Conjectures
“How did the Minister of Police stand, when the revolution was alive?” I asked.
“Vasilije,” she told me, sipping wine between phrases, “is a peculiar man, an original. He is interested in nothing except his comfort. Comfort to him means enormous amounts of food and drink and at least sixteen hours of sleep each day, and not having to move around much during his eight waking hours. Outside of that he cares for nothing. To guard his comfort he has made the police department a model one. They’ve got to do their work smoothly and neatly. If they don’t, crimes will go unpunished, people will complain, and those complaints might disturb His Excellency. He might even have to shorten his afternoon nap to attend a conference or meeting. That wouldn’t do. So he insists on an organization that will keep crime down to a minimum, and catch the perpetrators of that minimum. And he gets it.”
“Catch Radnjak’s assassin?”
“Killed resisting arrest ten minutes after the murder.”
“One of Mahmoud’s men?”
The girl emptied her glass, frowning at me, her lifted lower lids putting a twinkle in the frown.
“You’re not so bad,” she said slowly, “but now it’s my turn to ask: Why did you say Einarson killed Mahmoud?”
“Einarson knew Mahmoud had tried to have him and Grantham shot earlier in the evening.”