The Book of Air and Shadows

matter if he did, as it was unlikely that he would ever meet her again?
    The plane landed gently and taxied briefly through the small airport to the terminal. A blowing rain beat against the windows of the jet. Crosetti and the Mishkin brothers gathered up their carry-ons and outer garments. Crosetti got a handshake and an unexpected kiss on the cheek from Amalie Mishkin, who said, “Thank you for talking with me, and with Niko. And now you will go off to whatever insane adventure Jake will take you to and we will not see you again. I hope you will make your movie, Crosetti.”
    Then Jake Mishkin stopped in the aisle, looming behind him; Crosetti got a strong third-wheel feeling and quickly left the plane. The terminal was small, clean, efficient, and a small staff of uniformed ladies carried him through customs and immigration with the sort of service now available only to the very rich, and which Crosetti had never before experienced. A Mercedes limo waited outside along with a fellow carrying a vast umbrella. Crosetti entered the vehicle and within ten minutes was joined by Paul and Jake Mishkin. The car drove off.
    “Where are we going?” asked Crosetti.
    “Into town,” said Jake. “I have some legal business to attend to, trivial really, but enough to write off this trip and keep my firm happy, or at least less unhappy with me than they are. It should take no more than a day, if that. I’m sure you’ll find a lot to do in London. Paul can show you the sights. Paul is quite the world traveler.”
    “Sounds like fun,” said Crosetti. “And after that?”
    “We’ll go up to Oxford and see Oliver March. We’ll return Bulstrode’s personal effects and see whether we can get a line on what he was doing here last summer. Beyond that we’ll just have to play it by ear.”
    They stayed in a small, elegant hotel in Knightsbridge. Mishkin had stayed there before, and the staff made noises indicating they were glad to see him and that Crosetti was included in the welcome. Paul did not stay in the hotel.
    “My brother dislikes the trappings of luxury,” Mishkin explained later in the hotel’s tiny bar. He had drunk several scotches to Crosetti’s single pint. “I believe he’s gone to stay with his fellow Jesuits. And also to arrange for our security.”
    “He’s a security guy?”
    “No, he’s a Jesuit priest.”
    “Really? He said that, but I thought he was putting me on. What does a priest know about security?”
    “Well, Paul has a range of talents and interests, as I’m sure you’ll learn. I often think he’s one of the elite corps of papal assassins we read so much about nowadays. What did you think of my lovely family?”
    “They seemed very nice,” said Crosetti warily.
    “They
are
nice. Nice as pie. Far too nice for me. My wife is Swiss, did you know that? The Swiss are
very
nice. It’s their national specialty along with chocolates and money. Did you know that Switzerland was a very poor country before the Second World War? Then it was suddenly very rich. That’s because they supplied the Nazis with all kinds of technical goodies from factories that couldn’t be bombed because they were oh so neutral. Then there’s the matter of the hundred and fifty million reichsmarks the Nazis stole from exterminated Jews. That’s nearly three-quarters of a billion bucks in current dollars. I wonder what became of that? Not to mention the art. My father-in-law has a superb collection of Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings-Renoir, Degas, Kandinsky, Braque, you name it.”
    “Really.”
    “Really. He was a bank clerk before and during the war. How did he manage to accumulate such a collection? By being
nice
? My children are half Swiss, and that means they’re only half nice, as you probably observed. You’re probably a good observer, Crosetti, being a creative type, a writer like yourself, always lurking and taking things down. You probably have Amalie and me and the kids all figured out by now. You got a screenplay working in there? The Family Mishkin, now a major motion picture. The other half is half Jewish and half Nazi, which is definitely
not
nice. Have another drink, Crosetti! Have a cosmopolitan. The drink of your generation.”
    “I think I’ll stick with beer. As a matter of fact, I’m feeling a little lagged out so-”
    “Nonsense! Have a cosmopolitan on me. Best thing for jet lag, everyone knows that. Bartender, give this man a cosmo! And have one yourself. And