Ian Hocking - Flashback

Don Bennett was a short man who wore a suit with slightly baggy trousers, the English style. He was underweight, too, and Cory had no difficulty imagining him as an anxious and strict director. As Cory approached, Bennett switched from placing his knuckles on his desk to putting his hands on his hips until finally he reached out to shake hands. He was about forty, but his eyes were cynical and the constant motion of his body suggested a man bothered by time.

‘Constantin Wittenbacher,’ said Cory. ‘I am entirely at your service, Air Vice-Marshal.’

‘Please sit down.’

Cory tapped his cane against his shin. ‘I would prefer to stand.’

With an abrupt, interrogative tone, Bennett said, ‘German, are you?’

Cory knew that his worth was being weighed. There was an openness about Bennett’s expression that suggested this was nothing more than, say, an enquiry about Cory’s eligibility for a drinking club. Cory’s augmentations offered a numerical index of Bennett’s credulity by combining blink rate, vocal stress, and skin conductance, but he ignored these data. This came down to tradecraft. He had to win his support. He wove his words from the fictional threads of Wittenbacher, whose half-memories informed his own.

‘Air Vice-Marshal, my name is Colonel Constantin Martin Wittenbacher. I was formerly with fighter squadrons 26, 27 and 44.’

Bennett tipped his head back and opened his mouth as though this exactly confirmed his suspicion. He walked around the desk and stood next to Cory.

‘What did you fly?’

‘The Henschel H-123, Bf 109, and the Messerschmidt Me 262.’

Bennett leaned forward. ‘The 262? There’s a plane I’d like to fly.’

‘I flew it under Nowotny,’ said Cory. ‘It was a beautiful machine.’

‘How many successes, Colonel?’

‘Ninety-nine.’

‘One off a century.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘Well,’ said Bennett. The interest in his eyes had begun to fade. He walked around his desk and collapsed in his reclining chair. ‘What brings you to Buenos Aires?’

‘Some friends connected me with Peron’s associates in Berlin. Apparently, the man wants to build an air force. I was invited here to act as a consultant.’

‘A bit ruddy late for Peron to start up,’ Bennett said. He checked himself, looked for Cory’s reaction, and continued in a more confidential manner. ‘For all the favours we’ve done Argentina over the years, they were too bone idle to help us out when we needed them. Peron is a tricky customer, though. I’ve met him. He needs to learn some manners. Our problem is that Peron is well aware of our island’s taste for Argentine beef.’

‘Indeed.’

Bennett stood. Cory let the haughty eyes of the AVM sweep him from brogues to oiled hair-parting. Bennett did not blink easily. Just as Cory began to fear his Plan B had not worked—perhaps, after all, he would have to fight his way to Harkes and damn the consequences—Bennett opened a drawer and took out a bottle of Glenkinchie and two shot glasses. He poured two fingers’ worth in each.

‘What shall we drink to?’ said Bennett.

‘How about the elephant in the room?’

‘I don’t know the expression.’

‘It means that I hope you will help me with something very important as-yet unsaid.’

‘Go on.’

Bennett looked over his tumbler as he tipped it back. Cory sank the whisky too and released a contented breath. He put the glass on the desk and turned it, absently, one quarter. He drew upon a notion of Harkes, his quarry. Empathy came with surprising ease.

‘A man has followed me from Lisbon. He wishes me dead.’ How fluently the lies ran. How closely they brushed the truth. ‘He is working for a woman, a widow, who believes I killed her husband during the war.’

‘Well?’ asked Bennett.

Cory looked up. Bennett’s eyes had resumed their interested twinkle.

‘We scrapped over Leiden. Both our aircraft were hit, and we made landings less than a mile apart. I found him first and shot him, but not before he had put a bullet in my leg.’ Cory tapped his shin with his cane once more.

‘British?’ asked Bennett.

‘A Pole.’

Bennett sipped his whisky. ‘Tell me more about your pursuer.’

‘The private detective? He is a… a schrecklich… a formidable man. He found my hotel this morning. I fled in the clothes I stand in. My one hope is to escape to Chile.’

‘Do you have your passport?’

‘I do not, sir.’

‘Money?’

‘Gold sovereigns inside my belt. I have enough for whatever I need.’

Bennett waved his hand. It was enough to dismiss the thought of a bribe. Clearly, he considered himself above this. He collected the glasses and returned them to the desk drawer.

‘Paperwork is the plumage of bureaucrats, Colonel, and I don’t intend to spend my life preening it for them. A phone call to our Chilean office will work the requisite wonders. Are you prepared to help me in return?’

‘If I can.’

Bennett opened his blotter. He placed a sheet of headed paper on it and began to write.

‘When you reach Santiago,’ he said, not looking up, ‘you will be met by a man called Jack Leche. He’ll take care of you. Nobody, officially, needs to know of your presence aboard CS-59.’

‘Jack Leche?’

‘Let me be quite clear,’ said Bennett. He stopped writing, looking up this time. ‘His Majesty’s government has an interest in Chile. If you were to work for the Chileans in an advisory capacity, perhaps within their military, I’m sure any information you might pass back to us would be viewed appreciatively. I’m aware that you could disappear over there, even buy your way to Brazil, but I judge you to be a man of honour who will consider himself much obliged.’

‘Do you think a man of honour would spy?’

‘That,’ said Bennett, returning to his blotter, ‘is an excellent question.’

Miss Evans was a capable, pretty young woman in a uniform that reminded Cory of the British WAAF. Her designation ‘Star Girl’—the BSAA equivalent of stewardess—did not match her countenance, which was part matron, part butler. The impression she made on Cory was striking, to be sure, but this impression faded as the pair approached the passenger lounge. Harkes had to be inside. Cory knew that he carried enhancements that were rudimentary compared to I-Core. All things being equal, Cory would best him. But Harkes knew this, and unless he was stupid—which, as a scientist, Harkes was not—he would assume the advantage by other means.

As Miss Evans opened the door to the passenger lounge, Cory rose to the balls of his feet. He made a flash-bulb inventory of the passengers and referenced the passenger manifest he had glimpsed on the rack in the Star Girls’ office.

Miss Evans said, ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we will be boarding in a few minutes’ time. This means a slight delay, but Captain Cook is confident we can regain the time during flight. Please may I introduce Herr Wittenbacher?’

With a perfect recollection for names, Miss Evans presented each of the passengers. First was a Middle Eastern man silhouetted against the glass wall. His hands were clasped at his back and he nodded to Cory without expression. ‘Mr Casis Said Atalah,’ said Miss Evans. At an upright piano, stroking notes, was a gentleman with playful eyes. ‘Herr Harald Pagh.’ She turned to another who sat in a wicker recliner smoking a drooped pipe. ‘Mr Jack Gooderham.’ A fourth man, ‘Mr Peter Young,’ was playing cards with an elderly woman, ‘Frau Martha Horniche.’

None of the four men resembled Harkes, and Cory, slipping into the infrared, saw no evidence of twentieth-century plastic surgery. Harkes might have altered his appearance before he escaped, but Cory had not been apprised of this during his briefing, and he discounted the possibility.