Алистер Маклин - The Last Frontier

Reynolds’ thoughts were interrupted by the sound of the door across the hall opening. He looked up to see a man hurrying across the parquet floor, the tap-tap of his metalled heels urgent and almost comically hurried: he was shrugging a jacket over a crumpled shirt, and the thin, bespectacled face was alive with fear and anxiety.

‘A thousand apologies, comrade, a thousand apologies!’ he wrung white-knuckled hands in his distress, then glared at the porter following more slowly behind him. ‘This oaf here–’

‘You are the manager?’ the Count interrupted curtly.

‘Yes, yes, of course.’

‘Then dismiss the oaf. I wish to talk to you privately.’ He waited till the porter had gone, drew out his gold cigarette case, selected a cigarette with due care, examined it minutely, inserted it with much deliberation in his holder, took his time about finding his matchbox and removing a match, finally lit the cigarette. A beautiful performance, Reynolds thought dispassionately: the manager, already on the tenterhooks of fright, was now almost in hysterics.

‘What is it, comrade, what has gone wrong?’ In his attempt to keep his voice steady, it had been louder than intended, and it now dropped to almost a whisper. ‘If I can help the AVO in any way, I assure you–’

‘When you speak, you will do so only to answer my questions.’ The Count hadn’t even raised his voice, but the manager seemed to shrink visibly, and his mouth closed tightly in a white line of fear. ‘You spoke to my men some little time ago?’

‘Yes, yes, a short time ago. I wasn’t even asleep just now–’

‘Only to answer my questions,’ the Count repeated softly. ‘I trust I do not have to say that again … They asked if you had any new arrival staying here, any fresh bookings, checked the register and searched the rooms. They left, of course, a typed description of the man they were looking for?’

‘I have it here, comrade.’ The manager tapped his breast pocket.

‘And orders to phone immediately if anyone resembling that description appeared here?’

The manager nodded.

‘Forget all that,’ the Count ordered. ‘Things are moving quickly. We have every reason to believe that the man is either coming here or that his contact is already living here or will be coming here in the course of the next twenty-four hours.’ The Count exhaled a long, thin streamer of smoke and looked speculatively at the manager. ‘To our certain knowledge, this is the fourth time in three months that you have harboured enemies of the State in your hotel.’

‘Here? In this hotel?’ The manager had paled visibly. ‘I swear to God, comrade–’

‘God?’ The Count creased his forehead. ‘What God? Whose God?’

The manager’s face was no longer pale, it was ashen grey: good communists never made fatal blunders of this kind. Reynolds could almost feel sorry for him, but he knew what the Count was after: a state of terror, instant compliance, blind, unreasoning obedience. And already he had it.

‘A – a slip of the tongue, comrade.’ The manager was now stuttering in his panic, and his legs and hands were trembling. ‘I assure you, comrade–’

‘No. No, let me assure you , comrade.’ The Count’s voice was almost a purr. ‘One more slip-up and we must see to a little re-education, an elimination of these distressing bourgeois sentiments, of your readiness to give refuge to people who would stab our mother country in the back.’ The manager opened his mouth to protest, but his lips moved soundlessly, and the Count went on, his every word now a cold and deadly menace. ‘My instructions will be obeyed and obeyed implicitly, and you will be held directly responsible for any failure, however unavoidable that failure. That, my friend, or the Black Sea Canal.’

‘I’ll do anything, anything!’ The manager was begging now, in a state of piteous terror, and he had to clutch the desk to steady himself. ‘Anything, comrade. I swear it!’

‘You will have your last chance.’ The Count nodded towards Reynolds. ‘One of my men. Sufficiently like the spy we are after, in build and appearance, to pass muster, and we have disguised him a little. A shadowed corner of your lounge, say, an incautious approach, and the contact is ours. The contact will sing to us, as all men sing to the AVO, and then the spy himself will be ours also.’

Reynolds stared at the Count, only the years of professional training keeping his face expressionless, and wondered if there was any limit to this man’s effrontery. But in that same insolent audacity, Reynolds knew, the best hope of safety lay.

‘However, all that is no concern of yours,’ the Count continued. ‘These are your instructions. A room for my friend here – let us call him, for the sake of convenience, say, Mr Rakosi – the best you have, with a private bathroom, fire-escape, short-wave radio receiver, telephone, alarm clock, duplicates of all master-keys in the hotel and absolute privacy. No switchboard operator eavesdropping on Mr Rakosi’s room telephone – as you are probably aware, my dear manager, we have devices that tell us instantly when a line is being monitored. No chambermaid, no floor waiters, no electricians, plumbers or any other tradesmen to go near his room. All meals will be taken up by yourself. Unless Mr Rakosi chooses to show himself, he doesn’t exist. No one knows he exists, even you have never seen him, you haven’t even seen me. All that is clearly understood?’

‘Yes, of course, of course.’ The manager was grasping frantically at this straw of a last chance. ‘Everything will be exactly as you say, comrade, exactly. You have my word.’

‘You may yet live to mulct a few thousand more guests,’ the Count said contemptuously. ‘Warn that oaf of a porter not to talk, and show us this room immediately.’

Five minutes later they were alone. Reynolds’ room was not large, but comfortably furnished, complete with radio and telephone and a fire-escape conveniently placed outside the adjoining bathroom. The Count glanced round approvingly.

‘You’ll be comfortable here for a few days, two or three, anyway. Not more, it’s too dangerous. The manager won’t talk, but you’ll always find some frightened fool or mercenary informer who will.’

‘And then?’

‘You’ll have to become somebody else. A few hours’ sleep then I go to see a friend of mine who specializes in such things.’ The Count thoughtfully rubbed a blue and bristly chin. ‘A German, I think will be best for you, preferably from the Ruhr – Dortmund, Essen or thereabouts. Much more convincing than your Austrian, I assure you. East-west contraband trade is becoming so big that the deals are now being handled by the principals themselves, and the Swiss and Austrian middlemen who used to handle these transactions are having a thin time of it. Very rare birds now, and hence an object of suspicion. You can be a supplier of, let us say, aluminium and copper goods. I’ll get you a book on it.’

‘These, of course, are banned goods?’

‘Naturally, my dear fellow. There are hundreds of banned goods, absolutely proscribed by the governments of the west, but a Niagara of the stuff flows across the iron curtain every year – £100,000,000 worth, £200,000,000 – no one knows.’

‘Good Lord!’ Reynolds was astonished, but recovered quickly. ‘And I’ll contribute my quota to the flow?’

‘Easiest thing imaginable, my boy. Your stuff is sent to Hamburg or some other free port under false stencils and manifest: these are changed inside the factory and the stuff embarked on a Russian ship. Or, easier still, just send them across the border to France, break up, repack and send to Czechoslovakia – by the 1921 ‘in transit’ agreement goods can be shipped from countries A to C clear across B without benefit of any customs examinations. Beautifully simple, is it not?’