“What are you all here for?” asked Corker petulantly of a newcomer. “What’s come over them at home? What’s supposed to be going on, anyway?”
“It’s ideological. And we’re only half of it. There’s twenty more at the coast who couldn’t get on the train. Weren’t they sick at seeing us go? It’s lousy on the coast.”
“It’s lousy here.”
“Yes, I see what you mean…”
There was not much sleep that night for anyone in William’s room. The photographer who was dossing down found the floor wet and draughty and, as the hours passed, increasingly hard. He turned from side to side, lay flat on his back, then on his face. At each change of position he groaned as though in agony. Every now and then he turned on the light to collect more coverings. At dawn, when the rain began to drip near his head, he was dozing uneasily, fully dressed in overcoat and tweed-cap, enveloped in every available textile including the tablecloth, the curtains and Corker’s two oriental shawls. Nor did the other photographer do much better; the camp bed seemed less stable than William had supposed when it was sold to him; perhaps it was wrongly assembled; perhaps essential parts were still missing. Whatever the reason, it collapsed repeatedly and roused William’s apprehensions of the efficacy of his canoe.
Early next morning he rang up Bannister and, on his advice, moved to Frau Dressler’s pension. “Bad policy, brother,” said Corker, “but since you’re going I wonder if you’ll take change of my curios. I don’t at all like the way Shumble’s been looking at them.”
*
The Pension Dressler stood in a side street and had, at first glance, the air rather of a farm than of an hotel. Frau Dressler’s pig, tethered by the hind trotter to the jamb of the front door, roamed the yard and disputed the kitchen scraps with the poultry. He was a prodigious beast. Frau Dressler’s guests prodded him appreciatively on their way to the dining-room, speculating on how soon he would be ripe for killing. The milch-goat was allowed a narrower radius; those who kept strictly to the causeway were safe, but she never reconciled herself to this limitation and, day in, day out, essayed a series of meteoric onslaughts on the passers-by, ending, at the end of her rope, with a jerk which would have been death to an animal of any other species. One day the rope would break; she knew it and so did Frau Dressler’s guests.
There was also a gander, the possession of the night watchman, and a three-legged dog, who barked furiously from the mouth of a barrel and was said to have belonged to the late Herr Dressler. Other pets came and went with Frau Dressler’s guests—baboons, gorillas, cheetahs—all inhabited the yard in varying degrees of liberty and moved uneasily for fear of the milch-goat.
As a consequence perhaps of the vigor of the live-stock, the garden had not prospered. A little bed, edged with inverted bottles, produced nothing except, annually, a crop of the rank, scarlet flowers which burst out everywhere in Jacksonburg at the end of the rains. Two sterile banana palms grew near the kitchens and between them a bush of Indian hemp which the cook tended and kept for his own indulgence. The night watchman, too, had a little shrub, to whose seed-pods he attributed intoxicant properties.
Architecturally, the Pension Dressler was a mess. There were three main buildings disposed irregularly in the acre of ground—single storied, tin roofed, constructed of timber and rubble, with wooden verandahs; the two larger were divided into bedrooms; the smallest contained the dining-room, the parlor and the mysterious, padlocked room where Frau Dressler slept. Everything of value or interest in the pension was kept in this room and whatever was needed by anyone—money, provisions, linen, back numbers of European magazines—could be produced, on demand, from under Frau Dressler’s bed. There was a hut called the bathroom, where, after due notice and the recruitment of extra labor, a tin tub could be filled with warm water and enjoyed in the half darkness among a colony of bats. There was the kitchen not far from the other buildings, a place of smoke and wrath, loud with Frau Dressler’s scolding. And there were the servants’ quarters—a cluster of thatched cabins, circular, windowless, emitting at all hours a cozy smell of woodsmoke and curry; the center of a voluble round of hospitality which culminated often enough in the late evening with song and rhythmical clapping. The night watchman had his own lair where he lived morosely with two wrinkled wives. He was a tough old warrior who passed his brief waking hours in paring the soles of his feet with his dagger or buttering the bolt of his ancient rifle.
Frau Dressler’s guests varied from three to a dozen in number. They were Europeans, mostly of modest means and good character. Frau Dressler had lived all her life in Africa and had a sharp nose for the unfortunate. She had drifted here from Tanganyika after the war, shedding Herr Dressler, none knew exactly where or how, on her way. There were a number of Germans in Jacksonburg employed in a humble way in the cosmopolitan commercial quarter. Frau Dressler was their center. She allowed them to come in on Saturday evenings after the guests had dined, to play cards or chess and listen to the wireless. They drank a bottle of beer apiece; sometimes they only had coffee, but there was no place for the man who tried to get away without spending. At Christmas there was a decorated tree and a party which the German Minister attended and subsidized. The missionaries always recommended Frau Dressler to visitors in search of cheap and respectable lodgings.
She was a large shabby woman of unbounded energy. When William confronted her she was scolding a group of native peasants from the dining-room steps. The meaning of her words was hidden from William; from the peasants also, for she spoke Ishmaelite, and bad Ishmaelite at that, while they knew only a tribal patois; but the tone was unmistakable. The peasants did not mind. This was a daily occurrence. Always at dawn they appeared outside Frau Dressler’s dining-room and exposed their wares—red peppers, green vegetables, eggs, poultry and fresh local cheese. Every hour or so Frau Dressler asked them their prices and told them to be off. Always at half-past eleven, when it was time for her to begin cooking the mid-day dinner, she made her purchases at the price which all parties had long ago decided would be the just one.
“They are thieves and impostors,” she said to William. “I have been fifteen years in Jacksonburg and they still think they can cheat. When I first came I paid the most wicked prices—two American dollars for a lamb; ten cents a dozen for eggs. Now I know better.”
William said that he wanted a room. She received him cordially and led him across the yard. The three-legged dog barked furiously from his barrel; the milch-goat shot out at him like a cork from a popgun, and, like it, was brought up short at the end of her string; the night watchman’s gander hissed and ruffled his plumage. Frau Dressler picked up a loose stone and caught him square in the chest. “They are playful,” she explained, “particularly the goat.”
They gained the verandah, sheltered from rain and live-stock. Frau Dressler threw open a door. There was luggage in the bedroom, a pair of woman’s stockings across the foot of the bed, a woman’s shoes against the wall. “We have a girl here at the moment. She shall move.”
“Oh but please… I don’t want to turn anyone out.”
“She shall move,” repeated Frau Dressler. “It’s my best room. There is everything you want here.”
William surveyed the meager furniture; the meager, but still painfully superfluous ornaments. “Yes,” he said. “Yes, I suppose there is.”
*
A train of porters carried William’s luggage from the Hotel Liberty. When it was all assembled, it seemed to fill the room. The men stood on the verandah waiting to be paid. William’s own boy had absented himself on the first signs of packing. Frau Dressler drove them off with a few copper coins and a torrent of abuse. “You had better give me anything of value,” she said to William, “the natives are all villains.”
He gave her Corker’s objects of art; she carried them off to her room and stored them safely under the bed. William began to unpack. Presently there was a knock outside. The door opened. William had his back to it. He was kneeling over h
is ant-proof chest.
“Please,” said a woman’s voice. William turned round. “Please may I have my things?”
It was the girl he had seen the day before at the Swedish mission. She wore the same mackintosh, the same splashed gumboots. She seemed to be just as wet. William jumped to his feet.
“Yes, of course, please let me help.”
“Thank you. There’s not very much. But this one is heavy. It has some of my husband’s things.”
She took her stockings from the end of the bed. Ran her hand into one and showed him two large holes, smiled, rolled them into a ball and put them in the pocket of her raincoat. “This is the heavy one,” she said, pointing to a worn leather bag. William attempted to lift it. It might have been full of stone. The girl opened it. It was full of stone. “They are my husband’s specimens,” she said. “He wants me to be very careful of them. They are very important. But I don’t think anyone could steal them. They are so heavy.”
William succeeded in dragging the bag across the floor. “Where to?”
“I have a little room by the kitchen. It is up a ladder. It will be difficult to carry the specimens. I wanted Frau Dressler to keep them in her room but she did not want to. She said they were of no value. You see, she is not an engineer.”
“Would you like to leave them here?”
Her face brightened. “May I? It would be very kind. That is what I hoped, but I did not know what you would be like. They said you were a journalist.”
“So I am.”
“The town is full of journalists but I should not have thought you were one.”
“I can’t think why Frau Dressler has put me in this room,” said William. “I should be perfectly happy anywhere else. Did you want to move?”
“I must move. You see this is Frau Dressler’s best room. When I came here it was with my husband. Then she gave us the best room. But now he is at work so I must move. I do not want a big room now I am alone. But it would be very kind if you would keep our specimens.”
There was a suitcase which belonged to her. She opened it and threw in the shoes and other woman’s things that lay about the room. When it was full she looked from it to the immense pile of trunks and crates, and smiled. “It is all I have,” she said. “Not like you.”
She went over to the pile of cleft sticks. “How do you use these?”
“They are for sending messages.”
“You’re teasing me.”
“No, indeed I’m not. Lord Copper said I was to send my messages with them.”
The girl laughed. “How funny. Have all the journalists got sticks like this?”
“Well, no; to tell you the truth I don’t believe they have.”
“How funny you are.” Her laugh became a cough. She sat on the bed and coughed until her eyes were full of tears. “Oh, dear. It is so long since I laughed and now it hurts me… What is in this?”
“A canoe.”
“Now I know you are teasing me.”
“Honestly it’s a canoe. At least they said it was at the shop. Look, I’ll show you.”
Together they prized up the lid of the case and filled the floor with shavings and wads of paper. At last they found a neat roll of cane and proofed canvas.
“It is a tent,” she said.
“No a canoe. Look.”
They spread the canvas on the floor. With great difficulty they assembled the framework of jointed cane. Twice they had to stop when the girl’s laughter turned to a paroxysm of coughing. At last it was finished and the little boat rose in a sea of shavings. “It is a canoe,” she cried. “Now I will believe you about those sticks. I will believe everything you tell me. Look, these are seats. Get in, quick, we must get in.”
They sat opposite one another in the boat, their knees touching.
The girl laughed, clear and loud, and this time did not cough. “But it’s beautiful,” she said. “And so new. I have not seen anything so new since I came to this city. Can you swim?”
“Yes.”
“So can I. I swim very well. So it will not matter if we are upset. Give me one of the message sticks and I will row you…”
“Do I intrude?” asked Corker. He was standing on the verandah outside the window, leaning into the room.
“Oh dear,” said the girl.
She and William left the boat and stood among the shavings.
“We were just trying the canoe,” William explained.
“Yes,” said Corker. “Whimsical. How about trying the mistletoe?”
“This is Mr. Corker, a fellow journalist.”
“Yes, yes. I see he is. I must go away now.”
“Not Garbo,” said Corker. “Bergner.”
“What does he mean?”
“He says you are like a film star.”
“Does he? Does he really say that?” Her face, clouded at Corker’s interruption, beamed. “That is how I should like to be. Now I must go. I will send a boy for the valise.”
She went, pulling the collar of her raincoat close round her throat.
“Not bad, brother, not bad at all. I will say you’re a quick worker. Sorry to barge in on the tender scene, but there’s trouble afoot. Hitchcock’s story has broken. He’s at the fascist headquarters scooping the world.”
“Where?”
“Town called Laku.”
“But he can’t be. Bannister told me there was no such place.”
“Well there is now, old boy. At this very moment it’s bang across the front page of the Daily Brute and it’s where we are all going or know the reason why. A meeting of the Foreign Press Association has been called for six this evening at the Liberty. Feeling is running very high in the bunch.”
*
The German girl came back.
“Is the journalist gone?”
“Yes. I am sorry. I’m afraid he was rather rude.”
“Was he teasing, or did he really mean I was like a film star?”
“I’m sure he meant it.”
“Do you think so too?” She leant on the dressing-table studying her face in the mirror. She pushed back a strand of hair that had fallen over her forehead; she turned her head on one side, smiled at herself, put out her tongue. “Do you think so?”
“Yes, very like a film star.”
“I am glad.” She sat on the bed. “What’s your name?”
William told her.
“Mine is Kätchen,” she said. “You must put away the boat. It is in the way and it makes us seem foolish.”
Together they dismembered the frame and rolled up the canvas. “I have something to ask,” she said. “What do you think is the value of my husband’s specimens?”
“I’m afraid I have no idea.”
“He said they were very valuable.”
“I expect they are.”
“Ten English pounds?”
“I daresay.”
“More? Twenty?”
“Possibly.”
“Then I will sell them to you. It is because I like you. Will you give me twenty pounds for them?”
“Well, you know, I’ve got a great deal of luggage already. I don’t know quite what I should do with them.”
“I know what you are thinking—that it is wrong for me to sell my husband’s valuable specimens. But he has been away for six weeks now and he left me with only eight dollars. Frau Dressler is becoming most impolite. I am sure he would not want Frau Dressler to be impolite. So this is what we will do. You shall buy them and then, when my husband comes back and says they are worth more than twenty pounds, you will pay him the difference. There will be nothing wrong in that, will there? He could not be angry?”
“No, I don’t think he could possibly be angry about that.”
“Good. Oh, you have made me glad that you came here. Please, will you give me the money now? Have you an account at the bank?”
“Yes.”
“Then write a check. I will take it to the bank myself. Then it will be no trouble to you.”
When she had gone, William took out his expense sheet and dutifully entered the single, enigmatic item: “Stones… £20.”
*
Every journalist in Jacksonburg, except Wenlock Jakes, who had sent Paleologue to represent him, attended the meeting of the Foreign Press Association; all, in their various tongues, voluble with indignation. The hotel boys pattered amongst them with trays of whisky; the air was pungent and dark with tobacco smoke. Pappenhacker was in the chair, wearily calling for order. “Order, gentlemen. Attention, je vous en prie. Order, please. Messieurs, gentlemen…”
“Order, order,” shouted Pigge, and Pappenhacker’s voice was drowned in cries for silence.
“… secretary to read the minutes of the last meeting.”
The voice of the secretary could occasionally be heard above the chatter. “… held at the Hotel Liberty… Sir Jocelyn Hitchcock in the chair… resolution… unanimously passed… protest in the most emphatic manner against… Ishmaelite government… militates against professional activities…
“… objections to make or questions to ask about these minutes…”
The correspondents for Paris-Soir and Havas objected and after a time the minutes were signed. Pappenhacker was again on his feet. “Gentlemen, in the absence of Sir Jocelyn Hitchcock…”
Loud laughter and cries of “Shame.”
“Mr. Chairman, I must protest that this whole question is being treated with highly undesirable levity.”
“Translate.”
“On traite toute la question avec une légéretè indésirable.”
“Thank you, Mr. Porter…”
“If you pliss to spik Sherman…”
“Italiano… piacere…”
“… tutta domanda con levita spiacevole…”
“… Sherman…”
“Gentlemen, gentlemen, Doctor Benito has consented to meet us here in a few minutes and it is essential that I know the will of the meeting so that I can present our demands in proper form.”
At this stage one half of the audience—those nearest to William—were distracted from the proceedings by an altercation, unconnected with the business in hand, between two rival photographers.