Israel he was fighting for
himself; he risked his life to save his lif& It was the logical thing to
do. Still, he looked forward to the tirne~--in five years? Ten?
Twenty?-when he would be too old for field work, and they would bring him
home and sit him behind a desk, and he could find a nice Jewish girl and
marry her and settle down to enjoy the land he had fought for.
Meanwhile, having lost Professor Schulz, he was following the wife.
She continued to see the sights, escorted now by a young Arab who had
presumably been laid on by the Egyptians to take care of her while her
husband was away. In the evening the Arab took her to an Egyptian
restaurant for dinner, brought her home, and kissed her cheek under the
jacaranda tree in the garderL
The next morning Towfik went to the main post office and sent a coded
cable to his uncle in Rome:
SCHULZ MET AT AIRPORT BY SUSPECTED
LOCAL AGENT. SPENT TWO DAYS SIGHTSEE
ING. PICKED UP BY AFORESAID AGENT AND
DRIVEN DIRECTION QATTARA. SURVEIL
LANCE ABORTED. NOW WATCHING WIFF-
He was back in Zamalek at nine Am. At eleven-thirty he saw Fran Schulz
on a balcony, drinking coffee, and was able to figure out which of the
apartments was the Schulzes'-
By lunchtime the interior of the Renault had become very hot. Towfik ate
an apple and drank tepid beer from a bottle.
Professor Schulz arrived late in the afternoon, in the Same gray
Mercedes. He looked tired and a little rumpled, like a
22
TRiPLE
middle-aged man who had traveled too far. He left the car and went into the
building without looking back. After dropping him, the agent drove past the
Renault and looked straight at Towfik for an instant. There was nothing
Towfik could do about it.
Where had Schulz been? It had taken him most of a day to get there, Towfik
speculated; he had spent a night, a full day and a second night there; and.
it had taken most of today to get bacL Qattara was only one of several
possibilities: the desert road went all the way to Matruh on the
Mediterranean coast; there was a turnoff to Karkur Tohl in the far south;
with a change of car and a desert guide they could even have gone to a
rendezvous on the border with Libya.
At nine P.M. the Schulzes came out again. The professor looked refreshed.
They were dressed for dinner. They walked a short distance and hailed a
taxi.
Towfik made a decision. He did not follow them.
He got out of the car and entered the garden of the building. He stepped
onto the dusty lawn and found a vantage point behind a bush from where he
could see into the hall through the open front door. The Nubian caretaker
was sitting on a low wooden bench, picking his nose.
Towfik waited.
Twenty minutes later the man left his bench and disappeared into the back
of the building.
Towfik hurried through the hall and ran, soft-footed, up the staircase.
He had three Yale-type skeleton keys, but none of them fitted the lock of
apartment three. In the end he got the door open with a piece of bendy
plastic broken off a college setsquare.
He entered the apartment and closed the door behind him.
It was now quite dark outside. A little light from a streetlamp came
through the unshaded windows. Towfik drew a small flashlight from his
trousers pocket, but he did not switch it on yet.
The apartment was large and airy, with white-painted walls and
English-colonial furniture. It had the, sparse, chilly look of a place
where nobody actually lived. There was a big drawing room, a dining room,
three bedrooms and a kitchen. After a quick general survey Towfik started
snooping in earnest.
23
Ken Folleff
The two smaller bedrooms were bare. In the larger one. Towfik went
rapidly through all the drawers and cupboards. A wardrobe held the rather
gaudy dresses of a woman past her prime: bright prints, sequined gowns,
turquoise and orange and pink. The labels were American. Schulz was an
Austrian national, the cable had said, but perhaps he lived in the USA.
Towfik