by Mark A Biggs
‘I’m sorry Olivia. I’m not sure we have time for that. What about tomorrow?’
‘Inspector! That will not do,’ I said heatedly. ‘My feet are in absolute agony.’
‘In that case, I’ll have someone take you right away, but we will be leaving in an hour’s time.’
‘Inspector,’ I said indignantly. ‘What are you suggesting?’
Before he could answer I rose from my chair and moved towards the door. Stopping briefly to open it, I turned back and faced him to say, as I left, ‘I will be waiting for you in the foyer for that lift to Oxford. Don’t be late!’
Having been shopping and abandoned my old things, we left Exeter Police Headquarters, retracing some of the route of that morning. Just short of Bristol, where we were to swing right onto the M4 and the run into Oxford, we pulled into one of those mega Motorway Service Centres.
The Inspector had been right. I had no intention of abandoning Max or being deported to Australia. Getting safely out of the UK was my number one priority, which is where the plan to visit Pierre Gicquel’s grave came from. Over the next half an hour, while eating a late lunch, I shared a vaguely conceived plan of how I intended to find Max. Deliberately, I left out some of the details. I was forced to confess that, if I did find him, I had absolutely no idea what to do next. Improvise, was my best answer.
‘He may be on the tanker the authorities are tracking,’ suggested the Inspector, having listened to my ramblings patiently.
‘Did you read the article in the Sun newspaper this morning?’ It was a statement rather than a question, so I continued without waiting for his reply. ‘Multiple Russian submarines are off the coast of Scotland. That’s no coincidence. He’s on one of those, I know it.’
‘Well, for what it’s worth, someone else thinks so too. I have some presents for you,’ he said, reaching under the table and lifting a bag that he’d carried in from the car. ‘I think that you have been speaking to someone and have a much better idea of how to find Max than the story you just gave!’
‘Inspector!’
Ignoring me, he continued. ‘I received a phone call yesterday. They said that I was to visit the East Dart Hotel in Postbridge, Dartmoor, and ask for Rosie, the landlady who would have something for me. I have met Rosie before, when we were chasing you and Max all over England. You stayed there with Elinor, before she was killed in Cornwall.’
He paused and then said, ‘Sorry, I shouldn’t have brought that up.’
‘It’s okay,’ I said and, after a short silence gathering my thoughts, I continued. ‘People around us seem to die.’ The words came out before I realised what I was saying.
‘Like my daughter, you mean?’
‘That was insensitive of me, Inspector. I haven’t forgotten Kate and Edward.’
‘I know this may sound like a father speaking but I know that she isn’t dead. If she was, I would feel it. I don’t want to talk about it but she is not dead, I am certain.
‘Sorry Olivia, where was I? Oh yes, Rosie! She gave me these.’
He opened the bag, removed two passports and two credit cards and I could see several other things partly concealed but couldn’t make out what they were. However, I could see rolls of cash.
‘Well that’s inconvenient,’ I said, before checking myself and saying no more.
‘Inconvenient?’ asked Inspector Axel.
I mistakenly said ‘inconvenient’ because I had lied to Stephen Walls throughout the debriefing. I falsely claimed that the East Dart Hotel was our contact point with our secret organisation. It was, as far as I knew, just a hotel. Is this a trap to see if I was telling the truth, one I almost fell for? Or had the Agency used the hotel as a drop point and the Inspector as its courier? Finding the truth will have to wait.
‘Yes, inconvenient,’ I continued, trying to cover my tracks. ‘Two passports! I assume that someone wants you to come with me?’
‘So, it would appear,’ he said, while opening the first passport and reading the names. ‘When we decide it’s time to hide, I am to become Mr Jean-Marc Lemery. There’s an accompanying note that says I am to be your private secretary.’
‘And me?’ I asked, with an air of annoyance still in my voice.
He put his passport on the table and opened the other in a manner that could have been a theatrical scene in a play.
‘Lady Olivia Suzanne Elizabeth Huggins,’ he said, while looking over the rim of the passport.
‘Is there a note?’
‘Yes. It just says, Lady.’
‘And the other items?’
He put my passport back into the bag along with the credit card and pushed the package across the table before saying. ‘I don’t want to appear presumptuous Olivia but how did you organise this, the passports and all, when you were virtually a prisoner?’
‘It was really quite easy,’ I said, ‘During the debriefing, I was taken into the local town near where I was being held or as Stephen would say, near the town where I was a guest and given unaccompanied free time, to wander the street, shop and have a leisurely lunch. Inspector, I believe that it was part of their strategy to lull me into a false sense of security. Conscious that I was probably being followed, I couldn’t use a pay phone to call our headquarters nor the mobile phone they had given me. So, as you could imagine, I was on the lookout for another way to make contact. As chance would have it, I was able to borrow a phone from a shop assistant. He conveniently left it behind the counter while serving a customer. My call to headquarters was brief but long enough to request certain items I might need in my search for Max. Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough time to work out how I was going to retrieve them. After deleting the number, I had used from the phone, I put it back in its spot behind the counter without it being missed.’
‘You’re quite something,’ said the inspector after listening to my story.
But I was busy examining the contents of the package and ignored his compliment. I was pleased to discover that all the items I’d requested were there, including GPS tracking bracelets. Then it dawned on me, Cliff obviously trusted the Inspector and it was time I did as well.
My attention was drawn back to the Inspector by his voice.
‘It’s time we were leaving.’
CHAPTER THREE
Ferrari
Olivia
It was two days later, Saturday the 16th April, when the house phone rang at our Oxford stay. Inspector Axel answered and spoke with Stephen from MI6. I hovered nearby, eavesdropping on the conversation until it was my turn to speak.
The tanker they had been tracking had docked in Antwerp and, as expected, neither Max nor Claudia was on board. Accompanying his condolences was a solemn promise to leave no stone unturned in the search for Max, an invitation to dinner that night and two tickets on the 8:19am Eurostar train, leaving London the following morning for Paris. He also took the opportunity to inform me that I had been booked on a flight from Charles de Gaulle airport, France, to Melbourne, Australia. I was shocked when he said the date: Wednesday 20th April, four days’ time.
Ample time, according to Stephen, for me to visit Lannilis and the grave of Pierre Gicquel. I was, it seemed, to be trusted to fly to Australia unaccompanied. The more likely reason was their budget; it wouldn’t stretch to a guard, a decision I was determined to make them regret.
I decided, during the two-day stay in Oxford, to share my plans to find Max with Inspector Axel. I told him the details that I had previously left out and we agreed to work together, as a team. However, he was concerned about one aspect, my driving. I assured him that I had once been quite handy at the wheel.
‘It’s like riding a bike,’ I said.
* * *
Paris has always been one of my favourite places to stay with its rich history, architecture and little cafés peppering the streets.
What’s not to love?
Well, the cigarette smoke for one thing. If only the Parisians wouldn’t smoke! To be seated outside of a little café and watch the world
go by is one of the great pleasures of eating and of life. Yet in France, as in many places in Europe, most people smoke. Worse, they can smoke in the outside eating areas. There you are trying to enjoy a beautiful glass of wine, nibbling some terrine or pâté, and there’s cigarettes to the left of you, cigars on the right and pipes front and back. Every sight, sound and smell is tainted by putrid nicotine.
Despite this travesty, when we arrived in Paris, I was reminded why this was one of my favourite places on Earth and, after the motorcycle accident, somewhere I never dreamed that I would visit again.
From the airport, we visited one of the Inspectors contacts, to pick up some protection, as he described it. After checking into our hotel, a little before midday, Inspector Axel and I had just two and a half days before we needed to vanish from the MI6 radar. By then they would know that I had no intention of returning to Australia on their schedule.
With its view of the Eiffel Tower, our hotel was ideally positioned for the first part of the plan. By 1.00pm, having spent as little time as possible with unpacking and grabbing something to eat, the Inspector and l were walking near the Eiffel Tower. A security fence had been erected following recent terrorist attacks elsewhere in Paris. To gain access to the tower, visitors had to pass through check points and metal detectors, not dissimilar to catching a plane. We walked through the Eiffel Tower park towards the Champ de Mars bus stop where we caught the number 69. Riding on a bus, particularly the number 69, which drives past some of the main tourist sites in Paris is a great introduction to the city for any visitor. We had seen what we were looking for by the time the bus reached the Place de la Concorde and so changed to a number 73 for the ride up the famous Champs-Elysées, getting off at a stop near the iconic Arc de Triomphe.
‘What did you observe?’ asked the Inspector as if it were a test.
‘The young girls with their clipboards. Romanian pickpockets working the Tuileries garden between the Louvre Museum and the Place de la Concorde.’
‘Were they working on their own?’
‘They were in groups of two, but never that far away from another one. Working independently but hunting in packs of about six. Three groups of two.’
‘Minders?’
‘I’m sure they were there – they never work without them, but I couldn’t pick any. I did see them on the hill, in the Jardin des Champs-Elysées gardens. I think girls working in other areas, not just the gardens, were reporting back to them. At the very least they all seemed to be coming and going from there.’
From where we were, at the Arc de Triomphe, I could see girls on the next corner armed with their clipboards. I didn’t point but gestured with my head in the direction I wished the Inspector to look.
‘I wonder what their scam is today,’ he said.
‘The old survey one,’ I replied. ‘They look like they are part of the same group. At any rate, they are all dressed the same. The main activity however is in the Tuileries gardens. That’s where we should do it. And Inspector, we have our Ferraris there.’
‘True, Olivia, but the Ferraris are up and down the Champs-Elysées too, at most intersections. It may be best to do this in two separate places.’
‘You’re probably right, Inspector, but I think the Place de la Concorde will offer more options for a getaway. Did you book the restaurant?’
‘Tuesday night, the 8.30 sitting for five. You have the photos and envelopes?’
Reaching into my handbag, I retrieved three unsealed envelopes. Letting two drop back into the bag, I opened one to reveal a picture of Claudia and a letter.
‘Check,’ he said.
Before he had a chance to ask, I reached back into my handbag and pulled out two bracelets and said, handing them to him, ‘You will be wanting these.’
‘Okay Mum, let’s do it!’
‘Am I playing your mum or gran?’ I inquired, smiling.
‘Mum, surely, we can’t have people thinking that you’re eighty-seven, can we?’ he said with a chuckle.
The Inspector, playing my son, took from his pocket two tourist maps. I moved a bum bag that had been around my waist but hidden under my clothes to where it could be seen. Accepting one of the tourist maps and holding it in my right hand, I placed my left arm into his and we made our way to the bus stop and the ride to the Tuileries gardens. The trap was set.
It was a lovely spring afternoon for a walk in the gardens and we made it all the way to the Louvre Museum without being approached. Each time we came near the girls working the strip, they were already busy distracting some poor unsuspecting tourist so that they could pick their pockets. Before making the return journey, the Inspector asked if I would like to sit for a while near the pond. From there we had a wonderful view of the park, all the way back to the Paris Eye Ferris Wheel. Although I kept my own counsel, it was a welcome rest. Since the kidnapping, I had found myself struggling; it had unexpectedly triggered a little anxiety. It had become difficult sometimes to stop my mind ruminating over my health and age. Any fatigue or pain, even the normal issues associated with my years, filled me with fear. It made me unsteady on my feet and I needed to sit and rest. I knew it was all in my mind and, by God, I was going to fight it.
Dragging myself away from my worries, I looked down the avenue. Since the first time I came to Paris, I loved looking back through the park towards Place de la Concorde, but even this couldn’t soothe me. It was made worse because I realised my favourite view wasn’t enough to instil calm.
‘A pity. Not quite myself.’ I said it unintentionally aloud.
‘Are you all right, Olivia?’ asked the Inspector, with a hint of concern in his voice.
‘I’m ready. Take my arm – help me up and let’s go catch ourselves some pickpockets.’
Slowly, we made our way back towards the Paris Eye and, by concentrating on our targets, I felt my composure return, although I leaned more heavily upon the Inspector’s arm. We stopped a couple of times, pretending to consult our tourist map, before continuing our journey. Two girls approached, both aged around fourteen and dressed similarly in blue jeans and off-white tee-shirts. They looked remarkably alike with their olive complexion and black hair. All the pickpocket girls we had seen that day seemed, to us, identical. Not only did their age create law enforcement challenges but the description of the offenders would be so similar that it made it almost impossible for the police to identify a culprit. A tree hiding in a forest.
One of the two girls thrust a clipboard in front of me at chest and arm height.
‘We are conducting a survey,’ the girl said while smiling with disarming warmth.
With a pen that she held in her other hand, she engaged my eyes, drawing them down towards the survey.
The other girl had moved slightly to my side, the side away from the Inspector, ready to pick a pocket or two, as the old song goes.
‘Okay,’ I said, smiling back while letting my gaze be drawn downwards.
At that moment, Inspector Axel, with lightning speed, reached across, grabbed the girl’s arm, and snapped one of the GPS tracking bracelets onto her wrist. Both girls recoiled angrily away from us, spitting out a tongue lashing of obscenities.
‘It’s a GPS tracking device,’ said Inspector Axel, casually. ‘You can’t get it off without our help, so there is no point in running away until we are finished with you. Otherwise ladies, you may never be rid of it, not while you are alive anyway. And ladies, I have a feeling that your bosses will not welcome one of you home tonight, not while she is sporting the lovely new bracelet, as becoming as it is.’
While the Inspector spoke, my job was to scan our surroundings for a minder.
‘Inspector,’ I said. ‘We have company.’
An athletic man, over six feet tall, was approaching fast. Inspector Axel took from his pocket his police badge and held it up for the advancing man to see, before putting it away again. The man, the girls’ minder, hesitated before continuing. His angry demeanour was now replaced by an apologetic smi
le, his head shaking.
‘What have the girls done?’ he said with a Romanian accent. ‘They are only fourteen, you know. I’ll take them straight home and give them what for.’
He turned and faced the two girls.
‘What have you been up to?’
Raising his voice, he pointed a finger at each of them in turn while saying, ‘I’ve told you not to misbehave.’
But before he could finish his melodramatics, Inspector Axel interrupted.
‘Cut the rubbish and listen closely. One of your darlings is wearing a GPS tracking device. It’s impossible for you to remove, but we can do it, for information. We are looking for someone and, before you say anything, we don’t expect you to know her, but someone connected with your syndicate will. In exchange, we will remove the device. My colleagues from Interpol are diligently photographing you for posterity as we speak and have been taking pictures up on the hill.’
Inspector Axel paused and pointed towards the area, the one where we had seen the girls and their minders meeting earlier.
‘My colleagues are concerned that nothing should happen to the young lady wearing the bracelet; we wouldn’t want her to lose a hand or worse. If something were to happen to her, we will have you, all of you,’ he said, pointing towards the hill, ‘listed as terrorists right across Europe.’
‘We are not terrorists,’ said the minder, interrupting angrily.
Ignoring the interjection, Inspector Axel continued speaking.
‘When you and your friends are picked up on terrorism charges, we can hold you almost indefinitely, as you must know. We will probably have to release you, eventually. When we do let you go, we will let it be known how helpful you were, giving us information about the Russian Mafia. We will arrest some of them shortly after your release.’
Turning to face me, he said, ‘How long will any of them live, once the word is on the street that they are informers?’
‘Hard to say,’ I replied, ‘a couple of weeks, but it’s what happens to their families that I would fear. The Russian Mafia likes to ensure its message is clear.’
