Elusive Mrs. Pollifax

by Dorothy Gilman

  “And what kind of mash have we here?” asked Mrs. Pollifax in a depressed voice as she peered into still another tub at the Dobri Vapcarow Collective.

  She and Debby had been at the collective for nearly two hours and had not so much as glimpsed Assen Radev. They had seen a great number of geese, and rather too much of their substitute guide. He was a young man named Slavko, who sweated heavily over his translations, but she supposed it was not every day that a guide was forced into translating words like force-fed, foie gras, liver, mash and gaggles of geese.

  “This mixture has more corn than rye or wheat,” said Slavko after conferring with the foreman. He had already explained that the Dobri Vapcarow Collective was such a success that it was now a model for other collectives, and a laboratory for small experiments. “They eat our foie gras in all the capitals of Europe,” Slavko said proudly. “It brings much praise, much money.”

  The foreman, who spoke no English, listened impassively. He was a huge, ruddy-faced man in overalls and muddy hip boots who seemed to regard Slavko with the amusement he would accord a three-legged goose or some other colorful mutation of animal life; he smiled occasionally at Mrs. Pollifax, frequently at Debby and not at all at Slavko.

  But of Assen Radev they had seen nothing, and Mrs. Pollifax began to fear that she had miscalculated. She’d had no real, graspable idea of what a collective farm was, vaguely assuming it to resemble a New Jersey truck farm, intimate and on a small scale. This collective was like an open sea of land with a small island of barns on it. The cluster of barns and outbuildings was separated by smaller seas of trampled mud, and totally surrounded by pens of geese, but beyond this nothing could be seen on the horizon except clouds, and field after field of growing corn and wheat: the collective incorporated three villages and mile after mile of land. Assen Radev could be anywhere; he was certainly not here.

  “The land belongs to the workers,” Slavko was reciting. “After the crops are harvested, twenty percent of the profits go to the state, ten percent to the planting and ten percent to new machinery and repairs. The remaining sixty percent is divided among the workers according to workdays they have given–for two hundred workdays one thousand leva, for two hundred and fifty workdays, fifteen hundred leva.”

  “That’s five hundred American dollars,” Debby announced triumphantly.

  “In this room,” continued Slavko after consulting with the foreman, “there is compared the feeding by the hand with the feeding by machine.”

  Debby peered into the room and stepped back. “Ech,” she said. She had barely survived watching the geese fed by machine. She had fled outside, where Mrs. Pollifax had heard her retching. “I won’t,” she said. “I can’t.”

  Mrs. Pollifax nodded. “Quite sensible. Wait outside.”

  Four healthy-looking young women in overalls looked up as they entered the next room of the barn. Each was engaged in inserting a funnel down the throat of a goose, emptying mash into the funnel and then forcing it down the goose’s throat with a milking motion of the hands. They worked quickly, contentedly, like laboratory workers moving from test tube to test tube.

  “It’s only if you don’t think about it, I suppose,” said Mrs. Pollifax vaguely, and Slavko looked at her questioningly. “Forcing the food into them like that,” she explained.

  “It makes beautiful livers–big, big,” Slavko said, reverently sketching dimensions with his hands.

  Mrs. Pollifax looked away quickly, certain that she would never be able to eat pâté de foie gras again.

  “Now we have the big surprise for you,” Slavko said as they emerged into the sunlight again. “Please–across these ditches–step high!–to last building.”

  “Another surprise?” said Debby wearily, catching up with them.

  They mounted the wooden steps of a building with curtains at its windows, and entered a large bare room. “Please–you relax now if you please,” said Slavko. “This is building of collective meetings and keeping of books. Please sit, remove the coats if you will and relax.”

  “I will,” said Mrs. Pollifax, and shrugged off her coat and hung it over a chair, sitting down next to it to guard it.

  But when the foreman arrived, moving more slowly than they, Slavko hurried them all into a second room. “See–for you!” he cried with pleasure.

  Mrs. Pollifax exclaimed aloud. A long trestle table had been set up in this room and on it had been spread for them the fruits of the farm: bowls of fat red raspberries still glistening with dew; platters of delicate honeydew, chunks of cantaloupe and red juicy watermelon, a small loaf of pâté and several jugs of colorless liquor. At once Slavko slipped into the role of host and handed Debby and Mrs. Pollifax tiny glasses into which he poured the liquid.

  “Slivowicz,” he said, beaming.

  “How very hospitable of you all,” she said. Over his shoulder Mrs. Pollifax met the interested gaze of Lenin mounted on the wall: the picture was the only decorative note in the meeting room. “To peace,” she added, lifting her glass, and suddenly remembering that she had left her coat in the other room. “My coat,” she said. “Debby, could you …?”

  “Right,” said Debby, and promptly left, but when she returned she was empty-handed and obviously puzzled. She mutely shook her head, shrugging, and Mrs. Pollifax had to continue listening to the statistics that Slavko was earnestly reciting, as though by sheer volume he could persuade her of Bulgaria’s superiority.

  At last she turned to Debby and said bluntly, “Not there?”

  “Absolutely vanished.”

  Slavko pressed more slivowicz on them, but Mrs. Pollifax demurred, her mind now on the missing coat. “Liquid fire,” she told Slavko, smiling, and then, “I do think we must leave, Slavko. We’re growing tired.” And late, she added silently, noting that already it was two o’clock. Thanking them all with enthusiasm, she made her retreat to the anteroom and on the threshold stopped short because her coat was hanging over the chair where she had left it.

  She and Debby exchanged glances. Without any change of expression Mrs. Pollifax picked up her coat and put it on; her heart was beating faster. She had filled its pockets before coming here and she was not surprised to find her handkerchief still in the left pocket and a handful of coins in the right. What her fingers searched for now were the small knots of thread that she had sewn into the lining of the left pocket: five of them, thick enough to be felt but not seen. And they were no longer there.

  “What is it?” asked Debby in a low voice as they walked toward the car.

  Mrs. Pollifax was smiling. “I’m daring to hope that our trip here hasn’t been in vain.”

  “Even though you didn’t see him?”

  “Not a glimpse,” she said, “but I think I’m wearing the other coat.”

  They had not seen Radev at the collective, but when Mrs. Pollifax unlocked the door of her hotel room her burglar of the first evening was sitting in a chair by the window. “You certainly made good time,” she congratulated him, closing and locking the door behind her.

  His brows lifted. “You are not surprised?”

  “No, of course not. I do hope I didn’t hurt you too badly the other night?”

  His gaze was stony. “I have come for the money–it was not in the coat. I will have it now, please.”

  “If the money had been in the coat,” she said reasonably, “you wouldn’t have come and I would never have met you. I want to talk to you. By the way, the room may be bugged.”

  “The hell it is,” said Radev. “I checked.” He regarded her with curiosity, his eyes hostile. “You’re not the amateur I first thought, but this is bad, very bad, this meeting. Against all orders.”

  “I first met you as a burglar,” she retorted, “and that wasn’t my idea.”

  “You give me helluva shock. In fact you give me helluva lot of shocks. How can I get near you when the secret police stay on your tail–and I mean really on your tail–from seven o’clock Monday on? I never have a chance. Then you go o
ff to Borovets but are not at Borovets at all. Now I am waiting for my money.” He brought a small pistol from his pocket and rested it casually on one knee.

  “Did you know the Russian rubles are counterfeit?” she asked, sitting on the bed opposite him.

  “Sure I know they’re counterfeit. How did you know they’re counterfeit?”

  “I think that gun is extremely bad manners,” said Mrs. Pollifax, glancing at it. “Do you mind pointing it in another direction? We’re supposed to be allies, you know.”

  “It’s so you don’t get any ideas, and don’t be too sure we’re allies, either,” he said. “I got no allies, I work for cash. And I want that money.”

  “And we want you,” Mrs. Pollifax told him cheerfully. “You’re a professional, you see, and we need one badly.” Operation sounded like a professional word. “We have an operation planned.”

  He said savagely, “Appendix or tonsils? Look, lady, I’m in a hurry and I want that money. Do I have to kill you to get it?”

  Mrs. Pollifax shrugged. “Possibly. Have you heard of Philip Trenda?”

  “Sure I’ve heard of Philip Trenda. He’s dead. They found him dead today in Belgrade.”

  “So soon?” murmured Mrs. Pollifax. “That poor boy. Except it wasn’t Philip Trenda who died in Belgrade, you see, it was an imposter. Philip Trenda’s still alive and in Sofia.”

  Radev sighed. “Lady, I couldn’t care less. I’m not paid to worry about Trenda, I’m paid to get that money you brought in.”

  Mrs. Pollifax said tactfully, “But you see, I have it and you don’t.”

  He stared at her in astonishment. “You’re blackmailing me?”

  “I wondered how long it would take you to understand,” she said happily. “Of course I’m blackmailing you. I have what you want, and you have what I want. That’s the way blackmail works, isn’t it? But I’ll be very glad to give you the rubles after you’ve volunteered to help.”

  “Volunteered?” he said mockingly.

  “Yes, volunteered.”

  “And if I take my lumps and just leave?”

  “Why should you?” she asked. “We only want to borrow your professional services for a few days. You’ll have the rubles by Sunday.” If we’re still alive, she added silently.

  “Christ,” he muttered. “Maybe I ought to shoot you and forget the whole thing.”

  “The others, of course, would know that you shot me. I wouldn’t give a nickel for your chances of survival.”

  “Others?”

  “The people I’m working with,” she told him. “The Underground that I’m allied with here.”

  “You’re kidding me. In Bulgaria?”

  “It’s my assignment, contacting them. It’s they who identified you when you were following me, and they who searched your bag and found the duplicate coat. They know all about you. Name, address and–uh–affiliations.”

  “Christ,” he groaned. “All right, help do what?”

  “Free Philip Trenda, of course, as well as a few friends of the Underground.”

  He considered, scowling. “And then I’d get the rubles?”

  “Then you’d get the rubles.”

  “And where are these people?”

  “In Panchevsky Institute.”

  He sprang to his feet. “For chrissake, why not choose something easy? Like assassinating the Premier, for instance.”

  “Please–I do not like profanity,” begged Mrs. Pollifax.

  “Are you out of your mind? Panchevsky Institute?”

  “Since that’s where he is–and since we want to get him out,” she said tartly, “then naturally that’s the place from which we will have to recover him.”

  “Insane,” he said. “When?”

  “This weekend.”

  “For chrissake.”

  “Mr. Radev–”

  “Okay, sorry, but I tell you it’s impossible, you’re mad. I got a contact at Panchevsky who tells me about security and it’s tight, it’s–”

  “Contact?” said Mrs. Pollifax quickly. “A prisoner?”

  “Of course not, a guard,” he snapped. “What do you think I am, an amateur? He tells me who goes in, who comes out–for a price, of course, but he also tells me–”

  “Mr. Radev, I love you,” said Mrs. Pollifax impulsively, and leaned over and kissed him. “You see? You know a guard. I knew you’d be able to help us.”

  Radev recoiled. “Keep your hands off me, lady. For chrissake.”

  “I’m just so pleased,” she confessed. “The others lack a certain toughness, a certain experience–and you even have a gun.”

  He looked alarmed. “You mean they don’t?”

  “It’s almost five o’clock,” she said, consulting her watch. “I suggest you come along and meet them now. We’ve very little time, and final plans simply have to be made tonight.”

  Still he stood, not moving. “I have one thing to say,” he announced. “You look like a nice old lady. Really nice. Really kind, sweet, gentle. You are not nice,” he added.

  “Now that,” said Mrs. Pollifax, “is one of the nicest compliments I’ve had from a professional. Thank you, Mr. Radev.”

  “Oh for chrissake,” he said bitterly.

  19

  This time when the small blue car drew up to the Hotel Rila, Mrs. Pollifax directed Georgi to the hotel’s service entrance. “Assen Radev is joining us by way of the rear door. He’s just enlisted,” she told him.

  “Bora,” murmured Georgi, impressed. “You really are like a witch. But he will have to wear bandage over the eyes or he will know to find us again. Your scarf, please?”

  “All right. What about Mrs. Bemish?”

  “She has been with us all day giving much information. This lady has much courage. Last night she go to third floor at Panchevsky Institute–very illegitimate, you understand–and looks. She make guards very angry, but she says, ‘This is Petrov’s son.’ ”

  “I’m so glad we went to see her,” said Debby.

  Radev climbed in and grudgingly suffered the scarf to be tied over his eyes. When they arrived at the warehouse, their steps echoing again through the basement, Georgi whispered, “You have face stockings?”

  Mrs. Pollifax handed him four pairs of stockings and he hurried ahead. When she and Debby and Radev entered the room behind the furnace they found the faces of their Underground friends unrecognizably blurred: the noses flattened, mouths distorted and chins obscured by the gauzy stockings. Mrs. Pollifax removed Radev’s blindfold and he swore heavily. “Goons!” he cried despairingly.

  “Bring in Mrs. Bemish,” said Tsanko. He was lifting a large sheet of cardboard to the wall. When he had propped it among the pipes he stood back and Mrs. Pollifax saw that it was a large diagram of Panchevsky Institute. “Good evening,” he said, bowing. “I look sinister? As you can see, we have been busy.”

  “Good evening, Tsanko. We’ve been busy, too. This is Assen Radev, who knows a guard at Panchevsky Institute.”

  “Someone’s missing,” she said, counting the shrouded heads.

  “Capital!”

  “Volko–he has been taking apart fireworks today and working out formulas. Is most important. Ah, Mrs. Bemish,” he said.

  Georgi had brought in Mrs. Bemish, looking frightened, although her face brightened at sight of Mrs. Pollifax and Debby. “They think I do something,” she whispered to Mrs. Pollifax. “Is this possible?”

  “Ah–here is Volko, we begin now,” said Tsanko. “Please, everyone sit? Please, the meeting is to come to order,” he said sternly. “We are about to consider the storming of Panchevsky.”

  Boris said sourly, “What a pity we not forget whole thing and go to big tourist nightclub for evening.”

  Tsanko leaned over and affectionately gripped his shoulder. Straightening, he said, “Perhaps I say now that Boris has twice been to prisons for slips of the tongue. He has spent eight of past sixteen years in jails for mention of history not in our Republic of Bulgaria textbooks. Yet still h
e risks himself by helping us.”

  “I am behaving so badly you must say this?” asked Boris gloomily.

  “Very badly,” Tsanko told him gravely.

  Boris smiled, and again his face lighted up. “Then I be quiet–if only someone tell me how to silence my stomach, which growls at thought of prisons. Never mind, as history professor I have always the longing to see history made. Please continue.”

  Tsanko nodded. “Mrs. Bemish has brought much news for us tonight, both good and bad. In return we have had only bad news for her. We have told her that her husband is dead. Because his death is on our heads it is only fair we give her passport to leave country if this experience is survived. It is agreed?… Now here is diagram made from her very helpful description.”

  After swift glances at Mrs. Bemish they turned to the diagram. “The bad news is this,” continued Tsanko. “Our Bulgarian friends are here”–he pointed to the first floor of the south side. “Philip Trenda is at opposite end of Panchevsky, and high up, on third floor.”

  “Ouch,” said Debby, wincing.

  Glances swerved reproachfully to Mrs. Pollifax. “And the good news?” she asked, ignoring the others.

  Mrs. Bemish spoke. “The wall is not busy,” she said. “Only one man walk round and round. This is vacation season, workers go free to Varna and Golden Sands. Seven guards gone this week.”

  “Do you mean there aren’t sentries in each box?”

  Mrs. Bemish nodded.

  “A touch of carelessness,” murmured Mrs. Pollifax happily.

  “What are the plans?” asked Assen Radev, speaking for the first time.

  Mrs. Pollifax said, “We make the plans now. To begin with, because it does look so frightful–the diagram–I suggest we forget it’s a prison with a wall around it and look at it as though it’s two boxes, one inside the other.”