The Wolf at the Door

by Jack Higgins

  “Ivanov’s your biggest problem, the young military action dog who wants to be in charge.”

  “And Chekhov?”

  “My dear Daniel, you took me into your confidence last night. You gave me no specifics, but forgive a man used to subterfuge when he guesses that this all has to do with the Russians. And by the Russians, I assume it leads to Putin.”

  “The man himself.”

  “Max Chekhov is an oligarch, and they’ve fallen increasingly on hard times in the financial mess of the world of today and they need to look to the Kremlin for support. Chekhov has more to contend with than most, since he was chosen to head Belov International when the State took it over again.”

  “In other words, he’s a Putin man.” Holley nodded. “Lermov told me that Putin told him Chekhov was the only oligarch he had any time for, and that was only because he had him in his pocket.”

  “So what would you like to do now?” Selim asked, but didn’t get an answer.

  A harsh voice called, “Hold on, you two. What are you doing sniffing round here? I saw you looking down at the boat, and you had binoculars.”

  “I think you’re mistaken,” Holley called, and hissed at Selim, “Keep going, let’s get out of here.”

  Behind him, Jacob White increased his pace, reached out, grabbed Holley, and swung him around. Selim also turned and saw Chekhov and Ivanov toiling up the path behind.

  “My God, it’s you,” Ivanov called. “Hold him, Jacob.”

  Holley, on the half turn as Jacob swung him around, delivered a reverse elbow stroke into the mouth, and, as Jacob doubled over, raised a knee in his face that lifted him backwards. The result was quite devastating.

  Chekhov and Ivanov paused, Chekhov looking shocked. “Daniel,” he said. “What’s going on?”

  “I might ask you the same thing,” Holley answered, and Ivanov pulled a Makarov out of his trench coat pocket.

  “My turn, you bastard,” he said, and shot him.

  It was like a tremendous punch in the chest delivered by a sixteen-stone heavyweight fighter, and Holley staggered, lost his balance, and fell on his back. From the first impact, he had taken one deep breath after another, for sometimes the force of a blow into body armor could induce unconsciousness. All those years ago in the camp, he’d been trained to handle such a situation.

  He closed his eyes, heard Chekhov say, “You’ve killed him, you fool, you’ve ruined everything.”

  “The bastard deserved killing.” Ivanov dropped to one knee. “I think I’ll give him one in the forehead just to make sure.”

  Holley drew out the Colt .25, opened his eyes, reached up, and shot off half of Ivanov’s left ear. Ivanov screamed, dropped the Makarov, and got to his feet, clutching the wound, blood streaming through his fingers.

  Holley got up, aware of the pain in his chest and still breathing deeply. “I don’t know what’s been going on, Max, between you and the boy wonder here. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. I’ve organized everything for Friday, completed my side of the bargain, but what have you and this piece of dung been up to, that’s the question. I don’t think Lermov will be pleased, and God help you with Putin if he found that everything had been turned into a cock-up because you and Ivanov had a different agenda.”

  Chekhov was horrified. “I didn’t intend anything like this, Daniel, believe me. What am I going to do?”

  “There must be a first-aid kit on the Mermaid. Strap him up, put him in the backseat, and get back to the Embassy in London. Next time, I really will kill him.” He nodded at Jacob White, who had managed to get to his feet. “Maybe the last of the ape-men can give you a helping hand.”

  “I don’t think he can even help himself,” Chekhov said, and walked a few yards after them as they went to where the Mini Cooper was parked. He took out his diary and its pencil.

  Selim saw what he was doing. “Ah, you are noting the number, hoping to trace me? It is Algerian, my friend, quite untraceable.”

  Holley turned. “Grow up, Max, or do you want a bullet yourself? Just piss off, and tell anyone who needs to know that everything is organized, or, as I suspect Caitlin Daly would say, on Friday we’ll ‘astonish’ the world.”

  Selim got behind the wheel. “Get in, and I’ll show you what a great driver I am. What would you like to do?”

  Holley unbuttoned his shirt, found the Makarov round sticking in his bulletproof vest, and pulled it out. “A well-dressed man shouldn’t be without one. As to what I’d like to do. That place, the Ship Hotel in Chichester, where we stopped for coffee, had a decent-looking restaurant. I’d say we could get there in half an hour. Sorry you won’t be able to join me in the bottle of champagne I’m going to order.”

  “Then you’ll have to drink it all yourself, dear boy,” Selim Malik told him, and they drove away.

  The lunch was all that could be expected, and Holley drank far too much champagne, as he admitted, but the real discovery was Selim’s driving skill. He was first-rate.

  On the way back to London, Holley, half asleep in his seat, said, “I’ve got to give it to you, Selim. You handle this thing like a racing driver.”

  “Always my dream,” Selim told him. “Many years ago when I was at Oxford University, a policeman who pulled me up for speeding said, ‘Who do you think you are, Stirling Moss?’ ”

  “And you were flattered?”

  “Who wouldn’t be? Britain’s all-time favorite star of the racetrack and a true gentleman. Now, of course, I am getting too old.”

  Holley was aware of nothing more after that because he fell asleep.

  He woke with a start to Selim’s touch on his shoulder. They were outside the hotel. “Here we are. What now?”

  “Have a shower, sort myself out. Check the bruising.” Holley managed a laugh.

  “So you have nothing particularly important to do?”

  “Everything’s sorted, Selim, as I told Chekhov. It’s all in order. Friday, everything comes together, and we solve the problem for Mister Big at the Kremlin. I’ve one call to make on my Codex, and then I’m going to turn it off so nobody can get me for the rest of the night.”

  “I have a suggestion. The Curzon Cinema in Shepherd’s Market shows many interesting films. Tonight they show a French film directed by Jean-Pierre Melville in 1956, Bob le flambeur. It’s a wonderful heist movie—an aging gangster is tempted back into one last fatal throw of the dice.”

  “That sounds like just my kind of movie,” Holley said. “I can’t wait. We’ll have dinner afterwards. I’ll see you in an hour.”

  When he called Caitlin Daly, he got an instant response. “Where are you?” he asked.

  “At my office. Paperwork for the charity, and I’ve got a forum to attend with Monsignor Murphy.”

  “Don’t you find it difficult to fit everything in?”

  “Of course, but it’s important, the work we do, and he’s used to leaning on me in many ways. He’s an important figure in the Catholic Church in London. Even the rich respond to him, and their money is important to us.”

  “When I read all the files on your people, it fascinated me that the whole Hope of Mary thing came out of Murphy doing a visit to Derry for a few months during the worst of the Troubles and being impressed by the work the Little Sisters of Pity were doing. I never got any idea he was in favor of a violent solution to the Troubles.”

  “He isn’t. To believe in Sinn Fein and a United Ireland was always as natural as breathing for him, and I’m not saying he wouldn’t confess an IRA man when the Church said he shouldn’t—but not an ounce more than that. He’s a great and good man.”

  “And a bit of a holy fool. I wonder what he’d say about your involvement in the Glorious Cause? You’re sure he hasn’t got an inkling?”

  “Absolutely not. He’d be horrified. Stop this, Daniel, I don’t want to hear any more on the subject.”

  “Have you had any final news from Barry and Flynn?”

  “Not yet, but it’s only noon over there. Flynn
and Bulganin were supposed to go down to this Quogue place.”

  “You’re right. Tomorrow will be soon enough. You’ll be having a meeting in the chapel at the refuge, I suppose?”

  “You’re not going to suggest joining us?”

  “There’s no need. Everything’s worked out. You’ve done very well. I’m going out to a show, so I’ll turn off my mobile. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

  He got dressed, thinking about it. She obviously wanted to be in charge, a psychological hang-up, that, because of being leader of the cell for so many years. And that was fine, though he didn’t know how she’d react to his insistence that Monica Starling be taken out of the equation. He realized that it’d be better if he told her about it face-to-face, but he would leave that until tomorrow night.

  His phone sounded just before he was leaving. It was Chekhov. “Daniel, you’ve got to understand the pressures I’m under. Ivanov is a madman. I knew he was too good to be true the first time I met him.”

  “How is the bastard?”

  “Never mind that. He shot you in the chest. How did you survive that?”

  “I was wearing a bulletproof vest under my shirt. You really should consider it for yourself, Max.”

  “My God, I’m going to get one straightaway, but about Ivanov. I patched him up on the boat, and drove him back to the Embassy, as you suggested. They had some top surgeon in to stitch him up, but he’s going to look very strange.”

  “What were you doing there in the first place?”

  “He was very insistent that I should take him down there and show it to him. He said that perhaps it could be useful sometime.”

  “In what way?”

  “He didn’t say. I thought he might want it for weekends. You know, boyfriends and so on.”

  “I didn’t realize his inclinations ran that way. Mind you, that’s his business. To each his own. I’m going out, so you needn’t try again. If you want to cover your back, phone Lermov and tell him what happened.”

  “Actually, I already have.”

  “You’re a laugh a minute, Max.” Holley switched off and left.

  Bob le flambeur was sensationally good and lifted his spirits in spite of the downbeat ending. “Marvelous,” he told Selim as they sat in the booth at Al Busten. “They don’t make them like that anymore. I didn’t get a chance to tell you, by the way: Chekhov called me.”

  “What happened?”

  Holley told him. “A pity the sod didn’t die in the back of the Mercedes.”

  “You have a point. With such a man, one wonders what he could try next. Your big day, whatever it is, is Friday. I presume that after that your problems will be over?”

  “It would be a clean break, let’s put it that way.”

  “So what of tomorrow?”

  “I haven’t the slightest idea. I have one important phone call to make in the morning. The rest is just time filling.”

  “Then may I suggest an excellent way to spend the whole day. Twenty miles out of town is a spa and country club of which I happen to be a member. An excellent gymnasium, two swimming pools, more health treatments than you would know what to do with. There is even a golf course.”

  “I don’t play golf.”

  “You can drive round in a cart with some clubs and try?”

  “You know something, you’re absolutely right,” Holley told him, and emptied the champagne bottle into their glasses and toasted him. “And if it’s anything like it’s been, it’ll be a nice day out in the rain.”

  13

  Which it certainly was, but the day was saved by Selim planning ahead and speaking in the intimate way one would to an old friend, to someone called Martha who was, it seemed, director of activities. The result was that when they arrived at ten-thirty and ran from the Mini Cooper through pouring rain to the front entrance, they were met by an attractive fortyish blonde in white slacks and a blue blazer who had a full program organized for them.

  Club tracksuits were supplied. Selim went off for a massage, Holley elected to try the gym, where a muscular young man named Harry put him through a series of weight-training classes and, noting his age from the form he’d filled in, observed that he was in remarkable condition and obviously worked out.

  Holley didn’t tell him he had until recently been a regular user of the gym facility at the Lubyanka Prison. In any case, when he stripped off his vest, revealing the terrible bruise Ivanov’s bullet had made, his explanation—that he’d slipped against the end of a steel bar at a London gym—was received with horror at the lack of professionalism that had allowed such a thing to happen.

  He worked his way through a series of weight-lifting exercises and cycles and finally ended up in a sauna for half an hour, then another half hour swimming, and decided he’d had enough. He asked for a fresh tracksuit, went to the lounge bar, ordered a large scotch, and went and lay on a recliner, from which he could look out at the golf course stretching away into an infinity of rain and mist.

  He had his Codex in a pocket of the tracksuit, and, when it sounded, he got it out quickly. It was Caitlin Daly. “Where are you?”

  “Somewhere in Kent. What have you got for me?”

  “The word from Barry is excellent. He tells me that Potanin and the other man, Bulganin, are first-rate. Bulganin and Flynn went to Quogue and sniffed round. There aren’t too many people there this time of year, and with the weather, and they located the boat.”

  “And the Miller hit?”

  “Barry said Potanin’s provided him with a silenced pistol with hollow-point cartridges. He said Potanin instructed him to wait, identify his target, then shoot him up close, preferably in a crowd situation, and just keep on walking. Nobody sees a thing. Wasn’t that the way Mick Collins and his boys operated in Dublin in the old days?”

  For the first time, it occurred to Holley that she might be a raving lunatic. “Well, I suppose there is a certain truth to that, but let’s hope for Barry’s sake something else turns up. You’re seeing the cell again tonight?”

  “Yes, everyone’s ready for action, it’s all systems go.”

  “There’s just one change,” Holley said, and when Selim appeared in a robe, a towel around his neck, he put a finger to his lips and motioned him to sit.

  “What would that be?”

  “The woman, Monica Starling. I’ve decided against it. You can tell Murray his target is aborted.”

  Her response was immediate. “You can’t do that. It was agreed.”

  “I’ve changed my mind. I’m not going to be responsible for the killing of a woman, and, if you’ve a brain in you at all, you’ll know why. That’s an end of it. My decision.”

  “You can’t do that. I’m cell leader.”

  “And I’m the commander of the whole bloody plot,” Holley told her. “Without me and the Russians, you wouldn’t have an operation. Now you’ve still got one but without the killing of the woman.”

  Her reluctance was plain in her voice. “If that’s the way it has to be.”

  “Don’t mess with me on this, girl.” His voice was hard. “I hold the cards here. I can have word sent to Potanin that it’s all off, even order him to dispose of Barry and Flynn.”

  She was obviously shaken. “No, don’t do that.”

  “I’ll call round tonight after your six o’clock meeting and confirm this with you face-to-face. I’ll be waiting in the back pew.”

  “All right. I understand.”

  He switched off his Codex and turned to Selim, who was looking grave. “Not good, I fear, whatever it is. Who is this woman, have I met her?”

  “No, and you wouldn’t want to. A deeply disturbed individual, but aren’t we all? Now, how about some lunch? After all my exertions, I’m absolutely starving.”

  After lunch, Selim disappeared to indulge in a final massage of some description and an appointment in the hairdressing salon. Holley felt that enough was enough, although there was no doubt that he felt a lot better than when he’d arrived. He was s
itting in the lounge bar, thinking about what had happened with Caitlin Daly, when Martha appeared to inform him that the clothes he’d been wearing when he’d arrived had all been valeted and were waiting for him in the allotted cubicle.

  He found perfection. Even his tie had been pressed, the shoes shined. He returned to the bar lounge to find Selim still in a robe but with his hair trimmed and looking suspiciously black.

  “You’ve had a dye job,” Holley said.

  “And you, my friend, look like a whiskey advert. For a man of forty-nine, you look remarkably fit, Daniel. It’s not fair.”

  “Not much in life is,” Holley told him. “Let’s have a coffee, then you go and change, and I suggest we make tracks.”

  Selim waved to the barman as Holley’s Codex sounded. Lermov said, “There you are, Daniel. Time we talked, I think.”

  “Where are you?”

  “Moscow, but soon to leave for the Prime Minister’s plane.”

  “Well, that’s nice for you, so close to the seat of power. But remember Icarus. His wings melted and fell off when he flew too close to the sun.”

  “Ah, you obviously enjoyed the benefits of a classical education.”

  “Of a grammar school education, Josef, in my case the Leeds variety. What do you want?”

  “Daniel, you mustn’t go round shooting people, it won’t do.”

  “So you heard about that? From your pet poodle Chekhov, I suppose!”

  “Yes, and I know about the incident when Ivanov turned up at the church and tried to force you into the car. He was wrong.”

  “Glad you agree. But about yesterday’s incident, I would point out he shot me first. I’m only speaking to you now thanks to the genius of the Wilkinson Sword Company, which made my bulletproof vest.”

  “I accept all that, but you’ve certainly had your revenge. Half an ear gone.”

  “Well, let’s say he’s made his mark in the world. I should imagine he’ll look satisfactorily grotesque.”