6

“Darling,” Lisa said with a faint frown, laying aside the script she had been reading, “would you please stop that incessant pacing? This script is bad enough without my trying to read it while you do an imitation of a tiger in a cage! You are going to wear out Willi’s nice carpet. And you are also making me very nervous. Please?”

“Yes, sweet,” Kek said absentmindedly. He glared resentfully at the telephone and resumed his marching up and down. Two days! Certainly there wasn’t anything in the scheme he had proposed to Waldeck that required two days to decide on! If the blond man was thinking of trying the scheme alone; if he was under the impression—

“Darling! You didn’t hear a word I said before, did you? You’re still pacing!”

“Sorry,” Kek said abruptly, and dropped into a chair within easy sight of the telephone, glaring through the doorway at the instrument as if its failure to ring were at least partially its own fault.

Lisa studied his black expression critically, one finger holding her place in the new script.

“And you know, darling,” she remarked thoughtfully, “you haven’t had that smug look lately.”

“Haven’t I? No, I expect I haven’t.” Kek started to come to his feet and then fell back into the chair again. His hand unconsciously found and lit a cigarette; he snapped the match in his hand and tossed it toward the ashtray. “Damn! Two days! Do you suppose—” He suddenly seemed to realize he had been voicing his thoughts aloud, and he cut the sentence off almost in mid-word.

“Do I suppose what, darling?” Lisa was looking at him wide-eyed.

“Nothing, Lisa. Nothing at all.”

Lisa bent down, setting the script aside altogether, laying it face down on the floor beside her with a grimace for its poor quality. She took a bonbon from the box beside her chair, unwrapped it, popped it into her mouth, and licked her fingers daintily. She chewed it appreciatively, swallowed, and then brought her attention back to the matter at hand.

“Do you mean, Do I suppose that M’sieu Vries Waldeck has decided that even the teensy-weensy dangers in your scheme were just too much for a nervous little man like him?” She considered a moment. “Though he really isn’t so little, is he?”

Kek stared, eyes wide. He discovered his mouth had fallen open and instantly closed it. It normally took a great deal to disturb the aplomb of the very self-assured Kek Huuygens, but his lovely but slightly scatterbrained Lisa had just done it, and seemingly without effort.

“What in the devil are you talking about?”

“Or,” Lisa continued, her voice slightly curious, as if she would seriously like to know, “do you mean, Do I suppose that M’sieu Waldeck felt the scheme was an excellent one—which I agree it is, and I congratulate you on it, darling—but he felt he could find someone who would work with him on it for far less than the million-dollar fee you asked?” She smiled at him proudly. “It really was a lot of money to ask for, darling, but I do think it was worth it.”

“Lisa!” Kek sat straighter in his chair. His voice took on a dangerous tone. “How in the devil did you—” He stopped abruptly. “Do you mind explaining what you’re talking about?”

Lisa slipped off her shoes and tucked her feet under her in the large easy chair, prepared for a lengthy conversation.

“My darling Kek Huuygens,” she said with a quiet, almost superior smile, “did you honestly believe I thought you were an art appraiser? I don’t know a great many art appraisers—to be truthful, I know only one—and he isn’t the least bit like you. I know if an author put one on the stage with me—one like you, I mean—I would insist on a complete rewrite!”

“What on earth are you talking about?”

“I mean you’re nothing like a real art appraiser, darling. Not that you don’t know art, because I know you do, but the profession as a profession isn’t anywhere near as secretive as you make it. I have an uncle, you see, who is the one appraiser I know, and he works for The Hague Gallery, and he’s a little fat old man with rheumy eyes and an awfully big belly, and horribly pompous. He’s forever telling anyone who will listen about his discoveries; both the genuine paintings he uncovers—which he does with considerable aggressiveness, as if people were denying his word”—Lisa dropped her voice to an approximation of her uncle’s—“and the fakes he finds, which he tells us about with a good deal of glee.” Her voice had gone back up.

Despite himself, Kek had to smile. His Lisa never ceased to surprise.

“So you believe you have unmasked me as a non-art-appraiser simply because I’m neither rheumy-eyed, big-bellied, nor pompous?” He smiled at her. “Or simply because I’m not your uncle?”

“You’re pompous to a degree in your own way, darling,” Lisa said. She tilted her head to one side, considering him. “And I’m really quite pleased that you’re my husband and not my uncle. No; what really unmasked you was that my uncle dotes on publicity, and you shun it. And he travels very little and when he does he announces it weeks in advance, and you come and go with practically no notice, and keep it all very secret.”

“And on this extremely scientific basis, you have become convinced that my being an art appraiser has to be a pose.”

Lisa smiled at him. “That, and, of course, my conversation with M’sieu Vries Waldeck …”

“I see.” Kek’s smile had disappeared; there was a hardness in his gray eyes that Lisa had never seen before, but which she had long since suspected could appear. It was one of the things that made Kek so attractive to her. “But tell me something, Lisa: how does my failure to meet the rigid qualifications for art appraising as set forth by your odious uncle explain why you went to Vries Waldeck and inquired into my private affairs?”

“Because I was curious, of course, darling.” Lisa’s tone rebuked him for being dense. “Incidentally, he took me to a lovely restaurant, the Chambord. They have a Green Room and a Blue Room—”

“I know the Chambord.”

“—and he had to take me there because his club, you see, is limited to men. Don’t ask me why.”

“Probably,” Kek suggested with a touch of honest asperity, “because there has to be at least one place in this world where a man can go to escape a woman’s curiosity. And just what did he tell you?”

“A thousand fascinating things about you, darling. And all about the scheme of yours, of course.”

“And just why did he tell you?”

“Because he wanted my opinion, of course. M’sieu Waldeck is a Walloon, and I’m Walloon on my father’s side, and we Walloons have a tendency to be quite knowledgeable where money is concerned. Or possibly, appreciative would be a better word.” She smiled at him pleasantly.

“I see. And just what was your opinion?”

“But I already told you, darling. I thought your scheme was simply wonderful.” She hesitated momentarily, a tiny frown crossing her pure brow. “Of course there were several things I thought might be improved. Little things,” she hastened to add. “Minor things, but still …”

“Oh?” Kek tried his best to invest his tone with scathing sarcasm but discovered, as so many had before him, that it is practically impossible with one syllable.

“Yes. And M’sieu Waldeck agreed with me. The question of safety boxes, for example. I thought that a safe at home would be much better. Once the money is paid and divided a safe-deposit box might be better, but at the beginning …” She allowed it to trail off.

“Anything else?”

“Yes; the question of an office. A needless expense, darling. And a secretary—I’m quite capable of typing a few letters—”

“In English?” Kek asked, now allowing his sarcasm full rein.

“But why would they have to be in English? They would only have to be translated when they got to Brussels. Actually, French would be much more logical.”

It was true. Kek bit his lip. “Go on.”

“That’s really all, darling. As I said, only very minor points. M’sieu Waldeck—” The telephone suddenly shrilled from the hallway. Lisa swung her stockinged feet to the floor, forestalling Kek from arising. “I’ll get it, darling.” She padded silently into the hall and picked up the telephone.

“Hello? Oh, hello, M’sieu Waldeck.” Her hand came up abruptly to hold an impatient Kek in place. “No; I’m sorry but he isn’t here at the moment. But I’ll be happy to give him your message. What? I’m quite sure it will be fine. He’ll be there at twelve sharp tomorrow. And M’sieu Waldeck—” There was a moment’s pause; she cupped the receiver and winked at Kek broadly. “—Vries, then—I want to thank you for a lovely time yesterday. The flowers on the table were particularly thoughtful. How you ever discovered roses were my favorite, I shall never know. Fortunately I’m not a curious woman, so I shall allow you your secret and not even attempt to find out.” She made a moue at Kek and then blew him a kiss. “Of course, M’sieu—I mean, Vries. Thank you again. I hope so, too. Good-bye …”

She hung up with an elfin grin and padded back into the living room, bending over Kek in his chair, and tenderly kissing his cheek.

“At his club, darling, lunch, tomorrow.” Her smile, Kek noted, had that touch of smugness she always seemed to criticize in him. “Just to settle the final details, M’sieu Waldeck explained. We’ll be sailing—first class, incidentally—on Saturday morning at ten o’clock, for your—our—adopted country.”

Kek stared at her. “Waldeck—Vries to you—said that?”

“No, darling,” Lisa said airily, and slipped down into the chair with him. Kek willingly slid over, accommodating her lush body but not so much as to not enjoy its soft contact. “I said that. I stopped downtown after lunch yesterday and arranged our passage on the Ile de France.”

Kew smiled at her. “You were that sure?”

She kissed his cheek. “Let’s say I had a feeling. Anyway, we sail from Le Havre at nine in the morning, which means we’ll either have to leave here the evening before and practically spend the night on trains, or else give up Willi’s apartment a day earlier and stay in a hotel there the night before …”

They actually sailed on the following Tuesday rather than on the Saturday; at noon sharp rather than at ten A.M.; from Rotterdam rather than from Le Havre; and on the S.S. Nieuw Amsterdam of the Holland Line rather than the Ile de France.

“You’re just changing everything about to try and prove your masculine superiority,” Lisa said with a pout. “You know perfectly well that my arrangements were excellent.”

“But, my sweet,” Kek explained. “The food! It’s much better on the Dutch ships. It’s true, you know.”

“Kek Huuygens! You’re about as Dutch as I am! Less, actually. At least my mother was Flemish!”

“Then you should be in complete agreement,” Kek said. “And also, of course, I happen to have a dinner engagement on Monday in The Hague. Not”—he added with a twinkle in his eye—“with your fat uncle, the rheumy-eyed but noted art appraiser of the gallery there.”

“Nor with a woman, I hope.” It was said dangerously.

“No, sweet. Actually, with an old friend—male, I assure you—from Switzerland.”

“His name?”

“I forget,” Kek said, and smiled.

Lisa clenched her jaw. “Am I invited?”

“You are not, my sweet.” Kek’s smile turned tender. “I insist on having some secrets from my wife. I consider it essential to a successful marriage. Fortunately, I heard you telling our mentor, M’sieu Waldeck, that you are not the curious type, so I don’t even have to worry about that.”

“Kek Huuygens, don’t be cute!” Lisa clamped her mouth closed on her next words, bringing out her best histrionic talent, but it echoed hollowly at best. “You know, darling, at times you can be difficult,” she said, forcing her voice to be even, but the true state of her emotions was demonstrated by the violence with which she attacked the last of her packing.

“Thank you, dear,” Kek said gratefully.

He made it sound as if he had managed, after the four months of their marriage, to finally eke a compliment from his wife.

The first evening out of Rotterdam, well past the Hook of Holland and out into the choppy waters of the North Sea, did much to convince Lisa that at least one part of Kek’s alleged excuse for choosing the Nieuw Amsterdam was true. The food was exceptional, the wine superb, and Lisa—whose metabolism permitted her healthy Walloon appetite to be satisfied without changing her lovely figure—did full justice to the menu. They had a Dutch gin after their meal, and the waiter, overjoyed with the obvious appreciation of the cuisine, brought out the head chef to share in the glory. This worthy’s delight in meeting and pleasing the famous Mlle. Lisa Nieuport, whom he had once had the pleasure of seeing on the stage of the Odéon in Amsterdam, seemed to augur well for their culinary care throughout the journey.

Nor was the head chef (or the waiter) alone in his admiration. The captain, a man who hated the ritual of his evening roundtable and distrusted all those changing faces that partook of it, made a point of inviting M’sieu Huuygens and his beauteous wife to his table twice—each time seating Lisa to his left and Kek beside some Holland Line director’s wife, usually at the foot of the table, if roundtables can be said to have feet. All in all, it was everything that a traveling lady could desire.

Lisa also soon discovered that on the smaller Nieuw Amsterdam—smaller, that is, than the originally proposed Ile de France—her reputation made her much more of an attraction, even to the average passenger. Each morning after a delightful breakfast in their cabin, she held court in the main lounge, while Kek either played shuffleboard on the enclosed Promenade Deck, or read, or explored the ship in the company of one of the engineers. In the afternoon Lisa and Kek usually played bridge, almost always with a young couple they had met aboard and admired—Peter and Emy Van der Mol, newlyweds from Eindhoven on their way to Florida in the United States for their honeymoon. Their evenings were also frequently spent in company with the Van der Mols, although the ship’s officers usually joined them to share Lisa and Emy for dancing purposes.

Despite the lateness of the season and their curving course across the North Atlantic, the trip was most pleasant. The sea remained unusually calm for November in those latitudes, and the sun marched across the brilliant blue of a cloudless sky. Only those brave souls who ventured to the upper boat decks, above the protected Promenade level, discovered the biting sting of the arctic air. Lisa found herself quite happy that Kek had changed their sailing plans, and even the incident of the meerschaum pipe failed to disturb her for any length of time. Or at least failed to serve as a point of argument for very long.

It was on the third day at sea that Kek appeared at the bridge table in the lounge sporting a new and deeply curved meerschaum pipe. Lisa had been waiting for the Van der Mols and Kek, sitting alone at the table, idly shuffling a new deck of cards as she waited. She looked up at his approach and then frowned incredulously.

“What in the world is that?”

“What in the world is what, sweet?”

“That hideous thing in your mouth that—incidentally—makes your speech practically unintelligible, darling.”

“Hideous?” Kek removed the pipe from his mouth in order to allow the full force of his righteous indignation to be projected. “It’s the best pipe they had in the entire ship’s stores. If I told you what it cost, your Walloonian sense of values would appreciate it, if only for that! It has a little silver cap hinged to the bowl,” he went on, and touched it with his forefinger to demonstrate, “that makes it much safer on deck than cigarettes. Less ash blowing about, to get into people’s eyes, or to burn up the ship …”

“If you look carefully, darling,” Lisa said coldly, “you may note that you are not on deck. You are in the lounge. Nor have I seen you on any deck except the Promenade, which is enclosed and heated.” She sniffed. “A pipe! You look like an undergraduate.”

“But, sweet,” Kek objected, drawing up a chair and dropping into it, “I thought you were violently opposed to my cigarette smoking. So therefore a pipe—”

“I’m opposed to smoking in any form, and you know it.”

“But a pipe?” Kek looked amazed. “I thought all women loved to see a man smoking a pipe.”

“Then you thought wrong, darling. I—”

“That’s really not too polite, sweet,” Kek said admonishingly, and blew a mouthful of smoke in the general direction of the ceiling. “Peter smokes a pipe constantly, and Emy seems to enjoy it.”

“Except that you’re not Peter, and I’m not Emy. Peter is just out of the university. You’re quite a bit older.”

“Does one ever get too old for a pipe?” Kek asked wonderingly. “I thought it was quite the other way around. My grandfather, now—” He looked up, smiling, dropping the subject as being inappropriate. “Ah. Hello, Peter. Hello, Emy.”

“Hello, Kek, Lisa …” The two seated themselves across from each other and Peter smiled at Kek about the well-chewed bite of his ancient briar. “Well! I see I’ve finally convinced you that a pipe is far healthier than those cigarettes you used to smoke.”

“I love the smell of a pipe,” Emy said idly, and started to shuffle one of the card decks. She was a petite, pretty girl with a swirl of dark brown hair over an oval face, and large violet eyes. She turned to Lisa, smiling. “Don’t you?”

“Adore it,” Lisa said flatly. “Shall I start the deal?”

The game proceeded.

“Ah,” Peter said, arranging his cards, “I see you also followed my advice in your selection of tobacco, Kek. A mixture of Virginia and Venezuelan, actually. It’s probably the most expensive tin of blend in the ship’s store, but well worth it. Don’t you agree?”

“Completely,” Kek said, and inundated the table with puffs of smoke, to prove it.

Lisa choked a moment and then controlled herself. She stared at the flat metal box, her Walloon sense of values outraged, not to mention her sense of smell, and then reached out, picking it up. Her eye caught the price tag.

“It’s also the smallest and thinnest tin of tobacco in the world for the price,” she said disapprovingly.

“Ah!” Peter said, in the pleased tone of one whose argument has just been won for him by his opponent. “But that’s just the point, don’t you see? It doesn’t bulge your pockets all out of shape like those American or British packets.”

Kek had completed arranging his cards. “One club.”

Peter considered his hand and sighed. “I pass.”

Kek smiled across the table at Lisa, returning to the previous subject, but only for the purpose of eliminating it for all time.

“In any event, sweet, one doesn’t buy tobacco on the basis of the size or shape of the tin, but for its taste. And this one certainly has a grand aroma, doesn’t it?”

As if to prove it, he puffed some across the table.

“One diamond,” Lisa said, and then turned to Emy, smiling with false sweetness. “I’m sorry, my dear. It’s only proper to announce one’s bidding conventions. In our system, a diamond response”—she glared at Kek—“is a denial …”

It was not until the final morning of their voyage that Lisa raised any question regarding the Big Scheme—as she had come to think of it—and in so doing she demonstrated a certain nervousness that surprised Kek. He had come to consider his wide-eyed, fluffy blond Lisa as being almost beyond nerves, and certainly a lot tougher than he had suspected during their courting days and the first months of their marriage. True, at night when they retired, any masterfulness on her part disappeared completely under the fierce driving force of her passion, demanding domination, exhibiting submission as being both essential and delightful to her. But a subdued Lisa in the bright light of dawn was something else again. As they completed their final packing she paused to stare at him.

“Kek, darling?”

“Yes, sweet?”

“There’s just one thing …”

“Yes?”

“This matter of all those different names,” Lisa said in a worried tone. “Are they all really necessary?” She pushed aside the suitcase she had been packing and dropped onto the unmade bed, frowning up at him with concern. “How will you possibly arrange that many sets of identification papers?”

For a moment Kek just stared at her, and then he laughed.

“My darling Lisa,” he said, “America is not Europe, as you will quickly come to discover. It’s really an amazing place, by continental standards. If one is too old to register for conscription in the army; or if one isn’t required by the circumstances of his job to have a social security number—which is a type of old-age pension—then he can easily pass his entire life without any official identification whatsoever. In fact, if he has no desire to travel abroad, he needs no passport, and if he doesn’t want to drive an automobile, he needs no license. He can truly pass his life with no papers of any kind.”

Lisa stared at him in disbelief.

“No police card? No carnet?”

“Exactly. Remarkable, isn’t it? And if this lack of official recognition bothers one, it’s the easiest thing in the world to arrange whatever documentation one’s little heart desires. Or that one’s ego demands. There are Diners Club cards, gasoline credit cards, hotel credit cards—” He grinned. “I could go on until we docked, sweet, but then you’d still have your packing to finish.”

Lisa refused to be put off.

“But without a police card, how does one—?”

“To begin with, sweet, there are no police cards in America. Strange but true,” Kek said. “The only thing you require to establish a name for yourself”—he smiled at the phrase—“is merely an address, and this you arrange by renting a postal box at any postal substation. If they insist on a home address, you merely point out you are moving and between addresses. The post office sends the bill for the box rent to the box itself, and if you pay it on time and do not allow mail to accumulate too long, you are completely safe. And once you have post office box numbers as addresses, you are free to open bank accounts—as long as you have the money, of course,” he added with a grin.

“And then?”

“Then?” Kek shrugged. “Then America is just like the rest of the world. With bank accounts, all doors open. Credit cards in any name the bank account is in, charge accounts; everything …”

There was a moment’s silence. Then Lisa said, “It sounds like a carrousel.” She shook her head. “A whirligig. A merry-go-round.”

“It is,” Kek assured her gravely. “Exactly. Beautifully endless and completely mad.”

“But—”

“No ‘buts,’” Kek said. “Believe me, there’ll be no problem on that score.” His tone closed the subject; he tightened the final strap on his last bag, set it on the floor near the door, and rang for the room steward. The bell was answered almost immediately; Kek indicated the mountain of luggage already prepared and the final one still spread-eagled on the bed.

“Madame’s luggage, of course,” he said, “will go under the initial of her professional name: Mlle. Nieuport …”

“But, of course!” the steward said, amazed to think anyone would even consider it otherwise with a celebrity such as Mlle. Nieuport.

An envelope changed hands. Kek pulled on his coat, jammed his meerschaum into his mouth as usual, and moved toward the door, skirting the waiting steward, speaking to Lisa past the white-jacketed figure.

“I’ll see you on deck, sweet. We’ll be getting in soon and the view of New York harbor is worth the trip. I don’t want to miss it.”

“Wait for me!” Lisa wailed. She flung the balance of her underthings haphazardly into her suitcase and slammed it shut, only to reopen it a moment later with a muttered Flemish epithet in order to tuck in a bit of trailing lace, and finally latch it. She smiled brightly at the adoring steward, picked up her fur coat, and marched from the cabin with Kek.

They climbed the interior stairway the one flight from their level to the Promenade Deck and pushed through the heavy doors to be greeted by a blast of icy air. Deckhands had dropped the majority of the windows on the normally enclosed deck for some obscure reason of their own, and the brisk wind sweeping over the choppy gray waters of the bay hit Lisa and Kek squarely. Other passengers were also braving the freezing morning, huddled in their overcoats, staring toward the distant skyline of the city rising faintly through the mist; to their left the Statue of Liberty could be seen, looking a bit forlorn on its lonely pedestal so far from any activity except for a tug or two that chugged past, hooting in friendly fashion.

They saw the Van der Mols leaning over one of the windowsills and joined them. With many of the other passengers the two had been watching a small cutter jauntily bouncing over the water, bearing in the direction of the barely moving Nieuw Amsterdam. It flew an official ensign; obviously it carried the immigration personnel. Kek patted his pockets in vain and then turned to Peter.

“How about borrowing some tobacco? Mine’s packed and the ship’s store is closed in port.”

“You and that pipe!” Lisa sniffed.

“Of course.” Peter handed over the tin and turned back to watch the cutter while Kek stuffed the bowl of the meerschaum. The small boat drew close to the huge side of the ship and then bounced away, almost coquettishly. A ship’s ladder had been lowered, angling down from the purser’s deck; a stocking-capped seaman came forward in the cutter while the small boat made another pass at the behemoth. The ladder railing was expertly caught with a boat hook this time, and held firmly while six men hurriedly clambered from the bobbing cutter and made their way up the swaying ladder. Each was clad in a blue uniform with brass buttons; none wore an overcoat. Each was also encumbered with an attaché case. Peter took back his tobacco tin, tucked it into his pocket, and shook his head at the climbing men.

“No coats in this weather! They have to be crazy!”

Kek turned his back on the breeze and applied a match to his pipe. With smoke finally billowing about him, he turned back to the others.

“You folks are off to Florida by train this afternoon, eh?”

“Right,” Peter grinned. “If we wanted cold weather, Interlocken or the Jungfrau is a lot closer. Or Eindhoven itself, for that matter. What are your plans?”

“I cabled for reservations at the Pennsylvania Hotel,” Kek said, “and just had them confirmed. It’s just across Seventh Avenue from your railroad station. We’ll certainly have to get together for a drink, or lunch, or something before you leave.”

“We certainly shall. Look,” Peter said, thinking, “a friend of my father’s is sending a driver together with a station wagon to meet the ship and take us and our bags to the station. So we won’t get lost, I imagine, though we’ve both been here before and we speak the language. Anyway, why don’t we all go there together after customs? I’m sure the car will be plenty big enough. The Americans are ridiculously extravagant in matters like automobiles.”

“Fine!” Kek said, and thought a moment. “I’ll tell you what—”

He was forced to pause. The ship’s loudspeaker system came on the air, the sound echoing hollowly, bouncing eerily from davits, the half-opened windows, the stacked deck chairs lashed against bulkheads, as well as the straining passengers. It requested all passengers to assemble in the main lounge for the formality of immigration and requested them not to forget their passports. The announcement was made first in Dutch, and was then followed in both French and English. When the last echo had died away, Kek returned his attention to the other three.

“As I was saying, you can do me a favor and take Lisa to the hotel. You’ll go through customs quickly in weather this cold, mainly because the customs shed here is open and unheated. Lisa can check into our suite at the Pennsylvania and you are more than welcome to use it as a place to wait out your train. Your driver can leave your bags at the station and deliver the checks to you at the hotel, and then go on his way.” He grinned. “You can even order the drinks and have them ready when I finally get there.”

The three stared at him in surprise.

“And just where do you plan on going?” Lisa demanded.

“Me? Nowhere, sweet. Just through customs, like everyone else,” Kek said innocently, and then paused a moment to put his thoughts in order, to explain the thing properly. “You see, when I came to this country for the first time—which was a little over three years ago—the very first man I met happened, by chance, to be the chief of the customs service here in New York.” He shrugged expansively, but a bit ruefully. “Somehow he took a fancy to me …”

“And of course he knows you’ll be arriving on the Nieuw Amsterdam,” Lisa said sardonically.

“He’ll find out soon enough,” Kek prophesied, “and he’ll want to see me. I imagine it’s mainly because he has envied me the many things I’ve been able to do in my lifetime that he has not.” He waved a hand languidly. “Like being married to Lisa, for example.”

“Wonderful,” Lisa said. “Especially since you must have met this man at least two years before you met me.”

“I merely said, for example. At any rate,” Kek went on, “each time I land in New York, he insists on seeing me and spending hours talking over old times.”

“What old times?”

But Lisa’s eyes were twinkling now; she suddenly knew what Kek was talking about. Her luncheon with Vries Waldeck at the Chambord had revealed many things about her husband, and she was rather surprised at herself for allowing the diversion of the ship’s crossing to have permitted herself to forget them.

“Any old times,” Kek said expansively. “You don’t know the man, sweet, so you’re really in no position to understand his mental processes. Such as they are.” He hustled them toward one of the large heavy doors leading from the deck. “And there’s no sense in freezing out here any longer when they’re waiting for us in the main lounge. Who knows, they may even be serving drinks …”

The others discovered the truth of Kek Huuygens’ prediction when they saw him being approached and spoken to in the customs shed by one of the uniformed inspectors, and a moment later saw the inspector pick up his bags and walk off toward one of the offices at the end of the large, drafty dock. Kek waved to them with a grin, shrugged his shoulders to indicate his helplessness, and then the door closed behind him.

It was fully two hours later before he finally appeared at the door of the suite in the Pennsylvania Hotel. Peter was sitting in the living room as Kek tipped the bellboy and had his bags deposited just within the door.

“Well, well,” Peter said with a smile, “your friend really took up your time! For a while there I figured we’d been traveling with a famous smuggler, and that they’d have you in irons, or something, before we’d even get a chance to have that drink together.”

He was sitting on a comfortable sofa, a tall glass in his hand. Kek noticed a tray with whiskey, brandy, soda, and ice standing next to a nest of glasses on one of the tables. He slipped off his coat, dropping it onto a chair, and walked over to pour himself a stiff brandy.

“Nothing that dramatic, I’m afraid,” he said with a smile. “Where are the girls?”

“Your wife is unpacking, and I’m afraid my wife is sitting there watching and envying everything she sees.”

Kek grinned. He drank his brandy quickly, dug his meerschaum from his pocket, and then began the ritual of patting himself all over. Peter laughed and tossed across his tobacco tin.

“You’re going to be in serious trouble once we catch that train,” he said, smiling. “You’ll have nobody to borrow tobacco from.”

“I may even be driven to buy some,” Kek said with mock concern. “A terrible thought.” He turned toward the bedroom, packing the pipe as he went. “Let me just tell Lisa I made it here in one piece.”

He came back in a moment and tossed the tobacco tin back to Peter, who caught it expertly. Kek dropped into a chair, applied a match to his pipe, and once it was drawing to his satisfaction leaned his head back against the cushion in relaxation.

“She wasn’t particularly surprised that I got here,” he announced with a grin, and slowly shook his head. “You know? I can still feel the motion of the ship. It always lasts with me for several days.”

“So can I.”

“But at least you’ll be on a train in another six hours, and knowing those trains, you won’t feel the motion of the ship, believe me. You’ll feel the motion of the train. And count your blessings if you can even walk, let alone sleep.”

“In another hour, I’m afraid; not another six,” Peter said with true regret. “The train leaves at one o’clock.” He saw the shocked frown on Kek’s face and nodded. “I know—I thought it was later today, too, but it isn’t. Well, at least it’s nice to know that American travel agencies can make mistakes as well as Dutch ones.”

“That’s a shame. I’m just happy you hadn’t left before I came back. That would have been a tragedy. I’d hoped we could have lunch together.”

“I’d hoped so, too,” Peter said, “but Emy and I will have to eat on the train. And I’d better collect her and get moving.” He grinned. “Maybe we can eat while the train is still in the station. If what you say is true, we’ll probably spill less.”

“Much less,” Kek assured him gravely.

Peter finished his drink and came to his feet. “Well, it was fun. We were lucky to meet you people on the trip. We both enjoyed it.”

“And so did we,” Kek said sincerely.

Peter called his wife; the two women emerged from the bedroom.

“You know,” Kek said thoughtfully, “I never got to kiss the bride.”

“Then do it now,” Emy suggested with a smile. Kek pressed his lips to her cheek.

“That’s enough,” Lisa warned, and put her arm around Emy in a show of affection. The four moved to the door. “We have your address in Eindhoven, and once we get settled, we’ll be in touch.” The men shook hands and the women kissed; and then the Van der Mols were on their way. Lisa closed the door behind them and leaned back against it with a huge sigh.

“Thank the Lord!” she said fervently.

“What?” Kek frowned at her tone.

“Thank the Lord they’re finally gone!”

Kek was truly shocked. “I’m amazed at you! I liked them very much, and I thought you did, too!”

“Oh, I did,” Lisa assured him, moving from the door. “But that pipe!”

“Pipe?” Kek was mystified. “Peter’s briar?”

“No, darling. Your meerschaum. Now that the Van der Mols are gone you can stop smoking it, can’t you?”

“My dear Lisa, you become more unintelligible by the minute!”

“Do I, darling? And that tobacco tin that you traded with Peter on board ship just before we docked, and then traded back with him just a few minutes ago? Without—I’m happy to say—the slightest suspicion on his part? Would curiosity as to why you would want to do such a thing still be counted as unintelligible?”

Kek walked over and poured himself a stiff brandy. For a moment he considered offering one to Lisa and then decided against it. He drank it quickly and turned around to study his wife. She was watching him with a faint smile on her lips.

“My dear Lisa,” he said slowly, “at times you absolutely frighten me, do you know?”

“Oh, I hope not, darling,” she said sincerely. “It’s simply that I’ve always hated being kept out of secrets, even as a little girl.” Her look of curiosity returned. “Tell me, darling, what did your Swiss friend in The Hague ask you to bring in through customs that would fit in the bottom of a tobacco tin? Diamonds?”

“Yes, sweet.” Kek took the tin from his pocket, dumped the tobacco into the wastebasket, and shook out a small washed-chamois pouch. Lisa shook her head a bit disapprovingly.

“Don’t you think it was a bit dangerous, taking a chance of these being found and laid at your door, when it could jeopardize a scheme as big as the Big One?” Her tone of voice capitalized the words. “Just to do a favor for a friend?”

“Not quite a favor,” Kek said, and smiled. It was pleasant to discover one tiny facet of the operation which Lisa had not penetrated. “These will give me entrée to the people I need to borrow the initial funds from. Don’t you remember?”

Lisa smiled, proud of her husband once again.

“I should have known you wouldn’t take any chances with our million dollars, darling,” she said, and reached under one of the end tables for a telephone book.

Kek frowned at her. “And who do you plan on telephoning? You don’t know a soul in New York.”

“Why, rental agencies, darling,” Lisa said, surprised. “For a furnished apartment, of course. We want to get started as quickly as possible, don’t we? And besides,” she added, “do you know that behind the bedroom door in a little frame they have a sort of placard with the prices for this suite, and, darling, they are completely outrageous!”