“I must set to work methodically,” Prokop decided. Good; and after
reflecting for a long time and having a series of remarkable inspirations
he evolved a course of action....
To begin with, he inserted the following announcement in all the papers:
“Mr. Thomas. The messenger with a wounded hand asks the lady in the
veil for her address. Very important. P. Write ‘40,000’ to Box Office.”
This formulation of the inquiry seemed to him to be very ingenious; he
certainly did not know whether the young lady read the newspapers, and
especially advertisements, at all, but still, who knows? Chance is a
powerful factor. But instead of chance, circumstances came about which
could have been foreseen, but which Prokop had not anticipated. In answer
to the advertisement he received piles of correspondence, consisting
mostly of bills, reminders, threats and insults addressed to the missing
Thomas: “Let Mr. Thomas in his own interest furnish his address....” and
so on. Further, there wandered into the office of the paper a lean person
who, when Prokop called for the answers to his advertisement, stepped
up to him and asked him where Mr. Thomas lived. Prokop was as rude to
him as the circumstances permitted, whereupon the lean person produced
his authority out of his pocket and emphatically warned Prokop not to
misbehave himself. It was a question of a certain embezzlement and other
disreputable matters. Prokop was able to convince the lean person that
he himself was inordinately desirous of knowing where Mr. Thomas lived;
after this adventure and after studying the replies to his advertisement
his faith in the efficacy of such a method was seriously weakened. In any
case the replies steadily decreased in number, becoming on the other hand
more threatening in tone.
The next thing he did was to go to a private detective agency. There
he explained that he was looking for a mysterious girl in a veil and
attempted to describe her. The agency was quite prepared to furnish him
with perfectly discreet information regarding her if only he could tell
them her name, or address. There was nothing for him to do but to go away.
Then he got an inspiration of genius. In the package, which never left
him day or night, there was, besides a number of smaller bank-notes,
thirty thousand crowns done up in a wrapper, as is usually the custom
when banks pay out large sums of money. The name of the bank was not
on it; but it was at least highly probable that the girl had drawn the
money from some institution or other the day that Prokop left for Tynice.
Well, all he had to do was to find the exact date and then go round all
the banks in Prague and ask them to give him the name of the person who
on that day drew out thirty thousand crowns or something about that
figure. Yes, to find the exact date; Prokop was certain that Krakatit
had exploded on a Tuesday and it was probable that the girl had drawn the
money on a Wednesday; but Prokop was uncertain of both the week and the
month; it might have been in February or in March.
He made a tremendous effort to remember, or at least to calculate, when
it was; but all his speculations were nullified by the fact that he
had no idea how long he had lain ill. Good; they certainly must know
at Tynice what week it was in which he descended upon them. Dazzled by
this new hope, he sent a telegram to old Dr. Thomas: “Please telegraph
date when I arrived at your house. Prokop.” He had scarcely sent off
the wire when he was overcome with a feeling of remorse at having
behaved so badly. To the telegram he obtained no answer. Just as he was
about to abandon this trail it occurred to him that the caretaker’s
wife at Thomas’s flat might remember the date. He flew off there; but
the caretaker’s wife insisted that it was a Saturday. Prokop became
desperate; then he received a letter written in the large and careful
characters of a schoolgirl, to the effect that he had arrived at Tynice
on such and such a day but that “father mustn’t know that I have written
to you.” Nothing more. It was signed by Annie. For some reason Prokop’s
heart was torn by this couple of lines.
Now, having at last found the date he wanted, he rushed off to the
nearest bank; could they tell him who on such and such a day had drawn,
say, thirty thousand crowns? They shook their heads, saying that it was
not the custom to furnish such information; but when they saw that he
was completely disconcerted they consulted somebody behind and then
asked him on whose account the money had been taken out; for certainly
it had been drawn on a cheque, a deposit account or something of that
sort. Naturally Prokop did not know. Further, they told him, it was
possible that the person in question had only sold certain bills, in
which case there would be no record of his name in their books. And when,
finally, Prokop informed them that he had simply no idea whether the
money was paid out by this particular bank or not they burst out laughing
and inquired whether he was going round the two hundred and fifty-odd
financial institutions, agencies and exchanges in Prague with the same
question. So Prokop’s marvellous inspiration proved a complete failure.
There only remained the fourth possibility, the chance that he would
meet her. Prokop tried to introduce method even into this possibility;
he divided the map of Prague into sections and examined each one twice
daily. One day he calculated the number of people he would meet in this
way in one day and arrived at a total of nearly forty thousand; bearing
in mind the total population of the city it worked out that the chances
were one in twenty that he would meet her. Even this small probability
gave him hope. There were certain streets and places in which she was
more likely to reside, or along which she was likely to be walking;
streets with acacias in bloom, venerable old squares, intimate corners of
deep and serious life. It was surely impossible that she should be found
in the sort of noisy and dreary street along which one only hurried.
Nor amid the symmetrical desolation of characterless flats. Why, was
it not possible that she lived behind those large, dark windows beyond
which was to be found a shaded and refined quiet? Wandering as if in a
dream, Prokop realized for the first time in his life what there was to
be discovered in this town in which he had spent so many years of his
existence; God! how many beautiful spots, where life unrolls itself,
peaceful and mature, and entices one when one is distraught!
Numberless times Prokop dashed off in pursuit of young women who gave him
the impression from a distance, for some reason, of being she whom he had
only seen twice. He ran after them with a wildly beating heart; what if
it should prove to be she! Heaven knows what instincts of divination led
him to go after them. They were certainly mysterious, sad and beautiful,
absorbed in themselves and wrapped in some sort of inaccessibility. Once
he was almost certain that it was she; he was so excited that he had to
stop for a moment to take breath; and at that moment the woman got into
a tram and disappeared. For three days afterwards he waited near the
stopping place, but never saw her again.
Worst of all were the evenings when, completely exhausted, he sat rubbing
his hands on his knees and trying to evolve a new plan of campaign. God!
he would never abandon the search for her; it may be that it was an
obsession; that he was a lunatic, an idiot, a maniac; but he would never
give up. The more she evaded him—the greater efforts would he make; it
was ... simply fate ... or something.
Once he awoke in the middle of the night and it suddenly became
inevitably clear to him that he would never find her in this way; that he
would have to set out in search of George Thomas, who knew about her and
could tell him what he wanted. Although it was the middle of the night
he clothed himself, unable to wait until morning. He was unprepared for
the incredible difficulties that awaited him in obtaining a passport; he
could not understand what they wanted of him and alternately cursed and
grew dejected in feverish impatience. Finally, finally the night came
when an express carried him across the frontier. And now, to begin with,
to Balttin!
Now it will be decided, Prokop felt.