Topkapi by Eric Ambler Page A

an excuse for shooting me. I pretended not to notice him; but his presence did not improve matters. In fact, I was beginning to get an attack of my indigestion.
    After a while, the security man came back and beckoned to me. I went with him, along a passage with a small barrack room off it, to a door at the end.
    “What now?” I asked in French.
    “You must see the Commandant of the post.”
    He knocked at the door and ushered me in.
    Inside was a small bare office with some hard chairs and a green baize trestle table in the centre. The customs inspector stood beside the table. Seated at it was a man of about my own age with a lined, sallow face. He wore some sort of officer’s uniform. I think he belonged to the military security police. He had the carnet and my passport on the table in front of him.
    He looked up at me disagreeably. “This is your passport?” He spoke good French.
    “Yes, sir. And I can only say that I regret extremely that I did not notice that it was not renewed.”
    “You have caused a lot of trouble.”
    “I realize that, sir. I must explain, however, that it was only on Monday evening that I was asked to make this journey. I left early yesterday morning. I was in a hurry. I did not think to check my papers.”
    He looked down at the passport. “It says here that your occupation is that of journalist. You told the customs inspector that you were a chauffeur.”
    So he had an inquiring mind; my heart sank.
    “I am acting as a chauffeur, sir. I was, I am a journalist, but one must live and things are not always easy in that profession.”
    “So now you are a chauffeur, and the passport is incorrect in yet another particular, eh?” It was a very unfair way of putting it, but I thought it as well to let him have his moment.
    “One’s fortunes change, sir. In Athens I have my own car, which I drive for hire.”
    He peered, frowning, at the carnet . “This car here is the property of Elizabeth Lipp. Is she your employer?”
    “Temporarily, sir.”
    “Where is she?”
    “In Istanbul, I believe, sir.”
    “You do not know?”
    “Her agent engaged me, sir - to drive her car to Istanbul, where she is going as a tourist. She prefers to make the journey to Istanbul by sea.”
    There was an unpleasant pause. He looked through the carnet again and then up at me abruptly. “What nationality is this woman?”
    “I don’t know, sir.”
    “What age? What sort of woman?”
    “I have never seen her, sir. Her agent arranged everything.”
    “And she is going from Athens to Istanbul by sea, which takes twenty-four hours, but she sends her car fourteen hundred kilometres and three days by road. If she wants the car in Istanbul, why didn’t she take the car on the boat with her? It is simple enough and costs practically nothing.”
    I was only too well aware of it. I shrugged. “I was paid to drive, sir, and well paid. It was not for me to question the lady’s plans.”
    He considered me for a moment, then drew a sheet of paper towards him and scribbled a few words. He handed the result to the customs inspector, who read, nodded, and went out quickly.
    The Commandant seemed to relax. “You say you know nothing about the woman who owns the car,” he said. “Tell me about her agent. Is it a travel bureau?”
    “No, sir, a man, an American, a friend of Fräulein Lipp’s father he said.”
    “What’s his name? Where is he?”
    I told him everything I knew about Harper, and the nature of my relationship with him. I did not mention the disagreement over the traveller's cheques. That could have been of no interest to him.
    He listened in silence, nodding occasionally. By the time I had finished, his manner had changed considerably. His expression had become almost amiable.
    “Have you driven this way before?” he asked.
    “Several times, sir.”
    “With tourists?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Ever without tourists?”
    “No, sir. They like to visit Olympus, Salonika, and Alexandropolis on their way