William Bayer - Tangier

"In a minute, Peter, I'm going to walk out of here "

"Yes, yes. You're busy. I know. The Freys. You know their house, of course. Their collections. Their paintings and antiques. You know they raise Alsatian dogs. But did you know too that there are indictments against them in Belgium? That there are people in several countries who would give a great deal to know that they are here?"

"How do you know this?"

"I've known for a long time."

" How? "

"I've heard certain things. And I've discovered others on my own."

"You have proof?"

"I'm not a judge, Hamid."

"Who are they?"

"So! You believe me. Good!" He leaned forward, toward Hamid's ear, and spoke rapidly in a hoarse whisper, turning away every so often to clear his throat and cough. "They are notorious. The Beckers. Kurt and Inge Becker. Same first names, you see. During the war they ran a confidence ring, pretended they could help prominent Jews escape. They doublecrossed them, stole everything they had, murdered them after they'd signed over everything and placed themselves in their hands. They amassed a great fortune which they somehow managed to have transferred here. You can read about them in books, I expect, and also in Israeli files. Ha!"

He pulled Hamid by his sleeve over to the window, then pointed up at a palace that hung precipitously above the ravine. "Now they live quietly in their big house on the Mountain. That place is impenetrable as a fort. Walls, wire fences, dogs, electric gates. The Freys are courteous people, always dignified and correct. They give money to the local charities, and their servants report that they are kind. There is a rumor around that they are under royal protection. There's nothing more that I can tell you, except that everything I've said is true. They're excellent customers, by the way. Tell me what you'll do."

"You give information to me, Peter. I don't give it to you. But for what you've just told me I certainly hold you in regard."

He was pleased, walking back to the car. Though he knew he couldn't always trust Zvegintzov, this time intuition told him that he should. He had performed, he thought, a marvel of detective work, forming a theory that would explain the presence of an Israeli agent in Tangier, then uncovering information that suggested his theory was correct.

But later, that afternoon, he thought about Zvegintzov and the curious price he'd extracted for the Beckers' names. Why does Peter want my respect? What possible good could it do him now?

He was disturbed the next morning by something he saw on his way to work-a girl, no older than twelve, swinging a cat by its tail against a telephone pole on Rue de Belgique. He stopped his car, called out. The girl glared at him, heaved the cat away, and ran off down the street. The cat was dead. Hamid wrapped the carcass in a newspaper and deposited it in the trash.

Arriving at his office, he felt depressed. A great number of new cases had accumulated during the night. Aziz had arranged the dossiers in order of importance on his desk. Hamid looked at them, groaned, then set to work. By eleven he was finished, and exhausted from the task.

"About Lake," he said to Aziz. "Any idea why he's hanging around La Colombe?"

"We don't have anything on that, Hamid, except that he and Zvegintzov are friends. Lake's had him to the Consulate several times. The Russian takes part in the conversation, sometimes drinks too much and runs off about his clients. Lake's chauffeur says the Consul drives over there nearly every day, and that Zvegintzov gives Lake cigars."

Someone blew a whistle outside. Hamid walked to the window. Two cops were tussling with a boy in front of the building. A small crowd had gathered. A man in a bloodstained butcher's apron was waving his fist. A police jeep was parked by the curb.

"I've never known Peter to give anything away."

Aziz bent forward. "What do you think, Hamid?"

"Nothing. I don't think anything. I wish I were home in bed."

At noon he picked up his brother, then drove out to a fish restaurant on the Atlantic beach. They ordered seafood tapas, dishes of tiny eels and clams and squids, which they ate with bits of Arab bread.

"I'm worried about Kalinka."

He spoke rapidly, after a silence. Farid looked up and wiped his mouth.

"She's very strange lately. She's stopped smoking-Achar convinced her, but in a way that's made things worse. Now she draws and broods. I come home and find her sitting by the window. When I ask her what she's done, she looks at me and I feel her eyes drilling to my heart. I ask about the pictures. She shows them to me-strange, shadowy scenes. I ask her what they mean. She blinks at me and smiles."

"Well, Hamid, you have to take her to a doctor."

"She's been to Achar. Radcliffe too. They tell me she's just a little nervous, and I shouldn't allow myself to become upset."

"Maybe a psychiatrist-"

"In Tangier? Our so-called psychiatrists are madhouse attendants. Anyway, how can I send her to one of them? I'm an inspector of police. Soon everyone will be saying she's sick in her head. People will use that against me. I don't care, but those pitying looks, those suggestions that I throw her out. Ah!"

He swirled his fork among the eels. Farid pushed back his chair. His face was like Hamid's, but less Berber, prettier. "She's always been strange, Hamid."

"I know. At first I thought it didn't matter. She was what she was, I loved her, and that was enough. But now I feel I must understand her. She suffers. Perhaps she longs for something. Some loss. Torment. I don't know."

Then, sensitive to the fact that he was making his brother uneasy, Hamid switched the subject. "Have you ever sold anything to the Freys?"

Farid shook his head. "They don't collect Moroccan things. They like signed French furniture. Impressionists. Roman coins."

"You've seen all that?"

"One time. With Wax. He was after them for a while. When he smells money on people he warms up to them, and he smelled it on the Freys. He's drawn to rich people. When he finds them the first thing he does is think up a swindle. There was a jade scepter they had, and he wanted it. He had in mind a trade, a pair of short obelisks which he claimed were ancient pieces from Luxor, though I happen to know he had them made by the man who makes gravestones on Avenue Hassan II. Anyway, we went up to the Freys'. This was during the time that Patrick was teaching me interior decoration and good taste."

Hamid laughed, though his memory of that time was sad. He'd felt such shame for his brother then, the "bought boy" of Patrick Wax.

"He taught me a lot, you know. Took me to Europe. Showed me the museums. Enough so I could tell that the things up at the Freys' were good. They have an excellent Renoir and some wonderful bibelots."

"Did you like the Freys?"

"Are they involved in something, Hamid?"

"Perhaps. I can't tell you more than that."

"Well, all I can say is that they were pleasant enough, though not especially refined. There they were, living amidst all that splendor, but there was something ordinary, peasant-like about them too."

"Did Wax get his scepter?"

"No. They were shrewd. They saw through him. They sensed he was a charlatan. But they didn't let on. They just smiled and shook their heads."

As they drove back to the city, Hamid marveled at how much his brother had been changed by the three or four years he'd spent with Patrick Wax. He'd been taken into palaces and chateaux, taught about precious materials-marble, silver, bronze. Now he had his own shop, where he sold rugs and Berber jewelry. He designed candelabra, based vaguely on Moroccan models, which he sold to European decorators at many times their worth.

"It's funny, isn't it?" he said as they were passing through Place de France. "I became a policeman, and you became an antiquaire . Can you remember, fifteen years ago, the two of us kicking around a soccer ball in the dust?"