by Eric Ambler
“Leave everything to me, Herr Doktor,” Mr. Kusitch said.
He found the clerk who had charge of the accomodations and spoke to him in rapid French that Andrew could follow only in part. Mr. Kusitch frowned and gesticulated. He was definitely the tobacco salesman from Beirut, and someone had offered him a bad cigar.
It seemed there was trouble. More than one or two planes had been grounded for the night, and rooms were scarce in Brussels. All this might well be, but Mr. Kusitch was not satisfied with his allocation. The hotel was bad, he said. Once he had been there. Never again. He frowned more deeply, gesticulated more wildly. If Dr. Maclaren could go to the Risler-Moircy, then he could go to the Risler-Moircy.
When Andrew understood the situation, he tried to silence the little man. They could exchange, he said. He was not particular, so long as he had a reasonable bed. Let Mr. Kusitch go to the Risler-Moircy, whatever that was.
“No, no, no!” Mr. Kusitch changed to English. “It is not thinkable that I desert you when you have my word to look after you. We travel together. We stay in the same hotel. We go forward to London together.”
Andrew began to regret Mr. Kusitch altogether. He spoke a little coldly. “It’s quite unnecessary. I’m used to looking after myself.”
Kusitch shook his head violently. “Do not be anxious, Herr Doktor. I will fix. Leave everything to me.”
“I assure you…”
But Kusitch had already turned to the clerk and was deep in another volley of French. He flapped a hand, palm outward, at Andrew. The clerk seemed uncertain. Kusitch leaned forward confidentially, lowered his voice to a whisper, and again indicated Andrew. At last, with an angry shrug, the clerk took up a telephone and began to speak quickly.
“What’s going on here?” Andrew demanded.
“Patience,” Kusitch urged. “Everything will be all right. I said it was not safe for me to be left without a friend. I told him I had the falling sickness.”
Andrew stared. “Is that true?”
“In the diplomatic sense.” Mr. Kusitch smiled and made a deprecating gesture.
At that moment the clerk put down the telephone and scribbled in pencil on a card. “Risler-Moircy,” he read aloud. “Suite three eighteen. Okay?”
“Okay.” Kusitch was severe. He took the card with only a word of thanks. But he winked at Andrew.
For a moment or two, Andrew was on the point of telling Kusitch to go off to the Risler-Moircy on his own. He had, suddenly, an acute dislike of the man. There was nothing of fear in it, nothing of premonition, only a desire to be rid of him. He halted on the pavement outside the terminal building. He hesitated, but with no sense that he had come to a moment of extraordinary decision. Then, when he heard the hooting of cars and saw the strange traffic wheeling and weaving along the strange street, he felt a weariness that was near exhaustion. His dislike faded. Kusitch might be a presumptuous bore but, at least, he had secured comfortable beds for them. That was something.
Kusitch had found a taxi and was waiting on the curb with the inviting smile of a hired guide. Andrew hesitated no longer. He stepped inside.
Two
The Risler-moircy was after all a modest sort of family hotel with a lot of fumed oak and dark parquetry and a push-button lift that clanged and shuddered as it ascended. There was a faint smell of upholstery dust. The floor boards creaked and shifted under the parquetry, the crystal pendants of wall lamps trembled as you passed them. The Risler-Moircy’s best days were done.
“It is nice,” Mr. Kusitch said. “I have been here before. It is quiet, and very respectable. Nothing ever happens here.”
Afterwards, for days on end, Andrew was to dredge his memory in an effort to bring back every little detail of those hours in Brussels, to recall all that he could of Mr. Kusitch: his actions, his facial expressions, his words, the inflections even with which they were uttered. But at the time Andrew’s attitude towards his companion was composed of about equal parts of amusement, indifference and irritation; and some bewilderment, too.
There was, for instance, Kusitch’s insistence that they should not be separated and the fact, later to become apparent, that Kusitch had asked for a suite and not merely two rooms in the same hotel. On the pretence of being an epileptic, moreover. The man seemed to make a habit of exploiting imaginary ailments to gain his ends. No doubt, if the situation had demanded it, he would have given himself bubonic plague without batting an eyelid.
The suite was the modest sort of thing you might have expected in the Risler-Moircy. It consisted of two rooms with a communicating bathroom. One of the rooms was furnished with a double bed and the customary fittings of a bedroom; the other was more like a sitting room, with a three-foot divan made up for the night. Both chambers had doors on the corridor, and there was a key for each door.
Mr. Kusitch inspected the old-fashioned locks, tried the keys in them, frowned and shrugged.
“It is best to be careful,” he explained. “There are sometimes thieves in these hotels.”
Andrew was indifferent. “I’m not carrying valuables. If you’re nervous about anything, you can get the manager to lock it in the safe.”
“No, no, no!” Kusitch was anxious to reassure his friend. “It is nothing like that. I do not care for my things to be disturbed. That is all. Also, you know, they will steal anything these days.” He made a daring attempt at idiom. “I do not wish to lose my shirt.”
Andrew laughed and felt better.
Kusitch inspected the windows. The one in the sitting room opened onto a narrow balcony that gave access to a fire escape. There was no such convenience for the occupant of the bedroom, whose way of retreat must be through the bathroom.
Andrew wondered if his companion was nervous about fire, also, but apparently not.
“If you do not object, I would like to use the double bed,” said Mr. Kusitch carefully. “I regret that I do not offer you at once the best room, but I cannot sleep in a small bed. It is my liver complaint. It makes me restless in the night.”
He looked at his companion anxiously, then added, as if he thought more persuasion was necessary: “ I need large bed, or there is danger that I fall on the floor. Once I broke a bone so.”
“Don’t worry about me,” Andrew told him. “I prefer the divan.”
“It is good of you. We will wash; then I take you to a restaurant I know. The finest restaurant in Brussels for Wiener Schnitzel. And with good wine.”
“We’ll have to go easy. I didn’t bring much emergency money.” “No matter. I have enough. You will be my guest.”
“We’ll see.”
“No, no. It will be my pleasure. Now I will put out my things while you use the bathroom.”
“You’d better go first. I’ll have to shave.”
“It is good of you, Herr Doktor. I shall not trouble to do that now. Perhaps in the morning. I will be quick.”
A trivial exchange, but the arrangement was to have enormous consequences for Andrew. If he had taken first use of the bathroom, he would not have observed the peculiar actions of Mr. Kusitch in the bedroom. He would have closed the door on his side and left the little man to himself. But Kusitch, indifferent to matters of privacy-or because of his gregarious need-left the door open on his side when he invited Andrew to take his turn, and then started talking again, asking questions.
“How long have you been away from London?”
“Three years.”
“Himmel! I had thought you were tourist. Have you been working to stay so long from your country?”
“That’s it.”
“In Athens?”
“In Greece. For the International Red Cross.”
Lathering his face, Andrew turned towards the doorway. Kusitch was combing his hair. His cheap composition suitcase was open on the bed and he had set out some bottles and tubes on the dressing table.
“Ah! The International Red Cross!” He was having a little difficulty with a bald patch. “The war left much work fo
r you doctors. You found things bad in Greece?”
“Surely, they are bad everywhere in eastern Europe.”
“Yes.” Kusitch applied some grease to his hair and got to work with a brush. “In my country, too.”
“You are not from Greece?”
“Yugoslavia.” The little man’s tone was suddenly vague as if he had lost interest in the subject. Andrew turned from the doorway and began to use his razor. The bathroom mirror gave him a view of the bedroom, but it missed the section that contained Mr. Kusitch. The questioning voice still came from the position in front of the dressing table.
“Then you go home to London on leave, Herr Doktor?”
Andrew completed a stroke, holding a cheek taut. “No. I’ve given up the job. I’m going home for good.”
“So? You wish no more to be a doctor?”
“I’m taking a hospital post.”
He craned forward a little, coming to a place on his upper lip where he had cut himself yesterday. He heard Kusitch padding softly about on the bedroom carpet and caught a glimpse of him in the mirror on a course towards the window. Then, suddenly, he saw a more distant image of Kusitch. He watched because the curious effect interested him. Within the section of the bedroom revealed by the bathroom mirror stood a large antique pier glass. It was slewed round slightly off parallel to the wall and raked forward an inch or two from the vertical, and it was this accidental arrangement that had enlarged his field of vision.
Kusitch, still in his shirtsleeves, was standing on the parquetry beyond the line of the carpet. Andrew went on shaving, but continued to watch the image in the pier glass. Kusitch seemed to be in a dream for a moment. He made a movement behind him, and next he had a manila envelope in his right hand. He crouched down, lifted the carpet, shoved the envelope underneath it, and then pushed an armchair over the spot.
Andrew grinned. The little man wasn’t going to risk being waylaid and robbed in this foreign city, so with naive cunning he left the bulk of his money under the carpet for any dishonest servant to find. But he might be right at that. The obvious hiding places were sometimes the safer. Nevertheless, the precaution was in a way pathetic. What did the little man know of the Herr Doktor he clung to so trustfully? Was honesty so patent in the Maclaren face?
The Herr Doktor cleaned up the Maclaren face with a facecloth and took a look at it in the mirror. He was prejudiced, of course, but it did seem to him that it was fairly engaging as faces went. You would not, perhaps, describe it as particularly handsome, but you could scarcely deny that it was human. Why that girl at the airport should have looked at him as if he were some sort of werewolf he could not imagine.
He turned from the mirror, his spine crawling at the memory of the humiliation. He towelled his face vigorously, angrily. Then, as he looked over the towel’s edge directly into the pier glass, he saw something that put the girl from his mind.
Kusitch had just advanced to the bed and picked up his grey tweed jacket, and on the counterpane lay an automatic pistol.
Andrew stared.
There was no mistaking the thing. It showed up clearly, darkly metallic against the pink counterpane.
Kusitch put on the jacket that had covered the weapon. He straightened the lapels and squared his shoulders. He had his back turned towards the bathroom door and, if it had not been for the pier glass, Andrew would never have seen what was on the bed. But Kusitch was as yet unaware of the revealing pier glass. Still with his back to the bathroom, he took up the pistol, held it close to him, opened the magazine, and slid out the clip of cartridges. Then he pressed his thumb into the clip. He was making sure that the slides ran smoothly in the guides. They did. He replaced the clip. Then, as he did so, he looked up and saw the pier glass.
If he was disturbed, he gave no sign of it. He wheeled about and greeted Andrew with a beaming face.
“So,” he said. “You feel better that you have shaved, hah?”
“Much better.” Andrew tried to make his tone quite casual. “What are you doing with that thing?”
“This!” Kusitch weighed the pistol in his right hand. His eyes probed keenly, but he laughed. “Do not trouble yourself, Herr Doktor. When I travel in strange countries, I like to take my little friend with me. You cannot tell when he will not be of use.”
“What are you afraid of?”
Mr. Kusitch shrugged. “It is a precaution.” Andrew smiled. “Well, I’ve been in some tough places, but never one where a pistol would have been much use.”
“You are a doctor. My trade is different.”
“What is your trade?”
“Do you need to know that, my friend?” Kusitch was gently polishing the grip of his pistol with the ball of his thumb.
“I’m sorry.” Andrew spoke a little sharply. “You must forgive me if I seem curious. I was concerned only to know whether you were carrying anything valuable with you.”
“Only my life, Herr Doktor.”
The shutter flicked behind the grey eyes and Andrew saw mystery again. But it was no longer interesting. Now, it worried him. He had been a fool not to rebuff the man from the start. Almost certainly Kusitch was some sort of criminal. But he had given himself away too soon. If he thought he was going to get anything out of Andrew Maclaren, he was very much mistaken.
Andrew turned abruptly, strode through the bathroom to his own chamber and shut the door firmly. There was no look to the door, and nothing but a bolt on the bathroom side. He seized a shirt and hastily put it on, but before he could fasten the buttons, Kusitch had opened the door and entered.
Andrew turned, his heart throbbing painfully. The little man smiled mournfully and held out empty hands.
“You must not be angry with me, Herr Doktor,” he said. “You have cause; I will admit it. I ask questions but do not receive them. I will tell you about my trade, so that you will understand.”
“It isn’t at all necessary.” Andrew fumbled with the buttons of his shirt. He felt foolish now. He scowled.
“Pardon, but I think so,” Kusitch said with dignity. “There must be no suspicion between us.”
“Suspicion?”
“In your mind, Herr Doktor. You think perhaps that I am a thief who makes friendly to steal from you. Do not deny, Herr Doktor. Perhaps, even an assassin!” Kusitch lifted his arms from his sides and let them fall helplessly. “I am none of these things. I am a policeman, an investigator. It is inevitable in my trade that I make enemies, but these enemies are the criminals, the thieves, the assassins. I am a peaceful man. I like nothing better than to be with my wife and child in Dubrovnik, but my superiors order otherwise. I think sometimes they inflate their ideas of my talents, but… so!” Again the gesture with the arms. “They send me abroad on missions. They train me to see that my pistol is properly loaded; to have it ready for my need.”
His right hand flashed up and across his chest and under his jacket in a practised movement. The pistol was there, in a sling under his left arm, but he left it there. The movement was merely a gesture.
Andrew examined him with new interest. The look in the grey eyes; the quick, searching, almost furtive glances. A man seeking, or a man with the fear of being sought. A policeman. Of course.
Suddenly, Andrew’s sense of humour returned. He laughed.
Kusitch pursed his lips.
“You must understand of course that I am not an ordinary policeman,” he said. “My work is a speciality. I find stolen property. The thieves are no concern of mine, except if they lead me to the property.”
“What sort of property?” Andrew asked.
“The national treasures of my country.” Mr. Kusitch could not resist a small attitude. “The treasures looted by Hitler’s agents and others during the late war. You see, Herr Doktor, before the Germans arrived I was an art dealer. My establishment in Belgrade was an international centre. In particular I was fortunate with Slavonic art. I had connections with many capitals: Paris, London, Rome, New York. I travelled. I knew many lands. In the
war I lost everything. After the liberation, the state had need of my services and I gave them. You will appreciate that I am equipped for my new trade. I am an expert. I know the things I seek. I have some languages. Perhaps I make faults in my English, but German is like my native tongue. My French passes; my Italian is fair. My colleagues tell me I am poor in psychology, yet I succeed in my trade. Already I have recovered many treasures from Germany and Austria. The English and the American occupation authorities have been very kind, very helpful; especially in Germany.”
“And now you’re on the way to England? Do you mean to tell me you hope to find some of the loot there?”
“It has been dispersed. The paintings, the statues, the objets d’art, the precious books have been scattered wide and far.”
“What are you looking for this time? Paintings? Books?”
“Ah, please, Herr Doktor. You will permit me to be discreet. Also, it is getting late. I think we should go to our dinner. Yes?”
“Yes.”
Mr. Kusitch was the complete guide. He did everything. Andrew had not even to lift a finger to the row of buttons in the clanging, shuddering lift. Kusitch negotiated the exchange of traveller’s cheques at the caisse, hailed the taxi drivers, gave the directions, and after it was all over Andrew had little knowledge of where he had been. He retained only the impressions of places visited. The one name he caught was the Rue des Croisades. The restaurant was in a street off or somewhere beyond the Rue des Croisades.
It was a small restaurant. You went through a partitioned shop front affair with a cash desk and a pastry counter, and entered a long, narrow room with banquettes upholstered in a faded red material. There were two rows of tables separated by a central aisle, and at the far end a large mirror that made the room seem twice as long. Andrew remembered little more than this about it except that the food was good.
