The Boarding House Horror

7. Alice Bree

"A pity," I said. "Why?"

She flashed a white grin, but the gleam vanished before I could be certain I had seen it. "Alice Bree is fiction, I'm afraid. The hastiest of assumed identities. I'm telling you now, up front, rather than invent some web of lies on the fly."

My sense of dislocation increased. The boarding house had brought me nausea, a plague of cats, and the embarrassment of public weakness. Now, into my face it slammed a crisis of authority. As my stomach dropped, I hurled myself at the wall. "Miss, that would constitute failure to cooperate with an official of The Hague."

"I do apologize, Inspector. I've put you in an awkward position. Rest assured, I'll do all I can to help you solve the case. My reticence only extends to my identity. I'm quite happy to gossip about the others."

"I could have you arrested."

"Yes." Her placid voice held no hint of strain. "I'd miss Madame Groot's cooking, but the bed in jail might be more comfortable."

"Do not call my bluff."

She sighed. "I am not, Inspector. I'm aware that you can arrest me. If you do, I will not protest and I will not think less of you. However, if it really comes to that, I have a phone number you should call."

My voice rasped. "Give it to me."

"Now?"

"Now."

"If I must. It's Palace 31."

I blinked. The Palace exchange served the very heart of The Hague. Furthermore, the war trial at Peace Palace had siphoned off half our force, and caused me to be assigned to investigate the body on Pluvierstraat in the first place.

I replied with heat. "Are you claiming to be some sort of witness in the Darko Dor trial?"

Her lips moved not at all. As the seconds stretched, the silence allowed me to cool down. I said, "All right, I'll accept that, for now. Later, I'm going to call."

"That's to be expected." The corners of her lips twitched downwards. "Inspector."

"What?" She could not see the glare I sent her.

"Someone is eavesdropping."

My stomach clenched and I abruptly rose from my chair. A sardonic baritone drifted in from the hallway. "Don'ta worry. It is only me."

Mario's grinning head tipped into view.

"This is private," I snapped.

Mario assumed a cherubic expression and sauntered into the doorway. "I tiptoe by. I hoped you didda not hear me."

"Well, we did," I said. She had heard, anyway. "You may move along, Mr. Costa."

"I go, I go. I not bother to tiptoe anymore." His bulk moved from the doorway and his footfalls receded, down the hall toward the upstairs rooms.

I groused, "And now he walks so heavily I can hear him clomping over the howling wind."

"Indeed. Well, Inspector, what else would you like to know? As regards the death of George Raptis, I mean."

I ran a hand through my hair, then flipped some notebook pages. "When did you arrive?"

"Thursday afternoon. Only yesterday, but it sure seems like a long time since then!" Her American accent emerged strongly. She did not look American. I would have guessed she might be a child of the sands of Arabia and its burning sun.

"Did you know the deceased previously?"

"Only his name."

I blinked. "Oh?"

"If it is the same man, yes. A George Raptis was the officer in charge of the Cuxhaven Schiffsfabrik."

The last two words rolled off her tongue with a perfect German accent. My mouth dropped open.

She continued. "At the mouth of the Elbe."

I remembered that I had a notebook and pencil. I scribbled.

"They built warships primarily." Her lips pursed. "That's all I remember."

"How do you know even that?" My brows knit.

"I have a good memory."

I thought of the chess game downstairs. "I already know that. So, did you hear anything last night?"

"You mean after lights-out? No." Her voice grew fuzzy with bliss. "I slept deeply and well."

"What about before?"

"The cohort of guests is chatty. I couldn't possibly repeat all that was said.

I flipped a few pages back for a reminder. "What about raised voices?"

"Oh, yes. Raised voices and alcohol breath. Raptis vented at Mariam Saab about, shall we say, her habits during the Great War. I gathered that she was attached romantically to an officer who outranked Raptis himself. Inspector, that's an educated guess only. The words he chose included such epithets as slut and whore, and he accused her of being snobbish during the war. Raptis himself came across as rather a bully, needing a flow of praise to bolster his sagging ego. Miss Saab gave him none. She said very little, and after Raptis's petty explosion she retired for the evening."

My pencil flew on the page. "Anything else?"

"As Miss Saab left, Mr. Yankov said something under his breath that I didn't quite catch. Raptis then spat a heated paragraph in his direction. Let's see if I can remember."

"Please."

"I remember that Raptis called him Yanev instead of Yankov. I found it an interesting slip, if slip it was."

"You mean ..."

Alice Bree's lips twisted into a lopsided smile. "I suppose I mean there appear to be Ottomans infesting the boarding house. George Raptis was perhaps a high-ranking officer. Mariam Saab was a wife or mistress of a different officer. Lazar Yankov might have been known to Raptis by an alias. After telling Lazar Yankov to mind his own business Raptis ended with a veiled threat. Something like, 'If you want to keep your lily white Allied engineering job you had better be nice to me.'" She tilted her head to one side. "They spoke in German. The use of the term 'Allied' seemed to me significant."

"Do you know Dutch?" I said, in Dutch.

I saw that flash of a white smile again. "Ja."

"What else happened?"

"Mario Costa and Trevor Brashear comforted Daria Raptis for a while, but Miss Raptis went up to bed and left the two men to play darts. I think they both must have been drinking as they played. When Mr. Brashear lost, he displayed, shall we say, poor sportsmanship."

"He also shouted, eh? What about?"

"Called Mr. Costa a dirty cheater. Costa retaliated with 'crooked bookie' and 'bootlicking toady.' Brashear replied with 'drunken sod,' and then the argument died down."

After a few more scribbles, I looked up to her face, marked by scars and bruises but placid nevertheless. "And you? What did people say to you?"

"Very little. No one sees the blind."