by John Schou
and decided that she should not have worked totally in vain. “OK, but only half of it.” She parted it on the plate, raising hope that she might ingest the rest herself after we had gone.
“It is not good to have coffee alone on an empty stomach,” I argued as he left also the bread untouched. “Even in Spain, they do not do so.”
“Thanks for reminding me. Juanita, give me a brandy.”
He waited patiently for me to end my breakfast and I was not in a hurry. His two cups of coffee and one glass of brandy were annihilated fast but I decided that finally it was his turn to wait for me, after I had spent so many months waiting for him. He could have transferred his large body to his office, or whatever you should call the room where he spent most of his wakeful hours, but he decided to wait in silence, hoping it left an impression upon me. It did. The silence of my company prevented me from enjoying this breakfast and almost made me suffer, too. Before 10, we were in the office.
“Are there any personal letters for me?” he asked, as I was about to start the mail briefing.
“How could you guess?” I answered. “There was indeed one, brought here directly, no stamp.” I handed it over to him.
He did not open it immediately. “And the remaining mail?”
“Monday morning is generally peaceful. Some advertisements, which you do not need to look through, you pay me for that misery. Then a catalogue of classical music which, should I also read that, would cost you a fortune in damage compensation.” That was a test; I knew how much he enjoyed reading it and then later ordering some new CDs with my help. However, he did not react to the insult. I placed the catalogue on the table.
“Thanks, that’ll be all for now. You can go to your room now.”
“Very well, Sir.” As I left, I heard him cautiously open the letter.
Back in my own office, I turned on the computer. Soon, the telephone rang. It was internal; Mr. Smith told me that as soon as Juanita returned, I was free to leave for the rest of the day.
“But Juanita has taken free this afternoon.”
“Then someone else will come. I shall arrange it personally”
“Isn’t it about the time you tell me, what’s wrong?” Obviously not.
“Nothing is wrong,” he said and hung up.
I decided differently. Probably, Mr. Smith was seriously ill, the consequence of a yearlong bad style of life. It would be a difficult time, the coming months, but what then? Suddenly, I would stand without a job. Mr. Smith had family, a younger brother, Soames Smith, who once visited us here with his wife and two children, depriving me of my private section in the white house for several days. I was playing tourist guide to wife and children in the old Bentley, and I noticed how they enjoyed the old luxury car, revealing that they had nothing similar at home. The children were grown-up already then and are possibly spreading the Smiths around the Earth by now, at least there is no hope that I was considered with a larger sum in Theodore Smith’s last will, if at all. I was also incapable to carry his business on, should I get the chance to do so, and at least I knew it myself. I therefore started to look for a new job in the Internet, not for applying immediately but to inform me about the contemporary market. It was Mr. Smith who had taught me to consider the future beyond what would happen just next and elaborate various alternative reactions if this and that should happen, so it was only fair that I used this ability now that something grave had obviously happened to Mr. Smith, whatever its nature.
An hour later, Juanita knocked at the door. She told me that Mr. Smith wanted to inform me that I could leave now. I looked at the watch: in 20 minutes, it would be noon and at one p.m., we should normally eat. Not that I was hungry, after having consumed part of Mr. Smith’s breakfast, but I was worried about him. “What’s wrong in this house?” I asked, but Juanita just left with tears in her eyes.
I changed my clothes and went out in the autumn day. It was late September and the sun, invisible in the morning, had finally fought its way through the fog. I had no plans for the day. I called Alice on her mobile, but she had no time for me today.
“Maybe tomorrow evening,” she told me.
“Me too, maybe,” I answered.
“What’s wrong?”
“Something, but I don’t know what.”
“When shall you know about it tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow!”
“What?” she asked in surprise.
“I’ll call you tomorrow afternoon. Keep the date reserved from your long list of admirers. Take care!”
“You too. I’ll great a part of the long row of your competes this evening.” She hung up, leaving me a bit envious of what she might be up to this evening, but I did not want to expose me by asking her directly. As I knew her, she would deliver a full confession tomorrow, hardly including any larger sins.
I liberated by bike from the cellar, restored the flattened tires and drove off towards the forest in the North. As I passed the street in Hellerup, I forced myself to look straight ahead; otherwise I might have seen a taxi arriving with a well-known person, enough to increase my anxiety for the future. Good so, there would be enough of anxiety in the coming days.
2 – „Eric, We Have a Case“
The next day, I ate less at breakfast, not knowing what the morning would bring. However, also Juanita had taken her precautions and prepared no bacon and eggs for her boss, perhaps after instruction. Besides, he was late for the day; Usually, you could set your watch according to his appearance but only now, at 9:20, did we hear the elevator. As for the previous day, he only had two cups of coffee but at least without adding brandy, to me in the morning as adding petrol to fire.
“How was your day?”
“Fine! I had a bicycle trip to the woods, Dyrehaven by Klampenborg.”
“I hope you had something to eat in the evening.”
“My presence here is the best proof of that I survived, although you would hardly have found it possible, based on what I ate. How did you manage?”
“It is a miracle. Juanita made the dinner.”
I thought she was free but decided not to mention anything.
“He, don’t call it dinner again,” she wheezed, this time in English. “You have lost 10 kg since Saturday.”
“There is still enough left,” he said. “Besides, my appetite may soon return.”
“How?” I wanted to know.
“No business talk during the meals,” he stressed.
“I was just asking about how to restore your precious appetite. If it is related to business, I must excuse myself.”
“Indeed you must. Come when you have finished.” He drove away alone in his wheelchair.
“Can I have another piece of bread,” I asked Juanita. I felt no need to change my habits.
When I finally entered Mr. Smith’s office and living-room, he had placed himself on the throne, using the gallows that were already hidden behind the panel. No guests were expected, so the wheelchair was left in the room. There were no windows in the office; visitors would probably regard it an expression of Mr. Smith’s paranoia, or perhaps the desire to give his office the impression of an inner temple. Having heard of the attack some years ago, just before my employment here, I knew his reason better.
I gave the briefing of today’s mail, somewhat more voluminous as the day before. Mr. Smith showed no interest and let me talk without interruption, which was outstanding. When I finished after half an hour – I could have finished faster but enjoyed undisturbed talking, – he changed the subject.
“Eric, we have got a new case.”
“Not that I have noted.”
“No, it turned up yesterday after you had left. It is, perhaps, nothing special. A well-known woman is being blackmailed for her pet animal and wants us to deliver the ransom. It is packed in this suitcase. Do not open it, it contains a colour bomb, we intend to grasp the culprit. Ivan Petrov and two of his associates are alerted and will follow you when you receive information of, where to go. It is someho
w related to this key, probably from a luggage safe but not from the Central Station of Copenhagen, we checked hat yesterday.”
Strange! Last week, he said no thanks to a murder case and now I was told that he was dealing with a kidnapped pet story. Of course, it was a lie but if my boss wanted it that way, I could play this game as well. But it came more grotesque. “We?” I asked.
“Mr. Petrov. I called him yesterday when you were gone. He also prepared the suitcase.”
I decided not to tell him that I recognized the key from the profile in the mysterious letter. Why didn’t he send me to check that? Why did he on the contrary want me out of the house? Why did he tell about a mysterious woman but not about the content of the strange letter? There was only one reasonable conclusion: Mr. Smith was himself being blackmailed, and the reason was not a beloved animal but a skeleton in the cupboard, some dark period of his earlier life, I should guess. You cannot blackmail me, for example, since I have always followed the law – or almost always, and when I did not, nobody noticed. Perhaps Mr. Smith felt the same and once, somebody did notice? But what is he going to do about it? Cover one crime with another? What are Petrov and his gang supposed to do with the culprit? And now only did I realize that he was protecting me. I knew nothing about the plot, which was being made up. I was only going to deliver a ransom and then my job was done – what then might follow was certainly none of my business.
I was woken up from my consideration while Mr. Smith said, “And afterwards you are free to take your girlfriend out with the big car. I shall pay you both a dinner at Store Kro in Fredensborg, the table is reserved already. It is a small compensation for the trouble I caused yesterday.”
It was no trouble, actually, on the contrary, but I kept silent about it, just thanked and then asked, “When does the action start?”
“The blackmailer will call at 3 p.m. at the mobile phone – I gave him the number of our prepared one.” He referred to a special outfit we had given to a mobile phone, which was automatically transferred to five other listen-only devices. “Then I and the Petrov boys, whose task it is, if necessarily to protect you, can listen to the progress.”
“You don’t mind that I take my own gun along?”
“No, as long as you do not use it.”
“Never, of course. I just feel naked without a gun on such a mission.”
I went to my bureau and called Alice. “Can I fetch you at 2.30 p.m. from your job? We’ve got an exciting job together and afterwards a luxurious dinner in Fredensborg.”
“For that, I can join you in the exciting project. Is it dangerous?”
“No, but you always wanted to be involved in my daily work. Here is a chance to do so. I shall give you precise instructions when I see you. Can you be free at half past two?”
“One moment, I have to ask,” she said and returned a few minutes later. “It is OK.”
“Good. I shall pick you up with the Bentley from the street exactly at 14:30. Don’t be late.” There is no parking possibilities in the street where she works.”
“I’ll be waiting for you outside at half past two sharp!”
Just before noon, Mr. Smith called me into his office where he gave me three items, which were placed in front of him at the table. Since he is incapable of any physical activity, Juanita had collected them for him. “This is the suitcase. It is filled up with false money and a colour bomb to whoever opens it – let it not be you. Then there is the key for the luggage wardrobe. The contact man or blackmailer is a Dane called Henrik. You can speak your native language with him. I told him you were Georg Hansen, in order to protect your privacy. You shall drive around Kongens Nytorv twice at three o’clock to confirm that you have the ransom, and then follow Bredgade to the Marble Church, where you can stand for a while, and then he shall call you and give you further