are adept, she says. Yes. I am adept. I spy. I betray. I love when it is too late.
Frau Merthan was the telephone operator, another soldier of the night, whose sentry box was an airless cubicle beside reception.
"Guten Abend, Frau Merthan."
"Good morning, Mr. Jonathan."
It was their joke.
"Gulf war running nicely, I trust?" Jonathan glanced at the bulletins dangling from the newsprinter. "Bombing continues unabated. One thousand missions already flown. Safety in numbers, they say."
"So much money to spend on one Arab," said Frau Merthan with disapproval.
He began tidying the papers, an instinctive habit that had been with him since his first school dormitory. As he did so his eye caught the faxes. One sleek tray for incoming, contents to be distributed in the morning. One sleek tray for outgoing, waiting to be returned to their senders.
"Lots of telephone activity, Frau Merthan? Panic selling across the globe? You must be feeling like the hub of the universe."
"Princesse du Four must call her cousin in Vladivostok. Every night, now that things are better in Russia, she calls Vladivostok and speaks to him for one hour. Every night she gets cut off and must be reconnected. I think she is looking for her prince."
"How about the princes in the Tower?" he asked. "They seemed to be living on the telephone from the moment they got in there."
Frau Merthan tapped a couple of keys and peered at the screen through her bifocals. "Belgrade, Panama, Brussels, Nairobi, Nassau, Prague, London, Paris, Tortola, England somewhere, Prague again, more Nassau. All direct. Soon it will be only direct and I shall have no job."
"One day all of us will be robots," Jonathan assured her. Leaning over Frau Merthan's counter he affected a layman's curiosity.
"Does that screen of yours show the actual numbers they ring?" he asked.
"Naturally; otherwise the guests complain immediately. It's normal."
"Show me."
She showed him. Roper knows the wicked people everywhere, Sophie had said.
In the dining room, Bobbi the odd-job man was balanced on an aluminium ladder, cleaning the droplets of a chandelier with his spider mop. Jonathan trod lightly in order not to disturb his concentration. In the bar, Herr Kaspar's nymphet nieces in trembling smocks and stone-washed jeans were replenishing pot plants. Bouncing up to him, the elder girl displayed a pile of muddy cigarette stubs in her gloved palm.
"Do men do this in their own homes?" she demanded, lifting her breasts to him in saucy indignation. "Put their fag ends in the flowerpots?"
"I should think so, Renate. Men do the most unspeakable things at the drop of a hat." Ask Ogilvey, he thought. In his abstraction, her pertness annoyed him unreasonably. "I'd watch out for that piano if I were you. Herr Meister will kill you if you scratch it."
In the kitchens, the night chefs were preparing a dormitory feast for the German newlyweds on the Bel Etage: steak tartare for him, smoked salmon for her, a bottle of Meursault to revive their ardour. Jonathan watched Alfred the Austrian night waiter give a sensitive tuck with his fine fingers at the napkin rosettes and add a bowl of camellias for romance. Alfred was a failed ballet dancer and put "Artist" in his passport.
"They're bombing Baghdad, then," he said with satisfaction while he worked. "That'll teach them."
"Did the Tower Suite eat tonight?"
Alfred took a breath and recited. His smile was becoming a little young for him. "Three smoked salmon, one fish and chips English style, four fillet steak medium, and a double dollop of carrot cake and Schlag, which you call Rahm. Carrot cake is what His Highness has for a religion. He told me. And from the Herr Major, on His Highness's instructions, a fifty-franc tip. You English always tip when you're in love."
"Do we indeed?" said Jonathan. "I must remember that."
He ascended the great staircase. Roper's not in love; he's just rutting. Probably hired her from some tarts' agency, so much a night. He had
Frau Merthan was the telephone operator, another soldier of the night, whose sentry box was an airless cubicle beside reception.
"Guten Abend, Frau Merthan."
"Good morning, Mr. Jonathan."
It was their joke.
"Gulf war running nicely, I trust?" Jonathan glanced at the bulletins dangling from the newsprinter. "Bombing continues unabated. One thousand missions already flown. Safety in numbers, they say."
"So much money to spend on one Arab," said Frau Merthan with disapproval.
He began tidying the papers, an instinctive habit that had been with him since his first school dormitory. As he did so his eye caught the faxes. One sleek tray for incoming, contents to be distributed in the morning. One sleek tray for outgoing, waiting to be returned to their senders.
"Lots of telephone activity, Frau Merthan? Panic selling across the globe? You must be feeling like the hub of the universe."
"Princesse du Four must call her cousin in Vladivostok. Every night, now that things are better in Russia, she calls Vladivostok and speaks to him for one hour. Every night she gets cut off and must be reconnected. I think she is looking for her prince."
"How about the princes in the Tower?" he asked. "They seemed to be living on the telephone from the moment they got in there."
Frau Merthan tapped a couple of keys and peered at the screen through her bifocals. "Belgrade, Panama, Brussels, Nairobi, Nassau, Prague, London, Paris, Tortola, England somewhere, Prague again, more Nassau. All direct. Soon it will be only direct and I shall have no job."
"One day all of us will be robots," Jonathan assured her. Leaning over Frau Merthan's counter he affected a layman's curiosity.
"Does that screen of yours show the actual numbers they ring?" he asked.
"Naturally; otherwise the guests complain immediately. It's normal."
"Show me."
She showed him. Roper knows the wicked people everywhere, Sophie had said.
In the dining room, Bobbi the odd-job man was balanced on an aluminium ladder, cleaning the droplets of a chandelier with his spider mop. Jonathan trod lightly in order not to disturb his concentration. In the bar, Herr Kaspar's nymphet nieces in trembling smocks and stone-washed jeans were replenishing pot plants. Bouncing up to him, the elder girl displayed a pile of muddy cigarette stubs in her gloved palm.
"Do men do this in their own homes?" she demanded, lifting her breasts to him in saucy indignation. "Put their fag ends in the flowerpots?"
"I should think so, Renate. Men do the most unspeakable things at the drop of a hat." Ask Ogilvey, he thought. In his abstraction, her pertness annoyed him unreasonably. "I'd watch out for that piano if I were you. Herr Meister will kill you if you scratch it."
In the kitchens, the night chefs were preparing a dormitory feast for the German newlyweds on the Bel Etage: steak tartare for him, smoked salmon for her, a bottle of Meursault to revive their ardour. Jonathan watched Alfred the Austrian night waiter give a sensitive tuck with his fine fingers at the napkin rosettes and add a bowl of camellias for romance. Alfred was a failed ballet dancer and put "Artist" in his passport.
"They're bombing Baghdad, then," he said with satisfaction while he worked. "That'll teach them."
"Did the Tower Suite eat tonight?"
Alfred took a breath and recited. His smile was becoming a little young for him. "Three smoked salmon, one fish and chips English style, four fillet steak medium, and a double dollop of carrot cake and Schlag, which you call Rahm. Carrot cake is what His Highness has for a religion. He told me. And from the Herr Major, on His Highness's instructions, a fifty-franc tip. You English always tip when you're in love."
"Do we indeed?" said Jonathan. "I must remember that."
He ascended the great staircase. Roper's not in love; he's just rutting. Probably hired her from some tarts' agency, so much a night. He had
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