The Sword and the Net полностью

He checked himself and she looked at him and said:

“To-night, you mean?”

“Yes,” he said. “Yes. I mean that. I mean that wherever in this country we start from to try to reach Washington, there they will be to attempt to stop us. On the roads and on the railway stations and the wharfs and at the airports and . . .”

She laughed at him. “All right,” she said. “You mean everywhere. Very well, sir, you’ve warned me. Anything else?”

He had to smile at her. He said:

“Repeat the Plan of Operations. That is an older.”

She said, staccato: “Leave here eight p.m. On the road, split up but keep in sight Take eight-forty-five Oakland bus from Monterey. In Oakland keep split and I follow you roundabout way toward airport. When I get sign from you, we confer. If everything’s all right so far proceed separately into airport, mingling as much as possible with other passengers. Buy separate tickets to Washington. I must watch you constantly for signs.”

Otto put his arms about her and drew her close and kissed her. The apprehension was upon him again, lying across his lungs like a heavy weight.

The hours dragged, but they killed them. With the razor he had bought on his last trip to the shops, Otto shaved off the nine-day stubbly beard. It had not grown fast enough to do other than make him untidily conspicuous in such company as that of aeroplane passengers, and this must not be. As it was, he must trust to the polo coat and a clean, new, dollar-fifty yachting-cap to make him a reasonable figure. The cap would cover his hair and the big coat his body and he would change his gait: he would stoop a little and exaggerate his limp and perhaps . . .

A thought struck him and he called softly to Clare. He said:

“The little women’s store where you bought the blouse? Does it sell coats—big coats—overcoats?”

They were not in the cellar; they were in the house above and Otto was using the spotted, peeling mirror in the bathroom. Clare stood in the doorway now. She said:

“I’m not sure. . . . Let me think. . . . Yes, they do. I saw two atrocious things hanging up there behind the counter. Why?”

Otto grunted. The blade in the razor was pulling abominably. He said:

“Describe to me the less atrocious. I must go there and buy it for you. It will be good.”

He watched her smile at him in the mirror, and his heart turned over as it always did at this smile. She said:

“We should’ve thought of that before. But I will go, blockhead! You’ve been to the village three times—I’ve only been once. And there’s no danger there—and you’re always giving lectures about not doing anything conspicuous! How unremarkable d’you think you’d be buying a coat for a girl in a little place like that!” She came away from the door and stood on tiptoe close to him and dropped a kiss upon his neck.

They couldn’t stay still. They tried to keep in the cellar as they had upon other mornings, but they couldn’t: they had to keep moving about.

They were in what must have been the dining-room now. Otto sat upon the table and whittled with his knife at a piece of wood which was taking on the rough outline of an aeroplane. Clare was on her knees by the shuttered window: she was looking at the carving upon the heavy chest which stood beneath it.

The most extraordinary idea came into Otto’s mind; he was thinking of Altinger when it came to him—and he knew, now that he had put it into recognizable shape inside his head, that it was not a new idea but something he had known for a long time. He went on whittling, and spoke without looking up. He said:

“It is a strange thing. There is one man against us—against me—who is the one man that . . . that . . .” He struggled for the English words. “He is the man who is typical of them. They do not think he is a good Nazi. They know he is brilliant and worth much to them, but they think he is working too much for himself. He is the man I think of as . . . as symbolical of them, because, in himself, he stands for what they stand for. I feel that if I . . . I have a victory over him, I have won. That is stupid talk—but I feel like that! . . .”

They couldn’t stay still: they had to keep moving about. They climbed the rickety stairs to the attic which was humped above the short end of the L and found it a bare place, much bigger than they had thought, and with a huge skylight window in which the glass was still intact. They knew that from both sides the trees must screen this part of the roof and Otto helped to raise the thing and prop it open so that the sun came in warm upon them and they could see blue sky in a frame of green.

They pulled out a great packing-case from a corner and stood upon it and rested their arms upon the edge of the window and looked up and out at the sky and the tree-tops and the little fluffy white clouds and for a moment thought of nothing but each other.

Then there came a droning hum above them and a black-and-yellow Army trainer flew across the blue strip of their vision and banked steeply and was out of their sight.