“Don’t think I'm letting my imagination run away with me. I swear there was no mistake about it. I jotted down his words that very evening so as to make quite sure. You can have a look at my notebook if you like.”
The recovery of her composure strongly influenced Austin’s decision. In a few minutes he drew up his plan of battle. First he told her briefly the contents of the top-secret messages and the outlines of Gleicher’s proposal. She distrusted the whole business and would look upon it only as a trap set with Arvers’ complicity. Austin discussed it no further and gave her her instructions.
“I’ll phone him tomorrow to let him know I’ve arrived. I’ll tell him that the Allies are interested in the offer and I have come to look into it more closely, which is actually true. I’ll ask him to arrange for me to meet Gleicher and Otto. He’ll have to phone them. And then . . .”
He had a final twinge of conscience, which was swiftly dispelled by the recollection of Dr. Fog’s last words of advice.
“And then you will listen carefully to every word they say and take it all down. After that we’ll be able to see whether I ought to keep the appointment and what precautions I’ll have to take. Whatever you do, be careful not to rouse their suspicions.”
She promised to do exactly as he said. They left the auditorium without being noticed and parted outside the movie. He stood there for some time, puzzled, watching her as she moved away and was finally swallowed up in the crowd.
27
“Is that you, Herr Arvers? What, you’re surprised I recognize your voice? But it's very characteristic, you know; no one who has heard it once is likely to forget it. What can I do for you . . . ? Yes, yes, I see, very interesting. At last! Hold the line a moment, will you . . .”
Gleicher frequently assumed this bantering tone with Arvers. He seemed to delight in alternately terrifying and humiliating him. He put his hand over the mouthpiece to say softly to Otto, who was sitting op- posite him writing:
“They’re biting.’’
Otto interrupted his work and took the receiver his chief handed to him.
“Really? Someone very important, you say?”
“It’s my immediate superior from London,” Arvers replied. “He has already been here. He is familiar with all the French side of the business and has been detailed to arrange a meeting with someone of even greater importance."
This was exactly what Austin had told him to say. Claire, who was listening in upstairs, heaved a sigh of disappointment at hearing not a single suspect word. True, Gleicher’s tone was slightly peculiar, but that was not sufficient proof for Austin.
“Where will the meeting be held? But at your place, of course, Herr Arvers. You know what confidence I have in you! Naturally there’ll just be the two of you, no one else."
“Naturally," Arvers replied.
Gleicher fixed the meeting for the evening two days ahead, then continued in a tone of authority:
“I don’t think I need remind you again to stick to my instructions."
Claire’s hopes soared. She underlined the word “instructions" in the notebook in which she was taking down the conversation.
“I hope you haven’t said anything that could rouse your chief’s suspicions?"
“I've adhered to our agreement to the letter."
“Our agreement!”
Arvers' use of this term was a halfhearted endeavor not to lose face in his own eyes. He could not regard himself as a traitor: he was merely acting as an intermediary in some tricky negotiations between enemy leaders, that was all. Away from Gleicher, he had plucked up enough courage to use this word, which cast a reassuring light on the transaction.
“Our agreement!’’
The sarcasm contained in the exclamation cut him to the quick. In the margin of her notebook, Claire recorded these changes in tone by a system of conventional signs. For all his anger, Arvers did not dare answer back. Once again he was frightened of receiving a reply that would shatter all his illusions.
He ventured, however, to ask for further details on one particular point. He did so with a note of entreaty in his voice, after having sworn to himself several times in the past twenty-four hours that he would take a firm line when discussing the deal.
“You did say, didn’t you, Mr. Gleicher, that if all goes well . . . that if you’re satisfied with my services,” he added in a wheedling tone, “you would give me the roll?”
This—the only demand he had made from the very beginning—was almost in the nature of a condition he had steeled himself to impose. Gleicher had agreed to it, to save himself a fruitless argument.
Claire scribbled this down, then paused in bewilderment, waiting for a further explanation.
“The roll? What roll?”