Love For An Enemy

by Love For An Enemy (retail) (epub)

  ‘Yes. Why?’

  ‘D’you know where Mitcheson’s girlfriend’s flat is?’

  ‘Er—’ he had to think quickly… ‘Yes, more or less. Why? Solange did try to call me, but—’

  ‘Can you get ashore – now, quickly – and meet me there?’

  ‘I – suppose so. Yes. But what—’

  ‘The girlfriend’s brother – Emilio Caracciolo – called at her flat a couple of hours ago. Believe it or not. Seems he’s one of de la Penne’s boys. At any rate, came in with them. So—’

  ‘I don’t believe it.’

  ‘Never mind about believing. It’s a fact – unless both those girls are hallucinating. How soon can you be there?’

  He thought for a moment… ‘If you have transport – and I get a boat over to you—’

  ‘Good idea. We’ll wait for you at the Mahroussa Quay. Double quick, eh?’

  * * *

  The car, a khaki-painted Ford, swung right out of Rue Ras el-Tin into Rue Masquid Terbana. At its wheel, a slight, greyheaded major by name of Dewar, whom Currie had met once very briefly in Henderson’s company, months ago. He asked Henderson – there was a lot to absorb, in a space of minutes – ‘Did you say it was Solange who rang you?’

  ‘No. Mitcheson’s girlfriend. Miss Seydoux was with her. In fact she’d persuaded her to make the call. Mitcheson had left my number with her to use in an emergency. Not quite with this in mind, but – just as well. As long as she’s straight, mind you.’

  ‘You mean Lucia Caracciolo? Of course she’s—’

  ‘Bit close to home though, isn’t it. A brother driving a human torpedo – here in Alex, and actually paying her a visit?’

  ‘I happen to know her quite well, as you know. We’ve had this conversation before – haven’t we?’

  ‘She’d hardly have alerted us to the brother’s presence—’ Dewar glanced sideways at Henderson as he made this rather obvious point – ‘if she’d been in any way involved in—’

  ‘Exactly!’

  ‘I agree, it’s a valid point. But still – bloody odd… In any case – my interest, Currie – our interest – is much less in the probity or otherwise of Miss Caracciolo than in laying hands on her damn brother.’

  ‘Who might—’ Dewar put in, bumping the car over tramlines and turning east along the broad sweep of the Corniche – ‘might be tempted to reappear.’

  ‘You say he told Lucia he’d come to – fetch her away to Italy?’

  ‘Yup.’ Henderson glared at some drunken-looking soldiers who’d almost walked under the car, causing Dewar to swerve. ‘That’s what we’re told.’

  ‘And she told him to – effectively, go jump in the lake.’

  ‘Back to his natural habitat, you might say.’ The soldier’s accent matched his surname. He wore the ribbon of an M.C. on his tunic, had a deep gouge of an old scar in the right side of his neck, and before they’d got into the car at the shore end of the Mahroussa landing place Currie had noticed that he limped. Matching these clues to the grey hair, it wasn’t difficult to guess he’d been through the mill of ’14 –’18. Glancing at Henderson again: ‘You said she sounded hysterical?’

  ‘Shocked. Upset. You name it.’

  Currie had about forty questions in his head. Having had no option but to accept the barely credible as fact, the questions then piled up, had to be sorted out and the more basic ones given priority. Such as, for instance: ‘Did the brother say – or did she know – why he wanted to take her away?’

  ‘Don’t know. Didn’t ask. As I said, the priority’s to catch him. Not analyze his bloody motives.’

  ‘She’ll understand it better than we do, I imagine.’ Dewar still had his foot well down although they were approaching the eastern end of the Corniche. Darkening sea on their left, Fort Qait Bey a blurred hump a mile across it northwestward, Silsila Fort not far ahead. Tram rattling by on their right. The car was slowing, at last. ‘Made a bit of progress there.’ Dewar had a pipe between his teeth. ‘Getting onto the Ramleh road anywhere near town centre’s a real bugger.’

  ‘Yes… Look, I’m sorry to ask so many questions—’

  ‘Ask away.’

  ‘Fetching her away to Italy – unquote… How the hell would he set about it? Even if she wanted to go – which before Henderson here raises the doubt again I can tell you I’m damn sure—’

  ‘Would not have called us, would she. Plain fact, she would not. But how would our Wop hero do it: well, since these fellows came by submarine, might one not suppose that’d be their way of getting about?’

  ‘Offshore rendezvous. Take a boat out.’

  ‘He’d probably swim out, wouldn’t he. But with his sister with him – aye, a boat. Beg, borrow or steal. Here we go…’ He’d forked right along the tramway route, swung hard right now into Rue el Chatby. A shortish road – only about 200 yards down to where there was a monument of sorts at its southern end, and swinging left there – heeling, tyres whistling – into Rue Sultan Kamil. ‘Thing is – if she won’t go along – and she won’t unless we can persuade her—’

  ‘Persuade her?’

  ‘If she won’t, our friend’ll be off on his own. Or – as we were conjecturing before you joined us – along with any more of ’em, if there are others at large. That’s one of the things that’s of primary importance and we still can’t be sure of, d’you see. As I’m sure you don’t need to be told, we cannot afford to let even one of the sods get out of Egypt with knowledge of the state that battleship of yours is in.’

  ‘What’s this about persuading her?’

  ‘Not to go, old lad, only to appear to be willing to go. So he’ll stick his head up, see.’

  He thought about it. Wishing to God Mitcheson was here. The soldier swung his car rocking into Rue de Ramleh. It would be plain sailing from here on: as long as he could find the place, when they got closer… He asked them – either of them – ‘Why did you want to bring me in on this?’

  Henderson answered: ‘To start with because Miss Seydoux was insistent on it. She took over the telephone from the girlfriend, wanted me to get hold of you. She’d tried to call you herself, she told me, before she persuaded the other one to call me.’

  ‘I did get a message. Thought it’d be just a social thing. I’d have rung back later, anyway.’

  Dewar cut in: ‘Direct me from here on, will you?’

  ‘It’s some way yet. Past the Sporting Club and over the Nuzha Road junction. I’d say about half a mile beyond that crossroads.’

  He sat back, thinking that it was natural enough that Solange should have turned to him, and that Lucia would have got on to her. But it was Mitcheson she’d be really screaming for, he guessed. And he, Josh Currie, should perhaps see himself as looking after Mitch’s interests, in this business. Especially as Henderson was such a hard-nosed sod. When Mitch came back from patrol, if anything had gone wrong—

  Like these people using Lucia as bait, for instance. Which seemed to be what they had in mind.

  ‘Talking of getting out to Italy—’ Dewar, speaking over his shoulder, one eye on the road and a column of Army tracks which they were passing – ‘I’d guess a submarine would be about the only way. Did you hear the story of how the Young Officers – that pro-Axis lot, know about them, do you?’

  ‘Abdel Nasser and Co.’

  ‘Aye. Well, there was a German plan to get the Young Officers’ eminence grise – General Aziz al-Masri, that is – out of the country. For purposes unknown, but guessable. Liaison between the Gyppo army and the Afrika Korps, one supposes. Anyway, the scheme fell flat on its Gyppo-Jerry face. Luftwaffe ’plane flew in, landed secretly in the desert, all well up to that point, but – hell, cops and robbers from there on, real Marx Brothers stuff, cars breaking down and so forth. The general’s still with us, anyway. Moral of the story is we try not to make it easy for them.’

  ‘Glad to hear it.’ They’d just passed the Nuzha crossing. ‘Half a mile to go, Major.’ Lake Hadra was on the ri
ght now, beyond and below the railway line. Not that you could see far off the road now, with darkness closing in. He said to Henderson, ‘If the plan is for a submarine rendezvous, there’ll have to be a coast-watch set up. Patrols of some sort. If there are any ships – trawlers or whatever – available for it?’

  ‘Damn well have to be made available!’

  ‘We’re a bit short, aren’t we? Inshore Squadron aren’t getting much harbour-time… What about the R.A.F.?’

  ‘Not a hope.’ Dewar said this. ‘There’s a small staff at Dekhela, but no aircraft. I know this for a fact. We’ve a Wingless Wonder on our own staff, as it happens. Well – their aircraft are all up the bloody desert, aren’t they?’

  ‘Best slow a bit.’ Currie leant forward again. Solange had shown him Lucia’s block of flats once when they’d been out this way, and that rather vague recollection was all he had to go on now.

  * * *

  ‘He told me I should be killed if he had to leave without me. Nothing he could do would prevent it, he said. Also if I told anyone, if I made problems for them. For us, he said, not for me. If Solange hadn’t made me telephone you, I—’

  ‘Might not have.’ Dewar nodded. ‘Understandable. But you’ve done the right thing. No question.’

  Lucia looked awful. Mitcheson, Currie thought, might hardly have recognized her. Pale – haggard, even – with dark smudges under her eyes and the eyes dull, worn-looking.

  Henderson picked up the framed portrait again, grimaced at Emilio Caracciolo’s wide, youthful grin. ‘Looks as if he’d pack a punch, all right.’ He shook his head slightly. ‘But my God, some brother, eh?’ He put it down, on the low, glass-topped table. ‘How do you feel about him now?’

  It seemed an odd question, and Solange, on the sofa beside Lucia, flared at him: ‘How would you think she’d feel?’

  ‘How I’d think is neither here nor there.’ Henderson frowned. ‘But how Miss Caracciolo feels—’

  ‘It is a valid question, ladies. For us – as strangers to you – to have some understanding of the brother-sister relationship.’ The soldier’s tone and look of enquiry were kinder than Henderson’s more peremptory manner. Lucia told him: ‘I feel nothing for him except dislike. Years ago we were – normal, brother and sister, but – it’s like he went mad or—’

  ‘Right.’ A nod. ‘Believe me, you have all our sympathy, Miss Caracciolo. I know it can’t be easy for you.’ He asked Solange: ‘You hurried over here immediately after your cousin telephoned you, Miss er—’

  Currie prompted: ‘Seydoux.’

  ‘Miss Seydoux. Apologies, I—’

  ‘I was late coming. Lucia told him I’d be arriving any moment. So he left, saying to think about it and he’d telephone, when he did it had better be the right answer, and so forth. Then she called me – to make sure I was coming, but then she was crying and – I got it out of her. I tried to call Josh – Commander Currie – but I couldn’t get him so I left a message that I’d be here, and – well, when I get here Lucia’s in a state of – collapse, just about, and—’

  ‘You’d told your brother that Miss Seydoux was on her way?’

  ‘I wanted only for him to go. Yes – I told him. Well, it was true, she should have been here by then. But anyway to be rid of him – so I could think, decide what to do—’

  ‘Whether to go with him or not?’

  ‘No!’ Her eyes hardened as she looked at Henderson. ‘Definitely not!’ She looked back at Dewar. ‘My brain was – stopped, I—’

  ‘You’d have been in shock. Seeing him on your doorstep would have been enough, let alone the threats.’ Dewar, from his manner and obvious empathy with her, could have been her father. ‘Imagine—’ addressing Henderson – who was a cold fish, Currie thought. He’d never really liked him. Dewar was saying ‘—her own brother, mark you, telling her come along or else – her own damn brother!’

  ‘Yes.’ Solange had an arm round Lucia’s shoulders. ‘Lucia is not – soft, you know. If it had been some – Ettore Angelucci, for instance, one of that rabble – Ettore did threaten her before, you know? Well – you know, Josh—’

  ‘So do they.’

  ‘Miss Caracciolo—’ Dewar was studying Emilio’s portrait again – ‘when he made this demand to you, did he mention how he’d be taking you away?’

  ‘Yes. In a submarine. I said something like “It wouldn’t be possible anyway”, and he said “By submarine, it’s not only possible, it’s arranged.” And also: “That’s my own business, as it happens.”’ She’d shuddered. Turning back to Solange: ‘Figures toi—’

  ‘It’s been a dreadful shock to you, Miss Caracciolo. We understand that, and sympathize. But—’ Dewar was toying with an empty pipe – ‘this is very much an emergency now, and your brother has got to be caught. For more than one reason, it’s a matter of absolute necessity. He and any others who may be with him. Once caught, he’ll be a prisoner of war, no harm will come to him, he’ll simply be locked up. So by helping us you won’t be doing him any harm, in the long run.’

  ‘How, help you?’

  ‘Well, I’m coming to that. He’s going to telephone you for your decision later – some time later, you said.’

  ‘It’s what he said, yes.’

  ‘No particular time was mentioned?’

  ‘No. I don’t think—’

  ‘Tonight, for instance?’

  ‘How can she know?’

  Currie was thinking that no-one would have guessed, tonight, that Solange was the younger of the two. Quite a different Solange… He suggested: ‘As he knows Solange might be here, he may decide not to call until much later – or even tomorrow morning.’

  ‘Well, that’s a point…’

  Henderson shifted impatiently in his chair, stubbed out a cigarette. ‘He’ll call, anyway. Irrespective of when, what we want to know is what you’ll say to him.’

  ‘I don’t know. Don’t know…’

  ‘It’s what we came to you for—’ Solange looked at Dewar, spreading her hands – ‘to be advised what to do!’

  ‘Yes. Absolutely. But just for – complete mutual understanding, shall we say – am I correct in my assumption, Miss – may I call you Lucia?’

  She’d nodded.

  ‘Can we take it as read that under no circumstances would you allow yourself to be removed to Italy?’

  ‘I’d rather they killed me!’

  ‘Then you’ll cooperate with us completely, help us to catch him?’

  She glanced at Solange: then nodded. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Fine. Splendid. In point of fact, in regard to your own safety, even, it’s the only satisfactory solution. As a first step, incidentally. After that’s achieved, if any threat remains – as he asserted it would, right? – well, we’ll have to see to your protection in the longer term, as well.’

  Currie suggested: ‘Cairo? Stay with your mother?’

  ‘Not before Ned gets back.’

  He interpreted to Dewar, ‘Ned Mitcheson – he’s a submariner,’ and turned back to Lucia: ‘He left on the twelfth – a week ago. Means – I suppose – another week at least, perhaps longer.’

  ‘But he’s come back much sooner, sometimes.’

  ‘She could stay with us.’ Solange told her, ‘I wish you would. We’d all feel so much better… ’To Currie, then: ‘I’ve told her this already, but—’

  ‘I must be here when he comes, you see.’

  Dewar suggested: ‘Couldn’t you move in here temporarily, Solange? Don’t mind if I call you Solange—’

  ‘Of course, I could stay with you, Lucia!’

  ‘Lucia?’

  ‘I suppose…’

  ‘Well, that’s fine.’ Dewar nodded to Solange. ‘I’ve a car here with me, I could run you home to collect whatever you want, presently. You might have a word to your parents on the telephone first… Yes, Lucia?’

  ‘What should I say to Emilio?’

  ‘Ah. What we’d like you to say is that you’ve thought it over
and decided you’ll go with him.’

  He’d paused, expecting interruptions, but both girls were silent, their eyes on his face, waiting for more.

  He explained: ‘Because it’s the one way we’ll flush him out. He’ll have to come for you – or arrange to meet you somewhere – and we’ll grab him.’

  ‘Here?’

  ‘Wherever. If he comes here – well, downstairs, probably. Is there more than one entrance, by the way?’

  ‘No—’

  ‘Will you see to it—’ Currie interrupted – ‘that if there’s any kind of a brawl, when you’re arresting him—’

  ‘Lucia’s safety will be paramount. Don’t worry.’

  ‘If I go to work tomorrow—’

  ‘Saturday?’

  ‘Oh. No.’ Tapping her forehead. ‘I’m – confused, still…’

  ‘How would you have been spending the weekend if this hadn’t happened? Bit of shopping – social life – cinema?’

  ‘I’ve nothing planned. Oh, I might visit Solange’s family, but otherwise—’

  ‘Easier if we can have some idea of where you’re likely to be going. The men we’ll have on this are pretty good, but obviously any help you can give them… Then again, you might give some thought to how you’ll explain your change of mind, to your brother. He’s sure to wonder, isn’t he? You might say you were initially shocked, but now you’ve had time to—’

  ‘Yes.’ She’d shut her eyes. ‘Yes, I can do that.’ A shiver… ‘It’s all right. I’m just—’

  ‘Exhausted. Not surprising, not in the least. But – suppose he asks you to meet him – in town, say, or wherever – if you could give us a buzz before you start out, let us know where? We’ll have our man here – but he’ll be outside, you’d find it easier to pick up that telephone to us than to chase around finding him or his chaps. One thing I promise, just to have this clear – you won’t have to get as far as any boat. Let alone submarine. You can rest assured – our own vital interests, as well as yours. We’re out to catch him – and once he’d got that far we’d have lost him – eh?’