"All clear," I said. "I asked the desk to call a taxi. It's probably waiting by now."
She didn't move at once. She was looking at the dresser top, where an impressive number of film cartridges stood in neat rows, like soldiers on parade. After a moment, she glanced at me questioningly.
I said, "That's the gather, ma'am. I lined them all up there to see what they looked like. I'll wrap them up and send them out in the morning."
She looked surprised. "I thought you were going to take them to Stockholm with you."
I shook my head. "I changed my mind. Why should I take a chance on their color processing, when I know I can get a good job in New York? As for the black-and-whites, there's a lab I know that can do a better job than I can, working in a hotel sink. It'll mean a little fun with customs, I understand, but I've been told they'll let you send exposed, undeveloped film out of the country, if you merely sign your life away first."
There was a little silence. Her back was to me, but I could see her face in the mirror. It was a mean curve I'd pitched her. She'd expected those films to be lying around for several days longer. She was thinking hard. She laughed mechanically, and touched one of the cartridges.
"My God, there are a lot of them, aren't there?"
It was a typical amateur reaction. The stuff comes out of the factories by the running mile, but the amateur clings to the notion that each square inch is precious and irreplaceable. Lou still had the attitude of the box-camera duffer who keeps the same roll in the camera from one Christmas to the next. I hadn't been able to get it through her head that film, like ammunition, is expendable.
"Yup," I said, "a lot of 'em. And there ain't a cow in the herd worth a plugged nickel, ma'am."
She threw me a quick, startled glance over her shoulder. "What do you mean?"
I said deliberately, "I'm speaking from the artistic and editorial point of view, of course, not the technical. We've got lots of technically beautiful negatives, but as publishable pictures go, all we've got is a bunch of corny, unimaginative junk. I think you know that."
She swung around to face me. "If you feel like that, why did you take them?" she demanded angrily. "Why didn't you tell me-"
"Lou," I said, "don't go naпve on me at this late stage in the proceedings. You've hauled me hundreds of miles and had me expose hundreds of yards of film in weird and rather dull places that had nothing much to do with the article we were supposed to be illustrating. Any time I turned aside to shoot something really interesting, something with human appeal, something a magazine might actually go for, you'd be tapping your foot impatiently and looking at your watch. Now don't give me that wide-eyed look and start asking silly questions. You know why I took your pictures the way you wanted me to. I've been waiting for a man to show. A man named Caselius. I expect him to turn up any time now, particularly if you let him know all this stuff will be leaving the country tomorrow."
She licked her lips. "What makes you think I'm in communication with this man… what did you call him?"
I said, "Cut it out, Lou."
"Caselius?" she said. "Why do you expect this man Caseliьs to come to you?"
"Well," I said, "it's just a childish theory of mine, but I have a feeling he's interested in these pix, even if no editor would look at them twice."
"What are you trying to say, Matt?"
I said, "Honey, I'm not blind, even if I act that way occasionally. Between your connections, and my bona-fide journalistic background, and our American passports-not to mention the backing of a well-known American magazine
– we've bamboozled the Swedes into letting us make a nice photographic survey of the transportation facilities and natural resources of this strategic northern area. A couple of guys named Ivan wouldn't have got past the first gate, would they?"
She said, "Matt, I-"
"Oh, don't apologize," I said. "It was a bright scheme, and it worked fine. But you're lucky you got a man like me, with an ax to grind, to do your camera work. A real magazine photographer, full of artistic integrity, might have balked at being told what to shoot and how to shoot it. At least he'd have asked some embarrassing questions."
I waited. She didn't say anything. I went on: "I suppose your friends have trained intelligence specialists working in the real top-secret areas we couldn't get access to. But we've done pretty well, as far as I can judge. We've got a set of films on this country that any professional spy would be proud to send in to headquarters. Now all that remains is getting it into the proper hands. Am I correct?"
After a moment, she said, "I wondered… you're not stupid, and still you allowed yourself to be used…
"Honey," I said, "I'm not a Swede. That's one of the discoveries a man makes as he grows up: the discovery that you can have only one woman and one country at a time. Any more and life gets too damn complicated. My folks came from here, sure, but I was born in America and I'm a U.S. citizen and I have a job to do. That's plenty of responsibility.for me. Let the Swedes worry about their own politics and their own security."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean," I said, "it's nothing to me who takes pictures of what in this country, Lou, or where those pictures go. Do I make myself clear?" I took her by the shoulders to emphasize my point. "What I'm driving at, Lou," I said, looking her straight in the eye, "is there are your films, right there behind you. Tell your people to come and get them. They don't have to get rough or tricky. You don't have to poison my soup or put a mickey in my drink. The pix are nothing to me. Take them and to hell with all of you. There's just one thing I want out of the deal."
When you act like a nice guy, everybody examines your motives with a microscope. When you act like a conscienceless louse, they generally take you at face value.
Lou licked her lips again. "What's that, Matt? What do you want for your films? Money?"
I said, "Folks have been known to get smacked talking like that, ma'am… No, I don't want money. I just want a look, one quick look, at a man's face. Lacking that, his name will do; the name he goes under in this country. I figure I've earned that much."
"A quick look." she said tightly, "so you can kill him!"
We were suddenly a long way apart, even though my hands were still on her shoulders. I took them away.
"The man we're talking about is the man who's probably responsible for your husband's death," I said. "Why should you worry what happens to him? That is, if your husband's really dead." A funny look came briefly into her eyes and went away. She didn't speak. I went on: "Anyway, I think you know what my orders are. Until they're changed, I'm harmless. I just want to find out who the hell I'm dealing with. I'd like to get that much of the job accomplished."
I moved my shoulders. "I'm offering you a bargain. Make up your mind. I'm not asking you to set him up for me. All I'm asking is who he is. There are your films, all together for the first and maybe the last time. You can have them easy or you can have them tough. Hell, I'm just one man, doll, and my hands are officially tied. What harm can I do? Check with Caselius himself. I don't think he's scared of letting me know who he is. I think he'll agree it's a good deal for him. His identity in exchange for the pix without fuss or trouble. What does he lose?"
She said, "You'd betray a friendly country, a country from which your people came-"
"Lou," I said, "cut it out. Let's not use big words like betray. I've got a job to do. It's not my business to protect the security of the mines and railroads of northern Sweden, a neutral country that's no ally of my country-it's not even a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, to the best of my knowledge. The Swedes can damn well look out for themselves. I've got a man to find. You want your films, give me my man."