Louise is still watching the man outside their compartment. She had pulled the curtain earlier, largely obscuring them from his view, but every now and then she pulls it back again, just enough so that she can peer into the corridor. “What do you think he’s doing here?” she asks, dropping her voice to a whisper, though he thinks she already knows.
“I don’t know,” he lies.
“What do you think he wants?”
“I don’t know.” Again, another lie.
“Well,” she says, her tone firm. “Perhaps we should ask him, then.”
“No, I don’t suppose we should.”
“Why not? I’m tired of being watched.” She turns to him, her gaze hard. Steely, he thinks. “It grows tedious after a while.”
There is an edge to her tone that Henri doesn’t think was there before. Something is amiss, has been ever since he had shown her his passport, hoping she might do the same. He had found her own—forged, as well—when he had opened her satchel, the piece of identification lying on top, as if waiting to be discovered. The passport itself is good—certainly good enough to get her across the Bulgarian and Turkish borders, and more than good enough to get her wherever she wants to go from there. Still, he can see it—the signs that it has been tampered with, that it is a forgery, however well-done it may be.
He thinks of the young man who had visited her in Paris, spending time in her hotel room. That must be it, he decides, recalling the small manila envelope that had been left for her at the front desk. He wants to ask, to see if he is right—but he can tell that she is not in the mood, that something has upset her, agitated her. Perhaps it is only the man watching them, but then Henri does not think that is all, senses that it came after he told her about his own past. It seems to have divided them, though he cannot understand the reason for this.
“Shall we go to the smoking saloon?” he suggests.
“Why, so that he can follow us there as well?” she challenges.
He sees her point but knows also that their location will not change the man’s whereabouts, that he will continue to follow them, to shadow them until he makes the decision to approach. It is only a matter of when, Henri knows. Something stirs in him then. A realization that they are running out of time, that it is all barreling toward an end and they have yet to really start.
“Louise,” he says, the name still unfamiliar on his lips. “Louise, what happened in Belgrade, I—”
The look she sets on him stops him cold. They remain like that for several minutes, maybe more—it certainly feels like it, Henri thinks.
“I’ve had enough,” Louise says, starting to stand, and he wonders for a moment what exactly it is that she means. “I think we should ask the gentleman if he’s lost, don’t you?”
Henri is about to tell her that they won’t do that, that it’s the most idiotic idea he can think of, when he realizes that she’s already standing, already opening the door, an incessant buzzing in his ears the only thing he can hear in that moment.
Louise steps forward, but before she can utter so much as a word to the stranger in the corridor, the night attendant is standing before her. Both Louise and the attendant jump back, startled by the other’s appearance. “My apologies, mademoiselle,” he begins, covered up by her saying, “No, don’t be silly, that was my fault entirely.”
They stand for a moment like that, unsure how to proceed. Then the attendant seems to recall himself, looks to Louise again, and says, “We have a compartment in our sleeping car that is empty until we reach Istanbul. I thought that, perhaps, mademoiselle might be more comfortable there overnight?”
He can see the surprise on her face, can feel her turn to him, just slightly. There is only one answer that makes sense, but still, he finds himself hoping she will give another. “Yes,” she says. “Yes, of course.”
The attendant smiles. “If you will please follow me.”
“Now?” she asks.
The attendant looks confused. “Yes, it is ready for you now.”
“I’ll just collect my things.” She turns, steps back into the compartment, avoiding his eyes. She reaches for her satchel—she is still wearing her coat—and hesitates. “Well, I suppose this is good night,” she says, looking back toward him.
Henri nods. “Bonsoir.”
The attendant clears his throat again. “Shall we?” he asks, indicating the direction in which they should begin.
“Yes,” Louise says again. “Yes, of course.”
Before he can gather himself to say anything, they are gone, through the vestibule and into the next carriage, leaving Henri alone. For the next few minutes, the compartment is silent, and he can feel the emptiness that her absence has left. He brushes this aside, knowing that he has other business to take care of now, that it cannot be ignored any longer.
He stands, opens the door to his compartment. “Well?” he says to the man standing in the corridor.
The man smiles, heads toward the open door. “On se rencontre enfin.” He gestures for Henri to take a seat first. “That was convenient,” the man says, indicating the direction in which Louise has disappeared. “Gives us a chance to speak.” He’s not someone Henri recognizes from Spain, and he wonders if he’s been hired for this job, as he seems to speak a little French, though his words are hesitant, unsure, his accent difficult to understand. Henri’s own Spanish is decidedly better.
“Yes,” Henri replies, wondering if the man had any hand in the compartment that suddenly became available. He wonders whether there is anything to worry about, on Louise’s end, whether someone might be waiting for her there—but no, he hasn’t noticed anyone else, thinks the man is alone. An assault on this train would likely bring too much attention, he reasons. “Presumably you already know my name. Perhaps you should tell me yours, since this is an introduction of sorts.”
The man smiles. “For now, let’s say Fulano.”
Henri does the translation, smiles back. If he didn’t have to dislike the man in front of him, he suspects he might feel quite the opposite. “All right, Fulano. Well?”
“Well,” the man repeats. “You have the girl, you have the bag. Quel est le problème?”
Henri exhales. He has been waiting for this, preparing, and he tells himself to begin slowly, to be careful with his words. He switches to Spanish, to make certain the man understands. “The problem is that the money isn’t in her bag.”
The man frowns, sits up. He has lost some of his bravado, Henri can tell. Good. He had been expecting that—or hoping for it, at any rate.
“What do you mean it isn’t in the bag?”
The question tells him exactly the type of man he is dealing with. This is good also, Henri decides. “I checked the bag. I found this instead.”
The man looks down at the carbon receipt that Henri has handed him. “What is it?”
“A wire transfer.”
The man looks up, confused. “For what?”
“She transferred the money while she was in Paris.”
“To where?”
He points to the receipt. “Istanbul.”
The man curses. “Why would she do that?”
Henri tries his best not to frown, to show signs of irritation. “To avoid a situation like this, I would suppose. One where the money is forcefully taken from her.”
The man nods. “Let’s drag her off the train, then, take her somewhere to get the money.”
“It doesn’t work like that.” Again, Henri measures his tone. He speaks slowly, with authority, but does his best not to condescend. He’s met men like this before, has dealt with them throughout his career. He knows their lack of patience, their unwillingness to commit to the smart plan when a quicker alternative is available. He must make him understand that there is no choice here, that there is only one option. “The money has been transferred to a specific bank in Istanbul. It’s the only place that it can be retrieved.”
“So why don’t we jump the train, hurry our way to Istanbul, and grab the money ourselves? You can tell them that the money belongs to your wife.”
“Unless you have the exact identification for the woman’s name listed just there,” he says, pointing at the carbon copy, “they won’t be handing over any money.”
The man curses, looks out of his depth. He asks Henri, “So what do we do?”
“Exactly what I have been doing.” Henri indicates their surroundings, leans back in his seat, and closes his eyes. “We wait.” He means to leave it at that, but between the clanking of the train and the feel of the man’s gaze upon him, he struggles to remain silent. “How long?” he finds himself asking. He opens his eyes. “Since Granada.” It isn’t a question.
The man fixes him with a disappointed stare, crossing his legs, then his arms, settling back into his seat. He says, his voice heavy with disappointment, as if Henri’s actions have wounded him, “This was a test, my friend.” He shakes his head. “And you are failing.”
Henri closes his eyes again. The man is lying.
They aren’t friends—and Henri has already failed.