A Woman Involved (34 page)

Now come on, he thought. This was either the easiest pick-up of his life, or she was a Comrade sent to pick him up. ‘Poor today. Have you just arrived?’

‘Yes. Isn’t that electric train something else?’

In case I noticed you on the train? Or was she for real, just suffering from chronic friendliness? ‘Delightful. Should do it in daylight. You touring Switzerland?’

‘Uh-huh. Just another American tourist.’

You don’t say. But American accents are the easiest to imitate. Hers was a drawl. How much baggage did she have?
If she was a Comrade who had followed him from Berne she wouldn’t have baggage. She said: ‘What’s the restaurant like in this hotel?’

Now he was almost sure. ‘Very good.’

‘Great, then I guess I’ll eat in. It’s cold out.’

He said: ‘You didn’t bring ski clothes all the way from America, did you?’

‘No, I’m going to buy gear tomorrow.’

Like I am. And he thought, Oh Jesus. But there were scores of people checking into hotels, going to buy or rent ski gear tomorrow. ‘What part of America are you from?’

‘Texas.’

That accent was phoney. If God had intended Texans to ski He’d have made bullshit white. He said:

‘Tell you what. I’m dining in, too. Would you care to join me?’

She gave him a pleasant, bruised smile. ‘What a good idea.’

He thought, And I haven’t even asked your name. But maybe she was just a lonely all-American tourist, big enough to look after herself over dinner with a fellow guest in a respectable hotel. He felt brutal saying it: ‘And afterwards, perhaps we can retire to my room and there make polite, and hopefully efficient, use of each other’s bodies.’

There was a silence.

‘Perhaps,’ she said, ‘the subject may come up, more indirectly, after dinner.’

He smiled at her, embarrassed. And he did not know what to think. Except that he wished he’d had the guts to try that one in the past. But she had not knocked him back, and that was enough. He drank down his whisky. He did not even taste it.

‘I must shave and freshen up. I’ll meet you here in … twenty minutes?’

‘Fine,’ she said, a little frostily.

He walked out of the bar. He followed the signs to the ski locker room. It was empty. He let himself out of the door, into a lane.

He was uptight again. He walked away from the Platz. He turned left and then right down back streets. He looked back. Nobody was following him. He took the next street, to the
modern Zermatterhof Hotel, and went in the ski locker door. He went up to the foyer.

He took a single room in the name of Johnson. He paid. If he could have done so he would have left town, but there are no cars in Zermatt, and the train had stopped running.

He went up to this room. Oh God, God, he hoped he was wrong. He hoped he had only spoiled a nice American lady’s evening.

He sat on the bed. He touched his pistol under his arm. Then dragged his hands down his face.

If she was a Comrade she would have telephoned her controller from Brig, where they changed trains for Zermatt. And reinforcements would be on the way right now. And there was no way he could get out of town till the morning.

He dared not go down to the restaurant. He picked up the bedside telephone angrily. He ordered a bottle of wine, steak, eggs and chips.

He sat there, waiting for it.

And, oh, just to pick up the telephone again and call the Yab Yum in Amsterdam and speak to Anna, and tell her he loved her … 

Good God, was he mad? … Taking on the KGB and MI6 and the Vatican itself? … 

He pressed his fingertips to his eyes.
How was he going to get to the Pope?

The night was a turmoil of frightening, shallow dreams. But when he awoke, before first light, unrested, he was almost calm. He would shoot any Russian bastard who came near him. If the bitch was a Comrade, there would be a dozen of them in town by daylight, covering the railway station, the cable cars. If the bitch was a Comrade he was cornered in the Alps and he had only one thing going for him – they had to take him alive, to find out where the microfilm was. And they couldn’t do that easily if he kept in the midst of people. And he would shoot
and run and go down fighting. He swung out of bed, and telephoned room service for a large pot of coffee. Then he chain-smoked grimly, waiting for the shops to open.

At eight-thirty he left the hotel via the ski locker room. It was a grey day, snowing lightly. He took the back streets. He went into the first shop selling ski gear.

He bought ski trousers, an anorak, goggles, a woollen cap, gloves and a small rucksack. He put them on in the store. He bought a tube of ‘Sudden Tan’ lotion and rubbed it well into his face in the changing cubicle. He looked in the mirror. The tan looked real. He bought a can of Nivea cream, and smeared the white ointment on his lips. He pulled his cap down low, put his goggles on his forehead. He stuffed his other clothes into the rucksack. He kept his gun in the shoulder holster, under the anorak.

Two doors away was a rental shop. He selected a pair of ski boots. He chose short skis, a hundred and seventy centimetres, to give him easier control. He rented them all for one week, and paid.

He left the store. He lowered his goggles over his eyes. There were plenty of people about now. He shouldered the skis, and set off down the sidestreets, heading for the cable-car station on the slopes.

There were hundreds of skiers trudging up to the cable car. He looked up the mountain. The slopes disappeared into cloud. He tramped up into the bleak station.

There were scores of people. He swept his eyes over them. He did not spot the woman. He looked at the notice board. And gave a sigh of relief. All the ski runs were open despite the cloud. He joined the queue, and bought a one-day ticket.

He clomped up the steps, to the cable-car platform. He went through the door, into the clamour of the cars bumping into each other. And he saw her.

She was leaning against the wall, holding skis, studying a map of the slopes. She was wearing a silver-grey ski suit. Morgan strode past her. She did not look up. He hurried to the cars. There were half a dozen people ahead of him. Each car was for four people. The first four skiers got into the front car,
the next couple into the one behind. They slammed the door, and the dispatcher went to lock them in, but Morgan hurriedly rammed his skis into the slot, re-opened the door and scrambled in. They looked peeved. But no way was he going to get into an empty car and give her the chance to ride with him alone. He slammed the door, and the dispatcher locked it.

The car jerked forward. It began to ascend. He looked back.

She was not standing at the wall any longer. He looked at the car behind. There were two people in it. He could not make out faces.

It takes about ten minutes to the first way-station of Furri, up a beautiful yawning canyon, the ski runs twisting down it – but Morgan saw none of it. His nerves were tight. He was sure now she was one of them.

The station loomed up, perched on a crag, its black mouth engorging cable cars. He got ready. The car entered the mouth, swinging. As the dispatcher unlocked the door, he scrambled out. He snatched his skis and strode away. The next car was approaching the mouth. He rounded the corner, and he ran. He could go three ways, to the cafeteria, to the snow, to the next cable-car platform. He clattered up the steps, dodging people.

There were about a hundred people waiting at the platform. A car was just coming in. It was capable of carrying a hundred and twenty people. He made his way into the midst of the crowd.

The car came rocking in. Its gate opened and the passengers began to board. Morgan was amongst the first. He walked to the far corner. He turned and watched.

The car filled up about him. There were still people arriving on the platform. And there she came.

She was hurrying up the steps. The last people were boarding. There was still space. She hurried aboard.

Morgan turned his back and closed his eyes.

Again he did not notice the beauty, the breathtaking chasms. He studied his ski map feverishly. Trying to remember what the different runs looked like, what hills and forks there were to lose her on. There was an ‘
Aaah
’ and he looked up. And there was the Matterhorn.

They had passed through the cloud layer. The great sharp peak reared up, steep and savage, black and white. And there was the knife edge between the mighty Matterhorn and the Klein Matterhorn, the Theodulpass in the saddle, the border of Switzerland and Italy.

Please God she doesn’t follow me over it. Please God I don’t have to kill her … 

The car came to rest ponderously at the Trochenersteg platform. The big doors slid open, the skiers started filing out. She had to be amongst the first to leave because she was standing at the door. She walked out, without a backward glance. Morgan hung back. She disappeared off the platform. But he knew what she was doing: standing around the corner, pretending to study her ski plan, waiting for him to emerge. As the last person in front of him stepped out onto the platform, Morgan turned and walked back into the car. The new passengers started coming aboard.

Morgan leant against the far window, and watched the door. She did not reappear.

The door slid shut. The car began to move.

He took a big, tense breath. He had lost her. But there was a snag. He had to come back here, to get up to Theodulpass. If she was a Comrade, she would still be waiting.

The cable car clanged to a halt back at the Furri station. Morgan was the first out. He strode through the complex. He saw the arrow pointing to the Schwarzsee cable car. He followed it. A car was loading. He squeezed on board. The doors slid shut behind him.

The car swung out into midair, and began the ascent to the Schwarzsee station. He looked at his ski map feverishly.

There was no way she could be there. No ski runs from Trochenersteg joined up with ski runs to Schwarzsee. He still had to go back to Trochenersteg, where he had lost her. But
he would arrive from a different direction, on a different cable-car system, on a different platform.

He strode off the platform at Schwarzsee, clattered down the steps, out onto the snow.

He threw his skis down, dug in his poles. He kicked the ice off his boots, and stepped into the skis, and the bindings snapped on. He shuffled his feet, testing himself. He pulled on his gloves. It was two years since he had done this. He dug in the poles, and shoved off, down the slope.

He kept his skis twelve inches apart. He gathered speed. He bent and stretched his knees, getting the feel of the snow again. Then he dug in one pole and swung his weight. He skidded sideways to a stop. He shoved off down the slope again. He dug in the other pole, and swung into a halt in the other direction, and he sprawled.

‘Shit!’

He clambered up, angrily.
He had not had his fucking mountain shoulder forward!
He shoved straight off again.

He tried it again. And remembered to turn his mountain shoulder forward. He got it right.

It was over an hour since he had lost her.

The cable car rocked into the Trochenersteg station. He kept in the middle of the disembarking passengers. He tramped through the complex, looking for the silver-grey ski suit. He followed the signs, and emerged onto the snow. He glanced around. There were dozens of people. He did not spot her. He put on his skis.

A few hundred yards below was the tee-bar that would tow him up to the knife edge of the Alps, the Theodulpass. He shoved off and skied down to it.

There was a short queue. She was not in it.

He shared a tee-bar with a dentist from Vienna who said that the beer, wine, food, service, weather, accommodation and skiing was better and cheaper in Austria.

The top of the tow loomed up; at the right moment, he let go. He swung out of the way, and came to a stop. He began to edge up to the very top of the Theodulpass, feverishly.

He came to the top, panting, his legs aching. There below
him was Italy. Snow-clad peaks and valleys stretching on and on, all the way to the horizon. And nestling down there was the Italian ski resort of Cervinia.

There were many people on the slopes, skiing to Cervinia. None seemed to be wearing a silver-grey ski suit.

He dug in his poles and shoved himself off the top.

He skied fast, avoiding the tricky bits, his eyes sweeping the slopes for silver-grey ski gear. He stopped only once, around a hillock, to rest his legs. He edged off the
piste
, and up the hillock for ten yards, and waited. People coming around the bend would not see him unless they looked back. He waited five minutes, and many people flashed past but nobody looked around at him.

He shoved off again.

He passed the cable-car station halfway down the mountain, skiing fast, but avoiding trouble. On the easy bits he looked back over his shoulder. There were plenty of people behind him.

He skied to the lower cable-car station, and swung to a halt. There was not a policeman in sight. He took off his skis, and shouldered them.

He set off down the snowy road, into the resort, trying not to appear in a hurry.

It was not as pretty as Zermatt. There were many cars. He headed towards the square where the buses wait. Before the square he turned left. Halfway down the street was a bar. He went in. It was almost empty.

He ordered a cappuccino. He watched the window. Nobody came in.

He ordered another cappuccino. While the barman prepared it, Morgan went into the toilet.

He locked the door. He pulled his jacket, trousers and shoes out of the rucksack. He took off his ski gear and put on his ordinary clothes. His shoulder holster. He stuffed his ski gear into the haversack. He kept his ski cap on. He picked up the rucksack and walked back to the bar. He pushed a fifty-franc note across to the barman. ‘Can I leave my skis here for a couple of days?’

The barman took the banknote. ‘Okay, sir.’

‘Thank you. Somebody will come to fetch them.’

He paid for his coffees in Swiss money, and left. He made his way by sidestreets, down towards the square.