by Jack Higgins
“I’m afraid not, and you, Chief Inspector?”
“I was kidnapped in London and flown here, wherever it is, in a private jet. We flew over the Mediterranean, I know that, but then they drugged my coffee.”
“They drugged me when they grabbed me in Corfu,” Marie said.
“I know, Dillon told me.” Hannah shook her head. “Poor Sean. To end up like that, shot in the back by some wretched hit man.”
The door opened and David Braun came in pushing a trolley. “Dinner, ladies.”
He started to lay the dining table and Marie said, “This is David, Chief Inspector, David Braun. He likes me, really, but on the other hand, he believes Judas to be a truly great man.”
“Then all I can say is he must be mentally deranged.” Hannah pushed David to the door. “Go on, get out of it. We can manage very well alone.”
Ferguson couldn’t sleep. He’d told Dillon and Blake about Teddy Grant’s intention of visiting Fort Lansing. He was sitting up in bed, reading, when the special mobile which Judas had given Dillon sounded. Ferguson let it ring for a while, then picked it up.
“Ferguson.”
“Hi, old buddy, just thought I’d let you know she arrived in one piece. She’s having dinner with the countess now. It’s countdown time, Brigadier. How long have we got? Three days. Dear me, Jake Cazalet must be going through hell.”
He started to laugh and Ferguson switched off the phone.
TWELVE
As the Gulfstream lifted off from Farley Field the following morning, Captain Vernon came on over the speaker.
“We’ll be able to land at Charles de Gaulle, but the weather isn’t good. Heavy rain and mist in Paris itself.”
He switched off and Blake made a cup of coffee, and tea for Dillon. “Imagine that bastard phoning Ferguson like that.”
“He likes sticking pins in people.”
“Well, I’d sure as hell like to stick pins in him. How are we going to play this, Sean?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea. What do you think?”
“Frankly, I don’t see how we can avoid a face-to-face confrontation.”
“The same tactic we employed with Berger.”
“Something like that.”
“And how far would you be prepared to go to save the President’s daughter, Blake? Can I shoot an ear off, put a bullet through his kneecap?”
Blake frowned. “For God’s sake, Sean.”
“The point of the exercise is to save Marie de Brissac’s life. Now, how far do I go? I mean, what if Rocard is made of sterner stuff than Berger? What if he tells us to get stuffed? All I’m trying to say is if you don’t like what I do, just step out of the room.”
Blake raised a hand defensively. “Give me a break. Let’s see how it goes, okay? And there’s Teddy checking out the 801st Airborne at Fort Lansing. Maybe he’ll come up with something.”
Judas was in his study at that moment, having risen early, seated behind the desk, going through papers and running the fingers of one hand through his cropped hair, when his special phone rang.
“Yes,” he said and listened. After a while, he nodded. “Thanks for the information.”
“Damn!” he said softly and flicked the intercom. “Aaron, get in here.”
Aaron entered a moment later. “Was there something?”
“Hell, no, I just wanted to let you know Berger’s dead. I had a call from one of my London people. He was knocked down by a bus in Camden High Street. It was reported on the local television news.”
“Unfortunate,” Aaron said.
“Yes, he was useful to us.”
“Are you ready for breakfast?”
“Yes, I’ll have it with you. I’ll be along in a moment.”
Aaron went out and Judas sat there for a moment, then picked up his special mobile and punched in Rocard’s number in Paris. A metallic voice replied in French. “Michael Rocard here. I’ve gone to Morlaix for three days. I’ll be back Wednesday.”
Judas cursed softly in Hebrew, then said, “Berger’s been killed in an accident in London. Contact me as soon as you can.” He switched off, got up, and went out.
When Blake and Dillon crossed the tarmac at Charles de Gaulle and went into the arrival hall, a young woman in a Burberry trenchcoat came forward to greet them, a large envelope in one hand.
“Mr. Dillon, I’m Angela Dawson from the Embassy. Brigadier Ferguson asked for these.” She held up the envelope and passed it over. “Also I’ve got a car for you outside. This way, please.”
She was efficiency itself as she led them to the main entrance and out to the parking lot. She stopped beside a blue Peugeot and handed the keys to Dillon. “Good luck, gentlemen.”
She walked away briskly and Blake said, “Where in the hell did Ferguson find her?”
“Oxford, I suspect,” Dillon said and got behind the wheel. “Let’s get moving.”
The weather report had been accurate for once, pouring rain and clinging gray mist. Blake said, “What a greeting.”
“I like Paris,” Dillon told him. “Rain, snow, mist, I don’t give a damn. It always excites me. I’ve a place here.”
“An apartment?”
“No, a boat on the Seine. I lived in it, on and off, for years during what Devlin would have called my dark period.” He turned along Avenue Victor Hugo and pulled in at the curb. “This looks like it.”
They got out of the Peugeot and went up the steps to the main entrance. As they stood examining the name cards, each beside its bell push, the door opened and a stout, middle-aged woman in raincoat and headscarf, a basket over one arm, emerged.
She paused. “Can I help, gentlemen?”
“We are seeking Monsieur Rocard,” Dillon told her.
“But he is not here. He went to Morlaix for a few days. He’s due back tomorrow.” She went down the steps, put up her umbrella, and turned. “He did say he might be back this afternoon late, but he wasn’t sure.”
“Did he leave an address? We have legal business with him.”
“No, I believe he was staying with one of his boyfriends.” She smiled. “He has many, monsieur.”
She walked away, and Dillon grinned. “Let’s take a look.” He pressed a button at random, and when a woman’s voice answered said, “It’s me, cherie,” in French.
The buzzer sounded. The door opened at a push, and they were in.
They found Rocard’s apartment on the third floor. The corridor was deserted and Dillon took out his wallet, produced a picklock, and went to work.
“A long time since I had to use one of those,” Blake said.
“You never lose the knack,” Dillon said. “I’ve always felt it would be useful if I ever have to take to crime.”
The lock yielded, he eased the door open and went in, Blake following.
It was a pleasant, old-fashioned apartment, with lots of antiques and Empire-style gold-painted furniture. The rugs were all collector’s items, there was what looked like a genuine Degas on one wall, a Matisse on the other. There were two bedrooms, an ornate marble bathroom, and a study.
Dillon pressed the recall button on the answering machine. The voice said: “Michael Rocard here. I’ve gone to Morlaix.”
“Go through his messages,” Blake said.
Dillon pressed the button and the messages, all in French, came through and then Judas cut in.
“Hebrew,” Dillon said. “We’ve just won the jackpot. I’ll play it again.” He listened intently, then nodded. “Berger’s been killed in an accident in London. Contact me as soon as you can.”
“Judas?” Blake said.
“Or I’m a monkey’s uncle.” Dillon looked around the study. “Not worth turning the place upside down. He wouldn’t leave incriminating evidence around, a smart man like that.”
Blake picked up a photo in a silver frame from the desk. It was very old-fashioned and in black and white. The woman was in a chiffon dress, the man in dark suit and stiff collar. There was a boy of perhaps t
en or twelve, a girl of five or six. It was strange, remote, something from another age.
“Family group?” Blake said.
“He’s probably the kid in the short pants,” Dillon told him.
Blake replaced the photo carefully. “Now what?”
“Better leave quietly. We can try again in case he does come back late afternoon. Otherwise we’ll just have to fill in the time.” He smiled. “In Paris, that usually means having a really great lunch.”
They left the apartment, paused while Dillon relocked the door, then went downstairs. Outside it was still raining and they paused, looking across at the Bois de Boulogne.
“A good address,” Dillon commented.
“For a successful man,” Blake nodded.
“The man who had everything and in the end found he had nothing.”
“Until Judas came along?”
“Something like that.”
“So what do we do now?”
Dillon smiled. “We’ll go and see if my barge is still in one piece.”
It was moored in a small basin on the Quai St Bernard. There were pleasure boats tied up to the stone wall, motor cruisers with canvas awnings up against the rain and mist drifting across the Seine. Notre Dame was not too far away. There were a number of flower pots on the stern deck with no flowers in them. Dillon lifted one and found a key.
“How long since you were here last?” Blake asked.
“A year or eighteen months, something like that.” Dillon went down the small companionway and unlocked the door.
He stood just inside. “Jesus, smell the damp. It could do with a good airing.”
It wasn’t what Blake had expected, a stateroom lined with mahogany, comfortable sofas, a television, and a desk. There was another cabin with a divan bed and a shower room and a kitchen galley.
“I’ll find us a drink.” Dillon went into the galley and searched the cupboards. When he came back with a bottle of red wine and two glasses, he found the American looking at a faded newspaper clipping.
“I found this on the floor. The Prime Minister. It’s from the London Times, but I can’t make out the date.”
“Good old John Major. Must have slipped down the back of the desk when I cleared the rest of the material. February nineteen ninety-one, the mortar attack on Downing Street.”
“So it really is true and you were responsible for that. You nearly brought it off, you bastard.”
“That’s true. It was a rush job, no time to weld guidance fins to the mortars, so they weren’t quite accurate enough. Come up this way.”
He had been very calm, very matter-of-fact as he had spoken. He opened another door that gave access to the aft deck. There was an awning, rain dripping from the edges, a small table and two chairs in wicker. Dillon poured claret into the glasses.
“There you go.”
Blake sat down and savored it. “Excellent. I’m supposed to have stopped, but I could use a cigarette.”
“Sure.” Dillon gave him one and a light and took another himself. He stood by the rail, sipping the wine and looking toward Notre Dame.
“Why, Sean?” Blake said. “Hell, I know your record backwards, but I still don’t understand. All those hits, all those jobs for people like the PLO, the KGB. Okay, so your father was caught in the crossfire in some Belfast street battle and you blamed the British Army and joined the IRA. You were what, nineteen? I understand that, but afterwards.”
Dillon turned, leaning on the rail. “Remember your American Civil War history. People like Jesse and Frank James? Raiding, fighting, and killing for the glorious cause and that was all they knew, so what came afterwards, when the war was over? They robbed banks and trains.”
“And when you left the IRA, you offered yourself as a gun for hire.”
“Something like that.”
“But when the Serbs shot you down in Bosnia, you were flying in medical supplies for children.”
“A good deed in a naughty world, isn’t that what Shakespeare said?”
“And Ferguson saved you from yourself, pulled you in on the side of right.”
“What a load of cobblers.” Dillon laughed out loud. “I do exactly what I was doing before, only now I do it for Ferguson.”
Blake nodded, serious. “I take your point, but isn’t anything serious business to you?”
“Certainly. Saving Marie de Brissac and Hannah from Judas, for instance.”
“But nothing else?”
“Like I’ve said before, sometimes situations need a public executioner and it happens to be something I’m good at.”
“And otherwise?”
“Just passing through, Blake, just passing through,” and Dillon turned and looked along the Seine.
At the same moment and six hours back in time, Teddy boarded an Air Force Lear jet at Andrews. They took off, climbed to thirty thousand feet, and the senior pilot came over the speaker.
“Just over an hour, Mr. Grant, and it should be pretty smooth. We’ll put down at Mitchell Field. That’s about forty minutes by road to Fort Lansing.”
He switched off and Teddy tried to read the Washington Post but couldn’t take it in. He was on too big a high. He had the strangest feeling about this. There was something waiting for him at Fort Lansing. There had to be, but what? He reached to the bar, made a cup of instant coffee, and sat there, thinking about things as he drank it.
Marie de Brissac was doing a charcoal sketch of Hannah. “You’ve got good bone structure,” she said. “That always helps. Were you and Dillon lovers?”
“That’s a leading question.”
“I’m half French. We’re very direct. Were you?”
Hannah Bernstein was careful to stay in the past tense where Dillon was concerned, just in case. “Good God, no. He was the most infuriating man I ever knew.”
“But you liked him in spite of that?”
“There was plenty to like. He had a ready wit, bags of charm, enormous intelligence. There was only one flaw. He killed too easily.”
“I suppose the IRA got to him early.”
It was a statement, not a question, and Hannah said, “I used to believe that, but only at first. It was his nature. He was too good at it, you see.”
The door rattled and David Braun came in with a tray. “Coffee and cookies, ladies. It’s a beautiful day.”
“Just put it on the table, David, and go,” Marie told him. “Don’t let us pretend that things aren’t as they are.”
It was as if she had slapped him, and his shoulders slumped as he went out.
“He really does like you,” Hannah told her.
“I’ve no time for false sentiment, not at this stage.”
She started to fill in the sketch and Hannah poured a couple of cups of coffee and placed one at Marie’s hand. She took her own and went to the open window and looked out through the bars.
“Come on, Dillon,” she said softly. “Sort the bastards.”
Teddy’s Presidential authorization had the same magical effect at Mitchell Field that it had had at Andrews. The duty officer, a Major Harding, had an Air Force limousine with a sergeant driver over from the vehicle pool in fifteen minutes.
“You look after Mr. Grant real good now, Hilton,” he said.
“Consider it done, sir.”
They moved out of the base and took a road that led through rolling green countryside. “Very pretty,” Teddy said.
“I’ve seen worse,” Hilton told him. “My last posting was Kuwait. I’ve only been back two months.”
“I thought you had a tan,” Teddy said.
Hilton appeared to hesitate. “Were you in the military, Mr. Grant?”
“My arm, you mean?” Teddy laughed. “Don’t be embarrassed. I was an infantry sergeant in ’Nam. Left the arm there.”
“Life’s a bitch,” Hilton told him.
“It’s been said before. Now tell me about Fort Lansing.”
“During the Vietnam War, there was one regiment after another th
rough there, but when the conflict was over it was rundown. There was some kind of resurrection at the time of the Gulf, but it’s just a primary infantry training base these days.”
“I just want the museum.”
“Hell, no problem. It’s open to the public.” They pulled onto a freeway. As he picked up speed, he said, “There’s a diner five miles along the way, and after that nothing for thirty miles. Do you want a coffee or a pit stop or something?”
“Good idea,” Teddy said. “But only for ten minutes. I want to get going,” and he sat back and tried to concentrate on the Post again.
In Paris, Michael Rocard parked as close as he could get to his apartment and walked to the front door. He hurried upstairs, only a satchel in one hand, and unlocked the door of his apartment.
Considering his age, his hair had a considerable amount of color in it and he looked ten years younger than he was, although the excellent suit he wore helped in that respect.
He checked the messages on his answering machine, listening to them one by one, then froze almost in panic as he came to Judas’s message in Hebrew. Berger dead. He went to the sideboard and poured cognac. What even Judas didn’t know was that Rocard and Berger had been occasional lovers. In fact, Rocard had developed a genuine and considerable affection for him. He unlocked a drawer in his desk, took out the special mobile, and punched out the numbers. Judas answered almost immediately.
“It’s Rocard.”
“You fool,” Judas told him. “Running off to Morlaix like a dog in heat and at a time like this.”
“What can I say?”
“So, Berger is dead, knocked down by a London bus. What’s the saying? Everyone is entitled to fifteen minutes of fame? Well, Berger got his, only it was a fifteen-second announcement of how he met his death on London local television.”
The cruelty was devastating, but what came next was worse. “You’ll need a new boyfriend for your London trips.”
Was there anything the bastard didn’t know?
Rocard mumbled, “What can I do?”
“Nothing. If I need you, I’ll phone. Three days, Rocard, only three days to go.”
