Suite 101 was the usual modest lay-out you get for fifty guineas a day: a little lobby, a sitting-room, and off either side of the sitting-room a bedroom, each with its bathroom. I started with Mrs Vadarci’s bedroom. She was clearly one of the untidiest women that ever lived. Her stuff was all over the place. I went through everything. She had a wardrobe that would have fitted out half the female cast of My Fair Lady, and enough jewellery to make a fair display in Cartier’s window. I was tempted to take the lot and go into retirement there and then. There were times later when I wished I had. The only thing that made me at all curious – there were no personal papers of any kind to do it – was a long soft leather container. It was at the bottom of a white pigskin case that was half filled with a ghastly collection of archaic underwear that should have been in the V. and A. Inside this long container was a whip. It had a gold grip decorated top and bottom with three ivory bands. The stock or body of the whip was, I guessed, of nicely tempered steel and it was covered with red morocco leather with a small Greek key pattern spiralling round it in gold. There was one thong at the end about four feet long. It was no toy and it made the air wince as I took a couple of practice swings with it.
The sitting-room did not produce anything. There were a few magazines and papers. On a sideboard were drinks, an enormous box of chocolates with liqueur centres, genuine, I found, when I chose a Cointreau. I helped myself to a whisky and soda and smoked half the cigarette and then dropped the rest into a tray. It was not as bad as I had expected.
Katerina’s bedroom was neat, everything in its place. She did not have a lot in the way of clothes, but what she had she treated with care ... folded and pressed, shoes on trees. There was a short nightdress laid out on the bed. It was silk and as light and frothy as meringue, and pale green. In a travelling writing-case on a table was her passport – West German Federal Government. Her name was genuine – Katerina Helga Saxmann. Flipping through it to the visa section I found the big tablet stamp of a Yugoslav visa. It had been issued the previous day at the Paris Embassy. Vazi tri meseca od dana izdavanja – valid for three months from the date of issue. With it were two Air France tickets to Dubrovnik, via Zagreb, for the next day, and a printed slip from the Yugoslav Travel and Tourist Agency, Atlas, confirming reservations for two at the Hotel Argentina, Dubrovnik. I dropped the case and contents on the floor and did not bother to pick them up.
Five minutes later I turned out of the Avenue George V into the Champs-Élysées, found a café, bought a paper, and saw that one of my horses had come up at a good price at Longchamp, and then I telephoned Vérité Latour-Mesmin, and asked her if she would have dinner with me. She said she was just washing her hair, and was going to have supper in her flat and would be happy to have me join her.
As I came out of the café and started to look for a taxi Casalis came up to me and asked for a light. He was wearing blue overalls and a false moustache.
I said, “For Christ’s sake – why the pantomime outfit? Even Howard Johnson could see through it.”
“Another job later. Breaking it in. Like it?”
“All you need is a pair of sabots.”
I held a lighter to his cigarette, and he said, after a puff, “Thank you, Mother Jambo. I’ve a message for you – left at the Hotel Florida. Also, I gather, you may have something for me.”
He was strolling at my side and he might have been with me and he mightn’t. I gave him a quick run down on the results of my visit to the suite, including the whip, and he slipped an envelope into my hand and melted faster than any genie.
In the cab I opened the envelope. It was from Katerina, and as I read it I wondered why I’d been working my fingers to the bone in the last hour.
It read—
Sorry, darling. Can’t make Solferino. Big boring Embassy dinner date. Flying Dubrovnik tomorrow. Is there a bridge there? Love. K
Why was she so certain that I would follow her wherever she went? She was, and she was prepared to give leads which other people paid me to work for? Curious.
So far as I knew, it was the first time I’d had dinner with a woman who had shot her husband. It made me take a fresh look at Vérité. She still came out all right in my book. Her face was a beautiful piece of work, with a bone structure which, no matter from what angle the light came, created an arresting combination of shadows and light planes. Her deep brown eyes had long lashes, and the thin dark eyebrows were so perfect that they made you want to put out your finger and smudge them even though you knew they were real. Not once while
