The Tiger in the Well, Page 28

"I'm used to it. And don't say my name aloud again. Come on, what do you want?"

  "It's the woman with the child. Mr Katz thought you ought to know, but no one could find you."

  Goldberg's eyes suddenly blazed, and Singer shrank back slightly under the intensity of his expression.

  "What about her? Have they found her?"

  "No. She's left the child at the Katzes'; RebeccaMeyer's looking after her. Miss Lockhart's disguised herself and gone to spy on the Tzaddik - working as a housemaid. They couldn't persuade her not to. And of course they didn't know. . ."

  Singer expected dismay, or fury; so when a broad smile of mischievous admiration spread across Goldberg's face, the young man was disconcerted.

  "What a girl!" said Goldberg. "Magnificent! Who'd have thought of that?"

  "But doesn't it make our plans more difficult?"

  "Considerably. It means we'll have to get her out. If only she has the sense to go carefully. . ."

  And it was winter again in Goldberg's face. Singer wished he wouldn't do that; you couldn't expect to go about disguised if your face was that expressive. What was more, the men near by had heard them whispering through the rant from the platform, and were turning to stare.

  But Goldberg was equal to that. Beaming with rapture at the starers, he turned his face to Arnold Fox, nodding and clapping his hands together softly in silent ecstasy.

  He's mad, Singer thought. Like the English girl Lockhart; she must be mad too. . .

  Sally didn't move. The footsteps moved slowly away from the lift - towards the door she was hiding behind - and stopped.

  A voice said, in English: "Do the servants clean down here?"

  It was not a voice Sally knew: German, she thought, precise and prim. But she knew the next voice.

  "Of course not," said Michelet. "They are forbidden to come here, Herr Winterhalter."

  The secretary, Sally thought.

  "You clean it yourself?"

  "That is so."

  "Not very well, I observe. You have dropped candle grease on the floor."

  "I have never used a candle down here. It must have been the workmen."

  "Mr Lee will not be pleased. See to it at once."

  Sally prayed that the wax would have hardened by now and wouldn't give her away.

  After a moment Michelet spoke again.

  "May I ask, Herr Winterhalter, has Mr Lee made provision for a nursemaid?"

  "A nursemaid?"

  "For the child. If she is to be kept down here, she will need someone to attend to her. I am merely inquiring."

  "Not your concern, Michelet."

  "I beg your pardon, Herr Winterhalter, it is precisely my concern. The care of every aspect of Mr Lee's personal life is in my hands. If this child is to become part of the household, and introduced into a . . . well, some kind of relationship with Mr Lee, it is my duty to make sure that she does not - for instance - die of neglect or starvation."

  "She will be fed. Do not be ridiculous."

  "And by whom?"

  "One of the servants. It does not matter. Her training will be in my hands."

  Sally could hardly breathe. This was Harriet they were talking about. . .

  "No doubt you know best, Herr Winterhalter," said Michelet silkily.

  "I do. Do not concern yourself with the matter. It is not in your province.

  "The care of Mr Lee is my province."

  "The regulation of the household is mine."

  "The regulation of that animal is my concern. No one can manage it but me. The child must be mine as well."

  "Yours?"

  The single word was loaded with contempt. Sally stood horrified; some bargain was being struck - some disposal of her own daughter was being argued over - but what it was, she daren't think.

  "Yes! Mine. If she is to replace that animal - to feed him, wipe his mouth, wash him - those are my responsibilities. It must be me who trains her. Only I know how to do it. And he will back me up!"

  "You think so?"

  "I know it!"

  "He has told me to assume authority. There is no disputing it. I am in charge."

  "You know nothing. All you know is correspondence, business, money. He does not want a little ape-secretary; he wants something to replace that monkey when it dies. A little charming creature who will feed him, clean him, hold his cigarettes, please him. I know those arts. You do not. She must be mine to train."

  "Too late, Michelet. Mr Lee himself will confirm what I say. The training of the child will be in my hands."

  "Impossible!"

  "Certain."

  "You will destroy her with your demands -"

  "These things are scientifically determinable. The precise degrees of pain, punishment, reward are known and calculated. There are tables, charts. Nothing will be left to chance, or instinct, or sentimentality, or whatever qualities you could manage to bring to it. And remind me, Michelet - what was the offence for which you served three years in prison?"

  Silence.

  "I think children came into that, did they not?" the secretary went on. "It was something, at any rate, that would make it undesirable to let you have charge of a child. Very well, we understand each other. There is no more to be said. Stand aside, please, and let me look in the other room."

  The light moved towards the door, and stopped in the doorway inches away from Sally as she stood holding her breath behind the door.

  "Will this be the child's bedroom?" Michelet asked, his voice quiet now.

  "Possibly." The secretary sniffed. "Strange. There is the smell of a candle here."

  He moved into the room. Sally could see him clearly; if he'd turned around he would have seen her. He touched a wall, looked at his fingers, dabbed them on a handkerchief in his pocket, turned back.

  Sally kept her head still, the hood shading her face.

  Winterhalter moved back to the door and through into the other room.

  "The paint is not quite dry yet. The doors will have to remain open until the smell is gone. Give me the key, please."

  A jingle of keys, and a moment or two later the clatter of the lift doors opening. Then the sighing of the hydraulics, and the light vanished as the lift moved upwards.

  Sally felt a stream of perspiration trickle down her back. She wanted to lean against the wall, but dared not because of the paint; instead she sank to her knees and let her head rest on the cold floor till she stopped trembling.

  Think about it later, she told herself. Get back to bed first.

  After waiting for what felt like a long time, she got to her feet and felt for the door. The darkness was complete. Striking a match was out of the question: she'd have to feel her way out of the cellar, risk the crossing of the hall, and get back up the servants' staircase. Supposing the paint was dry, and he'd locked the door. . .

  It took her the best part of an hour. As she closed the green baize door behind her out of the hall and set foot on the first steps, she heard a church clock strike two. She was cold, bone-weary, and aching in every limb from the day's hard work and the effort of not making a noise.

  Only three flights of stairs now. She reached the top of the first, turned to go up the next - and her heart slammed into her ribs with fear.

  Someone was standing there, waiting for her.

  He struck a match. In its flare she saw the plump, greedy face of Michelet.

  "So it was you," he whispered. "Louisa. The naughty Louisa. Well, mademoiselle, you had better come to my room, hadn't you? We will have a nice conversation. I look forward to it very much indeed."

  Chapter Twenty-three

  NO JUWES

  Once inside his room, he struck another match and lit a lamp. Then without any warning he seized her and kissed her full on the mouth. She could taste cigarettes, Parma violets, eau-de-Cologne.

  He was holding her awkwardly. Her neck was twisted; she couldn't breathe. She pushed him away and gasped.

  "Quiet," he hissed. "Mr Lee is only next door. His hear
ing is very acute. Well? What is your explanation?"

  "My explanation, sir?"

  "Of how you came to be in the cellar. You may count yourself very lucky I did not give you away to that imbecile Winterhalter."

  "I'm sure I don't know what you mean, sir. I didn't know there was a cellar. I've just been down to the kitchen - to the ice-box, sir. To put some ice on my head, because it was aching so. I know I shouldn't have done, but it was unbearable. I don't know who Mr Winter. . . I just don't know what you mean, sir."

  His eyes were narrow.

  "You were there. I saw the match you threw in the library fireplace, and I saw the drop of wax on the steps. Winterhalter missed that. And what about this?"

  He lifted her cloak. On the hem was a vague smear that might have been white paint.

  "I did that in the post office this morning - they'd just painted the walls. . .Why are you questioning me like this, Mr Michelet?"

  She tried to look innocent, puzzled, hurt. At the same time she let her cloak fall open slightly at the throat. She saw his eyes move there, and thought for the first time that she might be able to get away with it.

  He let the hem fall and reached up slowly to her jaw. He tilted her chin up and stroked his fingers down her neck to the hollow at the base of her throat. She willed herself to keep still as he traced the length of her collarbone from left to right and back again.

  She saw that his eyes were becoming glazed, and coughed slightly, as if she felt ill.

  "Please, sir. . ." she whispered.

  "Louisa, you have been a bad girl," he said in a low soft voice, almost as if he were mesmerized. "You must not tell me lies. What did you hear him say down there?"

  "I didn't hear no one, sir - honest -"

  Steeling herself, she put one hand timidly on his chest. He seized it and crushed it to his mouth, and then pulled her to him a second time and ran his hands down her sides under the cloak. She was trembling: let him think it was nervousness, she thought. He couldn't suspect it was loathing.

  "Oh, Mr Michelet. . . Please may I go to my bed, sir?" she whispered into his ear. "Another time . . . I'm not well, sir. . ."

  "Louisa," he said, and his voice was thick. "You're beautiful. One more kiss."

  He pressed his mouth on hers, busily working away like a greedy child with a sweet. She held her breath, making herself loose and passive and doll-like. Presently he stopped.

  "Soon," he said, and his eyes were lost. She'd never seen a man so nearly at the edge of his control, but she sensed his fear, too, holding him back: fear of Winterhalter, fear of Lee, fear even of her.

  Because he really wasn't sure now whether she'd heard them or not. And he couldn't afford to guess.

  He pushed her away. He was clearly the kind of man to like his women frightened, nervous, unwilling. If she had offered herself blatantly, he'd have turned away with loathing. She must let him think that he was the masterful pursuer and she was the timid victim.

  The last she saw of him before she left the room was his puffy eyes, still hot with desire, still hooded with fear.

  Sally had little more than three hours of sleep. Of all the images that haunted her dreams, none was worse than the idea of little Harriet imprisoned in that cellar and trained to act as the Tzaddik's . . . what? Nursemaid? Putting food into his mouth, wiping his chin. . .

  She felt sick when she thought about it. That, and her lack of sleep, made her look pale, and Mrs Wilson commented on it at mid-morning, when Sally was summoned to take a tray of coffee to the library.

  "No, it's nothing, Mrs Wilson," she said. "My head's been aching, but it'll clear up."

  There were three cups on the tray. Once again the Tzaddik called for her to come in, and once again she tried not to look up as she brought the tray to the table by the fireplace. She let her eyes flick across to the door she'd gone through to the cellar, inconspicuous in the corner of the room. It was closed.

  She curtsied briefly to the Tzaddik, and was about to leave when he said, "Stop. Your name is Kemp, is it not?"

  "Yes, sir," she said, glancing at him swiftly.

  "Be so good as to pour some coffee for my guests."

  "Very good, sir."

  She felt the three of them watch her as she set out the cups and poured the coffee. Who they were she didn't know until she handed the cups round. As one of the men took his cup without acknowledging it, he spoke to the other, and she recognized his voice: it was the man she'd seen on the immigrant ship, Arnold Fox.

  She looked up involuntarily then, and saw that the other man was Arthur Parrish, and he was looking at her with a little frown, as if he was puzzled. But he turned away to answer Arnold Fox, and she breathed again.

  Taking as much time as she reasonably could, she poured the second cup and listened.

  "You see, the danger in a full-scale pogrom, so to speak, on the Russian model," Parrish was saying, "is that Jews presently on their way to England would be tempted to miss it out altogether and go straight to America. Oh, I know you'd welcome that," he went on as Mr Fox seemed about to interrupt, "but look at it from a business point of view."

  He took his cup from Sally, who turned back to the Tzaddik. The monkey wasn't there, she noticed.

  "Pour some for me," the Tzaddik told her.

  That voice - oh, there was something in the softness, the depth, the cracked thickness of it. . . She'd heard it before, or dreamt it in a nightmare. Thankful for the excuse to stay, she poured another cup as Fox replied:

  "I have higher considerations than business, Mr Parrish. I am concerned with the purity of the English race."

  "You are a vain, pompous man whose main concern is getting himself elected," said the Tzaddik. "I am supporting you with my funds only to the extent that you are useful. The moment you cease to be so, I shall drop you. Kemp - bring me the cup. Lift it to my lips."

  "It's hot, sir," she said, aware of the subdued fury on the face of Arnold Fox, the cheerful blandness of Parrish; and aware too of the stillness of her hands as she held the delicate porcelain to his lips.

  He sipped noisily once, twice, three times. His bulk, so close to her, was massive and nearly shapeless; the suit he wore, though immaculately tailored, could not disguise the fact that his arms and chest were no more than inert lumps of fat. This close, she could hear him breathing, and see the huge chest inflate with effort and sigh itself empty again. And she could see how the sleek reddish hair was plastered to the scalp with some scented pomade, and how the helpless fingers, huge and dead in his lap, were perfectly manicured.

  "Again," he said, and she put the coffee cup to his mouth, feeling, despite her fear and loathing, a desperate pity for this man imprisoned in his vast hulk of flesh, utterly unable to make the slightest movement.

  Arnold Fox put down his coffee cup with a shaking hand and stood up. Sally was careful not to look at him, but held the cup out of the way for the Tzaddik to face him as Fox said in a throbbing voice, "I shall do as you say. I have no choice. But, Mr Lee, I am not afraid to label your change of mind as hardly less than a betrayal. Instead of the fine gesture of righteous anger the British people would wish to make, you reduce the affair to a . . . to little more than a drunken brawl. But you know best; doubtless you know best, sir. I am obliged to you both. Good day."

  And he left. Both men watched him indifferently, and when the door had slammed behind him, the Tzaddik said, "Good. That makes the decision for us. I am happy to accept the will of Heaven, Parrish."

  Mr Parrish smiled. "So now we press ahead, sir?"

  He stopped and looked up at Sally, who could feel his eyes on her, but kept hers modestly cast down.

  "Thank you, Kemp," said the Tzaddik. "You may go."

  "Thank you, sir," she said, curtsying, and left.

  In the hall she looked around quickly. No one in sight, and she knew Mr Clegg was busy in his pantry, and Mrs Wilson was in the kitchen, and. . .

  She bent down and pretended to be adjusting her bootlace.


  Parrish's voice came through the door: ". . . the whistles?"

  "Not yet," said the Tzaddik. "The English mob is not disciplined enough. It has lost the taste for rioting, besides. It will have to be educated."

  "But you want a full-scale riot?"

  "I want deaths, and lootings, and I want an entire street burnt down. A street of Jewish houses. That will create the most panic and resentment. And it will look as if Mr Fox was behind it, and he will try to stop it, thinking that's what we want, and he'll fail. The press will blame him for encouraging it; we will blame him for not stopping it. So we discard him at once, and pledge our support for Jewish charities and reconstruction and so forth. . . They will come to us voluntarily, Parrish. The little fish will swim into the net!"

  "Magnificent," said the other man. "What date did you have in mind, Mr Lee?"

  Sally leant closer to the door to hear.

  And then a hand clasped her mouth and an arm encircled her waist and lifted her clear of the floor.

  For a second she struggled, until she realized that the hand over her mouth was wearing a white glove. It wasn't Michelet - it was one of the footmen. Suddenly she let herself flop, as if she'd fainted.

  Startled, he loosened his grip. She fell forward, but found her balance and whipped round to face him.

  "What d'you think you're doing?" she hissed.

  "Just having a bit of fun -"

  He was a strapping, swaggering sort of fellow, with a broad confident grin. But he was looking a little uneasy now in the face of her anger.

  "How dare you touch me like that?" she said, keeping her voice low so as not to be heard through the door. And as she looked, she saw a different expression come into his face, and realized that she'd made a mistake.

  "Who are you, anyway?" he said. "You're not a bloody maidservant - I can see that now. What are you doing here?"

  What she'd done was to act like a lady: to do what a person of her class would naturally do if a man behaved as he'd done. She'd assumed that any girl would have done the same. Now, in a split second, she recalled the different way men looked at her when they thought she wasn't a lady, and knew that a real servant wouldn't have had the option of being ruffled and indignant. She should have been wearily contemptuous.

  But as soon as she realized that, she saw a way of winning back the initiative. She'd have to move fast, though; keep him off-balance.

  She put a finger to her lips, hushing him, looked around, and then beckoned him to follow her into the dining room next door.