Tender to Danger

Three

Andrew’s first thought naturally was that the man had dressed and gone downstairs to wait for him. It was not, perhaps, an action in the character of the clinging Yugoslav, but you might as well believe in Santa Claus as look for consistency in human beings. Scots excepted of course. Andrew shrugged it off, went to the bathroom, slipped back the bolt and followed his morning routine.

It was not until he was putting away his toilet things that a new thought about Kusitch came to him. The man hadn’t used the bathroom that morning. The articles he had deposited untidily on shelf and washbasin were just as he had left them overnight: the tube of toothpaste uncapped, the toothbrush lying across the aluminium soap container, the shaving brush held to the razor case by a wide rubber band. The soap was dry; the shaving brush, too. He had said that he was going to shave in the morning.

Perhaps he had gone down to the street to find a barber? Then why had he taken his valise with him? And, if he had packed up to continue his journey to London, why had he left these things in the bathroom? All his other possessions were gone, including the various bottles of pills and lotions from the dressing table. Where the pistol had rested on the bedside table, the key of the room now lay. Kusitch had finished with it.

Andrew picked it up and locked the door, returned through the bathroom to his own chamber, dressed hastily, took the key down to the desk and made inquiries about Kusitch. The reception clerk had not seen him. The porter shook his head and suggested that he might have gone in to breakfast.

Andrew went in to breakfast. There were only a few persons in the restaurant and Kusitch was not among them. Andrew sat facing the entrance, watching every arrival. He ate a brioche and drank his coffee. There was not much time left then.

He hurried back upstairs, hoping that Kusitch had returned, that he might even be waiting in the corridor outside the locked doors.

The corridor was empty; the doors were still locked.

Andrew threw the forgotten possessions of Kusitch into his own bag, descended to the foyer again, ordered a taxi, surrendered his key and asked for his bill. While he waited, he watched the entrance door. The lift came shuddering down and stopped with a crash. He turned in the direction of the machine as a solitary passenger issued from the cage, carrying a light valise. It was not Kusitch. It was the girl with red hair, the girl addressed as Miss Meriden by the air hostess of the plane from Athens.

Possibly it was the surprise of seeing her here that made him start, yet there could be nothing logically surprising in the fact that she, too, had stayed at the Risler-Moircy. He had, indeed, allotted her a room here in his little fiction of the night.

She stared straight at his left ear as she came towards the desk, but gave no sign that she had ever seen him before or that she was seeing anything of him but his ear now. She looked almost aggressively healthy and self-sufficient. “Smug” was the word that came to Andrew’s mind. A clerk appeared to attend to her as if he had been waiting all his life for this opportunity.

“My bill, please!” she demanded, and one felt that the Queen of Sheba would have been less imperious. “Miss Ruth Meriden. And I have to catch the ten o’clock plane. Will you get me a taxi right away, please?”

“Certainly, mademoiselle.” He snapped his fingers and a porter came running.

Here was a chance for a good deed that a Boy Scout would have jumped at. “If you don’t mind sharing, I have a taxi already waiting to take me to the air terminal.” With a slight bow, of course.

Andrew kept his lips together grimly. He watched the girl in the mirror behind the counter. She might be tiresome, but she was undeniably beautiful. She turned her head and for an instant, through the mirror, their eyes met. At that moment his bill arrived.

He looked at the amount, and it was more than he had expected. It gave him a scare. He wondered if he had enough money left to meet it. He had not budgeted for any possible delays, and, after his expenditure on dinner with Kusitch, he was down to a few franc notes and his last traveller’s cheque. After the first scare came something like panic. He thought of asking the clerk if he could take a cheque on his London bank. He was pulled up by the further thought that this would be a contravention of the currency regulations. He looked at the bill again, almost incredulously; and then he understood what had happened.

“This is made out for the suite,” he said. “I just want the bill for my room. I have nothing to do with Mr. Kusitch. He will pay for his own room.”

“I’m sorry, sir! It is not the practice to separate the rooms in the accounting. The suite was engaged in the names of yourself and your friend.”

“Very well. I’ll pay half. You can collect the rest from Kusitch.”

“Pardon, sir. Your friend seems to have gone on ahead of you. You yourself handed in his key. We assume, of course, that you will make yourself responsible for the full amount.”

“I’m not responsible for Mr. Kusitch in any way.”

“But you occupied the suite, sir. The amount is not much more than our usual tariff for room and bath.”

“No doubt it’s reasonable, but I don’t know how much money I’ve got left.”

It was ridiculous. The girl at the counter was listening, taking in the whole farcical scene, no doubt with a smirk of amusement on her smug face. He did not dare to look into the mirror. He knew his face was getting redder, and part of the hot blood was a rising indignation at the behaviour of Kusitch. It was clear enough now why Kusitch had skipped, but he wasn’t going to get away with it, by heaven! The amount of the whole bill might be insignificant, but he’d exact the full half of it from Kusitch. Policeman, was he? Well, we’d soon see about that!

He was turning out his pockets like a boy in a sweet shop, putting the money on the desk in front of him-francs, some paper drachmas, his lucky penny. The whole lot didn’t amount to a half of what was needed.

By now the other clerk was there with Miss Meriden’s bill, and she, too, was putting money on the counter; but from a well-stocked wallet. He was within the range of a delicate perfume that probably came from something in her open handbag, a perfume that would have cost her more per ounce than the whole amount of this wretched hotel bill.

He surveyed his collection of currency and pulled out his pocketbook, and then, as he opened the worn pigskin, he sighed with relief. Instead of one, he had two traveller’s cheques left, and they were plenty. He signed them, and the polite clerk took them to the caisse.

The girl was still at the counter. He kept his eyes lowered. He caught a glimpse of her hands moving beside him, reaching for her receipt, tucking it away, closing her bag. And her hands were something of a shock to him. They were fine hands, strong and capable, but they suggested a worker rather than one who lived in decorative idleness. They were cared for, obviously, but were marked by cuts and scars. The right thumb wore an adhesive bandage. The left forefinger had a blue bruise under a broken nail, as if it had received a whack with a hammer.

He had, perhaps, two seconds to notice these curious details. Then the hands were withdrawn, and he was aware that she had left the counter. He looked up and saw her back, a receding image in the mirror, followed by the porter with her valise. A mirror on the opposite side of the foyer returned a reflection of her approach, and he saw her serene face again with its corona of red-gold hair. He continued to stare after she had gone, seeing himself reflected back and forth. The place had more mirrors in it than the Palace of Versailles. Someone must have had a mania for…

He remembered suddenly the doubly-reflected picture of Kusitch stooping in the corner of his room, shoving the manila envelope under the carpet. He hoped Kusitch hadn’t forgotten that envelope, because it probably contained his money and the man was going to need it to pay his share of the confounded bill.

“Your taxi, monsieur.”

He followed the porter. He saw Ruth Meriden again as her cab drove away from the hotel, and in another moment his own cab started as if in pursuit.

There was quite a crowd at the terminal building. He checked the number of his plane and found the official who was dealing with the passengers. Flight 263-that was the designation. The girl was the fourth person ahead of him, and there was still no sign of Kusitch.

Andrew was still the last in the line when he reached the desk. He asked about Kusitch.

“Kusitch?” The official looked at his passenger list. “I’ve no one of that name.”

“But you must have,” Andrew protested. “It’s the ten o’clock plane to London, isn’t it?”

“Certainly, sir. Flight two-six-three.”

“Then Mr. Kusitch is a passenger. We travelled together from Athens yesterday. We reserved seats for this morning as soon as we heard the night plane for London was grounded. Kusitch must be on your list. He has the seat next to mine.”

Andrew became vehement. The official shook his head, then hesitated.

“Perhaps there has been a cancellation,” he suggested. “Just a moment. I’ll find out.”

He picked up a telephone, pressed a button, and made his inquiry. He spoke to Andrew, holding a hand over the receiver.” That’s right, sir… P. G. Kusitch. He cancelled his reservation. The seat has been given to Major Bardolph.”

Andrew felt anger rising. What sort of damn-fool game was the fellow playing? Skipping out of the hotel with his bill unpaid, leaving his things in the bathroom.

“When did the man cancel his seat?”

The official passed on the question and transmitted the answer to Andrew.

“Last night, sir. He telephoned.”

“But that’s impossible. I’m sure he never left his room. He was in bed, asleep.”

“Nevertheless…”

Andrew began to feel a little sick. He pressed a hand on the desk before him. “Please,” he said. “Can you find out the time your people got the message?”

The official put through the additional inquiry. There was a short wait. Then he announced: “Our record says twenty-two thirty-three hours. Monsieur Kusitch telephoned in person.”

“Ten-thirty!” Andrew shivered as if a blast of cold air had touched him. “At ten-thirty I was with Mr. Kusitch in a cafe, drinking coffee and cognac. He definitely did not telephone.”

“But surely, sir? He has not come to claim his seat. That proves that he must have cancelled it.”

Andrew gazed at the man incredulously. He had a queer feeling in his stomach and icy fingers seemed to be pressing him in the small of the back. He put both hands on the desk and leaned heavily.

“I was with Kusitch all the evening,” he asserted. “From seven o’clock on he was scarcely out of my sight. We left the hotel together and did not get back till after midnight. Kusitch never went near a telephone in that time.”

“Possibly he had someone pass on the message for him?”

“No. He never had the slightest intention of giving up his seat in the plane. He was anxious to get to London as soon as possible.”

“Then where is he, sir?” “I don’t know. The last I saw of him, he was in bed…”

He broke off, suddenly recalling the sounds in the night. He had interpreted them so amusingly. He had imagined the comical figure of Mr. Kusitch falling out of bed and climbing back again. That was a laugh, a good laugh. He heard the bedsprings creaking. Again he felt the cold touch at the bottom of the spine. He had known fear more than once in his life, but this was a different kind of fear. He pulled himself together, shaking away the sickness, and in the instant he knew what he had to do.

“There’s something wrong,” he told the official. “You’d better make full inquiries about that phone call. I’m going back to the hotel. Can you switch my seat to the afternoon plane?”

“But, Dr. Maclaren, the bus is about to leave for the airport.”

“This is serious. It may be very serious indeed. If you can’t put somebody else in my seat, I’ll have to pay an extra fare.”

“Some people are waiting, but at this late hour it is very difficult.”

“Can you get me on an afternoon plane?”

“There’s a vacancy on Flight seven-four-nine, two-thirty.”

“All right. Find out about that telephone call. The police may want to know.”

Andrew checked his bag at the luggage office and strode off quickly. Outside he passed the bus loaded with the passengers for Flight 263. It was waiting; waiting for him. The red-haired girl sat well up towards the front, and now the customary serenity of her face was marred by a slight frown of impatience. For a moment he regretted that he had given up his seat. That was curious; but, of course, it was simply that he realised that he was meddling with something that did not concern him. What was Kusitch to him that he should put himself to any trouble over the man?

He halted. All the doubts he had entertained about Kusitch went through his mind again. The man’s story might have been wholly false. He could be something silly like a spy. He could have chosen to disappear in the middle of the night, suddenly apprehensive of one of those enemies he had talked about. He could be a criminal with quite another motive for performing a vanishing trick. And he could be merely an unhappy creature with persecution fantasies, a paranoiac.

All the probable and improbable explanations wheeled in Andrew’s head, but none of them altered the basic situation. Kusitch had dropped out of sight, and he, Andrew Maclaren, was the one man who could do something about it. If he did nothing, if he washed his hands of the whole affair and went on to London, no one might ever hear another word of Kusitch.

How it had happened he could not say, but Kusitch seemed to have established a claim on him. He had wanted to get rid of the little man. He had found him a bore and a nuisance; but he had also found him pathetic. Andrew could see again the hurt-dog look of appeal in the round face, and it was an appeal he could not resist. It might have been instinct, a hunch, an extrasensory perception of some other kind, but he believed in that instant that Kusitch was in danger of his life, and that he had to do something about it.

He hurried past the bus and hailed the first taxi he saw. In seven minutes he was back at the Risler-Moircy. He would not have been surprised to find police cars drawn up in front of the entrance and the foyer swarming with plain-clothes men and uniformed agents. There was nothing, not even a porter in the foyer. A young couple emerged from the restaurant deep in an argument. That was all. It was the midmorning lull when the Risler-Moircy relaxed and yawned. The clerk at the reception counter seemed half asleep.

Andrew explained that he had left something in his room. The clerk, completely indifferent, produced the key at once. People were always leaving things in their rooms it seemed: pocketbooks, trinkets, dead bodies.

The idea came to Andrew with horrifying impact. He hadn’t thought of that before, but now the one thing in his mind was the door of the clothes cupboard in the double bedroom.

The lift was shuddering about somewhere near the top of the building. Andrew could not wait for it. He ran up the stairs and was breathing heavily when he reached the third floor. The door of the sitting room was open. He paused a moment, then walked in, surprising one of the floor maids who was stripping the divan.

She was full of apologies. She thought Monsieur had departed. If she was in the way, she would return later.

He told her to carry on, and repeated the excuse he had made to the clerk.

The girl hesitated, gathering up the used linen in her arms. He asked her if she had done the other room, and she replied that she had. She had not noticed any forgotten property.

“I’ll look,” he told her, and all the while he was trying to hide the fact that his nerves were jumping.

He closed and bolted the bathroom door so that she could not follow him. Once he was in the room he had no hesitation. He went to the clothes cupboard and pulled the door open. There was nothing there. Not even a coat hanger on the rail, let alone a corpse.

There was sweat on him. He could feel the prickle of it and was annoyed. He had seen enough of death, God knows, and he should, as a professional man, have been able to face a corpse unemotionally. Yet this time the thought of it had come too close to him. He stood staring into the empty cupboard, quite still for a moment. The reprieve was for him and not for Kusitch, yet it made him believe that Kusitch was still alive, however illogical this new belief might be.

He shut the cupboard door and looked round the room. He went to the corner near the window and lifted the carpet with his toe.

The manila envelope was still there.

To his mind it was positive proof that Kusitch had not left the hotel voluntarily. If he had done so, he must surely have taken the envelope with him. The suggestion had been that he had hidden it because it contained money or a means of drawing money. In that case he would not have departed without it.

Andrew stooped, holding the carpet back. The envelope lay flap down and there was nothing written on the exposed side. He hesitated. The correct thing was to leave it as it was and notify the police; touch nothing. But he had to know what was in the envelope; besides, it might not be safe to leave it under the carpet.

He picked up the packet and allowed the carpet to fall back into place. As he straightened himself, he heard someone trying the bathroom door, turning the handle. The door creaked as pressure was applied to it, and a male voice asked in French if anyone was there. The voice had an accent that Andrew could not identify. It was provincial, perhaps: Walloon, Flemish, or whatever they called it. Another servant, he thought, and resented the peremptory note in the voice. Let him wait.

Andrew was at the window, peering at the package as if, by concentration, his eyes might see through the opaque manila paper that kept its secret. The envelope measured about seven and a half by five inches. The contents made a mass whose area might have been covered by a pound note. The mass was not very thick, but such a tightly packed wad, if it were indeed composed of pound notes, must have represented a substantial sum of money; something like two hundred or so. Tentatively, he pushed a finger beneath the flap of the envelope. He could feel that the flap was only lightly gummed. He slid his finger forward. The flap sprang. The envelope was open.

The wad was a booklet. Andrew took it out, stared at the green paper binding, blinked at it, and stared again. At first sight it was just unbelievable, but no amount of gazing at it would effect a transformation. The legend upon it was fixed in white lettering: “A London Transport Publication.” And then, following the symbol of circle and bisecting bar: Green Line Coach Guide.

Andrew thumbed hastily through the stapled pages of timetables, but saw nothing between die leaves; not a solitary bank note, not even a key to the cipher of the Yugoslav secret police.

It was anticlimax, and the sudden release of tension made him feel curiously weary. He dropped the envelope on the floor and put the Green Line Coach Guide in his pocket. Then he sat down in the window and looked across the room at the newly made bed. He smiled ruefully, thinking of Kusitch. Bits of behaviour, remembered fragments of speech, now came together to form a pattern. The pistol, the manila envelope, locked doors, fastened windows, wall-backed seats, searching looks, confidences, the pathetic clinging to the chance company of a fellow passenger… The man must live in a most extraordinary world of fantasy; a world in which a Green Line Coach Guide became the plans of the Petropavlovsky Fort or the blueprints of a hydrogen bomb, a nightmare world in which there were enemies behind every pillar. The man’s conscious mind, of course, had really nothing to do with it. He was dominated by his fantasies and they followed a classic pattern. He was the sufferer, the persecuted. Not all his persecutors were projected, of course. Some stayed inside: epilepsy, lumbago, the liver complaint. And the hostages in Dubrovnik, the imaginary wife and child. Heaven alone knew what new terror had seized him in the night after his fall from the bed. By now he might be on his way to Warsaw or Waziristan. There was still that phone call to the air terminal to be considered, but no doubt there was a simple explanation.

Andrew felt himself cheated. He felt doubly cheated when he thought of the plane that would be taking off for London in a very few minutes. And somehow Miss Ruth Meriden, her red hair, cool eyes, smug look and all, got mixed up with his regrets. It was curious that he should have a feeling of emptiness when he considered that it was unlikely he would ever see her again; curious, because he despised the type and found the individual wholly objectionable. It was even more curious that he should now begin to blame Kusitch bitterly for the sense of loss that came over him.

There was nothing more to do in the hotel. He went into the bathroom, threw back the bolt in the farther door, and entered the living room. A man rose from an armchair and wheeled to face him.

“Pardon for my disturbance,” he said. “I wish to see the suite by the permission of the chambermaid. My room has not the comfort. I make change-over when you are departing.”

The voice was that of the man who had tried the bathroom door. His English was worse than his French, but more revealing. The accent was German. So was the parade-ground arrogance. His tone was sharp and accusing. He said, in effect: “Why are you holding me up? Get the hell out of it, and be quick!”

At that moment Andrew was not in a conciliatory frame of mind. “Where I come from,” he said, “it’s customary to wait till a room is vacated before moving in.”

“I have no need for instruction. I make no fault. The chambermaid tells me the Englishman is departing.”

“I haven’t departed yet. And I’m not English.”

“No? This is not the right suite, perhaps? The maid said the Englishman and a friend were to leave this morning.”

The man was tall and lean. He had a nose that looked as if it had been stropped to a fine edge. His mouth was a hard line between thin and shapeless lips. The eyes were black, and quick with animal menace, but the rest of the face had the wooden immobility of a ventriloquist’s dummy. The lower jaw moved when required; only the eyes were alive. They narrowed aggressively, demanding an answer from Andrew. When they failed to get it, the mouth moved again.

“Perhaps your friend is in the next room? The maid makes more mistakes?”

The maid returned along the corridor and hesitated in the open doorway. She saw that the situation was unfortunate, and turned a worried look on Andrew.

“Pardon, monsieur. I am sorry you have been disturbed.” Then she spoke in German to the tall man. “I asked you to wait till the suite was ready, Herr Schlegel.”

The reply came quickly and harshly. “You told me the suite was empty. You are a fool. Get out of my way.”

He walked with a stiff gait that might have been due to a mechanical limb. He thrust out a hand to wave the girl aside. Andrew stopped him.

“Now that you’re here, you can look the place over,” he said. “I’m going. I’ve finished.” “Did you find what you wanted, monsieur?” the girl asked him.

“Yes. I found it, thanks. Good-bye.”

He looked back from the first turn in the corridor. Herr Schlegel was standing in the doorway of the sitting room, watching him.