Trickery Read online

  He lay listening to the noise and he felt quite certain about what it was. But where were the sirens and where the guns? That German pilot certainly had a nerve coming near Brighton alone in daylight.

  The aircraft was always far away and soon the noise faded away into the distance. Later on there was another. This one, too, was far away, but there was the same deep undulating bass and the high swinging tenor and there was no mistaking it. He had heard that noise every day during the Battle.

  He was puzzled. There was a bell on the table by the bed. He reached out his hand and rang it. He heard the noise of footsteps down the corridor. The nurse came in.

  ‘Nurse, what were those aeroplanes?’

  ‘I’m sure I don’t know. I didn’t hear them. Probably fighters or bombers. I expect they were returning from France. Why, what’s the matter?’

  ‘They were Ju-88s. I’m sure they were Ju-88s. I know the sound of the engines. There were two of them. What were they doing over here?’

  The nurse came up to the side of his bed and began to straighten out the sheets and tuck them in under the mattress.

  ‘Gracious me, what things you imagine. You mustn’t worry about a thing like that. Would you like me to get you something to read?’

  ‘No, thank you.’

  She patted his pillow and brushed back the hair from his forehead with her hand.

  ‘They never come over in daylight any longer. You know that. They were probably Lancasters or Flying Fortresses.’

  ‘Nurse.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Could I have a cigarette?’

  ‘Why certainly you can.’

  She went out and came back almost at once with a packet of Players and some matches. She handed one to him and when he had put it in his mouth, she struck a match and lit it.

  ‘If you want me again,’ she said, ‘just ring the bell,’ and she went out.

  Once towards evening he heard the noise of another aircraft. It was far away, but even so he knew that it was a single-engined machine. It was going fast; he could tell that. He could not place it. It wasn’t a Spit, and it wasn’t a Hurricane. It did not sound like an American engine either. They make more noise. He did not know what it was, and it worried him greatly. Perhaps I am very ill, he thought. Perhaps I am imagining things. Perhaps I am a little delirious. I simply do not know what to think.

  That evening the nurse came in with a basin of hot water and began to wash him.

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘I hope you don’t think that we’re being bombed.’

  She had taken off his pyjama top and was soaping his right arm with a flannel. He did not answer.

  She rinsed the flannel in the water, rubbed more soap on it, and began to wash his chest.

  ‘You’re looking fine this evening,’ she said. ‘They operated on you as soon as you came in. They did a marvellous job. You’ll be all right. I’ve got a brother in the RAF,’ she added. ‘Flying bombers.’

  He said, ‘I went to school in Brighton.’

  She looked up quickly. ‘Well, that’s fine,’ she said. ‘I expect you’ll know some people in the town.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘I know quite a few.’

  She had finished washing his chest and arms. Now she turned back the bedclothes so that his left leg was uncovered. She did it in such a way that his bandaged stump remained under the sheets. She undid the cord of his pyjama trousers and took them off. There was no trouble because they had cut off the right trouser-leg so that it could not interfere with the bandages. She began to wash his left leg and the rest of his body. This was the first time he had had a bed-bath and he was embarrassed. She laid a towel under his leg and began washing his foot with the flannel. She said, ‘This wretched soap won’t lather at all. It’s the water. It’s as hard as nails.’

  He said, ‘None of the soap is very good now and, of course, with hard water it’s hopeless.’ As he said it he remembered something. He remembered the baths which he used to take at school in Brighton, in the long stone-floored bathroom which had four baths in a row. He remembered how the water was so soft that you had to take a shower afterwards to get all the soap off your body, and he remembered how the foam used to float on the surface of the water, so that you could not see your legs underneath. He remembered that sometimes they were given calcium tablets because the school doctor used to say that soft water was bad for the teeth.

  ‘In Brighton,’ he said, ‘the water isn’t …’

  He did not finish the sentence. Something had occurred to him; something so fantastic and absurd that for a moment he felt like telling the nurse about it and having a good laugh.

  She looked up. ‘The water isn’t what?’ she said.

  ‘Nothing,’ he answered. ‘I was dreaming.’

  She rinsed the flannel in the basin, wiped the soap off his leg and dried him with a towel.

  ‘It’s nice to be washed,’ he said. ‘I feel better.’ He was feeling his face with his hand. ‘I need a shave.’

  ‘We’ll do that tomorrow,’ she said. ‘Perhaps you can do it yourself then.’

  That night he could not sleep. He lay awake thinking of the Junkers 88s and of the hardness of the water. He could think of nothing else. They were Ju-88s, he said to himself. I know they were. And yet it is not possible, because they would not be flying around so low over here in broad daylight. I know that it is true and yet I know that it is impossible. Perhaps I am ill. Perhaps I am behaving like a fool and do not know what I am doing or saying. Perhaps I am delirious. For a long time he lay awake thinking these things, and once he sat up in bed and said aloud, ‘I will prove that I am not crazy. I will make a little speech about something complicated and intellectual. I will talk about what to do with Germany after the war.’ But before he had time to begin, he was asleep.

  He woke just as the first light of day was showing through the slit in the curtains over the window. The room was still dark, but he could tell that it was already beginning to get light outside. He lay looking at the grey light which was showing through the slit in the curtain and as he lay there he remembered the day before. He remembered the Junkers 88s and the hardness of the water; he remembered the large pleasant nurse and the kind doctor, and now a small grain of doubt took root in his mind and it began to grow.

  He looked around the room. The nurse had taken the roses out the night before. There was nothing except the table with a packet of cigarettes, a box of matches and an ashtray. The room was bare. It was no longer warm or friendly. It was not even comfortable. It was cold and empty and very quiet.

  Slowly the grain of doubt grew, and with it came fear, a light, dancing fear that warned but did not frighten; the kind of fear that one gets not because one is afraid, but because one feels that there is something wrong. Quickly the doubt and the fear grew so that he became restless and angry, and when he touched his forehead with his hand, he found that it was damp with sweat. He knew then that he must do something; that he must find some way of proving to himself that he was either right or wrong, and he looked up and saw again the window and the green curtains. From where he lay, that window was right in front of him, but it was fully ten yards away. Somehow he must reach it and look out. The idea became an obsession with him and soon he could think of nothing except the window. But what about his leg? He put his hand underneath the bedclothes and felt the thick bandaged stump which was all that was left on the right-hand side. It seemed all right. It didn’t hurt. But it would not be easy.

  He sat up. Then he pushed the bedclothes aside and put his left leg on the floor. Slowly, carefully, he swung his body over until he had both hands on the floor as well; then he was out of bed, kneeling on the carpet. He looked at the stump. It was very short and thick, covered with bandages. It was beginning to hurt and he could feel it throbbing. He wanted to collapse, lie down on the carpet and do nothing, but he knew that he must go on.

  With two arms and one leg, he crawled over towards the window. He would reach forward as far
as he could with his arms, then he would give a little jump and slide his left leg along after them. Each time he did it, it jarred his wound so that he gave a soft grunt of pain, but he continued to crawl across the floor on two hands and one knee. When he got to the window he reached up, and one at a time he placed both hands on the sill. Slowly he raised himself up until he was standing on his left leg. Then quickly he pushed aside the curtains and looked out.

  He saw a small house with a grey tiled roof standing alone beside a narrow lane, and immediately behind it there was a ploughed field. In front of the house there was an untidy garden, and there was a green hedge separating the garden from the lane. He was looking at the hedge when he saw the sign. It was just a piece of board nailed to the top of a short pole, and because the hedge had not been trimmed for a long time, the branches had grown out around the sign so that it seemed almost as though it had been placed in the middle of the hedge. There was something written on the board with white paint. He pressed his head against the glass of the window, trying to read what it said. The first letter was a G, he could see that. The second was an A, and the third was an R. One after another he managed to see what the letters were. There were three words, and slowly he spelled the letters out aloud to himself as he managed to read them. G-A-R-D-E A-U C-H-I-E-N, Garde au chien. That is what it said.

  He stood there balancing on one leg and holding tightly to the edges of the window sill with his hands, staring at the sign and at the whitewashed lettering of the words. For a moment he could think of nothing at all. He stood there looking at the sign, repeating the words over and over to himself. Slowly he began to realize the full meaning of the thing. He looked up at the cottage and at the ploughed field. He looked at the small orchard on the left of the cottage and he looked at the green countryside beyond. ‘So this is France,’ he said. ‘I am in France.’

  Now the throbbing in his right thigh was very great. It felt as though someone was pounding the end of his stump with a hammer and suddenly the pain became so intense that it affected his head. For a moment he thought he was going to fall. Quickly he knelt down again, crawled back to the bed and hoisted himself in. He pulled the bed-clothes over himself and lay back on the pillow, exhausted. He could still think of nothing at all except the small sign by the hedge and the ploughed field and the orchard. It was the words on the sign that he could not forget.

  It was some time before the nurse came in. She came carrying a basin of hot water and she said, ‘Good morning, how are you today?’

  He said, ‘Good morning, Nurse.’

  The pain was still great under the bandages, but he did not wish to tell this woman anything. He looked at her as she busied herself with getting the washing things ready. He looked at her more carefully now. Her hair was very fair. She was tall and big-boned and her face seemed pleasant. But there was something a little uneasy about her eyes. They were never still. They never looked at anything for more than a moment and they moved too quickly from one place to another in the room. There was something about her movements also. They were too sharp and nervous to go well with the casual manner in which she spoke.

  She set down the basin, took off his pyjama top and began to wash him.

  ‘Did you sleep well?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good,’ she said. She was washing his arms and his chest.

  ‘I believe there’s someone coming down to see you from the Air Ministry after breakfast,’ she went on. ‘They want a report or something. I expect you know all about it. How you got shot down and all that. I won’t let him stay long, so don’t worry.’

  He did not answer. She finished washing him and gave him a toothbrush and some toothpowder. He brushed his teeth, rinsed his mouth and spat the water out into the basin.

  Later she brought him his breakfast on a tray, but he did not want to eat. He was still feeling weak and sick and he wished only to lie still and think about what had happened. And there was a sentence running through his head. It was a sentence which Johnny, the intelligence officer of his squadron, always repeated to the pilots every day before they went out. He could see Johnny now, leaning against the wall of the dispersal hut with his pipe in his hand, saying, ‘And if they get you, don’t forget, just your name, rank and number. Nothing else. For God’s sake, say nothing else.’

  ‘There you are,’ she said as she put the tray on his lap. ‘I’ve got you an egg. Can you manage all right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She stood beside the bed. ‘Are you feeling all right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good. If you want another egg I might be able to get you one.’

  ‘This is all right.’

  ‘Well, just ring the bell if you want any more.’ And she went out.

  He had just finished eating, when the nurse came in again.

  She said, ‘Wing Commander Roberts is here. I’ve told him that he can only stay for a few minutes.’

  She beckoned with her hand and the wing commander came in.

  ‘Sorry to bother you like this,’ he said.

  He was an ordinary RAF officer, dressed in a uniform which was a little shabby. He wore wings and a DFC. He was fairly tall and thin with plenty of black hair. His teeth, which were irregular and widely spaced, stuck out a little even when he closed his mouth. As he spoke he took a printed form and a pencil from his pocket and he pulled up a chair and sat down.

  ‘How are you feeling?’

  There was no answer.

  ‘Tough luck about your leg. I know how you feel. I hear you put up a fine show before they got you.’

  The man in the bed was lying quite still, watching the man in the chair.

  The man in the chair said, ‘Well, let’s get this stuff over. I’m afraid you’ll have to answer a few questions so that I can fill in this combat report. Let me see now, first of all, what was your squadron?’

  The man in the bed did not move. He looked straight at the wing commander and he said, ‘My name is Peter Williamson, my rank is squadron leader and my number is nine seven two four five seven.’

  The Champion of the World

  First published in the New Yorker, 31 January 1959

  All day, in between serving customers, we had been crouching over the table in the office of the filling-station, preparing the raisins. They were plump and soft and swollen from being soaked in water, and when you nicked them with a razor-blade the skin sprang open and the jelly stuff inside squeezed out as easily as you could wish.

  But we had a hundred and ninety-six of them to do altogether and the evening was nearly upon us before we had finished.

  ‘Don’t they look marvellous!’ Claud cried, rubbing his hands together hard. ‘What time is it, Gordon?’

  ‘Just after five.’

  Through the window we could see a station-wagon pulling up at the pumps with a woman at the wheel and about eight children in the back eating ice-creams.

  ‘We ought to be moving soon,’ Claud said. ‘The whole thing’ll be a washout if we don’t arrive before sunset, you realize that.’ He was getting twitchy now. His face had the same flushed and pop-eyed look it got before a dog-race or when there was a date with Clarice in the evening.

  We both went outside and Claud gave the woman the number of gallons she wanted. When she had gone, he remained standing in the middle of the driveway squinting anxiously up at the sun which was now only the width of a man’s hand above the line of trees along the crest of the ridge on the far side of the valley.

  ‘All right,’ I said. ‘Lock up.’

  He went quickly from pump to pump, securing each nozzle in its holder with a small padlock.

  ‘You’d better take off that yellow pullover,’ he said.

  ‘Why should I?’

  ‘You’ll be shining like a bloody beacon out there in the moonlight.’

  ‘I’ll be all right.’

  ‘You will not,’ he said. ‘Take it off, Gordon, please. I’ll see you in three minutes.’ He disappeared into
his caravan behind the filling-station, and I went indoors and changed my yellow pullover for a blue one.

  When we met again outside, Claud was dressed in a pair of black trousers and a dark-green turtleneck sweater. On his head he wore a brown cloth cap with the peak pulled down low over his eyes, and he looked like an apache actor out of a nightclub.

  ‘What’s under there?’ I asked, seeing the bulge at his waistline.

  He pulled up his sweater and showed me two thin but very large white cotton sacks which were bound neat and tight around his belly. ‘To carry the stuff,’ he said darkly.

  ‘I see.’

  ‘Let’s go,’ he said.

  ‘I still think we ought to take the car.’

  ‘It’s too risky. They’ll see it parked.’

  ‘But it’s over three miles up to that wood.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘And I suppose you realize we can get six months in the clink if they catch us.’

  ‘You never told me that.’

  ‘Didn’t I?’

  ‘I’m not coming,’ I said. ‘It’s not worth it.’

  ‘The walk will do you good, Gordon. Come on.’

  It was a calm sunny evening with little wisps of brilliant white cloud hanging motionless in the sky, and the valley was cool and very quiet as the two of us began walking together along the grass verge on the side of the road that ran between the hills towards Oxford.

  ‘You got the raisins?’ Claud asked.

  ‘They’re in my pocket.’

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Marvellous.’

  Ten minutes later we turned left off the main road into a narrow lane with high hedges on either side and from now on it was all uphill.