Floodgate

by Alistair MacLean

  Not to be outdone, van Effen smiled in turn. ‘You must be in a desperate way.’ He lifted and examined his empty glass. ‘If you’d just poke your head round the corner, Vasco, and make the usual SOS.’

  ‘Of course, Stephan.’ There was an unmistakable expression of relief in his face. He did as asked then settled back in his seat.

  ‘No more interrogation,’ Agnelli said. ‘I’ll come straight to the point. Your friend Vasco tells me that you know a little about explosives.’

  ‘Vasco does me less than justice. I know a great deal about explosives.’ He looked at Vasco in reproof. ‘I wouldn’t have thought you would discuss a friend—that’s me, Vasco, in case you’ve forgotten—with strangers.’

  ‘I didn’t. Well, I did, but I just said it was someone I knew.’

  ‘No harm. Explosives, as I say, I know. Defusing bombs I know. I’m also fairly proficient in capping well-head oil fires but you wouldn’t be approaching me in this fashion if that was your problem. You’d be on the phone to Texas, where I learnt my trade.’

  ‘No oil fires.’ Agnelli smiled again. ‘But defusing bombs—well that’s something else. Where did you learn a dangerous trade like that?’

  ‘Army,’ van Effen said briefly. He didn’t specify which army.

  ‘You’ve actually defused bombs?’ Agnelli’s respect was genuine.

  ‘Quite a number.’

  ‘You must be good.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘You’re here.’

  ‘I am good. I’m also lucky, because no matter how good you are the bomb you’re trying to defuse may be your last one. Peaceful retirement is not the lot of a bomb disposal expert. But as I assume you have no more unexploded bombs than you have oil wells, then it must be explosives. Explosives experts in Holland are not in short supply. You have only to advertise. That I should be approached in a clandestine fashion can only mean that you are engaged in activities that are illegal.’

  ‘We are. Have you never been? Engaged, I mean?’

  ‘All depends upon who defines what is illegal and what is not and how they define it. Some people hold definitions which are different from mine and wish to discuss the matter with me. Very tiresome they can be, those alleged upholders of justice. You know what the British say—the law is an ass.’ Van Effen considered. ‘I think I put that rather well.’

  ‘You’ve hardly committed yourself. May one ask—delicately, of course—whether this discussion you are avoiding has anything to do with your vacationing in Amsterdam?’

  ‘You may. It has. What do you want me to blow up?’

  Agnelli raised his eyebrows. ‘Well, well, you can be blunt. Almost as blunt as you can be, shall we say, diplomatic’

  ‘That’s an answer? An explosives expert is good for only one thing—exploding things. You wish me to explode something? Yes or no?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Two things. Banks, boats, bridges, anything of that kind I’ll blow up and guarantee a satisfactory job. Anything that involves injury, far less death, to any person I won’t have any part of.’

  ‘You won’t ever be called upon to do any such thing. That’s also a guarantee. The second thing?’

  ‘I don’t seek to flatter you when I say that you’re an intelligent man, Mr Agnelli. Highly intelligent, I should think. Such people are usually first-class organizers. To seek the help of a last minute unknown to help you execute some project that may have been in the planning stage for quite some time doesn’t smack to me of preparation, organization or professionalism. If I may say so.’

  ‘You may. A very valid point. In your position I would adopt the same disbelieving or questioning attitude. You have to take my word for it that I am a member of a highly organized team. But, as you must well know, the best-laid plans etc. An unfortunate accident. I can explain to your satisfaction. But not just at this moment. Will you accept our offer?’

  ‘You haven’t made one yet.’

  ‘Will you accept an offer of a job in our organization, on, if you wish, a permanent basis, on what I think you’ll find a very satisfactory salary plus commission basis, your special responsibility being the demolition of certain structures, those structures to be specified at a later date.’

  ‘Sounds very businesslike. And I like the idea of commissions, whatever they may be. I agree. When do I start and what do I start on?’

  ‘You’ll have to bear with me a little, Mr Danilov. My brief for this afternoon is only of a limited nature—to find out, if, in principle, you are prepared to work with us, which I’m glad to say you seem to be. I have to report back. You will be contacted very shortly, sometime tomorrow, I’m sure.’

  ‘You are not the leader of this organization?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You surprise me. A man like you acting as a lieutenant—well, this leader I must meet.’

  ‘You shall, I promise.’

  ‘How will you contact me? No phones, please.’

  ‘Certainly not. You will be our courier, Vasco?’

  ‘My pleasure, Mr Agnelli. You know where to reach me any time.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Agnelli stood up and gave his hand to van Effen. ‘A pleasure, Mr Danilov. I look forward to meeting you tomorrow.’ Helmut Paderiwski didn’t offer to shake hands.

  As the door closed behind them, Sergeant Westenbrink said: ‘I need another beer, Lieutenant.’

  ‘Peter. Always Peter.’

  ‘Sorry. That was pretty close. The ice was very thin at times.’

  ‘Not for a practised liar. I rather gather that you’ve given them the impression that I’m a desperate and wanted criminal?’

  ‘I did mention that there was the odd extradition warrant out for you. But I didn’t forget to emphasize your generally upright and honest nature. When dealing with your fellow criminals, of course.’

  ‘Of course. Before you get the beer, I have a phone call to make. Well, get it anyway.’

  Van Effen went to the bar and said to the man behind it, ‘Henri, a private call, if I may.’

  Henri, the proprietor, was a tall, gaunt man, sallow of countenance and lugubrious of expression. ‘You in trouble again, Peter?’

  ‘No. I hope someone else will be, soon.’

  Van Effen went into the office and dialled a number. ‘Trianon? The manager, please. I don’t care if he is in conference, call him. It’s Lieutenant van Effen.’ He hung on for a few moments. ‘Charles? Do me a favour. Book me in as from a fortnight ago. Enter it in the book, will you, in the name of Stephan Danilov. And would you notify the receptionist and doorman. Yes, I expect people to be enquiring. Just tell them. Many thanks. I’ll explain when I see you.’

  He returned to the booth. ‘Just booked myself—Stephan Danilov, that is—into a hotel. Agnelli pointedly did not mention anything about where I might be staying but you can be sure that he’ll have one of his men on the phone for the next couple of hours if need be, trying to locate me in every hotel or pension in the city.’

  ‘So he’ll know where you are—or where you’re supposed to be.’ Vasco sighed. ‘It would help if we knew where they were.’

  ‘Should know soon enough. There’s been two separate tails on them ever since they left the Hunter’s Horn.’

  Van Effen, appearance returned to normal, asked the girl at the Telegraph’s reception desk for the sub-editor who had taken the FFF’s first telephone message. This turned out to be a fresh-faced and very eager young man.

  ‘Mr Morelis?’ van Effen said. ‘Police.’

  ‘Yes, sir. Lieutenant van Effen, isn’t it? I’ve been expecting you. You’ll be wanting to hear the tapes? Maybe I should tell you first that we’ve just had another message from the FFF, as they call themselves.’

  ‘Have you now? I suppose I should say “The devil you have” but I’m not surprised. It was inevitable. Happy tidings, of course.’

  ‘Hardly. The first half of the message was given over to congratulating themselves on the Texel job, how it had happened precise
ly as they had predicted and with no loss of life: the second half said there would be scenes of considerable activity on the North Holland canal, two kilometres north of Alkmaar at nine o’clock tomorrow morning.’

  ‘That, too, was inevitable. Not the location, of course. Just the threat. You’ve taped that, too?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘That was well done. May I hear them?’

  Van Effen heard them, twice over. When they were finished he said to Morelis: ‘You’ve listened to those, of course?’

  ‘Too often.’ Morelis smiled. ‘Fancied myself as a detective, thought maybe you would give me a job but I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s more to this detecting business than meets the eye.’

  ‘Nothing struck you as odd about any of the tapes?’

  ‘They were all made by the same woman. But that’s no help.’

  ‘Nothing odd about accents, tones? No nuances that struck you as unusual?’

  ‘No, sir. But I’m no judge. I’m slightly hard of hearing, nothing serious, but enough to blunt my judgment, assuming I had any. Mean anything to you, Lieutenant?’

  ‘The lady is a foreigner. What country I’ve no idea. Don’t mention that around.’

  ‘No, sir. I rather like being a sub-editor.’

  ‘We are not in Moscow, young man. Put those tapes in a bag for me. I’ll let you have them back in a day or two.’

  Back in his office, van Effen asked to see the duty sergeant. When he arrived van Effen said: ‘A few hours ago I asked for a couple of men to be put on a Fred Klassen and Alfred van Rees. Did you know about this, and if you did, do you know who the two men were?’

  ‘I knew, sir. Detective Voight and Detective Tindeman.’

  ‘Good. Either of them called in?’

  ‘Both. Less than twenty minutes ago. Tindeman says van Rees is at home and seems to have settled in for the evening. Klassen is still on duty at the airport or, at least, he’s still at the airport. So, nothing yet, sir.’

  Van Effen looked at his watch. ‘I’m leaving now. If you get any word from either, a positive not negative report, call me at the Dikker en Thijs. After nine, call me at home.’

  Colonel van de Graaf came from a very old, very aristocratic and very wealthy family and was a great stickler for tradition, so it came as no surprise to van Effen when he approached their table wearing dinner jacket, black tie and red carnation. His approach bore all the elements of a royal progress: he seemed to greet everyone, stopped to speak occasionally and waved graciously at those tables not directly in his path. It was said of de Graaf that he knew everybody who was anybody in the city of Amsterdam: he certainly seemed to know everybody in the Dikker en Thijs. Four paces away from van Effen’s table he stopped abruptly as if he had been transfixed: but, in fact, it was his eyes that were doing the transfixing.

  That the girl who had risen from the table with van Effen to greet de Graaf had this momentarily paralysing effect not only on de Graaf but on a wide cross-section of the males of Amsterdam and beyond was understandable. She was of medium height, wore a rather more than well-filled ankle-length grey silk gown and no jewellery whatsoever. Jewellery would have been superfluous and no one would have paid any attention to it anyway: what caught and held the attention, as it had caught the riveted attention of the momentarily benumbed Colonel, was the flawless classical perfection of the features, a perfection only enhanced, if this were possible, by a slightly crooked eyetooth which was visible when she smiled, which seemed to be most of the time. This was no simpering and empty-headed would-be Miss Universe contender, churned out with repetitive monotony by a Californian-style production line. The finely chiselled features and delicately formed bone structure served only to emphasize the character and intelligence they served only to highlight. She had gleaming auburn hair, great hazel eyes and a bewitching smile. It had, at any rate, bewitched the Colonel. Van Effen cleared his throat.

  ‘Colonel van de Graaf. May I introduce Miss Meijer. Miss Anne Meijer.’

  ‘My pleasure, my pleasure.’ De Graaf grabbed her outstretched hand in both of his and shook it vigorously. ‘My word, my boy, you are to be congratulated: where did you find this entrancing creature?’

  ‘There’s nothing to it really, sir. You just go out into the darkened streets of Amsterdam, stretch out your hands and—well, there you are.’

  ‘Yes, yes, of course. Naturally.’ He had no idea what he was saying. He seemed to become aware that he had been holding and shaking her hand for an unconscionably long time for he eventually and reluctantly released it. ‘Remarkable. Quite remarkable.’ He didn’t say what he found remarkable and didn’t have to. ‘You cannot possibly live in this city. Little, my dear, escapes the notice of a Chief of Police and I think it would be impossible for you to be overlooked even in a city of this size.’

  ‘Rotterdam.’

  ‘Well, that’s not your fault. Peter, I have no hesitation in saying that there can be no more stunningly beautiful lady in the city of Amsterdam.’ He lowered his voice a few decibels. ‘In fact I would come right out and say that she is the most stunningly beautiful in the city, but I have a wife and two daughters and these restaurants have ears. You must be about the same age as my daughters? May I ask how old you are?’

  ‘You must excuse the Colonel,’ van Effen said. ‘Policemen are much given to asking questions: some Chiefs of Police never stop.’

  The girl was smiling at de Graaf while van Effen was speaking and, once again, van Effen could have been addressing a brick wall. ‘Twenty-seven,’ she said.

  ‘Twenty-seven. Exactly the age of my elder daughter. And Miss Anne Meijer. Bears out my contention—the younger generation of Dutchmen are a poor, backward and unenterprising lot.’ He looked at van Effen, as if he symbolized all that was wrong with the current generation, then looked again at the girl. ‘Odd. I know I’ve never seen you but your voice is vaguely familiar.’ He looked at van Effen again and frowned slightly. ‘I look forward immensely to having dinner with you, but I thought—well, Peter, there were one or two confidential business matters that we had to discuss.’

  ‘Indeed, sir. But when you suggested we meet at seven o’clock you made no exclusions.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  The girl said: ‘Colonel.’

  ‘Yes, my dear?’

  ‘Am I really such a hussy, a harlot, harridan and ghastly spectacle? Or is it because you don’t trust me that you want to speak privately with Peter?’

  De Graaf took a pace forward, caught the girl by the shoulders, removed one hand to stop a passing waiter and said: ‘A jonge jenever. Large.’

  ‘Immediately, Colonel.’

  De Graaf held her shoulders again, stared intently into her face—he was probably trying to equate or associate the vision before him with the creature he had met in La Caracha—shook his head, muttered something to or about the same nameless deity and sank into the nearest chair.

  Van Effen was sympathetic. ‘It comes as a shock, I know, sir. Happened to me the first time. A brilliant make-up artist, don’t you think? If it’s any consolation, sir, she also fooled me once. But no disguise this time—just a wash and brush-up.’ He looked at her consideringly. ‘But, well, yes, rather good-looking.’

  ‘Good-looking. Hah!’ De Graaf took the jonge jenever from the waiter’s tray and quaffed half the contents at a gulp. ‘Ravishing. At my age, systems shouldn’t be subjected to such shocks. Anne? Annemarie? What do I call you?’

  ‘Whichever.’

  ‘Anne. My dear. I said such dreadful things about you. It is not possible.’

  ‘Of course it’s not. I couldn’t believe Peter when he said you had.’

  Van Effen waved a hand. ‘A loose translation, shall we say?’

  ‘Very loose.’ Wisely, de Graaf did not pursue the subject. ‘And what in heaven’s name, is a girl like you doing in a job like this.’

  ‘I thought it was an honourable profession?’

  ‘Yes, yes, of cours
e. But what I meant was—well—’

  ‘What the Colonel means,’ van Effen said, ‘is that you should be an international stage or screen star, presiding over a Parisian salon, or married to an American oil millionaire—billionaire, if you like—or a belted English earl. Too beautiful, that’s your trouble. Isn’t that it, Colonel?’

  ‘Couldn’t have put it better myself.’

  ‘Dear me.’ Anne smiled. ‘Doesn’t say much for your Amsterdam girls. You mean you only employ ugly girls?’

  De Graaf smiled for the first time that evening. ‘I am not to be drawn. The Chief of Police is famed for his powers of recovery. But you—you—among those dreadful Krakers and dressed like a—like—’

  ‘Harlot? Hussy?’

  ‘If you like, yes.’ He put his hand on hers. ‘This is no place for a girl like you. Must get you out of it. Police is no place for you.’

  ‘One has to earn a living, sir.’

  ‘You? You need never earn a living. That, Anne, is a compliment.’

  ‘I like what I’m doing.’

  De Graaf didn’t seem to have heard her. He was gazing at some distant object out in space. Van Effen said to the girl: ‘Watch him. He’s at his most cunning when he goes into a trance.’

  ‘I am not in a trance,’ de Graaf said coldly. ‘What did you say your surname was?’

  ‘Meijer.’

  ‘You have a family?’

  ‘Oh, yes. The usual. Parents, sisters, two brothers.’

  ‘Brothers and sisters share your interest in law and order?’

  ‘Police, you mean. No.’

  ‘Your father?’

  ‘Again police?’ She smiled as a person smiles when recalling someone of whom they are very fond. ‘I couldn’t imagine it. He’s in the building business.’

  ‘Does he know what kind of business you are in?’

  She hesitated. ‘Well, no.’

  ‘What do you mean, well, no? He doesn’t, does he? Why?’

  ‘Why?’ She seemed to be on the defensive. ‘He likes us to be independent.’