Dennis Wheatley: Black August

'I don't believe a word you say!'

'Oh, I mean it ' she stuck her chin out challengingly. 'I'm selfish conceited of my looks, and I'm sullen when I don't get what I want so now you know!'

'Then it's quite time someone took you in hand,' he said firmly, 'and I'm applying for the job.'

Her eyes dropped beneath his steady gaze, but he was forced to look up as a tall, thin man paused by their table on his way out.

'Hullo, Akers?' he said with evident annoyance. But he did not introduce his friend to Ann.

' 'Lo, Kenyon,' said the tall man lazily. 'Government's taken special powers for a three months' moratorium just had it from the House and thought you'd like to know.'

'Have they? Well, perhaps it's a good thing on the whole. At least we shall know where we are in a day or two now.'

'Optimist!' grinned Akers.

'Pessimist!' countered Kenyon. 'Have they had any news from the States yet?'

Akers's pale blue eyes went suddenly blank. 'My dear boy how should I know?'

'Well you ought to, you're in the F.O.'

'Not my department,' Akers smiled blandly as he fingered his long moustache.

'Well, have they managed to check the fire raising in Berlin then?'

'Heaven Knows! but I shouldn't worry your young head make hay my dear boy, hay while the sun shines!' Ann could not see his face and without turning his head he swivelled his eyes in her direction.

'Good night,' said Kenyon pointedly.

'God bless you we shall all meet on the steps of the guillotine, I don't doubt.' With a dry chuckle Akers sauntered slowly away.

Kenyon looked after him thoughtfully. 'How like a Foreign Office man,' he said. 'Always ready to tell you everybody else's news, but never any of their own!'

'Is he really in the Foreign Office?'

'Yes, he's a first class civil servant.'

Like you will be one day?'

'Well, not exactly. He's, quite an important person I only hope to be a minor cog in the Government wheel.'

'I couldn't help overhearing what he said. Do you think his story about the moratorium is right?'

'Certain to be, the information of men like Akers is always reliable. Have some raspberries sorry there is no cream but it is this wretched rationing of dairy produce and butcher's meat.'

'No thanks Kenyon?'

'Yes,' he looked up quickly, it was the first time she had called him by his Christian name.

'He was only joking when he talked about the guillotine or its equivalent, wasn't he?'

'Why, of course there's nothing to worry about really.'

'But I am worried now. There was something about that man's horrible cynicism that brought things home to me as nothing else has done… and you see I live on my own, so if things get really bad…' She paused with the sudden realisation that she was doing exactly as Gregory Sallust had suggested appealing for the protection of a man she hardly knew. 'Oh, I suppose I'm being silly,' she finished awkwardly.

'No, I understand,' Kenyon hesitated, not wishing to go back on his own urgent warning of a few days before but longing to reassure her. He ended by adopting the latter course. 'Just look at all these people, Ann you can see that there is no immediate cause for alarm anyway.'

She glanced round the crowded restaurant. Not a single table seemed unoccupied, and yet the floor was already packed with dancers. Everybody was drinking champagne. Waiters hurried to and fro clutching two, three, four bottles or magnums in their strong fingers, whisking away the empties and plunging the new supply into the silver buckets which held the crackling ice. Above the soft music of the band came the unceasing murmur of the thousand guests. The shaded lights drew out the rainbow colours of the women's dresses, but hid their faces, kindly for the most part, in a softer light as they smiled and laughed, fingering the pearls that took life from the bare flesh of their bosoms and playing the eternal game of make believe with their respective men.

The whole scene breathed such an atmosphere of tranquil, prosperous solidity among the ruling caste that Ann was momentarily reassured. It seemed impossible that in one awful cataclysm they might be swept away. The band lilted slowly into an old fashioned Viennese waltz set to the new rhythm. She smiled across at Kenyon.

His thoughts had been very different. He knew that this seeming prosperity was an empty, tragic sham. Two thirds of these well dressed people were already on the verge of ruin, or bankrupts; striving to forget their crushing anxieties for a few hours by reckless expenditure and forced gaiety. If the crash really came they would be swept away like thistledown, the great hotel left empty deserted a prey to prowling thieves; those ragged outcasts who now slept fitfully on the hard seats of the Embankment would take possession of the soft beds in the rooms upstairs. What would happen if the rioters proved too much for the troops he wondered; supposing a gang of roughs burst in at this moment armed Communists what then? This crowd would stampede like any other. A few gallant fellows who put up a fight would be shot down the rest scramble wildly for the entrances and the women! he could almost hear them scream as they fled down the corridors, and the rip of the silk and the satin as the invaders clutched at their dresses in a brutal endeavour to grab their jewels.

Kenyon sipped his brandy and looked at Ann. She was smiling at him. Mechanically he smiled in return; then with an almost superhuman effort lest she should sense his forebodings, he cried: 'Come on let's dance!'

The floor was crowded, but somehow they managed to edge their way into the slowly revolving mass. Kenyon's height was an advantage, Ann's head barely came up to his chin, so to steer her was easy, and her weight was so slight that he could hardly feel it unless he pressed her to him. As he glanced down he caught a glimpse of the little mole on the curve of her left cheek, and the sight of it thrilled him curiously.

'Happy?' he asked almost curtly.

'Oh, need you ask!' came the swift reply, and she seemed to cling more closely to him.

'Ann?' he whispered a few moments later. She heard him even above the throb of the band, and turned her face up to his in quick response:

'Yes, Kenyon yes?' Her eyes seemed enormous, limpid yet sparkling in the reflected light.

For once Kenyon found himself tongue tied. 'Just… just Ann!' he breathed; 'just Ann!'

How long they danced Ann could never afterwards remember. She had a vague recollection of Kenyon ordering an ice for her and a brandy and soda for himself. They did not say anything particular, and in that swaying throng waltzes or one way walks made little difference only a glower or a faster time.

Quite suddenly it came to her that the great room was two thirds empty, and she was saying that she simply must go home. He settled his bill while she got her coat and then led her out into the street.

'I shall be all right,' she said as he helped her into a taxi, 'please don't bother to see me home.'

'Nonsense,' he laughed. 'Taxi 272 Gloucester Road,' and in a moment they were seated side by side speeding along the almost deserted Strand.

As he reached out and took her hand she made no pretence of trying to avoid the gesture, but let it rest for the remainder of the journey, warm between his own. Almost impossibly soon, it seemed to her, the cab stopped she was getting out, and Kenyon was paying off the man. 'But don't you want to take him on?' she heard herself saying.

'No, pick up another later.' He stood tall, purposeful looming above her in the semi darkness as she inserted her key in the lock.

'You can't come in, you know!' she said.

'Can't I?' he squeezed her arm. 'Don't be silly, Ann I want to carry away memories of the place where you live so that I can call up pictures of you in my mind. I know there's a sitting room you told me so. You trust me, don't you?'