Supplementary
The
Midnight Visitor
Robert Arthur
Sometimes appearances
can be deceptive, as in the case of Ausable, a secret agent, who despite his
common looks, with his resourcefulness and presence of mind outwits a deadly
criminal. Read the story to see how this happened.
AUSABLE did not fit any
description of a secret agent Fowler had ever read. Following him down the musty corridor of the gloomy
French hotel where Ausable had a room, Fowler felt let down. It was a small
room, on the sixth and top floor, and scarcely a setting for a romantic
adventure. Ausable was, for one thing, fat. Very fat. And then there was his
accent. Though he spoke French and German passably, he had never altogether
lost the American accent he had brought to Paris from Boston twenty years ago.
“You are disappointed,” Ausable said wheezily over his shoulder. “You were told that I was a
secret agent, a spy, dealing in espionage and danger. You wished to meet me because you
are a writer, young and romantic. You envisioned mysterious figures in the
night, the crack of pistols, drugs in the wine. “Instead, you have spent a dull
evening in a French music hall with a sloppy fat man who, instead of having messages slipped
into his hand by dark-eyed beauties, gets only a prosaic telephone call making
an appointment in his room. You have been bored!” The fat man chuckled to
himself as he unlocked the door of his room and stood aside to let his
frustrated guest enter. “You are disillusioned,” Ausable told him. “But take
cheer, my young friend. Presently you will see a paper, a quite important paper
for which several men and women have risked their lives, come to me. Some day
soon that paper may well affect the course of history. In that thought is
drama, is there not?” As he spoke, Ausable closed the door behind him. Then he
switched on the light. And as the light came on, Fowler had his first authentic
thrill of the day. For halfway across the room, a small automatic pistol in his
hand, stood a man.
Ausable blinked a few
times. “Max,” he wheezed, “you gave me quite a start. I thought you were in
Berlin. What are you doing here in my room?” Max was slender, a little less
than tall, with features that suggested slightly the crafty, pointed
countenance of a fox. There was about him aside from the gun - nothing
especially menacing. “The report,” he murmured. “The report that is being
brought to you tonight concerning some new missiles. I thought I would take it
from you. It will be safer in my hands than in yours.”
Ausable moved to an
armchair and sat down heavily. “I’m going to raise the devil with the
management this time, and you can bet on it,” he said grimly. “This is the
second time in a month that somebody has got into my room through that nuisance
of a balcony!” Fowler’s eyes went to the single window of the room. It was an
ordinary window, against which the night was pressing blackly. “Balcony?” Max
said, with a rising inflection. “No, a passkey. I did not know about the balcony. It might have
saved me some trouble had I known.” “It’s not my balcony,” Ausable said with
extreme irritation. “It belongs to the next apartment.” He glanced
explanatorily at Fowler. “You see,” he said, “this room used to be part of a
large unit, and the next room - through that door there - used to be the living
room. It had the balcony, which extends under my window now. You can get onto
it from the empty room two doors down - and somebody did, last month. The
management promised to block it off. But they haven’t.” Max glanced at Fowler,
who was standing stiffly not far from Ausable, and waved the gun with a
commanding gesture.
“Please sit down,” he
said. “We have to wait half an hour, I think.” “Thirty-one minutes,” Ausable
said moodily. “The appointment was for twelve-thirty. I wish I knew how you
learned about the report, Max.” The little spy smiled evilly. “And we wish we
knew how your people got the report. But no harm has been done. I will get it
back tonight. What is that? Who is at the door?” Fowler jumped at the sudden
knocking at the door. Ausable just smiled. “That will be the police,” he said.
“I thought that such an important paper as the one we are waiting for should
have a little extra protection. I told them to check on me to make sure
everything was all right.” Max bit his lip nervously. The knocking was
repeated. “What will you do now, Max?” Ausable asked. “If I do not answer the
door, they will enter anyway. The door is unlocked. And they will not hesitate
to shoot.” Max’s face was black with anger as he backed swiftly towards the
window. He swung a leg over the sill. “Send them away!” he warned. “I will wait on
the balcony. Send them away or I’ll shoot and take my chances!” The knocking at
the door became louder and a voice was raised.
Keeping his body twisted
so that his gun still covered the fat man and his guest, the man at the window
grasped the frame with his free hand to support himself. Then he swung his
other leg up and over the window-sill. The doorknob turned. Swiftly Max pushed
with his left hand to free himself from the sill and drop to the balcony. And
then, as he dropped, he screamed once, shrilly. The door opened and a waiter
stood there with a tray, a bottle and two glasses.
“Here is the drink you
ordered when you returned,” he said, and set the tray on the table, deftly uncorked the bottle,
and left the room. White-faced, Fowler stared after him. “But ...” he
stammered, “the police...” “There were no police.” Ausable sighed. “Only Henry,
whom I was expecting.” “But won’t that man out on the balcony…?” Fowler began.
“No,” said Ausable, “he won’t return. You see, my young friend, there is no
balcony.”
Robert Jay Arthur Jr. (November
10, 1909 – May 2, 1969) was a writer of speculative fiction and specialised in
crime fiction, and mystery fiction. He was known for his work with The
Mysterious Traveler radio series and for writing The Three Investigators , a
series of young adult novels. Arthur was honoured twice by the Mystery Writers
of America with an Edgar Award for Best Radio Drama. He also wrote scripts for
television.
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