The Light of the Day - Eric Ambler [35]
“One moment, sir. There is something.” I had had an idea.
“What is it?”
“There is something that you could do, sir. If, before I speak to Harper, I could have a license as an official guide with tomorrow’s date on it, it might help.”
“How?”
“It would show that in the expectation of driving Miss Lipp on her tour, I had gone to the trouble and expense of obtaining the license. It would look as if I had taken him seriously. If he or she really wanted a driver for the car it might make a difference.”
He did not answer immediately. Then he said: “Good, very good.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“You see, Simpson, when you apply your intelligence to carrying out orders instead of seeing only the difficulties, you become effective.” It was just like The Bristle in one of his good moods. “You remember, of course,” he went on, “that, as a foreigner, you could not hold a guide’s license. Do you think Harper might know that?”
“I’m almost sure he doesn’t. If he does, I can say that I bribed someone to get it. He would believe me.”
“I would believe you myself, Simpson.” He chuckled fatuously, enchanted by his own joke. “Very well, you shall have it by noon, delivered to the hotel.”
“You will need a photograph of me for it.”
“We have one. Don’t tell me you have forgotten so soon. And a word of caution. You know only a few words of Turkish. Don’t attract attention to yourself so that you are asked to show the license. It might cause trouble with museum guards. You understand?”
“I understand.”
He hung up. I paid the proprietor for the call and left.
Outside, the man in the chauffeur’s cap was waiting up the street. He walked ahead of me back to the hotel. I suppose he knew why I had been to the café.
There was a guide to Istanbul on sale at the concierge’s desk. I bought one with the idea of brushing up on my knowledge of the Places of Interest and how to get to them. On my way down to my room I had to laugh to myself. “Never volunteer for anything,” my father had said. Well, I hadn’t exactly volunteered for what I was doing now, but it seemed to me that I was suddenly getting bloody conscientious about it.
I spent most of the following morning in bed. Just before noon I got dressed and went up to the foyer to see if Tufan had remembered about the guide’s license. He had; it was in a sealed Ministry of Tourism envelope in my mailbox.
For a few minutes I felt quite good about that. It showed, I thought, that Tufan kept his promises and that I could rely on him to back me. Then I realized that there was another way of looking at it. I had asked for a license and I had promptly received one; Tufan expected results and wasn’t giving me the smallest excuse for not getting them.
I had made up my mind not to have any drinks that day so as to keep a clear head for Harper; but now I changed my mind. You can’t have a clear head when there’s a sword hanging over it. I was careful though and only had three or four rakis. I felt much better for them, and after lunch I went down to my room to take a nap.
I must have needed it badly, for I was still asleep when the phone rang at five. I almost fell off the bed in my haste to pick it up, and the start that it gave me made my head ache.
“Arthur?” It was Harper’s voice.
“Yes.”
“You know who this is?”
“Yes.”
“Car okay?”
“Yes.”
“Then what have you been stalling for?”
“I haven’t been stalling.”
“Fischer says you refused to deliver the car.”
“You told me to wait for your instructions, so I waited. You didn’t tell me to hand the car over to a perfect stranger without any proof of his authority …”
“All right, all right, skip it! Where is the car?”
“In a garage near here.”
“Do you know where Sariyer is?”
“Yes.”
“Get the car right away and hit the Sariyer road. When you get to Yeniköy look at your mileage reading, then drive on towards Sariyer for exactly four more miles. On your right you’ll come to a small pier with some boats tied up alongside it. On the left of the road opposite the pier you