by John Denis
* * *
Poupon turned in triumph to Philpott, ‘Alors,’ he pointed to the phone, ‘it was too easy, mon ami. They’ll make the first payment in five minutes from now. They’re calling Smith this very moment.’
Philpott poked his head out of the van. ‘Did you hear that, Sonya?’ he asked.
‘Got it,’ she said.
‘Send it off to C.W.,’ Philpott ordered. ‘And tell him to welcome Graham to the organization.’
‘Check,’ Sonya replied. She worked the telegraph key, and the reflector sent out a series of winking flashes.
Poupon sat back in his chair, and lit up a foul-smelling pipe which had been banned from the conference room; Philpott, though, was more tolerant. ‘One feels,’ Poupon puffed, matches flying like kindling chips, ‘one feels we are entering the final phase. Yet we have no idea in the world how Smith can possibly get off that tower without us locating him.’
Philpott nodded moodily. He crossed the van to a table in the corner, where the City Engineer’s superintendent was still poring over his maps of dark and submerged places known only to a few specialist moles with circles under their eyes, whose company decent citizens normally shunned.
‘Are you absolutely certain,’ Philpott asked for at least the tenth time, ‘that there aren’t any underground connections — passages, that sort of thing — from the tower to the subways, the metro, the sewers … anywhere?’
‘I have told you, sir,’ the superintendent answered, containing his patience masterfully, ‘there are none — at least, none that are marked on the maps.
‘The bases of the tower’s four feet are self-contained. You see — here, there, there, and here. Yes, there is an electrical inspection chamber. We know they got into that, because we saw them unloading cable and take it in. But apart from that, there are no tunnels, open sewers, metro connections, no catacombs, priest-holes, potholes, lost Egyptian tombs … beneath the tower there is nothing but what should be there: power lines, water-mains, pneumatics and hydraulics. All of them, naturellement, are “live”.’
‘Maintenance crawlways, then,’ Philpott persisted, hopefully.
The superintendent shook his delicately greying head. ‘Non, monsieur. Rien.’
Philpott sighed his exasperation. Poupon suggested, ‘We know they have a helicopter, but of course they can’t use it. The Air Force would blast it out of the skies.’
‘They would,’ Philpott agreed. ‘Once the lasers were off, anything that came near the tower would be scrap within minutes.’ He gnawed his lip, and said to Sonya, ‘I believe we’re still missing something obvious. Read me back C.W.’s first message, would you, please?’ he directed. ‘The bit about the techniques they practised in training. I’m sure there was something there I overlooked.’
Sonya started the transcription — but Philpott interrupted her with an urgent snap of his fingers. ‘Poupon!’ he exclaimed. ‘Maybe you have it. The helicopter! If the helicopter is to be involved at all, the pilot will know precisely where and when he’s supposed to pick up Smith.’
He grew more excited. ‘Look — it’s about time we broke up Smith’s cosy little nest in the Loire Valley. Get the police in there — the Army, too. Don’t smash up the place — not that you’d be allowed to. But find me that pilot, Poupon, and wring him dry. I want him singing like a bird by midnight.’
Poupon inclined his head. ‘Consider it done, Monsieur.’
* * *
Pei was on telephone duty in the restaurant again, and picked up the receiver when the bell chimed. He answered the call, and listened in silence. ‘A moment, please,’ he requested, ‘I shall contact Mister Smith.’
He cradled the phone lengthways, and ran to the gallery. Smith was approaching with a search party, empty-handed. ‘The first payment, sir,’ Pei chattered, ‘it’s ready; it’s on the way. Fifteen million dollars. They’ve called — they’re still on now — to confirm our readiness to receive it.’
‘Ahhhh,’ Smith beamed. ‘Max,’ he ordered a senior crewman, ‘train a searchlight on the front entrance. Pick up whoever’s approaching the perimeter. Make sure there are no tricks. Then send two men down to get the money. Gentlemen, the bastards are crumbling. With any luck, we may be able to forget about Mrs Wheeler.’
Where the Pont d’Iéna bisects the Quai Branly on the river side of the tower, a heavily armoured military truck pulled into the area of No-man’s-land. Headlights blazing, the truck crossed to the Quai Branly perimeter, and a section of the barricade peeled away. Eight French paras got out of the back to join their young officer, who had travelled in the passenger seat.
Where the barricade had lain, one of the paras sketched a precise line in luminous paint. The officer chirped an order. The paras returned to the truck, and hauled out four aluminium suitcases. The lieutenant directed that they be placed in a group three feet short of the glowing boundary.
The powerful searchlight from the tower illuminated the pantomime, and also picked up two dark, hooded figures leaving the sanctuary of the tower base. They walked beneath the four great arches of its legs towards the perimeter. Each of the eight paras stood tensed and ready, weapons at the port, fingers on trigger-guards. They were the tough men, the hard ones, the élite of the French Army; ruthless, dare-devil fighters who had taken on the best in the world, and (sometimes) won.
Two men from the tower, their metal tags winking in the headlamp beam, stopped short. One whispered into a communicator. Smith, on the tower, brought his binoculars to a sharper focus, and rapped an order into his walkie-talkie.
One of the two detached himself and advanced to within a couple of feet of the painted line. He pointed at the suitcases and said, ‘Mister Smith wants them touching the line.’
‘Whereas my orders,’ the young officer replied, ‘are that they should stay where they are. If you want them, you will have to come and get them.’
The commando blinked behind his mask, and measured the distance from the line to the cases. With eight trigger-happy paras there, whoever crossed the line to retrieve the cases was dead. He retreated to join his companion, and once more made contact with Smith.
Then both men came to within spitting distance of the line, and the commando spokesman said, firmly, ‘Put them on the line. If you do not, Mister Smith says he will not be responsible for the consequences.’
The lieutenant shook his head. ‘I do not,’ he said, ‘take my orders from Mister Smith. Mine come from General Jaubert. Those are the orders I obey.’
‘On the contrary,’ spoke a new voice from behind the Saracen truck, ‘you will do as Mister Smith says.’ Philpott walked out and stood squarely facing the young lieutenant, in the glare of the lights. ‘Put the suitcases on the line,’ he directed.
‘I do not know you, Monsieur,’ the officer replied.
‘My name is Malcolm Philpott, and I have with me the Red priority directive of President Giscard D’Estaing.’ He thrust the affidavit before the lieuten ant’s eyes. ‘I am in charge of this operation, Lieutenant,’ Philpott went on, calmly.
‘I have told General Jaubert once today already, that when I wish him to take an initiative, I will give him leave to do so. He has disobeyed my orders, and he will be held to account for it. Now —’ his voice grew sharper, ‘put the suitcases on the line.’
The lieutenant shuffled uncomfortably, and said, ‘One moment. I will check.’ He rounded the truck to the driver’s seat, and picked up a walkie-talkie. Two minutes later he was back. ‘It will be as you say, Monsieur,’ he muttered. He gestured towards the cases, and two burly paras moved them carefully up to the phosphorescent marker, with their bases touching the gleaming paint.
Philpott barked, ‘You two — get what you came for.’ The commandos grinned, picked up a suitcase in each hand, and walked back to the tower.
They reported to Smith in the restaurant, where a team had been assembled to make a rough count of the fifteen million dollars. Smith listened in silence, and when the commando h
ad finished, he rubbed his chin thoughtfully. ‘Describe Philpott,’ he ordered, ‘describe him minutely.’
Both men obliged, and Smith ordered Leah to contact the château and run Malcolm Philpott through the master computer. It took the computer less than five minutes to deliver details of a man and an organization of which Smith had known next to nothing.
‘UNACO?’ he mused, incredulously. ‘Not the CIA, nor INTERPOL, nor the FBI? Not the US Army, or NATO? UNACO? Malcolm Philpott can afford to pay C.W. more than I can? I am opposed by a toothless professor, a bunch of civil servants and a few crank scientists? And I was getting worried?’
Smith laughed an ugly, barking laugh. He caught Leah by the arms and drew her to him. ‘Now I can afford to relax,’ he whispered. ‘I have been too long without your body. We will celebrate.’
She smiled up at him. ‘Then let us drink first,’ she suggested.
‘Capital,’ Smith agreed. He called for champagne, and he and Leah, joined by Sabrina and Mike Graham, drank a toast, jubilantly proposed by Smith.
‘To the United Nations Anti-Crime Organization — and Malcolm Gregory Philpott.’
Graham looked across at Sabrina, and treated her to a long, slow wink.
* * *
C.W. crouched on the window-sill of the VIP room. The sole illumination came still from the chink of light peeping through the shield around the bulb. The black agent reached out, grabbed the nylon rope, hauled its trailing end up, and pulled it into the room.
C.W. looped the strong thread around him in mountaineer style, and paid out the spare line. He turned to Adela Wheeler and said, ‘We’re stuck in here, and it gives me bad vibes. I want out.’
‘I do, too,’ she replied, gamely.
‘OK,’ C.W. nodded. ‘So how do you feel about heights?’
‘They terrify me,’ she admitted.
C.W. nodded again. ‘That figures,’ he grunted. ‘Then close your eyes.’
The count in the restaurant was going well. Two of Smith’s commandos were trained in the so-called ‘banker’s flip’, and their moistened fingers flew at extraordinary speed through the neatly wrapped bundles of tens, hundreds, and thousands. Smith had left the menial work to his staff. He and Leah were now languorously joined, on a mattress in a room right next door to the VIP room.
Graham and Sabrina stood on the fringe of the counting group, hunched over a table in the centre of the café. Occasionally, Sabrina let her attention wander. She never appreciated seeing other people’s money, unless she had stolen it.
A vague flash of movement outside the restaurant window crept into the corner of her eye. She looked — and hissed a warning to Graham.
Clearly visible through the patchwork of girders, they saw C.W. sliding down the rope. Riding him piggy-back, clutching his neck for dear life, her eyes tightly shut, was Adela Wheeler, in dark, bloodstained combat fatigues.
They disappeared from view, and the tautened rope slipped back into its box-girder shell.
C.W. eased the rope out through clawed hands. Sweat ran down his face, and the wind blew Adela’s thick, lustrous grey hair across his eyes. He stopped his descent, balanced on a cross-strut, and moved so that she could stand alongside him, with his arm about her waist. C.W. cleared his brow on his sleeve. Adela was breathing heavily. ‘How much further?’ she gasped, and made to look down at the ground.
C.W. caught her by the chin. ‘Don’t even think of it,’ he commanded, fiercely. ‘Just remember, you’re safe with me. I’m the best there is.’ She nodded mutely. C.W. helped her on to his back again, and muttered, ‘Not far to go, love. Not far now.’
He swung out and inched down the face of the tower, his hands paying out rope, his bare feet caressing the struts. He drew in close again as he thought he heard movement from above. He looked up. Mike Graham and Sabrina, crouched by the gallery railing, waved and urged him on.
C.W. smiled, and started the downward haul. And a protruding rivet caught a button of his combat safari jacket.
There was a soft ripping sound. C.W. froze, and looked about him. He dropped a few inches lower — and the ripping noise intensified. This time C.W. felt the tug on his clothing. He tried feeling his way back up but the snagged cloth would not release him.
The rivet now rested on the part of his jacket where the metal safety tag was pinned. Sabrina, on the gallery, gasped in horror, and Graham muttered a meaningless prayer.
C.W. said, ‘Hold tight, Adela. We’re caught up on something.’ She got his neck in a vicious lock, and he allowed them to fall another foot down the rope.
With a final, ugly tearing sound that invaded the black man’s brain like a death knell, C.W.’s safety tag pulled free in its square of cloth.
It glided away into the darkness, lost amongst the tangle of ironwork.
C.W. was now defenceless against the laser-guns, though Adela still wore Claude’s metal tag on her breast.
ELEVEN
Commissioner Poupon put the telephone down, and leaned back in his fragile, canvas-framed chair with an expression of beatific contentment across his pugnacious face. ‘So, my friend,’ he murmured to Philpott, ‘at last, action.’
There was no reply. Poupon glanced over at his colleague: Philpott had slumped into a corner of the van, his head sunk on his chest. Poupon regarded him gravely, then rose, crossed the floor, and gently shook the sleeping man’s shoulder.
Philpott jerked awake, looked up into Poupon’s face, and rubbed his eyes. ‘Christ,’ he murmured, ‘that’s a fine time for a cat-nap.’ He yawned, shook his head to clear the cobwebs, and asked the Commissioner if there had been any news.
Poupon indicated that there had. ‘We parachuted a hundred soldiers into the château,’ he said proudly. ‘It was all over in less than half an hour. The Château Clérignault still stands, as glorious as ever, but now it’s in our hands.’
Philpott climbed groggily to his feet. ‘Fantastic,’ he grinned. ‘And the chopper pilot? Did you get him?’
Poupon nodded. ‘Well?’ Philpott demanded.
‘His instructions,’ Poupon answered carefully, ‘are to pick up Smith at a particular point — on the River Seine.’
‘On the river?’ Philpott exploded. ‘Where, for God’s sake?’
‘Well down from the Tour Eiffel,’ Poupon explained. ‘Between the Statue de la Liberté and the church of Notre Dame D’Auteuil — a kilometre and a half, perhaps.’
Philpott jammed a fist petulantly into the palm of his hand. ‘Then how’s he getting there?’ he wondered. ‘It’s a fair step from the tower to the river — all of it across open ground, most of it outside the laser perimeter. Even if he leaves the lasers on, he’s vulnerable as soon as he’s out of their range. It doesn’t make sense, Poupon. It’s crazy … no tunnels, no passages, no sewers. Is he going to burrow like a gopher?’
Poupon shrugged. ‘Je ne sais pas, Monsieur … we shall wait and see. But we have more urgent matters to consider, n’est-ce pas? Mrs Wheeler, for example. Not to mention your agent — if he’s still alive.’
Philpott grimaced wearily. ‘Yeah,’ he admitted. ‘No word from C.W. for half an hour, at least. What the hell’s happening up there?’ Philpott punched the van wall, and rubbed his knuckles in frustrated rage.
* * *
C.W.’s rope ran out while he was still forty-odd feet from the ground. He shifted the burden of the woman on his back, adjusted her hold on his neck to a less suffocating angle, and muttered, ‘Hold on real tight now, baby. From here, it’s the hard way. I may have to fly a little. But remember — you’re safe. It’ll be just like taking a bumpy elevator ride.’
Adela Wheeler gave a scarcely audible squeaking reply, and C.W. committed their souls to providence and the formidable strength of his arms and legs.
Up aloft, the mouse-ear detectors sniffed the air and sought out the strange, moving mass descending the tower like a hunch-backed tarantula.
C.W. blinked the sweat out of his eyes, sniffed, and measured a cross-
strut until he found a diagonal. He curled his toes around it, bent his body into a bow, and slid down to the next horizontal. Then he repeated the process.
Another Lap-Laser joined the gun monitoring their progress. It, too, twitched and stirred. Inside the computer, lying unwatched in the restaurant command post, a helix of silicon chips and wheels tried to sort out what was happening.
C.W. was tiring fast. His arms were straining from their sockets. His heart pumped blood around his body with a thud that he felt must penetrate even to Smith’s lair. He knew he must rest … yet he could not be separated from Adela Wheeler. To do so was certain death — for both of them.
Unprotected, the lasers would seek him out for sure. And Adela Wheeler had no earthly hope of getting down by herself. She would stay rooted to the ironwork until fatigue claimed her body. And she would be grateful for the last despairing plunge into oblivion.
He gritted his teeth and swore fiercely, repeating one four letter word over and over again. Mrs Wheeler moaned through her pain. ‘I trust it’s not me you want, Mr Whitlock. And if it is, I only pray to God that you can wait for a more suitable time and place.’
It was too much for C.W. He guffawed, and swung her off to stand by him, being careful to hold her close. He planted a big, smacking kiss on her lips. ‘You know, Mrs W.,’ he said, ‘you’re some doll. And a widow, too. And rich! I could do a great deal worse.’
Adela smiled, and kissed him back on the cheek. ‘You’re a naughty boy, C.W.,’ she murmured, ‘and I’d have been proud, proud and privileged, to have had you as a son, as well as Warren. You’re my kind of man, and if you don’t watch out, I’ll ignore the forty years between our ages and show you a thing or two.’
C.W. rolled his eyes, and did a passable imitation of a rampant stallion. Adela giggled, and C.W. said, ‘OK now. Back up. Hold on real well. The last bit’s going to be a picnic.’
At the first level gallery rail, Mike grinned his relief. He had sent Sabrina back into the restaurant to cluster with the gloaters. Now he made to rejoin them himself. He ran into Smith and Leah, still flushed from their love-making.
