The Lonely Skier (10 page)

‘He seems a pleasant enough fellow,' I replied. ‘He is well read, friendly—has an attractive personality.'

He smiled. ‘An engaging personality, eh? And he has travelled. He was in the United States during the prohibition days. Later he returned to England and in 1942 he joined the British Army.' He considered a moment. Then he said, ‘Would it interest you to know, Mr Blair, that he deserted whilst serving in Italy?'

‘How do you know?' I asked.

‘He was useful to me in Greece,' Keramikos replied. ‘For a time he operated a deserter gang in Naples, a bad crowd, composed of a variety of nationalities. They were cleaned up by the military police in the end. That was when he came to Athens. He operated on his own there as an UNRRA official. He was a very successful UNRRA official.' He smiled and took out a heavy silver watch. ‘We must go,' he said, ‘or you will miss your bus.' And he rose to his feet and paid the bill. I got up. The hum of voices, the clatter of crockery—all the sounds of the café—thrust themselves into my mind so that I wondered whether I had really understood what the Greek had told me.

Outside it was cold and the setting sun lit up the Dolomite peaks above the little town so that they flamed against the delicate blue of the sky. ‘What was he doing for you in Greece?' I asked as we walked over to the bus stop.

But he held up his hand. ‘I have said enough,' he answered. ‘You are observant, Mr Blair. But do not be too observant. This is not England. The Austrian frontier is only a few miles away. Beyond lies Germany. Behind us is France. You were here in Italy before—but with your Army. You were part of a great organisation. But you are a civilian now and this is a strange, sick Europe. Things happen. Authority is a poor, bewildered official when things are out of control. Beyond all this luxury and all these men and women here who have grown fat on war, there is a vast human jungle. In that jungle, there is fear and starvation. It is the survival of the fittest. I tell you about Mayne because I would not like you to step outside this nice civilised Cortina and find yourself in that jungle.' He smiled at me as though he had passed some quite innocent remark. ‘Tell Aldo for me, please, that I shall not be in to dinner.'

‘But I thought you were coming back with me on the bus?' I said.

‘No. I said that because I wished to talk to you alone. Remember your English saying—it takes all men to make a world. Remember also, please, that the world is not a good world just now. Good-night, Mr Blair.'

I watched his thick-set, powerful figure thrust its way through the crowded pavement till it was lost to view. Then I got on to the waiting bus with only my somewhat startled thoughts for company.

Joe Wesson was the only person in the
rifugio
when I returned. He looked at me sourly. ‘I'd like to know what the hell you're playing at, Neil!' he grunted as he handed me a drink.

‘Because I went to an auction this morning instead of getting on with the script?' I asked.

‘Because, as far as I can see,' he replied, ‘you haven't done a damn stroke of work since you arrived here. What's the matter? Won't your mind settle down to it?'

‘I'll catch up after dinner,' I said. ‘I've got the first part all worked out.'

‘Good!' he said. ‘I was beginning to get worried. Know what it's like. Seen other fellows in the same fix. It's not like camera work. It's got to be in your mind first.' For a man in such a hard business as films, he had an extraordinarily kind nature. ‘How did the auction go?'

I told him.

‘So that's why Valdini was so blasted miserable when I came in,' he said as I finished. ‘Sicilian gangster, hm? Just what he looks like. You'd better keep clear of that damned Contessa of his, Neil. I went to Sicily once. All dust and flies—it was summer. Got involved with a little girl at the
pensione
. Her boy-friend came at me with a knife. But I was quicker then than I am now.'

We were the only two in to dinner. The big bar room seemed large and quiet—almost watchful. Our voices were never raised. We did not talk much during the meal. I was conscious of a nervous strain. I found myself wondering what the other three were doing—wondering what was happening in the world outside, wondering what was going to happen here. It was as though the hut, perched on the vast white shoulder of Monte Cristallo, was waiting for something.

I took myself off to my room immediately after dinner. I had to give Joe the impression I was doing some work. I wanted to work. I sat there at my typewriter, thinking how desperate Peggy and I had been before I had run into Engles in London that morning. I did not want that to happen again. This was my chance. All I had to do was produce a script that Engles would like.

But it just would not come. Every idea that came into my mind was over-shadowed and crowded out by the thought of what was happening here in this hut. It was impossible to concentrate on fiction when the facts right under my nose were so absorbing. For the hundredth time I tried to figure out why Engles was interested in the place. Valdini and the Contessa were now clear in my mind. But Mayne and Keramikos? Was it true what Keramikos had told me about Mayne? And why had he told me? Why had he warned me? And who had bought Col da Varda, and why?

I stared blankly at the keys of my typewriter, smoking cigarette after cigarette in a frenzy of frustration. Why didn't I ignore the whole thing and get on with the script? I cursed my honesty and damned Engles for employing me as watch-dog to a group of highly questionable characters and not as a straightforward script writer.

It was cold in the room, even with the electric heater on. The moon had risen and, beyond the reflected gleam of the unshaded electric light bulb, I could see the frosted white of the world outside my window. It came right up to the window, that cold, unfriendly world. The snow was thick on the window-sill—thick and glistening white. And from the roof a great curve of snow hung suspended like icing on a cake, ending in a long, pointed icicle.

At length I gave it up. It was no good thinking about writing a script when so many queries crowded my brain. I began to hammer out on the typewriter yet another report for Engles, this time on Keramikos. Whilst I was recalling that tea-time conversation, I heard the
slittovia
. It came up and went down again three separate times within an hour. I heard voices downstairs in the bar. Then, about ten, there was the tramp of heavy boots on the stair boards, voices said good-night, doors banged. Joe poked his head round the door of my room. ‘How's it going?' he enquired.

‘All right, thanks,' I told him.

‘Good. It's all clear downstairs now. They've all gone to bed. It's warmer down there, if you're working late.'

I thanked him. He went into his room. I heard him moving about for several minutes. Then all was quiet. The hut had settled down to sleep. The sound of Joe's snores began to come through the match-boarding as clear as though he were asleep in the room.

I put the lid on my typewriter and got up. I was stiff with cold. I hurried into the warmth of my bed. But I could not sleep. Thoughts kept chasing through my mind.

Whether I dozed off or not I do not know. All I know is that I was suddenly awake. And it was much later. The moon had moved round and was shining across the room on to the white enamel-ware of the wash-stand. The rhythmic snore of Joe's breathing was just the same. The hut was quiet. Yet something was different. I lay huddled in the warmth of the bedclothes looking about me, conscious of that strange watchfulness I had felt in old houses when as a child I had lain awake in the dark.

I tried to go to sleep again. But I could not. I thought of the bar downstairs. I could do with a cognac or two. I got up and put two sweaters and my ski suit on over my pyjamas. I had just finished dressing when I noticed something different about the window. I went over to it and peered out. The great overhanging mass of snow with the icicle on the end was gone. The sound of it falling must have been the cause of my waking.

I was turning away when I saw a figure moving across the belvedere. The moon gave his body a long shadow that lay full across the boards of the platform. I peered down as it hurried silently down the steps and was lost to view behind the wooden balustrade. When it was gone I blinked my eyes and wondered if it had ever really been there. It had been a tall figure.

I hesitated. It was nothing to do with me. A boy-friend of Anna's perhaps. Her bright, laughing eyes might well do more than flirt with visitors as she brought them food and drinks. I looked at my watch. It was after two.

I suppose it was the fact that I was actually dressed and wide awake that determined me. I was suddenly outside my room and slipping quietly down the stairs in stockinged feet.

The large bar room was a ghostly space of silence in the wide shafts of moonlight. I crossed it quickly and opened the door. Outside it was cold and bright with the moon. I put my shoes on and tiptoed across the belvedere and down the steps on to the snow path that led up from the
slittovia
.

I was in shadow here, for the platform of the belvedere was higher than my head and the path ran close beside it. I stopped to consider. There was no sign of the figure I had seen from my window. The
rifugio
, viewed from this angle, had a perfectly straight façade. The great pine piles on which it was built were so tall that it was possible for a man to walk underneath by bending slightly. Halfway along, the pine supports ceased and the base of the hut became concrete. This was the concrete housing of the
slittovia
plant. It had a broad window looking straight down the sleigh track. I could see the dark square of it despite the fact that it was in shadow. Just below the window was a slit and the cable that emerged from it was just visible. Opposite the window, a wooden platform had been built out on to the actual slope of the trackway to enable passengers to alight from the sleigh.

I was cold, standing there, and I began to regard myself as more than a little foolish, wandering about in the snow after shadows at two in the morning. But just as I was considering returning to the bar for a drink, I saw a slight movement where the pine supports gave place to the concrete machine housing. I watched closely. For a while there was no further movement, but now I could make out a darker shadow against the concrete. It was the shadow of a man standing very still almost underneath the flooring of the bar.

I froze to complete stillness. I was in shadow. As long as I did not move he might not see me. I must have stayed like that for perhaps a minute, debating whether I dare risk moving right under the platform, for, if he came back towards me, he was bound to see me. Before I could make up my mind, however, the shadow began to move. It came out from underneath the
rifugio
and moved along the concrete face of the machine-room. He was quite clear to me now in silhouette against the white snow of the firs beyond. He was a shortish, thick-set man. He was not a bit like the man I had seen cross the belvedere. He stopped by the window of the machine-room and peered in.

I climbed quickly over the crisp-piled snow and got in under the platform. Then I made my way carefully along under the hut until I was close to the concrete section. I peered out. The man was still there, his body a dark shadow by the window.

A light suddenly shone out from the machine-room. It was the moving light of a torch and it rested for a moment on the face of the watcher. I recognised it instantly. It was Keramikos. I stepped back behind one of the supporting piles. I was only just in time. The Greek slipped back into cover. But he was not quick enough. The sound of footsteps crunched in the frosty snow and the torchlight was shone straight on to him. ‘I have been expecting you.' I could not see the speaker. He was just a voice and the glare of the white circle of his torch. He spoke in German, the lighter German of Austria.

Keramikos stepped forward. ‘If you were expecting me,' he replied in German, ‘there's no point in my continuing this game of hide-and-seek.'

‘None whatever,' was the reply. ‘Come inside. You may as well look at the place whilst you're here and there are some things we might talk over.'

The beam of the torch swung away and the two figures moved beyond my line of vision. A door was closed and their voices immediately ceased.

I slipped out of my hiding-place and moved quietly to where Keramikos had been standing. I knelt down to peer in through the window, so that my head would not appear at the level expected if the torch were shone on the window again.

It was a weird scene. The torch was held so that the light of it fell full on Keramikos. His face was white in the glare of it and his shadow sprawled grotesquely on the wall behind him. They sat opposite each other on the great cable drum. The stranger was smoking, but he had his back to me, so that the slight glow as he drew on his cigarette did not show me his face. Except for the one wall, the room was in half darkness, and the machinery showed only as shadowy bulks huddled in their concrete bedding.

I remained watching till my knees began to ache. But they just sat there talking. They did not move. There were no excited gestures. They seemed quite friendly. The window had small panes set in steel frames. I could not hear a word.

I crawled across the platform and stepped over the cable. The snow crunched noisily under my feet. I was at the very top of the sleigh track. It dropped almost from under my feet, a snowy slash between the dark firs. I crossed it and went round the corner of the concrete housing to the door, which was under the wooden flooring of the
rifugio
. It was closed. Very carefully I lifted the latch and pulled it towards me.

Through a half inch slit I could see that the scene had not changed. They were still seated, facing each other, with Keramikos blinking like an owl in the glare of the torch. ‘. . . loosen off this cog,' the stranger was saying, still in Austrian. He shone the torch on a heavy, grease-coated cog that engaged the main driving cog on the rim of the cable drum. ‘Then all we have to do is to knock it out when the sleigh has started down. It will be on the steepest part. There will be an accident. Then I will close the
rifugio
. Afterwards we can search without fear of interruption.'