That area of the body, just above the lip, a meeting point, etc., was currently covered by annoying bristles. Raymond had dared to suggest a false beard: ‘Mr Raymond, I gave up being a circus performer thirty years ago, and I have no intention of starting again now.’
He would have given all the banknotes in his wallet to be able to concentrate amidst all that confusion.
As a conditioned reflex, Cary stretched out a somnambulant hand along his duffel-coat to find the pocket in which.
Empty. No comforting bulge.
His hand darted towards the other pocket and rummaged around in it. His fingers gripped a piece of paper.
Cary opened his eyes wide with a start and unfolded the sheet in front of his nose.
Major Dyle fell silent.
Cary turned the paper around to read it. An incomprehensible language. Italian. A large title in the middle, in block letters. Then, one line under the other, something that looked like the lines of a poem, some scribbles, words crossed out with a stroke of the pen.
‘What is it, Mr Kaplan? You seem concerned.’
‘I am, Major. It would seem that this is not my duffel-coat.’
‘It’s not yours?’ exclaimed Dyle in an over-the-top performance of astonished stupidity. ‘Whose is it, then?’
‘I couldn’t begin to guess. Does this scrap of paper give you any clues?’
The major put on a pince-nez and concentrated on the ornate handwriting. He was the kind of person who overemphasises his every attitude, like B-movie character actors. If the situation called for astonishment, Dyle was the most astonished man in the world; if he was expected to concentrate, his forehead immediately developed five or six profound wrinkles; if his role required him to demonstrate affability, the only way to switch off his natural charm was to knock his teeth down his throat.
‘It looks like Italian,’ he said after a great deal of effort. ‘The headline says Povera Patria, “Poor Fatherland”. Does that suggest anything to you?’
‘It suggests that someone must have swapped my duffel-coat for his, and it must have happened in Trieste, in that café in the centre, what was it called?’
Cary clearly remembered going into the establishment, ordering his tea and paying straight away, yes, and the waiter had asked for his duffel-coat, which was slung over the back of the chair, to take it to the cloakroom. And then? Then nothing, he hadn’t used his wallet again: he hadn’t had to pay for anything else, and they had been waved through customs because their car belonged to the corps diplomatique.
‘Stop in the first village, Howard,’ ordered Major Dyle, ‘and find a telephone.’
Then he turned back to Cary, still calling him Kaplan for the sake of the driver. ‘Could you give me a description of your duffel-coat, Mr Kaplan?’
Cary pursed his lips, the big dipper accelerated: ‘My duffel-coat is identical to this one, Major, the swap was caused precisely by their similarity to one another. Doesn’t that seem likely to you?’
‘Oh certainly, Mr Kaplan, that’s elementary.’ Sherlock Holmes grumbled to himself, then continued: ‘And your wallet? Could you describe it to me? Do you remember what was in it?’
‘A plain leather wallet, long and flat. Inside: my passport, two hundred-dollar bills, a bit of loose change in lire, and. I don’t remember anything else, Major.’
‘Fine, Mr Kaplan, forget it ever happened. With the help of our agents in Trieste, it will be as though you never lost your wallet. And please note that I am not saying this out of national pride, or to give you some kind of pointless reassurance, you see —’
‘Could you pass me that piece of paper for a moment?’ Cary asked with perfect timing. If he let him loose on that subject he’d be off again, at least half an hour’s tirade on the efficiency of His Majesty’s agents. Then he had noticed something. On the back, someone had reproduced a signature hundreds of times. The handwriting looked the same as the poem. The signatures were almost identical, with small variations here and there, as though to the writer were trying to find the most elegant way of writing his name.
Cary narrowed his eyes and tried to decipher the scribble. Then he asked for confirmation.
‘This is an interesting piece of information, Major. Your friends won’t mind having a name to start off with, will they? What do you think it says?’
Dyle studied the piece of paper as though it were the Rosetta Stone.
‘Hmm, let’s see, Carlo. Carlo Alberto Rizzi, I would say, yes, that’s it, Carlo Alberto Rizzi. There’s no doubt about it. Things are looking up, Mr Kaplan. By this evening, we will have found your wallet.’
In the meantime, the Triestine poet Carlo Alberto Rizzi would search fruitlessly for a patriotic poem in the pockets of his duffel-coat, finding instead a leather wallet, 200 dollars and the British passport of Mr George Kaplan.
Chapter 50
Port of Bar, Montenegro, 28 April
A mixture of fish, naphtha and sweat. The smell of the port. Since he had learned to walk, he had grown up on the docks, cadging a few cents from the longshoremen and listening to the sailors telling their fantastic tales. The smell of grim and boastful men, trawlers, barnacles clinging to the piers of the bridge. Even when he had had his first fuck, the youngest whore he had been able to afford. And that smell was still there as he weighed down the feet of those poor bastards, deaf to their pleading and the promises of all the wealth in the world.
He climbed down from the ship, feeling sick. It wasn’t seasickness; he was disgusted with the endless shit jobs he had done in his life. To discover that what he was best at was settling other people’s scores in exchange for decent wages, a clean suit and a matching tie. His tour of the Sicilian refineries had been enough to stir old grievances in his belly: now here he was in a lousy little harbour frequented by the worst kind of human scum that the asshole of the world could shit on to the earth. Another job for Steve Cement.
Just one thing kept his mind alert: determination. The last task was completed. Lyonnese Toni was waiting for him in Cannes, to buy his drugs.
Walking towards the three shady figures at the end of the bar, he thought about what Luciano had said: ‘I commend myself to you, Steve, I want everything done just as it was before. And if they balk at the price, tell them to fuck off, and their mothers too. And take care, ok?’
The three faces showed a complete set of all the things that a blade can do to a human face. Only their sloping moustaches partially hid the damage. They were wearing stinking jackets and sailors’ berets made of rotten wool. They emanated that smell.
He stopped in front of them and looked straight at them without batting an eyelid.
‘Bulatovic.’
The man in the middle nodded to him to follow him. Zollo walked behind them.
They escorted him to a tavern with the sound of music and laughter coming from inside. About thirty men were crammed into the place, and an old man was wheezing away on the accordion in a corner at the back. Some of the patrons were soldiers, with long beards and uniforms loosened because of the heat. The smoke from cigarettes and hubble-bubbles created a dense fog, and beyond it Zollo could just make out the one who was supposed to be his man. On previous journeys he had dealt with intermediaries, but this time the packet of heroin was a very big one: the boss himself had bothered to come here to receive it.