The Last Frontier Read Online Free PDF Page B

which they held hopeless people in fear-ridden thrall: they had learnt much from Hitler's Gestapo during the Second World War, and had that knowledge refined by their current nominal masters, the NKVD of Russia. But now the pupils had outdistanced their mentors, and they had developed flesh-crawling refinements and more terribly effective methods of terrorisation such as the others had not dreamed of.

But Colonel Szendro was still at the talking stage. He turned round in his seat, lifted Reynolds' bag from the back, set it on his lap and tried to open it. It was locked.

'The key,' Szendro said. 'And don't tell me there isn't one, or that it's lost. Both you and I, I suspect, Mr. Buhl, are long past that kindergarten stage.'

They were indeed, Reynolds thought grimly. 'Inside ticket pocket of my jacket.'

'Get it. And your papers at the same time.'

'I can't get at these.'

'Allow me.' Reynolds winced as Szendro's pistol barrel pushed hard against lips and teeth, felt the colonel slip the papers from his breast pocket with a professional ease that would have done credit to a skilled pickpocket. And then Szendro was back on his own side of the car, the bag open: almost, it seemed, without pausing to think, he had slit open the canvas lining and extracted a slim fold of papers, and was now comparing them with those he had taken from Reynolds' pockets.

'Well, well, well, Mr. Buhl. Interesting, most interesting. Chameleon-like, you change your identity in a moment of time. Name, birthplace, occupation, even your nationality all altered in an instant. A remarkable transformation.' He studied the two sets of documents, one in either hand. 'Which, if any, are we to believe?'

'The Austrian papers are fakes,' Reynolds growled. For the first time he stopped speaking in German and switched to fluent idiomatic Hungarian. 'I had word that my mother, who has lived in Vienna for many years, was dying. I had to have them.'

'Ah, of course. And your mother?'

'No more.' Reynolds crossed himself. 'You can find her obituary in Tuesday's paper. Maria Rakosi.'

'I'm at the stage now where I would be astonished if I didn't.' Szendro spoke also in Hungarian, but his accent was not that of Budapest, Reynolds was sure of that -- he had spent too many agonising months learning every last Budapest inflection and idiom from an ex-Professor of Central European languages of Budapest University. Szendro was speaking again. 'A tragic interlude, I am sure. I bare my head in silent sympathy -- metaphorically, you understand. So you claim your real name is Lajos Rakosi? A very well-known name indeed.'

'And a common one. And genuine. You'll find my name, date of birth, address, date of marriage all in the records. Also my -- '

'Spare me.' Szendro held up a protesting hand. 'I don't doubt it. I don't doubt you could show me the very school desk on which your initials are carved and produce the once-little girl whose books you once carried home from school. None of which would impress me in the slightest. What does impress me is the extraordinary thoroughness and care of not only yourself but the superiors who have so magnificently trained you for whatever purpose they have in mind. I do not think I have ever met anything quite like it.'

'You talk in riddles, Colonel Szendro. I'm just an ordinary Budapest citizen. I can prove it. All right, I did have fake Austrian papers. But my mother was dying, and I was prepared to risk indiscretion. But I've committed no crime against our country. Surely you can see that. If I wished, I could have gone over to the west. But I did not so wish. My country is my country, and Budapest is my home. So I came back.'

'A slight correction,' Szendro murmured. 'You're not coming back to Budapest -- you're going, and probably for the first time in your life.' He was looking Reynolds straight in the eyes when his expression changed. 'Behind you!'

Reynolds twisted round, a split second before he realised Szendro had shouted in