Proteus

by Morris West

  ‘Any luck at your end?’

  ‘The usual crowd reaction. Conflicting accounts, contradictory descriptions. We’re looking for a bearded dwarf, seven feet high, carrying a butcher’s knife!’

  ‘How did they know Hugo was going to be at the opera?’

  ‘Oh that! The old man’s had the same seats for twenty years. He went to every first night of every season. It was my business to know that, of course. But in this job it’s the simple things that trip you up. If they hadn’t got him before, they’d have got him afterwards; but he helped them by putting on that big show for you.’

  ‘Oh Christ!’

  ‘Another thing: Hugo’s always used the same limousine service in Tegernsee. They have only one big vehicle, which you used tonight. Someone telephoned asking to hire it. They were told it was already booked for a regular client.’

  ‘They were very thorough.’

  ‘They get better all the time.’

  The artist put the last strokes to his drawing and pushed it across the desk to Spada. Deskau watched him closely. Spada nodded emphatically.

  ‘That’s him.’

  ‘You’d swear it?’ There was a high rasp of warning in Deskau’s voice. ‘You’re convinced enough to send him to Stammheim for twenty years?’

  Spada hesitated.

  ‘Well, if you put it like that, I’m not sure.’

  Deskau swung back to the artist.

  ‘Bring me the index sheet.’

  The artist hurried from the room. He was back in three minutes with a buff-coloured dossier card. Deskau studied it in silence for a few moments, then said to the artist:

  ‘That’s all, thank you. Leave us now.’

  The artist gathered up his gear and went out. Deskau said quietly:

  ‘Now that we are alone, I ask you again: Is that the man?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Deskau handed the card to Spada. The name on the top was Gebhardt Semmler. Spada stared at it, dumbfounded. Then a new horror struck him. He turned whitefaced to Deskau.

  ‘I was photographed by the press outside the Opera House.’

  ‘I know,’ said Kurt Deskau sombrely.

  ‘So if you take Semmler, I’m involved. El Tigre will know I identified him and my whole operation in Argentina is broken wide open. I’ll never get near Vallenilla.’

  ‘Only if we publish the fact that an identification has been made.’

  ‘Even if you don’t, I’m still your principal witness. You can’t keep me out of the documents.’

  ‘We can defer them – but not long.’

  ‘How long?’

  ‘Until we ask the Dutch police to arrest and extradite him.’

  ‘Not good enough. I’ve got a whole team trapped in Buenos Aires. If El Tigre blows the whistle, they’re dead.’

  Deskau said nothing. He opened the drawer of his desk and took out two envelopes which he handed to Spada.

  ‘Your passport in the name of Erwin Hengst. German driver’s licence, cheque book, credit cards, account number at the Deutsche Bank. Your new biography. You’re a consulting engineer from Frankfurt-am-Main. Study the details carefully . . . There’s a KLM flight to Amsterdam at fourteen-thirty-five tomorrow. Be on it…’

  ‘And what I do in Amsterdam is my own business?’

  ‘Precisely.’ Deskau had already dismissed the subject. ‘Now I’m going to call in a stenographer to take your deposition on tonight’s events. You’ll sign it before you go. There’s no way I can bury it; so be careful what you say about your reasons for being in Munich and be very vague about your identification of the murderer.’

  ‘Thanks, Kurt.’

  ‘Don’t thank me!’ Deskau’s control was wearing very thin. ‘A great German is dead. I think you’ve got a better chance than I have to nail the bastard who killed him.’

  ‘How do you want him?’

  ‘He’s your pigeon,’ said Deskau with studied indifference. ‘Just call me here when the job’s done. Now, let’s get this deposition written . . . Then I’ll have a police car take you back to Tegernsee. You’re elected to break the news to Fraulein Helga.’

  When he reached Tegernsee he found that the news had outrun him. Helga and the housekeeper had seen the first accounts on television. Neighbours had come running, in the fashion of country-folk, and the house was mercifully busy with mourners and comforters, sitting death-watch with the bereaved.

  Helga rushed to greet him, wept on his shoulder, and then begged to know every last detail of the grisly evening. He would gladly have dispensed himself from the role of narrator but there was no escape. The reliving of the drama was a curative act, a purgation of the terror that, else, could poison them all.

  Yet, even as he spoke, Spada became aware that each word took him a pace further away from his audience. It was not that they were hostile; it was simply that they sensed him as a fateful person. Had he not come, Hugo Von Kalbach might still be alive; therefore . . . but no! Logic had nothing to do with their attitude. Rather it was a primitive, instinctive withdrawal from the shadow of so portentous a stranger. So, as soon as he could decently do so, he excused himself to the company, kissed Helga goodnight, and went to his bedroom, carrying with him the cardboard box containing the manuscript of Meister Hugo’s last work.

  He had promised to read it in New York, but the news of Teresa’s arrest had banished it from his mind. He should, at least, dip into it, as a compliment to the old scholar; in the same instant he saw it as a futile exercise. Hugo Von Kalbach was dead – a victim of the epidemic violence whose course he tried to chart. Once they got rid of the last medic, the plague would take its course unhindered; the city would be given over to the pillagers and the grave-robbers. It was a bleak thought to end a brutal day. He left the manuscript unopened on the table and, ten minutes later, was asleep and dreaming.

  CHAPTER SIX

  In a small, smoky bar on the Leidesplein in Amsterdam, the man who had killed Meister Hugo Von Kalbach drank schnapps with lager chasers and waited for the man who wanted to discuss a consignment of Tiger Beer. He sounded a good prospect – recommended by former clients, and apparently not scared of the price. The money would be useful. This last job paid nothing but expenses, because it was done on behalf of his own Commando. Outside work paid well – and was much less dangerous, because there was no routine to it.

  Gebhardt Semmler was a man who liked to keep his head down. Because he was no bad painter anyway, he had been able to establish a pattern of legitimate activity: sketching and copying in the galleries, peddling his folios to the winter tourists in the night-spots. The police presented no problem. His name was not listed among those of the other Baader-Meinhof groups in Holland. The sketch of Von Kalbach’s assassin, published by the Munich police, was so inaccurate as to be laughable. His only real worry was loneliness, a sense of unease and displacement, a need for reassurance that he was still loved and respected by his comrades-in-arms. That was another good reason for taking on a new job. He needed it to hold his confidence.

  Some of the other comrades, he knew, were already posted around Amsterdam; but the word was out: ‘Stay away from that lot. They’re special and sensitive.’ Which was somewhat of an understatement; since the group in question was known to be the custodian of two SAM missiles and to be seeking a suitable emplacement near the flight paths into Schiphol airport.

  However, Gebhardt Semmler did not envy them too much. He preferred to work alone, devising his own tactic for his own target. He was absorbed in his reverie and his second glass of schnapps, when a fellow wearing a soiled trench coat, tinted glasses, and two days’ growth of stubble, eased himself on to the bench beside him and asked politely, in German:

  ‘Mind if I sit here?’

  ‘Suit yourself.’

  The waitress came; the visitor ordered rum and hot water. Then he said casually:

  ‘Usually I drink Tiger Beer; but it’s cold outside.

  ‘Talk,’ said Gebhardt Semmler. ‘But not too lo
ud!’

  Spada pulled a folded newspaper out of his pocket and spread it, half-open, on the table. The headline was a report of the arrest of four terrorists in an apartment near Schiphol airport and the discovery of a large stock of arms including a rocket launcher. Spada refolded the paper and stuffed it back in his pocket.

  ‘That happened in the early hours of this morning. So the comrades have been under interrogation all day. We figure the dragnets will be out soon. Now would be a good time to move out of Holland.’

  ‘I’m not worried. Nobody can prove anything against me – nobody!’

  ‘All the better – for us and for you.’

  ‘Where do you want me to go?’

  ‘Switzerland.’

  ‘What’s the job?’

  ‘The same as you did on Hugo Von Kalbach: one man in a crowded public place. You’re in and out before anyone knows what’s happened.’

  ‘How the hell did you know about Hugo Von Kalbach?’

  Spada shrugged and gave him a sidelong grin.

  ‘We kept tabs on you, sonny. You didn’t think we’d buy smoke in a bag, did you?’

  ‘Haven’t I seen you some place before?’

  ‘I doubt it.’

  Semmler puzzled for a moment and then said abruptly:

  ‘Name the price.’

  ‘Ten thousand dollars.’

  ‘When do I collect?’

  ‘Five now, five on completion.’

  ‘Who pays?’

  Spada took out his wallet and extracted a card on which was engraved the Proteus symbol. He handed it to Semmler.

  ‘Put that in your wallet. When the job’s done, you go to an address I’ll give you in Paris, present that card and collect the rest of the fee . . . Well, are you in or out?’

  ‘I’d like to see the cash first.’

  ‘Here, in this dive? You must be joking. We’d be knocked on the head before we were twenty paces down the street. If you like to come to my hotel. . ’

  ‘We’ll go to my place,’ said Semmler. ‘It’s only a block from here, on the canal.’

  ‘Fine! Let’s get the hell out of here.’

  Spada paid the score and they walked out into a freezing wind and slush trodden into the pavements. He asked casually:

  ‘What sort of a gun did you use on Von Kalbach?’

  ‘A Walther PK. Why?’

  ‘Have you still got it?’

  ‘Sure. I always carry it.’

  ‘Change it!’ said Spada curtly. ‘We don’t want two killings with the same gun. That’s the sort of thing that puts a noose around your neck.’

  ‘If I change, I’ve got to run round half the city looking for a new gun. And that could be hot too.’

  ‘Can you handle a Luger?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘When we get to your apartment we’ll swop.’

  ‘The money first,’ said Semmler firmly. ‘In here. I’m on the third floor.’

  On the landing Spada wiped his feet carefully, took off his galoshes and set them beside the door. Semmler laughed:

  ‘For God’s sake! You needn’t be that particular. Come inside.’

  The room was a large mansard apartment, half artist’s studio, half living-quarters, all of it untidy and grubby from bachelor neglect. Spada surveyed the litter with distaste.

  ‘My God! You don’t live very well, do you?’

  ‘That’s my business. Now, let’s see the colour of your money.’

  Spada plunged a gloved hand into his breast pocket and brought out two Manila envelopes, one of which he handed to Semmler.

  ‘Count it.’

  Semmler counted carefully through the bills, then slapped them against his palm.

  ‘Good! Now tell me about the job.’

  Spada handed him the second envelope.

  ‘It’s all in there. Read it, memorise it, destroy it. While you’re reading it, let’s have a look at that Walther of yours.’

  The young man hesitated. Spada took out his own pistol and laid it on the table beside the money. Semmler handed him the Walther, which was fitted with a silencer.

  ‘Be careful, it’s loaded.’

  Spada took it in his gloved hands and slipped off the safety-catch. He cocked it and sighted it at the window. Semmler shoved his thumb in the flap of the envelope and slit it open. He looked up and said:

  ‘With the silencer, it throws a fraction to the left; but for close work it’s fine.’

  ‘That’s handy to know.’ said Spada, and shot him in the head.

  He gathered up the papers and the money, shoved his own pistol into his pocket, then pressed the Walther into the palm of the dead man. Stepping delicately as Agag through the mess, he went out, closing the door softly behind him. He was in no hurry. All he needed was a shave before his next appointment. At the first dark spot, he tossed the pistol into the canal and walked on, whistling.

  In the master list of the Proteus organisation, Jan Pieter Maartens was listed under the code name Herring. He was a big, ruddy-faced fellow whose appetite for good food and pretty women was almost as large as his private fortune and his collection of Dutch Masters. He called himself, in the old-fashioned way, a ship-master, and his vessels tramped the coasts from Caracas to Callao, from Bandung to Botany Bay. He had long-term contracts with Spada Consolidated and a long and intimate friendship with John Spada himself.

  Half an hour after the execution of Gebhardt Semmler, Spada was seated in Maartens’ study with a glass of bourbon in his hand, and one of Rembrandt’s burghers as the sole witness to their colloquy. Maartens said in his usual bluff fashion:

  ‘Man, you look ragged. What have you been doing to yourself?’

  ‘One of our people was killed in Munich. Hugo Von Kalbach.’

  ‘I saw the news. A pity. I didn’t know he was one of us.’

  ‘He was also a dear friend of mine.’

  ‘So what brings you to Amsterdam?’

  ‘I’ve just shot the man who killed him.’

  ‘Oh!’ Maartens was studiously unsurprised. ‘Need any help?’

  ‘For that, no. It was a clean job. And the police won’t break their necks in the enquiry. However, there is another problem. You know what’s happened to my daughter and her husband?’

  ‘Yes. What can I do?’

  ‘I’m trying to spring Rodolfo Vallenilla from gaol in Argentina. If I can – and that’s a big ‒if” – I’ve still got to get him out of the country. He’s probably sick, which makes a bigger problem.’

  ‘So you need a ship.’

  ‘More, Jan. I need it standing by, ready to weigh anchor as soon as we’re aboard.’

  ‘So . . .I’ Maartens thought for a moment, puffing on his cigar. ‘It should be swinging out in the roads, not at the docks where you have to pass the port police and the customs boys.’

  ‘Can you help?’

  ‘I’m just thinking. There’s the Freya. She’s in Caracas now, waiting for casual cargo. We could send her down to Buenos Aires. She’s an old tub but we’re still screwing a small profit out of her.’

  ‘Could you hold her there for a while?’

  ‘Sure! Best thing would be to stage a breakdown. That way the harbour authorities don’t ask questions.’

  ‘What’s the skipper like?’

  ‘Young. Freya’s his first command.’ Maartens chuckled. ‘We like to let them cut their teeth on rusty boiler-plate . . . Yes, Freya would probably do.’

  ‘Is she fast?’

  ‘Hell no! Twelve knots and she’s popping her rivets. But, that’s no matter. A couple of hours’ steaming and you’re safe.’

  ‘OK. Freya it is. Who are your local agents?’

  ‘Guzman Brothers; but I’d rather not involve them. Just leave a note for the skipper in their office. I’ll tell him to expect it.’

  ‘The note will be from Erwin Hengst.’

  ‘Let me write it down.’ Maartens scribbled the name on his telephone pad.

  ‘You’ll be out of p
ocket, Jan. We’ll pick up the tab afterwards.’

  ‘For Proteus, no charges.’ Maartens was indignant. ‘A personal hand-out to the skipper and the crew. That’s all.’

  ‘You’re a good friend, Jan.’

  ‘Have another drink . . . I read in the New York Press that you’ve resigned as President?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Want some advice?’

  ‘From you? Sure.’

  ‘When this is over, go play a little. It’s a dogs’ world. Even Proteus can’t mend it in one man’s lifetime.’

  ‘So what do we do, old friend? Let the dogs take it over?’

  ‘We finish our drinks. I take you out to supper. . .’

  ‘I couldn’t eat a mouthful.’

  ‘You’ll eat!’ said Jan Pieter Maartens firmly. ‘You’ll drink. You’ll be nice to a couple of very pretty women, and tomorrow . . .’

  ‘Tomorrow I leave for Buenos Aires. Make sure you get me on the plane!’

  As the aircraft lifted off from the tarmac, he felt suddenly empty and intolerably lonely. The last links that bound him to normality were broken. He was a new man, with a new name, whose very identity depended upon the goodwill of a policeman in Munich. In Amsterdam he had killed a man; and although he felt no compunction for the act, he knew that it set him apart forever from the commonality of men. It was an experience, unique, unshareable and utterly joyless.

  In the place to which he was going, he would lead the life of a criminal, sidelong and wary always. He must speak an alien tongue, play, to the letter, every line of a complicated fiction, knowing that any slip meant torture and death. And for what? That was the real desolation: for what? He remembered what Anatoly Kolchak had said to him about Lev Lermontov. ‘Your bargain presents itself as a stupidity . . . You want to buy the most perishable and least valuable commodity of all – a sick human body! . . .’ Now, he was risking his life to procure that poor commodity and hand it back to his daughter to love and to cherish until death liberated her from it. He himself had demonstrated how trivial the gift really was. He had killed a man in cold blood and then gone out carousing with Jan Pieter Maartens.

  For one wild moment he felt his skull would burst with the madness. Then, slowly, the old pragmatic John Spada took control again. You can’t go back; go forward. Don’t dream; act! Don’t change the categories; otherwise the logic will become an absurdity.