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traffic roar that filled all the air around. The broad highway directly beneath me -- and about seventy feet beneath me -- appeared to be inextricably jammed with clanging tram-cars, hooting vehicles and hundreds upon hundreds of motor-scooters and bicycles, all of whose drivers appeared to be bent on instant suicide. It appeared inconceivable that any of those two-wheeled gladiators could reasonably expect any insurance policy covering a life expectancy of more than five minutes, but they appeared to regard their imminent demise with an insouciant bravado which never fails to astonish the newcomer to Amsterdam. As an afterthought, I hoped that if anyone was going to fall or be pushed from the balcony it wasn't going to be me.
    I looked up. Mine was obviously -- as I had specified -- the top storey of the hotel. Above the brick wall separating my balcony from that of the suite next door, there was some sort of stone-carved baroque griffin supported on a stone pier. Above that again -- perhaps thirty inches above -- ran the concrete coaming of the roof. I went inside.
    I took from the inside of the case all the things I'd have found acutely embarrassing to be discovered by other hands. I fitted on a felt-upholstered underarm pistol which hardly shows at all if you patronize the right tailor, which I did, and tucked a spare magazine in a back trouser pocket. I'd never had to fire more than one shot from that gun, far less have to fall back on the spare magazine, but you never know, things were getting worse all the time. I then unrolled the canvas-wrapped array of burglarious instruments -- this belt again, and with the help of an understanding tailor again, is invisible when worn round the waist -- and from this sophisticated plethora extracted a humble but essential screwdriver. With this I removed the back of the small portable fridge in the kitchen -- it's surprising how much empty space there is behind even a small fridge -- and there cached all I thought it advisable to cache. Then I opened the door to the corridor. The floor-waiter was still at his post.
    'Where's my coffee?' I asked. It wasn't exactly an angry shout but it came pretty close to it.
    This time I had him on his feet first time out.
    'It come by dumb-waiter. Then I bring.'
    'You better bring fast.' I shut the door. Some people never learn the virtues of simplicity, the dangers of over-elaboration. His phoney attempts at laboured English were as unimpressive as they were pointless.
    I took a bunch of rather oddly shaped keys from my pocket and tried them, in succession, on the other door. The third fitted -- I'd have been astonished if none had. I pocketed the keys, went to the bathroom and had just turned the shower up to maximum when the outer doorbell rang, followed by the sound of the door opening. I turned off the shower, called to the floor-waiter to put the coffee on the table and turned the shower on again. I hoped that the combination of the coffee and the shower might persuade whoever required to be persuaded that here was a respectable guest unhurriedly preparing for the leisurely evening that lay ahead but I wouldn't have bet pennies on it. Still, one can but try.
    I heard the outer door close but left the shower running in case the waiter was leaning his ear against the door -- he had the look about him of a man who would spend much of his time leaning against doors or peering through keyholes. I went to the front door and stooped. He wasn't peering through this particular keyhole. I opened the door fractionally, taking my hand away, but no one fell into the hallway, which meant that either no one had any reservations about me or that someone had so many that he wasn't going to run any risks of being found out: a great help either way. I closed and locked the door, pocketed the bulky hotel key, poured the coffee down the kitchen sink, turned off the shower and left via the balcony door: I had to leave it wide open, held back in position by a