'Goodbye!'
Martel found he was sweating. The atmosphere inside the booth was oppressive. He felt both exposed and trapped in the confined space. The phone rang in an astonishingly short time.
He snatched up the receiver. The same voice asked the question crisply.
'Is that…? Please confirm name of our mutual friend… 'Nagel. David Nagel…'
'Claire Hofer speaking…'
'Again do what I tell you without questioning my judgement – as fast as you can. Pay your bill at the Hotel Hecht – make up some plausible reason why you have to…'
'All right, I'm not stupid! What then?'
'Book in at another hotel in St. Gallen. Reserve a room for me. Warn them I'll arrive about one o'clock in the morning…'. 'You need parking space for a car?'
'No. I'm coming in by train…'
'I'll call back in minutes. I have to find accommodation and tell you where to come. Goodbye!'
Martel was left staring at a dead receiver. More precious time was being consumed. But she sounded good, damned good. He had to give her that. The whirlpool was gyrating faster. He felt he had been talking to a ghost. Claire Hofer had just been dragged out of the Limmat – according to Arnold…
Despite the growing heat inside the kiosk he inserted a cigarette into his holder, cursed, removed the cigarette and placed it between his lips minus holder. While talking he had turned round with his back to the coin box so he could watch the deserted concourse. He took several deep drags and the phone was ringing a second time. Her voice…
'Is that…? Good. Our mutual friend…'
'Nagel. Martel here…'
'I got lucky. Two twin-bedded rooms on the first floor. Hotel Metropol. Faces the station exit. Staring at you as you come out. I'll leave a note at the desk with just my room number inside the envelope.
O.K.?'
'Very…'
'Goodbye!'
In the next few minutes Martel moved very fast. He bought his rail ticket for St. Gallen. At the Hotel Schweizerhof he paid for the room he no longer needed. He did his best, to make the cancellation seem normal.
`I'm a consultant – medical – and I'm urgently needed in Basle by a patient…' Consultant was the word he had filled in on the 'occupation' section of the registration form when he had arrived. The term was impressive and totally vague.
He had not unpacked his bag a precaution he always took when arriving at a fresh destination – so all he had to do was to shove his shaving kit and toothbrush inside and snap the catches. Running down the stairs – the night clerk would see nothing odd now in his speedy departure – he hurried across to the first of the taxis waiting outside the station.
`I want you to take me to Paradeplatz. Can you then wait a few minutes by the tram stop while I deliver something? Then drive me straight back here?'
`Please get in…'
He was using up his last few minutes before the St. Gallen train departed but – knowing Zurich and the quietness of the streets at this hour-he believed he could just manage it. Because he had to check the state of Bahnhofstrasse where shots had been fired, blood spilt all over the sidewalk, and a bomb detonated against a bank.
He began chatting to the driver. All over the world cabbies are plugged in to a city's grapevine.
`Did you hear that terrific explosion not so long ago? Sounded like a bomb going off.'
'I heard it.' The driver paused as though picking his words with care. `Rumour is some fool of a tourist blew himself and his boat up on the lake…'
`It sounded closer…'
Martel left the query mark hanging in the air, wondering why the driver sounded so cautious. They were near Paradeplatz: soon all conversation would cease.
`Sounded closer to me,' the driver agreed. 'I was with a fare in Talstrasse and that was one hell of a bang. Now it could have come up the street from the lake…' He paused again. `Anyway, that's what the police told us.'
The police?'
'A patrol car stopped at the Hauptbahnhof rank. The driver got out to chat. He told us about this fool tourist blowing himself up on the lake.'
`Someone you knew? The policeman?' Martel asked casually.
'Funny you should say that.' Their eyes met in the rear-view mirror. 'I thought I knew every patrol car policeman in the city. I've been driving this cab for twenty years – but I never met him before …'
'Probably a new recruit fresh out of training school.'
'He was fifty if he was a day. All right if I wait here?'
It suited Martel admirably. The cabbie had parked well inside Paradeplatz – which meant he wouldn't be able to see where Martel went after he turned down Bahnhofstrasse. He lit a fresh cigarette and walked quickly. He was going to catch – or lose – the train by a matter of seconds.
The street was deserted and the only sound was that of his own footfalls on the flagstones. He crossed over to the other side and then stopped in sheer bewilderment. The whirlpool was spinning again.
There was no sign of the bloody incident Martel had witnessed and participated in two hours earlier. And there was no mistaking the location. He could see the archway where he and the girl had come through into Bahnhofstrasse. And there was a large and important bank in just the right position – opposite where the tram had been stopped, a bank with double plate- glass doors. But the glass was intact.
There was not a sliver of shattered glass in the roadway that Martel could see. The Swiss were good at clearing up messes, at keeping their country neat and tidy – but this was completely insane.
Now he was checking the sidewalk for blood, the blood he had slipped in, the dried blood still staining the soles of his shoes. The sidewalk was spotless. He had almost given up when he saw it. The fresh scar marks where bark had been torn and burnt by explosive from a tree. Even the Swiss couldn't grow a new tree in two hours.
CHAPTER 7
Thursday May 28
It was just after midnight at the remote schloss in the Allgau district of Bavaria. Reinhard Dietrich stood by a window in his library, looking out at the lights reflected in the moat. In one hand he held a glass of Napoleon brandy, in the other a Havana cigar. A buzzer began ringing persistently.
Sitting down behind a huge desk he unlocked a drawer, took out the telephone concealed inside and lifted the receiver. His tone was curt when Erwin Vinz identified himself.
`Blau here,' Dietrich barked. 'Any news?'
'The Englishman has left Zurich. He caught a train departing at 2339 hours from the Hauptbahnhof.' The wording was precise, the voice hoarse. 'Our people just missed getting on board after he jumped inside a compartment…'
'Left Ziirich! What the hell do you mean? What happened at the Centralhof apartment?'
'The operation was not a complete success…' Vinz was nervous. Dietrich's mouth tightened. Something had gone wildly wrong.
'Tell me exactly what happened,' he said coldly.
'The girl has taken a permanent holiday and she was unable to tell us anything about her job. We gained the impression she had no information to pass on. You don't have to worry about her…'
'But I do have to worry about Martel! Goddamnit, where is he now? Which train?'
'Its final destination was St. Gallen…'
Dietrich gripped the receiver more firmly, his expression choleric. In clipped, terse sentences he issued instructions, slammed down the receiver and replaced the instrument inside the drawer. He emptied his glass and pressed a bell.
A hunchback padded into the room. His pointed ears were flat against the side of his head so they almost merged with his skull. He wore a green beize overall and smelt of cleaning fluid. His master handed him the glass.
'More brandy! Oscar, Vinz and his special cell bungled the job. It looks as though Martel has arrived in St. Gallen, for God's sake…'
'We dealt with the previous English,' Oscar reminded him.