What Happened in Vienna, Jack?

by Daniel Kemp

  My height, a couple of inches over six foot, and my weight of between thirteen stone twelve, and fourteen stone two ounces never changed. I was heavily built in a muscular way. Whilst in London I kept fit by regularly visiting a gym and eating sensibly. The training I undertook was in strength rather than stamina, using progressively heavier weights for my profile, with only squats and the odd cycling machine for cardiac exercise.

  With Leeba's money I purchased not only off-the-peg suits, but jackets, trousers, shirts, ties and shoes in various colours. As I walked, glancing at my well-presented reflection in car windows or shops that I passed, I felt good, so much so that I had no hesitation in planning a visit the Tat & Tail after I made my way to apartment number 430, The Holstein Building, Baxter Street; my home, depositing the new look for me inside. Jack was both right and wrong. He was wrong about the apartment not being on the top floor; it was, and some apartment it was too. Split level with an open-plan kitchen, three bedrooms, two bathrooms, furnished with little regard to expense and overlooking the park below. There was even a table with chairs on the balcony. He was right though about the girl he knew at the club. She was entertaining in all manner of ways, lacking nothing when it came to vigour and staying power.

  I had no need to choose which bedroom at number 430 in which to sleep that night, nor did I indulge in any of its luscious furnishings until the morning on my return from the club, where I had fully immersed myself in amusement and vowed to carry on. With the blond hair and new wardrobe had come a newly awakened me who wasn't about to stand waiting at bus stops for the next ride to come along.

  * * *

  My driver's name was Barkley. Whether that was his first or last name was never made clear throughout our journey to the suburbs of Hartford that Tuesday lunchtime. He spoke very little and whenever he did he referred to me as sir. My attempts to dissuade him in this were futile, so I stopped and sat back to enjoy the view. The journey past quickly and smoothly until we pulled up outside a set of high security gates with an entry phone protecting what could only be described as a palatial mansion of some substance. Barkley made the introductions.

  “I have a Mr Shaun Redden to see Miss Penina. He is expected.”

  I was escorted through the white marble-floored entrance hall to the rear of the house by a frail, balding man in his late sixties with a curving scar on his forehead. He was dressed all in black, which did not reflect the abundance of splendour that surrounded my walk. Penina was lying beside the pool, stretched out on a sun lounger in partial shade. She wore a flimsy orange-coloured shawl over a gold bikini that disguised none of her sexuality. There was a table beside her with a telephone, bottles of sun cream, and a jug of lemonade. Through sunglasses she addressed me.

  “My sister tells me that you are my newly appointed personal advisor, Mr Redden. In which areas of my life do you think I need advice?”

  “Maybe in the quantity of your fluid intake, but certainly not in your dress sense or style.” I stepped forward and poured some of the iced cloudy liquid into the empty glass she held. “May I call you Penina or would you prefer Miss Stockford, Miss Stockford?”

  “Those who I like call me Penni, Shaun. What I'm seeing of you at the moment I'm liking, so Penni will do nicely.” She removed her glasses and examined me from toe to the tip of my head without moving. My eyes were wandering over her.

  “Are you Catholic Irish in religious doctrine alone, or in your taste for life, Shaun? Or are they the same thing to you?” she asked.

  “That's a tough one to answer, first up, but I'll have a stab at it. Without knowing the righteous things of life one would not be able to enjoy the sinful ones with the same amount of pleasure. I'm going to hazard a guess and say you know them both, but prefer the wicked to the pure. If that's the case, then I'm of the same persuasion, but far be it from me to show you an insight into the sin-laden world. It is too corrupt for someone as beautiful as yourself.”

  “Perceptive Catholicism! How rare and refreshing. But you are too young to know of promiscuity. If your perception holds no reprimand for apparently enjoying the sins that you and I do, then I shall listen to your advice, but I'm a totally wicked girl who prefers to direct matters rather than seek guidance from others.” From where she lay she passed me that glass. “Drink some, I've had enough.”

  She was tall, with the most exquisite tan imaginable, blonde-haired, with long slim legs beneath heavenly thighs. A small pinched waist leading up to champagne breasts and a coquettish smile that matched Brigitte Bardot's. A beautiful oval face with a small pointed chin beneath wide, thick lips that screamed, 'kiss me.' But it was her eyes that transfixed my stare the most. The tantalising blue of a spring sky and as wonderfully hypnotic.

  “There is something on which you may be able to advise me, Shaun. I cannot see colours in thoughts. I see every shade imaginable when composing music or playing it, but when it comes to the minds of other people, it's only black and white that I see. What advice would you give me to clear that vision?”

  “If by that you mean that you can see the good in others that some belittle or malign, then I have no desire to advise you otherwise, but if you saying that there are shades of wrong that you are willing to accept, then that's an illusion that does need rectifying.”

  “Pontifical Catholicism as well. You are one full of surprises. Have you an answer to the wrongs of this life to go with your cynicism?”

  “I could suggest a swim, Penni, alongside some deep contemplation of that question.”

  “Not dissimilar from the church then with your indecision! Could advise or would advise? Have you brought swimming trunks in that attaché case along with the business papers? Only I don't think it's big enough.” She bit her bottom lip then sighed and stood, discarding the shawl.

  “Are we alone?” I asked.

  “Would it matter if we were not?” she replied, unhooking the top of her bikini and allowing it to fall to ground.

  “I haven't got any trunks.”

  “I hoped you hadn't.”

  “Are you always this direct?” I asked awkwardly.

  “Do you want me, Shaun, or just talk to me?” I needed no second invitation.

  The memory of using Leeba's money in such a self-absorbed fashion the previous night haunted me, as the day brought the gift of extravagance in extremes of satisfaction. I felt both humiliation and fulfilment with her sensuality in equal measures. Fortunately my inexperience was not the defect I feared it may have been, but her supremacy surpassed my most frenzied thoughts of how sex would be. We showered then dried each other then showered again, until finally I mentioned the reasons that had brought me to her home. All the documents I carried were business related and quickly dealt with. When I finished reading them to her I added, “If you have no objections I'll be handling you in the future, Penni.”

  “Hmm,” she replied, “I quite like that idea, but I'm picky with performances. I save the most pleasurable for the most elitist people I mix with. I hope you experienced that virtuoso rendering I just gave in colour, Shaun. If not then perhaps another rendition is called for?”

  “Some of the colours were a little indistinct, Penni, but those that I saw clearly were of delightful shades.”

  “Then let us go see if we can discover the full spectrum of colour that exists only in a bedroom, and then you can advise me further on the business matters that so occupy that overworked mind of yours. But don't go jumping too far in front of yourself, Shaun. I know why Leeba sent you. Let's see how good you are at persuasion, shall we?”

  Barkley was smoking a cigarette beside the car when I eventually returned some hours later.

  “Did all go to your satisfaction, sir?” he asked obsequiously.

  “Perfectly, Barkley! Better than I could have imagined. But now I feel the urge to find a square with a nightingale in full song.”

  “I'm sorry, sir, but I don't know of any of those,” he replied.

  “That's a pity, Barkley. I felt sure
you'd know of one.” I laughed loudly at my attempted joke, to which he added a confused smile.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Sally's

  There was a letter pushed under the door at number 430 when I got back from Penina, and a message on the apartment's telephone. The call was from Richard Stockford. Karl Weilham was scheduled to chair a private meeting at the UN this coming Saturday, and Richard was attending. The question of a monopoly on the manufacture of an anti-typhoid drug was to be discussed in view of the forthcoming merger. His company and the West German one were the only two in the world to have developed and distributed Ampicillin, a recent replacement for Chloramphenicol when resistance to that drug had become widespread. He suggested I accompany him. The letter was from Jack. A curt, unceremonious one, not an invitation to a far off meeting. One that demanded immediate attendance.

  Meet Horace for afternoon tea. Post Haste!

  He was out of sight this time. Hidden in a high-backed alcove at the very end of Salvatore's where the shadows were at their darkest, but even those dark shadows could hide the flush in his cheeks.

  “What are you doing, Shaun? Are you an idiot or something worse? You've been out to meet Penina without my authority. It just won't do! Not at all!” The ashtray in front of him was overflowing with used butts of cigarettes as he lit another, not offering me one.

  “Leeba asked me to go, Jack, and I couldn't find a reason to say no. I thought you wanted me to know the family.”

  “Not shag them, Shaun! That's getting too close. Next you'll be falling in love and wanting a green card to stay and settle here raising kids on a ranch in Texas. Is it the cows or the stirrups and six-guns you're attracted to? If you're to stay in this job then you cannot get close to our 'cestui que trust'.” He beckoned a waiter who appeared carrying a bottle of Bells whisky. He already had a glass.

  “What does that mean, Jack? Not good at French!” We were interrupted by the waiter.

  “Volete un altro bicchiere, signore?”

  Jack nodded his approval to the suggestion, waiting for the second glass before pouring from the bottle and then addressing me.

  “It means beneficiary. Leeba has an altogether different agenda than we have. She's worried about her daughter's entanglement with members of a very nasty far-right organisation here in New York. We, on the hand, take a wider view. We aren't interested in the slightest with Leeba's concerns, Shaun. Please try to remember that no one is more important than each, and not put your,” he paused and drew on his cigarette, “manliness in front of the mission again. At least not with her! Keep it in your trousers other than at the Tat & Tail. Do you understand me?”

  “She's very attractive, and I didn't have to force myself upon her, you know. As I see it, knowing her and gaining her trust would be an ideal way to get inside Weilham's pocket as you so aptly suggested.”

  “Would it indeed! We have enough on Karl Weilham to strip him bare already. As for Penina, how would you feel if you had to put a gun to her pretty head? Would regrets force you to fatally hesitate from pulling that trigger? Some unfulfilled passion holding you back and wanting to turn the gun on yourself perhaps?”

  “Why do you want her dead?” I asked on standing up, towering over him. “There must be a better solution than that, Jack!”

  “Is there, Shaun? You know the full picture do you? Fancy a Nazi leader of the free world, or just fancy screwing the next one, eh? Sit down, drink your whisky and shut the hell up.”

  “How on earth is Penina to become President of America, Jack, that's just too far-fetched for even one of your stories.” I remained standing in defiance.

  “You have a lot to learn about life, Shaun. The first being to do what you're told to do!” he was dribbling through anger. I sat. “I just wish that on occasions you didn't show your ignorance quite so readily.” Another cigarette and an offer for me to join him. “Weilham more or less runs the United Nations. He has that label of senior assistant but he's more than that. He does the day-to-day important stuff. His bosom pals: Haynes Baxter-Clifford and Marty Killick head up the Nazi party here in America. Both, incidentally, are fabulously rich. Then, lo and behold, abracadabra a magician waves his magic wand and along comes Hitler's beautiful daughter into the political mix. Can you count the dollars going into her presidential coffers? There would be every right-wing zealot and halfwit the world over contributing to her conquering accession.”

  “You're mad if you believe that's possible! Do those three know about her birth?”

  “Am I mad? Did you not notice her eyes and colouring? She's his female offspring, Shaun, and has exactly the same magnetic appeal. And no to your second question; not yet.” He held out his hands in a simulated prayer at the end of his declamation.

  “But how can her heritage be discovered? Without that she's just another rich girl with an older infatuated man on her arm. Surely any Jewish tag attached to her would scare them away? As far as I know they're all catholic any way. They have been well hidden, I have to say, Jack. Congratulations on that one. Perhaps this Haynes is not looking beyond her sexual attraction and why would he. I certainly wouldn't.”

  “No, you haven't, Shaun, have you? None of this is secure in the sense that it needs to be. If Leeba is putting her hand into the waters and making the tiniest of ripples, then we must be careful. Very careful! Personally I'm amazed at just how well their secret has stood up. And there are others back home more amazed than me.” He poured two large glasses from the bottle that stood between us.

  “By others do you mean, Trenchard, Jack?”

  “No, I do not mean Trenchard, Shaun. Get him completely out of your mind. Barrington Trenchard is a dinosaur of a policeman and no more than that. He was an operative of little or no importance. I mean,” again a pause, this time to compose himself before saying something that he might regret, “It doesn't matter who I mean. Just be careful and keep looking over your shoulder. That flat of yours, did you tell Penina that you're living in one of her apartments?”

  “As a matter of fact I didn't, Jack. Why, important not to, was it?”

  “Yes, I think it was. How about her brother Richard, mention him, did you?”

  “I did not, Jack. As far as Penina is concerned I work for her sister as a research analyst doubling up as a special advisor on business matters that involve her, nothing more.”

  “She did not offer anything about Weilham, Baxter-Clifford or Killick?”

  “Not a word about any of them, but I was keeping her mind focused on something else for most of the time.”

  He sat back with yet another cigarette clenched between the fingers of his left hand looking into the smoke that circled the ceiling, but it wasn't my acerbic remark causing the distraction. The lines around his eyes and mouth looked deeper than I'd noticed before, as though they had appeared overnight without warning. Perhaps I was wrong, I thought, but then I noticed his hand shake as he flicked the ash into the fresh ashtray that the waiter brought over along with two coffees that I hadn't seen ordered. Little things become more noticeable as one gets used to mannerisms. The collar of his white shirt was smudged, as were his cuffs rolled back to his elbows. The skin on his forearms was wrinkled and scale-like in places with the back of his right hand having mauve patches running across it.

  “Are you alright, Jack?” I asked, concerned.

  “What? Yes, I'm fine, Shaun. I have to go and use the phone across the road. I'll be five minutes. Concentrate all you have on Karl Weilham whilst I'm gone. It's him we have to turn.” As he rose from his seat he asked, “They were used notes that Leeba gave you, I take it?”

  “Yes, they were. Nothing over a ten dollar bill.”

  “Oh, and by the way, what's the colour of the front door at that apartment where you live?” It was as though he didn't want to leave without making sure he'd covered everything. Very unlike his normal systematic self.

  “It wasn't you who posted the note under it then?”

  “No! One of Salva
tore's lot.”

  “It's a dark brown colour, Jack. Why?”

  “Get some matches and shoe polish then colour the matches the same shade as your door, or as near to it as you can get. Each time you leave the apartment wedge a coloured match or two into the doorjamb. Up high on the opposite side to the lock is best. No one thinks to look there. That way if they're moved when get home you'll know that you've had a visitor.”

  “You think there's a possibility of that happening?”

  “I don't know, but it's all too close for comfort for me.” Was he panicking, I wondered?

  “You didn't know that the apartment Richard gave me was Penina's, Jack, did you?”

  “I didn't know that the entire building was owned by Baxter-Clifford either, Shaun. Now that does rake at my skin a bit.”

  “Perhaps it's not only Leeba with their own agenda.”

  “Perhaps not! I'll go and make that phone call now. Be right back.”

  There was a slight stumble as he left the booth. If it wasn't from experience I might have thought he was drunk. I followed for a while then stood at the bar, after he had hurried out through the restaurant and then across the road. It was not like him to hurry. Salvatore was behind the bar watching too.

  “Have you noticed a change in Jack recently?” I asked the restaurant owner.

  “Mi scusi. Non capisco,” he replied.

  Yeah, I bet you don't understand, I silently thought.

  Chapter Eighteen