Alan Furst: Kingdom of Shadows

Morath and Balki walked around Bratislava, drank beer at a cafe, and waited. The city reminded Morath of Vienna in ‘38-Jewish shop windows smashed, Jew Get Out! painted on building walls. The Slovakian politicians hated the Czechs, invited Hitler to protect them, then discovered that they didn’t like being protected. But it was too late. Here and there somebody had written pro tento krat on the telephone poles, for the time being, but that was braggadocio and fooled nobody.

Back in the station restaurant, Morath sat with his valise between his feet, ten thousand dollars in Austrian schilling packed inside. He asked a waiter if the Danube bridge was open-in case he decided to drive across, but the man looked gloomy and shook his head. “No, you cannot use it,” he said, “they’ve been crossing for days.”

“Any way into Austria?”

“Maybe at five they let a train through, but you have to be on the platform, and it will be-very crowded. You understand?”

Morath said he did.

When the waiter left, Balki said, “Will you be able to get back out?”

“Probably.”

Balki nodded. “Morath?”

“Yes?”

“You’re not going to get yourself killed, are you?”

“I don’t think so,” Morath said.

The train wasn’t due for another two hours, so he used a telephone in the station to place a call to Paris. He had to wait twenty minutes, then the call went through to the Agence Courtmain. The receptionist, after several tries, found Mary Day at a meeting in Courtmain’s office.

“Nicholas!” she said, “Where are you?” She wasn’t exactly sure what he was doing. “Some family business,” he’d told her, but she knew it was more than that.

“I’m in Bratislava,” he said.

“Bratislava. How’s the weather?”

“Sunny. I wanted to tell you that I miss you.”

After a moment she said, “Me too, Nicholas. When are you coming back?”

“Soon, a few days, if all goes well.”

“It will, won’t it? Go well?”

“I think so, you don’t have to worry. I thought I’d call, to say I love you.”

“I know,” she said.

“I guess I have to go, there are people waiting to use the phone.”

“All right. Good-bye.”

“A few days.”

“The weekend.”

“Oh yes, by then.”

“Well, I’ll see you then.”

“Good-bye, Mary.”

The waiter had been right about the passenger train. It pulled in slowly, after six-thirty, people jammed in everywhere. Morath forced his way on, using his strength, smiling and apologizing, making a small space for himself on the platform of the last car, hanging on to a metal stanchion all the way to Vienna.

He called Szubl at his hotel, and they met in a coffeehouse, the patrons smoking and reading the papers and conversing in polite tones. A city where everyone was sad and everyone smiled and nothing could be done-it had always seemed that way to Morath and it was worse than ever that summer night in 1939.

Szubl handed him an envelope, and Morath used the edge of the table for cover and looked at the passport photo. An angry little man glared up at him, mustache, glasses, nothing ever goes right.

“Can you fix it?” Szubl said.

“Yes. More or less. I took a photo from some document his wife had with her, I can paste it in. But, with any luck at all, I won’t need it.”

“Did they look at your bag, at the border?”

“Yes. I told them what the money was for, then they went through everything else. But it was just the usual customs inspectors, not SS or anything.”

“I took out the stays out of a corset. You still want them?”

“Yes.”

Szubl handed him an envelope, hotel stationery. Morath put it in his pocket. “When are getting out of here?”

“Tomorrow. By noon.”

“Make sure of that, Wolfi.”

“I will. What about the passport?”

“Tell her your friend lost it. More money for Herr X, and he can just go and get another.”

Szubl nodded, then stood up. “I’ll see you back in Paris, then.”

They shook hands, and Morath watched him leave, heavy and slow, even without the sample case, a folded newspaper under one arm.

“Would you go once around the Mauerplatz?”

“If you like.” The taxi driver was an old man with a cavalry mustache, his war medals pinned to the sun visor.

“A sentimental journey,” Morath explained.

“Ah, of course.”

A small, cobbled square, people strolling on a warm evening, old linden trees casting leafy shadows in the light of the streetlamps. Morath rolled the window down and the driver took a slow tour around the square.

“A lady and I stayed here, a few years ago.”

“At the Schoenhof?”

“Yes. Still the same old place?”

“I would think. Care to get out and take a look? I don’t mind.”

“No, I just wanted to see it again.”

“So, now to the Landstrasse?”

“Yes. The Imperial.”

“Come to Vienna often?”

“Now and again.”

“Different, this past year.”

“Is it?”

“Yes. Quiet, thank God. Earlier we had nothing but trouble.”

8:15. He would try one last time, he decided, and made the call from a phone in the hotel lobby.

“Hotel Schoenhof.”

“Good evening. This is Doktor Heber, please connect me with Herr Kolovitzky’s room.”

“Sorry. Herr Kolovitzky is not available.”

“Not in his room?”

“No. Good night, Herr Doktor.”

“This is urgent, and you will give him a message. He took some tests, at my clinic here in Wahring, and he must return, as soon as possible.”

“All right, I’ll let him know about it.”

“Thank you. Now, would you be so kind as to call the manager to the phone?”

“I’m the manager.”

“And you are?”

“The manager. Good night, Herr Doktor.”

The next morning, Morath bought a briefcase, put the money and his passport inside, explained to the desk clerk that he would be away for a week, paid for his room until the following Thursday, and had the briefcase put in the hotel safe. From the art dealer in Paris he had a new passport-French, this time. He returned to his room, gave his valise a last and very thorough search, and found nothing out of the ordinary. Then he took a taxi to the Nordbahnhof, had a cup of coffee in the station buffet, then went outside and hailed a taxi.

“The Hotel Schoenhof,” he told the driver.

In the lobby, only men.

Something faintly awkward in the way they were dressed, he thought, as though they were used to military uniform. SS in civilian clothing. Nobody saluted or clicked his heels, but he could sense it-the way their hair was cut, the way they stood, the way they looked at him.

The man behind the desk was not one of them. The owner, Morath guessed. In his fifties, soft and frightened. He met Morath’s eyes for a moment longer than he needed to. Go away, you don’t belong here.

“A room, please,” Morath said.

One of the young men in the lobby strolled over and leaned on the desk. When Morath looked at him, he got a friendly little nod in return. Not at all unpleasant, he was just there to find out who Morath was and what he wanted. No hard feelings.

“Single or double?” the owner said.

“A single. On the square, if you have it.”

The owner made a show of looking at his registration book. “Very well. For how long, please?”

“Two nights.”

“Your name?”

“Lebrun.” Morath handed over the passport.

“Will you be taking the demi-pension ?”

“Yes, please.”

“Dinner is served in the dining room. At seven promptly.”

The owner took a key from a numbered hook on a board behind him. Something odd about the board. The top row of hooks, he saw, had no keys. “403,” the owner said. “Would you like the porter to take your valise up?” His hand hovered over a bell.