the magazine, handed this in turn to Agnelli and replaced the Lilliput
in its ankle holster. ‘That’s all. Three guns would be just too much to
carry about.’
‘So I should imagine.’Agreiii’s smile, which had momentarily vanished,
was back in place. He pushed the two magazines across the table. ‘I don’t
think we’ll be requiring guns this afternoon.’
‘Indeed. But something would be useful.’Van Effen dropped the magazines
into a side pocket. ‘I always find that talking -‘
‘Beer for me,’ Agnelli said. ‘And for Helmut, too, I know.’
‘Four beers,’ van Effen said. ‘Vasco, if you would be so kind -‘Vasco
rose and left the booth.
Agnelli said: ‘Known Vasco long?’
59
Van Effen considered. ‘A proper question. Two months. Why?’ Had they, van
Effen wondered, been asking the same question of Vasco.
‘Idle curiosity.’ Agnelli, van Effen thought, was not a man to indulge in
idle curiosity. ‘Your name really is Stephan Danilov?,
‘Certainly not. But it’s the name I go by in Amsterdam.’
‘But you really are a Pole?’ The elder man’s voice, dry and precise,
befitted his cast of countenance which could have been that of a moderately
successful lawyer or accountant. He also spoke in Polish.
‘For my sins.’ Van Effen raised an eyebrow. ‘Vasco, of course.’
‘Yes. Where were you born?’
‘Radom.’
‘I know it. Not well. A rather provincial town, I thought.’
‘So I’ve heard.’
‘You’ve heard? But you lived there.’
‘Four years. When you’re four years old a provincial town is the centre of
the world. My father – a printer – moved to a better job.’
‘Where?’
‘Warsaw.’
‘Ahal’
‘Aha yourself.’ Van Effen spoke in some irritation. ‘You sound as if you
know Warsaw and are now going to find out if I know it. Why, I can’t
imagine. You’re not by any chance a lawyer, Mr – I’m afraid I don’t know
your name?’
‘Paderiwski. I am a lawyer.’
‘Paderiwski. Given time, I would have thought you could have come up with
a better one than that. And I was right, eh? A lawyer. I wouldn’t care to
have you acting for my defence. You make a poor interrogator.’
Agnelli was smiling but Paderiwski was not. His lips were pursed. He said
brusquely: ‘You know the Tin-Roofed Palace, of course.’
:of course.’
Where is it?’
6o
‘Dear me. What have we here. The Inquisition? Ah. Thank you.’ He took a
glass from a tray that a waiter, following Vasco, had just brought into the
curtained booth and lifted it. ‘Your health, gentlemen. Ile place you’re so
curious about, Mr – ah -Padefiwski, is close by the Wista, on the comer of
the Wybrzeze Gdanskie and the Slasko-Dabrowski bridge.’ He sipped some more
beer. ‘Unless they’ve moved it, of course. Some years since I’ve been
there.’
Paderiwski was not amused. ‘The Palace of Culture and Science.’
‘Parade Square. It’s too big.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Too big to have been moved, I mean. Two thousand, three hundred rooms are
a lot of rooms. A monstrosity. The weddingcake, they call it. But, then,
Stalin never did have any taste in architecture.’
‘Stalin?’ Agnelli said.
‘His personal gift to my already long-suffering countrymen.’ So Agnelli
spoke Polish, too.
‘Where’s the Ethnographic Museum in Warsaw?’
‘It’s not in Warsaw. Mlociny, ten kilometres to the north.’ Van Effen’s
voice was now as brusque as Paderiwski’s had been. ‘Where’s the Nike? You
don’t know? What’s the Nike? You don’t know? Any citizen of Warsaw knows
it’s the name given to the “Heroes of Warsaw” monument. What’s Zamenhofa
Street famous for?’ An increasingly uncomfortable Paderiwski made no reply.
‘The Ghetto monument. I told you you’d make a lousy lawyer, Paderiwski. Any
competent lawyer, for the defence or the prosecution, always prepares his
brief. You didn’t. You’re a fraud. It’s my belief that you’ve never even
been in Warsaw and that you just spent an hour or so studying a gazetteer
or guide-book.’ Van Effen placed his hands on the table as if preparatory
to rising. ‘I don’t think, gentleman, that we need detain each other any
longer. Discreet enquiries are one thing, offensive interrogation by an
incompetent, another. I see no basis here for mutual trust and, quite
honestly, I need neither a job nor money.’ He rose. ‘Good day, gentlemen.’
Agnelli reached out a hand. He didn’t touch van Effen, it was
61
just a restraining gesture. ‘Please sit down, Mr Danilov. Perhaps Helmut has
rather overstepped the mark but have you ever met a lawyer who wasn’t
burdened with a suspicious, mistrustful mind? Helmut- or we- just happened
to choose the wrong suspect. Helmut, in fact, has been in Warsaw but only,
as you almost guessed, briefly and as a tourist. I, personally, don’t doubt
you could find your way about Warsaw blindfolded.’ Paderiwski had the look
of a man who wished he were in some other place, any place. ‘A blunder. We
apologize.’
‘That’s kind.’ Van Effen sat down and quaffed some more beer. ‘Fair
enough.’
Agnelli smiled. Almost certainly a double-dyed villain, van Effen thought,
but a charming and persuasive one. ‘Now that you’ve established a degree of
moral ascendancy over us I’ll reinforce that by admitting that we almost
certainly need you more than you need us.’
Not to be outdone, van Effen smiled in turn. ‘You must be in a desperate
way.’ He lifted and examined his empty glass. ‘If you’d just poke your head
round the corner, Vasco, and make the usual SOS.’
‘Of course, Stephan.’Tbere was an unmistakable expression of relief in his
face. He did as asked then settled back in his seat.
‘No more interrogation,’ Agnelli said. ‘I’ll come straight to the point.
Your friend Vasco tells me that you know a little about explosives.’
‘Vasco does me less than justice. I know a great deal about explosives.’ He
looked at Vasco in reproof. ‘I wouldn’t have thought you would discuss a
friend – that’s me, Vasco, in case you’ve forgotten – with strangers.’
‘I didn’t. Well, I did, but I just said it was someone I knew.’
‘No harm. Explosives, As I say, I know. Defusing bombs I know. I’m also
fairly proficient in capping well-head oil fires but you wouldn’t be
approaching me in this fashion if that was your problem. You’d be on the
phone to Texas, where I learnt my trade.’
‘No oil fires.’ Agnelli smiled again. ‘But defusing bombs -well that’s
something else. Where did you learn a dangerous trade like that?’
62
‘Army,’van Effen said briefly. He didn’t specify which army. ‘You’ve
actually defused bombs?’ Agnelli’s respect was genuine.
‘Quite a number.’
‘You must be good.’
CWhy?,
‘You’re here.’
‘I am good. I’m also lucky, because no matter how good you are the bomb
you’re trying to defuse may be your last one. Peaceful retirement is not
the lot of a bomb disposal expert. But as I assume you have no more
unexploded bombs than y6u have oil wells, then it must be explosives.
Explosives experts in Holland are not in short supply. You have only to
advertise. That I should be approached in a clandestine fashion can only
mean that you are engaged in activities that are Wegal.’
‘We are. Have you never been? Engaged, I mean?’
‘All depends upon who defines what is iBegal and what is not and how they
define it. Some people hold definitions which are different from mine and
wish to discuss the matter with me. Very tiresome they can be, those
alleged upholders of justice. You know what the British say – the law is an
ass.’ Van Effen considered. ‘I think I put that rather weU.’
‘You’ve hardly committed yourself. May one ask – delicately, of course –
whether this discussion you are avoiding has anything to do with your
vacationing in Amsterdam?’
‘You may. It has. What do you want me to blow up?’
Agnel1i raised his eyebrows. ‘Well, weU, you can be blunt. Almost as blunt
as you can be, shall we say, diplomatic.’
‘That’s an answer? An explosives expert is good for only one thing –
exploding things. You wish me to explode something? Yes or no?’
‘Yes.’
‘Two things. Banks, boats, bridges, -anything of that kind IT blow up and
guarantee a satisfactory job. Anything that involves injury, far less
death, to any person I won’t have any part Of. P
‘You won’t ever be caUed upon to do any such thing. That’s also a guaran .
The second thing?’
63
‘I don’t seek to flatter you when I say that you’re an intelligent man, Mr
Agnelli. Highly intelligent, I should think. Such people are usually
first-class organizers. To seek the help of a last minute unknown to help
you execute some project that may have been in the planning stage for quite
some time doesn’t smack to me of preparation, organization or
professionalism. If I may say so.’
‘You may. A very valid point. In your position I would adopt the same
disbelieving or questioning attitude. You have to take my word for it that