by James Munro
"This little favor," said Craig. "You did say 'we'?"
"More 'you,' really," said Loomis. "I'm too fat —and too important."
"Mind telling me what it is?"
"Of course," said Loomis. "You're going to help them rob a bank." He would say no more.
Japanese judoka who had taught him in London, would only say that Craig was better than he was— and he was a third dan in karate. For Craig, each hand, each foot, was a deadly weapon. He could, quite literally, kill with one finger. What use was lead pipe against that? And he had broken Fat Arthur's arm, quickly and surely, as one snaps a dry stick, for no other reason than that he disliked him. Loomis contemplated the fact that, like Frankenstein, he had created a monster. In Japan there were a handful of men who could kill Craig. Someday, maybe soon, one of them might have to.
The Mark X sliced past the family saloons as speedometer and tachometer needles revolved. A sign that said "ROUNDABOUT. REDUCE SPEED NOW" went by in a blur. Loomis lay back in the front seat, squat as a frog, and at the last possible second Craig eased on the brake and the big car squealed its outraged protest, circling the roundabout, while a man in a saloon, with his wife beside him and three kids in the back, stood on his brakes, inches from the Jaguar, swore once, then turned green. Craig's foot swiveled back to the accelerator. He said nothing, and Loomis thought how useful his monster was, and wondered when the monstrosity would outweigh the usefulness.
"You're not supposed to kill me, son," said Loomis.
"I never do," said Craig, "or anybody else. Unless you tell me."
He left the A.l then, and idled through Hertfordshire, pastel bright in the spring sunshine, through winding, leafy lanes as sentimental as calendar pictures, until he reached the nursing home.
It had once been a country house of modest dimensions, and its conversion had been thorough and discreet. The lodge gate was a sheet of steel, the lodge itself of solid stone, with tiny windows. The men inside it were armed, and safe from anything smaller than a tank. The house walls were of smooth stone, without footholds and ten feet high. Electrified wire and barbed wire topped the walls: the angle irons that held them in position each contained the photoelectric cells of an alarm system. From a shed near the house came the hum of a generator: the nursing home had its own power supply. Among the elegant parterres of the flowerbeds were plastic mines. The place was what it was supposed to be—impregnable.
Loomis showed himself at the window, the gate swung open, and Craig drove in. As he did so, he knew he was held in a crossfire, knew too that a pack of dogs watched him, ready to attack if he got out of the car before he reached the portico of the house. By the time they'd reached the house, the doors were open. They could see no people in the hall, but they were there all right. And the dogs. The doors shut behind them.
"Wetherly's been looking after Calvet," said Loomis. "Done a lovely job. Matt Chinn's here too."
Wetherly was a psychiatrist who belonged, body and soul, to Department K. His security classification was as high as Loomis's. It had to be: from time to time he examined everyone in the department, from Loomis down. But Sir Matthew Chinn was different; he was a civilian psychiatric specialist of such eminence that the rich had to pay his weight in diamonds to obtain a visit.
"He's been having a look at Grierson," said Loomis. "After we've finished I want him to look at you."
He marched toward a door labeled "Group Psychotherapy." As he did so Craig's hand gripped his arm, and for all his weight Loomis had to turn to him.
"I'm not going crazy," said Craig. "I just like my
job." Then he hesitated, looked almost puzzled.
"Maybe that's crazy," he said.
* * *
Calvet was waiting with Wetherly. The brooding Slav look Craig remembered had gone, and now he was full of life, with a hypermanic's impatience when nothing was happening. As they watched, he arranged a table and four chairs, laid out scribbling pads and pencils, then turned to Wetherly with a contented sigh.
"We're all ready, I think," he said.
Wetherly, a bland, Pickwickian cherub, beamed at him, and Calvet sat down.
"You've met Craig before," said Wetherly. Calvet nodded, not looking at Craig.
"What's he on?" asked Craig.
Calvet scowled, and rapped on the table with his pencil.
"I'm not deaf," he said.
"Now, now," said Wetherly. "Craig can't help the way he is. None of us can."
"That's true," Calvet said. The pencil continued to tap.
"Jean-Luc's on pentathol from time to time," Wetherly said. "He likes it."
"It makes me tell the truth," said Calvet. "That's what I like."
"By the way, he's always Calvet now. Jean-Luc Calvet. Jean-Luc to his friends. There isn't any Dovzhenko."
"Dovzhenko's dead," said Calvet, and the pencil tapped on in the same broken rhythm.
"Morse code," said Wetherly. "Listen."
The pencil said "F-R-E-E" over and over.
"That's how I feel all the time," said Calvet, then his glance moved to Craig, and he snapped the pencil in two, stood up, and walked over to him. Craig moved slightly, his feet apart, weight evenly balanced, hands open by his sides. It was the beginning of the karate ritual. He should bow then, and utter the apologetic words that were also a warning: "I come to you with empty hands." He did neither.
"You killed Dovzhenko," Jean-Luc said.
Loomis growled: "Look, son," and Wetherly touched his arm. He was smiling.
"I'm very glad you did," said Calvet. "You set Calvet free." He slapped Craig on the shoulder and turned to the table.
"Come on," he said. "We've got work to do."
They sat round the table: four men who might be meditating the possibility of a little slam in spades.
"He knows about James Soong," said Loomis. It was like hauling the keystone out of a dam. Jean-Luc foamed words, and the others listened, as Craig took notes.
Soong had once belonged to Chinese Internal
Security, starting with the Tiger Beaters, the men and women who specialized in the detection of de-viationists and bourgeois. From there he had been transferred, because of his exceptional promise, to the group called Wrong Thoughts Corrected, a counterintelligence unit that specialized in the surveillance of Russia. He had been one of the last students there before the split, and had arranged the death of S. I. Lemkov, Russia's leading expert on Chinese affairs. From Russia he had gone to Tunisia, then to Morocco, where he had become aware of Russian efforts to find him. (The KGB's Executive Division had put Soong's death, preferably after interrogation, as a matter of top priority. It had been an agent of Calvet-Dovzhenko's who had found him in Tangier.) He disappeared from Morocco, and another KGB man, doing what amounted to a regulation checkup of Calder Hall, had spotted him in Keswick. The need for interrogation had passed by then; the Executive Division had therefore killed him.
"The Russians do not like their opposition to get away with murder," said Calvet. "Personally I find this unrealistic."
"What was Soong doing in Keswick?" Loomis asked.
"Waiting," said Calvet, then frowned. "I was coming to that. Just listen and I'll explain everything. There is no need to interrupt."
Loomis muttered and was still, like a volcano not ready to erupt, and Calvet talked on, oblivious.
Wrong Thoughts Corrected had recently made a deal with another anti-Russian group, this time working from Europe. Its headquarters was in
London, but they had thriving agencies in Paris, West Berlin, and Warsaw. This group was known as BC, which stood for Bourgeois-Capitalist. The KGB as yet had no knowledge of its chief members, but they did know three things: one, that it had access to a great deal of information that made Russia look foolish or hateful to the outside world; two, that it had interfered, by murder or sabotage, in projects that Russia valued highly as influencing foreign opinion; and three, that it banked in Tangier.
Craig said: "Two questions."
&
nbsp; Calvet turned red at once, and began to yell about paying attention.
"I killed Dovzhenko for you," said Craig. "The least you can do is listen."
Calvet said: "Of course. I'm sorry," and smiled. When he smiled he looked innocent and young.
"What sort of projects did they sabotage?" asked Craig.
"Space shots," said Calvet. "Two Russian men have died in space. They think the BC had a hand in it."
Loomis sighed, a vast rumble of anger and dismay.
"Why bank in Morocco?" asked Craig. "It's hard to get the money out."
"Not for them," answered Calvet. "They have friends in Morocco. Powerful friends."
He went on talking. The bank was the Credit Labonne in Tangier. There was something about British newspapers, but he didn't know what. The trouble was that the KGB had only captured one BC operator, and he'd had a weak heart. He'd died before they could find out the names they needed. The Russians were always in too great a hurry, their methods lacked refinement.
"They don't understand," Calvet said. "To be really thorough, one must be gentle."
He smiled at Wetherly, the young, innocent smile, and Wetherly beamed back. Suddenly the smile faded, and Calvet began to talk in Russian. Then the words too faded, and he burst into tears. Wetherly bustled to him like a tubby ward sister, and Calvet clung to him and sobbed.
"Out," said Wetherly. "You've got the lot."
In the room labeled "Matron" Loomis and Craig sat and waited for Sir Matthew Chinn. Loomis looked at Craig, big, wary, and patient as ever, but oblivious to anything that didn't threaten him. When Calvet looked nasty, Craig was ready; when he wept, Craig ignored him.
"Credit Labonne. That's a bad one. I used to have an account there," said Craig.
"I know," said Loomis.
"Who's going to help me?"
"Later," said Loomis. "You've got to see Matt Chinn now, and I want to think about newspapers."
"Calvet said he didn't know—"
"Then I'll have to think. I hate thinking," said Loomis. "Makes me hungry."
Sir Matthew Chinn was a small Napoleonic man with a head that projected from his shoulders like an acquisitive bird's—a herring gull, say, or a jackdaw. He looked like a man who couldn't remember when he had last been wrong. Craig spent three hours with him, and at the end of it they went to the room where Grierson lay, eyes looking straight ahead, fingers busy with his piece of string. Chinn studied him intently, as if he were a fascinating but quite hopeless problem in chess, then Craig looked at him too, politely, because Chinn expected it. Grierson gave no sign that he knew they were there.
"He's quite helpless," Sir Matthew said. "Can't even control his bowels sometimes." Craig said nothing.
Sir Matthew permitted himself a small flash of temper.
"Sooner stink than remember, I suppose," he said.
Craig said: "I'd better be off."
"Just a minute," said Sir Matthew. "I want you to tell me what happened just before he got like that."
"You know."
"I want you to tell me."
"We had to kill a man," said Craig. "He had a bodyguard—we had to kill them as well. To get at him. It wasn't easy. I needed a gun that would scare them. I got a twenty-gauge riot gun. That's a shotgun with a sawed-off barrel. The Yanks use riot guns, but not twenty-gauge ones."
"Why not?"
"You have to get close," said Craig. "When you do—if I fired one at you now it would just about cut you in half." He looked at Grierson, still fumbling his string, and said: "I made a mistake in giving him that."
"You did?"
"He wasn't up to it," said Craig. "He killed two
blokes with it, and wounded another—he lost his arm. But then Grierson went funny. I should have used that riot gun myself."
8
"Killing's just a job to him," said Sir Matthew. "Like digging ditches."
Loomis lay back in his chintz-covered chair, watching an early bee bump among a vase of roses.
"Where d'you leave him?" he asked.
"He's waiting in the car."
"He nearly crashed today," said Loomis.
"I know. He told me. Your nervousness amused him. He likes risks."
"I don't," said Loomis, "but I have to take them."
"With him?"
"You tell me."
"For the moment he's a reasonable risk," Sir Matthew said. "He's not a psychopathic murderer in the usual sense."
"Cut out the codology," said Loomis.
"He won't kill unless there's risk to himself," said Sir Matthew.
"Even now?"
Sir Matthew nodded. "At one time he had a love-hate for that kind of killing—it disgusted him, but it exhilarated him, too."
"Like sex to a vicar," said Loomis.
"The established clergy have their own problems," Sir Matthew said. "Most of them are too poor to afford me. Craig is no longer aware of this love-hate when he kills."
"Why not?"
"He's killed too often," Sir Matthew said. "I made him." "I didn't say that."
"You didn't have to. Look, I need Craig, d'you see?" "I do indeed." "Is it safe to use him?"
"For a while, yes, if you must," said Sir Matthew. "He's good at it, you know, and he's still got it under control."
"And one day he won't?"
"That's very possible. He's no longer aware of his love-hatred for killing, but it's stronger than ever. One day he won't wait for you to find his targets."
"How long?"
"He'd better see me in three months," said Sir Matthew, and stalked to the door, then he turned around. Loomis was surprised to see that his face expressed emotion. The emotion was malice.
"I should make a note of it, Loomis," said Sir Matthew. "One fact is overwhelmingly clear. Once Craig rejects your authority, his first target is obvious."
"Who?" Loomis asked.
"You," said Chinn.
* * *
Mrs. McNab brought in more newspapers, and Craig groaned aloud. The room held a couple of thousand already.
"These are the last," said Mrs. McNab. Craig grunted. "Any orders, sir?"
"Keep reading," said Craig.
If Mrs. McNab had not been a lady, she would have groaned too.
They were looking for news items on Russia: copy that knocked the country. Vanishing Sputniks, failure of five-year plans, plane crashes, the defeat of Moscow Dynamo, reputed sex changes in Russian women athletes. Anything that made Russia look bad. There was plenty of it. Craig and Mrs. McNab read of riots in Azerbaijan, attempted kidnapping of defecting diplomats in Sydney, denunciations of poets in Leningrad, towns that changed their names as one after the other of the giant idols—Trotsky, Kamenev, Stalin, Khrushchev—crashed. Carefully they noted the date and the edition of each paper that ran each story. Russian claims to have invented everything from the telephone to the airplane; political theorizing that ruined a wheat crop; drunks and the jet set and the man who made a fortune bootlegging the records of Louis Armstrong, until long before the end it seemed to Craig that only two kinds of people existed: the Russians, who did stupid things, and the rest of the world, who watched. Craig gathered up a pile of foolscap and went to the door.
"You needn't wait," he told Mrs. McNab. "It's almost teatime anyway."
"Very good, sir," said Mrs. McNab.
The time was 8:30. She hated him more than ever.
Loomis seemed to have devoured even more papers in even less time. The room was littered with them. He'd simply hurled them away when he'd finished with them, to make room for more. He sat now before an enormous plate on which was a roast chicken stuffed with truffles. The remains of a sole mornay had been pushed aside, a wedge of Stilton lay waiting. With it he drank a Chateau Lafite.
"I told you," he grunted. "Thinking makes me hungry. Want a drink?"
"Please," said Craig.
"Find a glass then," said Loomis.
Craig found a teacup, and Loomis shuddered.
"See a pat
tern?" he asked.
Craig sipped, and nodded, then looked at his sheaf of foolscap.
"Daily News, Glasgow Evening Messenger, Yorkshire Mercury, Woman's Ways, and In," he read.
"Woman's Ways? In?" asked Loomis.
"All the newspapers belong to Salvation Press," Craig said. "They do Woman's Ways, and In as well."
"In?"
"It's a groovy trend setter," Craig said ex-pressionlessly. "The mag that shows you tomorrow's world today. It doesn't like Russia either. Nor does Woman's Ways."
"You're not just a pretty face are you?" said Loomis. "That's the way I worked it out as well. Salvation Press is always first with the Russian stuff. Ahead of the Mail and Express even. And it prints stuff the others don't even bother with."
"That's right," said Craig, and drained his teacup.
"They got a tip-off," said Loomis. "They must have. There's too much coincidence, d'you see? I think that's what Calvet was on about."
"Yes," said Craig. "Nice wine, this."
Loomis grunted and pushed the bottle in-finitesimally toward Craig, who filled his cup.
"There's something else," he said. Loomis grunted again. "Salvation Press is run by a bloke called Simmons," said Craig. "C. G. Simmons. He owns Midland Television, too."
"That so?" said Loomis, and chuckled.
"He's got a daughter," Craig said. "Jane. She was with the walking party who saw Soong die."
"Bit o' luck, that," Loomis said. "Linton reckons she was sweet on you."
"You have plans for me?"
"You need a bit of a breather," said Loomis. "Country air. Wholesome food." He speared a mouthful of chicken and truffles. "Surrey. That's the place."
"Where Simmons lives?"
"Ahh," said Loomis. "Go down there and chat her up a bit. See if you can meet her pa."
"What's my cover?" Craig asked. "She knows I'm on to the Soong business."
"Foreign Office," said Loomis. "Far East Department. They had you up there in case Red China got irritated. I'll let you have the papers tomorrow." He chuckled. "Oh son," he said, "I've waited for years to see you in a bowler hat."
"I thought I was going to rob a bank," said Craig.
"That comes later," said Loomis. "When you get help."
