I Was Jack Mortimer

9

AS SOON AS THE COAST WAS CLEAR, Marie also ran down. The front door was open; she carefully peered out into the street and saw that it was deserted. However, at the very moment when she stepped out of the house, one of the detectives — the tall one — and Haintl, were already on their way back. Finding the neighbouring streets deserted, they had no doubt surmised that Marie was probably still in the house. That it hadn’t occurred to them why they hadn’t heard her running down the stairs when they were following her could probably be best explained by the fact that they themselves were making so much noise in the pursuit.

As soon as they turned the corner, the two of them immediately saw Marie and broke into a run. She started in the other direction, towards Mariahilfer Strasse. At that very moment the Oxenbauers, the housekeeper and the second detective came round the corner ahead of her. The first lot shouted to the second to stop Marie. She therefore ran as quickly as she could diagonally across the street, ducking and weaving to evade the first two, and ran on with all six of them in hot pursuit.

She didn’t run towards her house, but in the opposite direction. She thought that in this way she’d be able to prevent them finding Sponer, for as long as she managed to keep running, the detectives would be much too preoccupied with catching her to bother about Sponer.

The detectives and Haintl ran in front, while the Oxenbauers and the housekeeper brought up the rear. Everyone, including those who in actual fact were not at all involved in the matter, seemed hell-bent on not letting Marie and Sponer get away with it. All through the chase the detectives would issue shrill whistling sounds.

Marie, of course, immediately realized that very soon she’d be out of breath and wouldn’t be able to maintain the pace, and that they’d catch up with her even if she ran like mad. Also, a policeman on the beat, attracted by the detectives’ whistles, dived out in front of her.

The pursuers shouted to him to stop Marie, but he failed to grasp their meaning simply because she threw herself straight in his arms and gasped, “They’re chasing me!” Thereupon she staggered behind him and stood there panting for a second.

“Stop!” the policeman shouted at the officials who, being in plain clothes, he failed to identify as fellow guardians of the law, bearing down upon him at full pelt. They, of course, took no notice of his command. “Stop!” he shouted once more, and as they were by now very close and were clearly intent on grabbing hold of Marie, without any hesitation he socked them over the head with his rubber truncheon. One of them went down instantly, while the other began to reel; Haintl, too, ran up now, helped one of the injured detectives to his feet, and while confusion reigned and the ill-treated detective took pains to explain to the policeman that he was an idiot, Marie was once more able to continue her getaway.

Now, however, the pursuers were no longer able to keep up the pace and, in addition, Haintl had his work cut out helping the seriously hurt detective to stay in the chase. The Oxenbauers were far behind by now, and when Marie reached the corner of the street and looked round, she could no longer see any of them.

In two or three minutes she came to Mariahilfer Strasse, the section that runs from Westbahnhof to Schönbrunn Palace. She ran directly towards the city centre, but after a few steps realized this was a mistake. It would have been better to have run in the opposite direction, since there among the houses and in the dim side streets she stood more of a chance to shake them off her track. However, it was too late to turn back. Moreover, some of the passers-by who were still about even at that late hour would notice the chase, for the pursuers were shouting and whistling, though Marie still had such a good lead over them that she would always be somewhat ahead of them before the passers-by took any notice. She finally decided to jump into a taxi and headed for a line of three or four waiting cabs, but then ran past the astonished drivers after she realized she couldn’t in the time available tell any of the drivers to drive off just like that, immediately; and besides, the engine might well not start straight away, or the driver himself would have noticed the pursuers in the meantime and simply refused to drive off. After she had run past the taxis, however, it struck her that she no longer heard the whistling and shouting of her pursuers; she stopped, gasping for breath, and saw that they had commandeered one of the taxis in order to drive after her.

For a moment she thought that her luck had run out. Then she staggered towards an approaching tram.

It was, of course, not a regular tram at this time of night, but a service vehicle with a high superstructure, used nightly to inspect and maintain the overhead electric cables. A second car, a type of trailer carrying the necessary equipment, was coupled to the first. The two tramcars were travelling quite fast. The headlights dazzled her; she tried to grab hold of the first car and jump on board, but was plunged into darkness after the lights had passed, and she missed her chance. The second tramcar then followed, but she soon saw there was no way she could jump on; only when the rear end of the car came up level did she see a pair of handles, or rather a type of iron clamps forming some steps. She grabbed hold of one of them and, due to the speed of the car, was immediately thrown off balance since, in her confused and exhausted state, she had not thought of running in the same direction as the car after she had grabbed hold of the step. Nevertheless, being dragged along, holding on for dear life, she managed to reach the handle with her second hand and pull herself up, whereupon she then felt herself being carried along. What’s more, she finally managed to find a foothold. For a second or two she just hung on, completely exhausted.

In the meantime the motorcar was in hard pursuit and catching up. They had seen Marie’s manoeuvre and were calling to the driver of the tram to stop. However, this tram wasn’t stopping anywhere, except for maintenance, and moreover the driver had no idea what was going on, perhaps he didn’t even hear anything. In any case, he just let them carry on shouting and drove on.

Marie in the meantime had clambered up the iron steps and tumbled over the railing into the trailer. There was no one there, for the crew were all in the front car. For a few seconds she lay panting on the floor, then she stood up and looked over the top of the railing.

The car with her pursuers was closing the gap fast, but at this point the tram turned left into the ring road. Before the tram turned, the pursuers had tried to come up level, they had opened the car door, and the blond detective was standing on the running board, ready to jump onto the trailer. The car was already alongside when the tram veered left. The gap between the tram rails and the boarding step narrowed so quickly that the car was forced to brake suddenly. It was too late, however. The off-side front wheel caught the edge of the boarding step and was jerked sideways; the car went out of control, and the detective on the running board was thrown onto the road.

He lay there, apparently injured. The others ignored him, however, jumped out of the car, and ran after the tram.

The tram gathered speed along the ring road. Haintl and the remaining detective, realizing they could no longer keep up, screamed and bellowed at the top of their voices. Meanwhile, in the front tramcar they were by now aware of what had happened, but the driver, because he either still hadn’t noticed anything, or else had a guilty conscience, as maybe he thought he was responsible for the accident, drove on regardless. The others, however, drew his attention to the pursuers. There was a brief exchange of words, the tram finally came to a halt, and Marie, who had still not been noticed by the people in the front tramcar, jumped down from the trailer.

In front of her was a narrow side road flanked by trees and some bushes. She ran into the cover it afforded. In the meantime the detective and Haintl came running up, completely out of breath. They must have noticed Marie leap from the trailer, and without bothering to explain anything to the people on the tram also dashed into the cover of the side road.

On the far side stood a large sprawling building, still brightly lit. Between the side road and the building was a lane on either side of which there was a long line of parked taxis and private cars.

The building was a suburban hotel, the ground floor accommodating a coffee house and a large, popular entertainment complex.

Marie ran across the road and along the line of parked cabs. However, as she approached the entrance to the complex, she became increasingly conspicuous on account of all the bright lights, and on the spur of the moment she jumped into one of the cabs.

Its driver, like the majority of the drivers, was not standing by his cab. However, Marie’s pursuers hadn’t overlooked the possibility that she might jump into one of the cabs and drive off, and they wanted to forestall her manoeuvre. What they evidently didn’t know was which car she had got into. So they began to search the nearest cars by opening the doors and looking inside. They could no longer summon the strength to shout and draw attention, for they were completely out of breath.

They simply opened and closed the cab doors, with the result that one of the drivers approached them and asked them where they wanted to go. Needless to say, they didn’t reply.

In the meantime Marie tried to make herself inconspicuous in the back of the cab she had jumped into. She couldn’t ask the driver to take her anywhere for the simple reason that there was no driver about. However, presently the driver appeared with a group of people who were prepared to get into the taxi and gave him an address.

Five people were about to get in and soon noticed there was already someone crouching in the back. Normally one would, of course, have assumed that the taxi had already been taken, but Marie remained silent for so long, cowering in a corner, that it was not until someone had sat on her lap — the driver had switched on the light in the back only a couple of seconds after he had got into his seat — that it suddenly dawned on those getting into the taxi that something was not in order, and they immediately asked what the person was doing in the back. There was therefore nothing left for Marie but to jump out of the taxi onto the road, skirt round the vehicle and dash through the gates of the entertainment complex.

Her pursuers, who were by now quite close as they went through the cars, saw what she’d done and ran after her.

It must have been a private function, or rather the tail end of one — this was no longer the season for public ones. In the cloakroom, as Marie dashed through, people were already in the process of collecting their overcoats. Tickets at the entrance to the reception rooms were no longer being checked with the result that she was able to enter unchallenged. Here there was still a fairly large crowd of people among whom she could disappear. She tore off her coat and dived into the crowd. There were hundreds of women there, all looking much like one another and, indeed, no better dressed than she was.

Having burst into the hotel, it was while Haintl and the detective began accosting all the womenfolk in search of Marie, which naturally created the impression that both of them were drunk, and the staff were about to apprehend and eject them, that Marie managed to dash across the floor of the next reception room and reach the passageway between the private rooms and the coffee house, for she was familiar with the general layout, having already been there two or three times previously with Sponer. She hurried through the coffee house, back into the street and, half-running, half-walking, and set off in the direction of her house. She unlocked the front door, rushed up the stairs and entered her flat, completely exhausted.

However, Sponer was no longer there.

He had waited in the living room, nervously smoking and staring vacantly before him, and at first had thought for a few moments about Marie, but then his thoughts drifted to Mortimer and Mortimer’s murderer, and to the underworld from which they had both emerged and to which they had both returned — one living, the other dead.

Since the beginning of the world there was the upper world and the nether world — the underworld. Not just one, but two worlds — that then was the world. Since the beginning of mankind there were the obermenschen and the untermenschen, not just one mankind as such, but two — that then was mankind. As a consequence there were the high and the low, the noble and the ignoble, the saints and the sinners, the gods and the demons — that was mankind. But also, since the beginning of mankind it was not a question of noble or ignoble, upper or lower, evil or good; but rather noble, ignoble, upper, lower, evil and good, all rolled into one — that then was man.

Since time immemorial there were gods and demons, virtue and vice, saints and sinners, angels and beasts, lords and knaves. Oft were the lords the knaves, and the knaves the lords. Never were the lords and the knaves one and the same. But each had a touch of the lord and a touch of the knave in him, a touch of the reigning and a touch of the slaving, the conscientious and the ruthless, the animal and the spiritual, the loving and the hating, the shining and the darkening in him.

The underworld had again and again broken through the Earth’s ridiculously thin crust, and since time immemorial the demon would rear up in men’s hearts.

One believed it was possible to drive crime under the asphalt and the concrete of cities, under multi-storey buildings, roadways and churches. It could be confined, so it was thought, in canals, under bridges, in abandoned cellars… But that was not true at all. It rose, it penetrated into houses, stations, offices. It penetrated into Mortimer’s bank, settled at his writing desk; it travelled with him to Europe, followed him invisibly, like Satan followed Judas Iscariot, and dragged him down again into the underworld, without a sound, without a trace, without leaving a single clue. He had sat there dead, as dead as a doornail, in the taxi, with three bullet holes in him — that was all. No sound, no shadow, no sign of the murderer; the dead man had just sat there as though not dead at all, his eyes fixed in a sidelong indifferent stare, and it was only when Sponer shook him that he slumped forward and lay between the suitcase and the seat, and Sponer then realized that the man was in cahoots with the Devil, and that Mortimer was now trying to drag him, too, down into hell. How was he allowed to do so, who gave him the right, why had the guilty one gone free, why hadn’t Mortimer clung to the real murderer?…

Sponer looked up with a start. Fiala had entered from the adjoining room.

“Marie isn’t back yet?” he asked.

“No,” said Sponer, and he looked at him blankly.

“It’s already a quarter past three,” Fiala said.

“A quarter past three?”

“Where on earth have you sent her?”

“Who? Marie?”

“Yes. She’s been gone more than half an hour.”

It wouldn’t have taken her more than a few minutes to reach Sponer’s place, then another ten minutes at most to collect his things — for she knew, of course, where they were — and then another couple of minutes to return home. He had told her to come back, that it was urgent; she herself must, of course, have realized that. Why then wasn’t she back yet? Perhaps, he thought, perhaps…

“Well?” Fiala asked.

“What?” Sponer shouted nervously.

“Where is Marie?”

“I don’t know!” Sponer replied. “I’m waiting for her myself!”

Something must have happened, otherwise she’d have returned by now. Obviously the Montemayors had already called the police, and it was lucky for him that he hadn’t gone to his flat. If, however, they’d arrested Marie, he’d never be able to get his things, above all the money. How then would he escape? And besides, they’d ask Marie where he was, and although, of course, he had asked her not to say anything and she’d keep her mouth shut, nevertheless they would in any case come and search her flat, for it was likely that…

He jumped to his feet. “What’s the exact time?” he asked Fiala.

“Almost half past,” Fiala said. “Tell me, where’s Marie?”

“I’ll go and meet her,” Sponer said. “She must almost be here by now. I’ll ask her to come straight up.”

With that he dashed out of the room. Fiala watched him go. Sponer opened the door to the apartment, which was not locked, closed it behind him, listened for a moment in the darkness of the landing, and ran down the stairs. The front door was locked. He struck a match, looked for the housekeeper’s door and knocked. After a couple of seemingly endless minutes the housekeeper finally appeared, woken for the second time.

“Open the door!” Sponer commanded.

“Why didn’t you get the key from the Fialas?” she asked.

“Come on!” Sponer shouted. “Open the door!”

She shuffled to the door, mumbling to herself, and unlocked it. He quickly peered into the street and then stepped out. She closed the door behind him.

He first hurried in the direction from which Marie would have to come — if indeed she came. However, if she did, then she probably wouldn’t be alone. He therefore turned back, went past her front door, and stopped round the next corner.

The street was completely silent except for the flapping of a loose strip of lead under a roof guttering in the damp wind. After some time two people appeared from a side street, crossed the road, and disappeared at the far end.

He waited a further quarter of an hour. Nobody came. He was now convinced they’d caught Marie. And soon people would come, burst into Fiala’s house, and search the apartment.

He could not escape without money. At best he could try to lie low somewhere in the city, but there was no one left at whose place he could shelter. Besides, wherever he went, they’d immediately report him. So, from now on, all he could do was stay on the move and hope they wouldn’t find him. However, after a couple of days they’d be sure to catch him. He might just as well give himself up now. It was as short as it was long. He really didn’t have a choice.

He was now no longer Jack Mortimer; he was no longer even Sponer, the driver; he was no longer anybody.

He was finished. However, when he realized that the game was up, he didn’t do what he would have done if he were still Sponer, namely go and report to the police. He did what Jack Mortimer would probably have done in his shoes. He glanced once more along the silent streets and then walked on.

He went to Marisabelle’s.

The street lights flickered and swayed. His steps echoed between the bleak, grimy fronts of the suburban houses. However, as he drew near the city centre, he became aware of a continuous clanging and rattling sound, and the clip-clop of horses’ hooves, as if an occupying force were approaching while the city slept: it was the traffic from the country, coming to supply the early morning markets. When he turned into Burggasse, it was full of vans and carts. A straggling mass of draught horses and vehicles, with small lamps on the shafts of horse-drawn carts or dangling above the coachmen’s seats, were all bathed in the dim light of gas-lit street lanterns. Brass-inlaid leather finery dangled from the horses’ halters; their drivers, huddled in coats and blankets, crouched half asleep; milk carts laden with metal churns rattled over the cobbles; and the smell of horses and petrol, mixed with the smell of fruit, vegetables and autumn flowers, hung in the air.

Every night, out on the farms, carts are loaded, horses are brought out of the grange stables; every night a train of these conveyances performs its ghostly journey, which goes on for several hours at walking speed. Isolated farmsteads swim into view along the sides of the road and then sink back into the darkness; a wind blows from the wet fields. These are replaced by the brick walls of the suburbs; the roads are now paved; heavy hooves strike the surface noisily; the carts sway from side to side; the city finds its reflection in the horses’ huge eyes as in a dream; and as in a dream the people perceive the rattle of the carts outside their bedroom windows. Come the morning, everything’s gone. The horses, as they are unharnessed from the empty carts on their farms where snowflakes or blossoms fall from the fruit trees, have forgotten that it was a city they’d been to at night, and the city has forgotten that a procession of carts comes and goes every night.

Sponer hurried down Burggasse alongside the rumbling and clanking carts, then turned right onto Lastenstrasse, which was equally busy. Only at Karlsplatz did he turn off, and the clatter and rattle died away in the distance.

It must have been close on four in the morning when he reached Marisabelle’s house.

He went up to the front gate and rang the bell. While he was waiting, he suddenly fancied he could see Marisabelle’s outline in the shadow of the gate, like the other morning when her shadow receded as she shrank back, and the gate closed. He had not followed her then. Now, however, he would go through the gate, and the fact that she had backed away wouldn’t help her in the slightest. He would reach her.

Finally a light appeared in the glass panes over the gate; he could hear the sound of approaching steps echoing in the entrance hall, and the gate opened. A porter — a man of about fifty-five or sixty, clean-shaven and casually dressed — peered out of the gate and asked Sponer what he wanted.

“I must speak to Fräulein von Raschitz,” Sponer said.

“Who?” the porter asked.

“Fräulein von Raschitz.”

“What, now?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not possible,” the porter replied.

“Why not?” Sponer asked.

“What’s it about?”

“It’s urgent.”

“What do you mean, urgent? Can’t it wait till the morning?”

“No,” Sponer said. “It can’t.”

“Can’t you leave a message?” the porter enquired.

“A message?” Sponer asked. “No, I can’t leave a message.”

“But I can’t let you in all the same. You’ll wake up the whole house if you…”

“If I what?”

“If you ring.”

“Possibly,” Sponer said. “However, I have to speak to the lady.”

“Is it so urgent?”

“Yes.”

“Can’t you speak to the major?”

“No,” Sponer said and stepped through the gate. He knew that he would speak to Marisabelle. Now that he was so close to her on such a night, a porter was no longer an obstacle. The servants, too, wouldn’t prevent him, nor the major, not even Marisabelle’s mother. He pushed the porter aside and entered. The man immediately grabbed his arm.

Sponer tore himself free. “Keep away!” Sponer yelled out and pushed past him into the entrance. It was similar to the one in Prinz-Eugen-Strasse, where he had approached Marisabelle the first time. He could see the staircase on the left. A large electric ceiling lantern cast everything into light and shade. “Which one’s her flat?” he asked as he headed for the staircase.

The porter ran after him and asked if he was out of his mind or what.

“I have to speak to the lady,” Sponer barked. “Do you understand?”

“But you can’t wake them up at this hour!”

“That’s for me to decide!” Sponer retorted. “Which one’s their flat?”

The porter stood there, not knowing what to do.

“Well?” Sponer shouted.

“First floor, the one on the left,” the man said finally.

Sponer immediately made for the staircase, followed a moment later by the porter. He turned the landing light on and walked up the stairs, while the porter remained below, looking up at him.

On the first floor Sponer read: Raschitz.

He rang the bell.

While he waited for the door to open, he rested his hand on the heavy, polished door, then leant forward and let his forehead, too, rest against the door.

He had closed his eyes.

There was no smell of cooking or stale air on these stairs. The people who lived here didn’t have to drive a taxi for a living and wouldn’t be suspected of having killed Jack Mortimer. Although the difference was just a single rank, Major von Raschitz lived here, and not the son of Captain Sponer. Also, Marisabelle lived here, not Marie. One was an aristocrat, the other a simple seamstress now under arrest because of him; one had sacrificed everything for him, the other hadn’t even condescended to listen to him. However, he knew that she would listen to him now. One listens to a person who comes in the scarlet cloak of a murderer, even if he is only a driver.

He could hear steps approaching. He straightened up. A housemaid with a dressing gown over her shoulders opened the door.

“What’s the matter?” she asked softly. “What do you want?”

“I want to speak to Fräulein Marisabelle.”

“To Fräulein Marisabelle? Now? You must be mad!”

“Listen,” he said, “I must speak to her. It’s very important. I wouldn’t have come otherwise.”

“But I can’t wake her up now.”

“You must!”

She stood there, indecisive. She was still very young and rather pretty.

They looked at each other, and when she saw his eyes maybe she somehow realized that something special and important might have occurred between a man with such beautiful eyes and Marisabelle, which explained the urgency of the matter at this time of night.

“What’s your name then?” she finally asked.

“Sponer,” he said. “However, there’s no need to mention my name to the lady. Just say someone needs to speak to her urgently.”

“Keep your voice down,” she whispered. “You’ll wake the house up if you haven’t already done so!”

“Go and tell her,” he pleaded.

She fell silent and looked at him again, and he looked at her too.

“All right,” she finally whispered. “I’ll tell the lady.”

Then she closed the door and he heard her scurry off.

Sponer stood there, and after a few moments he heard the porter take a couple of steps down below on the staircase, obviously wanting to know whether Sponer was still there. Then it became quiet again, the porter was probably listening to what was going on above. The maid opened the door again.

“She’s not in,” she whispered.

“Who’s not in?” Sponer stammered.

“The lady.”

“What do you mean?”

“She’s not at home.”

“How come she’s not home?”

“She was invited out last night and she’s not back yet.”

“At this hour?”

“Yes.”

“It’s not true!” Sponer shouted dejectedly.

She furrowed her eyebrows.

“What’s not true?” she asked.

“That she’s not in! You simply don’t want to announce me.”

“So,” she said, “you don’t believe me. Of course, I can’t ask you to see for yourself. Whether or not you believe me is up to you.”

With that she closed the door. Sponer tried to put his foot in the way, but was too late. He knocked loudly on the door and shouted that he believed what she’d just told him, but he at least wanted to know when Marisabelle would return. There was no answer. He stood there fuming, and finally descended the stairs.

The porter was standing down below.

“Well?” he asked.

“They said she’s not in,” Sponer muttered.

“There, you see!” the porter said, and switched off the light on the staircase.

“What do you mean, ‘You see’?” Sponer shouted. “You yourself thought she was in! Where else would she be! Of course she’s upstairs!”

“She was invited out,” the porter said. “I saw her leave the house some time before ten o’clock. If she’s not back yet, she’ll…”

Sponer had motioned to him to stop talking.

They stood there together in the entrance, and heard the sound of a car drive up to the house; people got out, conversed in front of the house, and then bade one another goodbye. Sponer recognized Marisabelle’s voice.

A key was inserted into the lock at the top of the front gate, but was not turned since the gate was, of course, unlocked; nevertheless, the porter’s keys on the inside fell to the floor, and the gate opened.

Marisabelle and her brother entered.

She was wearing an evening dress and a fur; he was wearing a coat over a tuxedo and a black top hat.

While the porter greeted them and picked up his keys from the floor, and the young Raschitz asked him what the matter was, Marisabelle took a couple of steps and recognized Sponer.

*

She stopped dead in her tracks, and the young Raschitz looked up.

Sponer went up to Marisabelle.

She didn’t flinch, however; she merely stared at him, perfectly composed, for she probably sensed from the circumstances and the expression on his face that something quite extraordinary must have happened. He stood there in front of her, bowed, and whispered something in her ear.

At that moment the young Raschitz approached and asked her in a shrill and demanding voice what this man wanted.

Marisabelle, without looking at him, motioned him away with a movement of her head, while Sponer ignored him completely and continued speaking to her imploringly.

Marisabelle blushed.

“What on earth’s the chap going on about?” the young man shouted. “Shall I get rid of him?”

Marisabelle, as white as a sheet, turned to face him.

“Go away,” she said in a peculiarly forced voice. “I have to talk to him.”

“What does he want from you?”

“I can’t tell you. Go away!”

“Why should I?”

“You can see he wants to tell me something.”

“What did he say to you?”

“It’s none of your business.”

“I won’t tolerate him annoying you like this!”

“Leave me alone!” she shouted, her words as sharp as tacks. “You’ve no right to boss me about!”

He looked at her, nonplussed.

“Leave me alone!” she repeated. “I’ve got to talk to him, don’t you understand?”

He looked at her completely flabbergasted, then raised his hands in the white doeskin gloves as if about to strike someone.

“Clear off!”

He dropped his hands, stood there for a moment, then turned, cursing, and strode furiously towards the staircase. They heard him walk up the stairs.

The porter stared at them. Marisabelle motioned to him to leave. He hastily locked the gate and withdrew into his flat.

Marisabelle looked at Sponer; her eyes were wide open and her lips were trembling.

“It’s not possible,” she finally said. “I must have misunderstood what you said.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“You understood me quite correctly,” he said.

“Who’s the dead person then?” she stammered.

“An American,” he said. “His name is Jack Mortimer, a gangster, someone shot him. However, it’s irrelevant who he is and who the murderer was. The fact is, I can no longer prove it wasn’t me who killed him. There’s nothing more I can do to convince anyone I’m not guilty. They’re already looking for me. I don’t believe for one moment they’ll think I’m here, but nevertheless it could be dangerous for you that I’m here…”

She made a dismissive gesture.

“The fact is, I’m done for,” he said. “By tomorrow they’ll arrest me. All I needed to do was to go to the police and report I had a dead person in the car and didn’t know who’d shot him, and in the end they’d have had to believe me and I’d have been released. Instead, I’ve done just the opposite, and have landed myself in no end of a mess. I can see it all now. If I hadn’t done it, I wouldn’t be here now. If I didn’t have blood on my hands, which I hadn’t spilt, I wouldn’t have seen you again. If I hadn’t been in a mess, I wouldn’t have been able to come here and tell you I love you.”

Then he fell on his knees, threw his arms around her, and buried his face in her lap.

Instead of extricating herself and pushing him away, she leant back and closed her eyes; her hands groped for a moment in the darkness and then strayed over his hair and his shoulders. He was overcome by a convulsive movement like that of a man sobbing.

“Come now, get up,” she finally whispered. “We can’t stay here. Come with me!”

He stood up, feeling slightly giddy. She took him by the hand and led him up the stairs. They stopped in front of her flat.

“Wait here a moment,” she said.

She took a key out of her handbag and opened the door. After a few moments she reappeared. She had a bunch of keys in her hand.

“Follow me,” she said. They ran up the next flight of stairs and, taking one of the keys from the bunch, she opened the door to an apartment. On the brass plate he read: “Dorfmeister”.

They stepped into an entrance hall. She switched the light on, locked the door and left the key in the lock. She opened the next door, they entered a room that appeared to have been unoccupied for a long time, then they went into a second room, a bedroom, in which the furniture was covered with sheets and the curtains had been taken down. The chandelier, too, was covered by a large, shroudlike sheet, through which the bulbs shone dimly after Marisabelle had pulled the switch. The air was stale and smelt of camphor.

“Where are we?”

“Some relatives of ours live here,” she said. “But they’re not here now. They’re away at the moment.”

They stood in the doorway and looked into the room, which was in semi-darkness and appeared extraordinarily large and bare. He felt for her hands and began to squeeze them. He lifted up her hands and buried his face in them.

She leant against the wall and looked at him. She opened her mouth a couple of times as if to say something.

“Why,” she finally asked, “did you do it?”

He pretended not to hear and smothered the palms of her hands with kisses.

“Why did you do it?” she repeated.

He looked up.

“Do what?” he asked.

In the dim yellow light of the shrouded chandelier her face shimmered like pale, translucent alabaster illuminated from within, and her eyes, unnaturally large, stared out from under her long, glinting eyelashes.

“What?” he asked once more. “What have I done?” And he slowly lowered his face and kissed her on the mouth.

She did not return his kiss. She waited until he had withdrawn his lips from hers, and then said, “Why did you kill that man?”

He didn’t understand at first what she said.

“What?” he asked.

“Why did you kill him?” she repeated.

“Me?” he asked. “Who?”

“Jack Mortimer.”

“Jack Mortimer?”

“Yes.”

“You believe I did it?”

“Yes.”

He straightened up.

“Are you out of your mind?” he yelled.

“Why?” she asked, and contracted her eyebrows.

“Do you think I’d have come to you if I’d actually done it, and what’s more would have told you?”

She shrugged her shoulders.

“You said you loved me,” she murmured. “Why wouldn’t you have come to me even if you’d actually…”

“You think I’m capable of such a thing?” he cried out.

She looked at him.

“I don’t know,” she finally mumbled, and her eyes assumed a look of uncertainty. “Or,” she continued after a moment, “would you have rather not come to me if you’d done it?”

He was silent for a moment.

“What do you think I’d have done,” she said, “if you’d come to me to say you had killed? Do you think I’d have screamed, woken up the house, reported you?”

“I wouldn’t have come at all,” he stammered.

“No?”

He was silent.

“I told you yesterday,” she said, “that you don’t really love me.”

“Why not?”

She straightened up, went into the room and sat on the edge of the bed.

“Because otherwise,” she said, and brushed her hair back, “you’d have had to come, even if you’d done it. If you loved me, you’d have had to tell me you had done it. If you were prepared to do such a thing, you should have believed I’d be prepared to listen to you.”

There was silence. They looked at each other. Then he slowly went over to her.

As he advanced, she shrank back almost imperceptibly.

He was now no longer the man who’d spoken to her on the street because he’d fallen in love with her, and who could be dismissed because it would be too awkward to exchange more than a few words just because he happened to have a lovely pair of eyes. He was no longer the driver to whom one could say, “I don’t need your car now. Please stop pestering me, especially in front of my house.” He was no longer someone one wouldn’t want to meet again because he was a nonentity from heaven knows where. He was now the one who’d be arrested the next day, and all her reserve, upbringing, status and sense of decorum crumbled into dust before the one who came to her, surrounded with the dreadful halo of crime. She had never imagined that she would actually listen to him, but now that he had come — in the middle of the night, agitated, harassed, pursued, lost — all her inhibitions vanished into thin air and she felt attracted to him.

He came close to her, drew her close and kissed her. Their lips merged. They sank back on the bed, and the darkness threw a veil over their closed eyelids, their fate, and their desperate love for each other.