The Twisted Wire Read online

  ‘You will be there?’

  ‘Of course. I made arrangements to collect tickets this morning.’

  Bartlett took the initiative and was surprised at himself. ‘Then we will discuss our common interests over dinner this evening.’

  She smiled and Bartlett thought he detected relief that the decision had been taken from her. ‘Very well,’ she said. ‘But first we must see the bonfires.’

  ‘What bonfires?’

  ‘Tomorrow is May 6, Lag Ba‘Omer, a Jewish holiday, Mr Bartlett. Tonight there will be bonfires all over Tel Aviv. It is just like your Guy Fawkes night. Except that there are no fireworks.’

  ‘Very well, Miss Rabinovitz. I’ll look forward to it.’

  ‘Be here at six,’ she said. ‘I’ll pick you up in my car.’

  She ran down the steps and stopped a passing sherut. Bartlett took his key and walked past the tiny art gallery towards his ground-floor room. As he walked down the corridor his new instinct told him that he would discover that his room had been searched: His new instinct was right.

  THREE

  The first attempt on Bartlett’s life was made as he and Raquel wandered among the bonfires blazing on the bank of the narrow and muddy River Yarkon to the north of the city. Around the corner a queue formed for the Swedish film Elvira Madigan; from a jetty looped with fairy lights couples rowed into the gurgling, loving night: high above, the red light of an airliner moved among the thick stars.

  But the children were concerned only with their fires pluming sparks and spitting with the fat venom. They roasted potatoes in their jackets, drank mineral waters and made black coffee.

  Bartlett pointed to the top of one of the bonfires. ‘What’s that?’ he said.

  Raquel who was wearing a dark blue trouser suit said: ‘It is nothing. Just some old heirloom they are burning.’

  Bartlett fished his spectacles from his breast pocket. ‘It can’t be a Guy, surely.’

  Raquel pulled at his arm. ‘It is nothing, I promise you.’

  Bartlett peered at the effigy. ‘He might be nothing to you,’ he said. ‘But he means a lot to a few million Egyptians. That’s Nasser those kids are burning. I thought this was supposed to be some sort of religious celebration connected with the Passover.’

  ‘Just a childish prank,’ she said. She led him away. ‘For an absent-minded professor you seem to notice a lot.’

  ‘It’s my training,’ he said. ‘Staring at rocks all the time. That’s how I noticed that my room had been searched this afternoon.’

  ‘Not your suitcase again,’ she said.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘They left that alone this time.’ He picked up a twig smouldering at one end and lit a cigarette. ‘You don’t believe me, do you, Miss Rabinovitz?’

  ‘It would take more than you have so far told me to make me believe that someone is after you.’ She peered at him, firelight flickering on her inquisitive features. ‘Is there something more you should tell me, Mr Bartlett?’

  ‘Nothing,’ he said.

  His instinct, his reactions, and the shot all synchronised. In the darkness beyond the bonfires, in the paint-smelling waste where the skeletons of old ships yearned for the quick waters, he noticed a small shine of light like a brass knob on a black door. His instinct told him: gold-rimmed spectacles. Then a blur of face and a gleam of silver as slight as a minnow in deep water. A gun, his instinct said. He felled Raquel with one arm and hit the ground beside her. The bullet hit the fire beside them with a dusty thud.

  Raquel twisted away from him. ‘Hey,’ she said. ‘Have you gone crazy?’

  ‘Perhaps,’ he said. ‘You stay there.’

  No one seemed to have heard the shot among the cracking embers. A few children gazed in astonishment at the two of them lying on the ground. Keeping low he ran towards the edge of the darkness. But there was no one there, although he thought he heard running footsteps and the sound of rotting wood breaking.

  The girl joined him, dusting ash from her trouser suit. ‘And now I suppose you’re going to say someone was shooting at you,’ she said.

  ‘They were.’

  ‘This is getting beyond a joke.’

  ‘I entirely agree,’ he said. ‘Come on, I need a drink.’

  They went to an open-air café where men played chess on black-and-white oilcloth spread on the tables. Bartlett ordered a Scotch, Raquel Rabinovitz a Carmel gin and tonic. ‘You’re driving me to drink,’ she said.

  ‘You still don’t believe me?’

  ‘I didn’t hear a shot. And I can’t think why anyone should be after you if your mission to Israel is so innocent.’ Beside them an excited chess player slapped his queen down with no respect for royalty. ‘What can anyone be after? Whatever it is it’s not in your suitcase and it’s not in your room. Perhaps it’s in your briefcase. Where is your briefcase?’

  ‘It’s at the hotel,’ he said.

  ‘In your room?’

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘In the hotel safe.’

  ‘Why do you put your briefcase in the hotel safe if you’ve got nothing to hide?’

  It was difficult to explain. A hardening determination to defeat those who were pursuing him. The excitement of a mysterious challenge as he approached middle-age after a life of preoccupation with sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous rocks. Pure perversity. ‘I didn’t see why they should have it all their own way,’ he said.

  ‘If you’re so convinced that an attempt has been made on your life why do you not tell the police?’

  ‘Because, like you, they would not believe me.’

  He finished his Scotch. Down the road the bonfires were dying and the children were fishing for potatoes in the glowing ash. They gave him an idea.

  ‘After we’ve had dinner,’ he said, ‘I can prove to you that someone wants to kill me.’

  ‘On your life?’

  ‘On my life,’ he said.

  The first course at Yunis, the open-air Arab restaurant in the ancient adjoining city of Jaffa, named after Japhet, one of Noah’s sons, was served a minute after they sat down. The Arab proprietor apologised for the delay.

  They sat at an unsteady table covered with oilcloth. A cat sat in the branches of a tree growing to one side of the courtyard waiting for night birds; behind them a party of exuberant Israelis in town from a border Kibbutz got drunk on Coke and fizzy orange; in front of them two elderly American tourists and their wives regarded everyone with affection.

  They ate humus and tehina dips with peta, hot red Turkish salad and mixed salad, and drank white Avdat wine. They had reached the barbecued fish and the second bottle of Avdat when the crewcut American came up to their table. ‘Pardon me for interrupting your meal,’ he said.

  Bartlett looked up and waited. The American hesitated. Then he said: ‘I wasn’t too sure when I first saw you come in. But I guess we were on the same plane together yesterday.’

  Bartlett wiped up the last of the humus with his peta. ‘I believe we were,’ he said. ‘And you were in Dizengoff this morning.’

  ‘I sure was. What a street that is. It’s got Piccadilly and the Via Veneto licked.’ He paused, looking from Bartlett to Raquel and back again. ‘Say, do you mind if I join you in a glass of wine?’

  Bartlett, who did mind, tried to appeal silently to Raquel. She said brightly: ‘Of course not. Please sit down.’ But he already had. He ordered another bottle of wine and said: ‘My name’s Everett. Harry Everett. It’s sure good to see a familiar face.’

  ‘Familiar since yesterday,’ Bartlett said.

  Raquel said: ‘Are you here on vacation, Mr Everett?’

  Everett shook his square, friendly face. ‘No, business I’m afraid. A two-day visit. That’s why I’ve gotten myself a seat on Mr Bartlett’s tour for the geologists tomorrow. So I can see some of the country before flying back to the States.’

  Bartlett diverted the gaze of the fish head towards another table and said: ‘How did you know my name, Mr Everett? How did you know I was going on a t
our tomorrow? And why did you fly here from London instead of New York if, as you imply, your business is in America?’

  Everett looked surprised. ‘Gee,’ he said. ‘Are you from the FBI?’ He smiled boyishly.

  ‘No,’ Bartlett said. ‘Are you?’

  ‘No, sir. I’m an architect. There have been some last minute hang-ups on a new hotel my company is building out at Herzliya. I got your name from the Dan Hotel because I’m staying there too. Another coincidence, I guess. Anyway, I saw you walking out of the hotel today and I asked reception who you were because I thought we might get together for a drink sometime. He said you were here for a conference on geology at Jerusalem. Then I remembered reading in the local paper that all you geologists were going to be taken on a tour of Israel tomorrow even though it’s a holiday. So I made me a few calls and wangled myself a trip.’ He patted his thick chopped hair proudly.

  Bartlett ran his fingers through his own untidy hair and imagined he could feel the thicker texture of the grey strands. He was aware that Everett was much nearer to Raquel’s age group than he was. He decided to leave as soon as possible. He turned to Raquel. ‘Shall we bother with coffee?’

  ‘Yes please,’ she said.

  Bartlett controlled his irritation. They drank Turkish coffee from thick cups while Everett talked informatively about the effect of salt and sunshine on the façades of seafront hotels in the Eastern Mediterranean. The effect was not good, Bartlett gathered, as he examined Everett’s façade. A face so honest that it had to be devious, strong freckled hands, blue Brooks Brothers suit, thin tie with thin black and red stripes, square-toed black shoes. Bartlett called for the bill.

  ‘Hey,’ Everett said, ‘at least let me pay for the wine.’

  Bartlett shook his head. ‘Buy me a drink tomorrow – at the Dead Sea.’

  As they walked out Everett held Bartlett’s arm so that Raquel drew ahead of them. ‘Tom,’ he said as if a lifelong friendship had been crystallised into the last hour. ‘Can I have a chat with you later? Alone.’

  ‘What on earth for?’

  ‘I can’t tell you now. But it’s very important.’

  Bartlett allowed his annoyance to surface. ‘Not tonight,’ he said. ‘As you can see I’m out with a girl. A very attractive girl. I might be in my dotage as far as you are concerned but I can assure you that it is not my intention to spend the rest of the night discussing the geological characteristics of the Beit Shean Valley with her.’

  But Everett’s manner had changed. His fingers were tight around Bartlett’s forearm and his candid, campus features were suddenly ruthless. To Bartlett the change was as frightening as suddenly glimpsing cruelty in a child. ‘Tonight,’ Everett said.

  His insistence encouraged the perversity in Bartlett’s nature. ‘I’ll talk to you tomorrow on the trip,’ he said. ‘Now if you’ll excuse me there’s a lady waiting for me outside.’

  Everett’s face relaxed. He replaced his mask of naïveté and patted his hair. ‘Okay Tom,’ he said. ‘Till tomorrow.’

  They walked into the street where cats waited for scraps and children waited for agora. Raquel was sitting at the wheel of her small Fiat.

  As Bartlett walked towards it an old Ford V8 came rocking down the dark, narrow street. He flattened himself against the wall as it swept past.

  Raquel said: ‘I suppose you think that was another attempt on your life.’

  ‘Not necessarily.’

  ‘I think the driver had merely been smoking.’

  ‘Smoking?’

  ‘Hash,’ she said. ‘There’s a lot of it round here.’

  The Ford stopped near Yunis restaurant and the Arab driver climbed out, sat on a doorstep and smiled idiotically into the darkness.

  ‘No,’ Bartlett said. ‘I don’t think he was trying to kill me. But if you drive me first to the Dan Hotel and then to the River Yarkon I’ll prove to you that someone is.’

  First he swept away the still-warm ash. Then he began to excavate with his tools. He could smell the mud from the river and the saline breath of the sea. The girl kneeling beside him said: ‘Now I know you are crazy.’

  ‘Just wait,’ he said. ‘You’ll see.’

  ‘See what?’

  ‘Just wait.’

  It was 1 a.m. The darkness was warm, the suburb dead. After digging and scratching in the moonlight for five minutes he began to feel anxious. Perhaps he was crazy. He felt the girl’s hair brush against his face. He didn’t want to be proved crazy in front of her.

  His trowel struck metal. ‘Watch carefully,’ he said. He dug lower and then levered the trowel upwards. The bullet came free and rolled on to the trowel. He knew how a dentist felt. ‘Now do you believe me?’

  She nodded, her face grave in the moonlight. And Tom Bartlett found that he was happy that he had proved that someone was trying to kill him.

  FOUR

  A thrush was singing in Grosvenor Square. The morning air smelled of evaporating dew and unfurling roses and the hair of the pretty girls and young men bounced as they walked to work. But Dean Ralston, one of the senior security officers at the United States Embassy in London, was not affected by the expectancy of the morning. He walked rapidly and unhappily down the corridor of the magnificent embassy to the office of the Ambassador.

  The Ambassador said: ‘It can’t have been. There must have been a mistake.’

  Ralston shook his head and stared at his policeman’s feet. ‘I’m afraid not, sir. We have indisputable proof that the Russians managed to plug into the Washington line.’

  The Ambassador stared grimly at the photograph of the President at his desk. ‘I understood that was impossible. How long do you reckon they’ve been tapping it?’

  Ralston lit a cigarette with a large windshielded lighter. ‘Not long, according to my contact. A couple of days at the most.’

  ‘Who is this contact of yours?’

  ‘Begging your pardon, sir, but I’d prefer not to say.’

  The Ambassador who had been accustomed to total obedience during his business life walked over to the window, fists bunched in his pockets. He was a small man with a pouchy face that belied his toughness. ‘What the hell are you going to do about it then?’

  ‘The wire’s been taken care of,’ Ralston said. ‘There’s no sweat there. Our only worry is what information the Soviets picked up in the last couple of days. Can you help us there, sir?’

  The Ambassador poured himself a glass of water. ‘The President has only been on the wire twice this week. Both times it was about this guy Bartlett. The President is very anxious that we gain some prestige from the four-power talks on the Middle East crisis. It seems that Bartlett can help us.’

  Ralston said: ‘I know about that, sir. We have a man out there now. The trouble is that the Russians will be on to him because of this intercepted call. My sympathies lie with this poor bastard Bartlett.’

  ‘Is there anything more we can do?’

  Ralston shrugged. ‘One of our best operators is out there. And our people in Israel have been alerted. We have an edge because we’ve got diplomatic recognition and can operate more freely.’

  ‘Details like that never stopped the Soviets,’ the Ambassador said. He tossed back his glass of water as if it were vodka.

  Ralston looked out of the window at the blossoming May day. ‘There’s just one more thing, sir,’ he said.

  ‘What is it? It can’t be anything worse.’

  ‘It’s not exactly worse,’ Ralston said carefully.

  ‘What the hell is it then?’

  ‘It seems that one of the presidential calls got crossed. We’ve had a call from a local exchange down in Sussex. Apparently the call was picked up in a village down there.’

  The Ambassador sat down again. ‘You mean some yokel listened to the President talking to me?’

  ‘Not exactly a yokel, sir.’

  ‘Who was it then?’

  ‘Bartlett, sir. Your namesake. Apparently he was calling his wife here just as
the President came through.’

  ‘This,’ the Ambassador said slowly, ‘is the sort of thing that you can never imagine happening to the Russians.’ He paused. ‘Although I guess they screw up things from time to time. Is there anything more we can do?’

  ‘Not a lot,’ Ralston said. ‘We’ve already clammed up the local exchange. As far as we know the only other people who heard the President – apart from yourself and the Soviets – was Bartlett himself. Our man is on to Bartlett but of course he doesn’t know yet that the KGB are on to him as well.’

  ‘What about Bartlett himself? If he overheard the conversation he must realise that he’s dynamite.’

  ‘He doesn’t appear to have reacted so far,’ Ralston said.

  The Ambassador pondered on the implication. Then he said: ‘Hell, you don’t think that Bartlett’s sympathies lie in the other direction, do you? You don’t think that he’s a Commie?’

  ‘I don’t figure it that way,’ Ralston said. ‘He’s just a geologist. A bit bumbly, a bit absorbed with his work. He probably didn’t realise what he was listening to.’

  ‘How did we get this Bartlett lead in the first place?’

  ‘Through his wife,’ Ralston said. ‘As you know, she works in the library. She has a tendency to shoot her mouth off. Normally we feed her stuff that we want her to broadcast. She’s quite useful that way. But in this case she picked up the information from her husband.’

  ‘Why do you feed her information?’ The Ambassador’s voice was touched with sarcasm. ‘Of course you don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to. I am only the Ambassador.’

  ‘Because she’s taken to sleeping with an Arab,’ Ralston said. ‘That poor sucker Bartlett. He’s got the Americans, the Russians, the Arabs and the Israelis on to him.’

  ‘How do you know the Israelis are on to it?’ the Ambassador said.

  ‘I don’t for sure. But I’ll wager a week’s salary on it because the Shin Beit is the best secret service in the world.’

  The phone rang and the Ambassador picked it up. He put his hand over the receiver and gestured to Ralston to leave the room. ‘It’s the President,’ he said.