Autumn in Oxford: A Novel Read online

  Silverstone scribbled,

  It doesn’t matter. We need a way to communicate in writing that disappears. Whoever’s been searching your cell to read the composition books searched my office too. I didn’t believe you because it’s a violation of the most basic principle of British justice. But it’s happening, and we need to do something about it. I am going to assume that they may be listening to these conversations too. That’s why we’ll use the slates.

  Tom took her slate, read it, and began to write.

  Any idea who is doing this? It can’t be the screws, as least not on their own.

  Alice wrote furiously,

  No, unless they are being paid or forced to do it. But they are letting someone violate your rights. Who? Probably the people who framed you.

  She continued writing,

  There are many leads in the two composition books you filled out. Do you have any theories?

  She handed the slate to Tom. He looked at the pad and wrote a few words on his, passing it to her.

  Yes. Too many. Most of them far-fetched.

  Alice took hers back, lifted the cellophane, and wrote.

  You never told me about those two articles, anonymous ones, you wrote for the Tribune, one last spring, the other this fall, about the Rosenbergs and the Dr. Zhivago business. But Michael Foot told me about the telephone calls he received afterwards and the letter he wrote to you. Does the name Philby mean anything to you?

  Tom replied on the pad before him and turned it towards her.

  No.

  Then he took it back and began writing again.

  But there was something funny that I remember about the Zhivago article. In it I speculated it was the CIA that was behind the embarrassment the whole thing caused the Russians. The way I got the idea later made me suspect that someone—the Soviets—wanted me to find out and spread the word it was a CIA plot. There was a hint, delivered by an Oxford don named Berlin, who had connections everywhere—Foreign Office, intelligence services, maybe even the Russian embassy. I think I was being used.

  Alice nodded and wrote,

  Philby is a journalist, worked for Foreign Office in the war, may be ex-MI6. Ring any bells?

  Tom was about to speak. Silverstone grasped his hand and pushed the slate towards him. He wrote,

  No.

  Why are we using two slates?

  She took hers back, scribbled, and handed it back.

  If they confiscate the pads and examine the backs, they won’t be able to tell which of my questions your answers correspond to.

  Tom nodded and wrote,

  I filled the two new composition books you gave me with gibberish. Then I marked their exact locations very carefully and put a strand of hair over them. It was gone when I got back from exercise, and they’d been moved ever so slightly. They’d been examined, maybe photographed.

  Alice now wrote,

  Are you certain about which bookshop on Charing Cross Road you met the people you thought you knew from New York, the Cohens?

  Tom scribbled,

  Yes, Marks and Co., 84 Charing Cross.

  She rose. “I think that’s enough for today. I’ll come back in a few days. Perhaps the trick cyclist will have some results.”

  Tom was quizzical. “Trick cyclist?”

  Alice laughed. “Cockney for psychiatrist.”

  “Ah, yes, Liz once used the term.”

  What to wear when “casing a joint”? Alice wondered. She loved American slang. Looking for antiquarian books might require something different from the court attire she enjoyed wearing, especially to distract opposing counsel. She could unerringly predict which barristers would come over to her and surreptitiously try looking down the cleavage in her open blouse beneath the blue serge of a tightly fitted but unbuttoned suit jacket. Once she had even been reproved for her décolletage by a “silk”—an older Queen’s Counsel. But the younger barristers told her to ignore him. Would tarty be the right attire, or was it a task for Miss Marple tweeds? She decided on décolletage.

  At Marks and Co., she approached the counter. “I’m looking for a copy of Orwell, Homage to Catalonia.”

  “We’ve got a dozen or so on the history shelf.” The clerk pointed to the room behind him.

  “I’m looking for a first edition, Secker and Warburg, 1938.”

  “Ah, yes. We’ve got one—three quid.”

  This she did not want to hear. “A bit pricey. Can you suggest anyone else who might have one cheaper?”

  “I’m prepared to bargain, miss. How much would you like to pay?”

  “I’d like to shop round.” She was firm. “Any suggestions?”

  “Lots of shops up and down the road. Nearest one is Kroger’s, behind St. Clement Danes, the church in the Aldwych.”

  Pay dirt! Practically under her nose. She’d passed it twice going to Fleet Street and back. “Thank you.”

  Kroger’s Antiquarian Books was a much smaller shop, where Essex Street ended at the Strand. The bell on the door rang as Alice entered. There was a very young man at the counter. If this was Peter Kroger, he could not have been more than nine when Tom Wrought knew him in New York. Alice reflected, Looks like décolletage was the right choice.

  “Hello, I’m looking for a first edition of Orwell, Homage to Catalonia. Do you have one?”

  “Sorry, no.”

  “But you haven’t even looked.” She smiled.

  “It’s a small shop, miss. I know the stock.”

  “Can you find me a copy?”

  “Certainly.” He smiled a little too eagerly. It was an opening for conversation.

  “You’re very young to own a bookshop like this, Mr. . . .”

  “Jencks. Not the owner; it’s a couple from Ruislip, the Krogers, who own it.”

  “Ruislip. That’s a coincidence. I live in Ruislip.”

  “Well, then, you could collect it from Mr. Kroger without coming all the way back in to town.”

  “Very good. Here’s a phone number you can call me on when it comes in.” With a copy at Marks and Co., she wouldn’t have to wait long.

  Indeed, she didn’t. The answering service had taken the message just two days later. She could collect her book at 45 Cranley Drive, Ruislip, the next afternoon—price four guineas.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Liz knew it was not the best of circumstances to be visiting New York for the first time.

  She’d never flown transatlantic before, but the new BOAC Comet IV—the first turbojet in service across the Atlantic—was a revelation. Looking down at the Heathrow tarmac, Liz watched the plane come up to the Queen’s terminal building like a quietly beautiful animal, gracefully and in perfect proportion. An hour later she felt the deep roar of the four jet engines as the plane accelerated into the sky, pushing her shoulders back in the seat like a gentle but insistent lover. The novelty, the smoothness, the luxury, the serenity of the view down to the clouds completely distracted her from the dubious mission she had undertaken.

  She ate and dozed, drank a cocktail, and began to let her thoughts drift. She spent a long time inspecting her emotions about Tom, making sure of them again. Going over the weeks and months of the autumn had lost none of its power to arouse her. But Liz was still equally certain of what being with Tom would mean for her if he were ever freed from Brixton. These thoughts were repeatedly swamped by persistent, even relentless, longing.

  Liz tried to summon up anger towards Trevor. But now she found that she could hardly remember the details of any of their repeated squabbles. The whole exercise just gave way to sadness. She had been surprised by the children’s resilient response to his death. Within a week the pall it had cast was gone. Were children really so unsentimental, or had he just not been a large enough presence in their lives? It was all too early to tell.

  Then the longing for Tom returned, stabbing at her gut, finally to be overwhelmed by the dark reality she faced, Tom faced. The silent but minatory voice in her head told her that conjuring a future w
ith the man she loved would simply make her feel worse. You’ve got to stop spinning fantasies, or you won’t be able to continue when they come crashing to earth. Focus on your mission. What if your Professor Franklin in Brooklyn can’t help? What then? You don’t dare just go look up this Folsom in Washington.

  The pilot’s voice came on the intercom, announcing the absence of any headwind and telling all that at present speed, they’d break the record to New York by more than an hour. And so it was. Nine hours had passed before Liz even noticed. By early evening she was walking through the nothing to declare gate of the customs hall at Idlewild International Airport.

  She had paid for speed across the Atlantic, but now in New York, Liz would have to pinch pennies. There was a coach—Americans called it a “bus”—to Grand Central Station. She found herself queuing for the next departure, while her fellow Comet passengers standing at the taxi rank gave her a look of abject pity.

  After postausterity London and white-bread Toronto, the New York that passed her by as Liz walked west from the bus stop on Forty-Second Street was exhilaration and anxiety. The pace of the pedestrians, their heterogeneity and that it seemed to go unnoticed, all were hard for Liz to accept. The serried ranks of taxicabs, among which private cars were far between, formed a bright yellow wave cresting at each traffic signal. The brilliance of the streetlights seemed to shelter everything beneath them from the gloom of a night sky. The aggressive good humour of shoeshine boys, pushcart peddlers, the elderly women “manning” the newspaper kiosks, all these had no counterpart, she thought, in a staid London or a prim Toronto. Did she have the wiles to survive a week here?

  After ten minutes’ walk, Liz finally recognized something. It was the vastness of the great public library, imposing order on the intersection at Fifth Avenue. The presence of an iconic site gave her an anchor she recognized from Trafalgar Square or Queens Park in Toronto. She was not walking into anarchy after all. Then, behind Bryant Park, she could suddenly see, lit against the sky in a way nothing in London ever could be, the Empire State Building. Suddenly she was a tourist, searching the skyline for other sites, the Chrysler Building, the United Nations, St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Rockefeller Center. Were any of them nearby?

  Crossing Fifth Avenue she entered the west side of Manhattan. Coming to the end of another long block, Liz recognized the rolling news scrawl on the New York Times building at Broadway. She stopped to watch the vast face on a billboard blowing smoke rings for Lucky Strikes. Then she walked down another long street to Eighth Avenue, losing count of the movie theatres at twenty-four.

  When she saw the flashing hotel sign running vertically down five stories of a small building, she decided she had seen enough for her first night in New York. It was three o’clock in the morning London time when Liz’s head landed on the pillow, and she badly overslept the next morning. But she woke with a sense of mission that drove her quickly to shower and dress. Across the street from the hotel, which looked much shabbier in the morning light, was the vast picture window of a 1930s streamlined building, Horn and Hardart’s Automat. Ah, another tourist attraction, Liz thought, but one that will give me a quick breakfast. She entered, took a tray, laid some flatware on it, and began to slide it along the rails fixed at waist height to a wall that was fitted with small windowed cubicles displaying food. Liz found their little glass doors were locked against her.

  With slight impatience the customer behind addressed her. “Ya needs nickels.” He pointed towards a central kiosk with what looked like tellers’ windows. Only then did she notice that there was a coin slot next to each of the little doors.

  “Oh, thank you.” Liz took her tray from the rails, put it down on a table, and went over to the teller’s window. She put down a dollar and received ten nickels and two quarters. Dropping enough of these into the coin slot at one cubicle, she was able to extract a delicious slice of apple pie, still warm. Then she advanced to the large, gleaming silver coffee urns. There she plucked up a heavy mug and held it under the spout, added milk, and found her way to a solitary table.

  Looking round, she spotted the bank of green phone booths with a bright enamelled white-and-blue Liberty Bell disk on each of them. There was what looked like a full set of New York telephone directories on a raised stand beside them. When she had finished her coffee, she felt for how much change remained and stepped towards the shelf of directories.

  “Brooklyn College, extension please.” The voice had the New York accent she had heard only in movies.

  “I’d like to speak to Professor Franklin, in the history department.”

  “One moment, please.”

  The next voice Liz heard was chipper. “History department.”

  “Dr. Franklin, please.”

  “Won’t be back till eleven thirty. He’s teaching.”

  “Can I make an appointment to see him today? When his class is finished, if possible.”

  “Yes. Whom shall I say called?”

  “My name is Elizabeth Spencer, and it’s an urgent matter, concerning Thomas Wrought.”

  “I’ll tell him.”

  “One more thing. How can I get there?”

  “Well, where are you?”

  “Manhattan—Eighth Avenue and Forty-Second Street.”

  “Easy. Shuttle to Grand Central, IRT downtown Lex express to the last stop, Flatbush Avenue. We’re in Boylan, third floor.”

  Liz was not ashamed to ask for a translation. “Can you explain—Shuttle? Lex downtown IRT express, Flatbush?”

  The voice at the other end clucked slightly. Patiently, the voice explained. Everything, Liz realized, was going to be an adventure. The first challenge would be finding somewhere that would exchange her sterling. She’d assumed it would be no more difficult to change pounds for dollars than it was to do the reverse in London. Back at the hotel, the desk clerk hadn’t the slightest idea where she could do so. “Maybe Grand Central?” he offered, but he couldn’t be bothered trying to find out. How much would she need, anyway? Fifteen cents for the subway each way. Well, she had that covered from the dollar she’d broken at the Automat. She kept an eye out for a Bureau de Change among the theatres, drugstores, bars, and cafeterias along the way to Times Square. None. Americans must think that the dollar is the only currency in the world. Even provincial Toronto has bureaux de change. The thought made her feel a little superior.

  By eleven twenty-five Liz found herself coming out of the subway to a scene that might have been pastoral at any other season. But now, in February, across Flatbush Avenue spread a carpet of frozen winter grass leading back to a bell-towered Georgian Colonial building. It was flanked by more utilitarian office structures. One of these was Boylan Hall. It rose to the left of the steepled building on which she could see the large clock now reading eleven thirty. Liz quickened her step.

  John Hope Franklin was waiting for Liz at the door to the history department office. An owlishly wise-looking man with glasses, of average height, close-cropped hair, and a bright smile beneath a black moustache, he grasped her hand firmly. His dress was formal and his manner was deliberate, but a real warmth shone in his smile.

  “Come this way.” He led her to an office with the name MR. FRANKLIN on it. She noticed it didn’t read Dr. or Professor, just Mr. There was a wing chair to the left of the desk, and he invited her to sit. Then he closed the door quietly, went to his desk, and folded his hands in front of him. “So, it’s about Tom Wrought? How is he?”

  “In grave difficulties, I am afraid, Professor Franklin. He is in Brixton Prison, London, awaiting trial for murder.”

  “No! Surely I would have heard. It would have been in the papers.”

  It struck Liz that Franklin’s voice was preternaturally calm, even as he expressed his surprise.

  “There has been almost no notice taken of the matter in the London papers either. It’s something that mystifies us—Tom’s solicitor and me.”

  “But a murder and a Pulitzer Prize-winner? Doesn’t stand to reaso
n.”

  “He’s innocent, sir.” Franklin said nothing. “I know. I am the murdered man’s wife. But the circumstantial evidence is compelling. Too compelling, sir. We suspect that my husband was murdered to frame Tom and silence him.”

  “Silence him? From saying what?”

  “That’s the problem. We don’t know. That’s why I am here.”

  “I don’t see how I can help, Mrs. Spencer.”

  “I’m reluctant to tell you the theory we’re working on, both because it’s pretty thin and because it may make it dangerous for anyone who helps us. After all, whoever they are, they’ve already killed one person.”

  “Try me. I think I owe it to Tom at least to listen.”

  So Liz laid out the few bits of information that she and Alice had. She concluded, “I need to find out as much as I can about this man Folsom. He’s crossed Tom’s path too many times for it to be coincidence alone. You were in Washington for so many years. I thought you’d know someone there who could help me.”

  “I know only two people in Washington who ever had anything to do with the Senate Judiciary Committee, and I am afraid their relationship with that august body is fraught, to say the least.” Liz pulled a small notepad from her purse and picked up a pen. “One is Thurgood Marshall, head of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. He’s the lawyer who won the Brown versus Board of Education decision. The Dixiecrats in the Senate hate him, especially Eastland, who your man Folsom works for.”