Silhouette in Scarlet vbm-3

by Elizabeth Peters

The first to respond to the smell of cooking was the cat. I had been wondering where it was; that cosy little sitting area absolutely demanded a fat, purring cat. it came in through the window, startling me so that I dropped the spoon I held – a big, fluffy tabby, its forehead marked with the customary black M, its jowls outlined in white. Tail elevated and bristling, it studied me warily for a moment, and I stared back, mesmerized by its glowing green eyes. Then it opened its mouth and emitted a ladylike, dainty little mew.

  While the cat wove in and out around my feet, purring hoarsely, I found its bowl in a cupboard, and a can of cat food, identifiable by the picture on the label, in the pantry. He (his sex was obvious, as soon as he turned his back) tucked into the food with that accusing air of imminent starvation typical of cats. I wasn’t too worried about him. The island probably abounded in small rodents, and he had already demonstrated a commendable caution in approaching strangers. His chances of survival were probably better than mine.

  When the kitchen door opened, he scuttled for cover under the table. He didn’t move fast enough.

  ‘What a touching tableau,’ John exclaimed. ‘The cook and her cat. Hello, cat.’ He squatted. After a moment a suspicious whiskered face appeared. The two of them contemplated one another in solemn silence for a time. Then, with a kind of feline shrug, the cat gave John an unmistakable cold shoulder and returned to its dinner.

  ‘Crushed again,’ said John. Rising, he sniffed appreciatively. ‘What’s for dinner?’

  ‘Your dinner? I haven’t the faintest idea.’

  John raised one eyebrow – a trick of his I particularly abhor – and wandered into the pantry I lifted the lid of a skillet. Whole onions, cooked in butter and brown sugar, simmered in half a cup of beef stock. John came back empty-handed but unperturbed. Whistling, he opened the refrigerator door and draped himself over it, staring into the fridge in that maddening way men and children have, as if they expected a seven-course meal to materialize on a shelf. I almost snapped, ‘Close that door.’ I must have heard Mother say it a thousand times.

  To my chagrin John found the food I had pushed to the back of the shelves. I suppose Mrs Andersson had taken it out of the freezer the night before. Murmuring affectionately, he removed a bowl of kidneys, a box of mushrooms, and the butter.

  ‘Lend me the knife,’ he said abstractedly.

  I borrowed it back a little later to slice cabbage. John stirred things into his sautéed kidneys and mushrooms and fed scraps to the cat. It had transferred its fickle affections to John, and ignored me completely. obviously it preferred kidney to canned food.

  It went out the window in a long, flowing leap when the others started to file in. They stood around watching and sniffing hopefully. I drained my potatoes and put them through the ricer, added butter and a generous amount of hot milk. John tossed linguine into a big pot of boiling water. Everybody else drooled.

  Leif was the last to appear. He had showered and changed, and he looked like the kind of man a wife hopes will come home for dinner. I gave him a melting smile and waved my spoon toward the rocking chairs. ‘Sit down, Leif. Supper will be ready in a few minutes.’

  With a broadening grin he took in the two chairs, the table with two place settings, and the ring of hungry faces. ‘I will get us something to drink,’ he said.

  I suggested a light Riesling, to go with the fish, and told him where to find it in the pantry. As he opened the bottle, I met Max’s narrowed eyes.

  ‘I’m sure you wouldn’t trust anything I cooked,’ I said guilelessly.

  ‘I have enough for everyone,’ John announced, sloshing his linguine into a colander. Max turned his hostile stare onto John, who said impatiently, ‘I don’t give a damn whether you eat it or not, Max, but it surely must have occurred to you, as it has to Dr Bliss, that poisoning is an extremely slow and chancy method of incapacitating a large-sized group.’

  Max thought this over, and as the truth of it dawned, his cheeks turned the colour of fresh liver. ‘But you were the one,’ he began.

  ‘I just threw that idea out to liven things up,’ John said. ‘Have a kidney.’

  The pike was delicious. I guess the kidneys were too. The gang polished them off and gobbled up everything else in sight, including the remains of the pike, which I magnanimously contributed. Fish is no good the second day anyway.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ John said, surveying the scraped plates. ‘I ought to have made meatballs too. Never mind, we’ll have them tomorrow night.’

  This hopeful suggestion hung twitching and dying in midair like a hooked fish. Max grunted and pushed his chair from the table.

  ‘Oh, no, you don’t,’ I said, as the rest followed suit. ‘I cleaned up one mess today. It’s your turn for KP.’

  I honestly didn’t expect this order would be obeyed, but after a moment Max nodded. ‘Sir John will oblige.’

  ‘Sir John’ looked mutinous. ‘It’s not fair. I did the cooking.’

  For a minute it appeared the situation was going to develop into one of those all too familiar family squabbles, like the ones my brothers and I had every day of our lives. ‘It’s your turn tonight. No, it’s not, I did it yesterday. You did not, I traded with you Tuesday . . .’

  Max banged his fist on the table. ‘Hans.’

  ‘Aber, Herr Max, ich weiss nicht – ’

  I decided to get out and leave them to settle it. The argument broke out again as soon as I left the room. Somehow I was not surprised to see that John had also slipped out.

  ‘Shall we take a little stroll in the garden?’ he asked.

  ‘That’s what I had in mind. A solitary stroll.’

  Trotting to keep up with me, he remarked, ‘I sense a specific source of annoyance, over and above the general vexation I seem to arouse in you. You’d better tell me what it is; we can’t work efficiently while you are nursing some fancied grudge.’

  I spun around. He ground to a halt and ducked, just in time to avoid the fist I shook under his nose. ‘Annoyance? I never had a very exaggerated opinion of your morals, but after seeing the end product of your latest caper I am not inclined to add myself to the list of victims.’

  ‘Ah – Georg.’

  ‘Georg,’ I agreed.

  ‘I suppose you wouldn’t believe me if I told you I was not responsible.’

  ‘I wouldn’t.’

  ‘We’d all have a better chance of getting out of this if you could bring yourself to cooperate with me.’

  ‘You cooperate first,’ I said.

  ‘If I’m to get out of the house tonight, I’ll need your help.’ He broke off with a grunt of exasperation as the front door opened and Rudi appeared. ‘Pretend to be angry,’ he muttered.

  ‘No trouble.’ I slapped his face hard. He yelled. Rudi grinned – at least I think the slit in the lower part of his face was intended to be a smile.

  John retreated into the house, ostentatiously nursing his cheek. Rudi followed. I went down the steps into the garden.

  The roses were beginning to bloom. I touched a creamy bud; its opening petals were as translucent as fine porcelain. Gus had talked about his rose garden the night before. His mother had set it out, nursing the prize plants through the long cold winter. Gus was enormously proud of it.

  Where was he now, the kind old man who had welcomed kin so warmly? If he met his death through my carelessness and lack of foresight I would never forgive myself.

  It was still bright daylight, and would be for many hours. If John meant to prowl tonight, he wouldn’t have a long period of darkness at his disposal. In fact, he might not have any. This far north, with midsummer almost upon us, a deep dusk is the most one can expect in the way of night. John would need all the distraction he could get, there was no question about that.

  In the crystal-clear air the distant mountains of Norway looked like a low-hanging white cloud, the snow on their peaks shimmering in reflected sunlight. The lake was as calm as a fish pond. The island was almost in the centre of the lake, but the di
stance between our dock and the one opposite, on the mainland, seemed slightly shorter than it was elsewhere. If we had to swim, that was the obvious route – straight towards the garage-boathouse on shore. Gus was the one I was worried about; but with Leif to help, I could probably get him across. If we could get even fifteen minutes’ apart, night or day . . . Surely there would be people at the boathouse during the day, villagers who kept their boats there, and the old codgers. A flash of light caught my eye. It came from the shadows under the eaves of the garage, and as I squinted, shading my eyes with my hand, I thought I saw them – five shapes, rigid as statues in their wooden chairs.

  ‘Laugh,’ said a voice behind me.

  I turned with a start. ‘Laugh,’ Max repeated, taking my arm. ‘One of them is watching us through binoculars.’

  I stretched my mouth into a gaping grin. The crown of his dead, flat grey hair barely reached my nose, but the pressure of his fingers bit into my bicep. I let him turn me towards the house.

  ‘They are only inquisitive old men, with nothing better to do,’ Max went on. ‘But I would not want you to succumb to a foolish impulse. The situation has not changed. Mr Jonsson is still in my hands, and if a signal from you brought one of those doddering ancients to the rescue, he would only be added to my collection of hostages.’

  ‘I have only your word for it that Gus is still alive,’ I said, as he opened the door for me.

  ‘I wondered when you would bring that up. Would you like to talk to him?’

  He led the way into the study. I took a chair by the desk while he opened a cupboard and removed a canvas-wrapped bundle. He made no attempt to conceal what he was doing. I suppose he thought I wouldn’t have enough technical knowledge to recognize the device.

  I hadn’t seen that particular model before – it was a good deal more sophisticated than the ones my brothers owned – but I recognized it as a kind of wireless walkie-talkie. Max pushed a few buttons, and a long antenna wavered out. He pressed more buttons.

  A harsh voice croaked a few words. Max answered in English, obviously the lingua franca of that cosmopolitan group. ‘Put Mr Jonsson on.’

  After an interval I heard Gus’s voice. ‘Vicky? Are you there, my dear?’

  ‘Gus! Gus, are you okay?’

  ‘Yes, they have not hurt me. Have they hurt you?’

  ‘No. Don’t worry about me, Gus, I’m fine.’

  ‘Do nothing, Vicky. Do what they say. Take no risk.’

  Before I could answer, Max played a tattoo on the buttons and the antenna retracted. He returned the gadget to the cupboard, locked it, and tucked the key ostentatiously into his jacket pocket.

  He needn’t have worried. The walkie-talkie wouldn’t do me any good; it obviously had a limited range. I had been right all along – Gus was on the island. And now I knew where on the island.

  I suspected the conversation had been set up in order to calm Gus as well as me. The hostage situation worked both ways; he wouldn’t try anything while I was in Max’s hands. At least I hoped to God he wouldn’t. He was a proud man, unaccustomed to intimidation, and if he lost his temper he might do something rash. The sooner I put my half-baked plan into action, the better. I had to cooperate with John. I knew it, and he knew it too. He had the best chance of scouting unseen; he could move like a shadow, and he knew dirty tricks I had never heard of. I figured I could count on him not to double-cross me, because he needed me as much as I needed him. Alone he was no match for Max and the boys, especially since Leif and Georg weren’t too crazy about him either.

  My meditations were interrupted by an object that came flying in through the open window. It landed on a table and squatted there, staring with malevolent emerald eyes.

  ‘Ah,’ Max exclaimed. ‘What a beautiful cat. Hello, my friend; what is your name?’ He held out his hand and made cooing sounds.

  To my surprise and disgust, the cat promptly responded. Another flying leap took it to the desk. Max scratched it under the chin. Not only did it accept the caress, it squirmed and wriggled and started to purr.

  ‘So much,’ I said, ‘for stereotypes.’

  Leif would have said, ‘What?’ Max laughed, his hand moving over the cat’s head and neck with practised skill.

  ‘I’m sorry to disturb your prejudices, Dr Bliss. I am very fond of animals, and they like me. I have a cat of my own, an aristocratic Siamese named Marguerite.’

  He certainly knew how to handle the species. The big tabby literally drooled on him. Finally it flung itself on its back in an abandonment of bliss, knocking Max’s briefcase to the floor. The crash startled it. With a hiss it bounced up and departed, via the window.

  Smiling, Max bent to pick up his possessions. The briefcase had sprung open, scattering the contents – scissors, black papers, white cardboard mounts. Not all the papers were black, however. A few sheets were scarlet, bright as fresh blood.

  ‘You use red paper?’ I asked curiously.

  Max’s deft hands paused in their work of gathering up the papers. ‘Sometimes,’ he said curtly.

  ‘When the mood takes you, or . . .’ The funniest feeling came over me; I don’t know why. I swallowed. ‘Or – or for a particular reason?’

  ‘For a particular . . . collection.’ Max’s back straightened, the briefcase in his hands. His eyes avoided mine. ‘We all have personal idiosyncrasies, Dr Bliss.’

  ‘Right,’ I mumbled. ‘Sure.’

  Max selected a sheet of black paper. ‘You permit?’

  I gave him the profile he wanted, without further comment. He made a sound of satisfaction. ‘You are a good subject, Dr Bliss. Such well-defined features.’

  The sticky subject had been dropped. We were back on our old terms. I thought I knew the significance of the scarlet silhouettes, and I was no more anxious to talk about them than Max was. But, my God, the psychological impact of that little ‘idiosyncrasy’ . . .

  Max was still snipping when a delegation trooped in, headed by John. He gestured at Rudi.

  ‘Must I have Peter Lorre dogging my footsteps?’

  Instead of appearing offended, Rudi beamed with pleasure. I suppose if you are imitating a villain, it is a compliment to be compared to one of the greatest.

  ‘I have decided you require a permanent escort,’ Max said equably. ‘Don’t feel persecuted; Mr Hasseltine will also be guarded.’

  He indicated Hans. That literal-minded soul was standing so close to Leif that his heavy breathing blew the latter’s hair into his face. Leif glowered.

  ‘I will not endure this,’ he exclaimed.

  ‘Sit down!’ Max shouted. ‘All of you, sit and be quiet. I am in no mood for childishness tonight.’

  I gestured towards the sofa where I was sitting, and Leif joined me. Hans tried to squeeze his bulk into the narrow space between us. ‘Hey,’ I said. Max rolled his eyes.

  ‘Heaven give me patience. Hans, take a chair – that one, behind the sofa.’

  Everyone subsided. The glum silence was broken by Max. He held up the finished silhouette.

  ‘It is not so pleasant as the last,’ he said in a worried voice.

  ‘I don’t feel as pleasant,’ I assured him. He had caught my scowl and out-thrust lip quite accurately.

  Max picked up another piece of paper. It was black, not scarlet, but as his eyes focused on John, the latter sprang from his chair as if he had been stung.

  ‘This is a dull group,’ he announced. ‘What about a game?’

  Without waiting for an answer, he threw open one of the cupboard doors. ‘Chess, checkers, Go, Monopoly . . . He must have bought out a toy shop. Anyone for a game of Scrabble?’

  ‘Why not?’ I stood up.

  I don’t know what John would have done if someone else had accepted his offer. In fact, I didn’t know what he was going to do now that I had accepted it. The manoeuver was pretty obvious. Max thought so too. His eyes sparkled with malicious amusement.

  ‘What a charming idea. We will all be entertained. Rudi, sit at
the table and call out the words as they are played.’

  Apparently undisturbed by this suggestion, John poured the tiles out onto the table. I helped him turn them over and watched approvingly as he gave them a very perfunctory shuffle. I palmed the pieces I wanted – not very expertly, but nobody saw me. All eyes were glued on John.

  I moved first. That was fine with me. I had only one question, but it was an important question, and I wasn’t sure when, if ever, I would have an opportunity to talk privately with John.

  I spelled out ‘boss’ and rolled my eyes in Max’s direction as Rudi intoned the word like a bingo announcer.

  ‘No, no,’ John said. There was a brief but perceptible pause before he added, ‘You’ll have to do better than that, my girl.’

  The confirmation came as no surprise. Directors of big criminal organizations don’t go into the field; they sit in fancy offices in New York or Hamburg or Marseilles, and give generous donations to charity. I realized there was another question I needed to ask, and cheated shamelessly as I collected my next tiles. Rudi didn’t notice; he was watching John.

  John spelled ‘distract,’ using the second 5 in ‘boss,’ then folded his hands and smiled at me. One thumb was folded across; the other jerked up, indicating . . . Not Rudi, as I had expected. Hans, who was leaning over Leif’s shoulder trying to see the board.

  If I had planned a spot of nocturnal spying, I’d rather have had Hans on my trail than Rudi. The latter was much more intelligent. However, Hans was much bigger. It was a moot point, and I figured John had his reasons.

  Rudi announced ‘distract,’ with a thick Viennese accent. He was getting into the swing of it, rolling his r’s with fine effect. Max’s brow furrowed. It was beginning to dawn on him that he might be missing some nuance or other.

  I spelled ‘initiame,’ slapping down the tiles with reckless haste, before Max could call the game off. It was the best I could do. I couldn’t find two t’s. John stared at me in consternation, while I thought the word at him as hard as I could. I don’t know whether ESP worked, or whether his quick mind made the right connection. He said, ‘Nothing,’ with crisp emphasis, and looked at his tiles. ‘Nothing,’ he repeated sadly. ‘What a rotten collection of useless consonants.’