The Human Pool (29 page)

ZURICH

TODAY'S FIRST PRIZE,
an air ticket to London, courtesy of our sponsor Dominic Carswell. Carswell at his most sincere called my mobile, offering to pay my way home.

Hoover was out somewhere with Beate. Carswell told me to look out the window and check the blue Mercedes down the hill. He got out to show he was alone. He looked untouched and above it all. A man on a Saturday afternoon, like the days of the week still meant something to him.

What the hell, I thought. I went down. Carswell looked a touch rueful. It was imperative I left Zurich, he said. Things were getting too dangerous. I thanked him, sarcastically, for his concern.

He took the line that everything I had heard about him was lies. He was involved in work he had been unable to talk about and had been for a long time. Infiltration, for the government, monitoring the Turkish conflict with the Kurds as it moved to London, bringing with it a drugs war. The Kurds had no diplomatic voice, he said. They had to resort to terrorism to broadcast their message and illegal enterprise to finance operations. The Turks were just as ruthless at counterinsurgency and were using Neo-Nazis to police Kurdish escape lines.

Carswell was good. There should have been TV cameras there. It was what he had done for years, offering a plausible précis. Carswell the spook, Carswell the undercover man. He pointed out that his role was the same as mine, an investigative one. Carswell knew it backwards. He seemed completely relaxed.

‘Who burned down the flat?' I asked.

We looked at each other. Carswell pursed his lips, deciding. ‘His name is Makal. He is a major in Turkish counterintelligence.'

‘I saw him in Frankfurt, too, and an associate of his nearly shot me.'

Carswell ironic: ‘You have been drawing attention to yourself.'

‘Why did you have me target Strasse? Did you fix to have him killed?'

‘I didn't arrange anything. He got on the wrong side of somebody. He probably didn't even know who.'

‘Now you're going to tell me you have no idea what you were doing in my hotel room.'

‘Proving my credentials. Friend Siegfried was convinced you were an agent.'

I looked at him for signs of guile. I was tired enough to want to believe him.

Carswell mopped up. Hoover was an old spook who should be in a retirement home, a rogue element. ‘Tell him to go home, too,' he advised, ‘before he gets hurt.'

Carswell the fixer gave me the name of a man to talk to about the absence of personal insurance for possessions lost in the fire. A policy would be created and backdated. I would receive £35,000 in compensation. I stared at my shoes. If that was the cost of a buy-out, it was better than Major Makal's alternative. I wondered at the ease with which Carswell and his like could fuck around with bureaucracy and conjure sums of money out of nowhere. I had the impression he was sorry for me. I felt pretty stupid and washed up. I asked that dumb question, ‘Why me?'

Carswell knew when to parry and when to thrust. When he hit, he hit true. Because I had a verifiable history. Because I had no background, by which he meant I was a virgin in his world. And because Dora had wanted me out of the way. Dora said I was too intense.

‘Same old story,' said Carswell, very flip and man-to-man. I had a flash of Hoover hitting me for insulting Beate. Carswell was the fuck everybody had in common. I was past anger.

I asked if he knew where Dora was. Not exactly, he said. I then asked if he had known about the parties. Not exactly, he repeated. What
did
he know? I asked, sarcasm rekindled. That Dora had been going through some kind of crisis, he said, which she wouldn't talk about, except to say she wanted to go away and sort out her head. What kind of crisis? Carswell thought it wasn't the usual kind to do with money, or work, or a man. Spiritual crisis was the only other kind that came to mind. Carswell nodded a maybe. ‘Your father.'

I had no answer to that. ‘Give me the ticket,' I said.

Carswell, handing it over: ‘Think of it as a way out of an impossible situation.' No handshake, just a half-nod of apology, and he was gone.

ZURICH

VAUGHAN CALLED ABE'S AND
said he wanted to come and say goodbye, but for me not to tell the others. I was still in shock because of Beate's unexpected lifeline.
Consummation
was not a word I had expected to apply again. I felt abashed and obscurely privileged while apprehensive at the thought of betraying Mary's memory. Fidelity to the dead is far harder to break with than the routine physical kind.

Vaughan arrived and said he wanted to talk. I suggested a café. Then they all wanted to come. Ballard was hanging around, too, and insisted on tagging along.

Vaughan drank three straight espressos. Abe said, ‘Herr Viessmann's website is a tad disappointing.' It had been. A couple of photographs showed grinning children, neatly dressed, and the equivalent to a parish newsletter related the steps being taken to care for the children and to reunite them with their parents. Of Viessmann there had been no sign in photographs or text, only ingratiating notes on new volunteer arrivals, most of whom were travellers who had heard about the place and ended up staying to help.

Vaughan and I loitered on the way back long enough for him to tell me he had heard from Dora and wanted to go home.

Bob Ballard walked in front of us, head cocked. We ran into a big crowd of people going the other way. Ballard called out, ‘It's the festival.' Sol said that there was a big community get-together downtown that evening. ‘See the Swiss enjoying themselves.' To which Abe added, ‘If that's not a contradiction in terms.' And Manny had capped that with: ‘The Swiss are the one nation it is still possible to make racist jokes about.'

Vaughan wanted to leave before the Krebs meeting. I told him he was needed, otherwise Krebs would walk. Ballard slowed down, trying to eavesdrop. Vaughan said, ‘Fuck off, we're having a private conversation here.'

‘No such thing,' said Ballard amiably.

I told Vaughan I was leaving, too, but after the meeting with Krebs, because I owed it to Sol. ‘Do the meeting,' I said, ‘and we'll drive you to the airport.'

He gave me a crafty look. ‘You and Beate? Okay. To the airport.'

So long, Willi,
I thought.
We don't need to meet again. We're renouncing the quest, and by the sound of it you have turned into a sanctified old bore, all atoned for.
Who knows what would happen with Beate. We would probably have a bust-up before the border. But trying to release her from her past struck me as more worthwhile than hunting down an old nemesis. Willi getting out of the river was nothing to do with me.

ZURICH

I HAVE OFTEN BEEN
told I work too hard and take insufficient holidays. I lied slightly as I made the necessary telephone calls to set up my sabbatical, saying I had been ordered to rest by my doctor. I was disappointed to be treated with only polite concern that probably masked indifference. A professional lifetime of what? Duty, service, and reputation, none of which would last a week of my being gone. Such diligence for nothing.

The apartment strikes me as sterile, with its careful selection and its unchanging good taste. Not many pass through its doors, certainly not into my bedroom. Adam slept in the spare room on the few occasions he was here. It was an unspoken arrangement neither of us questioned. He would plead jet lag and insomnia, I nocturnal restlessness.

The afternoon had resulted in a brief elation, the giddy joy of a disobedience too rarely indulged. We had kissed like teenagers in my car, in full sight of passersby. He kissed well, not that I can claim to be a judge of such things. He kissed like he was enjoying it, and I hope I didn't betray my nervousness, thinking how much more this was Mother's territory. He said, ‘I never expected to do that again.'

After we parted, after arranging for him to collect me around nine-thirty, deflation set in. With him I can cope. Alone I am not sure. The past dominates my life. Everything has been conditioned by it. A future seems frighteningly alien.

Our plan is to drive through the night until Italy. No stopover, no embarrassment of a hotel check-in. Hoover seems to understand my qualms.

My last night in Switzerland feels anything but real. The town is rowdy from the street festival. Stalls have been set up below my window, and thousands mill around buying beer and wurst. Annoying loud music from different sources competes with the start of fireworks which will later turn into a huge display, with synchronised music. A celebration of my departure.

I have packed including silk lingerie pieces never worn before. I have tried, and failed, to introduce a feeling of anticipation into my preparations, wondering under what circumstances I will next take off my clothes. All I experienced was a vague anxiety at the prospect of driving in the dark. Then Hoover called to say we would be going via the airport on our way, to drop off Vaughan. So much for a romantic escape, I thought, hiding my disappointment. ‘I'll make it up to you,' he said. ‘It wasn't in my plans, either.'

I play Patience, as I often do when I have a problem, except this time nothing is wrong, I tell myself, so it doesn't matter whether the cards come out.

The festival is on the television, with a camera crew in my street. Everyone tries too hard for a good time. The television commentators are young and too enthusiastic, with a point to prove that fun is being had. The commentator below my window is a foolish young woman in a yellow coat who says in a sing-song voice, ‘Not everyone is on the street yet, but we're expecting plenty before the night is over.' The broadcast is live but with a short delay, because I can see myself on television still standing at my window after I have moved away.

A burst of Chinese crackers echoes on the set. I get up to turn the sound down, just as something happens to make the young woman commentator stare in panic, her horrible enthusiasm quite gone. Her hand is pressed against the side of her head as she tries to decipher what someone is saying into her earpiece. Her face isn't coping, and her mouth is dragging down. I think, meanly, it is like watching the opposite of someone winning a prize.

A bass drum thumps like a migraine. Through the window I watch the crowd barging around, many of them aggressive and drunk already. People behind the commentator make inane faces at the camera as they have done all evening. I want to run downstairs to hear directly what she has to say, rather than watch her make a fool of herself on television. But I don't, and I leave the sound down.

The crowd remains oblivious to anything being wrong. The commentator's bright coat looks inadequate for whatever is happening. Some of the crowd are drunk enough to start laughing at her distress, which makes her cry. Sirens bleed into the drumming, but people ignore them or can't hear.
Why am I so calm?
I wonder. Because I have known all along it is too good to be true. (Silk lingerie I have never worn, tempting fate by packing it. It crossed my mind at the time, and now fate is answering back.)

A controlled-looking man comes on the television. He is in a studio and wears a sober suit. Along the bottom of the screen appears a running text of a news flash
—SHOOTING AT DOWNTOWN ZURICH HOTEL—NO DETAILS YET—CHAOS ON FESTIVAL STREETS—IMPOSSIBLE FOR EMERGENCY SERVICES AND FILM CREWS TO GET THROUGH.
I turn up the sound just as the man says, ‘There are fatalities, but we don't know how many.'

I switch him off and sit down to wait for Hoover, telling myself he will come. I have a glass of wine and then another, as it doesn't matter because we will be leaving in the morning now. I return to my game of Patience. The cards come out.

ZURICH

WE HAD BEEN IN
the lobby, hanging around like bad actors, waiting for Krebs. All I could think about was whether Dora had ditched me quite as ruthlessly as Carswell said.

Manny wore a smart cashmere coat, though the weather didn't demand it. Sol was in the suit he had worn to the lawyer in Bern. Among the casually dressed crowd, they looked like old hit men on the way to a mafia funeral. Abe wore something tentlike and black, with his hat. Sol had performed the opposite of his usual role, berating anyone he saw dropping litter. An old hippie in a rainbow T-shirt had said, ‘Hey, man, it's a party,' to which Hoover replied, ‘Fuck off, son.'

Sol had been upset when Hoover told him he wouldn't be staying on. My loss he could cope with, but Hoover's news had cast a damper. Even getting rid of Bob Ballard hadn't been as enjoyable as it should have been. Ballard had been promised a Carswell meeting outside Frau Schmidt's.

The hotel was super-smart in an executive magazine way, and hushed after the street. Abe was at the desk checking about the room. Sol was unwrapping a cheap cigar and dropping the cellophane. Manny had sat down and was watching proceedings with humourous detachment as he reached for another cigarette. Hoover was inspecting a big luggage trolley used for guests' cases, which was standing in the hall. The staff were wearing party hats. There was a casual, off-duty air. Bunches of people hung around, including some people in evening clothes discussing taxis.

I was thinking about Dora and Viessmann's shitty little website. Had it been her in one of the pictures, half turned away? Could she have ended up there? It wasn't impossible, given the connections.

Abe and Sol were walking over to me when several men came through the door, moving faster than everyone else. Suddenly the place was full of smoke and noise. I was thinking it was fireworks, and the festival had moved indoors. Sol seemed to trip and fall over, and a woman on the other side of the lobby collapsed. For a crazy second none of it made sense. I registered only incoherent details until I saw guns pointing at me out of the smoke and felt myself being jerked backwards as though my body was anticipating the hail of bullets. It was Hoover yanking me behind the baggage trolley. He pushed me in the direction of a corridor off the back of the lobby, and we ran down it, away from the gunfire. A man rushed past going the other way. He was carrying a machine-pistol but paid us no attention. He looked like one of Maurice's henchmen. The adrenalin flood made me lightheaded.

We got out of the back of the building. Hoover said to keep walking and not look back. We moved away from the lakeside, down empty side streets, before rejoining the crowd. The mood was more drunken and abandoned than before. People were starting to spew. Hoover and I were breathing hard. Fireworks crackled in the sky like an echo of the gun battle. Hoover said, ‘I always hated fireworks.' He looked old and panicked. He had seen nothing of what had happened.

Me, neither, apart from Maurice's man. I wasn't sure if Sol had been hit or diving for cover.

We used a pay phone to try Ballard's mobile. He sounded pissed off. No show from Carswell. Hoover said to meet us at Abe's and it was urgent.

It took forty minutes to push through the crowds to Abe's. There was no such thing as a taxi, and we wasted time waiting for a tram that never came. Hoover looked angry enough to have a heart attack, and kept repeating that he had walked us right into it. We had been set up. He said, ‘I was suckered by the mother. Why should her daughter be any different?'

Abe's key was in its place above the lintel. Upstairs everything was normal. Abe's computer was still on. There was no sign of Ballard. Hoover tried Beate. They spoke for a long time, sounding as if they were on the brink of quarrelling.

I kept expecting to see Abe and Sol and Manny coming in the door. The TV wasn't saying much. TV was normal, I thought. It normalised everything, even tragedy. It became someone else's story, even if you had been there.

I decided to take a piss. That was normal, I told myself. The bathroom was down a corridor lit with a red bulb. It gave the passage a darkroom feel. I noted every simple action, like switching on the light, to remind myself that everything was deeply unreal for the moment. I opened the bathroom door. The handle was slippery in my hand, which gave me a moment of warning but not enough.

Bob Ballard was sprawled in the tub, taking a bath in his own blood. His grey suit had gone red. The blood not in the bath had apparently been hosed over the tiles. Ballard had been cut up all over the place. His clothes were slashed to shreds. His face was criss-crossed as if someone had etched it with a razor blade.

Time must have passed (maybe I screamed) because Hoover was next to me saying, ‘What the fuck did this?' That seemed about right. The attack appeared inhuman. It looked as if it had been done by a wild animal in a frenzy. The room stank of effluent and body parts. It was impossible to reconcile the mass of violated flesh with the man it had once been.

Ballard was wearing his glasses. They were smeared and spattered with blood and hid his eyes. Hoover said we had to check if Ballard still had his phone because there would be a record of calls. We frisked him with averted eyes, hands turning sticky with blood.

Hoover talked as we looked, trying to sound calm: ‘Listen, nephew, this is what we're going to do. We are going to help ourselves to as many of Manny's bills as we can carry, then we're going to walk out of here.'

The phone was in the last place we looked, tucked in Ballard's top breast pocket. I felt giddy and faint with nausea.

Ballard had several unanswered calls logged from the same number, which turned out to be the Hotel Astoria in Budapest. Hoover asked the desk to put him through to Mr van der Valden. Someone picked up. Hoover said he was Bob Ballard, returning Mr van der Valden's calls.

Afterwards Hoover looked thoughtful and eventually said, ‘Mr van der Valden is expecting Mr Ballard. Well, nephew, how do you feel about a trip to Budapest?'