Confidential Agent, The by Greene Graham

Author:Greene, Graham [Greene, Graham]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Thriller, Fiction, Novel, Modern Classics
Publisher: Random House / Vintage Classics
Published: 1939-01-01T03:00:00+00:00

PART TWO

The Hunter

[1]

A hollow B.B.C. voice said: ‘Before we turn you over to the Northern Regional for a cinema organ recital from the Super-Palace, Newcastle, here is an SOS from Scotland Yard: “Wanted by the police: an alien passing under the name of D. who was arrested this morning at the request of the ⎯⎯ Embassy and made his escape after assaulting the Ambassador’s secretary. Aged about forty-five, five feet nine inches in height, hair dark inclined to grey, a heavy moustache, a scar on the right side of his chin. He is believed to carry a revolver.”’

The waitress said, ‘That’s funny. You got a scar too. Don’t you go and get into trouble.’

‘No,’ D. said, ‘no. I must be careful, mustn’t I?’

‘The things that happen,’ the waitress said. ‘It’s awful, isn’t it? I was just going down the street, an’ there was a crowd. Somebody committed suicide, they said, out of a window. Of course I stopped an’ watched, but there wasn’t anything to see. So at lunchtime I go round to the hotel – to see Else an’ ask what it was all about. When they said it was Else, you could’ve knocked me down with a feather.’

‘You and she were friends?’

‘Oh, she hadn’t got a better.’

‘And of course you’re upset?’

‘I can’t hardly believe it yet.’

‘It doesn’t seem likely, does it, a girl of that age? You don’t think it was – perhaps – an accident?’

‘Oh, it couldn’t a’ been. If you ask me, it’s a case of still waters – I know more than most people, an’ I think she was crossed in love.’

‘You do?’

‘Yes – with a married man living in Highbury.’

‘Have you told the police that?’

‘I’m to be called at the inquest.’

‘Did she tell you that?’

‘Oh no. She was a quiet one. But you pick up things.’ He watched her with horror: this was friendship. He watched the small brown heartless eyes while she invented things even as she talked. There wasn’t a man at Highbury except in that romantic and squalid brain. Was it she who had lent Else those novelettes which had conditioned her speech ? She said, ‘I think it was the children was the difficulty.’ There was a kind of gusto of creation in the voice. Else was safely dead; she could be reconstructed now to suit anybody at all. ‘Else was mad about him. It was a proper spell.’

He laid the money down beside his plate. He said, ‘Well, it was interesting to hear about your – adventure.’

‘It’ll be a long while before I forget it. I tell you – you could’ve knocked me down . . .’

He went out into the icy evening; it had been just chance which had led him to that café, or the fact that it was only two blocks from the hotel, and he wanted to make up his mind on the spot. The story was in all the papers now – ‘Gunman in Embassy’ stared at him from a poster. They had his

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