The Prize

by Irving Wallace

  There was the shortest pause, and then the voice concluded. ‘Max, we have made you a reasonable offer. Do not destroy it, or endanger those near and dear to you, by going to the Swedish security police. They will not find me. Nor will they find Walther or Emily. Act as I have suggested, one way or the other, but act on your own. Any other course will prove foolhardy. Mit herzlichen Grüssen, Max.’

  There was a click, the endless rubbing, and not another word in Craig’s ear.

  His hand darted to the machine, pulling the tiny lever to ‘Stop’. He hesitated a moment, the torrent of information scrambled and dancing in his head. Had he heard it rightly? Had he missed anything important? He wanted to hear Emily’s voice again, to test and judge the degree of her agitation and feeling. That, and to hear her. He gripped the rewind knob in his fingers and quickly reversed the tape. He edged the lever to ‘Play’, cupped his hand over the earplug, and listened for eternal mute minutes. There was nothing, no voice, no sound of any kind, except the mocking rasp of the tape as it wound in its circle. Finally, he realized the recorded tape had been automatically erased after it had played, through use of some unusual device. All he had heard would never be heard again. The future of the three Stratmans was in his hands-in his head, really-their predicament and the condition surrounding their future. Craig stopped the playback and removed the plug from his ear.

  He stood in the entry hall and tried to think. In his entire life, he had never heard anything more stupefying, unless it had been the first news of Harriet’s death. And now, in a sense, he had tuned in on the death of a second human being, were he Max or Walther Stratman. He was overcome by an apathy induced by the impossible: to save Emily’s father and yet save Max Stratman. But quickly the apathy passed, and necessity and responsibility mothered clarity.

  To whom could he go? Where could he turn? What was right? What was wrong?

  There was an easy but dreadful solution, of course. He need only awaken Max Stratman, soberly repeat every detail that had been on the incredible tape, and if Stratman believed him (and Craig thought that he would), Stratman himself could carry the burden of the decision into Concert Hall in two hours. It was tempting, dangerously tempting, this notion, to awaken Stratman and let him decide between his brother’s freedom and his nation’s need.

  And then, at once, the notion of what he had been tempted to do sickened Craig, and gave him the old revulsion towards himself, which he now understood more clearly. If he performed in the old, smooth way-running from a shout of distress in the night, ducking away from an uneven gang beating in the street, hiding from reality and his debt to existence by the soft coma of drink and drug and self-pity and inaction and retreat-he would leave this northern place as he had come, a riven and dismembered man, lost to himself and his time, the eternal victim of all unseen fears. The test was finally the test of his bedrock character. Victory or failure was not the criterion of the test. Responsible action was the criterion. No, of one thing he was certain at last-he would not awaken poor old Stratman.

  Yet, merely to prove something to himself, he could not be careless enough to accept a dare that would trifle with another’s life. And it was more than that now, because now he knew that Emily’s future was his own, and so this had come down to self-survival at last. To whom could he turn? The Swedish security police, of course. But even if they believed his wild story-and they might, because of his Nobel stature-what could they do? Eckart would evaporate, Walther would be whisked away, and Emily would long be a corpse in some narrow alley or a hostage in her hated Germany, before the police, without clues, could pick up her trail. The slow noisy wheels of officialdom, he decided, were to be ignored.

  But then, what else? There was only himself, with his knowledge, and no other. He, himself, on the trail? It was ridiculous. He had created too many books not to know of what fiction was made. In books, most often, you knew the end result, the solution, and you tried, as credibly as possible, to manipulate your characters towards it. But this was awful life, where the end result, the solution, was unknown, and therefore the hero character, taking up the gauntlet, had to go forth aimlessly in a maze, towards a destination that had no existence and towards a climax that could not be predicted. If he were writing-and an old nostalgia for that happy hideout enclosed him-how simple it would be. His writer’s mind revolved and wrote: a strange polar city blanketed in snow, a beautiful girl in hidden custody, a bizarre ransom note, two ideologies at war over the payment, and the attractive young man in the trench coat, treading his way through lonely foreign streets where dangers lurked, but always drawing nearer, as clue gave him clue, as-hell, and to hell with it!

  He broke off the contrived fantasy and tried to think harder. There was no knowledge of international intrigue-euphemism for plain filthy blackmail-in the true experience of his life. Except for his reading of documented books, and hearing of occasional Communist fanatics, like the one Lilly’s Hungarian, Nicholas Daranyi, had told him about-what was the name? Enbom, yes, Enbom, the Swede with Communist sympathies who had sold secrets to the Russians-except for such true…

  Suddenly Craig stiffened. His mind leaped to one sound possibility. Daranyi, Nicholas Daranyi.

  Craig tried to recollect what had brought him to Daranyi. A self-confessed free-lance spy, yes, but that was as much foolishness as fiction. It was something else altogether that excited him now. It was something that Daranyi had once said of himself, and something, their last time, that Lilly had said of Daranyi. He racked his brain, and cursed himself for not having been a better listener. Daranyi had worked, was working-which?-for a Nobel committee judge-to investigate all the present laureates. He had hardly paid attention to it at the time, but now, in review, it had a foul smell. Had he himself been spied upon? And Stratman? Had someone been interested in Stratman for any reason-perhaps for the reasons that had been erased on the tape? Far fetched, and yet-Daranyi was a possibility. Even if he knew nothing of this matter, he, more than anyone, would likely know what to do about it. Suddenly, for the first time, Craig took Daranyi seriously.

  He heard the clock, and he realized, painfully, that time was running out. He had less than an hour and three-quarters to act on his own. But now, for the first time, he had need to define his mission: to act on his own, yes, laudable-but to act how? And to what end? What was he after? He must reach Emily and Walther, of course. That was the goal. He must ascertain that Emily was alive and safe. He must look upon Walther with his own eyes and know that this sudden visitor was, indeed, Emily’s father. If he was not her father, the cruel hoax needed to be exposed. If the tape was true, and Walther true-and Craig had little doubt about this-then Craig must reason and plead with Walther to withdraw from this drama and end the impossible dilemma.

  Momentarily oblivious to his surroundings, Craig became aware that he had found the real motive for personal action. He reasoned the motive further; Walther, father, had come back into Emily’s life as Walther, stranger. The accident of blood did not necessarily establish the sire. Rather, closeness and love and responsibility and sacrifice made the sire. By this standard, Max Stratman, not Walther Stratman, was Emily’s male parent. If Max were snatched from her now, she would be condemned to life servitude with an utter stranger. Since she would not have Craig, and could not have Max, she would have no one but herself-and this self could not survive alone. For Emily, this emptiness would be the deeper death before dying.

  Standing in the entry hall, thinking, Craig was vaguely dissatisfied and wanted to rationalize his action further. There was also, he told himself, the matter of the greater good: Walther was an unknown quantity, whereas the free world needed Max, dared not lose him. Ergo: reject Walther to save Max and Emily. Ergo: find Walther, and convince him that he should go back voluntarily to where he came from. If Walther truly loved Emily-more, if he was concerned with the future freedom of mankind-he would be persuaded.

  But the pretentiousness and unfairness of this determination nagged at Craig. He tr
ied to dismiss it, yet it was there, persistently begging a hearing. Reluctantly, Craig gave the defence its kangaroo hearing. Yes, in an ancient time, Walther had played Sydney Carton to his brother Max’s Charles Darnay. Yes, Walther had suffered a long slavery under a system he abhorred, and deserved parole at any cost. Yes, Walther should be freed to enjoy his last years. That was justice. Nevertheless, for once, Craig looked upon justice as the baser choice. His emotions clung to the original impulse, go back, Walther.

  Craig’s quest was now clear. If he failed in it-failed to find Walther or, finding him, failed to convince him-there would be time enough to return to Max without imperilling Eckart’s deal. The consequences of failure were automatic. He would have to return to this room and tell Max Stratman the truth and let him do what would have to be done. Max Stratman would offer himself to the exchange at once. He would offer himself because of brother love and Emily love and, most compelling of all, because of the old swollen guilt. He would do so, without second thought, if Craig returned helpless in an hour and three-quarters, and he would do so this moment, if Craig marched into his bedroom and woke him with Eckart’s news. But not yet. Craig’s passionate need for Emily, for her safety and her peace of mind and what he now knew was right for her, shook him. He was animated into action.

  Pocketing the anonymous typewritten note, he hid the miniature tape recorder in the entry hall cupboard. Then, taking his pen, he added a thoughtful postscript to Max Stratman’s note left for his niece: ‘Have taken Emily out on the town. We’ll meet you at Concert Hall. Best, Craig.’ Now he lifted the receiver of the telephone and spoke to the operator. Did she have a number for one Nicholas Daranyi? He waited restlessly, and then the operator reported that there was no listing of any Daranyi in Stockholm.

  Craig hung up, and promptly his mind went to Lilly. At this hour, she would be in the Nordiska Kompaniet. He would find her, and through her find Daranyi. It was the best that he could do, he told himself helplessly.

  Swiftly, he strode out of the Stratman suite, hastened through the corridor, and rode the elevator down to the lobby.

  The lobby was, as ever, crowded. Craig pushed through the circle of people trying to enter the elevator, jostled against the Marceaus, with no time to murmur a civil apology, and started towards the stairs leading to the revolving door and the outside.

  As he reached the topmost step, he thought that he heard his name. He turned, and heard the stentorian voice again. ‘Craig.’

  It was Gunnar Gottling, in his eccentric fur cap and mangy coat, his bloodshot eyes and drooping bushes of moustache, not this time hiding his outgoing affection, tramping towards Craig. ‘You old son of a bitch,’ he was bellowing, ‘I was just ringing your room. I wanted to tell you I reread all those crappy books of yours the last couple days and-’

  Craig cut in. ‘Gottling, I’ve got no time for tea talk today. There’s trouble, and I-’

  ‘What trouble you in?’ Gottling’s face and manner had taken on the protective ferocity of a giant grizzly bear-U. horribilis-and there was no avoiding him. ‘You look pale as a spectre, and you look sore as hell. What’s eating you? Tell Gottling.’

  Craig became aware that Gottling’s voice carried, and many eyes were on them. He lowered his own voice. ‘I’m not in trouble. Someone else is-and it’s a matter of life and death-so-’

  He started to go, when Gottling clamped his arm. ‘I am here to help, Craig. What can I do?’

  Craig had started to say to Gottling that there was nothing he or anyone could do, and then, at once, he realized that Gottling could be of help. This was his city, this Stockholm, and he was a part of the best and the worst of it, and he was fearless. The question was his dependability.

  ‘How much can I trust you?’ asked Craig.

  ‘Cut that crap,’ said Gottling angrily. ‘I won’t fall in front of any trains for you-but I’ll go damn far. What’s your trouble? Abortion, blackmail, somebody’s arm you want to break? Just say it. Since that night in the Wärdshus, I got to thinking-that tall drink of water isn’t such a bad-’

  ‘Have you got your car with you?’

  ‘You bet your ass.’

  ‘I’ve got some mighty important calls to make, and I haven’t got much time.’

  ‘Hop in,’ said Gottling.

  And he thundered down the stairs after Craig, and through the spinning door behind him, and then caught up and pointed off to his compact Volvo station-wagon alongside the quay. Craig had forgotten his overcoat, but the last of the setting sun was still visible, and the air was only slightly chilled.

  They trudged through the low-packed snow, and Craig began to speak of what had happened and was happening in a sort of oral shorthand. With brevity, he filled Gottling in on his relationship with Emily Stratman.

  Once inside the station-wagon, Gottling looked at him questioningly.

  ‘Just a few blocks for the first stop,’ said Craig. ‘Nordiska Kompaniet.’

  Gottling started the car, and crouched over the wheel in his near-sighted way, as Craig picked up his story. He related all he knew of Emily’s tardiness which became absence, of his visit to her room, the typewritten sheet, and then he recited what he had heard on the miniature tape machine, feeling better to know that another shared the facts, should anything happen to him.

  When he had finished, Gottling belched across the wheel, and cursed classically. ‘Those friggin’ Commies,’ he said.

  ‘We don’t know-’

  ‘The hell we don’t,’ said Gottling. ‘Who wants the old man in East Berlin, anyway? Those little Prussky puppets? They’re go-betweens. It’s the big boys who want Stratman on their side. Goddammit, Craig, don’t you ever read the papers any more? Every other week some fag Englishman or little American with goggles turns up in Moscow and says peace it’s wonderful, and hands them a briefcase of discoveries. Do you think all the defectors do it just for love and money? Well, maybe most, because their heads are screwed on backwards, but dollars to doughnuts, every tenth man is blackmailed into crossing the line-they’re holding a relative or somebody-and the poor bastard scientist or diplomat-what can he do?’ They were on Hamngatan, and he swung the Volvo to the kerb. ‘Here’s your N.K. What gives here?’

  Craig opened the door. Then, one foot still on the floorboard, and the other on the kerb, he explained, in rapid-fire sentences, about Lilly Hedqvist and Nicholas Daranyi and himself.

  ‘I know Daranyi,’ said Gottling. ‘Always nosing around for gossip. I’m one of the decadent little bastard’s pet sources. I do it to let off steam. He knows it. But I like him. I like rabbits.’

  ‘Do you think I’m crazy to gamble Walther’s freedom-maybe even Emily’s life-on a longshot? Should I go to the police?’

  ‘Police? Ha! Those crooks. For all we know, they pulled the job. Naw, play it like a one-man team, Craig, a decathlon entry-all by your lonesome and no bumbleheads with billy clubs. Go in and see that broad of yours, and find out where the slob Daranyi lives-I wish I knew, but I don’t. Now, take off, and I’ll keep my engine revved up.’

  Craig pushed through a glass entrance door, and once inside the cavern of the crowded store, he tried to take his bearings. His eyes fell on the information booth to his left, and he fought through the swarm of shoppers to the pert Swedish girl in the booth. It was imperative that he see one of the assistants, Miss Lilly Hedqvist, in ladies’ wear, he pleaded. There had been an emergency in her family. The pert girl rang a bell. A slender young boy came on the run. There was an exchange in Swedish. The boy was gone. Craig was asked to wait. Ignoring the shoppers with bundles, who came and went before him, he waited, and he worried about Emily.

  It was several minutes before Lilly arrived, blue eyes opened wide with concern. Craig drew her aside, to a corner near the doors.

  ‘Lilly, I haven’t much time. Emily Stratman is in trouble-’

  ‘Trouble? In what trouble? I do not understand.’

  ‘I won’t go into it now, but we’re trying to stay a
way from the police to protect her and her father. It’s all tied up with her uncle being here for the Nobel awards, and I remembered something-you told me Daranyi was investigating the Nobel laureates-’

  ‘It is true.’

  ‘Where do I find Daranyi?’

  ‘He should be home. I will take you there.’

  ‘I haven’t got time. Just tell me-’

  ‘No, it is better I take you. One minute. I will inform the manager my mother is very ill. Wait outside.’

  Craig went outside, shivered as the breeze nipped at him, signalled Gottling to wait, and then himself stalked back and forth before the wide entrance of Nordiska Kompaniet. Lilly had said one minute, and it was literally one minute later that she burst out of the store, tugging on a bright plaid coat.

  Craig hustled her into the rear of the station-wagon, and swung himself into the front seat beside Gottling, who had, as he had promised, kept his motor running. Craig blurted his introduction, and Gottling’s dissipated face bore an expression of appreciation for Craig’s taste.

  ‘Tell him where to go, Lilly,’ said Craig.

  She spoke in Swedish, Gottling nodding, and all Craig could make of it was Mårten Trotzig’s Lane and Västerlånggatan. Gottling shifted, viewing the oncoming traffic through his rear mirror, and jolted the Volvo into a sudden skidding U-turn. Now he straightened the car, and retraced their original course, heading towards the Strommen canal, and then over the bridge towards the looming Royal Palace and the Old Town.