They Came to Baghdad Read online

  What then was Richard Baker to do with it?

  He could pass it on to Clayton, as His Britannic Majesty’s representative.

  Or he could keep it in his own possession until such time as Carmichael claimed it?

  After a few minutes’ reflection he decided to do the latter.

  But first he took certain precautions.

  Tearing a blank half sheet of paper off an old letter, he sat down to compose a reference for a lorry driver in much the same terms, but using different wording—if this message was a code that took care of that—though it was possible, of course, that there was a message written in some kind of invisible ink.

  Then he smeared his own composition with dust from his shoes—rubbed it in his hands, folded and refolded it—until it gave a reasonable appearance of age and dirt.

  Then he crumpled it up and put it into his pocket. The original he stared at for some time whilst he considered and rejected various possibilities.

  Finally, with a slight smile, he folded and refolded it until he had a small oblong. Taking a stick of plasticine (without which he never travelled) out of his bag, he first wrapped his packet in oilskin cut from his sponge-bag, then encased it in plasticine. This done he rolled and patted out the plasticine till he had a smooth surface. On this he rolled out an impression from a cylinder seal that he had with him.

  He studied the result with grim appreciation.

  It showed a beautifully carved design of the Sun God Shamash armed with the Sword of Justice.

  “Let’s hope that’s a good omen,” he said to himself.

  That evening, when he looked in the pocket of the coat he had worn in the morning, the screwed-up paper had gone.

  Seven

  Life, thought Victoria, life at last! Sitting in her seat at Airways Terminal there had come the magic moment when the words “Passengers for Cairo, Baghdad and Tehran, take your places in the bus, please,” had been uttered.

  Magic names, magic words. Devoid of glamour to Mrs. Hamilton Clipp who, as far as Victoria could make out, had spent a large portion of her life jumping from boats into aeroplanes and from aeroplanes into trains with brief intervals at expensive hotels in between. But to Victoria they were a marvellous change from the oft-repeated phrases, “Take down, please, Miss Jones.” “This letter’s full of mistakes. You’ll have to type it again, Miss Jones.” “The kettle’s boiling, ducks, just make the tea, will you.” “I know where you can get the most marvellous perm.” Trivial boring everyday happenings! And now: Cairo, Baghdad, Tehran—all the romance of the glorious East (and Edward at the end of it)….

  Victoria returned to earth to hear her employer, whom she had already diagnosed as a nonstop talker, concluding a series of remarks by saying:

  “—and nothing really clean if you know what I mean. I’m always very very careful what I eat. The filth of the streets and the bazaars you wouldn’t believe. And the unhygienic rags the people wear. And some of the toilets—why, you just couldn’t call them toilets at all!”

  Victoria listened dutifully to these depressing remarks, but her own sense of glamour remained undimmed. Dirt and germs meant nothing in her young life. They arrived at Heathrow and she assisted Mrs. Clipp to alight from the bus. She was already in charge of passports, tickets, money, etc.

  “My,” said that lady, “it certainly is a comfort to have you with me, Miss Jones. I just don’t know what I’d have done if I’d had to travel alone.”

  Travelling by air, Victoria thought, was rather like being taken on a school treat. Brisk teachers, kind but firm, were at hand to shepherd you at every turn. Air hostesses, in trim uniform with the authority of nursery governesses dealing with feeble minded children explained kindly just what you were to do. Victoria almost expected them to preface their remarks with “Now, children.”

  Tired-looking young gentlemen behind desks extended weary hands to check passports, to inquire intimately of money and jewellery. They managed to induce a sense of guilt in those questioned. Victoria, suggestible by nature, knew a sudden longing to describe her one meagre brooch as a diamond tiara value ten thousand pounds, just to see the expression on the bored young man’s face. Thoughts of Edward restrained her.

  The various barriers passed, they sat down to wait once more in a large room giving directly on the aerodrome. Outside the roar of a plane being revved up gave the proper background. Mrs. Hamilton Clipp was now happily engaged in making a running commentary on their fellow travellers.

  “Aren’t those two little children just too cute for words? But what an ordeal to travel alone with a couple of children. British, I guess they are. That’s a well cut suit the mother has on. She looks kind of tired, though. That’s a good-looking man—rather Latin looking, I’d say. What a loud check that man has on—I’d call it very bad taste. Business, I guess. That man over there’s a Dutchman, he was just ahead of us at the controls. That family over there is either Turkish or Persian, I should say. There don’t seem to be any Americans. I guess they go mostly Pan American. I’d say those three men talking together are Oil, wouldn’t you? I just love looking at people and wondering about them. Mr. Clipp says to me I’ve got real yen for human nature. It seems to me just natural to take an interest in your fellow creatures. Wouldn’t you say that mink coat over there cost every bit of three thousand dollars?”

  Mrs. Clipp sighed. Having duly appraised her fellow travellers she became restless.

  “I’d like to know what we are waiting for like this. That plane’s revved up four times. We’re all here. Why can’t they get on with things? They’re certainly not keeping to schedule.”

  “Would you like a cup of coffee, Mrs. Clipp? I see there is a buffet at the end of the room.”

  “Why, no, thank you, Miss Jones. I had coffee before I started, and my stomach feels too unsettled right now to take anything more. What are we waiting for, I’d like to know?”

  Her question seemed to be answered almost before the words were out of her mouth.

  The door leading from the corridor out of the Customs and Passport Department swung open with a rush and a tall man came through with the effect of a gust of wind. Air officials of the line hovered around him. Two large canvas sacks sealed were carried by an officer of BOAC.

  Mrs. Clipp sat up with alacrity.

  “He’s certainly some big noise,” she remarked.

  “And knows it,” thought Victoria.

  There was something of calculated sensationalism about the late traveller. He wore a kind of dark-grey travelling cloak with a capacious hood at the back. On his head was what was in essence a wide sombrero, but in light grey. He had silver grey curling hair, worn rather long, and a beautiful silver grey moustache curling up at the ends. The effect was that of a handsome stage bandit. Victoria, who disliked theatrical men who posed, looked at him with disapproval.

  The Air officials were, she noted with displeasure, all over him.

  “Yes, Sir Rupert.” “Of course, Sir Rupert.” “The plane is leaving immediately, Sir Rupert.”

  With a swirl of his voluminous cloak, Sir Rupert passed out through the door leading to the aerodrome. The door swung to behind him with vehemence.

  “Sir Rupert,” murmured Mrs. Clipp. “Now who would he be, I wonder?”

  Victoria shook her head, though she had a vague feeling that the face and general appearance were not unknown to her.

  “Somebody important in your Government,” suggested Mrs. Clipp.

  “I shouldn’t think so,” said Victoria.

  The few members of the Government she had ever seen had impressed her as men anxious to apologize for being alive. Only on platforms did they spring into pompous and didactic life.

  “Now then, please,” said the smart nursery governess air hostess. “Take your seats in the plane. This way. As quickly as you can, please.”

  Her attitude implied that a lot of dawdling children had been keeping the patient grown-ups waiting.

  Everybody filed out onto
the aerodrome.

  The great plane was waiting, its engine ticking over like the satisfied purring of a gigantic lion.

  Victoria and a steward helped Mrs. Clipp on board and settled her in her seat. Victoria sat next to her on the aisle. Not until Mrs. Clipp was comfortably ensconced, and Victoria had fastened her safety-belt, did the girl have leisure to observe that in front of them was sitting the great man.

  The doors closed. A few seconds later the plane began to move slowly along the ground.

  “We’re really going,” thought Victoria in ecstasy. “Oh, isn’t it frightening? Suppose it never gets up off the ground? Really, I don’t see how it can!”

  During what seemed an age the plane taxied along the aerodrome, then it turned slowly round and stopped. The engines rose to a ferocious roar. Chewing gum, barley sugar and cotton wool were handed round.

  Louder and louder, fiercer and fiercer. Then, once more, the aeroplane moved forward. Mincingly at first, then faster—faster still—they were rushing along the ground.

  “It will never go up,” thought Victoria, “we’ll be killed.”

  Faster—more smoothly—no jars—no bumps—they were off the ground skimming along up, round, back over the car park and the main road, up, higher—a silly little train puffing below—doll’s houses—toy cars on roads…Higher still—and suddenly the earth below lost interest, was no longer human or alive—just a large flat map with lines and circles and dots.

  Inside the plane people undid their safety belts, lit cigarettes, opened magazines. Victoria was in a new world—a world so many feet long, and a very few feet wide, inhabited by twenty to thirty people. Nothing else existed.

  She peered out of the small window again. Below her were clouds, a fluffy pavement of clouds. The plane was in the sun. Below the clouds somewhere was the world she had known heretofore.

  Victoria pulled herself together. Mrs. Hamilton Clipp was talking. Victoria removed cotton wool from her ears and bent attentively towards her.

  In the seat in front of her, Sir Rupert rose, tossed his wide-brimmed grey felt hat to the rack, drew up his hood over his head and relaxed into his seat.

  “Pompous ass,” thought Victoria, unreasonably prejudiced.

  Mrs. Clipp was established with a magazine open in front of her. At intervals she nudged Victoria, when on trying to turn the page with one hand, the magazine slipped.

  Victoria looked round her. She decided that air travel was really rather boring. She opened a magazine, found herself faced with an advertisement that said, “Do you want to increase your efficiency as a shorthand typist?” shuddered, shut the magazine, leant back, and began to think of Edward.

  They came down at Castel Benito Aerodrome in a storm of rain. Victoria was by now feeling slightly sick, and it took all her energies to accomplish her duties vis-à-vis her employer. They were driven through scurrying rain to the rest house. The magnificent Sir Rupert, Victoria noted, had been met by an officer in uniform with red tabs, and hurried off in a staff car to some dwelling of the mighty in Tripolitania.

  They were allotted rooms. Victoria helped Mrs. Clipp with her toilet and left her to rest on her bed in a dressing gown until it was time for the evening meal. Victoria retired to her own room, lay down and closed her eyes, grateful to be spared the sight of the heaving and sinking floor.

  She awakened an hour later in good health and spirits and went to help Mrs. Clipp. Presently a rather more peremptory air hostess instructed them that cars were ready to convey them to the evening meal. After dinner Mrs. Clipp got into conversation with some of her fellow travellers. The man in the loud check coat seemed to have taken a fancy to Victoria and told her at some length all about the manufacture of lead pencils.

  Later they were conveyed back to their sleeping quarters and told curtly that they must be ready to depart at 5:30 a.m. the following morning.

  “We haven’t seen much of Tripolitania, have we?” said Victoria rather sadly. “Is air travel always like this?”

  “Why, yes, I’d say so. It’s just positively sadistic the way they get you up in the mornings. After that, often they keep you hanging round the aerodrome for an hour or two. Why, in Rome, I remember they called us at 3:30. Breakfast in the restaurant at 4 o’clock. And then actually at the Airport we didn’t leave until eight. Still the great thing is they get you to your destination right away with no fooling about on the way.”

  Victoria sighed. She could have done with a good deal of fooling about. She wanted to see the world.

  “And what do you know, my dear,” continued Mrs. Clipp excitedly, “you know that interesting looking man? The Britisher? The one that there’s all the fuss about. I’ve found out who he is. That’s Sir Rupert Crofton Lee, the great traveller. You’ve heard of him, of course.”

  Yes, Victoria remembered now. She had seen several pictures in the press about six months ago. Sir Rupert was a great authority upon the interior of China. He was one of the few people who had been to Tibet and visited Lhasa. He had travelled through the unknown parts of Kurdistan and Asia Minor. His books had had a wide sale, for they had been racily and wittily written. If Sir Rupert was just noticeably a self-advertiser, it was with good reason. He made no claims that were not fully justified. The cloak with the hood and the wide-brimmed hat were, Victoria remembered now, a deliberate fashion of his own choosing.

  “Isn’t that thrilling now?” demanded Mrs. Clipp with all a lion hunter’s enthusiasm as Victoria adjusted the bedclothes over her recumbent form.

  Victoria agreed that it was very thrilling, but she said to herself that she preferred Sir Rupert’s books to his personality. He was, she considered, what children call “a show-off!”

  A start was made in good order the next morning. The weather had cleared and the sun was shining. Victoria still felt disappointed to have seen so little of Tripolitania. Still, the plane was due to arrive at Cairo by lunchtime and the departure to Baghdad did not take place until the following morning, so she would at least be able to see a little of Egypt in the afternoon.

  They were flying over the sea, but clouds soon blocked out the blue water below them and Victoria settled back in her seat with a yawn. In front of her Sir Rupert was already asleep. The hood had fallen back from his head, which was hanging forwards, nodding at intervals. Victoria observed with a faint malicious pleasure that he had a small boil starting on the back of his neck. Why she should have been pleased at this fact was hard to say—perhaps it made the great man seem more human and vulnerable. He was as other men after all—prone to the small annoyances of the flesh. It may be said that Sir Rupert had kept up his Olympian manner and had taken no notice whatever of his fellow travellers.

  “Who does he think he is, I wonder?” thought Victoria to herself. The answer was obvious. He was Sir Rupert Crofton Lee, a celebrity, and she was Victoria Jones, an indifferent shorthand typist, and of no account whatever.

  On arrival at Cairo, Victoria and Mrs. Hamilton Clipp had lunch together. The latter then announced that she was going to nap until six o’clock, and suggested that Victoria might like to go and see the Pyramids.

  “I’ve arranged for a car for you, Miss Jones, because I know that owing to your Treasury regulations you won’t be able to cash any money here.”

  Victoria who had in any case no money to cash, was duly grateful, and said so with some effusion.

  “Why, that’s nothing at all. You’ve been very very kind to me. And travelling with dollars everything is easy for us. Mrs. Kitchin—the lady with the two cute children—is very anxious to go also, so I suggested you’d join up with her—if that suits you?”

  So long as she saw the world, anything suited Victoria.

  “That’s fine, then you’d better get off right now.”

  The afternoon at the Pyramids was duly enjoyable. Victoria, though reasonably fond of children, might have enjoyed it more without Mrs. Kitchin’s offspring. Children when sightseeing is in progress are apt to be somewhat of a handica
p. The youngest child became so fretful that the two women returned earlier from the expedition than they had meant to do.

  Victoria threw herself on her bed with a yawn. She wished very much that she could stay a week in Cairo—perhaps go up the Nile. “And what would you use for money, my girl?” she asked herself witheringly. It was already a miracle that she was being transported to Baghdad free of charge.

  And what, inquired a cold inward voice, are you going to do once you are landed in Baghdad with only a few pounds in your pocket?

  Victoria waved that query aside. Edward must find her a job. Or failing that, she would find herself a job. Why worry?

  Her eyes, dazzled with strong sunlight, closed gently.

  A knock on the door, as she thought, roused her. She called “Come in,” then as there was no response, she got off the bed, crossed to the door and opened it.

  But the knock had not been at her door, but at the next door down the passage. Another of the inevitable air hostesses, dark haired and trim in her uniform, was knocking at Sir Rupert Crofton Lee’s door. He opened it just as Victoria looked out.

  “What’s the matter now?”

  He sounded annoyed and sleepy.

  “I’m so sorry to disturb you, Sir Rupert,” cooed the air hostess, “but would you mind coming to the BOAC office? It’s just three doors down the passage here. Just a small detail about the flight to Baghdad tomorrow.”

  “Oh, very well.”

  Victoria withdrew into her room. She was less sleepy now. She glanced at her watch. Only half past four. An hour and a half until Mrs. Clipp would be requiring her. She decided to go out and walk about Heliopolis. Walking, at least, required no money.

  She powdered her nose and resumed her shoes. They felt rather full of feet. The visit to the Pyramids had been hard on her feet.