Nothing That Meets the Eye

by Patricia Highsmith

  Jeff found himself stirring his usual one lump of sugar into his coffee. He didn’t remember ordering coffee. He stood with one leg over the seat of a stool, his topcoat folded over his arm. And his black case was at his feet, he saw. In it was the informal contract that he wanted Kyrogin to sign, or agree to. He’d make it. Jeff downed the last of his coffee and, feeling more sure of himself, surveyed the people at the little tables along the glass wall. He was looking deliberately now for the girl who resembled Phyl.

  There she was, seated at a table with a young man in blue jeans and denim jacket, and Jeff judged from their attitudes that they were not together. The girl was neatly dressed (as Phyl would have been) in a well-cut navy blue coat, an expensive-looking scarf at her neck. Suddenly it crossed Jeff’s mind that she could be Phyl’s daughter. How else could there be such a resemblance? Phyl had married—nineteen years ago, Jeff remembered with painful accuracy—a man called Guy. Guy what? Fraser or Frazier, something like that. Jeff had deliberately tried to forget how to spell it, and had succeeded.

  The girl looked at him, happened to lift her eyes straight toward him, and Jeff felt as if he had been shot.

  Jeff dropped his own eyes, closed them, heard his heart catching up, and he slowly reached for his wallet and put a dollar bill on the counter. That had been like the first time he had seen Phyl, in that room full of other people. Worse now, because he knew Phyl. He knew also that he still loved her. He had come to terms with that years ago, he reminded himself. A man didn’t commit suicide, didn’t ruin his career, just because he was in love with a girl he couldn’t have. There was such a thing as trying to forget, which really meant trying not to dwell upon it, or let it become an obsession. His love for Phyl was now something he had to live with, he had decided. But he had to admit that not a month, not a week went by, even now, when he didn’t think of Phyl, didn’t imagine being with her—in bed, out of bed, just existing, with her. And now he was married, the outer trappings were there, solid, tangible as his son Bernard, real as the ugly brown formica bar under his fingers now, or as a bullet that might penetrate his forehead and kill him.

  He hoped he would not be seated next to the girl on the seven-hour flight to Paris. If that happened, he’d ask for his seat to be changed on some pretext. But with two hundred or so passengers, it wasn’t likely.

  Twenty minutes later, Jeff was being borne at increasing speed across the airfield, and then came the lift, the wonderful lightness as the air took over and the ground dropped below and the roar of the motors became fainter. On Jeff’s left was a window looking out on a gray wing, and on his right a plump woman with a midwestern accent, and next to her a man who was probably her husband. From where he sat, Jeff ­couldn’t see the girl, and he had avoided looking for her when the scores of passengers had been boarding.

  Jeff unfastened his seat belt and lit a cigarette. A stewardess made slow progress up the aisle, and when she arrived, Jeff ordered a scotch on the rocks. Then came lunch. Then the sky began to darken as they raced in the same direction as the earth turned. A film made its appearance at the end of the plane’s aisle. Jeff had declined the use of earphones. He wanted to snooze if he could. He lowered the back of his seat, closed his eyes and loosened his tie.

  Kyrogin, Jeff was thinking, might not be difficult. Kyrogin had showed a sense of humor on the telephone last week. “Our seas are not made of vodka,” Kyrogin had said, his accent heavy in a baritone voice. Meaning it was not pleasant to fall into the White Sea in winter or any other time. That was a crack against Ander-Mack’s safety laws. Jeff’s company avoided unions. They hired roustabouts for dangerous work at high wages. The Russians were not famous for unions or for respect for life and limb, so Jeff wasn’t worried. If he could only show Kyrogin the contract, then the deal was clinched, Jeff thought. Jeff envisaged Russian labor plus some Scots and English dropouts from the British North Sea oil operations. The boys were tough, they got injured, or killed, they became bored, a lot quit. But no one could deny that the pay was good. That was what counted for them, and what counted for the Russians was speed.

  As a matter of fact, Jeff thought as he looked down the dimly lit aisle of the plane, there might be a representative of a rival firm on this flight. If so, Jeff didn’t know what man, even what type of man to look for. Young or old, conservative or—the opposite, he’d be carrying the same kind of papers as Jeff, carrying the same kind of hope. Jeff slumped in his seat, and tried to relax and doze off.

  You haven’t any time for me anymore. . . .

  Jeff sat up again. Through the gentle hum of the jets, Phyl’s voice had come, straight into his ears. Jeff rubbed his eyes, deliberately yawned, and lay back again. He locked his fingers across his waist, and was about to close his eyes when the girl who looked like Phyl, coatless now and in a light-colored blouse, dark skirt, walked toward him in the aisle. She was going to stop and say something to him, he thought. Absurd! He was half asleep. But he sat up just as the girl passed his seat row, as if to brace himself, as if there weren’t two people between him and the girl.

  Down the aisle, a pair of horses galloped noiselessly, in color, straight toward the audience. Wide awake now, Jeff suffered a long minute of depression, as if his mind, somewhere unknown even to him, had taken a toboggan ride into a dark valley. He knew why he had gone over his current assignment, why he had reaffirmed his confidence in himself: his work was all he had. And yet he knew that because of his work he had lost Phyl. Phyl had been engaged to Guy. And Guy—or rather his family—had money. Jeff had wanted to compete, to prove himself, in the way he thought would count with Phyl, by making money, solid, big money. Oddly and ironically, Jeff thought, Phyl might have stayed with him if he hadn’t made a lot of money, just a bit, and if he’d spent more time with her. Ironically, Phyl had drifted away, because she had thought he was drifting away. They’d had just thirteen months together, composed of a week snatched here and there, a few days in hotels in Chicago, San Francisco, Dallas, happy moments when Jeff had clasped Phyl in his arms (in motels, hotels, in a certain apartment in Evanston rented in Phyl’s name), when he had said to her, “Everything went great today! We’re ten thousand dollars richer. Maybe more, I haven’t figured it out yet.” But what had counted, it seemed, and against him, was the time he had spent away from Phyl, too many days, perhaps just three days at a time, but too many. That was how Jeff saw it, anyway. But the loss! When he had thought he had “succeeded” to find it a “failure”! For Phyl, he had summoned all his drive. He didn’t regret that.

  Wasn’t the girl going to return down the aisle? Jeff slumped again and put his hand over his eyes, so he couldn’t possibly know when she passed again.

  At Roissy Airport, the passengers from Flight 807 trickled toward the passport control desks and became three solid lines. The girl, Jeff saw, was the second person in front of him. Then the man between them hailed someone behind Jeff and quit the line, and Jeff was right behind the girl. She had a white plastic carryall at her feet, and out of the top of it, beside an open carton of Camels from which one pack had been removed, poked the furry head of a toy panda. Jeff let the distance between him and the girl widen by a few inches. The passport stamps thumped, the lines crept. When the girl reached for the carryall, the panda fell out, and the girl didn’t notice.

  Jeff retrieved the panda. “Excuse me,” he said. “You dropped this.”

  Phyl’s eyes glanced at him, then the panda. “Oh, thank you! My good luck piece!” She smiled.

  Even her teeth were like Phyl’s, the eyeteeth slightly pointed. Jeff acknowledged her thanks with a slight nod. The line moved.

  “I’d’ve missed that. If I’d lost it, I mean. Thanks very much,” the girl said over her shoulder.

  “Not at all.” Was her voice like Phyl’s? Not really, Jeff thought.

  The girl, then Jeff, passed the control desk and walked into the freedom of Paris. Jeff’s pulse
slowed to normal. He did not look to see if the girl was being met by any of the people waiting, some of them waving to faces that they recognized.

  Jeff was able to claim his suitcase quickly, and then he headed for the taxi rank. He asked the driver to go to the Hôtel Lutetia. It was just after one A.M. and raining slightly.

  “Bon soir,” Jeff said to the clerk at the hotel desk, and continued in French, “I have a reservation since yesterday. Cormack.”

  The clerk smiled as he greeted Jeff. Jeff didn’t know this clerk, but the clerk evidently knew Jeff’s name. “Monsieur Cormack! Yes, sir. You have an appartement, as your cable requested. That is number twenty-four, sir.”

  The bar was still functioning, Jeff saw. He intended to send for a bottle of cold mineral water, maybe coffee also. In his room—a nice, spacious room adjoining a salon—Jeff hung up a dark blue suit and tossed folded white silk pajamas on the turned-down bed, washed his face and hands at the bathroom basin, then picked up the telephone. He had a sudden hunch, for no reason at all, that Kyrogin was at the George V, and he was going to try it.

  There was a soft knock at the door. Jeff put the telephone down.

  A bellhop stood outside the door with a message on a tray. “A cable for you, sir. We regret we forgot to give it to you downstairs.”

  “Thank you,” Jeff said, and took the cable. He closed the door and tore the envelope open. The cable said:

  EITHER INTER-CONTINENTALE OR GEORGE V.

  Jeff smiled a little. He’d been right about the George V. That was a good omen. The cable was unsigned. Jeff knew it was from Ed Simmons. Ed had been pulling every string in New York and Moscow to find out where Kyrogin would be staying in Paris, in order to save Jeff some time.

  Jeff picked up the telephone again. “I would like to ring the George V, please.” After a few seconds, he had the George V switchboard. “May I speak with Monsieur Kyrogin, please? That’s K-y-r-o-g-i-n.”

  “One moment, sir.”

  If the clerk demurred about ringing Kyrogin, Jeff was prepared to say that Monsieur Kyrogin was expecting his call, regardless of the hour.

  “I am sorry, sir, there is no Monsieur Kyrogin here.”

  “May I ask what time you are expecting him?” Jeff asked in a tone of confidence.

  “We are not expecting him, sir. I have the reservations here before me. No one by the name of Kyrogin is expected.”

  “I see. Thank you.” Jeff put the telephone down. That was a disappointment. Was the operator correct?

  There was still the Inter-Continentale, and Jeff took up the phone again, and glanced at his watch. Exactly two A.M. Jeff asked the Lutetia operator to ring the Inter-Continentale for him and, when Jeff’s telephone rang, went through the same procedure.

  “One moment, sir,” said the Inter-Continentale operator. And then, after a moment, “He has not yet arrived, sir.”

  Jeff smiled, relieved. “But you are expecting him—when?”

  “Any moment, sir. The note here says he will be arriving tonight but possibly quite late.”

  “May I leave a message? I would like him to ring Monsieur ­Cormack”—Jeff spelled this—“at the Hôtel Lutetia.” He gave his hotel’s number, which was on a card by the telephone. “It is most important, tell him, and he may ring me when he comes in, at any hour tonight. Is this understood?”

  “Yes, sir. Very good, sir.”

  Jeff was not at all sure Kyrogin would ring at any hour, not if he came in tired at three A.M., not if he was in Paris this very minute, still with his suitcase, talking to the representative of some other firm, and maybe concluding a deal. Kyrogin would know what Jeff’s message meant, and he would know the name Cormack from Ander-Mack. So what Jeff had to do tonight was ring every fifteen minutes or so, and hope to catch Kyrogin at the Inter-Continentale when he arrived and before he went to bed and refused to take any calls.

  Jeff unpacked the rest of his things, put his attaché case on the writing table in his bedroom and his memo book on the oval table in the salon by the telephone. There was also a telephone by his bedside. Then he lifted the telephone again and ordered a large bottle of Vichy. “Just put it in my room, would you? I’m going down to the bar for a coffee.” Jeff suddenly wanted to get out of his room, to move around a little.

  He took the stairs down. The first thing he saw, the first thing his eyes focused on, when he reached the lobby, was the girl. The girl again. Yes. With the long brown hair, and in the navy blue coat. She stood talking to the man behind the desk. Jeff wanted to speak with the clerk before he went into the bar, and he walked toward the desk with a deliberate casualness.

  The clerk looked at him, and Jeff said:

  “I’m expecting a telephone call at any moment. I’ll be in the bar—at least for the next fifteen minutes.”

  “Oui, monsieur,” said the clerk.

  The girl recognized Jeff. “Well—hello again!” She looked a little tired, and worried.

  Jeff smiled. “Hello again.” He went into the nearly empty bar, and took a stool at the counter. When the barman had finished polishing a glass, Jeff ordered a coffee.

  “We are closing soon, sir, but there is just time for a coffee.”

  The girl—Jeff could see half her figure, the back of her head and coat—stood with an indefinite air in front of the desk. Then she walked slowly with her suitcase and the carryall into the bar. She gave him barely a glance, and took one of the stools three distant from Jeff, occupied it by putting her handbag on it.

  “Have you any fresh orange juice?” she asked the barman in English.

  “I am sorry, mademoiselle, the bar is close,” said the barman in English also. He was again polishing glasses.

  “A glass of water?” the girl asked.

  “Certainly, miss.” The barman poured it and set it in front of her.

  She was waiting for someone, Jeff supposed. Maybe the room reserved wasn’t in her name. If so, the hotel perhaps couldn’t let her take the room. Jeff concentrated on finishing his coffee, which was very hot.

  Suddenly—Jeff felt it—the girl turned her eyes toward him.

  “Can you imagine, I’ve had a room reserved here for at least two weeks, and because I’m a day early, maybe a typographical error on somebody’s part, not mine—” She gave a sigh. “Well, I’m supposed to wait till noon tomorrow and take a seat in the lobby, unless some other hotel comes up with a room tonight, and it doesn’t look like it, because they’ve already called three.”

  This burst made Jeff dismount from his stool. His mind was dazzled by the memory of Phyl losing her temper in the same manner, talking in the same way. Jeff was also trying to think of a solution. Some fleabag hotel would have a room at this hour, but he didn’t think the girl would want such a hotel. “That’s tough.—There’s not even a small room free here?”

  “No! I’ve really asked.” She sipped her water with an air of disgust.

  Jeff put a five-franc piece on the counter. “I’ll speak with the desk, see what I can do,” he said to the girl, and went into the lobby.

  The desk clerk, courteous as ever, said, “I know, Monsieur Cormack, it is a mistake with the date. By one day. But we simply have no room, not even a little one. There is only a cot in a servants’ corridor—absurd! And the less good hotels—they are not even answering the telephone at this hour!” He shrugged.

  “I see.” Jeff went back into the bar.

  The girl looked at him with a faint hope in her face.

  “No luck there. If it’s just a matter of waiting . . .” He struggled with his words, reassured himself that his objective was to be helpful, and plunged ahead. “You could sit down more comfortably in my suite. I’ve got two rooms. In what’s left of the night . . .”

  The girl was hesitating, too tired to decide at once.

  “
We can speak to the desk, tell them you’re in my suite, if you’re expecting someone.”

  “Yes, but I’m expecting someone tomorrow.—Frankly, I’d give anything just to wash my face,” the girl said in a whisper. She looked near tears.

  Jeff smiled. “Come on, we’ll tell the desk,” he said, and picked up her suitcase. He noticed that the panda was still in the carryall. At the desk, he said, “Mademoiselle has decided to wait in my apartment.”

  The clerk looked a little surprised, then relieved that the problem had been solved. “Très bien, monsieur.” He nodded a good night to them.

  They went up in the elevator, which was self-operating, and Jeff pulled out his key and opened the door.

  He had left the lights on. He followed the girl into the salon with her suitcase, and closed the door. “Please make yourself at home.” He put her suitcase by the sofa. “The bathroom’s beyond the bedroom. I think I’ve got to stay up all night for a business call, so it won’t bother me at all if you walk through.”

  “Thanks very much,” the girl said.

  Then she was in the bathroom, her coat lay on the sofa, her suitcase was opened on the floor, and Jeff stood listening to the water running. He felt curiously stunned. Frightened, even. He didn’t want to know if the girl was Phyl’s daughter, he realized. He wasn’t going to ask her anything that might lead to information about her mother.

  Jeff picked up the telephone and asked for the Inter-Continentale again. Now it was 2:37 A.M.

  “No, Monsieur Kyrogin has not arrived, sir,” said the male voice at the other end.

  “Thank you.” Jeff felt suddenly discouraged. He imagined Kyrogin having been met at the airport by some enterprising fellow who had found out his arrival time, imagined them talking now in a bar or in the hotel room of the other man, and Kyrogin agreeing to the other man’s proposal. They’d maybe toast it in vodka.