Christopher Reich - Numbered Account

When Nick looked up again, he noted the arrival of a swarthy man—tall and thick with curly black hair, looking strangely his way. Could be a thug, he thought. Nick glanced up and offered a weak smile, but the ill-shaven man was examining a favorite watch and couldn’t be disturbed.

Nick stopped to study a solid gold wristwatch. Come closer, he dared him. If you’re a customer, like me, you’ll keep walking. He kept his eyes glued to the gaudy watch—nice if you’re a Vegas bookie or a loan shark in Miami Beach. Looking up, he saw that the man had vanished.

“I see that Monsieur is interested in the Piaget,” came a polished voice from behind his right shoulder.

Nick turned and stared into a dazzling smile.

“Frankly, I would recommend something more casual,” said the swarthy salesman. “Maybe even something a little bit rugged. You appear a man of action, a sportsman, non? Perhaps the Daytona from Rolex? We have a wonderful model in eighteen-karat gold, sapphire crystal, deployment buckle, water resistant to two hundred meters. The finest timepiece in the world for just thirty-two thousand francs.”

Nick raised an eyebrow. If he ever had a spare thirty thousand francs, he wouldn’t spend it on a watch. “Do you have that model with a diamond bezel?”

The salesman registered gross disappointment. “Helas, non. We have just sold our last such model. But may I propose—”

“Maybe another time then,” Nick cut in apologetically before finding the staircase to the ground floor.

He exited the store and headed south toward the lake, staying close to doorways and shop windows. You are getting paranoid, he told himself. You didn’t see anybody in that alley. You didn’t see any peaked cap trailing behind you. The man in Bucherer was a salesman. Nick asked himself who in the world would have the slightest interest in following him. He had no idea. No logical answer suggested itself.

Relax, he told himself.

In front of him, the Bahnhofstrasse widened. The buildings to his right fell away, revealing a large open square, the Paradeplatz. Trams arrived from all four corners, encircling the kiosk and ticket station that sat shyly in the midst of their more commanding neighbors. To his immediate right stood the headquarters of Credit Suisse, a neo-Gothic edifice reflecting the Victorian era’s pride in the mastery of detail. Farther across the square sat the Swiss Bank Corporation, a masterpiece of postwar anonymity. Immediately to his left, the Hotel Savoy Baur-en-Ville welcomed many a thirsty banker to Zurich’s most elegant watering hole.

Nick crossed the street and turned into the square. He ducked into the entry hall of Credit Suisse where he hid, rather idiotically by his own estimation, behind a potted date tree. Well-dressed eccentrics were apparently quite common in Zurich, for none of the bank’s customers, seeking the services of the twenty-four-hour bancomat, gave him a second glance. He waited five minutes, then deciding he’d studied the date tree’s leaves long enough, left the bank. He paused to allow the number thirteen tram to pull into the Paradeplatz, direction Albisguetli, then trotted across the tracks, daring the number seven, picking up speed rapidly in the other direction,to hit him. With one last stride, he was clear of the tracks and on safe ground. Content that no one was behind him, he walked directly across the square to the Confiserie Sprungli.

As Nick passed through the pastry shop’s doors, he was overwhelmed by a succession of intoxicating aromas, each more seductive than the last. A whiff of chocolate, the tart sniff of lemon, and in a lower register, a note of freshly whipped cream. He made his way to the counter and asked for a box of chocolate luxembergerli, confections of meringue and chocolate cream, each no larger than his thumb and lighter than air. He paid and turned toward the exit. Leave your overactive imagination at the door, he told himself.

Then, for reasons Nick couldn’t quite explain, he turned to take a final look back into the pastry shop. Perhaps he’d wanted to savor the feeling of safety the shop had provided. Or, less sentimentally, and as he would prefer to believe, he had actually felt someone’s eyes upon him. But look back he did. There at the opposite entryway stood a middle-aged man of olive complexion and salt-and-pepper goatee, wrapped in a houndstooth cape. He wore an Austrian mountain guide’s hat, rugged green with a sandy brush extending from its brim. The hat rose like an incomplete mountain, a shallow cleft interrupting its summit. The caped shoulders were rounded.

Nick had found his Klansman.

The man stared intently in his direction for several moments. When he realized that his subject was returning his gaze, his mouth turned upward in an insolent smile. His eyes narrowed, then he rushed from the store. The bastard was letting him know he’d been following him.

Nick remained where he was for perhaps five seconds. The realization had left him too shocked to move. Moments passed. Bewilderment was replaced by anger. Furious, he raced out the nearest exit to confront his stalker.

The Paradeplatz was jammed with hundreds of people. Nick dashed into a multitude of shoppers, commuters, and tourists. He darted through the crowd, raising himself on his tiptoes to see the people ahead. The evening gloom, the snow and mist, made it impossible to separate one group from the next. Still, he searched for the creased hat, the Holmesian cape. He circled the square twice, looking everywhere for the little man. He had to know why he was being followed. Was the man in the cape just some middle-aged freak with nothing better to do, or had someone put him up to it?

Fifteen minutes later, he decided that further search was futile. His stalker had vanished. Just as bad, sometime during his search, he’d dropped the box of pastries. Nick returned to the Bahnhofstrasse and continued south toward the lake. He noted that the crowds had thinned. Few stores were open. Every tenth step he turned and checked for the presence of his gentlemanly escort. The street was empty. Only the trail of his own footprints in the powdery snow followed him.

Nick heard the whine of an engine approaching behind him. This part of the Bahnhofstrasse was reserved for trams. Automobile traffic was limited to several blocks going north and south. He checked over his shoulder and confirmed the presence of a late-model Mercedes saloon car: black with smoked windows and consular plates. It appeared to have come from the Paradeplatz. The car gunned its motor and pulled up alongside him. The passenger window lowered and an ungoverned head of brown hair popped out.

“Mr. Nicholas Neumann,” called Sterling Thorne. “You’re an American, correct?”

Nick took a step back from the automobile. Wasn’t he popular tonight? “Yes, I am. Swiss and American.”

“We’ve been interested in meeting with you for a few weeks now. Did you know that you’re the only American working at the United Swiss Bank?”

“I don’t know all the members of the bank,” answered Nick.

“Take my word for it,” Thorne suggested affably. “You’re flying solo.” He was wrapped in a suede jacket, collar turned down to expose a lamb’s wool lining. His eyes were ringed with dark circles, his cheeks sunken, pocked with a hundred pinpricks.

“How do you like working in that nest of vipers?” he asked. “I mean being an American and all.”

“We’re a pretty benign group. Hardly vipers.” Nick matched Thorne’s cordial tone, wondering where this was leading, sure it was nowhere he wanted to go.

“Well, I will agree that you fellas don’t look like much, but looks can be deceiving, can they not, Mr. Neumann?”

Nick leaned down to look into the car. One look at Thorne brought back his aversion to agents of the United States government. He thought of the man in the cape with the mountain guide’s hat—his stalker. He couldn’t link the dignified clothing, the European headgear, the overall refined bearing with Sterling Thorne. The two were oil and water. “What can I do for you? It’s snowing. I have a dinner appointment. Mind if we get to the point?”