Betty knocked tentatively on the door of room number 212. Voices from within told her that the occupants were still there, but it was now late in the morning and unless she was able to make their bed very soon she wouldn’t have time to get ready for her lunchtime duties. She hadn’t yet met the couple in 212, but Elsie, who normally did this room, said they were foreigners and “a bit funny”.
The door opened a fraction, and a pair of eyes peered out through the crack. When they recognized Betty’s chambermaid uniform and cleaning gear, the door was opened more fully and a youngish woman, plainly dressed and with her hair tied severely back, poked her head out and quickly glanced each way down the corridor to ascertain there was no-one else there, and then pulled Betty quickly inside and locked the door behind her.
The air inside was thick with smoke. A great mass of papers littered the table by the window, with more on the floor. Seated at the table was a man in shirt-sleeves and waistcoat, with a pen in his hand. The woman spoke to him in a foreign language, and he then turned to face Betty.
“If you please, sir; I’ve come to make the bed and tidy the room”, said Betty.
“And what is your name, child?” His accent was so strong that Betty had difficulty understanding him.
“Betty Worthing, if you please, sir”. She dropped him a little curtsey, because she sensed that, despite the fact that his clothes were rather shabby and that he and his wife were occupying one of the cheapest rooms in the hotel, he was nevertheless a gentleman.
“Ah, Betty Worthing, yes”. (He pronounced it as “Vording”) “You may clean the room, child. But you must never touch my papers. Never, you understand?”
“Yes, sir”. Betty proceeded with her work, conscious that the couple were closely watching her every movement. She was careful not to touch a single paper, however much she longed to stack them in a neat pile and dust all the cigarette ash from the table. She allowed herself no more than a single fleeting glance at one paper, which was not only in a foreign language, but written in strange letters which she could not read. At last she finished her work, curtsied to the couple and let herself out. They were indeed “a bit funny”!
Betty was assigned to room 212 for the next few weeks. She never found the room empty, at any time of the day. The strange couple always had their breakfast in the room, and never went down to the dining room together for other meals. Sometimes the man went out for a walk on his own, or the woman went shopping, and to post letters. They wrote a lot of letters, often to foreign countries. Sometimes they had visitors, mostly other foreigners, and then animated conversations continued throughout the night.
As the man became more accustomed to Betty’s presence, he began to ask her questions; about how much she was paid and the hours she had to work; about her family and life in the town. Often he made notes about her answers. In time she found it easier to understand him, though he never learnt to pronounce her name properly. In an odd way, she liked him. His wife said little. Betty worked out from their conversations (which were never in English) that she was called “Nadezhda” and that she called her husband “Illyich”. That’s a very strange name, Betty thought.
Then one day the clerk at the hotel reception desk called Betty over. “There’s a man wants to speak to you”, he told her, indicating a respectably-dressed stranger seated near the entrance. “He says it’s important”.
Betty didn’t usually like to be seen walking out with strange men, but she allowed him to take her to a café (where fortunately there wasn’t anyone who would recognize her) and they sat in a quiet corner. She remained on her guard, and hoped he wouldn’t suggest anything improper.
“You are Betty Worthing, chambermaid at the hotel?” He asked, and she nodded. “And you clean room number 212, where live a man and a woman, yes? Tell me now, how does he look?”
Betty considered. This man was clearly another foreigner; perhaps from the same country as the couple in 212, since he pronounced her name in the same way. What was going on, she wondered. But she saw no harm in answering his question.
“He’s not very tall, and his forehead’s bald. He’s got a little beard. He’s got high cheekbones and his eyes are a bit slanted. I think his wife calls him Illych”.
“Ah yes! It is him!” the man hissed, “And his woman, Nadezhda, she is very plain, yes? She is not his wife, you know. Immoral behaviour! Yes, a very bad couple! Most wicked!”
Betty stiffened. Her brother was living with a girl who wasn’t his wife, and although she didn’t approve of such behaviour, she didn’t see why strangers had any right to make remarks about it.
“Are they criminals?” she asked. “Shouldn’t you tell the police?”
“Ach, your police; they are so stupid! Just because this man commits no crime under your law, they ignore him! But this man, he is more dangerous than any robber; far more dangerous! But you can help us. He has many papers in his room, yes? Then perhaps you can bring some to us: you will be rewarded. Or does he let you post letters for him? No? Then you can persuade him to, and bring them to us. And also the letters he receives, yes?”
Betty found herself disliking the man more and more. She might only be a chambermaid, but she still had some professional pride; and the suggestion that she, an honest girl working in a respectable hotel, might steal a guest’s papers and letters ….. the very idea! And why should a foreigner say the British police were stupid: what an insult! On the other hand, she was tempted. It wasn’t so much the promise of a reward, though heaven knows she could do with more money. But she’d always had the dream that she might one day be the heroine of a great adventure mystery, and now it looked as if the dream might be coming true.
“I’ll see what I can do, sir”, she said, cautiously.
(To be continued in a later entry)
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