She sat very still. The walls were no longer revolving, and the vulpine features at the end of the sofa came into sharp focus. ‘I heard —’ she began, but Shiva Steiner lifted a jewelled finger and motioned unobtrusively to the huissier at the end of the hall.
‘You heard?’ he said gently.
‘I heard it in Klosters this afternoon. In the hotel. There were a lot of people talking and there was a German — I think he was a German — and he was telling everyone that there had been shooting on the mountain just before the avalanche —’ the words had begun to flow even faster than she could think — ‘he said someone had shot the Ruler, and that it was the shot that had set off the avalanche.’
Steiner glanced up at the huissier, then pointed at Sarah’s glass. ‘And did he say the Ruler had been killed?’
‘I think — maybe —’ she blinked at the pair of bright little eyes watching her along the sofa — ‘maybe he said it, or someone else did.’ She tried to smile. ‘So it isn’t true?’ she added.
‘Well, it certainly wasn’t true at six o’clock this evening.’
‘You mean, there was nothing on the news?’
‘I did not hear the news,’ said Steiner; ‘but I did speak to His Imperial Highness.’
She found herself repeating his words: ‘You spoke to His Imperial Highness.’ Her eyes were open wide, her mouth felt dry.
Steiner gave her a lubricious smile. ‘I speak to His Highness almost every evening at six — if not on the telephone, I visit him at his chalet.’ His hands spread out in a deprecating gesture. ‘My dear young lady, my business interests do not only involve money — for what is money but scraps of printed paper? I deal in something more substantial — oil. That is why I can afford to be generous — to fly my friends in a private jet to Mamounia so that they may relax and be happy at my expense. You will not, I hope, think me impertinent if I include you as one of my friends?’
She looked up. The huissier stood beside her with a fresh glass of Cointreau on a silver tray.
CHAPTER 24
They had started off as soon as they could make out the silhouette of the trees around them, with the mists rising from the lake below. It was 5.40 — just about safe, and legal, to drive on side lights only — with the road to Zürich still almost deserted.
Packer again took the wheel. His eyes stung from lack of sleep and his limbs ached; for unlike Ryderbeit he had slept only in snatches, his body refusing to relax, his senses alert to the smallest sound, the faintest hint of movement in the darkness outside.
Their departure was surprisingly, even suspiciously, uneventful. They passed the Fiat still at the edge of the road, resting on its flattened tyres, with its smashed rear window catching the rising sun.
As Pol had emphasized, to assassinate a public figure, however securely guarded, did not call for any special talent; the real skill lay in escaping afterwards.
Their original plan, which had been finalized in the hotel in Chur the morning before, had been for Packer and Sarah to take the Fiat to Zürich Airport, where they would leave it in the parking lot and book themselves one-way tickets to Singapore — the remotest spot they could think of where British subjects do not require a visa. It was a thin ruse, but it might cost the police — and anyone else who was interested — a few critical hours. Meanwhile, the two of them had intended to take the airport bus — more anonymous than a taxi — into the city centre, where they would make their way to the railway station and board the first train leaving. It wouldn’t matter where.
Ryderbeit had agreed to a similar schedule, but travelling separately, on the 4.30 train down to Landquart, and on to Zürich, where he too would disappear, armed with the identity of Daniel Spice-Handler. There had been no mention of their ever meeting again.
Subsequent events had changed all this: first the avalanche, then Sarah’s wilful disloyalty, and now this mysterious ambush, which had been carried out despite the confusion following the Ruler’s murder. However, Packer was determined to stick to the original plan as closely as possible. Even if his phoney flight to the Far East was not picked up, he calculated that the airports and roads would be checked first. The era of the railway was over — which might give them an hour or two’s grace.
Meanwhile, they had already lost more than six hours, he remembered; and it was still a good ninety minutes’ drive to Zürich, where they would arrive in the middle of the early rush hour. With their cargo of corpses, it was a risk they could not take; and he had already decided to make for the nearest town, Näfels, thirty kilometres away, at the beginning of the main stretch of autoroute to Zürich. Here they would leave the truck in a quiet street, and take a train or bus.
He was driving fast. The traffic was still light, but he was becoming increasingly puzzled, with a conflict of relief and anxiety, by the total absence of any police on the road. Fourteen hours ago one of the most powerful men in the world had been assassinated less than fifty miles away; yet the Swiss authorities — proud hosts on whose territory the Ruler had been slaughtered — had so far not even thrown up a single roadblock.
Packer had not communicated his misgivings to Ryderbeit, who showed contempt for all potential danger, reacting only when that danger became imperatively real. In any case, the Rhodesian was now fully occupied, searching the body of the second gunman, which they had been unable to do during darkness for fear of turning on the interior light.
When Ryderbeit climbed back into his seat, he looked disgruntled. He had pocketed a fat sum of Swiss francs from the man’s wallet, which again had been otherwise empty. The only mark of identity was a season ticket in a celluloid holder, valid for the Gotschnabahn for one month, with six days to run. It was made out in the name of A. G. ESMET, nationality Turkish. The photograph showed a heavy face with a dark jaw and a low forehead. Certainly not Chamaz; nor did Packer think it was Chamaz’s companion whom he had seen two nights ago in the Chesa bar.
Ryderbeit wiped the wallet and season-ticket holder clean before tossing them into the back of the truck. ‘First a Lebanese — now a Turk,’ he muttered. ‘Seems they recruit their cowboys and gorillas from neighbouring countries, so it doesn’t embarrass the Imperial Household when one of them gets nobbled, eh?’
‘I don’t suppose it fools the Swiss for long,’ Packer said, thinking again: Where are those cool efficient Swiss? At the same time he remembered something else — that damn window next to him, with its neat bullet-hole surrounded by a web of cracked glass. The side windows did not roll down, but slid open, and it would only need one inquisitive eye to spot the damage; for even if the average Swiss wasn’t used to gunfights in real life, he still watched them on television. Packer cursed himself for not having smashed out the whole window while they were in the layby; for now it was too late. The traffic was beginning to build up towards the entrance to the autoroute.
‘You know something, soldier?’ Ryderbeit said casually. ‘We should have dumped our two passengers in the lake. They wouldn’t have swum.’
Packer did not laugh with him. He was becoming irritated by Ryderbeit’s easy manner; the man didn’t even need a shave, while Packer kept catching his own grizzled, red-eyed image in the driving mirror.
Näfels was a spruce dreary town off the tourist belt, its streets already crowded with industrious early risers. Packer headed for what looked like the centre. He saw an arrow marked ‘Bahnhof’ on a lamp-post, swung the wheel and cut left across the oncoming traffic. A whistle blew and he heard a shout from behind. He hesitated, then pulled up.
The man came round the front of the truck, noting the registration, then stopped by Packer’s half-open window. ‘Vous parlez français?’ he asked, in his odious Swiss-German accent.
Packer nodded, not moving his eyes from the man’s face. Under the grey kepi it was an absurdly young face. There was a ripe yellow pustule at the edge of his nostril and his mouth had the churlish officiousness that is a substitute for authority.
‘You saw the red light b
ack there?’ the policeman said.
‘It was green when we crossed. I am sure it was green.’ Packer smiled into the boyish eyes, desperate to keep the young man’s attention from straying to the bullet-hole which was less than six inches between them.
‘Where are you going to?’
‘Geneva,’ Packer said quickly, remembering that the truck carried Geneva plates.
‘This is not the way to Geneva.’ And the policeman’s eyes strayed past Packer’s shoulder to the back of the truck. ‘You need the autoroute to Zürich.’ There followed one of those timeless pauses that is the trademark of all policemen. The man was still looking into the back of the truck. ‘What are you carrying?’ he said at last.
Packer detected a slight sound beside him, as Ryderbeit slid his hand under his anorak. Packer decided to take the offensive. ‘We’re stopping at the station to collect the luggage of some friends in St Moritz. As you know, the railway has been cut off by the avalanche. These friends are important people —’ he leaned forward and gave a slow nod — ‘and it would be most unfortunate if they missed their belongings owing to a small misunderstanding.’
As he spoke, he heard a sizzle as Ryderbeit drew down the zip of his anorak. Christ, he thought, all we need now is to shoot a cop.
The policeman stepped back and said, ‘In future you must drive with more attention. You could have caused an accident.’ He pointed up the street. ‘If you want the station, it is the second turning on the left. And next time be careful of the lights.’ He saluted and walked away round the back of the truck.
Packer’s hands were shaking as he double checked in the mirror before pulling out into the traffic. Beside him Ryderbeit let out a low cackle. ‘I’d like to have seen that kid’s face if he’d looked in the back! He’d have probably fainted.’
Packer nodded. ‘He’s also going to make an excellent witness when they find this truck.’
They didn’t speak again until they were in the square opposite the station. Packer cruised round and saw what looked like a warehouse with an alley leading round the back. He drove up to it, turned the corner, and found himself facing a dead end. There was no one in sight, and the only other vehicle was a cart loaded with freshly sawn logs.
It took them less than two minutes to unload their luggage, toss the two dead men’s guns into the back of the truck, lock all the doors, and run back into the square, where Packer dropped the keys into a litter bin. The station had only two platforms and the train for Zürich was already in.
From now on, it was decided, they did not keep too closely together. Packer bought the tickets, while Ryderbeit made for the bar. The train was leaving in four minutes, but at this point Packer did not care whether Ryderbeit caught it or not.
The carriage was only half-full, mostly with coarsely dressed Mediterranean types who looked like immigrant workers. Packer settled himself into a window seat, stretched his head back, and felt the full impact of exhaustion. The train jolted into motion and the rhythm of the wheels carried him into a deep sleep.
He was woken by someone shaking his shoulder. He blinked into the dark glasses and hooked face of Ryderbeit, who had slid into the seat beside him. He had a couple of newspapers in his hand. ‘Can you read Kraut?’ he demanded, and thrust the papers on to Packer’s lap.
One was obviously a local paper; the other was the Neue Züricher Zeitung. Packer stared blearily at the local paper, which had a banner headline in red, over a huge photograph depicting a wall of snow and a column of men with long poles. He reflected that the aftermath of an avalanche was rather like the end of a battle — except there are rarely any bodies to be seen. Neither make good photographs.
The headline proclaimed: KILLER AVALANCHE IN KLOSTERS AND DAVOS: AT LEAST 31 DEAD, MANY MISSING, GOVERNMENT DECLARES STATE OF EMERGENCY. The story filled the front page, and overflowed inside, with more photographs.
He turned to the Neue Züricher Zeitung. The lead story concerned Cyprus; a second story was about Kissinger; and the avalanche claimed four columns at the bottom of the page. Packer hunted quickly through the rest of the paper, wondering if his sketchy German had missed something.
Ryderbeit was watching him with a sly grin. ‘I always heard journalists were a load of lazy bums, but they can’t be this bad. It’s the gag, soldier. The iron muzzle, padlock and all.’ He paused, then sucked in his breath in a hiss. ‘He was dressed in his usual black sweater and red, white and blue anorak. Wraparound glasses, gorgeous silver hair — the Serene Imperial Pin-Up Boy himself. And I sent that lovely little plastic pellet smack into the Imperial cranium so they’ll have to melt the snow all around and put it through a sieve to find the pieces. Yet — yet —’ his fingers stabbed viciously at the newspapers on Packer’s knee — ‘it’s the assassination of the decade and it doesn’t get one fucking mention!’
Packer was very awake now. ‘Even our old friend, Chamaz, got quite decent coverage. And he wasn’t even dead!’
‘You telling me the Ruler’s not dead?’ Ryderbeit said quietly.
‘It’s the only thing I can think of for the moment. Maybe I’ll come up with something more brilliant later on. But two days ago the Ruler tells Pol that the operation’s off. He also tells Pol to carry on with the original plan — with the difference that I’ve got to knock you off, instead of the Ruler. And the Ruler’s not the kind of man to have scruples about sending up an understudy, just to find out what our reaction would be.’
‘Maybe — if he is alive — he thinks we were killed in the avalanche?’
‘So why did he set up the ambush?’
Ryderbeit pulled a sour face. ‘How the hell could he be so sure? Unless he set up the ambush to find out?’
‘That presupposes that his boys had the Fiat under observation.’ Packer sighed. ‘It’s possible, even probable, with Chamaz still on our tail. Klosters is a small place. Come to think of it, so is St Moritz.’
Ryderbeit’s eye squinted round at him. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘I was just thinking of a girl I used to know.’ Packer leaned against the window and closed his eyes. ‘Wake me when we get to Zürich.’
‘Well, this is it. As the sentimentalists say, I hate goodbyes at railway stations.’ Ryderbeit clapped both hands on to Packer’s shoulders. ‘Do we keep in touch, soldier?’ He grinned. ‘All right, I stopped being sensitive a long time ago. I’m a pariah. People hire me — use me — sometimes even pay me. Then they get shot of me like I’m carrying bubonic plague.’
Packer cut him short. ‘Is there anywhere I can get hold of you?’
‘Ah, there’s a touch of humanity!’ Ryderbeit shook his head. ‘You might try the American Express in Rome — the eyeties are one of the few people I haven’t crossed so far, and they’ve got a lousy secret police. You might also try the Tel Aviv Hilton. And the name’s Spice-Handler, remember — once again the Wandering White African Jew.’
The Zürich station loud-speaker was announcing the imminent departure of the 9.10 express to Geneva. ‘For Christ’s sake, lie low and don’t splash your money around,’ Packer said, picking up his case. ‘And be careful with that toy gun of yours — especially when you go through airport checks.’
‘Always keeping to the right side of the road, eh, soldier? You know, you’re still a miserable bastard — but I guess I’d be the same if I had to foreswear the Demon Drink. Fact is —’ and for a moment Packer had a disconcerting glimpse of Ryderbeit embarrassed — ‘with all we’ve been through, I’ve quite got to like you, soldier. Some day we might work together again.’
‘Yes. And if my theory about the Ruler is correct, that day may be sooner than you think.’
A whistle blew; Packer turned and ran down the platform, just managing to leap aboard the last carriage as the train began to move. When he looked back, Ryderbeit had gone.
The open carriage offered him no cover. It was crowded, mostly with sober-faced men in business suits with despatch cases resting on their laps. Packer not
ed each one — first those facing him, then, after a visit to the toilet, observing the rest on the way back to his seat.
At each of the three stops — Berne, Fribourg, Lausanne — he changed carriages, leaving the train with his luggage, and only reboarding when the whistle blew. Again, it was more his senses than his eyes that were alert: he was no longer looking out for the square-shouldered, dull-eyed gorilla with his cheap ill-fitting suit bulging in the wrong places and taking half an hour to read one paragraph in the newspaper.
He was looking for someone quiet, typical — a face in the commuter crowd — a face that would reappear just once too often.
Eighty minutes later, when they drew into Geneva Central Station, Packer still felt ‘clean’ — or as clean as he could hope to feel over the coming months. He had spotted only one mild suspect on the train, but he had disappeared at Lausanne while Packer was changing carriages. After the abortive ambush, he was not under-rating the Ruler’s capacity for following through with a ‘grand slam’, even here in Switzerland, and even with him and Ryderbeit now split up. Packer was taking no chances.
In the terminal’s wash-and-brush-up emporium, he changed into a light suit, and at last rid himself of his ski boots, which had begun to weigh him down like a convict’s ball and chain. He also bought all the French papers and the Herald Tribune.
The avalanche was again given wide coverage, but with few fresh facts. One French paper, however, carried a report alleging that the disaster had been started by gunfire. There followed another denial by the Swiss army that any soldiers were responsible, but the report also reminded its readers that the Ruler maintained a staff of 200 highly trained and heavily armed bodyguards at his chalet in Klosters, ending with an implication that an attempt might have been made yesterday on the Ruler’s life.
Le Journal de Genève, like its staid sister, the Neue Züricher Zeitung, gave the avalanche unsensational coverage, but added a brief paragraph quoting the Chief of the Graubunden Canton Police, who had spoken to a member of the Ruler’s household, who in turn had denied that any of His Majesty’s servants were responsible for any alleged shots. Packer wondered how many petrodollars those words had cost His Serene Highness — or whether it was just part of the contract for his resident’s permit.
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