The Man Who Went Up In Smoke (4 page)

The plane was an Ilyushin 18 turboprop from Czechoslovak Airlines. It rose in a steep arc over Copenhagen and Saltholm, and an Öresund that glittered in the sun. Martin Beck sat by the window and looked down at Ven Island below, with Backafall Cliffs, the church and the little harbor. He had just had time to see a tugboat rounding the harbor pier before the plane turned south.

He liked traveling, but this time disappointment over his spoiled holiday overshadowed most of his pleasure. Moreover, his wife had not seemed to understand at all that his own choice in the matter had not been very great. He had called the evening before and tried to explain, but had not been particularly successful.

'You don't care a bit about me or the children," she had said.

And a moment later:

'There must be 
other
 policemen besides you. Do you have to take on 
every
 assignment?"

He had tried to convince her that he would in fact have preferred to go out to the island, but she had gone on being unreasonable. In addition, she had demonstrated various evidence of faulty logic.

'So you're going to Budapest to enjoy yourself while the children and I are stuck by ourselves out on this island."

'I am not going for fun." "Hmm-mph."

In the end she had put down the receiver in the middle of a sentence. He knew she would calm down eventually, but he had not attempted to call again.

Now, at an altitude of 16,000 feet, he tipped his seat back, lit a cigarette and let his thoughts of the island and his family sink into the back of his mind.

During their stopover at Schönefeld airport in East Berlin, he drank a beer in the transit lounge. He noted that the beer was called Radeberger. It was excellent beer, but he didn't think he would have cause to remember the name. The waiter entertained him in Berlin German. He did not understand very much of it and wondered gloomily how he was going to manage in the future.

In a basket by the entrance lay a few pamphlets in German and he took one out at random to have something to read while he waited. Clearly he needed to practice his German.

The leaflet was published by the German journalist's union and dealt with the Springer concern, one of the most powerful newspaper and magazine publishers in West Germany, and its chief, Axel Springer. It gave examples of the company's menacing fascist politics and quoted several of its more prominent contributors.

When his flight was called, Martin Beck noted that he had read almost the whole pamphlet without difficulty. He put the pamphlet into his pocket and boarded the plane.

After an hour in the air, the plane again came down to land, this time in Prague, a city that Martin Beck had always wanted to visit. Now he had to be content with a brief glimpse, from the air, of its many towers and bridges and of the Moldau; the stopover was too short to give him time to get into the city from the airport.

His red-haired namesake in the Foreign Office had apologized for the connections between Stockholm and Budapest which were not the world's best, but Martin Beck had no objections to the delays, although he was not able to see more of Berlin and Prague than their transit lounges.

Martin Beck had never been to Budapest and when the plane had taken off again, he read through a couple of leaflets he had received from the redhead's secretary. In one dealing with the geography of Hungary, he read that Budapest had two million inhabitants. He wondered how he was going to find Alf Matsson if the man had decided to disappear in this metropolis.

In his mind he reviewed what he knew about Alf Matsson. It was not a great deal, but he wondered whether there was really anything else to know. He thought of Kollberg's comment: "Singularly uninteresting person." Why should a man like Alf Matsson want to disappear? That is, if he had disappeared of his own free will? A woman? It seemed hardly credible that he should sacrifice a well-paid position—one that he seemed to be happy with, moreover—for that reason. He was still married, of course, but perfectly free to do as he wished. He had a home, work, money and friends. It was hard to think of any plausible reason why he should voluntarily leave all that

Martin Beck took out the copy of the personal file from the Security Division. Alf Matsson had become an object of interest to the police simply because of his many and frequent trips to places in Eastern Europe. "Behind the Iron Curtain," the redhead had said. Well, the man was a reporter, and if he preferred to undertake assignments in Eastern Europe, then that in itself wasn't so peculiar. And if he had anything on his conscience now, why should he disappear? The Security Division had consigned the case to oblivion after a routine investigation. "A new Wallenberg affair," the man at the F.O. had said, thinking of the famous case of a well known Swede last seen in Budapest in 1945: "Spirited away by the Communists." "You see too many James Bond movies," Kollberg would have said if he had been there.

Martin Beck folded up the copy and put it into his briefcase. He looked out the window. It was completely dark now but the stars were out, and way down there he could see small dots of light from villages and communities and pearl strings of light where the street lamps were on.

Perhaps Matsson had started to drink, abandoning the magazine and everything else. When he sobered up again he would be broke and full of remorse and would have to make his presence known. But that didn't sound likely either. True, he drank occasionally, but not to that degree, and normally he never neglected his job.

Perhaps he had committed suicide, had an accident, fallen into the Danube and drowned or been robbed and killed. Was this more likely? Hardly. Somewhere or other, Martin Beck had read that, of all the capitals in the world, Budapest had the lowest crime rate.

Perhaps he was sitting in the hotel dining room right now, having his dinner, and Martin Beck would be able to take the plane back the next day and continue his holiday.

The signs lit up. No smoking. Please fasten your seatbelts. And then they repeated the same thing in Russian.

When the plane stopped taxüng, Martin Beck picked up his briefcase and walked the short stretch toward the airport buildings. The air was soft and warm although it was late in the evening.

He had to wait quite a long time for his only suitcase, but the passport and customs formalities were dispensed with swiftly. He went through a huge lounge, its walls lined with shops, and then out onto the steps outside the building. The airport appeared to be far outside the city. He saw no other lights except those within the area of the airport itself. As he stood there, two elderly ladies climbed into the only taxi there was on the turn-around drive in front of the steps.

Some time elapsed before the next taxi drove up, and as it took him through suburbs and dark industrial areas, Martin Beck realized he was hungry. He knew nothing about the hotel he was going to stay at—other than its name and the fact that Alf Matsson had stayed there before he had disappeared—but he hoped he would be able to get something to eat there.

The taxi drove along broad streets and around large open squares into what appeared to be the center of the city. There were not many people about and most of the streets were empty and rather dark. For a while they went down a wide street with brightly lit store windows before continuing into narrower and darker side streets. Martin Beck had no idea whatsoever where he was in the city, but all the while he kept an eye out for the river.

The taxi stopped outside the lighted entrance of the hotel. Martin Beck leaned over and read the figure on the red meter before paying the driver. It seemed expensive, more than a hundred forints. He had forgotten what a forint was worth in his own money, but he realized that it couldn't be very much.

An elderly man, with a gray mustache, a green uniform and visored cap, opened the taxi door and took his bag. Martin Beck walked through the revolving doors behind him. The entrance hall was large and very lofty, the reception desk running at an angle across the left-hand corner of the hall. The night porter spoke English. Martin Beck gave him his passport and asked if he could have dinner. The porter indicated a glass door farther down the hall and explained that the dining room was open until midnight. Then he gave the key to the waiting elevator man who took Martin Beck's bag and preceded him into the elevator. The car creaked its way up to the first floor. The elevator man appeared to be at least as old as the elevator, and Martin Beck tried in vain to relieve him of his bag. They walked down a long corridor, turned to the left twice, and then the old man unlocked some enormous double doors and put the bag inside.

The room was over twelve feet high and very large. The mahogany furniture was dark and huge. Martin Beck opened the door to the bathroom. The bathtub was spacious with large, old-fashioned taps and a shower.

The windows were high and had shutters on the inside, and in front of the window alcove hung heavy white lace curtains. He opened the shutters on one side and looked out Immediately below was a gas lamp, throwing out a yellowish-green light Far away he could see lights, but quite a time elapsed before he realized that the river was flowing between him and the lights over there.

He opened the window and leaned out Below, a stone balustrade and large flower urns encompassed tables and chairs. Light was streaming out onto them, and he could hear a little orchestra playing a Strauss waltz. Between the hotel and the river ran a road with trees and gas lamps, a trolley line and a broad quay, on which there were benches and big flower pots. Two bridges, one to his right and the other to the left, spanned the river.

He left the window open and went down to eat. Opening the glass doors from the hall, he came into a lobby with deep armchairs, low tables and mirrors along one wall. Two steps led up to the dining room and at the far end sat the little orchestra he had heard up in his room.

The dining room was colossal, with two huge mahogany pillars and a balcony running along three of the walls, high up under the roof. Three waiters wearing reddish-brown jackets with black lapels were standing inside the door. They bowed and greeted him in chorus, while a fourth rushed forward and directed him to a table near the window and the orchestra.

Martin Beck stared at the menu for a long time before he found the column written in German and began to read. After a while the waiter, a gray-haired man with the physiognomy of a friendly boxer, leaned over toward him and said:

'Very gut Fischsuppe, gentleman."

Martin Beck at once decided upon fish soup.

"
Barack
?" said the waiter.

'What's that?" said Martin Beck, first in German, then in English.

'Very gut aperitif," said the waiter.

Martin Beck drank the aperitif called 
barack. Barack palinka
, explained the waiter, was Hungarian apricot brandy.

He ate the fish soup, which was red and strongly spiced with paprika and was indeed very good.

He ate fillet of veal with potatoes in strong paprika sauce and he drank Czechoslovakian beer.

When he had finished his coffee, which was strong, and an additional 
barack
, he felt very sleepy and went straight up to his room.

He shut the window and the shutters and crept into bed. It creaked. It creaked in a friendly way, he thought, and fell asleep.

Martin Beck was waked by a hoarse, long-drawn-out toot. As he tried to orient himself, blinking in the half-light, the toot was repeated twice. He turned over on his side and picked his wristwatch up off the night table. It was already ten to nine. The great bed creaked ceremoniously. Perhaps, he thought, it had once creaked as majestically beneath Field Marshal Conrad von Hötzendorf. The daylight was trickling through the shutters. It was already very warm in the room.

He got up, went out into the bathroom and coughed for a while, as he usually did in the mornings. After drinking a gulp of mineral water, he pulled on his dressing gown and opened the shutters and the window. The contrast between the dusky light of the room and the clear, sharp sunlight outside was almost overwhelming. So was the view.

The Danube was flowing past him on its calm, even course from north to south, not especially blue, but wide and majestic and indubitably very beautiful. On the other side of the river rose two softly curved hills crowned by a monument and a walled fortress. Houses clambered only hesitantly along the sides of the hills, but farther away were other hills strewn with villas. That was the famous Buda side, then, and there you were very close to the heart of Central European culture. Martin Beck let his glance roam over the panoramic view, absently listening to the wingbeats of history. There the Romans had founded their mighty settlement Aquincum, from there the Hapsburg artillery had shot Pest into ruins during the War of Liberation of 1849, and there Szalasis' fascists and Lieutenant General Pfeffer-Wildenbruch's SS troops had stayed for a whole month during the spring of 1945, with a meaningless heroism that invited annihilation (old fascists he had met in Sweden still spoke of it with pride).

Immediately below lay a white paddle steamer tied up to the quay, with its red, white and blue Czechoslovak flag hanging limply in the heat and tourists sunbathing in deckchairs on board. What had waked him was a Yugoslavian paddle-wheel tugboat that was slowly struggling upstream. It was big and old, with two tall funnels tilting asymmetrically, and it was pulling six heavily loaded barges. On the last barge a line had been strung between the wheelhouse and the low loading crane between the hatches. A young woman in a head scarf and blue work garb was tranquilly picking washing out of a basket and carefully hanging up baby clothes, unmoved by the beauty of the shores. To the left, arching over the river, was a long, airy, slender bridge. It seemed to lead directly to the mountain with the monument—a tall, slim bronze woman with a palm leaf raised above her head. Across the bridge thronged cars, buses, trolleys and pedestrians. To the right, northward, the tugboat had reached the next bridge. Again it let out three hoarse toots to announce the number of barges it was pulling, let down its funnels fore and aft and slid in under the low arch of the bridge. Just in front of the window a very small steamer swung in toward the shore, slid over fifty yards athwartship with the current and smartly completed the maneuver, putting in with hardly an inch to spare at a pontoon jetty. A preposterous number of people went ashore from the steamer and an equally preposterous number then boarded it.

The air was dry and warm. The sun was high. Martin Beck leaned out of the window, letting his eyes sweep from north to south as he considered a few facts he had gleaned from the brochures he had read on the plane.

'Budapest is the capital of the Hungarian People's Republic. It is considered to have been founded in 1873, when the three towns Buda, Pest and Óbuda were united into one, but excavations have revealed settlements several thousand years old, and Aquincum, the capital of the Roman province of Lower Pannonia, was situated on this spot. Today the city has nearly two million inhabitants and is divided into twenty-three districts."

It was certainly a very large city. He remembered the legendary Gustaf Lidberg's almost classic reflection on landing in New York in 1899, on his search for the counterfeiter Skog: "In this ant-heap is Mr. Who, address: Where?"

Well, New York was certainly larger than this, even at that time, but on the other hand, Chief Detective Lidberg had had unlimited tune at his disposal. He himself had only a week.

Martin Beck left history and the river traffic to their respective fates and went and took a shower. He put on his sandals and his light-gray Dacron slacks and wore his shirt outside. As he critically observed his unconventional attire in the mirror in the huge wardrobe, the mahogany doors suddenly opened by themselves, slowly and fatefully, with an unnerving creak, as in early thriller films. He still hadn't got his pulse under control when the telephone began to ring with short, urgent little signals.

'There's a gentleman to see you. He's waiting in the foyer. A Swedish gentleman."

'Is it Mr. Matsson?"

'Yes, I'm sure it is," said the receptionist happily.

Of course it is, thought Martin Beck as he went down the stairs. In that case there would be a thoroughly honorable end to this odd assignment.

It was not Alf Matsson, but a young man from the Embassy, extremely correctly dressed in a dark suit, black shoes, white shirt and a pale-gray silk tie. The man's eyes ran over Martin Beck, a glint of wonder in them, but only a glint.

'As you will understand, we are aware of the nature of your assignment. Perhaps we should discuss the matter."

They sat down in the lobby and discussed the matter.

'There are better hotels than this one," said the man from the Embassy.

'Really?"

'Yes. More modern. Tip-top. Swimming pool."

'Oh yes."

'The night club here isn't much good either."

'Oh yes."

'With regard to this Alf Matsson."

The man lowered his voice and looked around the lobby, which was empty except for an African sleeping in the farthest corner.

'Yes. Have you heard from him?"

'No. Nothing at all. The only thing we know for certain is that he checked in at Ferihegyi, that's the airport here, on the evening of the twenty-second. He spent the night at some kind of youth hotel called Ifjuság up on the Buda side. The next morning he moved in here. About half an hour later, he went out and took his room key with him. Since then, no one has seen him."

'What do the police say?"

'Nothing."

'Nothing?"

'The ones I've spoken with don't seem interested. Officially speaking, that attitude is defensible. Matsson had a valid visa and he has registered as a resident at this hotel. The police have no reason to concern themselves with him until he leaves the country, so long as he doesn't overstay the period of his residence permit."

'Couldn't he have left the country?"

'Quite unthinkable. And even if he had succeeded in getting over the border illegally, where would he go then? Without a passport. Anyhow, we've made some inquiries at the embassies in Prague, Belgrade, Bucharest and Vienna. Even in Moscow, for safety's sake. No one knows anything."

'His employer seemed to think that he had two things to do here. An interview with Laszlo Papp, the boxer, and an article on the Jewish museum."

'He hasn't been to either place. We've done a little investigating. He had written a letter from Sweden to the curator of the museum, a Dr. Sos, but did not look him up. We've also talked to Papp's mother. She had never heard of Matsson's name and Papp himself is not even in town."

'Is his luggage still in his hotel room?"

'His possessions are at the hotel. Not in his room. He had reserved a room for three nights only. The hotel management retained it at our request, then moved his luggage into the office. Out here. Behind the reception desk. In fact, it wasn't even unpacked. We paid the bill."

The man sat in silence for a while, as if he were thinking something over. Then he said solemnly, "Naturally we're going to demand the amount back from his employers."

'Or his estate," said Martin Beck.

'Yes, if things turn out to be as bad as that."

'Where's his passport?"

'I have it here," said the man from the Embassy.

He unzipped his flat briefcase, took out the passport and handed it over, simultaneously taking his fountain pen out of his inside pocket.

'Here you are. Would you sign for it, please?"

Martin Beck signed. The man put away his pen and the receipt.

'Well, then. Is there anything else? Yes, of course, the hotel bill. You needn't worry about that. We've had instructions to cover your expenses. Rather unorthodox, I feel. Naturally you should have had daily expenses in the usual fashion. Well, if you need any cash, you can collect it at the Embassy."

'Thank you."

'Then I don't think there's anything else, is there? You can go through his possessions whenever you like. I've let them know."

The man got up.

'In fact you're occupying the same room that Matsson had," he said in passing. "It's 105, isn't it? If we hadn't insisted on the room remaining in Matsson's name, you would probably have had to stay at some other hotel. It's the height of the season."

Before they parted, Martin Beck said, "What do you personally think about this? Where's he gone?"

The man from the Embassy looked at him expression-lessly.

'If I think anything at all, I prefer to keep it to myself."

A moment later he added, "This thing is very unpleasant."

Martin Beck went up to his room. It had already been cleaned. He looked around. So Alf Matsson had stayed here, had he? For an hour, at the most. To expect any clues from his activities during that brief period would be demanding too much.

What had Alf Matsson done during that hour? Had he stood by the window like this, looking out at the boats? Perhaps. Had he seen somebody or something that made him leave the hotel so quickly he'd forgotten to hand in his key? Possibly. What would it have been, then? Impossible to say. If he'd been run over in the street, it would have been reported at once. If he had planned to jump into the river, he would have had to wait until dark. If he had tried to nurse his hangover with apricot brandy and had plunged into another drinking bout as a result, then he'd had sixteen days in which to sober up. That was a bit much. Anyway, he had not been in the habit of drinking while on an assignment. He was the modern type of journalist, it had said someplace in the report from the Third Division: quick, efficient and direct. He was the type who did the job first and relaxed afterward.

Unpleasant. Very unpleasant. Singularly unpleasant. Damned unpleasant. Blasted unpleasant. Almost painfully so.

Martin Beck lay down on the bed. It creaked magnificently. Gone were thoughts of Baron Conrad von Hötzendorf. Had it scrunched beneath Alf Matsson? Presumably. Was there anybody who didn't test the bed as soon as he stepped into a hotel room? So Matsson had lain here and looked up at the ceiling over twelve feet above. Then, without unpacking and without handing in his key, he had gone out… and disappeared. Had the telephone rung? With some startling news?

Martin Beck unfolded his map of Budapest and studied it at length. Then he was seized with an urge to perform some kind of duty, so he rose, put the map and his passport into his hip pocket and went down to inspect the luggage.

The porter was a somewhat stout, elderly man, friendly, dignified and admirably intelligible.

No, no one had phoned Mr. Matsson while Mr. Matsson was still in the hotel. Later, when Mr. Matsson had left, there had been several calls. They had been repeated the following days. Was it the same person who had phoned? No, several different people—the operator at the board was sure of that. Men? Both men and women, at least one woman. Had the people who phoned left any messages or telephone numbers? No, they had left no messages. They hadn't given their telephone numbers either. Later there had been calls from Stockholm and from the Swedish Embassy. Then, however, both messages and telephone numbers had been left. They were still here. Would Mr. Beck like to see them? No, Mr. Beck would not like to see them.

The luggage was indeed to be found in a room behind the reception desk. It was very easily inspected. A portable typewriter of the standard make Erika and a yellowish-brown pigskin suitcase with a strap around it. A calling card was fitted into the leather label dangling from the handle. Alf Matsson, Reporter, Fleminggatan 34, Stockholm K. The key was in the lock.

Martin Beck took the typewriter out of its case and studied it for a long time. Having come to the conclusion that it was a portable typewriter of the Erika make, he went over to the suitcase.

The bag appeared neatly and carefully packed, but all the same he had a feeling that someone with a practiced hand had been through it and put everything back into place. The contents consisted of a checked shirt, a brown sport shirt, a white poplin shirt with the laundry band still around it, a pair of freshly pressed light-blue trousers, a kind of blue cardigan, three handkerchiefs, four pairs of socks, two pairs of colored shorts, a fishnet undershirt and a pair of light-brown suede shoes. Everything was clean. In addition, a shaving kit, a sheaf of typing paper, a typewriter eraser, an electric razor, a novel and a dark-blue plastic wallet of the kind that travel agencies usually give away free and that aren't big enough for the tickets. In the shaving kit were shaving lotion, talcum powder, a cake of soap still in its wrapper, a tube of toothpaste that had been opened, a toothbrush, a bottle of mouthwash, a box of aspirin and a pack of contraceptives. In the dark-blue plastic wallet were $1500 in $20 bills and six Swedish 100-kronor notes. An astonishingly large sum for traveling money, but Alf Matsson seemed to be accustomed to doing things in a grand manner.