Lawrence Durrell: White Eagles Over Serbia

That afternoon he spent shopping at the Army and Navy Stores, filling out the little green invoice he had been given, and marking up his purchases to Foreign Office Special Orders Department. He treated himself to a new sleeping-bag, made of fine kapok-stuffed quilting, and a supply of fishing-line which he put on the same expense account. He was beginning to feel absurdly light-hearted. This feeling, he realized, would gradually disappear as he neared the theatre of operations. That evening he treated himself to a dinner at Scott’s and a theatre, and when he reached his club surprised himself by staying up till past midnight reading a travel-book. He was normally an early bird. But soon these civilized pleasures would be out of his reach and he wanted to enjoy them to the full.

The following morning he walked in the grey bedrizzled streets, drinking in the smells of London, to the river. In the armoury at Millbank he presented his service order and was allowed to play about with pistols of every calibre and shape. Henslowe, the artificer, followed him about benevolently, showing him his wares with absurd pride. “You never turned in that Luger you borrowed, Colonel Methuen,” he said reproachfully. “I have to answer for it to the War Office.” Methuen apologized. “It’s lying in a swamp somewhere,” he explained, and was immediately given an elaborate form to fill up with a description of how the weapon had been lost. “Just put L on D (lost on duty),” said Henslowe sorrowfully. “Now you say you want one with a silencer.”

“Small,” said Methuen. “Pocketable.”

“There’s a new point three eight,” said Henslowe regretfully, but with the air of a haberdasher finding the right size of neck and wrist for a man of unusual shape. “Only for heaven’s sake bring it back! You see,” he added, “it’s still on the experimental list. First time they’ve fitted a silencer of this pattern to a point three eight. It’s a sweet weapon, werry sweet.” He pronounced the word “weepon”. He found the pistol in question and pressed it upon his visitor, holding it by the barrel. It was small but ugly looking. “The balance is not all it might be, sir. But it’s a werry sweet weapon.”

They tried it downstairs on the miniature range. “It’ll do me very well,” said Methuen. “I must say it hardly makes any noise at all.”

“Just a large sniff, sir. Like a man with a cold.”

“Send it to me,” said Methuen, and Henslowe inclined his head sorrowfully with the air of a man who is glad to serve, but who feels that he is in danger of losing a much-cherished possession. “You won’t leave it in a swamp, will you, sir?” Methuen promised faithfully not to. “It’s hard when we get so few nice things these days.”

“I know.”

On his way to the Shop he could not resist a last look round the Tate Gallery with its harvest of rippling canvases bathed in the cold grey light of a London sky.

Dombey was sitting in his office dictating from a sheaf of papers into the mouthpiece of his dictaphone. “Come in,” he said, switching off, as Methuen put his head round the door. “Come in and tell me all the news.”

“Everything is in order. I came to give you an ultimatum: if I go to Yugoslavia I’m damn well going into the mountains to fish. If you want me to stay in Belgrade then the trip is off, and you can find someone else.”

A crooked smile spread itself over Dombey’s countenance. “My dear fellow,” he said, “I should never stand in the way of a trouter. Never.”

“Well, so long as that is understood.”

“You are a free agent. If you think that you want to investigate the place where Peter met his death … who am I to say you nay?”

Methuen strode off down the corridor to the despatch-room and arranged for his parcel of effects to be delivered to the Foreign Office bag-room. They would be sent on to him under seal, while he himself was to travel in the character of the innocent Judson, the army accountant. That gave him an idea. He rang Dombey. “This man Judson,” he said. “Hist,” said Dombey. “Not on the phone. Come to my office.” Methuen returned to find his chief glaring indignantly at a minute written in the round feminine hand of the Chief Secretary. “In the past seven days,” he read out, “we have monitored all phone conversations in the SOq building. Out of a hundred conversations ten concerned confidential matters. This must stop.” He sighed. “It is perfectly intolerable. We are back in the Middle Ages. We have to use the phone for something … what were you asking?”

“Judson,” said Methuen. “What does he look like?”

“Like an accident. Adenoids. Spots, Flat feet. Constipation. Colds. Heavy underwear. Horn-rimmed spectacles.”

“All right. All right.”

“Passport section will give you all the information you need about him. They’ve fixed up his passport to fit you.”

They had done more than this; they had obliged him with a Yugoslav ration card, an identity card, and a sheaf of points which would, all things being equal, enable him to purchase enough textiles for two shirts in Belgrade. It was quick work. Methuen retired to an empty office and put in a toll call to Ravenswood, the little country pub in which he spent all his holidays. Septimus answered almost at once with his great growling voice of welcome. “But of course, Colonel Methuen; of course we’ve room. Pity it’s only for a night though — can’t you make it longer?”

“I wish I could,” said Methuen.

“Never mind,” said Septimus. “I’ll see that there’s something worth eating for dinner. What time will you be in?”

“About seven-thirty.”

“I’ll send the pony trap.”

“Don’t worry. I’ll walk through the fields.”

Septimus groaned; nobody over eighteen stone can bear to hear the word “walk”.

“I’d rather you than me,” he said.

That night Methuen left the little station of Ravenswood and walked across the wet fields to The Parson’s Nose, already preoccupied with the problems of his mission. Septimus and his buxom wife greeted and made much of him and he found that they had given him the best bedroom.

He spent a happy hour playing darts in the tap-room with his village acquaintances before confronting the kind of dinner for which Septimus was famous. Then he read for a while before turning in, full of an unhurried contentment. The book was Walden which he never tired of; a little India-paper edition which he always carried when he was out in the wilds and out of which he had evolved a laborious private code for keeping in touch with Dombey. Indeed he had first selected the book as a code-book, only to fall under its spell after many re-readings in solitary places.

He lay for a long time that night in the darkness, listening to the deep stillness of the English countryside and gathering himself together for the new mission which he knew would tax his resources to the utmost. Somewhere a nightingale sang softly, with a magical lazy clarity. The scent of honeysuckle came in at the open windows, and he could hear the soft whisper of rain in the leaves outside the window-sill. Ah! the familiar luxury of England! Why was one such a fool, to trade it against the chances of a nameless grave in an Asiatic swamp or on a Bosnian mountain?

For a wild moment he thought of ringing Dombey up and telling him: “I’ve changed my mind. I’m going on to the retired list for good. I’ll stay right here in Ravenswood until I die.” The longing was so great that he even rose on one elbow in the dark and reached out towards the telephone by his bed; but he knew in his heart of hearts that he would never lift the receiver off its hook. He must go on this new mission. Yet to assuage the thought of telephoning he got out of bed and rang up Boris. The wig-maker’s voice sounded remote and crackly, and was half-submerged in a buzz of talk. “I have some friends here,” he explained. “But your fancy dress is delivered this morning. I hope it fits you. Sbogom, my dear fellow.”