the Historian (2005) by Elizabeth Kostova

Author:Elizabeth Kostova [Kostova, Elizabeth]
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2010-12-19T00:42:27.390000+00:00

Chapter 42

But can't you get the police to help? This place is overflowing with them, it seems.' Hugh James broke a piece of bread in half and took a hearty bite. 'What a dreadful thing to have happen in a foreign hotel.'

'We've called the police,' I assured him. 'At least I think we have, because the hotel clerk did it for us. He said no one could come until late tonight or early tomorrow morning, and not to touch anything. He's put us in new rooms.'

'What? Do you mean Miss Rossi's room was ransacked, too?' Hugh's great eyes grew rounder. 'Was anyone else in the hotel hit?'

'I doubt it,' I said grimly.

We were seated at an outdoor restaurant in Buda, not far from Castle Hill, where we could look out over the Danube toward the Parliament House on the Pest side. It was still very light and the evening sky had set up a blue-and-rose shimmer on the water. Hugh had picked out the spot it was one of his favorites, he said. Budapestians of all ages strolled the street in front of us, many of them pausing at the balustrades above the river to look at the lovely scene, as if they, too, could never get enough of it. Hugh had ordered several national dishes for me to try, and we had just settled in with the ubiquitous golden-crusted bread and a bottle of Tokay, a famous wine from the northeastern corner of Hungary, as he explained. We'd already dispensed with the preliminaries our universities, my erstwhile dissertation (he chuckled when I told him the scope of Professor Sssndor's misconceptions about my work), Hugh's research on Balkan history and his forthcoming book on Ottoman cities in Europe.

'Was anything stolen?' Hugh filled my glass.

'Nothing,' I said glumly. 'Of course, I hadn't left my money there, or any of my valuables and the passports are at the front desk, or maybe at the police station, for all I know.'

'What were they looking for, then?' Hugh toasted me briefly and took a sip.

'It's a very, very long story.' I sighed. 'But it fits in pretty nicely with some other things we need to talk about.'

He nodded. 'All right. Unto the breach, then.'

'If you'll take your turn, as well.'

'Of course.'

I drank half my glass for fortification and began at the beginning. I wouldn't have needed the wine to erase any doubts about telling Hugh James all of Rossi's story; if I didn't tell him everything, I might not learn everything he knew himself. He listened in silence, with obvious absorption, except when I mentioned Rossi's decision to conduct research in Istanbul, when he jumped. 'By Jove,' he said. 'I'd thought of going there myself. Going back, I mean I've been there twice, but never to look for Dracula.'

'Let me save you some trouble.' I refilled his glass this time and told him about Rossi's adventures in Istanbul and then about his disappearance, at which Hugh's eyes bulged, although he said nothing. Finally I

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