‘Very strange indeed. Especially since you say your friend was a dependable type. But why were you interested in my advertisement? I mean: in connection with Bill? Bill—, what, by the way?’
‘Bill Kenrick. He’s a flyer like me. With OCAL. We’ve been friends for a year or two now. The best friend I ever had, I don’t mind saying. Well, it was like this, Mr Grant. When he didn’t turn up, and no one seemed to know anything about him or to have heard from him—and he had no people in England that I could write to—I thought about what other ways there were of communicating with people. Other than telephones and letters and telegrams and what not. And so I thought of what you call the Agony Column. You know: in the newspapers. So I got the Paris edition of the Clarion —the files, I mean, at their Paris office—and went through them, and there was nothing. And then I tried The Times, and there was nothing there either. This was after some time, of course, so I had to go back through the files, but there was nothing. I was going to give it up because I thought that that was all the English papers that had regular Paris editions, but someone said why didn’t I try the Morning News. Well, I went to the News, and there didn’t seem to be anything from Bill, but there was this thing of yours that rang a bell. If Bill hadn’t been missing I don’t suppose I would have thought twice about it, but having heard Bill gabble something along those lines made me notice it and be interested. Are you with me, as Bill says?’
‘Entirely. Go on. When was it that Bill talked about the odd landscape?’
‘He didn’t talk about it at all. He just babbled one night when we were all a little drunk. Bill doesn’t drink, Mr Grant. I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. I mean: drink as a habit. A few of the boys in our lot do, I admit, but they don’t last long in OCAL. They don’t last long anyway. That’s why OCAL heaves them out. They don’t mind them killing themselves, but it gets expensive in crates. But now and then we have a night-out like other people. And it was on one of those nights out that Bill got going. We were all a little high so I don’t remember anything in detail. I know we were drinking toasts and we were running out of subjects by that time. And we were taking it in turn to think up unlikely things to toast. You know: like “The third daughter of the Lord Mayor of Bagdad”, or “June Kaye’s left little toe”. And Bill said: “To Paradise!” and then gabbled a piece about talking beasts and singing sands and what not.’
‘Didn’t anyone ask about this Paradise of his?’
‘No! The next fellow was just waiting to get his word in. No one was paying any attention to anything. They’d just think Bill’s toast pretty dull. I wouldn’t have remembered it myself if I hadn’t come across the words in the paper when my mind was full of Bill.’
‘And he never mentioned it again? Never talked about anything like that in his sober moments.’
‘No. He isn’t much of a talker at the best of times.’
‘You think, perhaps, if he was greatly interested in something he would keep it to himself?’
‘Oh, yes, he does that, he does that. He’s not close, you know; just a bit cagey. In most ways he’s the most open guy you could imagine. Generous with his roll, and careless with his things, and willing to do anything for anyone. But in the things that—in personal things, if you know what I mean, he sort of shuts the door on you.’