“A natural thing for ghosts-or illusions.”
“But I can’t believe I was as drunk as all that!”
“What did you do then?”
“I had to have another drink. My nerves were all to pieces.”
“Didn’t that bring him back?”
“No, but it sent me back to Anna’s.”
I think he would have been ashamed to come to me with his absurd story if it had not been for the attempt on Anna Schmidt. My theory when he did tell me his story was that there had been a watcher-though it was drink and hysteria that had pasted on the man’s face the features of Harry Lime. That watcher had noted his visit to Anna and the member of the ring-the penicillin ring-had been warned by telephone. Events that night moved fast. You remember that Kurtz lived in the Russian zone-in the second bezirk to be exact, in a wide empty desolate street that runs down to the Prater Platz. A man like that had probably obtained his influential contacts. The original police agreement in Vienna between the allies confined the military police (who had to deal with crimes involving allied personnel) to their particular zones, unless permission was given to them to enter the zone of another power. I only had to get on the phone to my opposite number in the American or French zones before I sent in my men to make an arrest or pursue an investigation. Perhaps forty-eight hours would pass before I received permission from the Russians, but in practice there are a few occasions when it is necessary to work quicker than that. Even at home it is not always possible to obtain a search warrant or permission from one’s superiors to detain a suspect with any greater speed.
This meant that if I wanted to pick up Kurtz it would be as well to catch him in the British zone.
When Rollo Martins went drunkenly back at four o’clock in the morning to tell Anna that he had seen the ghost of Harry, he was told by a frightened porter who had not yet gone back to sleep that she had been taken away by the International Patrol.
What happened was this. Russia, you remember, was in the chair as far as the Inner Stadt was concerned, and the Russians had information that Anna Schmidt was one of their nationals living with false papers. On this occasion, halfway through the patrol, the Russian policeman directed the car to the street where Anna Schmidt lived.
Outside Anna Schmidt’s block the American took a hand in the game and demanded in German what it was all about. The Frenchman leant against the bonnet and lit a stinking Caporal. France wasn’t concerned and nothing that didn’t concern France had any genuine importance to him. The Russian dug out a few words of German and flourished some papers. As far as they could tell, a Russian national wanted by the Russian police was living there without proper papers. They went upstairs and found Anna in bed, though I don’t suppose, after Martins’ visit, that she was asleep.
There is a lot of comedy in these situations if you are not directly concerned. You need a background of general European terror, of a father who belonged to a losing side, of house searches and disappearances before the fear outweighs the comedy. The Russian, you see, refused to leave the room: the American wouldn’t leave a girl unprotected, and the Frenchman-well, I think the Frenchman must have thought it was fun. Can’t you imagine the scene? The Russian was just doing his duty and watched the girl all the time, without a flicker of sexual interest: the American stood with his back chivalrously turned: the Frenchman smoked his cigarette and watched with detached amusement the reflection of the girl dressing in the mirror of the wardrobe, and the Englishman stood in the passage wondering what to do next.
I don’t want you to think the English policeman came too badly out of the affair. In the passage, undistracted by chivalry, he had time to think, and his thoughts led him to the telephone in the next flat. He got straight through to me at my flat and woke me out of that deepest middle sleep. That was why when Martins rang up an hour later, I already knew what was exciting him-it gave him an undeserved but very useful belief in my efficiency. I never had another crack from him about policemen or sheriffs after that night.
When the M. P. went back to Anna’s room a dispute was raging. Anna had told the American that she had Austrian papers (which was true) and that they were quite in order (which was rather stretching the truth). The American told the Russian in bad German that they had no right to arrest an Austrian citizen. He asked Anna for her papers and when she produced them, the Russian took them.
“Hungarian,” he said, pointing at Anna. “Hungarian,” and then flourishing the papers, “bad bad.”
The American, whose name was O’Brien, said, “Give the goil back her papers,” which the Russian naturally didn’t understand. The American put his hand on his gun, and Corporal Starling said gently, “Let it go, Pat.”
“If those papers ain’t in order we got a right to look.”
“Just let it go. Well see the papers at H. Q.”
“The trouble about you British is you never know when to make a stand.”
“Oh, well,” Starling said-he had been at Dunkirk, but he knew when to be quiet.
The driver put on his brakes suddenly: there was a road block. You see I knew they would have to pass this military post. I put my head in at the window and said to the Russian, haltingly, in his own tongue: “What are you doing in the British zone?”
He grumbled that it was “Orders.”
“Whose orders? Let me see them.” I noted the signature-it was useful information. I said, “This tells you to pick up a certain Hungarian national and war criminal who is living with faulty papers in the British zone. Let me see the papers.”
He started on a long explanation. I said, “These papers look to me quite in order, but I’ll investigate them and send a report of the result to your colonel. He can, of course, ask for the extradition of this lady at any time. All we want is proof of her criminal activities.”
I said to Anna: “Get out of the car.” I put a packet of cigarettes in the Russian’s hand, said, “Have a good smoke,” waved my hand to the others, gave a sigh of relief and that incident was closed.
WHILE MARTINS told me how he went back to Anna’s and found her gone, I did some hard thinking. I wasn’t satisfied with the ghost story or the idea that the man with Harry Lime’s features had been a drunken illusion. I took out two maps of Vienna and compared them: I rang up my assistant and keeping Martins silent with a glass of whisky asked him if he had located Harbin yet. He said no: he understood he’d left Klagenfurt a week ago to visit his family in the adjoining zone. One always wants to do everything oneself: one has to guard against blaming one’s juniors. I am convinced that I would never have let Harbin out of our clutches, but then I would probably have made all kinds of mistakes that my junior would have avoided. “All right,” I said, “go on trying to get hold of him.”
“I’m sorry, sir.”
“Forget it. It’s just one of those things.”
His young enthusiastic voice (if only one could still feel that enthusiasm for a routine job: how many opportunities, flashes of insight one misses simply because a job has become just a job), his voice tingled up the wire: “You know, sir, I can’t help feeling that we ruled out the possibility of murder too easily. There are one or two points…”
“Put them on paper, Carter.”
“Yes, sir. I think, sir, if you don’t mind my saying so (Carter is a very young man) we ought to have him dug up. There’s no real evidence that he died just when the others said.”
“I agree, Carter. Get on to the authorities.”
Martins was right! I had made a complete fool of myself, but remember that police work in an occupied city is not like police work at home. Everything is unfamiliar: the methods of one’s foreign colleagues: the rules of evidence: even the procedure at inquests. I suppose I had got into the state of mind when one trusts too much to one’s personal judgement. I had been immensely relieved by Lime’s death. I was satisfied with the accident. I said to Martins: “Did you look inside the newspaper kiosk or was it locked?”