East of Algiers

by Francis Durbridge

  The enquiries at the hospitals and police-stations produced a nil result.

  ‘But do not worry, Monsieur Temple. If you will give me a description of your wife I will guarantee that every policeman and detective in Tunis will be on the watch for her. Who knows, it may jog a memory in some of my men’s minds. If you have a photograph that would be even better.’

  Luckily I had a very good snapshot of Steve in my wallet, taken from close up. I handed it to Renouk, who examined it with interest and then looked up at me.

  ‘I can understand your disquiet, monsieur. You have a very attractive wife.’

  I did not like to be away from the hotel for too long at a time. It was the most obvious place for anyone to try and contact me. Renouk was kind enough to send me back in his own car. He told me again not to worry, and I knew that only by keeping a clear head would I be of any use to Steve.

  My supercilious friend at the reception desk had been relieved by another clerk when I got back, but the new man gave me the same answer. No messages. I controlled an impulse to pick up one of the huge ornamental vases and smash it against one of the shiny marble pillars. This was a war of nerves. Steve’s kidnappers intended to work me up to a state of dithering suspense. It was quite possible that they had someone watching me, and I would only play into their hands if I gave any indication that my nerve was going.

  ‘—there was only this cable for you from Paris, monsieur.’

  I realized that the desk clerk was still talking to me, handing me an envelope across the counter.

  I began to rip the cable open. This could be it: but why from Paris? I was glad to see that my hands were quite steady as I unfolded the slip of paper. The message had been handed in at two p.m. by Paris time.

  ‘Arriving Tunis late to-night. Will contact you at hotel. Forbes.’

  I stared across the hotel foyer in a daze. What was bringing my old friend from Scotland Yard to Tunis at this very psychological moment? He had disappeared from London some weeks before, and Steve and I half believed the story that his health had broken down and he had been ordered away for a rest cure. But if that were so, why was he posting to Tunis in such a hurry and how on earth did he know that we were staying at the Hôtel François Premier? Well, I’d know the answer that night, and this cable did mean one thing: I would have an ally in this terribly hostile and mystifying city.

  ‘Not bad news, I hope?’

  Audry Bryce. Luckily I had folded the cable up so she had had no chance of reading it over my shoulder. I turned and greeted her with a smile as open and frank as her own.

  ‘No, thank you. Just a message from an old friend of mine at Scotland Yard.’

  She rode that one, rather as a boxer rides a punch he has seen coming.

  ‘Mrs. Temple is not around?’

  I thought the phrasing of the question was rather false, as if she knew the answer.

  ‘No, she’s gone shopping. You know how women sometimes lose count of time. Why don’t you join me for tea? I feel the need of company.’

  ‘That’s very kind of you, Mr. Temple. I’d just love to do that.’

  She had fallen easily into her role as a dumb American tourist. We strolled out to the terrace like a couple of long lost friends gaily swapping trivialities. When the tea came I asked her if she would be ‘mother’, and we giggled together at the old joke.

  ‘By the way,’ I said, ‘how’s Pierre? I’m surprised he’s not with you.’

  The lid of the teapot fell with a crash on to my cup, knocked it over and sent tea sloshing all over the table. A damned fool of a waiter came hurtling forward and sacrificed his snow-white serviette to saving her skirt. It gave her a few moments cover to regain her composure.

  ‘Who’s this Pierre?’ she asked me when the status quo had been restored. ‘I don’t seem to recall anyone of that name.’

  ‘My mistake. I probably mistook him for someone else of the same name – or vice versa.’

  ‘What’s that again?’

  ‘The same person with another name,’ I said, and smiled brightly at her again.

  ‘That’s double talk,’ she told me, but without conviction.

  I took a sip of tea. It was weak and bleak, but I did not mind much. I was beginning to understand why cats find a peculiar fascination in playing with mice.

  ‘We were interested in your tip about the slippers, Miss Bryce.’

  ‘Oh, good. Did you manage to find the sort of thing you wanted?’

  ‘I think so. I imagine that’s very much your speciality.’

  Her cup was half-way to her lips. It stopped there.

  ‘My speciality? I don’t get this.’

  ‘Anything to do with – leather.’

  She was worried now and on the defensive. She did not spill her tea this time, but the cup went down on to the saucer with an unhealthy crash. She began to become very busy about lighting a cigarette.

  ‘This Pierre I was mentioning,’ I said casually. ‘Of course, I realize you don’t know him, but it’s an interesting story. He has been engaging in what you and I might call a rather shady business, and the police have been watching him for a very long time. Like a good many of his kind he’s too over-confident, and he’s given himself away on a number of counts. He made the very great mistake of committing murder, and as you know it’s very hard to get away with that nowadays. What with Interpol the co-ordination between the various countries is amazingly good.’

  I glanced up at my companion. She had dropped the mask and turned sickeningly pale. The hand which held the cigarette was trembling. She was staring straight ahead of her. I even began to feel a little sorry for her – till I remembered Steve.

  ‘Yes, the police are just about ready to take Pierre whenever they want. All they’re waiting for now is to find out who his associates are. Some of them may not realize that Pierre is wanted for murder, but they’ll all have to face a charge of being accessories to murder. By the way, do they still use the guillotine here in Tunisia or has the Arab administration got its own method?’

  The woman who called herself Audry Bryce threw down her cigarette.

  In a very low voice and with a quite different intonation she said: ‘I’ve had just about as much of this as I can take.’

  Then she got up and walked away into the hotel.

  I sat waiting for five, ten, fifteen minutes. At the end of that time a chasseur came on to the terrace.

  ‘Paging Mr. Temple. Paging Mr. Temple.’

  I lifted a finger and his sharp eyes picked me out at once. He came across to my table.

  ‘You are wanted on the telephone, Mr. Temple.’

  ‘Coming. Just hold on a minute.’

  I tore a leaf from my pocket-book and scribbled on it.

  ‘You might be glad of a friend on the police side. Could we not get together again?’

  I folded it up and handed it to the chasseur with a thousand-franc note.

  ‘Get that to the lady in room three seven one, but don’t let anyone see you give it to her. If she’s not alone make some excuse and wait till later.’

  The chasseur, child though he was, winked naughtily at me and pocketed the money.

  My telephone call was from Tony Wyse.

  ‘Long time no see,’ he said when he had announced himself. ‘I’m sorry I haven’t been round to visit you. I’ve been rather tied up with business and what not. Have you been savouring the delights of Tunis?’

  ‘We’ve had a very eventful time so far.’

  ‘That’s good. Listen, I wondered if you and Mrs. Temple would dine with me this evening?’

  ‘It’s very kind of you, Wyse, but I’m afraid something has happened to my wife. She left the hotel early this morning and has not been seen since.’

  ‘What?’

  There was a stunned silence at the other end. Then Wyse said: ‘Good God!’ My news seemed to have hit him like a bombshell.

  After a while he said: ‘What have you done about it? Have you told the po
lice?’

  ‘Yes. I’ve told the police and they’ve tried all the hospitals. No luck.’

  ‘This is terrible news. Look here, Temple, I’ve got to see you. Will you be there if I come over right away?’

  I glanced at my watch. It would soon be time for me to leave if I was to keep my appointment with O’Halloran.

  ‘No. I have to go out now. I have an appointment which I must keep.’

  ‘Well, what about dining with me this evening in any case – even if you have to be on your own?’

  ‘Well, I will if I can. Where shall we meet?’

  ‘At the Hôtel Tunisie. It’s at Sidi bou Saïd. A taxi will get you there in a quarter of an hour. Shall we say eight o’clock?’

  ‘The Hôtel Tunisie at Sidi bou Saïd?’

  ‘That’s right. I’ll be there at eight anyway, and you come as soon as you can.’

  ‘I’ll do my best.’

  ‘Fine. See you then.’

  I was smoking more than my normal quota of cigarettes. I lit another as I came out of the phone booth, and stood for a while watching the people walking through the hotel foyer or sitting waiting for a friend to appear. I kept checking in my mind, wondering whether there was some lead I had missed, some obvious step that I ought to be taking. There was no good in asking the desk yet again if there was any message for me. They could perfectly well see me where I was standing. Now it was six hours since I had last seen Steve, and there was still no message. Had something gone wrong? Had she put up too good a fight and been accidentally killed in the struggle? Then the worst thought of all hit me. Had she been taken not in order to blackmail me, but to find out how much we knew? Was someone spending all this time in trying to make her tell something she didn’t even know?

  For a moment a red film slimed across my eyes and I had to clench my fists. In spite of my resolution I was going towards the desk again, like a drug addict who must have another shot of dope. Perhaps a message had come in during the last few minutes.

  The chasseur to whom I had given the note ran up and touched my elbow as I turned away, empty-handed, after another useless enquiry.

  ‘I caught her just as she was getting into a taxi,’ he said. ‘No one saw me. She said to give you this.’

  I nodded my thanks and opened the note. Underneath my own message these ten shaky words had been scribbled: ‘Be in your room at midnight. I will come then.’ The chasseur was still waiting in hopes. ‘Get me a taxi,’ I told him, and followed slowly as he darted towards the street.

  Chapter Eight

  KHÉRÉDINE is not far from Tunis straight across the lagoon as the crow flies, or as the railway runs. If you go by car you have to describe a half-circle, which takes you out to El Aouina airport on the road to Sidi bou Saïd. Khérédine is a curious quarter, part bathing beach, part luxury residential district, part dock area. My driver knew the Hotel du Port and took me unhesitatingly to a grimy street with houses on one side and an indeterminate waterfront on the other. This was the part where boat repairs were carried out, house-boats moored, and private motor-launches tied up. The Hôtel du Port was an old-fashioned café made more unappetizing by its yellowy strip lighting. I could see dockers in the bar at the front grouped round a billiard table. The strains of accordion music floated out through the open door.

  When my taxi had driven away I felt that I was alone in a very foreign part of the world. The sun had gone down and been followed very swiftly by darkness. The moon was not yet up. The glow of Tunis seemed to be reflected down from the sky, and only beyond its halo did the stars seem bright. I could hear the small Mediterranean waves feeling their way in among the boats, slopping against the pylons of the wharf and gurgling up on to isolated little patches of sand.

  I had omitted to ask O’Halloran on which side of the café Durant’s house stood, but since the café was on a street corner the information was not necessary. The house was clearly used partly as residence and partly as offices. Durant’s business sign had been painted across one of the ground-floor windows, and upstairs there were frilly lace curtains. I went up the steps and rang the bell, wondering whether this time I was really going to meet the elusive David Foster – and if not whom O’Halloran would produce to impersonate him.

  The bell was answered by a slatternly woman with an apron tied round her middle and her sleeves rolled up to the elbow. Her hands were wet with soapy water and she had to push the hair out of her eyes with the back side of her wrist.

  ‘The office is closed, monsieur.’

  ‘I arranged to meet a Mr. O’Halloran here at seven o’clock. Has he arrived yet?’

  ‘What name?’

  ‘O’Halloran,’ I said again, knowing full well that to French ears it must sound more Arabic than Irish.

  She shook her head and pursed her lips.

  ‘No one of that name here.’

  ‘This is the house of Monsieur Durant?’

  ‘Yes, this is Monsieur Durant’s house.’

  ‘Will you tell him that Mr. Temple is here? I think he is probably expecting me.’

  ‘Tem-pel. Well he has gone out a little time ago. Is it urgent?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It is very urgent indeed.’

  She shrugged her shoulders and sniffed resignedly.

  ‘I will try and find him for you. You can wait here.’

  She wiped her hands on a corner of her apron and opened the door of one of the ground floor rooms. She snapped on the light and left. I heard her close the front door and hurry down the steps. Durant’s office was a litter of papers, files and blueprints. Dust lay thick on the shelves and floor. All the ash-trays were full to overflowing. The single bulb hanging from the middle of the ceiling shed a defeatist light over this scene of disorder. I realized that I must be fully visible to anyone outside, so I sat down in one of the chairs and lit one of my own cigarettes. I hoped that it might do something to dispel the odour of stale Gauloise smoke.

  After ten minutes the conviction grew on me that I was being made a fool of and that O’Halloran had never had any intention of turning up. Here I was sitting inactive in a fly-blown office in Khérédine when at this very minute some message about Steve might be coming in to the hotel. I had been pretty sure at Zoltan Gupte’s shop that neither he nor O’Halloran knew about her abduction. Why then was I wasting time out here?

  I was about to pack the whole thing up when I heard footsteps in the street outside, and recognized the voice of the woman with the apron. She was with a man. They were squabbling violently.

  Durant burst into the room, brimming over with apologies. He had been called over to the Port Office, he had explained, and had lost count of the time. He was one of those Frenchmen on whom the North African climate has a bad effect. He had run to flesh and the muscles of his face had gone slack. His colour was unnaturally high and I suspected that he drank too much. He looked about sixty, though he may not have been more than forty-seven.

  ‘You were expecting me, then?’

  ‘Yes, I had a message from Monsieur Zoltan Gupte, I hope you will overlook my being late, monsieur. I would not like Monsieur Zoltan Gupte to think that I had not done my best. Now if you will come with me down to the landing-stage I will take you out to the yacht.’

  ‘The yacht? Is that where O’Halloran and Zoltan Gupte are?’

  Durant was shepherding me out of the house. He seemed in a great hurry to make up for lost time.

  ‘I do not know if Monsieur Zoltan Gupte is there, monsieur. I do not ask questions. I do as he tells me, that is all.’

  ‘How long will it take to row out to the yacht?’

  ‘Not long, monsieur. Maybe five minutes.’

  Now that I was here I might as well carry through to the end.

  I said: ‘Make it as quick as you can. I haven’t much time to spare.’

  I found it rather remarkable that this Frenchman should adopt such a servile attitude towards a mere antique dealer from the Arab quarter. He was hurrying me through a maz
e of sheds and piles of timber at such a pace that I had no chance to ask him any questions. Presently our feet resounded on a small wooden jetty to which a number of rowing-boats were attached. Durant selected one of the smaller ones and put out a hand to steady me as I stepped aboard.

  ‘This is not a work I usually do myself,’ he explained, as he pushed off. ‘But my employees have all gone home. Still, since it is for Monsieur Zoltan Gupte…’

  ‘He is a man of considerable influence?’ I observed.

  ‘Monsieur Zoltan Gupte? You did not know that he is one of the richest men in Tunis? Some say he is a millionaire.’

  ‘He has other irons in the fire besides his antique shop, then?’

  ‘I do not enquire about that, monsieur. I ask no questions. He pays me well and that is enough.’

  We were clear of the other boats now. After a glance over his shoulder Durant was heading at an oblique angle away from the shore. I could detect the dim outline of a large yacht moored some way out.

  ‘Do you know a Mr. David Foster?’

  ‘That is an English name, monsieur? No, I do not know of such a person.’

  ‘Have you taken anyone else out to the yacht this evening?’

  ‘No, monsieur. It is too early. Usually the gentlemen who visit the yacht come at ten, eleven – maybe midnight.’

  ‘But you do know Mr. O’Halloran – he is a friend of Zoltan Gupte. A small Irishman with a couple of teeth missing.’

  ‘Yes, I remember him, monsieur. Only four days ago I took him out to the yacht in this boat. Very sad. You saw about his death in the papers? These killings are becoming all too frequent in Tunis.’

  The shore line had slid back into the darkness behind us. The surface of the sea was inky black and as smooth as if oil had been poured on it. The lights from the port installations sent reflexions wriggling across the water towards us. As we moved further out I could see the lights of the Arab quarter climbing the hill away behind Khérédine. Further to the right the gaunt heights of Hammam Lif rose like black-draped phantoms against an only slightly less dark sky. Curiously magnified sounds drifted out from the shore, seeming to slide across the water to us as easily as stones across a curling rink – the blaring radio from the Hôtel du Port, the honk of a car moving along the water-front, a sudden human cry, and behind it all the vague bustling ant-heap rumble of a big city. Somewhere not far off I could hear the rushing swish of a bow wave as a motor-boat moved fast towards the land.