The Foreign Correspondent by Alan Furst Read Free Book Online Page A

landed hard.
    “Carlo?”
    Weisz fought his way upright, and, taking baby steps, circled the car and put both hands on the trunk. “Try it now.”
    The engine raced as the wheels spun themselves deeper into the grooves they’d built. “Not so much gas!”
    The window squeaked as Salamone cranked it down. “What?”
    “Gently, gently.”
    “Allright.”
    Weisz pushed again. There would be no Liberazione this week.
    From a boulangerie on the corner, a baker appeared, in white undershirt, white apron, and a white cloth knotted at the corners that covered his head. The wood-burning ovens of the bakeries had to be fired up at three in the morning, Weisz could smell the bread.
    The baker stood next to Weisz and said, “Now we do it.” After three or four tries, the Renault shot forward, into the path of a taxi, the only other car on the streets of Paris that morning. The driver swerved away, blew his horn, shouted, “What the hell’s the matter with you?” and circled his index finger beside his temple. The taxi slid on the snow, then drove across the bridge as Weisz thanked the baker.
    Salamone crossed the river, going five miles an hour, then turned left and right on the side streets until he found the rue Parrot, close by the Gare de Lyon railroad station. Here, for travelers and railroad workers, was an all-night café. Salamone left the car and walked to the glassed-in terrace. Seated alone at a table by the door, a short man in the uniform and hat of a conductor on the Italian railways was reading a newspaper and drinking an apéritif. Salamone tapped on the glass, the man looked up, finished his drink, left money on the table, and followed Salamone to the car. Maybe an inch or two over five feet tall, he wore a thick, trainman’s mustache, and his belly was big enough to spread the uniform jacket between the buttons. He climbed into the backseat and shook hands with Weisz. “Nice weather, eh?” he said, brushing the snow off his shoulders.
    Weisz said it was.
    “All the way up from Dijon, it’s doing this.”
    Salamone got into the front seat. “Our friend here works on the seven-fifteen to Genoa,” he said to Weisz. Then to the conductor: “That’s for you.” He nodded toward the parcel.
    The conductor lifted it up. “What’s in here?”
    “Galley trays, for the Linotype. Also money, for Matteo. And the newspaper, with a makeup sheet.”
    “Christ, must be a lot of money, you can look for me in Mexico.”
    “It’s the trays, they’re zinc.”
    “Can’t he get trays?”
    “He says not.”
    The conductor shrugged.
    “How’s life at home?” Salamone said.
    “It doesn’t get any better. Confidenti everywhere, you have to watch what you say.”
    “You stay at the café until seven?” Weisz said.
    “Not me. I go to the first-class wagon-lit and have a snooze.”
    “Well, we better be going,” Salamone said.
    The conductor got out, carrying the parcel with both hands. “Please be careful,” Salamone said. “Watch your step.”
    “I watch it all,” the conductor said. He grinned at the idea and shuffled off through the snow.
    Salamone put the car into gear. “He’s good at it. And you can’t ever tell, about that. The one before him lasted a month.”
    “What happened to him?”
    “Prison,” Salamone said. “In Genoa. We try and send a little something to the family.”
    “Costly, this business we’re in,” Weisz said.
    Salamone knew he meant more than money, and shook his head in sorrow. “Most of it I keep to myself, I don’t tell the committee more than they need to know. Of course, I’ll fill you in as we go along, just in case, if you see what I mean.”
      
    20 January. It stayed cold and gray, the snow mostly gone, except for soot-blackened mounds that clogged the gutters. Weisz went to the Reuters bureau at ten, up near the Opéra Métro station, close by the Associated Press, the French Havas bureau, and the American Express office. He stopped there first.