Over the High Side (22 page)

Van der Valk enjoyed the antique phrase.

‘Blackmail will be the next step, no doubt,' as though it were the most natural thing in the world.

‘Ah,' said Van der Valk. ‘I'd been wondering about that.'

‘Has it by the way occurred to you that Denis has vanished rather suddenly? It strikes me as being a little pat. Explosion – puff of smoke – trapdoor – pantomime demon …'

‘I hadn't thought about it. His father's arrival caused a panic, I suppose, and precipitated him. You mean that she tipped him off in some way? Too deliberate and conscious an act, I should have thought. I may be reading her all wrong, but I think she's trying to make a stout denial as you put it that her father's dead at all. It doesn't work – keeps blowing up in her face. Hence her very unbalanced reactions.'

‘Anastasia,' said Coninck reflectively. ‘I like her coming to the hotel like that … great fun. Now let me see. There's bound to be an uproar; my dear friend Betty Lynch has
enlisted me … I take it that your immediate authority, for administrative convenience, will be the embassy?'

‘A man called Slavenburg – a counsellor of some sort.'

‘A man called Slavenburg … I'll talk to the Ambassador, I think; I know him well.' No dogsbodies.

‘But the decision, I should think, rests with the Procureur General in Amsterdam. From the political angle, Lord knows who – The Hague…. This boy Denis must be found.'

‘Quite. The Procureur?'

‘Yes, Mr Sailer.'

‘Not Tony Sailer?'

‘That's right.'

‘What is it that you want, Commissaire?'

‘Not to have the boy chased, I should think. He'll turn up – or perhaps I should say that we can probably find him quickly enough when we really want him. More urgently, I don't want to be chased. I don't suppose I'm telling you anything new but the problem for a police officer is that he's practically never left in peace to get on with his job.'

‘The problem is fairly familiar to me,' dryly. ‘Suppose I say, to you, in confidence, and I use that abused word literally, to mean that I will trust you and that you can trust me – suppose I say to you that I can take Tony Sailer off your back. I add, in the hope that I cause you no offence, that I am concerned with a highly-valued friendship, with persons I love and esteem, more than I am with the adventures of ah, this eccentric young woman of yours.'

It took Van der Valk a moment to sort out this diplomatic syntax: he said he would be very happy.

*

‘I was thinking of asking him,' he said to Inspector Flynn next morning, ‘what he thought about Denis when he took the words out of my mouth. Don't know anything about Denis, he says, I'm eighty years old and I know a lot about men but I know nothing about adolescent boys. After which I got told it was my bedtime and I'd better pop along, which I did. Have you ever read Proust?'

‘No.'

‘Nor me. Maybe he'd teach us to understand the adolescent boy.'

‘Don't want to understand the adolescent boy,' said Flynn. ‘Too many fellers doing that in the world as it is.'

‘Source of this whole trouble.'

‘Yes, yes, but eff the adolescent boy – only figuratively, that is,' he added cautiously. ‘I mean I've enough on me own plate right now. What are these Italians doing?'

‘Been instructed to drop it. Got the feller at the Vatican to say that if the boy indulges in a fugue it's better not to hunt him. Leave 'em alone and they'll come home. Wonder where's he got to,' reflectively.

‘Shouldn't think it much matters. Be more inclined meself to ask where he'd turn up.'

‘You're a man in my own heart.'

‘After, it would be.' Automatically.

‘What's that mean, after my heart?'

‘No idea; the English is a loony language. Why we use it is anyone's guess.'

‘Like where Denis turns up.'

‘Right here, my guess would be.'

‘You think so? He's just run away blindly, no? Why did he go to Rome? To gain time, no? Put your head under the sheet and hope the nasty men will go away. These people always do that. Say they want to be alone to think things out. Boy must realize he's in trouble, but it's like getting out of bed on a cold winter morning; he's going to count slowly to fifty first. Do you think it possible that Stasie tipped the boy off? Doesn't make sense to me.'

‘Why not? We've no way of controlling it. If you're right about her she's too dotty anyway to worry about being an accessory after the fact or aiding a fugitive or what not. Because there isn't any fact. Anyway, why shouldn't he have contacted her? He sends her a card saying Having Fun, but why shouldn't he phone, say? I'd think he feels bewildered and looks for reassurance … oh damn it; I don't know.'

‘Nobody loves me either.'

‘What you doing about that?'

‘Going to make Stasie love me,' said Van der Valk, grinning.

*

Mr Slavenburg was perplexed, but not showing it.

‘The Ambassador would like to see you,' careful to sound neither menacing nor disapproving.

Monsieur de Coninck was spry, no doubt about it.

‘Good morning, Excellency.'

‘Ah, Van der Valk; sit down, sit down. This Lynch affair. I gather you are aware of this recent development – mm, precipitates matters, hm?'

‘I just hope it won't go precipitating me.'

‘I certainly don't think you should do anything hastily. I am not myself fully briefed on your activities: not my fish, shall I say? – see no need to concern myself with the frying of it: however. I am aware that in such circumstances you will be seeking fresh instructions: I wished merely to tell you that your view of the matter – I've had copies of your reports under my eye, naturally – that your handling of the matter seems proper, and that I should be disposed to endorse any eventual approval of the way you see fit to conduct your uh, investigation. In the event of an adverse decision, of course, I would not feel called upon to criticize the ministry's judgment. I wouldn't be exactly discontented, either,' with a pleasant smile. ‘Am I clear, eh?'

‘Yes, Excellency.'

‘As for calling the Irish judicial authorities into consultation, I should be inclined at the present to – to leave the door open; in fact, uh, not to put too fine a point upon it, to do nothing. Your liaison man – he's au fait? Good, and he gives you no cause to believe that they view your activities as uh, undesirable? – very good, very good, we'll say no more. You will continue of course to keep Mr Slavenburg informed; I need hardly say that from our standpoint the fullest possible reports are the essential feature of your work here. We'll take it all as said. You're comfortable? Looking after you all right? Yes, well, so they should; lot of money being spent, however, long as it's all properly accounted for. Very good, Van der Valk, I needn't keep you.'

Amiable enough. Feeling his rear comparatively secure he bought a large map of the environs of Dublin and spent a pleasant hour studying it. Around lunch-time an embassy messenger brought an envelope containing a telegram that had – knowing Mr Sailer – probably been succinct enough to start with but had been translated into jargon by some diplomatic code-clerk.

‘Instructions unchanged stop. You will take all reasonable steps consistent with prudence for interviewing witness at large stop. Should conclusion same abut on desirability of apprehension said witness you will consult embassy who will conduct necessary démarches Irish judiciary stop. No steps to be taken without consultation Irish police stop. Essential all forms Irish judicial procedure followed stop. Discretionary powers conferred subsequent extreme prudence enjoined ends. Originated Procureur-Generals office province North Holland signed Sailer.'

He had lunch alone in the corner of a corner table, in the hotel restaurant, both flanks anchored like Ernest Hemingway.

Since getting hit on the head he had had his eye open a good deal. He did not know much about Mr Collins, but felt fairly sure nobody had been dogging his footsteps. Still, so far he had strolled around on foot and used public transport. His expense account having been passed absolutely without a murmur by the embassy comptroller he was now thinking of hum, enlarging his scope of action, and approaching the invaluable Mr Ryan for a little self-drive car. Nothing can be done in Dublin without one Mr Ryan or another. He found that Dublin traffic took a bit of practice, but he passed a comfortable afternoon and nobody followed him.

*

‘Hallo?'

‘Oh, it's you.'

‘That's right. I promised to ring you. Things to talk about.'

‘So you did. That would be nice.'

‘Can I talk?'

‘Yes but not here.'

‘Oh I wouldn't want to compromise you.'

‘No harm done. As it happens that falls out quite well. Eddy's going to Liverpool – oh, that happens quite often. The planes don't suit so he takes the night boat. So that I'm at a loose end, a bit. Perhaps we could go out somewhere.'

‘That sounds nice.'

‘Have you got a car?'

‘Yes.'

‘Why don't you pick me up at the top of Temple Hill where the road branches off to Bray – you know? Not at the house, I rather think.'

‘No. What time?'

‘Around half past seven?'

‘Understood.'

*

Darling Arlette,

Wound up in a most involved intrigue, which would amuse you greatly; impossible woman going to extraordinary lengths to throw confusion and embarrassment into the Martinez business. Her latest gag is to implicate me in a kind of complicity – the workings of her mind! – and there is a seducation act going on – there, the subconscious of my typewriter has produced just the right word. She is at the bottom of the still unexplained behaviour of the boy, and now perhaps it will be my turn for some of the sentimental seducation! Damn, there's the phone again … My laddy Flynn waiting for me downstairs. I'll get this finished tomorrow – we've got to plot a bit of tactics, and then I have a dinner date with the lady… Full report then! A tout à l'heure …

Van der Valk had always had a taste for risk. Arlette was fond of saying that it was bad taste … He had a Nordic streak of sentimentality too, which she didn't like either, tending to come moistly out at melodramatic moments. Like the time he had been in hospital, immobilized in plaster from the waist down, after an adventure that had finished rather badly for all concerned. Arlette had been with him all evening, for the next morning the plaster was due to come off, and one was not quite certain how much movement there would be. He himself was wondering whether he would walk – whether he would ever walk … He started talking about his childhood, in broadest nostalgic vein.

‘Must have been just before the war – thirty-eight, thirtynine. I was sixteen, I suppose, going through the racing-car craze. It wasn't like now, everything so cut and dried, so dull somehow. The drivers too seem so drab nowadays – serious, dedicated little technicians, just like astronauts. Then there was the human element: drivers did extraordinary things – the cars too, sometimes; things exploded, or the tyres flew off. My big hero was Nuvolari, Tazio Nuvolari, the Mantovano Volante. Once his motor caught fire – he got out on the back and steered with his feet till the car lost speed enough to jump off.

‘It was beginning to get dull, because the German cars outclassed all the others – oh there were Alfas still and Talbots and Maseratis but Mercedes won everything. Caracciola, and Lang, and Manfred von Brauchitsch – and an English boy too called Dick Seaman… I remember his getting killed on the Nurburgring, on the hump-backed bridge.'

Arlette didn't at all like this talk of getting killed: she was too rather bored. But if he wanted to talk…

‘Most of the other drivers joined the only team able to keep up; Auto Union, another German lot – funny cars; you sat in front, and they were tricky to drive. Nuvolari of course. And there was a young German boy with a great deal of talent, good-looking boy, all very romantic, called Bernd Rosemeyer, who became a popular hero.'

‘Not mine,' said Arlette, who had been ten, skipping a rope, very carefully brought up, forbidden to see Walt Disney's ‘Snow White' because it was both vulgar and frightening.

‘Hitler was very keen on all this; you know, enjoyed winning. The car firms got given lots of money, and of course won more and more easily, and looked for other fields to conquer, and they started building very low streamlined cars – painted silver, rather pretty, very spectacular – and began breaking speed records on the autobahnen, which were new then – all adding up to a fine bit of national propaganda, you get it?'

‘I do recall how cross they were about Jesse Owens.'

‘Yes, but he wasn't a car alas. Mercedes and Auto Union, ding dong, and it developed into a sort of personal match between Caracciola and Rosemeyer. Old and young, plain and good-looking, the Rudi and the Bernd.'

‘Sounds a bit one-sided.'

‘Oh no, the Rudi had tremendous prestige. He'd won everything, and he'd been in dozens of crashes, bust his legs so often that he limped in a funny way … like me – I hope…'

‘Not like you,' firmly, ‘but go on anyway.'

‘It wasn't like a race – only one car went at a time, measured along a special stretch, fantastic speeds, I don't recall but getting on for three hundred. One day there was bad weather, strong gusting wind I think, and everyone said oh well, no racing today. But Caracciola was hanging about, and said the hell with it, and got in his car and made the best time yet.'

Silence; the man was remembering excitement. Heroics: it was nineteen thirty-nine; heroics had still a couple of years to run.

‘A bit like a ski competition – you know, Jean-Claude or whoever is still at the top, and word coming back – an Austrian has made best time.'