World War 2 Thriller Collection

by Len Deighton

  The main port of Nice is not the sort of place where you see the fancy yachts double-parked, with film stars dining al fresco on the poop deck, and borrowing a cup of caviare from the tycoon next door. This is a strictly business-only mooring, the Club Nautique is another call. But for a Sunday morning, it was unusually crowded: a dozen men stood around a Peugeot van, and watched two frogmen having their equipment checked. The metal barriers that divide the car-parking area had now been rearranged to cordon off the quay, and a uniformed policeman guarded the only gap in it.

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘A little walk,’ I said.

  ‘Little walk somewhere else,’ said the cop.

  ‘What’s happening?’ I said.

  ‘Did you hear me? Get going!’

  I walked, but kept to the other side of the fence until I came to some other spectators. ‘What’s happening?’ I asked.

  ‘A body, I should think,’ said a woman with a shopping bag. She didn’t look round to see who’d asked, in case she missed something.

  ‘A suicide?’

  ‘Off one of the yachts,’ said another man. He was dressed in an orange-and-yellow yachtsman’s wind-cheater, with a heavy-duty zip in bright red.

  ‘Some millionaire, or his fancy piece,’ said the woman. ‘On drugs, probably – an orgy, perhaps.’

  ‘I’ll bet they are Germans,’ said the man in the wind-cheater, anxious lest the woman’s fancies should be so elaborate as to eliminate his own prejudices. ‘Germans can’t hold their drink.’

  The officious policeman came back to where we were standing. ‘Move on,’ he said.

  ‘Move on yourself, you dirty pig,’ said the woman.

  ‘I’ll put you into the van,’ said the policeman.

  ‘You ponce,’ said the woman. ‘What could you do with me in the back of the van?’ She let out a cackle of dirty laughter and looked round at the rest of us. We all joined in, and the policeman went back to the barrier.

  The unity of our gathering thus demonstrated, a hitherto silent member of the crowd was encouraged to speak. ‘They think it’s a tourist,’ he said. ‘Tangled in the anchor ropes of one of the boats – the Giulietta or the Manxman there – they think he went in during the night. The frogmen will soon get him.’

  ‘It will take them an hour,’ said the man in the yachting-jacket.

  Yes, I thought, it will take them an hour. I moved away from the spectators, and walked slowly up the steep connecting street to the Boulevard de Stalingrad.

  Everywhere seemed closed, except for the bakers across the street and a large café, its name, ‘Longchamps’, in white plastic letters on a hand-painted acid-green background. The floor was cleared, as if for dancing, or a bout of bare-fist fighting. There were a dozen or more customers, all men, and none of them dressed well enough for Mass. In a far corner, a man in a booth accepted bets, and all the while the customers were prodding the racing papers, writing out slips and drinking pastis.

  I ordered a cognac, and drank it before the girl behind the bar replaced the cap on the bottle.

  ‘That’s an expensive way to satisfy a thirst,’ she said. I nodded, and she poured a second one. This one I took more slowly. The radio music came to an end and a weather forecaster started a lot of double talk about areas of high pressure. The woman switched it off. I sipped my brandy.

  A man came up, put a one-franc coin into the machine on the counter and got a handful of olives. ‘Have one,’ he offered. It was Schlegel.

  I took one without comment but my eyes must have popped.

  ‘Thought they were untangling me from an anchor chain, did you?’

  ‘Something like that,’ I said.

  Schlegel was wearing native costume: stone-coloured golf-jacket, dark pants and canvas shoes. ‘Well, you started celebrating too soon, blue-eyes.’

  ‘Did you ever think of wearing a black beret with that outfit?’ I asked.

  We took our time before moving to the quietest corner of the café, alongside a broken juke-box.

  ‘Here’s what you asked for,’ said Schlegel. ‘The contacts that Melodie Page made with her “running officer” and the report dated six weeks before her death.’

  I opened the brown envelope and looked inside.

  ‘She stuck with Champion – very close,’ said Schlegel. ‘She went with him to stamp exhibitions in Zürich and Rome. The last three cards have special exhibition cancellations, you’ll notice.’

  I looked at the postcards that Melodie Page had sent to her cut-out. They were the sort of thing that several aerophilately firms sell: picture postcards of the Graf Zeppelin airship anchored at some place in South America, the Hindenburg airship flying over New York and a grim one that showed the same airship exploding in flames in Lakehurst in 1937. The last card was a picture of an American airship, Macon, sent after her return to London.

  ‘Nothing complicated about the code,’ explained Schlegel. ‘She met her contact five days after the postmark date. Seven days after if the postcard was coloured.’

  I went through the cards again.

  Schlegel said, ‘Why did she suddenly become interested in aerophilately?’

  I said, ‘The cards were easy to obtain. Champion likes using them to send to his collector friends. And if she’s at these stamp shows, what could be more natural?’

  ‘This couldn’t be a big stamp racket, could it?’ said Schlegel.

  ‘Champion might transfer money that way. A stamp is a bit like a bearer-bond but it’s not much of an investment. After all, the value has got to go up at least thirty per cent before you’ve covered the dealer’s mark-up.’

  ‘What about forgeries or stolen stuff?’

  ‘No,’ I said.

  ‘How can you be sure?’

  ‘On the scale we’re talking about, it would be impossible. The word gets around. A stamp crook has to nibble a mouthful at a time. Making a half way decent forgery of a stamp is a long expensive business. And you can’t recoup by suddenly putting a hundred forged rare stamps on the market, or prices would slump to nothing. Even with genuine stamps they would. And what kind of dough are we talking about? Even in the swish Bond Street auctions you won’t find many single stamps fetching more than fifty pounds sterling. That kind of swindle isn’t going to meet Champion’s wine bill!’

  He opened his case and brought out the five-page report that the London office had sent. It was an analysis of Champion’s movements, and the spending and activities of his companies, during the previous six months. Or as much as London knew of them. ‘Not to be taken away,’ said Schlegel, as I opened it hurriedly. He went to the counter and brought two espresso coffees. By the time he’d returned, I’d scanned it.

  ‘Nothing there, is there?’ He tapped the coffee with his spoon. ‘You’d better drink that. Two brandies under is no way to face that boy, even if he’s half of what you say he is.’

  I drank the hot coffee, folded up his sheets of typing, and handed them back to him.

  ‘And the trucks in Marseille?’

  ‘They are being loaded. The manifest says engine parts, chemicals and heavy-duty plastics and fabrics. It’s a diplomatic load, just as we were warned it would be.’

  ‘Did you find out anything about the Topaz girl?’

  Schlegel studied me carefully before replying. ‘She’s twenty-five. British subject, born in London. Only child. Doting parents to whom she writes each week. Her father is a retired research chemist, living on a small pension in Portsmouth, England. She hasn’t lived at home since she first went to college in London. She graduated with honours in thermo-chemistry but she’s never had a proper job. She’s worked as a waitress and gas-pump attendant … you know the kind of thing. Seems like she’s hooked on kids. Her last three jobs have been as a children’s nurse. She’s not a qualified nurse, of course.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘She’s a qualified thermo-chemist.’

  ‘Oh, Jesus!’ said Schlegel. ‘I knew this was going to start you shove
lling that Serge Frankel shit all over me. Thermo-chemists don’t manufacture nukes.’

  ‘No,’ I said patiently. ‘Thermo-chemists don’t manufacture nukes. But thermo-chemistry does relate to the explosion of nukes.’ I opened the manila envelope he’d given me, and I found the photo postcard of the Hindenburg disaster. ‘And the conversion of hydrogen into helium also relates to the explosion of nukes.’ I stabbed my finger at the great boiling mass of flame erupting out of the airship.

  Schlegel took it from me and bent close to look at the photo, as if he might discover more there. He was still looking at it when I left.

  20

  The cars of Nice are mostly white, so Champion’s black Mercedes was easily spotted on the Place Massena. The driver was in the car, but Champion and his son were sitting outside a café-bar under the stone arcades. Champion was drinking an apéritif, and Billy was arranging sweet-wrappers on the circular metal table-top. Billy waved when he saw me. He’d saved me two cubes of chocolate, which by now were soft, misshapen and coated with pocket-fluff.

  Champion got to his feet too. They’d clearly had long enough sitting there, and he didn’t offer me a drink. The chauffeur had the door open as we reached the car, and there was a discussion about whether Billy was permitted to sit in front. Billy lost and was seated between us in the back.

  Champion opened the window. The sun had heated the interior enough to explain why most cars were white.

  ‘Now don’t get chocolate all over the upholstery,’ said Champion. He got a handkerchief from his top pocket.

  ‘I’ll be careful,’ I said.

  ‘Not you, stupid,’ said Champion. He grinned, and wiped Billy’s hands and mouth.

  ‘You can’t always be sure, these days,’ I said.

  ‘Don’t say that, Charlie.’ He seemed genuinely hurt. ‘Have I changed so much?’

  ‘You’re a tough cookie, Steve,’ I told him.

  ‘Welcome to the club,’ he said. He looked to Billy to see if he was listening to us.

  Billy looked up at me. ‘I’m a tough cookie, too,’ he told me.

  ‘That’s what I said: Billy is a tough cookie, Steve!’

  Billy looked to his father to check me out. Steve smiled. ‘We don’t want too many tough cookies in the family,’ he said, and straightened Billy’s tie.

  By this time we’d reached the airport turn-off. The chauffeur was overtaking the Sunday drivers creeping along the promenade. An Air France Caravelle came down alongside us, to land on the runway that runs parallel to the road. There was a roar, and a scream of rubber as its jets reversed.

  Billy watched the Caravelle until it disappeared from sight behind the airport buildings. ‘When will we go in an aeroplane again, Daddy?’

  ‘One of these days,’ said Champion.

  ‘Soon?’

  ‘Perhaps.’

  ‘For my birthday?’

  ‘We’ll see, Billy.’

  ‘Will Uncle Charles come too?’

  ‘I hope so, Billy. I’m counting on it.’

  Billy smiled.

  The car sped on over the Pont du Var and to the tollgate of the autoroute. Like any good chauffeur, our driver had the coins ready, and so we joined the fast-moving lane for the automatique. A few cars ahead of us, the driver of a VW camper tossed his three francs into the plastic funnel. The barrier tilted upwards to let the VW through. Before it dropped back into position again, a lightweight motor-cycle slipped through behind it. The long lines of cars at the other gates kept the gate-men too busy to notice the infringement.

  ‘Young bastards!’ said Champion. ‘Bikes are not even allowed on the autoroute.’

  By that time we were through the barrier, too. The two youths on the motor-cycle had pulled into the slow lane and were weaving through the traffic. The pillion passenger had a golf-bag on the shoulder, and kept turning round to be sure there was no pursuit. They were a sinister pair, both in black one-piece suits, with shiny black bone-domes and dark visors.

  ‘That’s what I mean, Steve. There was a time when you would have laughed,’ I said.

  He’d been watching the motor-cycle riders through the rear window, but now he turned away. ‘Perhaps you’re right,’ he said tonelessly.

  The traffic thinned. The driver pulled out to the fast lane and put his foot hard down. The car leaped forward, passing everything on the road. Champion liked speed. He smiled, and glanced triumphantly at the cars that were left behind. The motor-cyclists were the only ones who chased us. We went faster and faster still, and they kept on our tail.

  I put my hand out to steady Billy as we accelerated. As I did so, Champion’s face tightened with rage. The light inside the car changed dramatically. The windows frosted, one by one, as if whitewash was being poured over us. Champion’s hand hit my shoulder and knocked me aside. I toppled, falling upon Billy, who let out a loud yell of protest.

  Champion seemed to be hammering upon my back with all his strength, and under both of us, Billy was squashed breathless. The Mercedes rocked with a succession of spine-jarring jolts, as if we were driving over railway sleepers. I knew that the tyres had torn, we were riding on the wheel-rims. As the car struck the verge, it tilted. The driver was screaming as he fought the steering-wheel, and behind his shrill voice I heard the steady hammering noise that can never be mistaken.

  ‘Down, down, down,’ Champion was shouting. The car began to roll over. There was a sickening thump, and a squeal of tortured metal. The horizon twisted, and we fell upwards in a crazy inverted world. The car continued to roll, tossing us around like wet clothes in a tumble-dryer. With wheels in the air, the engine screamed, and the driver disappeared through the windscreen in a shower of splintered glass that caught the sunlight as it burst over him like confetti. For a moment the car was the right way up, but it started to roll for a second time, and now fir-tree branches, clods of earth and chopped vegetation were coming in through the smashed windows. When upside down, the car slowed, tried to get on to its side, but with a groan settled on to its roof, wheels in the air, like a dead black beetle.

  If I expected hordes of rescuing Samaritans, I was to be sadly disappointed. No one came. The trees made it dark inside the narrow confines of the bent car. With great effort I extricated myself from under Champion’s bloody limbs. Billy began to cry. Still no one appeared. I heard the buzz of traffic speeding past on the autoroute, and realized that we were out of sight.

  I struggled with the door catch, but the car had warped enough to jam the door. I rolled over on to my back and braced my hands behind my head. Then, both feet together, I kicked. There was a sound of breaking glass and the door loosened. I clambered out. Then I got Billy under the armpits and pulled him clear.

  Any last doubt I’d had about the two motor-cyclists machinegunning us was dispelled by the bullet-riddled body of Champion’s driver. He was dead, shiny with bright-red blood, upon which thousands of particles of safety glass stuck, like sequins on a party dress.

  ‘Daddy’s dead,’ said Billy.

  I fumbled around for my spectacles and then took Champion’s limp arm and dragged him from the car. It was now an almost unrecognizable shape. There was the stink of petrol, and the loud gurgle of it pouring from the inverted petrol tank.

  ‘Go over there and lie down, Billy.’

  Champion wasn’t breathing. ‘Steve,’ I whispered. ‘Don’t kid around, Steve.’

  The irrational thought that Champion might be shamming was all I had to comfort me. I pushed a finger into his mouth and found his dentures. They were half way down his throat. I tipped him face-down, and thumped him in the small of the back. Billy was staring at me wide-eyed. Champion gurgled. I hit him again, and shook him. He vomited. I dropped him flat on his face and began to pump the small of his back, using a system of artificial respiration long since discarded from the first-aid manuals. Soon I felt him shudder, and I changed the pressure to coincide with his painful inhalations.

  ‘Where’s Billy?’ His voice was cruell
y distorted by the absence of his dentures.

  ‘Billy is absolutely all right, Steve.’

  ‘Get him away from the car.’

  ‘He’s fine, I tell you.’

  Champion closed his eyes. I had to lean close to hear him. ‘Don’t send him to wave down a car,’ he mumbled. ‘These French drivers will run anyone down to avoid being late for lunch.’

  ‘He’s right here, Steve.’

  His mouth moved again, and I bent close. ‘I said it would be like old times, didn’t I, Charlie?’

  21

  ‘Don’t ask me for a medical reason,’ said the doctor. He finished dressing a cut on my arm. ‘Let’s just say that it wasn’t Monsieur Champion’s time to go.’

  ‘But how sick is he now?’

  ‘Most people would need a couple of months’ convalescence. But then most people would probably have died in the smash. Most people would need an intensive-care unit, instead of sitting up in bed asking for whisky. But the police can’t talk to him until next week. I told them that.’

  ‘I’m sure he stopped breathing,’ I said. ‘I thought he was dead.’

  ‘Will-power,’ said the doctor. ‘You see a lot of it in my job. Had he been in a depressed state, he might have died. As it is, he’s probably got all manner of plans that he simply won’t give up.’

  ‘You’re probably right,’ I said.

  ‘You saved his life,’ said the doctor. ‘I told him that. It was lucky that you were only slightly hurt. You saved him. Those damned dentures would have choked him: he wouldn’t have been the first, either. Airlines tell people to remove them if there’s the danger of a forced landing.’

  ‘We’ve known each other a long time,’ I said.

  ‘Don’t talk to him tonight,’ said the doctor. ‘Well, let’s hope he’s around to do the same thing for you some time.’

  ‘He already has,’ I said.