‘It’d be nothing more than he deserves,’ said Tammy, ‘if you refused to have anything more to do with him.’
‘I’m afraid I’m stuck with him,’ said Hugo.
‘He’s a murderer.’
‘Not proved.’
‘It’s obvious. He knew they’d put a bomb in his car and he faked things so that poor little Urban walked into it.’
‘I didn’t know you knew Mr. Nussbaum.’
‘I’d met him. He came along to make his mark with Bob. Arms salesmen always keep in with the Department of the Exterior. I thought he was a nice little man. He told me all about his wife and children.’
‘Watch the fish. It’s going to fall off that stick in a moment.’
It was a very small shark. They had caught it on their way over to the island. With its scrawny neck, its bulging stomach and its sad eyes it looked like an advertisement for Oxfam.
Tammy had constructed the fire out of driftwood, showing remarkable expertise.
‘I learned to do this sort of thing at Summer Camp,’ she said. ‘It’s an American institution. Any parents who can afford it, shoot their children off to one at the beginning of the long vacation. It does both parties good, I guess. It gets the children out of their parents’ hair for a while and teaches them how to get along with other people. For the first twenty-four hours you were homesick, then you met some marvellous boy—’
She sighed, and rotated the small shark. She had spitted it on a long stick, balanced between two uprights. It was beginning to go brown at the edges.
‘Some marvellous boy—?’
‘His name was Homer. I was ten and he was fourteen. I thought he was the most perfect thing I’d ever seen. Like a young god, or something.’ She sighed again. ‘I met him last year. He’s in an office on Wall Street, and he’d already begun to get fat. Would you believe it?’
‘I expect there were others.’
‘Certainly.’ She looked at him out of the corner of her cat’s eyes. The first time I was actually seduced was on my fifteenth birthday.’
‘I’m surprised it didn’t happen before.’
‘It was meant to make you feel grown-up. It just made me feel messy.’
‘Watch it,’ said Hugo. The fish had canted dangerously.
‘Tell me something,’ said Tammy when the fish had been rescued. ‘What are you aiming to get out of this?’
‘Out of what?’ Hugo’s mind was entirely on her.
‘Out of coming out here. You had a lovely job, plenty of money, and a lot of lovely girls to play around with—’
‘The lovely job had finished. I had a bit of money, but certainly not enough to keep me warm for the rest of my life. And as for the lovely girls, if you think it’s fun making love to a girl with four cameras, two sound booms, and a studio full of extras leering at you, then think again.’
‘O.K. I’ll give you that. But why Umran?’
‘It’s a job. Come to that, why are you here?’
‘It’s a job.’
‘Not a very suitable job for a girl, I should have thought.’
‘That’s where you’re wrong. What you see here is no ordinary girl. It’s a dedicated, case-hardened agent of the U.S. State Department. And anyway, there are jobs girls can do and men can’t.’
‘Such as?’
‘Such as, for instance, if Prince Hussein should wish for a consort. I’d be right in line for the situation. It’s been suggested in certain quarters already.’
Hugo sat bolt upright and said, in tones of outrage, ‘Who has suggested it?’
The young man hinted at it. He implied that his father would not be averse.’
‘And Bob would let you do it?’
‘If it cemented the entente, he would surely regard it as my dooty.’
Hugo lay back again. He said, ‘I thought for a moment you were serious.’
Tammy said nothing. She had buried both of her small, square feet in the sand and was twiddling them round until the tops of her toes appeared like little pink and white sea creatures coming up for air. Finally she said, ‘Tell me something, Hugo. If there really was trouble and we cleared out by kind permission of the Officer Commanding United States Battle Cruiser Archimandrite, would you come along?’
‘I’d like to, but I don’t really see how I could.’
‘Bad for the Tiger image?’
‘Don’t talk rubbish.’
‘What then? British phlegm. The stiff upper-lip. I say, old man, do you think those Wuzzies are going to attack up? Can’t, old boy. It’s the fourth of June. Everybody knows the fourth of June’s a holiday.’
‘That sort of thing went out thirty years ago.’
‘There must be a little of it left,’ said Tammy wistfully. ‘In odd holes and corners. Don’t tell me the last pair of spats has been laid away in moth-balls, the last monocle broken.’
‘If you want to hear the true voice of Britain,’ said Hugo, rolling over on to his stomach and reaching for his discarded jacket, ‘I will read you the text of a message received at eighteen hundred hours last night. It is marked Top Secret, so I am committing a serious offence against the Official Secrets Act by revealing the contents to you. No matter.’ He adjusted an imaginary monocle in his right eye and read out, ‘Your telephonic communication timed fourteen thirty hours local time on April 26 and your request transmitted in that message now considered by all relevant authorities here. Stop. Concluded that on balance of politico-diplomatic considerations and taking account all factors transmitted you verbally by department Foreign Office concerned not presently desirable initiate or suggest any visit armed forces from your Southern neighbours to you. Stop. Should situation change will inform you forthwith.’
‘What does it mean?”
‘It means “no”. It took them seventy expensive words to say it, but it means “no”.’
‘I can’t make out that last bit at all about them telling you if the situation changed. You’d know about that before they did, I should think.’
‘I agree. Palmerston would have sent a gun boat. Or a message saying, “Not bloody likely, chum. You stick it out.” Now we have to put in slush about relevant departments and politico-diplomatic considerations.’
‘It’s not just you,’ said Tammy. ‘We all do it. The U.S. State Department is just as bad. Worse, I guess. They’d have taken a hundred words to say it, and put in something about the man on the spot exercising independent judgement and a prayer for the United Nations. That would be to cover them, if things went badly wrong.’
‘I bet the Russians don’t behave like that.’
‘The Russians! My goodness, have you ever seen one of their messages. They’d have been twice as long again. They’re terrified of saying anything which isn’t authorised in writing by some superior authority.’
‘Have you ever seen a Russian message?’
Tammy looked a shade embarrassed, and said, ‘Once or twice. In the line of duty. What I really wanted to say was that you mustn’t think too badly of Bob. He has to keep in wireless touch, through the navy, with his bosses in Washington. He really is tied by the leg.’
‘Did I sound as though I was thinking badly of him yesterday evening?’
‘I was waiting for you to insert your fingers in the top pocket of your vest, extract a white feather, and hand it to him.’
‘He could have handed it right back,’ said Hugo. ‘I’m a terrified coward. Do you think that fish is ready?’
‘I guess it’s as ready as it’s ever going to be.’ Tammy removed the stick, and tilted the incinerated lumps of shark on to two cardboard plates which they had brought with them. They tasted surprisingly good. The rest of the meal was tunny-fish sandwiches made with unleavened bread, apples and a bottle of red wine bought from Moharram. It was labelled, ‘Jolly-grape – guaranteed produce of many leading French vineyards.’
After the meal Hugo buried the bottle and the debris and said, ‘I’m going to sleep,’ and in a few minutes was asleep. Tammy propped herself up on one elbow and took a long and thoughtful look at him. He slept easily, on his right side. His face was a bit red, but he was not sweating or snoring.
When Hugo woke up, he rolled over, saw the remains of the fire, remembered where he was and sat up. There was no sign of Tammy. Then he saw her red head, bobbing in the water fifty yards out to sea. She swam leisurely towards him, and got to her feet as the ground shelved towards the island. He then saw that she was naked.
She said, ‘I couldn’t put on a bathing costume. The water’s heaven. Just the right temperature, and like it was full of bath salts—’ She added politely, ‘I hope you don’t mind.’
‘Not a scrap.’
She spread a towel in the dip in the sand, disposed herself on it, and said, ‘Now that you have seen all of me, there’s not much point in covering anything up, is there?’
‘None at all,’ said Hugo. He started to take off the cotton singlet which, with a pair of shorts, was all he was wearing at that moment.
‘Were you planning to have a bathe?’
‘I had more immediate plans,’ said Hugo thickly.
‘Involving me?’
‘Involving you.’
‘Well, all right. Only one request from this girl. Do everything terribly slowly. I’ve always found that the prologue is better than the play.’
‘All right,’ said Hugo. He wished he could have sounded as cool and sophisticated about it as she did.
It was at this precise moment that they heard, muffled by the distance but horribly distinct, the boom of a gun.