Return to Vienna (10 page)

“Max!
He’s what we have in common.”

Steve held back for a second, then said brutally, ‘That cuts me out, doesn’t it?”

I drew in breath sharply. “What do you mean?”

Another pause as he considered what to say. When he spoke again it was to back-pedal. “I just meant that it’s no good your trying to live in the past—you are too young for that. And the right future for you, Jessica, doesn’t include most of the people you knew before.”

“You meant something else,” I whispered.

He turned to me slowly. It was too dark to see, but I could imagine the look in his eyes. For several long-drawn seconds he was quite utterly still, then swiftly he reached forward, drawing me into his arms.

“This is what I meant, Jessica.”

“No!”

I jerked back in a stupid panic. Like some naively innocent young girl getting more than she’d bargained for, I began groping madly for the door catch.

I couldn’t find it, but I didn’t need to. Steve drew away from me immediately and moved right back against the door on the farther side.

“I’m sorry about that “

Still breathing deeply, I said, “Drive me home, please.”

“In a minute,” he muttered.

“Now, please.”

But he didn’t attempt to start the car. The dancing lights of Vienna seemed farther, away now. They mingled with the night sky overhead, as remote as the stars themselves. The true reality was Steve and me enclosed within his car. Not even the road beneath us or the trees around us. Just Steve and me.

It couldn’t go on like that.

“Drive me back, please,” I said desperately, my willpower ebbing.

Still he made no move. It came through clearly that he was struggling with himself over something more than a simple urge to kiss me. I felt that a single word from me now would snap his control, so I kept silent.

At length he said in a stilted voice, “I’ve got something to tell you. Something I should have told you before.”

I wanted not to listen, but knew I must.

“What is.it?” I asked huskily.

Even then Steve was reluctant to speak, and suddenly, by some flash of insight, I understood what it was all about. He knew, or thought he knew, something seriously to Max’s discredit. Was he to expose my husband, knowing it would shatter precious memories for me, or should he go on concealing the truth?

I said, very faintly, “You had better tell me, Steve.”

He was turned away, as if staring fixedly into space. But I believed that his eyes were shut.

He began, his voice heavy, “Having taken over Max’s job, I’m using his office now. About a couple of weeks ago I came across a large manila envelope in his desk. One of the drawers was sticking, and when I took it out to see what was up, I found this package wedged at the back. It had been hidden there quite deliberately—it couldn’t have got there by accident.”

“Go on....”

“It contained money—a great deal of money. Austrian schillings, American dollars, and sterling. Over eight hundred pounds altogether.”

I swung around to look at Steve, and found that he had turned toward me. Our eyes met, only a foot apart.

I was trying to adjust my mind to this news. I shouldn’t really be surprised that Max had kept money hidden in his desk. He would hardly have banked what he was paid by British intelligence, nor could he have kept any large sums of cash in our apartment in case I had found it and asked questions.

I took a deep breath and muttered—casually, I hoped, “Yes, I know what that would be.”

It was a foolishly inadequate thing to say, of course. But I so desperately wanted to protect Max’s good name, to banish Steve’s obvious suspicion that the money had been come by dishonestly. If I acted quite matter-of-factly, with any luck he might conclude that everything was perfectly aboveboard, thinking it just an eccentricity of Max’s to keep big amounts in cash.

Incredulously, Steve exclaimed, “You
knew
about it!”

“No, I didn’t say that.”

“But. . .”

“I said I knew what it would be. I didn’t actually know that it was there.”

“I see!” But clearly Steve didn’t see at all. Even in the darkness I could tell that he was frowning as he groped around for the right thing to say. “I’ve been worried sick ever since I found that money. At first I was going to send it to you. That’s why I wrote the other day, sort of feeling my way. . . .”

“So that’s why you wrote!”

The disappointment must have spilled over into my voice, because Steve said quickly, “I was planning to get in touch with you a bit later on, of course, when you’d had time to ... Anyhow, I decided that the best thing was to wangle a trip to the head office so I could see you in London. I thought it might be easier to explain, that way.” I sensed his shrug. “And to think you knew about it all the time!”

“I’m sorry,” I muttered awkwardly.

“When you turned up here in Vienna, I just couldn’t make it out. Why
did
you come, Jessica? Was it something to do with the money?”

“I told you why I came, Steve.” I swallowed, and lied. “It’s got nothing whatever to do with the money.”

He paused, then said accusingly, “But you’re not a bit surprised to hear about me finding it in Max’s desk—or about the amount. Eight hundred pounds!”

“I told you. I know what it is.”

“Then you’d better have it right away. The envelope’s still there in the desk exactly as I found it— that seemed the best place, for the time being. But I’ll go and fetch it in the morning, and bring it to your hotel.”

“No!”

My fierce reaction was instinctive. The money had come from the same source that was now paying me, of course. But somehow I felt that I couldn’t bear to touch it.

“What do you mean?” demanded Steve. “That you don’t want me to bring the money to your hotel, or that you don’t want it at all?”

I shook my head miserably. “I suppose I’d better have it.”

“Why on earth shouldn’t you, if it was Max’s? God knows, he didn’t make much other provision for you.”

“I said I’ll have it,” I snapped. “But there’s no hurry. Anytime will do.”

“All the same, I’ll come around in the morning. It’s Sunday, so I’ll be free.”

“As you wish.” I suppose I sounded beastly ungracious, but I had to bring this to an end. Deceiving Steve was one of the most hateful parts of the job I’d undertaken. It made me feel the shabbiest sort of cheat. “Please take me back now.”

For a moment I thought that Steve was going to hit me—he might have if he’d been a different kind of man. As it was, he exploded in a fury of words.

“You . . . you treat me like a bloody nothing—that’s what! Shoving me off as if I was some filthy snooper poking his long nose in. I was fool enough to think we understood each other.”

A sob burst up from my throat, and I felt myself shaking uncontrollably. Gripping the edge of the leather seat with tense tight fingers, I tried to force myself into stillness. But the trembling only grew worse, taking hold of my entire body.

Steve’s rage was instantly gone. He seemed as if he wanted to comfort me. And then, with an abruptness that hit as hard as his bitter words, he turned away and started the car.

“It’s getting late,” he muttered.

We drove back toward the city, not talking at all. Past midnight now, the streets were almost deserted, and as we approached the hotel, even the muted exhaust of Steve’s Mercedes seemed loud enough to wake the sleeping neighborhood.

Pulling up outside the Mahlerhof he switched off, and came around to join me on the pavement. There was enough light shed from the hotel entrance for me to see the strain in his face. His brow was furrowed deep, and his eyes were dark with anxiety.

“Good night, Steve,” I said wretchedly.

He reached out, taking my hands in his.

“I’ll come tomorrow. You go to bed now, and I’ll be around in the morning. We’ll talk again—we’ll get it all sorted out.”

I said, with a choke in my voice, “There’s nothing
... nothing to sort out, Steve. Honestly….”

He silenced me with a kiss. Briefly he touched my cheek with his lips, just as I had done to him the night before on this same spot. It was a kiss of love, but a comforting kiss, empty of any immediate passion.

“Tomorrow,” he said gently, and released my hands.

I didn’t look back as I walked through into the hotel. I felt a lot calmer, almost serene. My problems hadn’t disappeared in those few seconds, nor was a solution to them any clearer. But somehow I seemed filled with a new strength. I still trembled—but that was something else altogether.

The night porter, hastily swallowing a mouthful of cheese roll, nodded and smiled at me from behind the desk. But he didn’t reach up for my room key.

“There is a gentleman to see you,
meine Dame.
He waits in the lounge.”

“A gentleman . . . ?” I glanced over my shoulder, but from here, with the lounge only dimly lit, I couldn’t see much through the glass doors. It could only be Richard, I thought, and was amazed that he’d risked approaching me so openly. But perhaps he considered it was safe to come to the hotel this late at night.

“Has he been waiting long?”

Even the blasé hotel porter was a little intrigued, I believe. He leaned confidentially across the counter and spoke softly. “An hour, perhaps. He is very persistent—
nicht?”

“Oh dear!”

The porter lowered his tone a degree more. “If you wish it, you could go straight up to your room, and I will inform the gentleman when he next inquires that you have still not returned.”

I shook my head. “Thank you, but there is no need for that. I will go in and see him.”

Just one shaded wall lamp burned in the lounge. As I went into the room I saw a dark figure, back half turned to me, rising from a low armchair. It was only as he came forward and the glow of the light reached his face that I recognized him.

“Herr Hellweg! Whatever are you doing here?”

Herr Hellweg came forward and took my arm. “You had better sit down, my dear, and permit me to explain.”

I followed him, confused and rather dazed. He led me to the chair he had been using, then took a seat himself beside me. It was deathly quiet in here. Perhaps the porter was trying to listen, but with the swing doors closed he’d hear nothing unless we spoke too loudly.

Leopold Hellweg kept his voice low. “Ilse and I are most concerned about you.”

I stayed silent and waited for him to commit himself further. It astonished me that he should have acted so quickly. Richard, I knew, had anticipated that it might take several weeks of patient trail-laying, of mixing freely with old acquaintances and generally playing the part of my husband’s confidante in all things, before these shy contacts of Max’s would come forward and declare themselves.

And here it was, only my second day in Vienna, and they had already made a move!

I felt nervous. Perhaps I was just afraid that having come so far so quickly, I might by some foolish false step scare them off again.

After a pause, Leopold was continuing, “When you spoke this evening about that terrible accident of yours, and how in fact it was no accident at all, it occurred to us that our . . . our adversaries might well make a second attempt to dispose of you.”

“But it was Max they were after,” I protested without thinking. “They succeeded in what they set out to do.”

His brows drew together in a puzzled frown. “But you told us they must have intended to kill you, also.”

“Yes,” I agreed hastily. “I’m sure that’s true. . . .”

He leaned forward in his chair, his almost black eyes searching my face. “You were Max’s wife. Would it not be too dangerous for them to allow you to go on living—knowing what you must know?”

It seemed as if events were suddenly running away with me, and I could feel my confidence ebbing fast. I just wasn’t cut out for this devious world of undercover agents at all. I hated all the necessary lying and pretending—even to friends. But that was no excuse. Somehow I’d got to force myself to act out the role I’d come here to play.

I said, trying to inject the proper degree of fear into my voice, “Of course, you’re quite right, Herr Hellweg. I
am
in danger.”

“So,” He smiled at me questioningly. “Then why did you return to Vienna, Frau Varley? Why deliberately come back to face such a risk?”

The time had come, I realized. Right now I had to give a clear go-ahead signal to this man I’d met only a few short hours ago. I tried to keep calm as I looked at him.

“I
had
to come,” I said in a flat voice. “There was no other way. I was the only person who could complete what Max had begun.”

His dark eyes were needle-sharp now, piercing me through, so that I felt pinned to the chair. I was painfully aware of my quick, shallow breathing. I heard the porter at the desk cough twice, and a car drove past in the street outside. And then it was quiet again except for the pulse that pounded in my ears.

It seemed a very long time before Leopold Hellweg spoke again and snapped the tight-stretched tension. “You have acted most sensibly, my dear. Most sensibly.” His understanding smile confirmed the message of his words.

I felt giddy and light in the head. It was so much easier than I had dared hope. Scarcely thirty-six hours in Vienna, and already my job was done. From now on it would be downhill all the way. How pleased Richard was going to be when I told him!

And Steve! Didn’t this mean that now I could be honest with Steve? But what
was
honest, my thoughts went running on. What did I truly think of Steve Elliott, and what did I want from him?

Leopold’s voice, returning to his original theme, took me unawares. “We cannot allow you to take any further risks, Frau Varley. We must find some way to protect you.”

I jerked out of my dream and stammered, “Protect me ... ?”

“You have admitted that you are in danger of your life. Naturally, we must protect you.”

In my surge of relief, I’d overlooked this aspect. It was understandable that he should be concerned about my danger. On the other hand, if I explained that Richard Wilson was giving me all the protection I needed, with men watching over me every minute of the day, it might scare Herr Hellweg off altogether.