The Namesake by Fitzgerald Conor

Author:Fitzgerald, Conor [Fitzgerald, Conor]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub, azw3
Tags: Suspense
ISBN: 9781608198450
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA
Published: 2011-04-04T06:00:00+00:00

Damned phone. It was still under his hand, he picked it up – no, it was the one beside the bed. He rolled over, realizing the air had darkened considerably and grown cooler and wetter. ‘Pronto?’

‘Room 17.’

‘Huh?’

‘I’ll meet you there,’ said the manager, his voiced hushed with boyish excitement. ‘You’ll see. I’ve sent my daughter down to you. She’ll be there any moment.’

Someone knocked gently on the door, and Blume jumped out of bed and opened the door.

‘My father said to give you this.’ She handed him a neat stack of A4 paper. ‘And to go down to Room 17 immediately. Down those steps.’

The manager was waiting in the corridor below. ‘The German is not back yet but it’s getting dark. He’ll be here any moment,’ he said. He stopped outside Room 17 and opened the door. Beaming from ear to ear at his own cleverness, he then placed the spiral-bound notes in Blume’s hands. ‘I managed to get them all back into the spine. My fax machine is also a photocopier, so I thought I could copy them for you as I sent them, see? Then you can put this back in his room and the German will be none the wiser.’

Not bad, thought Blume, though he did not like the idea of the hotel manager being in too much on this, and definitely did not want him to watch as he opened Konrad’s suitcase and slipped the document back in. He nodded, took the file and closed the door in the eager manager’s face.

The manager knocked immediately.

‘No,’ said Blume. ‘You can’t come in here.’

The manager’s voice, hoarse with panic and excitement, came from behind the door. ‘The German’s walking up the steps. I just caught a glimpse of him. He’ll come in the door at the end of the corridor. It’ll take him only seconds . . . He’s going to catch us . . . Wait.’

Blume heard the manager move away from the door and his footfalls pounding down the corridor. He took his time even so, placing the document carefully in the position he remembered finding it. If Konrad walked in, well, it would be embarrassing, that was all. He closed the suitcase, walked quickly to the door, surveyed the room once more.

He slipped out of the room as the manager came running up the hall, breathless.

‘I pulled hard at the door so he couldn’t open it from the outside. Really hard like it was locked, not like someone was pulling it. He’ll have gone up the cliff path to get in, and then he’ll come down the stairs . . . that’s him. Quick, we can get out here.’

He ran down the corridor again. Blume followed reluctantly, and they exited the door the manager had been blocking. They ascended the steps back up to the parking area, past the camper van, and back into the hotel. The daughter and her father exchanging theatrical glances, Blume went back down to his room, dissatisfied.

Konrad had been willing to leave the documents unattended for hours.

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