The Woman in the Fifth by Douglas Kennedy Read Free Book Online Page B

left his morning job to come to the hotel to bring you here because you were in some sort of trouble with the management. Or, at least, that is what he told me before he left. Adnan was very fond of you – and was looking forward to having you down the corridor from him. Were you fond of him?'
     
A pause. The question was asked in a perfectly level, unthreatening way – even though its subtext was glaringly obvious.
     
'I was very sick in the hotel – and he was very kind to me.'
     
'By "very kind" do you mean . . . ?'
     
'I mean, he showed me remarkable kindness when I could hardly stand up.'
     
'What sort of "remarkable kindness"?'
     
'I didn't fuck him, OK?' I said.
     
Monsieur Sezer let that angry outburst reverberate in the room for a moment or two. Then a small smile flashed across his thin lips before disappearing again. He continued as if he hadn't heard that comment.
     
'And when you left the hotel today with Adnan . . .'
     
I took him through the entire story, including Adnan telling me to walk ahead of him when we got caught between the two pairs of flics . He listened in silence, then asked, 'You are married?'
     
'Separated.'
     
'And the reason you are in Paris . . . ?'
     
'I am on sabbatical from the college where I teach. A sabbatical is kind of a leave of absence—'
     
'I know what it is,' he said. 'They mustn't pay much at the college where you teach, if you are interested in renting a chambre .'
     
I could feel my cheeks flush. Was I such an obvious liar?
     
'My circumstances are a little tight at the moment.'
     
'Evidently,' he said.
     
'What I'm most worried about right now is Adnan,' I said.
     
A wave of his hand.
     
'Adnan is finished. He will be on a plane back to Turkey in three days maximum. C'est foutu .'
     
'Can't you do anything to help him?'
     
'No.'
     
Another silence.
     
'So, do you want his chambre ?' he asked. 'It is nicer than the one I was going to show you.'
     
'Is the rent high?'
     
'It's four hundred and thirty a month.'
     
Thirty euros more than I had been quoted.
     
'I don't know,' I said. 'It's a little steep for me.'
     
'You really are in a bad place,' he said.
     
I gave him a guilty nod. He turned to the heavy who met me at the door and said something in Turkish. Mr Tough Guy gave him an equivocal shrug, then murmured a comment that made Monsieur Sezer's lips part into the thinnest and briefest of smiles.
     
'I have just asked Mahmoud here if he thinks you are on the run from the law. He said that you seemed too nervous to be a criminal. But I know that this "sabbatical" story is a fabrication – that you are talking rubbish – not that I really care.'
     
Another fast exchange in Turkish. Then: 'Mahmoud will take you to see the two chambres . I promise you that you will want Adnan's.'
     
Mahmoud nudged me and said, 'You leave bags here. We come back.'
     
I let go of the suitcase with wheels, but decided to keep the bag with my computer with me. Mahmoud muttered something in Turkish to Monsieur Sezer. He said, 'My associate wonders if you think all Turks are thieves?'
     
'I trust nobody,' I said.
     
I followed Mr Tough Guy down the stairs and across the courtyard to a door marked Escalier B . He punched in a code on a panel of buttons outside the door. There was the telltale click, he pushed the door open, then we headed up the stairs. They were narrow and wooden and spiral. The walls in the stairwell had been painted shit brown and were in an urgent need of a washing-down. But it was the smells that really got me: a noxious combination of bad cooking and blocked drains. The stairs were badly worn down. We kept heading upward, the climb steep. At the fourth floor, we stopped. There were two metal doors there. Mahmoud dug out a large bunch of keys and opened the door directly in front of us. We walked into a room which gave new meaning to the word 'dismal'. It was tiny – with yellowing linoleum, a single bed. There was stained floral wallpaper,