, so they learn another and say damn all in that. Arabic?"

"No."

"Why not? You were there long enough."

"Well, just scraps. Elementary stuff."

"Should have got yourself an Arab woman. Perhaps you did. Did you know old Freddie Hamid while you were there, chum of mine? Bit of a wild chap? Must have done. Family owns the pub you worked in. Got some horses."

"He was on the board of management of the hotel."

"Total monk, you are, according to Freddie. Asked him. Model of discreet behaviour. Why did you go there?"

"It was chance. The job was advertised on the notice board at hotel school the day I graduated. I'd always wanted to see the Middle East, so I applied."

"Freddie had a girlfriend. Older woman. Bright. Too good for him, really. Lot of heart. Used to hang around the race course and the yacht club with him. Sophie. Ever meet her?"

"She was killed," Jonathan said.

"That's right. Just before you left. Ever meet her?"

"She had an apartment at the top of the hotel. Everyone knew her. She was Hamid's woman."

"Was she yours?"

The clear, clever eyes did not threaten. They appraised. They offered companionship and understanding.

"Of course not."

"Why of course?"

"It would have been madness. Even if she'd wanted it."

"Why shouldn't she? Hot-blooded Arab, forty if a day, loves a tumble. Personable young chap. God knows, Freddie's no oil painting. Who killed her?"

"It was still being investigated as I left. I never heard whether they arrested anyone. Some intruder, they thought. She surprised him, so he knifed her."

"Wasn't you, anyway?" The clear, clever eyes inviting him to share the joke. The dolphin smile.

"No."

"Sure?"

"There was a rumour Freddie did it."

"Was there, though? Why'd he do a thing like that?"

"Or had it done, anyway. She was said to have betrayed him in some way."

Roper was amused. "Not with you, though?"

"I'm afraid not."

The smile still there. So was Jonathan's.

"Corky can't make you out, you see. Suspicious chap, Corks. Got bad vibes about you. Record's one man, you're another, he says. What else have you been up to? Got any more skeletons in your cupboard? Tricks you've pulled that we don't know about? Police don't? More chaps you've topped?"

"I don't pull tricks. Things happen to me and I react. That's how it's always been."

"Well, Christ, you certainly react. They tell me you had to identify Sophie's corpse, cope with the rozzers. That right?"

"Yes."

"Pretty foul assignment, wasn't it?"

"Someone had to do it."

"Freddie was grateful. Said, if I ever saw you, tell you thanks. Off the record, of course. He was a bit worried he'd have to go himself. Could have been tricky."

Was hate within Jonathan's reach at last? Nothing had altered in Roper's face. The half-smile was neither more nor less. Out of focus, Corkoran tiptoed back into the room and lowered himself onto a sofa. Indefinably, Roper's style altered and he began playing to an audience.

"This boat you came to Canada on," he resumed in his confiding way. "Got a name at all?"

"The Star of Bethel."

"Registered?"

"South Shields."

"How'd you gel the berth? Not easy, is it? Bum a berth on a dirty little boat?"

"I cooked."

Seated in the wings, Corkoran was unable to restrain himself.

"With one hand?" he demanded.

"I wore rubber gloves."

"How'd you get the berth?" Roper repeated.

"I bribed the ship's cook, and the captain took me on as a supernumerary."

"Name?"

"Greville."

"Your agent chap, Billy Bourne. Crewing agent, Newport, Rhode Island," Roper continued. "How did you bump into Bourne?"

"Everyone knows him. Ask any of us."

"Us?"

"Crew. Catering staff."

"Got that fax from Billy there, Corks? Likes him, doesn't he? Full of balm, far as I remember?"

"Oh, Billy Bourne adores him," Corkoran confirmed sourly.

"Lamont can do no wrong. Cooks, pleases, doesn't pinch the silver or the guests, there when you want him, fades away when you don't, sun shines out of his fundament."

"But didn't we check some of the other references? They weren't all that clever, were they?"

"A tad fanciful, Chief," Corkoran conceded. "Moonshine, in fact."

"Fake 'em. Pine?"

"Yes."

"That fellow whose arm you smashed up. Ever see him before that night?"

"No."

"Not eating at Low's some other evening?"

"No."

"Never sailed a boat for him? Cooked for him? Run dope for him?"