Epitaph for a Spy Read Online Free
camera, take those dangerous-looking photographs, and restore the camera to the suitcase in two hours. Besides, why put the camera back again? No, that would not do.
Then another thought struck me. The photographs I was supposed to have taken were the first ten on the spool. They must have been, for my last lizard shot had been number thirty-six. Now you can’t turn a roll of film backwards, and there were no double exposures on the film. Therefore, as I had started a spool at the carnival in Nice, a new spool must have been put in before the Toulon photographs were taken.
I jumped up in my excitement from the bed on which I had been sitting, and my trousers sagged down. I rescued them and, with my hands in my pockets, marched up and down the cell. Of course! I remembered now. I had been slightly surprised to notice when I had started on the lizard experiments that the exposure counter on the camera had registered number eleven. I had thought that I had made only eight exposures at Nice. But it is very easy to forget odd shots, especially when there are thirty-six exposures on the spool. Yes, the spool had certainly been changed. But when? It couldn’t have been done before I arrived at the Réserve, and I had started on the lizards the following morning after breakfast. It came to this, then: that between 7 p.m. Tuesday and 8.30 a.m. (breakfast-time) Wednesday, somebody had taken my camera from my room, put a new spool of film in it, gone to Toulon, penetrated a carefully guarded military zone, takenthe photographs, returned to the Réserve and restored my camera to my room.
It didn’t sound possible or probable. Quite apart from any other objections, there was the simple question of the light. It was practically dark by eight o’clock, and as I had not arrived until seven, that disposed of Tuesday. Even supposing that the photographer had gone by night and started work at sunrise, he would have to be very quick and clever to get my camera back into my room while I was lying in bed looking out of the window. And, anyway, why return it to me with the spool still inside it? How had the police got into the business? Had the taker of the photographs told them anonymously? There was, of course, the chemist. The police had obviously been in ambush for the owner of the negative. Perhaps the chemist had been caught with the photographs and sworn that they had belonged to me. But then, that didn’t account for their being with my experimental shots. There had been no sign of a join in the negative. It was hideously puzzling.
I was feverishly going over the ground for the third time when there was the sound of footsteps in the corridor outside and the door of my cell opened. The fat man in the tussore suit came in. The door closed behind him.
For a moment he stood wiping the inside of his collar with his handkerchief, then he nodded to me and sat down on the bed.
“Sit down, Vadassy.”
I sat down on the only other piece of furniture in the room, an enamelled iron
bidet
with a wooden lid on it. The small, dangerous eyes surveyed me thoughtfully.
“Would you like a bowl of soup and some bread?”
This I had not expected.
“No, thank you. I am not hungry.”
“A cigarette, then?”
He proffered a crumpled packet of Gauloises. This solicitude was, I felt, highly suspicious; but I took one.
He gave me a light from the end of his own cigarette. Then he carefully wiped the sweat from his upper lip and from behind his ears.
“Why,” he said at last, “did you admit that you took those photographs?”
“Is this another official interrogation?”
He brushed cigarette ash off his stomach with the now sodden handkerchief.
“No. You will be interrogated officially by the
juge d’instruction
of the district. That is no business of mine. I am of the Sûreté Générale and attached to the Department of Naval Intelligence. You may speak quite freely to me.”
I did not see why he should expect a spy to speak quite
Then another thought struck me. The photographs I was supposed to have taken were the first ten on the spool. They must have been, for my last lizard shot had been number thirty-six. Now you can’t turn a roll of film backwards, and there were no double exposures on the film. Therefore, as I had started a spool at the carnival in Nice, a new spool must have been put in before the Toulon photographs were taken.
I jumped up in my excitement from the bed on which I had been sitting, and my trousers sagged down. I rescued them and, with my hands in my pockets, marched up and down the cell. Of course! I remembered now. I had been slightly surprised to notice when I had started on the lizard experiments that the exposure counter on the camera had registered number eleven. I had thought that I had made only eight exposures at Nice. But it is very easy to forget odd shots, especially when there are thirty-six exposures on the spool. Yes, the spool had certainly been changed. But when? It couldn’t have been done before I arrived at the Réserve, and I had started on the lizards the following morning after breakfast. It came to this, then: that between 7 p.m. Tuesday and 8.30 a.m. (breakfast-time) Wednesday, somebody had taken my camera from my room, put a new spool of film in it, gone to Toulon, penetrated a carefully guarded military zone, takenthe photographs, returned to the Réserve and restored my camera to my room.
It didn’t sound possible or probable. Quite apart from any other objections, there was the simple question of the light. It was practically dark by eight o’clock, and as I had not arrived until seven, that disposed of Tuesday. Even supposing that the photographer had gone by night and started work at sunrise, he would have to be very quick and clever to get my camera back into my room while I was lying in bed looking out of the window. And, anyway, why return it to me with the spool still inside it? How had the police got into the business? Had the taker of the photographs told them anonymously? There was, of course, the chemist. The police had obviously been in ambush for the owner of the negative. Perhaps the chemist had been caught with the photographs and sworn that they had belonged to me. But then, that didn’t account for their being with my experimental shots. There had been no sign of a join in the negative. It was hideously puzzling.
I was feverishly going over the ground for the third time when there was the sound of footsteps in the corridor outside and the door of my cell opened. The fat man in the tussore suit came in. The door closed behind him.
For a moment he stood wiping the inside of his collar with his handkerchief, then he nodded to me and sat down on the bed.
“Sit down, Vadassy.”
I sat down on the only other piece of furniture in the room, an enamelled iron
bidet
with a wooden lid on it. The small, dangerous eyes surveyed me thoughtfully.
“Would you like a bowl of soup and some bread?”
This I had not expected.
“No, thank you. I am not hungry.”
“A cigarette, then?”
He proffered a crumpled packet of Gauloises. This solicitude was, I felt, highly suspicious; but I took one.
He gave me a light from the end of his own cigarette. Then he carefully wiped the sweat from his upper lip and from behind his ears.
“Why,” he said at last, “did you admit that you took those photographs?”
“Is this another official interrogation?”
He brushed cigarette ash off his stomach with the now sodden handkerchief.
“No. You will be interrogated officially by the
juge d’instruction
of the district. That is no business of mine. I am of the Sûreté Générale and attached to the Department of Naval Intelligence. You may speak quite freely to me.”
I did not see why he should expect a spy to speak quite
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