THE GREAT SCHEMER
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Hippolyte had never had to deal with any one like Render before and he felt uncomfortable. . , ■ X ’ said Hippolyte, * I think I must be going. ‘ Goin’e ? ’ said Bender. ‘ There’s no need for you to h^rry I’m sure. The secret pohce wUl come soon not think of an answer. He unbuttoned his shabby overcoat, sat down on the bench, and glowered at Bender. ., ‘ I don’t know what you’re driving at, he said ratner
^^‘^t’s not difficult. You’ll soon understand.
Just
^^Bend^r put his boots on, started to walk up and down the room, and then began : ‘ Whmh frontier did you cross? The Polish ? French ?^Rumanian An expensive pleasure, no doubt. A friend of mine crossed the frontier recently. He lives on our side o the frontier and his wife’s relatmns are on the oth side. Then he had a quarrel with his wite. She ran across the frontier back to her parents. My fnend sat alone for three days and saw it was no laughing matter. There was no dinner and the roonis were eettine dirty, so he decided to make it up with her. He set out one evening to cross the frontier, but he was collared and put into prison for six inonths and now they say the wife has come back, the fool, but her husband is sitting in prison. ... So you also crossed the Polish frontier ? ’ i u‘ I didn’t do anything of the kind, said Hippolyte. ‘ My word of honour I didn’t,’ he added, for he felt that this young man was obstructing his way to the diamonds. ‘ I am a subject of Soviet Russia. After all, I can show you my passport.’ ‘ With the present rapid development of printing in the West it is easy enough to make a Bolffievik passport. It’s even siUy of you to mention it. One of my friends went so far as to print American dollars.
