Triple (10 page)

Ken Folleff

"What about details of transportation?"

"All have to be approved by us."

Dickstein closed his notebook. "It sounds like a good system. Can I see it

in operation?"

"Mat wouldn't be up to us. You'd have to contact the atomic energy

authority in the member country and ask permission to visit an

installation. Some of them do guided tours."

"Can you let me have a list of phone numbers?"

"Certainly." Pfaffer stood up and opened a filing cabinet

Dickstein had solved one problem only to be confronted with another. He had

wanted to know where he could go to find out the location of stockpiles of,

radioactive material, and he now had the answer: Euratom's computer. But an

the uranium the computer knew about was subject to the rigorous monitoring

system, and therefore extremely difficult to steal. Sitting in the untidy

little office, watching the smug Herr Pfaffer rummage through his old press

releases, Dickstein thought: If only you knew whats in my- mind, little

bureaucrat, yoxfd have a blue fit; and he suppressed a grin and felt a

little more cheerful.

Pfaffer handed him a cyclostyled leaflet. Dickstein folded it and put it in

his pocket. He said, "Thank you for your help."

Pfaffer said, "Where are you staying?"

'The Alfa, opposite the raflway station."

Pfaffer saw him to the door. "Enjoy Luxembourg."

"I'll do my best," Dickstein said, and shook his hand.

Tle memory thing was a trick. Dickstein had picked it up as a small child,

sitting with his grandfather in a smelly room over a pie shop in the Mile

End Road, struggling to recognize the strange characters of the Hebrew

alphabet. The idea was to isolate one unique feature of the shape to be

remembered and ignore everything else. Dickstein had done that with the

faces of the Euratom staff.

He waited outside the Jean-Monnet building in the late afternoon, watching

people leave for home. Some of them interested him more than others.

Secretaries, messengers and coffee-makers were no use to him, nor were

senior administrators. He wanted the people in between: computer pro-

grammers, office managers, heads of small departments, personal assistants

and assistant chiefs. He had given names

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TRIPLE .

to the likeliest ones, names which reminded him of their memorable

feature: Diamante, Stiffcollar, Tony Curtis, Nonose, Snowhead, Zapata,

Fatbum.

Diamante was a plump woman in her late thirties without a wedding ring.

Her name came from the crystal glitter on the rims of her spectacles.

Dickstein followed her to the car park, where she squeezed herself into

the driving seat of a white Fiat 500. Dickstein!s rented Peugeot was

parked nearby.

She crossed the Pont-Adolphe, driving badly but slowly, and went about

fifteen kilometers southeast, finishing. up at a small village called

Mondorf-les-Bains. She parked in the cobbled yard of a square

Luxembourgeois house with a nailstudded door. She let herself in with a

key.

The village was a tourist attraction, with thermal springs. Dickstein

slung a camera around his neck and wandered about, passing Diamante's

house several times. On one pass he saw, through a window, Diamante

serving a meal to an old woman.

The baby Fiat stayed outside the house until after midnight, when

Dickstein left.

She had been a poor choice. She was a spinster living with ter elderly

mother, neither -rich nor poor-the house was probably the mothees--and

apparently without vices. If Dickstein had been a different kind of man

he might have seduced her, but otherwise there was no way to get at her.

He went back to his hotel disappointed and frustrated-unreasonably so,

for he had made the best guess he could on the Information he bad.

Nevertheless he felt he had spent a day skirting the problem and he was

impatient to get to grips with it so he could stop worrying vaguely and

start worrying specifically.

He spent three more davs getting nowhere. He drew blanks with Zapata,

Fatburn and Tony Curtis.

But Stiffcollar was perfect.

He was about Dickstein's age, a slim, elegant man in a dark blue suit,

plain blue tie, and white shirt with starched collar. His dark hair, a

little longer than was usual for a man of his age, was graying over the

ears. He wore handmade shoes.

He walked from the office across the Alzette River and uphill into the

old town. He went down a narrow cobbled

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Ken Folleff

street and entered an old terraced house. Two minutes later a light went on

in an attic window.

Dickstein hung around for two hours.

-When Stiffcollar came out he was wearing close-fitting light trousers and

an orange scarf around his neck. His hair was combed forward, making him

look younger, and his walk was jaunty.

Dickstein followed him to the Rue Dicks, where he ducked into an unlit

doorway and disappeared. Dickstein stopped outside. The door was open but

there was nothing to indicate what might be inside. A bare flight of stairs

went down. After a moment, Dickstein heard faint music.

Two young men in matching yellow jeans passed him and went in. One of them

grinned back at him and said, 'Tes, this is the place." Dickstein followed

them down the stairs.

It was an ordinary-looking nightclub with tables and chairs, a few booths,

a small dance floor and a jazz trio in a comer. Dickstein paid an entrance

fee and sat at a booth, within sight of Stiffcollar. He ordered beer.

He had already guessed why the place had such a discreet air, and now, as

he looked around, his theory was confirtned: it was a homosexual club. It

was the first club of this kind he had been to, and he was mildly surprised

to find it so unexceptionable. A few of the men wore light make-up, there

were a couple of outrageous queens camping it up by the bar, and a very

pretty girl was holding hands with an older woman in trousers; but most of

the customers were dressed normally by the standards of peacock Europe, and

there was no one in drag.

Stiffbollar was sitting close to a fair-haired man in a maroon

double-breasted jacket. Dickstein had no feelings about homosexuals as

such. He was not offended when people supposed, wrongly, that he might be

homosexual because he was a bachelor in his early forties. To him,

StiffcolJar was just a man who worked at Euratom. and had a guilty secret.

He listened to the music and drank his beer. A waiter came across and said,

"Are you on your own, dear?"

Dickstein shook his head. "I'm waiting for my friend."

A guitarist replaced the trio and began to sing vulgar folk songs in

German. Dickstein missed most of the jokes, but the

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rest of the audience roared with laughter. After that several couples

danced.

Dickstein saw Stiffcollar put his hand on his companion7s knee. He got up

and walked across to their booth.

"Hello," he said cheerfully, "didn't I see you at the Eurar tom office

the other dayr,

Stiffcollar went white. "I don't know . .

Dickstein stuck out his hand. "F-d Rodgers," he said, giving the name he

had used with Pfaffer. "I'm a journalist"

Stiffcollar muttered, "How do you do." He was shaken, but he had the

presence of mind not to give his name.

"I've got to rush away," Dickstein said. "It was nice to see

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"Goodbye, then."

Dickstein turned away and went out of the club. He had done all that was

necessary, for now: Stiffcollar knew that his secret was out, and he was

frightened.

Dickstein walked toward his hotel, feeling grubby and ashamed.

He was followed from the Rue Dicks.

The tail was not a professional, and made no attempt at camouflage. He

stayed fifteen or twenty steps behind, his leather shoes making a regular

slap-slap on the pavement Dickstein pretended not to notice. Crossing the

road, he got a look at the tail: a large youth, long hair, worn brown

leather jacket.

Momentg later another youth stepped out of the shadows and stood squarely

in front of Dickstein, blocking the pavement. Dickstein stood still and

waited, thinking: What the hell is this? He could not imagine who could be

tailing him already, nor why anyone who wanted him tailed would use clumsy

amateurs from off the streets.

The blade of a knife glinted in the street light The tail came up behind.

The youth in front said, "All right, nancy-boy, give us your wallet."

Dickstein was deeply relieved. They were just thieves who assumed that

anyone coming out of that nightclub would be easy game-

"Don't hit me," Dickstein said. -ru give you my money." He took out his

wallet.

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Kon Fat"

'Ile wallet," the youth said.

Dickstein did not want to fight them; but, while he could get more cash

easily, he would be greatly inconvenienced if he lost all his papers and

credit cards. He removed the notes from the wallet and offered them. "I

need my papers. Just take the money, and I won't report this."

The boy in front snatched the notes.

The one behind said, "Get the credit cards."

The one in front was the weaker. Dickstein looked .squarely at him and

said, "Why don't you quit while you're ahead, sonny?" Then he walked

forward, passing the youth on the outside of the pavement.

Leather shoes beat a brief tattoo as the other rushed Dickstein, and then

there was only one way for the encounter to end.

Dickstein spun about, grabbed the boy's foot as he aimed a kick, pulled

and twisted, and broke the boy's ankle. The kid shouted with pain and

fell down.

The one with the knife came at Dickstein then. He danced back, kicked the

boy's shin, danced back, and kicked again. The boy lunged with the knife.

Dickstein dodged and kicked him a third time in exactly the same place.

There was a noise like a bone snapping, and the boy fell down.

Dickstein stood for a moment looking at the two injured muggers. He felt

like a parent whose children had pushed him until he was obliged to

strike them. He thought: Why did you make me do it? They were children:

about seventeen, he guessed. They were vicious-they preyed on

homosexuals; but that was exactly what Dickstein had been doing this

night.

He walked away. It was an evening to forget. He decided to leave town in

the morning.

When Dickstein was working he stayed in his hotel room as much as

possible to avoid being seen. He might have been a heavy drinker, except

it was unwise to drink during an operation-alcohol blunted the sharp edge

of his vigilance-and at other times he felt no need of it. He spent a lot

of time looking out of windows or sitting in front of a flickering tele-

vision screen. He did not walk around the streets, did not sit in hotel

bars, did not even eat in hotel restaurants-he always used room service.

But there were limits to the precautions a

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