A Matter of Honour (22 page)

But the one thing that worried him most was
the conversation with Lawrence – the Lawrence of old?

The two policemen arrived at the Hotel
Monarque at twenty past seven that Thursday morning. They were tired,
discontented and hungry. Since midnight they had visited forty-three hotels on
the west side of the city, on each occasion with no success. They had checked
over a thousand registration cards and woken seven innocent Englishmen who had
not come anywhere near fitting the description of Adam Scott.

At eight they would be off duty and could go
home to their wives and breakfasts; but they still had three more hotels to
check before then. When the landlady saw them coming into the hall she waddled
as quickly as possible from the inner office towards them. She loathed the
police and was willing to believe anyone who told her that the Swiss pigs were
even worse than the Germans. Twice in the last year she had been fined and once
even threatened with jail over her failure to register every guest. If they
caught her once more she knew they would take her licence away and with it her
living. Her slow mind tried to recall who had booked in the previous evening.
Eight people had registered but only two had paid cash – the Englishman who
hardly opened his mouth, Mr Pemberton was the name he had filled in on the
missing card, and Maurice who always turned up with a different girl whenever
he was in Geneva. She had destroyed both their cards and pocketed the money.
Maurice and the girl had left by seven and she had already made up their bed,
but the Englishman was still asleep in his room.

“We need to check your registration cards
for last night, madame.”

“Certainly, monsieur,” she replied with a
warm smile, and gathered together the six remaining cards: two Frenchmen, one
Italian, two nationals from Zurich and one from Basle.

“Did an Englishman stay here last night?”

“No,” said the landlady firmly. “I haven’t
had an Englishman,” she added helpfully, “for at least a month. Would you like
to see the cards for last week?”

“No, that won’t be necessary,” said the
policeman. The landlady grunted with satisfaction. “But we will still need to
check your unoccupied rooms. I see from the certificate that there are twelve
guest bedrooms in the hotel,” the policeman continued. “So there must be six
that should be empty.”

“There’s no one in them,” said the landlady.
“I’ve already checked them once this morning.”

“We still need to see for ourselves,” the
other officer insisted.

The landlady picked up her pass key and
waddled towards the stairs, which she proceeded to climb as if they were the
final summit of Everest. She opened bedrooms five, seven, nine, ten, eleven.
Maurice’s room had been remade within minutes of his leaving but the old lady
knew she would lose her licence the moment they entered twelve. She just
stopped herself from knocking on the door before she turned the key in the
lock. The two policemen walked in ahead of her while she remained in the corridor,
just in case there was any trouble. Not for the first time that day she cursed
the efficiency of Swiss police.

“Thank you, madame,” said the first
policeman as he stepped back into the corridor. “We are sorry to have troubled
you,” he added. He put a tick on his list next to the Hotel Monarque.

As the two policemen made their way
downstairs the landlady walked into room number twelve, mystified. The bed was
undisturbed, as if it had not been slept in, and there was no sign of anyone
having spent the night there. She called on her tired memory. She hadn’t drunk
that much the previous night – she touched the fifty francs in her pocket as if
to prove the point. “I wonder where he is,” she muttered.

For the past hour Adam had been crouching
behind a derelict coach in a railway goods yard less than half a mile from the
hotel. He had a clear view for a hundred yards in every direction. He had
watched the early morning commuters flooding in on every train. By twenty past
eight Adam judged they were at their peak. He checked that the icon was in
place and left his hideout to join the flood as they headed to work. He stopped
at the kiosk to purchase a newspaper. The only English paper on sale at that
time in the morning was the
Herald-Tribune:
the London papers didn’t arrive until the first plane could land, but Adam
had seen the
Herald-Tribune
come in
on the train from Paris. He made two other purchases at the station kiosk
before rejoining the scurrying crowds: a city map of Geneva and a large bar of
Nestle’s chocolate.

There was still plenty of time to kill
before he could present himself at the Consulate. A glance at the map confirmed
that he could already see the building he had marked out as his next place of
sanctuary. He steered a route towards it that allowed him to stay in contact
with the largest number of people. When he arrived in the square he continued
under the shop awnings round the longest route, clinging to the wall, always
avoiding the open spaces. It took a considerable time but his judgment was
perfect. He reached the front door as hundreds of worshippers were leaving from
the early morning Communion service.

Once inside, he felt safe. Notre Dame was
the main Catholic Church in the city and Adam found his bearings in a matter of
moments. He made his way slowly down the side aisle towards the Lady Chapel,
dropped some coins in one of the collection boxes, lit a candle and placed it
in a vacant holder below a statue of the Virgin Mother. He then fell on his
knees, but his eyes never closed. A lapsed Catholic, he found he no longer
believed in God – except when he was ill, frightened or in an aeroplane. After
about twenty minutes, had passed Adam was distressed to see that there
was
now only a handful of people left in the cathedral. Some
old ladies dressed in black filled a front pew, moving their rosary beads
methodically and chanting,
“Ave Maria,
gratia plena, Domine teum, Benedicta...
” A few tourists were craning their
necks to admire the fine roof, their eyes only looking upwards.

Adam
rose
slowly,
his eyes darting from side to side. He stretched his legs and walked over to a
confessional box partly hidden behind a pillar. A small sign on the wooden
support showed that the box was not in use. Adam slipped in, sat down and
pulled the curtain closed.

First he took out the
Herald-Tribune
from his trench-coat pocket, and then the bar of
chocolate. He tore the silver paper from the chocolate and began to munch
greedily. Next he searched for the story. Only one or two items of English news
were on the front page, as most of the articles were devoted to what was
happening in America. “The pound still too high at $2.80?” one headline
suggested. Adam’s eyes passed over the smaller headlines until he saw the
paragraph he was looking for. It was in the bottom left-hand corner: “Englishman
sought after German girl and Swiss taxi-driver murdered.” Adam read the story,
and only began to tremble when he discovered they knew his name:

“Captain Adam Scott, who recently resigned
his commission from the Royal Wessex Regiment, is wanted... please turn to page
fifteen.” Adam began to turn the large pages. It was not easy in the restricted
space of a confessional box. “. . .
for
questioning by
the Geneva police in connection with...”

“
Au
nom du Père, du Fils
et
du Saint Esprit
.”

Adam looked up from the paper startled and
considered making a dash for it. But he allowed his long-ago training to take
hold as he found himself saying automatically, “Father, bless me, for I have
sinned and wish to confess.”

“Good, my son, and what form has this sin
taken?” asked the priest in accented but clear English.

Adam thought quickly, I must give him no
clue as to who I am. He looked out through the gap in the curtain and was
alarmed to see two policemen questioning another priest by the west door. He
drew the curtains tight and turned to the only accent he could ever imitate
with any conviction.

“I’m over from Dublin, Father, and last
night I picked up this local girl in a bar and took her back to my hotel.”

“Yes, my son.”

“Well, one thing led to another, Father.”

“Another what, my son?”

“Well, I took her up to my room.”

“Yes, my son?”

“And she started to undress.”

“And then what happened?”

“She started to undress me.”

“Did you try to resist, my son?”

“Yes, Father, but it got harder.”

“And did intercourse take place?” asked the
priest.

“I’m afraid so, Father. I couldn’t stop
myself. She was very beautiful,” Adam added.

“And is it your intention to marry this
girl, my son?”

“Oh, no, Father, I’m already married and
have two lovely children, Seamus and Maureen.”

“It is a night you must for ever put behind
you.”

“I’d like to, Father.”

“Has this happened before?”

“No, Father, it’s the first time I’ve been
abroad on my own. I swear to it.”

“Then let it be a lesson to you, my son, and
may the Lord find it in his mercy to forgive you this abominable sin and now
you must make your act of contrition.”

“Oh my God...”

When Adam had completed the act of
contrition the priest pronounced absolution and told him he must as penance say
three decades of the Rosary.

“And one more thing.”

“Yes, Father?”

“You will tell your wife everything the
moment you return to Ireland or you cannot hope for atonement. You must promise
me that, my son.”

“When I see my wife, I will tell her
everything that happened last night, Father,” Adam promised, as he once again checked
through the curtains. The police were no longer anywhere to be seen.

“Good, and continue to pray to our Blessed
Lady to keep you from the evils of temptation.”

Adam folded up his paper, pushed it in the
trench-coat and bolted from the little box and took a seat on the end of a pew.
He lowered his head and began to whisper the Lord’s Prayer as he opened the map
of Geneva and began to study the road plan. He had located the British
Consulate on the far side of a large garden square by the time he reached ‘Deliver
us from evil.’ He estimated that it was just over a mile away from the
cathedral, but seven streets and a bridge had to be negotiated before he would
be safe. He returned to the Lady Chapel and his knees. Adam checked his watch.
It was too early to leave St Peter’s so he remained head in hands for another
thirty minutes, going over the route again and again. He watched a party of
tourists as they were conducted through the cathedral. His eyes never left them
as they began to move nearer and nearer to the great door at the west end of
the aisle. He needed to time it to perfection.

Suddenly Adam rose and walked quickly down
the side aisle reaching the porch only a yard behind the party of tourists.
They shielded him out on to the square. Adam ducked under a shop awning at the
side of the road,
then
walked round three sides of the
square to avoid the one policeman on duty by the north corner. He crossed the
first road as the light turned red and headed up a one-way street. He kept on
the inside of the pavement, knowing he had to turn left at the end of the road.
Two uniformed policemen came round the corner and walked straight towards him.
He jumped into the first shop without looking and turned his back on the
pavement.

“Bonjour,
monsieur,”
said a young
lady to Adam.
“Vous desirez quelque
chose?”
Adam looked around him. Lissome mannequins in knickers and bras
with suspenders and long black nylon stockings stood all around him.

“I’m looking for a present for my wife.”

The girl smiled. “Perhaps a slip?” she
suggested.

“Yes,” said Adam, “definitely a slip. Do you
have one in burgundy?” he asked, as he half turned to watch the policemen
stroll past.

“Yes, I think so, but I’ll have to check in
the stockroom.”

Adam had reached the next street corner long
before she had returned with ‘just the thing’.

He managed the next few minutes walk without
incident and with only two hundred yards to go could already feel his heart
thumping as if it was trying to escape from his body. On the final corner there
was only one policeman in sight, and he seemed intent on directing traffic.
Adam kept his back to the officer as he could now see the garden square that
had only shown up on the map as a tiny green blob. On the far side of the road
he spotted a Union Jack hanging above a blue door.

Never run the last few yards, especially
when it’s open ground, his sergeant had told him many times when on patrol in
the Malayan jungle. He crossed the road and stood on the edge of the small
park, only fifty yards away from safety. A policeman was patrolling aimlessly
up the road but Adam suspected that was only because there were several
consulates standing adjacent to one another. He watched the officer carefully.
It took the man two minutes to reach the end before he turned and continued his
leisurely walk back. Adam ducked behind a tree in the corner of the little park
and selected another tree on the far side of the road only yards from the
Consulate front door that would shield him from the oncoming policeman. He
estimated that by walking at a speed that wouldn’t attract attention he could
cover the last thirty yards in
under
ten seconds. He
waited for the policeman to reach his farthest point.