“No harm in trying. Okay, forget it.” He moved a step away from her and regarded her affectionately. “You know, Marcia, you are a very attractive woman. Tell me something: just why haven’t you married?”
Marcia stroked the fur of her stole. Her smile was a little rueful.
“Here’s your taxi, Harry. Thanks, and I’ll be waiting for a call from you . . . Christmas.”
“You’ll get it. You know something? I’ve begun to ask myself why the hell I haven’t married.”
When he had driven away in the taxi, Marcia walked to where she had parked her Mini-Cooper on the Ponte de la Tournelle.
She unlocked the car door and slid into the driving seat. For a moment or so, she stared through the dusty windshield. Did Harry mean anything by that last remark? she wondered. She was now thirty-five. She was getting bored being Dorey’s slave. Although she loved Paris, how much nicer it would be to have her own home in New York.
Don’t jump to conclusions, girl, she said, shrugging, then thumbing the starter, she drove rapidly to her three-roomed apartment on the Rue de la Tour.
Humming under her breath, she parked her little car, walked briskly through the dark courtyard, pressed the door release, then entered the lobby. She rode up in the elevator to the third floor.
Leaving the elevator, she took from her bag her front door key and inserted it into the lock. She had some trouble opening the door, and this puzzled her. Up to this moment, the lock had worked efficiently. But by pulling the door towards her and putting pressure on the key, she managed to get the door open.
This was something she must look at tomorrow morning, she thought, but right now, she wanted her bed. There was nothing nicer than to have a first-class meal and good company, then come back, throw off your clothes and get into bed with a good book. She would read for twenty minutes, then turn out the light.
She snapped on the lights and walked into her living room.
Then she stopped short, her blood turning cold, her mouth opening to scream.
The chill of cold steel touched her throat as Smernoff snarled, “One sound out of you, you bitch, and I will cut your throat.”
Malik lounged in her favourite armchair. A Russian cigarette burned between his thick fingers and his silver-coloured hair made a sharp contrast against the wine-coloured chair back.
“Don’t be foolish,” he said in his bad French. “All right, Boris, let her alone.”
Marcia recognised Malik. She had seen his photograph often enough in the various files she handled daily. She knew him to be the most dangerous of the Russian agents. Her heart quailed as Smernoff gave her a hard shove towards Malik.
“Sit down, Miss Davis,” Malik said politely. “We have no time to waste. I must know where Erica Olsen is. Please tell me.”
It said much for Marcia’s courage and self-control that by the time she had sat down and was facing Malik, she had recovered from the shock of finding these two men in her apartment, and she had also recovered her composure. She knew she was in deadly danger. She knew these two men would get the information they wanted from her unless she outwitted them. Her mind worked swiftly. She remembered Girland had already told Malik that Erica Olsen was to go to the American Embassy. This, she decided, must be her story. It would be hard to disprove, and she must be careful to convey to these two that she was giving the information reluctantly.
“You are Malik, aren’t you?” she said, looking steadily at the silver-haired giant.
“Never mind who I am. Where is Erica Olsen?”
“Where you can’t possibly get at her.”
“Miss Davis, I dislike being disagreeable to women,” Malik said, flicking ash on the carpet. “My companion has no such compunctions. You are wasting my time which is valuable. I am going to ask you again, and then if I don’t get a satisfactory answer, I will allow my companion to take over the interrogation. Where is Erica Olsen?”
Marcia appeared to hesitate. She shrank back in the chair. Her hands moved to her throat and her eyes became wide.
“I told you . . . where you can’t possibly get at her. She’s in the Embassy.”
“I was expecting you to say that,” Malik said. “My information is that she is on the Cote d’Azur. Where is Erica Olsen, please?”
Marcia stared into the expressionless eyes and she knew she had lost her gamble.
“Go to hell!” she said quietly, then starting up, she groped for the glass ashtray on a nearby occasional table with the intention of throwing it through the closed window.
She felt a blinding pain on the side of her neck, then she felt herself falling.
Smernoff who had chopped her with the side of his hand, caught hold of her and pulled her back into the chair.
Malik stubbed out his cigarette and lit another.
“Go ahead,” he said, and began to look around the room. He thought how comfortable it was and how he would like to own it.
Everything was in good taste. There were several good etchings on the walls. One by Springer, a movement of birds, particularly pleased him. These Americans certainly knew how to live well.
He thought of his own one-roomed home in Moscow, and he wrinkled his nose.
Smernoff had taken a hypodermic from his pocket. He stabbed a heavy dose of scopolamine into a vein on Marcia’s arm.
A half an hour later, Marcia was talking sleepily.
“Dorey has a villa in Eze,” she told Malik. “Erica Olsen is there with Girland. There are six of O’Halloran’s men guarding the villa.”
“How is the villa called?” Malik asked quietly.
“Villa Halios.”
Malik moved away from her and looked at Smernoff.
“I think that covers it.”
Smernoff nodded.
“Well, all right.” Malik collected five butts of his Russian cigarettes from the ashtray and put them in a matchbox. “Then she’s yours. It is a pity. She’s attractive, isn’t she?”
Smernoff shrugged. Women bored him.
“All cats are grey in the dark,” he said indifferently. “What is one woman less in the world?”
“Be careful.” Malik moved to the door. “Give me five minutes.”
Smernoff smiled.
“You don’t have to tell me. I know my job.”
Malik nodded and left the apartment. He rode down in the elevator. The time was now 11.50 p.m. The concierge was in bed.
No one saw him as he let himself out, crossed the street to where his car was parked. He got in and drove away.
Alone in the apartment, Smernoff helped Marcia to her feet.
“You need some fresh air,” he said and led her willingly to the open french window and out onto the balcony. He stood by her side looking down at the Rue de la Tour. At this hour, the street was deserted.
Marcia, drugged, sleepy and relaxed, put her hands on the damp balcony rail and breathed in the close night air.
Smernoff looked up and down the street. He looked intently at the lighted windows of the various nearby apartments. No one was out on their balconies. He stepped behind Marcia, bent, gripped her ankles tightly and heaved upwards.
She fell soundlessly, breaking her neck, her back and her right arm as she landed on the top of a parked Dauphine.
* * *
Ginny came out onto the terrace. Girland lifted his head and laid down the paperback he was reading.
“Well? How is she?”
“She’s all right,” Ginny said and sat in a chair near him. “She’s sleeping. I’ve given her a mild sedative. She should be able to get up tomorrow.” She looked at him. “Then you will have to play your role as her husband.”
Girland shrugged.
“I told you . . . it’s a job. I get paid for it.”
“I don’t think I want to stay here,” Ginny said, looking down at her hands. “I would rather return to the hospital.”
“This is your job, Ginny,” Girland reminded her. “You’re getting paid for it too.”
“She won’t need a nurse after tomorrow.”
“Okay, then let’s wait until tomorrow before you decide to rush off.”
Ginny got up and wandered to the balustrade. She remained still, looking down at the distant lights, then finally, she turned and looked at Girland who was staring up at the stars.
“I’m going to bed. She’ll sleep. Good night.”
Girland felt the tension in her, but he resisted the temptation to go to her. She was too young, he thought irritably. I can’t afford complications.
“Okay, Ginny,” he said casually. “Good night.”
She went into the villa.
He lit a cigarette and picked up the paperback, but he found he couldn’t be bothered with it. He threw it aside, got to his feet and looked around him. Somewhere in the garden, he could hear O’Halloran’s men talking in subdued voices.
“Is there anything else, sir?” Diallo asked as he came out onto the terrace. “A drink, perhaps?”
“No . . . fine, thanks. You go to bed. I’m just turning in,” Girland said.
“Then I will, sir. Good night.”
When the Senegalese had gone. Girland flicked his half-smoked cigarette into the darkness, then turning off the terrace light, he walked into the villa. As he was about to climb the stairs, the telephone bell began to ring. He went into the big living room and picked up the receiver.
It was Dorey.
“My secretary died half an hour ago,” Dorey said, in a hard, tight voice. “She fell from her apartment window. The post mortem is being rushed through. There is a puncture mark on her arm. I think she has been injected with scopolamine. If she has, she has talked. Be very much on guard, Girland. I’m sending down six more men. On no account is Erica Olsen to be allowed out into the open. Do you understand? Don’t let her out onto the terrace. It is just possible someone could snipe her from the Corniche if he was a first-class shot. She is to remain in the villa. This you must see to and I hold you responsible.”
“Okay,” Girland said. “I’ve already thought about the terrace. Is this Malik?”
“It must be, but I have no proof,” Dorey said bitterly. “The roads and airport are being watched. If he heads south, I will let you know.”
“I’ll talk to O’Leary right away. I’ll get him to put a man up on the Corniche.”
“Do that.”
“Oh, another thing. I want to see the file you have on Kung. Can you let me have it?”
“Why?”
“I know nothing about him. If she says something connected with him, I want as much information about him, to make sure she isn’t talking nonsense, as I can get.”
“Has she said anything yet?”
“She said something about a black grape.”
“A grape?”
“Yes. I don’t know what it means . . . it could mean nothing, but if she’s going to let drop things like that, I want to be sure I’m not missing anything.”
“Well, all right, I’ll send the file down with O’Halloran’s men. What exactly did she say about this grape?”
Girland told him.
“Hmm. Well, I don’t know. Extraordinary. All right, Girland, keep at it and report to me anything else she comes out with,” and Dorey hung up.
Girland left the villa and went down to the lodge. He told O’Leary what had happened.
“Get a man and a dog up on the Corniche. From up there, a class shot could pick us off like rabbits.”
“Oh, no,” O’Leary said firmly. “You’re wrong. I’ve checked from the Corniche. There’s no way down and the villa is completely screened from the road. If I had thought there was any danger from up there, I would have had a man there right away, but our rear is safe. Trouble is my business, Girland. You look after the woman. I’ll take care of the trouble.”
“I want a man and a dog up there,” Girland said quietly. “It’s an order, O’Leary.”
The two men stared at each other, then O’Leary, his eyes sparkling with anger, said, “If that’s what you want, then that’s what you’ll get.” He paused, then added, “but it’s a waste of a man.”
“You’re getting another six by tomorrow . . . and that’s what I want.”
Girland returned to the villa and walked slowly up the stairs, his mind occupied. He paused at Erica Olsen’s door, opened it quietly and looked into the room. She was sleeping, her blonde hair spread out on the pillow, her face with its classical beauty, relaxed and peaceful.
Girland closed the door and went along to the bathroom. He took a cold shower, then carrying his clothes, he walked the few paces to his bedroom and opened the door.
A small voice said, “Mark . . . please . . . don’t put on the light.”
He stood in the doorway, his clothes held against him, covering his nakedness.
“Ginny?”
“I don’t care! I know I will lose you tomorrow. Once that woman is up, you will never even look at me.” The moonlight coming through the slats in the wooden shutters gave him enough light to see Ginny sitting up in his bed, holding the sheet against her. “Please don’t hate me.”
“Ginny, darling, I could never hate you.”
Girland moved across the room, dropped his clothes and sat on the bed. He pulled the sheet from her.
“But, Ginny, are you sure?” His arms went around her slim, naked body.
“I know I am shameless,” she whispered, her fingers caressing his back, “because I am so very sure.”
She was an irresistible gift that Girland took gently and with pleasure.
* * *
Malik and Smernoff completely fooled the police who were watching for them on all roads leading south. They drove rapidly to Le Touquet Airport, then chartered an air taxi to Aix-en-Provence Aero Club. There one of Smernoffs men was waiting for them in a fast car. They drove through Draguignan, Grasse, Tourettes and down to Cagnes-sur-Mer. Here, in a shabby villa by the sea which one of the Soviet Embassy’s contacts owned, they sat around a table and Malik questioned Petrovka who Smernoff had alerted as soon as they suspected that Nice was the likely hiding place.
Petrovka, thin and young, with a burning ambition to be as successful as Malik, had gone to Dorey’s villa while Malik and Smernoff were on their way down to Cagnes. His report was brief and to the point.
“The villa is impregnable,” he said. “There is no way of breaking in except by a frontal attack. There are six heavily armed men guarding the place.”
He then produced a sketch map of the villa which Malik studied. Malik lit a cigarette and pushed back his chair.
“This needs thinking about. A frontal attack is out of the question.” He pointed to the map. “Are you sure we can’t get down the mountain from the upper road? Is there no path?”
“There is no path shown on the local maps.”
Malik made an impatient movement.
“That doesn’t mean there isn’t one. Go there at once and make sure.”
Petrovka got to his feet.
“At once,” he said and left.
Malik looked at Smernoff, his green eyes glittering.
“He should have checked. He is a fool.”
Smernoff shrugged.
“Show me anyone as young as he who isn’t a fool,” he said.
“I have to make do with what I can get.”
* * *
There were a number of French and American tourists on the 7.30 a.m. flight from Paris to Nice which arrived at 8.55 a.m.
Among them was a young Chinese girl who carried a violin case.
She wore a cheap-flowered dress and stiletto heel shoes. She walked a little awkwardly. She passed through the police barrier with the other tourists and then walked out into the lobby.
Jo-Jo, in a bad mood because he had had to get up so early, came over and joined her. He had no interest in Chinese women.
He thought their short, thick legs unsightly and their hips so much lumps of meat.
“Have you got it?” he asked the girl as she paused
before him.
“Yes.”
“Then come on.”
He walked out of the airport to where he had parked the 404.
The girl followed him, stumbling a little, but very proud of her stiletto heels. They got in the car and Jo-Jo, driving carefully, headed for Villefranche.
Neither of them said anything during the drive to Ruby’s hotel.
Pearl greeted the girl. In the security of their bedroom, Sadu opened the violin case and took from it a .22 rifle, neatly in half, a telescopic sight and a silencer. The gun was a beautiful precision firearm made by a Japanese hand. He handed the gun to Jo-Jo.
“Well, there you are,” he said. “I have done my job, now you do yours.”
Jo-Jo carried the gun to the bed and sat down. He assembled the gun, screwed on the silencer, then clamped on the telescopic sight. Walking to the window, he aimed at a distant tree. His movements were so efficient and professional that Sadu felt a little chill in spite of the stuffiness of the room.
Jo-Jo turned and smiled. He seldom smiled, and his thin, vicious face became even more vicious as he showed his badly-discoloured teeth.
“It’s a beaut,” he said. “She is as good as dead.”
Chapter Six
A movement near him brought Girland abruptly awake.
“It’s all right,” Ginny said softly. “I’m going back to my room.”
“What’s the time?”
“Just after six.”
Girland sighed, stretched and turned on his back. Ginny, sitting on the edge of the bed, her blonde hair a little tousled, her naked back to him, was groping with her feet for her slippers.
He reached out and pulled her backwards across his chest.
“Hello, Ginny,” he said. “Don’t go yet.” His hands closed over her small breasts and he kissed her ear.
She jerked away and scrambled clear of him. Snatching up her wrap, she put it on.
“No, please. I didn’t mean to wake you.”
Girland crossed his hands at the back of his neck and regarded her.
“It’s early. Come here . . . you don’t have to rush away as if you’re catching a train.”
“No. It was a lovely night, Mark, but it is finished now. It won’t happen again.”
1966 - You Have Yourself a Deal Page 11
