by Colin Forbes
When the express reached Freiburg, the last stop before the Swiss border, Lennox had a moment's hesitation. One of the three people on Lasalle's list of witnesses—Dieter Wohl—lived in Freiburg. Shrugging his shoulders like a Frenchman, Lennox remained in his seat. At the moment the important thing was to get clear of Germany, to break his trail; Freiburg was just across the Rhine from Alsace and he could visit Wohl later, after he had seen the Frenchmen. Promptly at 3.36 pm the Rheingold stopped at Basel Hauptbahnhof where Lennox got off.
He had now arrived in Switzerland.
Leaving the station he crossed the street and went into the Hotel Victoria where he booked a room for one night only. He had plenty of time then to find the right shop and purchase a second suitcase. Taking it back to his room, he re-packed, putting his British clothes into his own case; the French items he had purchased in Metz—all except those he was wearing— went into the Swiss case he had just bought. Going out again with the British case, he walked into the Hauptbahnhof and locked it away in a luggage compartment. As he shut the door he knew it was by no means certain he would ever see that case again.
Grelle arrived late for the exhumation of the grave of the Leopard. Involved as he was in three major operations— probing the attempt to assassinate the president; investigating the mystery of the Leopard; perfecting the security surrounding Guy Florian—he needed every spare minute he could find in a day. Already he was keeping going on only four hours' sleep a night while he cat-napped during the day when he could—in cars, in aircraft, even in his office when he could snatch time between interviews.
With Boisseau behind the wheel, Grelle was dozing as they turned off the main road into the forest along a muddy track. A gendarme with a torch had signalled them at the obscure entrance, which they would otherwise have missed. Long after dark—the exhumation was being carried out at night to help keep it secret—it was pouring with rain and the rutted track showed two gullies of water in their headlights. The prefect opened his eyes. 'If this goes on much longer,' he grumbled, 'the whole of France will be afloat. . .'
It was a fir forest they were moving into. A palisade of wet trunks rippled past the headlights as the track twisted and turned, as the tyres squelched through the mud and the storm beat down on the car roof. About two kilometres from where they had left the road Boisseau turned a corner and the headlights, shafting through the slanting rain, shone on a weird scene.
Arc-lights glared down on the excavation which was protected with a canvas tent-like erection. Heaps of excavated soil were banked up, and men with shovels were shoulder-deep inside the pit, still lifting hard-packed soil. Through the fan- shapes cleared by the wipers Grelle saw they were inside a wide clearing. Parked police vehicles stood around on carpets of dead bracken. Under the arc-lights a deep-scored mud-track ran away from the grave. Following the track with his eyes, Grelle saw a few metres away the blurred silhouette of the stone leopard effigy which had been hauled off the grave. It looked eerily alive in the beating rain, like a real animal crouched for a spring.
`I'll see how they're getting on,' said Boisseau, who had stopped the car. 'No point in both of us getting wet. . .'
An agent de la paix, his coat streaming with water, peered in at the window and his peaked brim deposited rain inside the car. Embarrassed, he took off the cap. 'Put it on again, for God's sake,' Grelle growled. 'Are you getting anywhere?'
`They have found the coffin. . .' The man was boyish- faced, excited at addressing the police prefect of Paris. 'They will have it up within a few minutes.'
`At least there is a coffin,' Grelle muttered. He was anything but excited. Even if there were a body inside he was dubious of what this might prove; after all, 1944 was a long time ago. Pessimistic as he was, he had still arranged for the forensic department at Lyon to be ready to get to work at once when the remains were delivered to them. A pathologist; a man with a fluoroscope who could assess the age of the bones; various other experts.
Grelle followed Boisseau out into the rain, hands tucked inside his raincoat pockets, hat pulled down. He would have to get wet sooner or later, and it looked bad for the prefect to sit in a warm car while the other poor devils toiled in the mud. He had taken the precaution of putting on rubber boots and his feet sank ankle-deep into the slippery mud. He stood under the glow of an arc-light while a drop of rain dripped from his nose-end, staring at the stone leopard crouched in the rain.
Above the noise of the pounding rain, the distant rumble of thunder, a new sound was added as they fastened chains round something in the depths of the pit. The tent was moved away so a breakdown truck could back to the brink. The driver moved a lever and the crane apparatus leaned out over the pit. In case of an accident the men were climbing up out of the pit now, smeared with mud. A filthy job. Probably all for nothing.
It was a disturbing scene: the wind shifting the tree tops, the endless rain, the glare of the arc-lights. And now the men in shiny coats fell silent as they waited expectantly, huddled round the grave. The chained coffin had been fixed to the hoist; the only man doing anything now was the truck driver, sitting twisted round in his seat as he operated levers. The coffin came up out of the shadows slowly, tilting at an acute angle as the machinery whirred, as the rain slanted down on the slowly-turning box. Everyone was very still. Grelle inserted a cigarette in the corner of his mouth and then didn't light it as he saw a gendarme glance at him severely. 'Bloody hell,' he thought, 'does he expect me to take off my hat ?'
Looking to his right again he saw the stone leopard, its mouth open, caught in the arc-light, as though enraged at the desecration. The officer in charge of the whole business shouted an order. The coffin, now above ground, swivelled in mid-air, was carried by the steel arm over to the canvas tent, gently eased and dropped just inside, under cover from the rain. Another shouted order. A man with a power saw appeared, examined the coffin and then began work, slicing the lid above where it had originally been closed. Boisseau made an inquiry, came back to the prefect.
`The screws are rusted in. They were advised not to use chisels and crowbars—any clumsiness might have shivered the remains to powder. . .'
Grelle said nothing, standing quite still with the unlit cigarette now becoming soggy in the corner of his mouth. On Boisseau's orders a light was brought closer, shining directly through the tent's mouth on to the coffin.
`Is it going to tell us anything, I wonder ?' Boisseau murmured and there was a hint of excitement in his voice.
`I wouldn't bet on it. . .'
`They said as far as they could tell it hasn't been disturbed for many years. The earth is packed like concrete.'
`What about that damned statue ?'
`Well bedded in. Again, not touched for years. . .'
The man with the power saw stopped. They were ready. A couple of men stooped at either side of the coffin, began sliding the lid off with care, out of the tent, so until they had removed the whole lid it wasn't possible to see what might lie inside. They seemed to take an age, bent as they were under the canvas roof; and they had to watch their footing; the ground was becoming a quagmire. Then they had moved aside and under the glare of the arc-light everyone could see. There was a gasp of horror.
Grelle stood as immovable as the stone statue a few metres away.
`My God!' It was Boisseau speaking.
Inside the coffin was stretched the perfect skeleton of an enormous hound, lying on its haunches, its huge skull rested between its skeletal paw-bones, its eye-sockets in shadow so that it seemed to stare at them hideously with enormous black pupils.
`Cesar....' The prefect grunted. 'Macabre—and brilliant. He couldn't take his dog with him because that would identify him. And he needed something to weight the coffin. So he killed the dog and provided his own corpse.'
Boisseau bent over the skeleton, examined it briefly. 'I think there is a bullet-hole in the skull.'
`I wonder if the bastard shot his own dog?' Once Grelle had owned a British wire-ha
ired terrier which had eventually been knocked down in the Paris traffic. He had never replaced the animal. He spoke in a monotone, then stiffened himself. 'Tell them to replace the lid and get the whole thing to Lyon. Come on!'
They left the men in the wood lifting the coffin and its contents into the breakdown truck and drove back along the muddy track. The statue would remain in the wood, close to the grave it had guarded so long, which was already filling up with water. Boisseau, noting the frown of concentration on his chief's face, said nothing until they turned on to the main road.
`Surprised ?' he asked as they picked up speed.
`Not really—although I didn't anticipate the dog. The whole thing has worried me since I read the file—it was out of pattern. He took all those precautions to make sure he couldn't be identified and then, when it's nearly all over, he walks into Lyon and gets himself shot. If he'd survived up to then, he should have gone on surviving—which he did.'
`So he's about somewhere ?'
`I know exactly where he is. He's in Paris. The trouble is I don't know who he is.'
`Danchin or Blanc—according to Gaston Martin. It's a nightmare.'
`It will get worse,' Grelle assured him.
Grelle remained in Lyon just long enough to make a few more inquiries and to hear the result of the fluoroscope test on the skeleton. 'I estimate the age of the bones as being somewhere between thirty and forty years,' the expert told the prefect. `That is, they have lain in the forest for that period of time.' Which meant the animal could easily have been shot and buried in August 1944.
Flying back to Paris aboard the helicopter, Grelle told Boisseau about his other inquiries. 'They gave me the details about the sculptor who made the statue. He was found shot in his house soon after he had finished the statue. The place had been ransacked and it was assumed he had disturbed a burglar. It gives you some idea of the ruthlessness of the man we're looking for. He covered his tracks completely—or so he thought. Until Lasalle resurrected him.'
`What the hell are we going to do ?' Boisseau asked. `Track him down.'
CHAPTER NINE
THE TWO MEN walked alone in the Paris garden, one of them tall and stooping slightly to catch what his much shorter companion was saying. The shorter man was thick-bodied and had short, strong legs. He spoke with respect but firmly, as though expecting opposition he must overcome. He spoke in little more than a whisper even though there was no one within twenty metres of where they walked.
'We must add Lasalle to the list. He is a very dangerous man and at this stage we dare not risk leaving him alive. Otherwise he will go on ferreting until he digs up something.'
`I think it's unwise,' the tall man repeated. have given you three names and that is enough. Every one you add to the list increases the risk. Something will go wrong. . .
`Nothing will go wrong. They are using the best people available for this sort of work. I understand the Commando has almost arrived in France—and they should complete their task within six days. . . .' The short man took out a handkerchief and blew his nose. He had a cold coming on; Paris really was an unbearably damp place. 'You haven't heard even a whisper that anyone knows about this ?' he inquired.
`Nothing. Let them just get it over with quickly,' the tall man said sharply. 'And let me know when I can stop worrying about it. I have enough on my mind at the moment.'
The short man glanced quickly at his companion, sensing the undercurrent of tension. This he understood; he felt tense himself.
`And Lasalle?' Since the kidnap operation has been cancelled we really must deal with that problem, too.'
`You can get in touch with the Commando then? Just in case any other problem crops up ?'
The short man hesitated, then took a decision. 'They will make contact with us at regular intervals. So the answer is yes. I hope you haven't left someone off the list ?'
`No one! Now I think we have talked enough. . .
`And Lasalle?' the short man persisted. 'It will look like an accident, I promise you. The men who are dealing with this are experts. . .'
`Experts?' The tall man straightened up and his expression showed distaste. 'In wartime one took these actions for granted, but in peacetime . . . Still, it has to be done. In a way it is a continuation of the war. As for Lasalle, he must not be added to the list yet. I am sure he has no idea what is going to happen when the president of France leaves for Moscow. . .'
PART TWO
The Killer Commando
December 17—December 21
CHAPTER ONE
IT HAD BEEN the secret nightmare of every major security service in the west since the earliest days of the Cold War— and the later phoney period of so-called `detente'—that in one major country or another a secret Communist would stay dormant until he had worked his way up the ladder of power and reached the summit.
This is the man who is most feared by intelligence chiefs in London, Washington and other capitals—the Rip Van Winkle of Communism who has no contact with Russian agents, who visits no safe houses to pass on information, who is controlled by no spymaster. And because for many years he has no contact with Moscow there is no way to detect him as, by sheer ability, he continues his climb. He is not interested in delivering the details of a guided missile system to Moscow—he hopes to deliver his country.
It was Col Rene Lasalle who first caught a whiff of conspiracy when he was still assistant chief of military counter-intelligence. Burrowing deeper into the background of the elusive Leopard, he came up against Guy Florian, who dismissed him for crossing the thin line between military and political counter-espionage. By a strange quirk of history it fell to Marc Grelle to take up the trail again where Lasalle had been compelled to lose it.
On Friday, 17 December—the day the Soviet Commando crossed the border into France—Marc Grelle was distracted from his many duties by what, at the time, seemed a diversion, an incident which would be recorded in the files and forgotten. At ten in the morning he heard of the emergency at Orly airport where Algerian terrorists had just tried to destroy an El Al aircraft on the verge of take-off. 'We'd better go and have a look,' he told Boisseau. 'I thought the security at Orly was foolproof. . .' Grelle had reason to be worried; in only a few days' time Guy Florian was due to fly from Orly to Marseilles, where he would make a major speech on the eve of his departure for Russia.
Arriving at the airport, where it was pouring with rain, they found that Camille Point, the officer in command of the Airport Gendarmerie, had the situation under control. In the distance, barely visible in the rain squalls, they could see the Israeli aircraft which had been the target standing unscathed at the end of a reserve runway. Boisseau left Grelle with Camille Point for a moment to check the position with a radio-equipped patrol car. The whole airport was swarming with armed police.
`One of my men spotted the terrorist just in time,' Point explained. 'He was aiming his weapon at the El Al machine which was just about to take off with two hundred people aboard. Mouton—the gendarme—fired at him and missed, but he scared the terrorist who ran off and left his weapon behind. Come up on to the roof and I'll show you. . .
`This terrorist—he escaped ?'
There was anxiety in Grelle's voice. It had been known for some time that an Algerian terrorist cell was operating inside Paris and the prefect was anxious to round up the whole gang. He had given orders—which Roger Danchin had approved— that if the gang was cornered the police were to shoot to kill. But one man was not enough. Boisseau, who had run back from the patrol-car, heard the question.
`He got away, yes,' Boisseau began.
`Shit!' Grelle said venomously.
`But we have him under observation,' Boisseau continued. `Using the new system you have set up for the presidential motorcade drive to Roissy on 23 December, he is being passed from one patrol-car to another at this moment. And he does not appear to realize he is being tailed. I have just heard that he is moving along the Peripherique, heading for northern Paris. . .
'
Boisseau broke off as the driver of the near-by patrol-car waved to him. When he came back after taking the new radio report he nodded to the prefect. 'He's still under surveillance, still heading north. Do we risk losing him or close in ?'
`Don't close in—and don't lose him,' Grelle replied.
`That's what I have just told them. . .'
It was worth the risk Grelle told himself as he followed Point up on to the roof of the building. If they could trace the Algerian to his secret hideout, maybe even then continue to keep him under surveillance, they stood a chance of wiping out the whole cell at one swoop. Reaching the rooftop, Grelle paused and stared. Five uniformed gendarmes were gathered round a bulky instrument lying on a sheet of canvas. The fingerprint man, who had just finished examining the weapon, stood up and addressed Boisseau. 'I've got what I want. Pleasant little plaything, isn't it ?'
`Grail ?' the prefect inquired.
`Yes, sir.' It was a young, keen-looking gendarme who replied.
Grail is the NATO code-name for the Russian-made SAM— surface-to-air missile system—of the man-portable variety. It was also the rocket-launcher, quite capable of being carried by one man, which Moscow had supplied in meagre quantities— and quite unofficially—to certain Arab terrorist organizations. Weighing no more than eighteen kilos when loaded with one rocket or strela (the Russian word for arrow) it has a range of between one and two miles.
Only a few years earlier, Heathrow Airport, London, had been sealed off while crack troops of the British Army took control in a major anti-terrorist operation. At the time there had been reports that a terrorist group armed with Grail was waiting to shoot down the incoming plane carrying Dr Kissinger. Similar to a bazooka in appearance, the weapon had a heavy stock and a complex-looking telescopic apparatus mounted over its thick barrel. Two rockets lay beside it on the canvas. Point flopped down behind the unarmed launcher and aimed it over the parapet at the stationary El Al plane. 'You should look at this,' he told the prefect. 'It gives me the creeps how close that bastard came to wiping out two hundred people. Buvon here knows the damned thing backwards. He's with the anti-terrorist section. . .
