William Bayer - Tangier

"Finally, a personal note. It isn't easy for an old actor to leave the stage, make his final bow. For almost sixty years I've trooped the boards-that seems now a long, long time. They say old soldiers never die, that they just fade away. Old actors-well, I don't know what they say about them. But this old actor will always be there in the hall to clap for all of you.”

Another pause, this time a long one. He knew his final words must sound most deeply felt.

"We've had our quarrels. We've shouted and screamed. We've laughed a lot, and wept a little too. But that's the theater. That's what it's about. A clash of intellects. Temperaments aflame. Before I open our meeting to business-and the business tonight will be to select a new leader for our club-let me just quote a few lines from the Tempest , old Prospero's farewell. It says what's in my heart:

But this rough magic

I here abjure; and when I have required

Some heavenly music, which even now I do,

To work mine end upon their senses that

This airy charm is for, I'll break my staff,

Bury it certain fathoms in the earth,

And deeper than did ever plummet sound

I'll drown my book.

He sat down then, to their utterly stupefied silence. All of them were pulsing with sentiment-except for Kelly, who glared at him and scowled. Luscombe couldn't blame him; his evening had been stolen by design. But Jill Packwood was weeping, and she was hard as nails. Jack Whyte's eyes were glistening. Jessica Drear held her face in sweating palms.

Derik Law stood up then, just as the two of them had planned. He began the song, and of course the others followed, eyes upon him, big and red, weeping and smiling and nodding all at the same time:

For he's a jolly good fellow!

For he's a jolly good fellow!

For he's a jolly good fellow!

That nobody can deny!

Lake had been circulating at the Manchesters' for an hour, waiting for Z to show up.

"Oh, he'll come. He promised," said Willard, snapping the shutter of his Instamatic, filling the room with a blinding flash.

"He'll be here eventually, Dan," Katie said. "Now go try some of my tuna spread."

Her tuna spread! It was sickening, tasted as though it were made of fur. The whole damn party was an outrage. Lake couldn't believe he was really there. He'd come only because Z was supposed to come, and he had to confront the Russian face to face. Otherwise he would have stayed home. It was a humiliation to be at the Manchesters' while the Ambassador was up at Henderson Perry's, mixing with the royals and tout Tanger .

The Manchesters! Christ! They'd invited him to "drink the dregs"! They'd served up the dregs, all right-Spanish "scotch," Argentine "vodka," all those undrinkable blended whiskeys they'd gotten for Christmas through the years. The potato chips were soggy. The canapes were a disgrace. The hall was filled with packing cases. The servants were sullen, worried about their tips.

"Great to meet you," he heard Willard say to a bunch of newcomers to Tangier. "Come visit us in Florida. We're moving there, you know." This was supposed to be a going-away party for the Manchesters' closest friends, but those friends were out on the terrace, talking among themselves, while the Manchesters stood alone in the living room saying tearful farewells to people they didn't know, snapping their pictures, even inviting them to visit them in the States.

It was insane. Madness. And still Z hadn't come. Lake was worried about that, that ever since he'd shown him the code machine the Russian had avoided seeing him alone. When he came into the shop Peter behaved as if nothing had happened, as if they'd never had that conversation in his office the Sunday past. Lake couldn't figure it out. He thought everything had been arranged. Z had as much as said he'd be willing to defect. What the hell had happened? Tonight he was going to find out.

The Manchesters were such boobs. How could he ever have thought of them as friends? They'd brought out every bit of junk they didn't want as offerings to their guests. There was a pile of stuff on the dining room table which Katie kept loading into people's arms. Wrinkled old maps of Morocco from the glove compartment of their car. A swollen can without a label (botulism for sure, he thought). A bottle of home-pickled watermelon rinds. Coat hangers and bent curtain rods. A fondue pot with an enormous crack. They must be nuts, he thought, trying to flog off stuff like that. Why didn't they just heave it in the trash? As it was they'd tried to sell everything they didn't want: potted plants, an ironing board, some inner tubes, a rusted lawn mower. But this other stuff-they had to be kidding, though there was Katie trying to stick Rick Calloway with a dozen lifeless tennis balls.

He stared around the room for a while, then tried to attract the attention of Jackie Knowles. But she and Foster were snuggling in the dining room like a couple of dodo birds in heat. Ever since Foster had come back from the north, all the gas seemed to have gone out of their affair. Why? He still wasn't sure, except that Foster had returned weathered and tanned, sporting a little Vandyke beard. It made him look all the more ridiculous, what with his blond hair curling down his neck. But that little beard seemed to be working wonders on Jackie. She called it "neat," said it felt good when Foster gave her head.

That was enough for Lake. He wasn't about to share Jackie with her husband or be satisfied with sloppy seconds. If the Knowles' had solved their sexual problems, that was fine with him. He and Jackie had had their fling. He told her to cool it for a while.

Suddenly he turned around-there was something buzzing in his ear. It was Anne Calloway talking away. Evidently she'd been speaking to him for quite a time.

"— There we were," she said, "sitting there at the Shepherd's Pie, all set to give Larry the old heave-ho from the club. You won't believe what happened an hour or so ago. God almighty, what a scene!"

"What did happen, Anne?" he asked, watching the door in case Zvegintzov came in.

"Like I said, Dan, we were waiting there when Larry showed up and flat resigned. Gave a brilliant farewell speech too. Broke us up, I'll tell you. Absolutely broke our hearts. Anyway, next thing you know we've all forgotten we called the meeting to bounce him out. Reelected him president of TP for life. Then created a new job, managing director, so Kelly wouldn't feel put down. You should have seen Kelly's face! He was furious. Stormed right out. But what could we do? Couldn't throw out Larry after all he'd said. They're still down there, the rest of them, eating sausage and guzzling beer-"

Anne Calloway was still chattering, though he'd nearly turned his back. He could see Fufu out on the terrace, spittle shooting from his mouth, holding forth on his favorite scenario, the one that ended with South Africa in a sheet of flames.

"Things are smelling bad here, Dan." It was Willard who'd sidled up. "We've loved Tangier, really have. We've had some terrific years. But now we're glad to be getting out. Whole country's rotten to the core."

Jesus Christ!

Lake couldn't believe his eyes. Old Ashton Codd was swiping the hors d'oeuvres, stuffing a great batch of those foul tuna canapes into his pockets, then looking around to be sure he wasn't seen. Lake turned away, sick to his stomach. It was horrible, just imagining all that furry tunafish sticking to the insides of Ashton's pants. What a nuthouse! Baldeschi was feeling up the new secretary at the British Consulate. Philippa Whittle, making her first appearance since she'd been attacked, glared around with the crisp and wary look of a woman who'd suffered an awful fright.

Z! Where was the little bastard anyway? Pinning him down was like trying to nail a glob of jello to the floor. Ah there he was, the Commie punk. He'd finally shown up, was standing by the door. Now was the time to move in, trap him against the wall.