*****
It was two-thirty in the morning. The club was empty, except for Jessica and the band and Sandy, who sat at a table near the bandstand. He had been sitting at that same table since ten o’clock. What a bladder the kid must have, Jessica thought admiringly. She sat down across from him.
“I’m so glad you wandered in tonight.” She looked at the others. “Sandy and I have discovered all kinds of mutual friends.” Stefan was glowering as he put away his instruments.
“Will you be able to rehearse with me tomorrow?” he said shortly.
“Oh, I’m sorry.Sandy and I are going to Vitosha for lunch tomorrow. I think I’d better not plan anything else.”
They all turned at her in surprise. She returned their looks blandly. She stood up. Karl said, “Would you like one of us to walk you back to the hotel?”
“Thanks, dear, but Sandy will do it. Won’t you?”
He jumped up, knocking over the chair in his haste.“Of course.”
He knocked over two more chairs on his way out.
“Did you have to request ‘Misty?’ with that fatuous look on your face? You’ll make us the laughing stock of the Balkans.”
“You told me to make a fool of myself.”
“I hadn’t realized the extent of your gift.”
They walked through the quiet deserted streets past the tomb of Giorgi Dimitrov.
“Are we really going to Vitosha tomorrow?”
“Have I ever lied to you? Yes, we’re going. Our main objective is Rila; Vitosha is just a diversion.”
“Do we need to do that?”
“I think it’s wise. If we’re lucky, we’ll never know.”
They found out.
Sandy arrived at the hotel at ten-thirty the next morning, having slept at least five whole hours, shiny with the resilience of youth and a good aftershave. She looked at him with loathing. She hated Turkish coffee, especially in the morning, and in a better world than this was, she talked to no one before she’d had at least three cups of strong American coffee. Especially twenty-five year olds.
“Good morning,” he said brightly. His first mistake.
“Mr. Carson?” she said coolly. They were, after all, in a public lobby. “So nice to see you again.” A patent falsehood. “Shall we go? I have a car outside.”
They walked out to the black Volga Ilya had loaned her. It had the same gear box as her Jaguar, although it seemed just a little more reliable, having 145,000 kilometers on its odometer. Or so Ilya alleged. Men were notorious stretchers of car statistics. She was about to start the car when she remembered the national preoccupation with gadgets. She turned to Sandy, draping her arm over the back of the seat in a very relaxed attitude. Preparing to wait him out.
“Have you got a camera in your shoe?
He hesitated. Wrong location. “Or anywhere else?”
He still hesitated. “Let’s have it. Come on.” Her tone was implacable. He removed his tie clip.
“Oh, God, a tie clip? How banal. What else have you got?”
“Just report paper.” He was stung.
“Get rid of it.”
“How are we going to report?” He looked like a mutinous five-year old deprived of a prize he had earned through a particularly traumatic trip to the dentist.
She couldn’t keep the exasperation out of her voice, though, God knows, she was trying. “What have you got to report? If we make it back, we can tell them about it. If we don’t, someone will mention it. The State Department will complain about us.”
He was momentarily diverted. “You don’t like State, do you?”
“We have a mutual admiration society, nil on both sides. Now, where are you going to stash this stuff? I assume you’ve assumed your room will be searched? Give it to the doorman or something, but get rid of it. Be back here in five minutes.”
The ride to Vitosha was a silent one. She parked in the lot adjacent to the restaurant, The Happy Man, and turned to Sandy.
“We are going in there and have lunch like two incipient lovers and you are going to be charming and intelligent and interested. If it kills you.”
They did and he was. She had to give him that. The lunch was simple, but good—cucumber salad and a local stew and the good fresh Bulgarian bread. They even provided a decent cup of Vietnamese coffee at the end of the meal. The smile on Jessica’s face was real as she surveyed the room. No one seemed to be paying more attention to them than was warranted. Sandy was a very good-looking young man and she was a chic westerner. Many of the patrons were obviously businessmen—even some non-Japanese.
“Let’s take a walk, shall we? It’s such a lovely afternoon.”
Sandy waited until they were away from the building, then said, “Are we going to Rila?”
She nodded. “I just want to see whether anyone in the restaurant is paying attention to us.”
They were on a grassy knoll above the restaurant; the path branched right and left. “Which way, Sandy?”
“Well, when in Bulgaria…let’s go left.”
They had taken only one step when something whizzed between them and hit a tree with an authoritative “thunk.” They looked at each other in astonishment and hit the ground. They lay there waiting. “I think you made the wrong choice.”
He grunted. “Someone sure seemed to resent it. What was that?”
Without raising her head, she muttered, “I think it was a shift in the balance of power. Let’s try to get into those trees.”
“Why are you whispering?”
“I don’t know. I’m not sure I can speak any louder.”
They got up cautiously and scurried toward the trees, some ten feet away. They were nearly there when two more “thunks” slammed into the trees ahead of them. They dove into the shelter of the pine branches and lay there. Jessica looked down. “Damn!” she said explosively.
“Are you hurt?”
“No. I have grass stain on my blouse.”
“For God’s sake, I thought it was something serious.”
She looked at him coldly. “Grass stain does not come out of silk.”
“So?It’s just a blouse.”
“A Calvin Klein, and it cost $135.”
“My God!” He reached over and began rubbing the sleeve. “Maybe I can help.”
“Stop! You’ll make it worse.” She was giggling now. “Scots blood, have you?”
“I must have. What are we going to do?”
“I was considering just lying here for a while. Do you have a better plan?”
“No. But I thought you knew all about this kind of thing.”
She was still a trifle breathless from the dive into the trees. It was a hell of a time to find out that her fitness training was deficient. She pulled herself up cautiously and spoke to him in the measured tones reserved for importunate four-year olds. His age was declining before her eyes. “I’m going to go over this once more, Carson. I do not live a life filled with derring-do and romance. No one, up to now, has ever shot at me with malice aforethought. Or on the spur of the moment, if it comes to that. I come, I go, I speak of Michelangelo. Neither shooter nor shot at have I been. I had hoped, with thought, to keep it that way.”
It was some time before he answered. “You seem awfully calm. Do you always quote Eliot under pressure?”
She could hear in his voice a wild hope that she was being modest. She knew how he felt. She wished she were too. She sighed.
“Sorry. But I’ve not fought at the hot gates, nor knee deep in the salt marsh. I have been refrigerated in Istanbul, but it’s not the same thing, is it?”
She grinned at him the grin that made hard bitten newspaper men dream dreams, and for the first time he saw her as a human being. It was just a glimpse, but it startled him. Before he could respond, she was on her feet, advancing cautiously out of the shelter of the trees. She was greeted with the same heavy thunk and a spray of pine needles. She dove back into the cover of the trees and sat brushing the dirt off her clothes.
<
br /> “Well, there goes that theory. I thought it might all be a dreadful mistake and someone would come rushing up and say how sorry they were.”
“Or a practical joke.”
“You ran with a rough crew at Harvard if that’s your idea of a joke. Well, they seem to mean it. What shall we do? You wouldn’t like to go all macho and offer to get us out of this?”
He just looked at her. She shrugged. “Just a thought.”
Sandy was terrified. He’d never been shot at before either, and he didn’t know Jessica well enough to know that her brittle humor was a sign of deep and genuine fear on her side. He thought she might be making fun of him and he still hoped she was more experienced in this kind of thing than she claimed. He took a deep breath. His voice was shaky, but it gained confidence as he said, “I know parts of the Wasteland. ‘April is the cruelest month.’”
“For God’s sake, if today is any indication, May can’t be far behind. Do you have to recite ‘The Burial of the Dead?’ Are we at the epitaph stage already? Don’t you know any Gerard Manley Hopkins or James Whitcomb Riley? I wouldn’t turn up my nose at Ogden Nash. ‘Candy is dandy but liquor is quicker’ is about my speed right now.”
“‘Breeding lilacs out of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull roots with spring rain.’” he continued doggedly. It took his mind off the madman shooting at them. This might be routine to her, but he was damned if she was going to make a fool of him. He glanced at her. She was looking at him in real surprise, her eyes narrowed. His recitation must be better than he thought.
“Do you know,” she said slowly, “That is exactly why you are here. They are awfully afraid, back on the Potomac, that these dull roots have been stirred with spring rain.”
“And have they?” he said politely. They might have been sharing coffee after the monthly meeting of the Harvard Debating Society. She sighed again. The ancient mariner had no corner on albatrosses. Her voice was crisp.
“Well, it would be nice to think they could be. We’ll just have to wait and see, won’t we?”
She stared out over the valley, but she could see nothing in the trees across the way. It was clear she was going to have to take charge. Nothing she could say or do would convince him she was a novice. At her age. She was beginning to have less fear of the gunman across the way than of Sandy’s continuing a complete recital of The Wasteland.
“OK, Kid. On your feet. There has to be another way off this mountain. If we go up, we have trees for cover. We’ll circle around and try to come out behind him. We can’t sit here. If he doesn’t get us, T. S. Eliot will.”
He scrambled to his feet and they started up the steep pine needle covered slope. You see, he said to himself, she was just testing your response under fire. He thought he’d acquitted himself rather well. She was still trembling inside, biting down hard to keep back a nervous giggle. It had sounded good. Let’s hope to hell it works. Where had she read the words she’d said so authoritatively to Sandy? She hoped it wasn’t one of those modern anti-hero novels where they were going to get wiped out on the next page.
They climbed up the steep slope, keeping to the shelter of the trees. The ground was slick with pine needles and she kept up a brisk pace. Her calves were on fire and her legs ached by the time she stood above the small hotel she had known was near the ski slope. She leaned against a tree, drooping with exhaustion.
“You’re pretty spry for a woman your age.”
“God, you’ve got a way with words.” She couldn’t help herself. She giggled. She was just too tired to put him in his place.
“What now?” he said after he’d gotten his breath. Which took him an unconscionably short time.
“We’ve got to find some way to get the car. We’re about a mile by the road from the restaurant.”
“Shall I try to get it?”
“Does your mother really need your insurance money, or are you just feeling generous? Let’s go down to the hotel, have a drink, and see whether there isn’t a bus boy we can send.” She was getting her strength back.
“All right,” he said reluctantly, “But I’d just as soon go get it myself.”
“I know you would, and I consider it a grave personal weakness not to send you. I’m just a poor defenseless woman.”
“Is the Sixth Fleet defenseless?”
“It depends upon which Senator you talk to.”
“Why do you suppose they’re shooting at us?”
She looked at him in amazement. “There’s more to you than meets the eye, Carson. Which, God knows, is fortunate. What else did you notice about that shooting?”
“They came awfully close.”
She nodded. “Doesn’t it seem likely that anyone who can shoot that well can probably shoot better?”
“You don’t think they wanted to hit us?”
“I certainly think they had mixed emotions.”
“Then why? To scare us?”
“They succeeded there.”
“Maybe to warn us off.”
“Off what? There’s nothing in Vitosha but ski tows.”
“And us.”
She looked at him for a long moment, then said slowly, “And us. Sandy, don’t ask why, ask what they actually accomplished.”
“They got grass stain on your blouse.”
She grinned. “And for that they’re going to pay. What else?”
“They kept us here.”
“Right. I’ve got to get to a telephone. Go into the hotel and find someone to get the car. Even in Bulgaria a small gratuity is appreciated. Five leva should do it. Sandy, under no circumstances are you to go yourself. You have absolutely no pension rights until you’re thirty.”
They went up the steps into the hotel and she hurried off to find a telephone.
Sandy went to the desk and was soon talking to a young man. He explained that they had had lunch at The Happy Man and had gone for a walk but his companion had overestimated her strength and was too tired to walk back to the restaurant. He was reluctant to leave her; could the boy perhaps bring the car? The boy was thrilled at the idea of driving the car. He understood perfectly, women were frail creatures. Sandy gave him the keys and a five leva note. He glanced around nervously; he hoped Jessica hadn’t heard that conversation.
He was sitting glumly in the lobby when Jessica finally reappeared, looking frustrated and worried.
“Bulgarian telephone is almost as efficient as standing on a hilltop and shouting. When I think how I malign Ma Bell.
Well, I finally got through to Rila. Father Vazov has not arrived yet. He was supposed to be there early this afternoon.”
She hadn’t bothered to tell him she knew someone at Rila — that they were going to meet someone.
“Maybe he stopped off somewhere.”
“I hope so. I guess it’s too early to worry. Where’s the car?”
“The boy is bringing it.”
Several minutes later, the boy appeared in the doorway looking unhappy. “There is a problem.”
Sandy looked at Jessica. She gave him a demure smile. “After you, my dear Alphonse,” she murmured, “I’m just the little woman.”
“What’s the matter?” he said to the boy. “Couldn’t you find the car?”
Oh yes, he had found it. But unfortunately it had not one, but two flat tires. There seemed to be only one spare. What to do?
Another look at Jessica. Sweet smile. “Tell me you majored in auto mechanics at Harvard, my angel.”
“Is there a service station in the area?” Sandy said to the boy.
Yes, there was one, but how were they to get the car there? “The kid’s sharp,” muttered Jessica. “Maybe I should recruit him.”
“Did they have a towing service?” Sandy said. They did.
Could Sandy call?
He could, said the boy, but it would be easier to go there.
“You go ahead,” Jessica said, “I’ll wait here,”
“Oh, I couldn’t leave you alone.”
The mouth still smiled, but a slight narrowing of the eyes warned Sandy that if they’d been alone, a karate chop would have been the least of his worries.
“You have very expressive eyes,” he said.
The smile sweetened. “Thank you, dear. Perhaps I had better go with you. I’d hate to miss a good service station.”
The boy disappeared to find someone to drive them to the service area.
Finally they were underway. It was only a ten minute ride to the station which was on the main road from Sofia to Athens. There was a great deal of activity visible as they pulled up to the office. “What is the trouble?” Jessica said in Bulgarian to the driver.
“Oh, you speak Bulgarian, Miss?”
No, I’ve got a good ventriloquist, dummy. It was her day for fools. But all she said aloud was, “Da.”
“I believe there has been an accident. The police are here. I will see.” He got out of the car and walked into the office.
Jessica looked at Sandy. “Would you like to place a small wager on the identity of the accident victim?”
“We don’t know there’s been a victim.”
She raised her hand as if to present the boy who came bursting out the door. “Oh, Miss, there has been a terrible accident near Rila Monastery, three killed and many hurt. The police have brought one of the cars back here. It will be some time before they can go for your car.”
“Well?” she said to Sandy. “Remember where you heard it first.” She sighed. “See if they have a tire; we’ll take it back and fix it ourselves. I’ve got to be back in Sofia in time to sing.”
“You’re going back?”
“I don’t think there’s any point in going to Rila tonight. And remember, we’re on an afternoon outing. My job is singing in that club.”
No Work for a Woman Page 14
