The Assignment (27 page)

He clasped his hands behind his back and swayed backward and forward on his heels and toes. Then he said: “We can look on this meeting as a pure formality and as an official contact in connection with the coming negotiations. The conference is to be led by you, sir, as Resident, while you, Colonel Orbal, will be the chairman of the Citizens’ Guard delegation. To introduce more detailed considerations at this time would be inopportune.”

Colonel Orbal nodded absent-mindedly and returned to his place by the window. Without turning around he said: “How many people have been killed here in the last two years?”

“About five thousand.”

“And all this comes from the same evil seed, from the same little clique of incorrigible fanatics. We must smash them. We must smash the rats.”

“Yes,” said Behounek. “We’re going to smash them.”

Colonel Orbal turned with a jerk and stared at Manuel Ortega.

“I was just standing there and thinking about a strange little detail,” he said. “If you were dead, then my son would be alive. I was standing there wishing you were dead. So far as I know, I have never before wished for the death of anyone, apart from enemies of my country in my capacity as a soldier.”

He shrugged his shoulders.

“Well,” he said, “truth is strange. Life for a life. Now I’ll go back home. My wife is suffering terribly from the grief which has overtaken us. You can contact me there then. Good morning, sirs.”

Manuel Ortega thought: Colonel Orbal. Leader of the
extreme right wing. Organizer of terror. The protector of the blasting details. A gray old man who wept.

“Oh well,” said Behounek, “that went off more painlessly than I had dared hope.”

Manuel looked at him. The veil was still there, making everything incomprehensible and unattainable. Behounek took out a cigar, bit off the end, and said: “I’m going on a trip around town now. D’you want to come too?”

Manuel shook his head.

“No. I’d rather stay here.”

“You can feel quite safe with me. At least, as safe as I feel myself. I’m going to see Dalgren.”

“Dalgren has as little interest in meeting me as I have in meeting him.”

“You’re wrong. His attitude had changed radically. When he saw the stand that the Ministry of the Interior has taken, he, like the rest of the inner circle, realized that publishing Larrinaga’s idiotic proclamation was a trick to win the confidence of the Communists and to persuade them to agree to the conference.”

“But it’s not like that,” said Manuel. “I’ve never thought of it in that way at all.”

“I know that,” said Behounek drily. “But so far I’m about the only one who does.”

He went to the door and put on his cap.

“You won’t come?”

“No.”

“You daren’t?”

“No.”

“I understand.”

He stopped, as if he had just thought of something else, and said: “But I know what you can do instead. Go up to the hospital and see your little friend with the beautiful feet.”

Manuel shook his head.

“Silly,” said Behounek: “You’ll have three policemen and a
covered jeep with you. It’s four minutes away and the town is virtually empty. I’ll go and order a car. It’ll be outside in five minutes.”

He left.

As the white jeep passed the sentries, Manuel Ortega was seized with panic. He broke out in a cold sweat and hunched down, trying to press himself as far into the corner as possible. The policeman looked at him in astonishment. He could feel the Astra against his ribs, but it made no difference. It had already failed him once and could no longer give him an illusion of safety.

Danica Rodríguez was lying in the officers’ department, in a small air-conditioned room with white walls. Two of the policemen went with him to the door, but stayed outside, as did the nun who had shown them the way and unlocked the door.

The woman in the bed looked pale and thin and her lips were dry and split. She no longer had a bandage around her head, but they had shaved off some of the hair from her scalp and put on a dressing. Her eyes were large and dark gray and serious.

Manuel sat down on the edge of the bed. After a moment’s hesitation, he kissed her on the forehead and said: “Hello. How are you?”

“Better. Headache’s gone. And you?”

“Not bad.”

“You don’t look too good. How’s everything going?”

“Very well. The conference starts tomorrow.”

“Manuel, lean over a little nearer.”

He obeyed.

“Listen,” she said. “I didn’t ask you to come just to have a chat and be told everything’s all right.”

He did not know what to say. Moreover, he felt nothing special for her, at least not at that moment. She went on: “First of all, I’ll tell you about what I didn’t want to talk
about before. I’m a member of Irigo’s Communist Party and I work to a certain extent with the Liberation Front. That’s why I wanted this job, and I managed to wangle it in the end. I would have got it before, in Larrinaga’s time, except that he insisted on having a male secretary, an adjutant. And what’s more, Sixto is my brother. I’m telling you this because I want you to know, now that you are alone.”

“I see.”

“No, you don’t see. When I woke up yesterday I had a feeling that something didn’t quite add up in practically everything we’ve done.”

She fell silent.

“Is that all?”

She looked at him with huge clear eyes and said so quietly that he had to strain to catch the words: “Manuel, could the conference be a trap?”

“How could it be?”

“I don’t know. But somehow or other everything went so smoothly. The right-wing extremists never wanted to negotiate before, and now they’ve agreed to everything. Could it be a way of getting hold of these people whom they’ve never been able to catch before, who have eluded Dalgren and Orbal and Behounek and the police and the army for years?”

“Neither the government nor the President would dare or even be able to commit such a breach of faith. They’ve even issued written guarantees.”

“I know. But still … Are you absolutely certain all the same that something isn’t awry? You must find out. Now. Today.”

“Yes,” he said. “I’ll look into it. But I’m almost certain your misgivings are unfounded, that you’re wrong.”

“But you promise?”

“Yes.”

Now that he was near her he began to feel differently. He was conscious of her physical presence under the white
blanket. At the same time he felt safer and less afraid. He even managed to smile.

“How’s the bruise?” he said.

“Still there. If it weren’t so awkward I’d show you. They’ve given me such a peculiar nightdress.”

“Well, see you the day after tomorrow.”

“Day after tomorrow?”

“Yes, you’ll be out then.”

“No one has said anything to me about it. The patient is never told anything. It’s like being in prison here. They even lock the door.”

“Typical army.”

“What bad luck we have when we’re about to sleep with each other.”

“Be all right the day after tomorrow.”

“Yes, I’ve had enough of this nonsense now.”

Suddenly he said: “Danica.”

“Yes.”

“I like you so much.”

She stretched up her hand and, putting her strong thin fingers on the back of his neck, she pulled him down against her shoulder, and whispered in his ear: “Manuel, I told you from the start that I’m not worth having. Everything I try just goes to pieces.”

She let him go.

“Wait, I want to show you something.”

He sat up.

“Some mail came yesterday,” she said. “I had a letter which had been forwarded from Copenhagen. From my husband—yes, we never got a proper divorce. I liked him so much, but it went wrong. You see, I destroy those I like and I don’t know how or why. We met five years ago in the capital. The Party was allowed then and we got out a newspaper together. He wrote well and everyone said he was a born journalist and propagandist. We had such a good time together, but then
it began to go wrong. Piece after piece began to fall off—we tried to glue them on again but it just went on breaking up. And it was nearly always my fault, I think. Last time we met was in Copenhagen eighteen months ago. It was … well, it didn’t work. Then he left. This letter is the first word I’ve had from him since then. Take it and read it. I want you to read it.”

He looked at the envelope. It was typed, with a Czechoslovakian stamp on it, and it had been mailed in Prague.

“I like him more than anyone else in the world,” she said. “I want to be good and not hurt him. Read it.”

Manuel opened the letter. It was quite short and looked as if it had been written by a child. The handwriting was large and round and uncertain. He read:

“Dear Dana. I have wanted to write for a long time but I find it difficult and could not do it but the doctor says that it is good for me if I do and now I am trying to. When I left you I went to France and then on to Spain and it went well and then I went to Bulgaria and across the border to Greece. That did not go well because they took us there. They beat me a lot every day for three weeks, I think it was, and then I was not very well. Then they let me out and I got across the border to Sofia and then came here. It is good here but I don’t seem to be able to do anything. Nothing comes to anything and the doctor says I must go out and he has bought me a brown suit and a hat too but I don’t seem to be able to. Dana dear this is not at all what I meant to say but I have been writing it for several days and it doesn’t get any better and the doctor says send it. Hope you are well. Your Felipe.”

At the bottom of the letter someone had added a note in English in red ink and very small handwriting:

“Dear Mrs. Rodríguez. From several points of view it would be a good thing if you could reply to this letter. Yours faithfully, Jaroslav Jiracek, M.D., Bulovka Hospital, Prague.”

Manuel Ortega put the letter back on the table by her bed.

“Are you going to go there?”

“Give me a cigarette, will you please. I suppose you’re not allowed to smoke here but to hell with that.”

She took a few nervous puffs and then said: “I don’t know. No, yes, no. I can’t do anything for him anyway. I know what it’ll be like.”

He had no reply to that, so he sat silent for a while.

Suddenly she said: “Manuel, what is it that we are doing? What is it that everyone in the world is doing?”

At that moment the nun came in. Her long black habit trailed on the floor.

“I’m sorry,” she said, “but you may not stay any longer now.”

Danica put her hand on the nape of his neck again and he went to her, lying with his nose against her throat.

“You won’t forget.”

“No.”

“If anything’s wrong, you must warn them.”

“Yes. See you tomorrow. Darling.”

“Yes. See you tomorrow.”

In the small white air-conditioned room the veil had vanished, but as soon as he was sitting in the car it reappeared. He sweated and pressed back into the corner.

“Oh, my God, as long as I can get away from here,” whispered Manuel Ortega.

It was half past nine when Behounek opened the door and said: “Come on—let’s go to the club and eat.”

Manuel Ortega had not seen him since long before the siesta. He himself had sat in his room, made a few calls, and seen everything slide into place, smoothly and with precision. The preparations in Mercadal were complete. Irigo was to come in a chartered helicopter the following morning. Everything was perfect.

The day had been hot and suffocating but no worse than usual.

He had also thought quite a bit about Danica Rodríguez and her questions, and he had formulated some of his own. These questions were troubling, but on the other hand he had watertight evidence to show that Danica must be wrong. In his safe lay the government’s promises and guarantees, signed by Radamek and his Prime Minister, documents which could not be false.

He had been afraid all day, not terrified or agitated, but more the victim of a passive fear, a helpless, creeping unpleasantness which made him feel weak and ineffectual.

Manuel went with Behounek to the club. They ate an expensive and very bad meal and talked about inessentials. At eleven o’clock they drove back to headquarters. In the big hall, Manuel Ortega said: “Captain Behounek, may I ask you one thing?”

“Of course.”

“Is the conference a trap?”

“Come on into my room.”

The Chief of Police closed the shutters and switched on his desk lamp. They sat opposite one another.

“Yes,” said Behounek.

“I asked: Is the conference a trap?”

“And I answered: Yes. Or more precisely: It is a wolf pit set for the country’s most dangerous enemies.”

“What’ll happen?”

“They’ll be arrested.”

“By you?”

“Yes. Or, if you prefer, by the Federal Police.”

“I’ll stop you doing it.”

“No, Ortega, you won’t stop me.”

“You forget that I still have some authority. I can ask for military assistance.”

“Where from?”

“You’re overlooking the fact that there are two thousand regular infantrymen in the immediate vicinity of the town. You’re also overlooking the fact that I can still reach both the Minister of the Interior and the President by cable. That is, assuming that you do not intend to use force against me.”