‘The Light of Day’

In “The Light of Day,” master adventure yarn spinner Eric Ambler gives us not a “whodunit?” but a “what did they do?” or more accurately, “what are they going to do?” This is a problem familiar to many of us. Have you even been part of a group where you know something is going on but you can’t exactly put your finger on it? Everybody else is in possession of the knowledge, except you, and sadly it seems to you extremely important -- if not a matter of life and death -- that you discover what it is.

It is a situation faced by many teachers when they come into the classroom to discover that some mischief has either just been executed or is being planned. It is a situation faced by a politician or monarch who suspects those around them to be plotting their downfall. It was a situation faced by Arthur Simpson when he made a few wrong choices in Athens.

As narrator of the story, Arthur, a petty criminal residing in Greece but in actual fact a child of an Egyptian family who had been educated at British public school, is caught up in a criminal gang. The problem is he doesn’t know exactly what they are going to do.

Set in the 1960s, a few years after the military coup in Turkey that ousted the Democratic Party from government and led to the hanging of former Prime Minister Adnan Menderes, this fast-moving tale keeps the reader on tenterhooks with a cliffhanger every chapter.

Ambler uses the literary device of having the story narrated by the main character to its full. He can have his character share his emotions with us as he weaves his tale. We experience Arthur’s perplexity, confusion and fear to the full as he explains what befell him. Light relief to the tension of the narrative is provided by Arthur’s gravelly, down-to-earth sense of humor that comes through in all of the asides he gives. One of the best examples of this is the cracking opening sentence to the novel: “It came down to this: if I had not been arrested by the Turkish police, I would have been arrested by the Greek police.”

Having hooked you with his opening line, Ambler does not disappoint and keeps your attention throughout this chase from Athens to İstanbul. Simpson made a passable living by preying on tourists who arrived at Athens airport. He would drive them into town, hopefully also be engaged to take them on a few private tours, and during the course of providing these services attempt surreptitiously to lighten the load of their wallet.

However, he chose the wrong victim in Harper, a man he assumes erroneously is an American. Caught red-handed in the act of trying to steal $300 of Harper’s traveler’s cheques, we share his relief when the police are not called. “I should have known better” is Simpson’s sardonic comment as he recalls this. Harper fires a few questions: Have you ever been jailed? Have you ever been to Turkey?

Simpson turns from villain to victim in one foul swoop as Harper makes him sign a confession at gunpoint and then holds this letter over him as blackmail. If our unlikely hero will do everything Harper asks of him the letter will be destroyed at the end of the mission. If not, it will be delivered to the Greek police.

Arthur’s assignment is to drive an expensive car overland from Athens to İstanbul while Harper and the car’s owner, Miss Lipp, take the boat. The condition is that he ask no questions.

Coerced and blackmailed into the task, Arthur has no choice but to comply. His first suspicion is jewelry smuggling, and a few hours’ drive out of Athens, after checking he has not been followed, he gives the car the once over. “I spent a good half hour searching that car. First I looked in the obvious places in the back of the spare wheel compartment, under the seat cushions, up behind the dashboard. Then I took off all the hub caps. … These had nothing in them, however. So I tried the tank, poking about with a long twig. … Again I drew a blank. I would have liked to crawl underneath to see if any new welding had been done, but there was not enough clearance. I decided to put the car into a garage greasing bay in Salonika and examine the underside from below. Meanwhile, there was an air-conditioner in the car, so I unscrewed the cover and had a look inside that. Another blank.” The garage check reveals nothing, so Arthur decides it must be the return journey that will be significant: Perhaps the car will be used not for smuggling contraband into Turkey but for smuggling drugs out.

Sadly for Arthur, the Turkish police at Edirne look in a few places he neglected. Alerted by an irregularity in his passport papers, they check the car out and discover a haul of guns and hand grenades stashed inside the door panels. He is immediately transferred to interrogation by the counterterrorism squad. Forget “Midnight Express,” this is a civilized police investigation. Offered a cigarette he concedes, “When a policeman gives you a cigarette it is usually the first move in one of those ‘let’s see if we can’t talk sensibly as man to man’ games in which he provides the rope and you hang yourself.” Under arrest Arthur for the first time tells the truth. However, he notes that his position at Edirne is hopeless from the start, “I had told a story that happened to be true, but sounded as if I thought they were half-witted.”

The Turkish police suspect a political motive for the cache of arms, believing that one group of supporters of the former regime do not like the army’s firm hand and are plotting some terrorist attack. Originally blackmailed into joining the gang, Simpson is now police bait to catch Harper and his terrorist colleagues.

Released with a specially adapted radio, a police tail and a communication method of a note inside old cigarette boxes, Simpson continues on his way to İstanbul, where he finds a Miss Lipp in a villa in Sarıyer, who simply wants to tour Topkapı Palace.

Ambler has meticulously researched his book, giving us detailed accurate descriptions of the Hilton Hotel and its environs, Sarıyer, the car ferry to Harem and the journey along the Ankara Asfaltı to Pendik on the Asian side.

It is page 172 out of 223 before we finally discover what Harper and Miss Lipp have planned and what Arthur’s role is to be in it. Poor unsuspecting Arthur finds himself in one of those damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t cleft sticks. The destruction of the blackmail letter and thereby his innocence before the Greek police depends on the success of Harper’s operation. However, proof that his story is true, that he is not a willing member of the gang, and thereby his innocence before the Turkish police, depends on its failure.

Oh, and what is the operation? Well, that would be telling…