by Colin Forbes
"There has been a reference to a conference, yes," Fondberg admitted.
Beaurain stood up. "I presume this means I can no longer rely on you for any assistance? That is the situation, is it not?"
The plump-faced, capable Swede paused, clearly reluctant to let his old friend leave. "There was a message for you, by the way," he said. "It was phoned through to me just before you arrived. I was not able to persuade her to leave her real name."
"Her?"
"Yes, it was a woman. The message for you was simply, Offshore from the port of Trelleborg. A hydrofoil. Champagne." Fondberg excused himself as the phone rang. He listened, spoke a few words and then replaced the receiver, his expression sombre. "There has been,a death at the Grand Hotel. An important lady."
"The Countess d'Arlezzo,"
Beaurain made it a statement and Fondberg's sensitive ear did not miss the inflection. He stood up behind his desk, his eyes alert, his mouth hard as he met the Belgian's grim gaze. Beaurain continued, "Earlier today I was talking with Erika - the Countess - in her suite at the Grand. I have known her for a long time. She told me she had been threatened by the Stockholm Syndicate. That phone call tells me roughly where the conference of the Syndicate will take place. We had arranged she should use the code-word champagne to identify herself. I believe I passed the person who must have been keeping an eye on her for the Syndicate, a waiter pushing a trolley."
"One of the Grand Hotel's regular staff - a waiter - has been found trussed up and stuffed inside a broom cupboard."
"How did she die?"
Beaurain walked over to the window with hands clasped behind his back while he waited for the reply, and stared out at the sunlight which Erika would never see again. His eyes were quite still.
Fondberg was beginning to feel very uneasy. He cleared his voice before he spoke. "She was found hanging from the shower in the bathroom. She used her bath-robe cord, a common..."
"I would be found ... hung and twisting like a side of meat turning in the wind." Beaurain repeated for Fondberg's benefit the words Erika had used. The Swede sank into the chair behind his desk and stared dully into the distance, tapping the stubby fingers of his right hand on the desk top, a sure sign that he was deeply disturbed. He listened while Beaurain related the whole of his conversation with the woman who had been one of the most powerful figures in Western Europe.
The Belgian's voice grew harsher as he concluded his version of his last meeting with Erika. "So these are the people to whom you are extending every courtesy and consideration that was the phrase, was it not? And they - all these members of the Stockholm Syndicate - are as guilty of Erika d'Arlezzo's murder as if they personally had tied round her neck the cord of her own bath-robe and strung her up to that shower."
"I said nothing about a murder." Fondberg wriggled uncomfortably behind his desk and, for the first time in their long friendship, he was unable to meet Beaurain's gaze.
"Christ Al-bloody-mighty!" Beaurain's fist smashed down on the desk-top. "You are not going to stoop so low that you will allow them to get away with this faked suicide?"
"No!" Fondberg came out of his mental daze and stared straight at Beaurain. "Of course I know it wasn't suicide! Had you understood Swedish you would have known I was speaking to the forensic expert who has already arrived at the Grand. I told him to send his report to me personally at the earliest possible moment. No-one else will be permitted to see it. I shall myself announce its findings to the international press now gathering here hoping for news of the "business" conference. It will cause a bombshell!"
"The Syndicate will come after you," Beaurain warned his old friend, but, he admitted privately to himself, he was also testing him. Such was the quicksand atmosphere of treachery and fear the unseen organisation had generated. Fondberg's reaction made him feel a little ashamed.
"Wrong, my friend. I am going after the Stockholm Syndicate! In committing this murder they have made a big mistake. They hoped their influence was strong enough to squash any attempt at a legitimate investigation. They overlooked the fact that I might intervene."
Events moved at bewildering speed during the next few days. On receipt of Beaurain's urgent signal sent by Stig Palme from a transceiver hidden in the basement of a house in the town of Strängnäs, Captain "Bucky' Buckminster left his anchorage off Copenhagen and proceeded south and east into the Baltic.
"We have to wait off the coast near Trelleborg," he told Anderson, the chief pilot of the giant Sikorsky which they carried on the helipad. "Just below the horizon so we cannot easily be seen from the Swedish shore."
"Any exercises once we get there?" Anderson enquired.
"Yes. Intensive training with the power-boats and dinghies equipped with outboards in fact all the fleet of craft in the hold. Another activity Beaurain wants toned up is the training of frogmen in underwater warfare."
"The Countess d'Arlezzo, president of the well-known group of banks, who was discovered hanging from the shower in the bathroom of her suite in the Grand Hotel was, in the opinion of the well-known pathologist, Professor Edwin Jacoby....'
Harry Fondberg, who was addressing a press conference called at very short notice - other reporters were still arriving, pushing their way into the crowded room was possessed of a certain dramatic sense which he now used to the full. Beaurain watched him from a position at the back of the room. Heads craned as the pause was stretched out. Most of the western world's leading newspapers, TV stations and magazines were represented.
'... was MURDERED!"
Pandemonium! The small plump chief of Säpo waited as men and women milled in the room - some already rushing for phones to catch editions about to go to press with the staggering announcement. The Countess d'Arlezzo's beauty had been compared with that of Sophia Loren; her business influence with that of Onassis. As the initial reaction subsided, Fondberg ruthlessly piled on the drama. Now it was too late for anyone to try and hold down the lid on the case. It was his first promised blow at the Stockholm Syndicate.
"In a moment Professor Jacoby will tell you his reasons for stating that in his opinion the alleged suicide was faked, could not have taken place in the way meant to fool the police. Or, shall we say, certain powerful criminal groups with international connections believed their influence was so great that no-one would ever dare reveal the truth?"
Louise whispered to Beaurain. "God: That's really blasted the case wide open. Whoever Hugo is, he's going to go crazy!"
"That's Harry's tactic," Beaurain murmured. "He hopes that by throwing him off balance he'll provoke him into making yet another blunder. And listen to this!"
The questions were now coming like bullets as reporters fought to catch Fondberg's eye. High up on a platform, he selected his questioners for their influence. Someone ran onto the platform with a note - doubtless from some Minister. Fondberg waved the messenger away and stuffed the message unread inside his pocket.
"Are you saying the Countess was mixed up in criminal activities?" asked someone from Der Spiegel.
"I am saying she was being blackmailed and intimidated in a way which would only be used by animals.
I have the most reliable of witnesses that she was actually threatened with death in the form her murder took."
"Your witness?"
"Would ex-Chief Superintendent Jules Beaurain of the Brussels anti-terrorist squad, previously in charge of Homicide, satisfy you?"
"Thank you. Yes!" said Der Spiegel.
"Christ!" Louise whispered. "He's blowing the whole works."
"And the one thing the Syndicate can't stand is publicity," Beaurain whispered back. "It's a dark evil creature which operates in the darkness."
"Would you care to elaborate on the structure of these powerful criminal groups you refer to?" The Times - of London.
"Check up on likely personalities at present in Stockholm," "Names, we need names!" The New York Times.
"You are here! Do some of your own investigative work, may I suggest!"
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"Leo Gehn has just arrived in the capital, I hear," The New York Times.
"I have heard that also," Fondberg replied blandly. "Next question, please,"
"Who controls the international criminal groups you referred to in reply to an earlier question?" Le Monde of Paris.
There was a prolonged pause. Tension built up in the packed room as Fondberg, one arm supporting another, a hand under his chin, seemed to be considering whether to answer the question. One thing was clear and heightened the tension until the atmosphere became electric: the chief of Säpo did know the answer...
"A directorate of three men," Fondberg spoke slowly and with great deliberation. As he paused again, the door next to Beaurain was pulled open. A man took three paces forward and stopped, holding a Smith & Wesson with both hands, the muzzle raised and aimed point-blank at Harry Fondberg.
Louise had a blurred impression of a short, burly figure wearing a boiler suit. Beaurain grabbed the man's wrist and elbow. There was a single explosion. The bullet fired in the tussle - which would have blown Fondberg off his feet - embedded itself in the ceiling. There was a shocked, incredulous hush which lasted several seconds, during which the only sound was the scuffle of feet as Beaurain overpowered the gunman. Uniformed guards were appearing in the hall beyond the open door. Beaurain hurled the would-be assassin with all his strength backwards into their arms.
"Check him for other weapons!" he snapped. "Or do I have to do the whole damned job for you? He came within an ace of killing your boss."
Chaos broke loose. The room erupted into movement as the mob of reporters stormed towards the doorways. Beaurain hauled Louise back out of the path of the turbulent crowd and pressed her back against the wall. In thirty seconds the room was occupied by only three people: Beaurain, Louise and Harry Fondberg.
The Swede jumped agilely from the platform and ran towards the Belgian, holding out his hand. 'For saving my life I can only say thank you,"
"We stage-managed that rather well. Maybe we should go into the theatrical business," Beaurain whispered.
"I have the information you asked me to dig up on Dr. Theodor Norling's background before he came to Stockholm. It tells us nothing," Fondberg informed his listeners.
Beaurain and Louise were sitting at a round table in the Säpo chief's office, eating hungrily from a selection of dishes which Fondberg had ordered from a nearby restaurant. Beaurain nodded at Fondberg's remark as the Swede studied the report without enthusiasm.
"It is the same with all these provincial police forces - they think we live the high life here and they can't even answer a civil request without grumbling at how busy they are," "Tell us what there is to know about Norling," Beaurain suggested.
"Born in Gothenburg, his parents moved when he was seven years old to Ystad," he looked at Louise. "That is an old medieval port on the southern coast in the province of Skåne. The people in Skåne are very different."
He might have been talking about the end of the world, as certain New Yorkers refer to the Deep South. Perhaps this was the Deep South of Sweden, Louise reflected. Fondberg continued reading from his folder.
"When I say Ystad I mean a small place close to it. The first thing Theodor Norling's parents did when they arrived from Gothenburg was to separate. His mother ran off with a ship's engineer while the father managed to get himself killed in a traffic accident a few weeks later. Young Norling was taken in by some aunt who had money and he was partly educated abroad. He returned to Skåne when he was twenty, attended the funeral of his aunt who had just died, and promptly used the legacy she had left him to set up in business as a collector."
"Let me guess," interjected Beaurain. "A collector of editions of rare books?"
"Wrong!" Fondberg chuckled delightedly at having scored a point when he saw Beaurain's expression. "As a collector and dealer in old coins."
"And he travelled a lot," Beaurain persisted, 'during the course of his business."
"Yes," Fondberg admitted.
"And most of his business was done abroad and locally he was known as a bit of a hermit and he never got married?"
"Yes," Fondberg agreed, almost reluctantly. "It is a waste of time my reading this folder since you seem to know the contents. It is true he was a hermit - and disliked on that account since he gave the impression he felt himself superior to the locals." The Swede chuckled again. "The truth of the matter probably is that he was very superior! Any more predictions?"
"Only one. He arrived suddenly in Stockholm to set up business as a dealer in rare books about two years ago."
Ten out of ten!" Fondberg did not even bother to refer to the folder.
"So," Beaurain suggested, 'to sum up, Theodor Norling has now no known living relatives. Correct? And have your people down there in darkest Skåne found any close friends he left behind who could identify a picture taken of him?"
"Yes - and no. As you suggested I sent the picture we have of Norling, a picture which had to be taken secretly because of a directive from higher up. The Ystad police showed it to the very few people who knew Theodor Norling when he was in business down there. Some immediately identified him from the photo. Others said they didn't think that was the man they had known as Dr. Theodor Norling."
"The man they had known as Dr. Theodor Norling." Beaurain repeated the words slowly as though relishing every syllable. The chief of Säpo was now looking thoroughly piqued. Louise did nothing to enlighten him.
"It's bloody uncanny," was her unladylike remark.
"What is?" Fondberg pounced.
"How we've heard this story before. Twice to be precise." She looked at Beaurain who nodded giving her permission to go ahead. "What you have told us about the background and origins of Dr. Theodor Norling is an almost exact replica - with a few minor variations - of the background histories of the other two members of the so-called directorate controlling the Stockholm Syndicate."
"You mean these men are sleepers who are now activated?"
"No, oddly enough, the other way round." It was Beaurain who spoke.
"You mean someone has invented dummy men?" Fondberg suggested.
"Not even that, Harry. Dr. Berlin certainly existed, was quite definitely brought up in Liège in his early days and started his business as a book dealer there. There are still people who remember him. Vaguely."
Fondberg shook his head and lit a cigar. "I am lost. Which, I suspect, is your intention, you bastard." He turned to Louise and bowed formally. "Please excuse my language, but you work with him, so..."
"I agree with you," Louise assured him.
"Let's try to find you since you're lost, Harry," Beaurain continued imperturbably. "Dr. Theodor Norling's background is vague because his parents vanished from his life early on, because his life-style was that of a hermit, because he travelled a lot on business and was seen very little before he came to live permanently in Stockholm. Two years ago."
"All that is in the goddam folder," Fondberg pointed out.
"Or Otto Berlin's background is vague because Liège is a large city, because he had no relatives and few acquaintances, because he also travelled a lot owing to the nature of his business. His character, too, was hermit-like. Perhaps it goes with the trade. So again, as with Norling, old acquaintances shown a photograph say "Yes, that's him," or "No, doesn't look much like him." Only one photograph is available of Berlin. These men seem to be very camera-shy."
"I am still lost," Fondberg growled.
"The third man was note the past tense Dr. Benny Horn who now lives in Copenhagen but originally came from Elsinore. And while I remember it, when do you think Dr. Otto Berlin moved himself from Liège to Bruges? About two years ago!"
"It is getting interesting," Fondberg was compelled to admit. He glanced at Louise. "This dishonest and devious man you choose to work for plays these games with me whenever he gets the opportunity. In England I think they call it dangling you on a string."
"Benny Horn's background antecedents are equally
vague when you go into them with a sceptical eye," Beaurain continued. "He was in the book dealer business for fifteen years in Elsinore before he moved suddenly to Copenhagen. Since then, no-one in Elsinore has seen him - not that there are many who would be interested."
"Another hermit?" Fondberg enquired.
"As I said, it seems to go with the trade. So, although he has a solid background of fifteen years' residence on the outskirts of Elsinore you can't track down many who actually knew him and then only vaguely. The local police produce his photograph and we get a repeat performance. Some say "yes" and some say "no" when asked to identify Horn. It's quite normal, as you know."
"I still don't understand it," complained Fondberg. "They're not sleepers, they're not dummy men."
"Someone went to a lot of trouble in Belgium, in Denmark, and here in Sweden searching out these men, Harry. The whole thing is quite horribly sinister - worked out by a brilliant mind and manipulated in a diabolical manner. What we are actually looking for is the fourth man."
"The fourth man?"
"The one they call Hugo, the man whose very name evokes terror, sheer terror."
Chapter Seventeen
The temperature was a comparatively pleasant 42 FV an east wind sweeping over the airport chilled the face, the expressions of the airport staff were sombre; a prejudiced observer might even have used the word 'sour'. As far as the eye could see the landscape and buildings were depressing. Scandinavian Airlines Flight SK 732 from Stockholm had just touched down at Leningrad.
Ignoring the stewardesses waiting by the exit, Viktor Rashkin left the plane and walked briskly to the waiting black Zil limousine. The KGB guard saluted, held open the rear door while Rashkin stepped inside, closed it and motioned to the chauffeur who started the machine moving at once. Rashkin was known for his impatience.
The cavalcade - a Volga car full of KGB agents preceded the Zil limousine while another followed in the rear - sped away from the airport and Rashkin glanced outside unenthusiastically. Why the hell did Brezhnev need to have personal reports on progress of Operation Snowbird? Rashkin suspected the old boy, surrounded by old-age pensioners, simply wanted a few hours of his company. He always asked for impersonations and roared his head off while Rashkin mimicked his victims.
