Return to Vienna

by Nancy Buckingham

  But as it happened, I didn’t need to take the bus. Steve Elliott was there waiting for me. At the sight of his husky, dependable figure coming toward me, that long purposeful stride that I remembered so well from the days when I’d watched for him from my first-floor hospital window, I felt a swift-rising bubble of happiness.

  “Steve!”

  “Jessica! It’s wonderful to see you again.” He took my two hands in his and stood back, surveying me, taking in everything about my appearance.

  “You’re looking better than when I last saw you,” he said judiciously. “For one thing, there’s a bit more flesh on you.”

  Whatever extra flesh there might be, I thought to myself, came from my cabbage existence these last few weeks. “Is that meant as a compliment?” I said, keeping it on a teasing level.

  He let his eyes answer for him—wide-set clear gray eyes that were only half-laughing. His forehead was creased into the frown lines I had noticed so often before. Max used to be impatient sometimes. He’d said to me more than once, “Old Steve gets so het-up over such piddling little issues. He can’t see that it’ll all be the same in a hundred years.”

  But Steve had been the raft I’d clung to while I was in the little convent hospital recovering from three cracked ribs and a broken collarbone, plus a host of minor injuries. And a broken heart. . . . Steve visited me regularly, every day at first, and then every other day, never once disappointing me. He seemed always to be there to hold my hand when things were blackest, giving me the courage to go on living.

  As soon as we were clear of the airport formalities, Steve settled me and my luggage into his dark blue Mercedes—a firm’s car painfully reminiscent of the one Max had used. It was only as we were heading for the city that I persuaded him to explain how he’d come to be at the airport to meet me.

  “Head office tipped me off that you were coming,” he said. “How else?”

  “But . . . but why should they have done that?”

  “Maybe they thought you needed protection. Or they might have realized that I’d want to know.”

  I was silent, thoughtful.

  He went on to inquire after my parents. He had met them several times when they’d come hastening out to Austria after the crash. They had stayed at a nearby hotel arranged for them by Steve, until I’d sent them home again a few days later. I knew Dad couldn’t leave his dental practice just like that, and I wasn’t in any actual danger.

  “What do your father and mother think of you coming back to Vienna like this, Jessica?”

  I felt suddenly piqued that everyone seemed determined to drag in my parents. True enough I was still only nineteen—or nearly twenty—but I had, after all, been married, and I wasn’t a kid any longer. “What should they think?” I demanded. “I am old enough to catch a plane by myself!”

  Steve didn’t reply to that. We drove on pretty fast, and in silence, until he shot at me abruptly, “Why exactly have you come back?”

  Richard and I had worked out an answer to this inevitable question. It was vague, allowing plenty of room for maneuver, and it wasn’t very convincing. It wasn’t meant to be very convincing. My sudden return to Vienna would strike everyone as curious, and we hoped that the people whom we wanted to come forward—Max’s secret contacts—would see through my lame story and guess the real reason for my presence here.

  I felt wretched about having to lie to Steve, and I stammered in the telling.

  “It’s a bit difficult to explain why I’ve come back. I was still groggy when I left Austria, and somehow I felt that I’d not said good-bye to it properly. This had been my home, and I’d seemed to fit in so naturally.” There was a sob in my voice that wasn’t acted at all. “I just had to see Vienna again, Steve, and my friends, to come to terms with myself. Does that make sense, or are you thinking I’m quite mad?”

  “I’d never think anything like that about you, Jessica,” he said seriously, but his eyes were deeply troubled.

  We were actually in the traffic-thick streets of the city before he said with a quick laugh, “I’ve not asked you where you’re staying. I suppose you’ve booked in somewhere?”

  ‘“Yes. The Mahlerhof. It’s a smallish place over in the Josefstadt district.”

  He thought for a moment. “Oh, yes, I know.”

  We drove on through the very center of Vienna, bringing memories crowding in and jerking at my heart, some almost too poignant to bear. Passing round the Opera House, my eyes were not for that splendid building but for Sachers Hotel behind it, where every month—except an unexplained once when Max seemed not to remember—we had celebrated the “anniversary” of our wedding. A super-deluxe evening out, he’d said, laughing deep into my eyes the way he sometimes did, for a super-deluxe girl.

  A minute later we had reached the Michaelerplatz, and as Steve swung around with the flow of traffic I glimpsed the apartment block in the Kohlmarkt where Max and I had lived. That luxurious up-to-the-minute service flat of ours—who was living there now? I steeled myself against tears, feeling fragile, brittle. Steve understood and didn’t try to talk.

  The afternoon sunshine scarcely reached down into Naglergasse, a narrow cobbled street lined solidly with tall and huddled buildings. We drew up outside the hotel, and Steve went to unload the luggage from the trunk. A porter ambled out to lend a hand. I glanced up at the unimpressive facade and wondered how long I’d be here.

  Some twenty yards back, another car, a gray Volkswagen, had pulled up to the curb. Idly, I noticed that nobody got out. Then the man behind the wheel lit a cigarette, and in the brief flicker of the match I saw his face quite clearly.

  He seemed oddly familiar, but recognition skipped me for a second or two. As I racked my memory, the vague impression of familiarity hardened. I had seen him before—only today. This was the bland executive type who had traveled in the same plane from London.

  Though he must have realized that I was staring at him, he took no notice, sitting there in the car calmly smoking. He looked so much a part of the everyday scene that I couldn’t think he was dangerous—and yet ... I didn’t believe in coincidence anymore.

  Was this the other side, the enemy, on to me already?

  Or was he one of Richard’s men, detailed to keep a benevolent eye on me? This idea seemed the more likely, on reflection, because he was making no effort at all to keep out of sight.

  No doubt I looked a bit lost, standing on the narrow pavement. Steve said reassuringly, “I’ll just come in with you and make sure there’s been no slip-up with your reservation. Then I’ll have to get going. I’ve a few things to clear up at the office.”

  The office in the Stubenring! Steve was in charge of it now.

  The desk clerk was courteous. Knowing I was from England, he kept his German slow and simple for my foreign ears. “Frau Varley, welcome to the Mahlerhof. I trust you had a pleasant flight.”

  “Danke, ja” I murmured, and immediately wondered how he was so certain that I’d arrived by air. Then I noticed the porter hovering with my luggage, which bore the tale-telling airline labels.

  I was beginning to suspect everybody now, I thought guiltily. But wasn’t that exactly what Richard had warned me to do?

  Chapter 4

  My room on the second floor was as anonymous in its way as my bedsitter back in London. The furniture looked like standard issue—bed, wardrobe, two chairs…. It was easy to imagine the thirty or so other rooms in the hotel all as nearly as possible identical.

  But the Mahlerhof was clean and comfortable, selected for me by Richard Wilson to fit in with the image I had to create for myself.

  As soon as the porter had gone and I was alone, I went across to the window, which overlooked the street. Peering down at a sharp angle, I confirmed that the gray Volkswagen was still there, drawn up at the curb.

  I lingered, staring out with blind eyes. I was trying to see ahead, but my future was blurred and without shape. I shrugged, an entirely self-conscious movement of the shoulders,
and drew back from the window. It was too late for me to pull out now! For the time being I would carry on as if unaware of the man on my tail, and when Richard contacted me I’d ask him about it.

  Steve had taken it for granted we’d be dining together, arranging to pick me up at eight o’clock. It was six-fifteen now. There was time to make one or two phone calls before he arrived.

  Pick up the old threads—that had been Richard’s primary instruction. I was to meet and mingle with the crowd I had known before. He’d warned me to be prepared for surprises. The lines of communication I was here to rebuild might well involve people I already knew. I found it hard to believe that anyone Max and I had mixed with could be concerned in getting information through the Iron Curtain. Although they were a sophisticated bunch, they seemed so open and friendly and uncomplicated. Like Max himself .…

  Such thoughts were morbid. Switching on the bedside light to make the room seem cozier, I threw myself into the job of settling in. It didn’t take long to unpack and put away my clothes. Then I slipped out of my green jersey suit while I debated what to wear for the evening.

  Crossing the room to the wardrobe, I caught a flash of movement from the building across the way—a drab-looking office building. I realized suddenly that I must be on view from there, and I was wearing only bra and panties, I went swiftly to the bedside light and switched it off. Pulling on my robe, I studied the windows across the narrow street. The building seemed to be deserted, until I spotted a man’s figure, which quickly moved back out of sight. Probably it was just a late office worker having a peek at a near-naked girl; and if that was all, then I’d merely make sure he didn’t get another chance. But I wondered, uneasily, if I was being watched for a more sinister reason. And if, as seemed likely, the man down in the gray car was one of Richard’s men, then who might this one be?

  I drew the curtains across the window and put the light on again.

  I finally decided to wear a sheath of dusky pink crepe, thinking that the shade would help give color to my face. The dress wasn’t as loose on me as I’d feared, so perhaps Steve was right about getting my figure back. But I still looked much too haggard. I gave my hair a good brushing and teased the fringe into a softening sweep across the forehead. I put in some careful work on my eyes, trying to mask the dull listlessness of these past weeks. More or less satisfied, I picked up my coat and handbag and made my way downstairs.

  The phone was in an alcove off the main lobby, a rather quaint glass-sided booth. I shut the door behind me and set about the job of renewing contacts with old friends.

  Once-familiar telephone numbers slipped my mind, and I had to use the directory. I tried ringing the Bentleys first, a very pleasant young American couple. Sam was the representative of an oil company, and his wife, Judy, had been quite a friend of mine. It was a real disappointment to have my call answered by a deep guttural voice which informed me stiffly that they had departed from Vienna; Herr Bentley, so the stranger believed, had received promotion abroad. I’d been away only two months, yet the seemingly permanent order of things had already changed!

  I got no answer from the next two numbers, and I could guess why. There had always been a lot of to-ing and fro-ing in our set for early-evening drinks. If I could only hit on the right address, I’d probably find quite a gathering of the old crowd.

  The best plan was to try somebody more likely to be at home. I thought of the Hutyens, the cheerfully plump Klara, who always served such vast, delicious, indigestible meals. After only three rings her voice came crackling over the line.

  “Klara!” I cried happily. “This is Jessica Varley.”

  There was just the briefest pause, and then she was all excited delight, greeting me in a gush of muddled English. “Jessica, liebling! How delightful! It is pleasured I am to be hearing your voice. So you are here in Vienna already!”

  I felt a sudden sense of chill. “But, Klara, how did you know I was coming?”

  “I do not know, liebling, how is it possible that I know? But I am happy you are arrived. Am I not telling Bruno all the time how I am hoping so much that you will be coming.”

  I sighed with relief, remembering how often in the past I had got the wrong idea from Klara’s words. She loved to practice her English on me, though we should probably have managed better in my German.

  “I’m here for a holiday, Klara. Just a few weeks.”

  We chatted for a long time, Klara bouncing out a string of questions. Was I better now? Really better? She meant, of course, had I recovered my mental balance from the hammerblow of Max’s death. And what were my plans now? Please to remember, she insisted, that I was welcome to stay with them as long as I liked. Dear Klara, I thought. She had a kind and generous heart.

  She was most pressing that I should dine with them this very evening. “You must come, liebling. We eat Leberknodlsuppe—you will like that, no? And roasted pig....”

  “I’d love to, Klara, but will you ask me for some other time? I’ve already got a dinner date for tonight.”

  “It is a man, yes? That is good! Please, then, you must the two of you with us eat.”

  I could no doubt have persuaded Steve to go to the Hutyens’. But I didn’t really want that. And besides, I rationalized, I needed to break myself in gently to the mammoth meals of a Viennese home.

  “It’s terribly sweet of you, Klara, “But I’m afraid I can’t. Not tonight.”

  “It matters nothing,” she said, and added seriously, “I am so happy for you, Jessica, that already you are forgetting. . . .” And then she became tied up in trying to extricate herself from the faux pas. But it was impossible to be really offended by anything Klara said.

  I realized with dismay, though, that what Klara had blundered into saying, others could well think in private—and a lot less charitably. It just hadn’t struck me that our friends might get the idea I’d forgotten Max too soon, too easily.

  Having fixed to dine with Klara in two days’ time, on Sunday, I rang off and decided not to bother with making any more calls at the moment. I strolled into the almost empty lounge and sat down; then after a few minutes I casually ordered a cup of mokka. I was discovering that playing a false part is not an easy thing to do, and I had to guard against acting too impetuously.

  I sat there pretending to read a glossy magazine until Steve called for me. He came walking across the quiet lounge and took the chair beside me.

  “You look good!”

  It struck the right note. After the trouble I’d taken to make myself presentable, his straightforward compliment gave me the little boost I badly needed right then.

  “Is there anywhere special you’d like to go?” he asked.

  “Oh, I don’t think so, thanks. You decide.”

  “Right. Somewhere with music, then—you must have music now you’re back in Vienna.” And perhaps Steve thought that music, like wine, would help to oil the conversation. He was probably right, at that.

  We went out to his car, and before getting in I glanced along the street. The gray Volkswagen had gone. But there were other cars, parked at intervals. Any one of them might contain my shadow for the next shift.

  Steve chose to take me to the Weisser Stier, a bright and colorful restaurant somewhere near the Messepalast. It might have been a film set of Old Vienna. As we went in, the orchestra was playing Wiener Blut, and despite everything, my spirits lifted.

  “This is just right!” I said, settling into my chair. I realized with a shock that apart from hasty lunch-bar snacks, this was the first time I’d eaten out since I’d been with Max.

  Steve grinned at me across the table. “It’s great seeing you again, Jessica.”

  “And you, Steve! You can’t imagine how grateful I am for all you did for me, the way you helped me.. ..”

  His expression hardened, as if he wasn’t pleased. He asked swiftly, “How long are you planning to stay here?”

  “Oh, a few weeks.” I had the answer ready, nice and roundly vague. “I’ll
have to see how things go…”

  “Forgive me asking, Jessica, but how are you fixed now? You know—money-wise?”

  “I’m all right for the time being.” Point-blank lying to Steve Elliott went against the grain, and I found it hard to meet his eyes as I went on, “I ... I discovered there was a bit of life insurance I’d not known about. Not a lot, but enough to give me this break.”

  The frown lines were deep across his forehead as he studied me. I felt my own gaze faltering, and had to struggle not to glance away. Luckily, the waiter appeared at just that moment.

  Now that we were here, I knew I couldn’t face much food. I asked Steve to order melon for me to start with, and a plain omelet and salad to follow.

  “Is that really all you want?”

  “Honestly, Steve.”

  “Well, all right, then. But let’s have something to drink first. Vodka and bitter lemon?”

  “Thanks.” I suddenly realized how much I could do with some Dutch courage, and was grateful that the waiter brought the drinks quickly.

  The orchestra poured Lehar into the warm smoky air, and the hubbub of conversation seemed to grow louder and louder, yet at the same time somehow more remote. It was amazing what a single drink could do after going without for a spell.

  Steve was saying, “It’s lucky that I’ve got no trips planned at the moment, and with the Trade Fair just finished, I won’t be too busy. We can see quite a bit of one another.”

  The prospect was tempting, but Richard had told me that my job here was to mix and mingle. Going around with Steve would not be doing that. Though he’d known quite a few of Max’s friends, Steve had never really belonged in our set. It was one of Max’s criticisms that Steve hadn’t been sociable enough.

  I said with a waver in my voice, “Naturally, I’d like to see something of you while I’m here, but it had better not be too often.”