The Money That Money Can't Buy

James Munro - The Money That Money Can't Buy

1

The three men in the Volkswagen talked mostly about chess, to which they were all devoted. From time to time the conversation veered to ballet and thence to football—one of them had a son who hoped soon to have a trial for his factory team— but mostly they spoke of chess. The landscape did not interest them: lakes, undisciplined woodland, mountains dusted with snow—these were no novelty, and could be ignored; but chess was at once stimulating, familiar, and abstract. It was pleasant to talk of chess when you were on your way to do a job, and pleasant to drive with the windows open after a spell in a deep-sea trawler that had bumped and smashed its way through the North Channel to Whitehaven. The three men were technicians of the highest class: they were used to better transport and accommodation, but grumbling didn't occur to them. Not one wholly trusted the other two, except in the performance of their essential and highly specialized duties.

The driver braked for a "halt. major road ahead" sign. Like the others, he had never been to England before, but the KGB had taken care of

driving on the left for him, as it had taken care of everything else. He knew all about motorways and coffee bars, and which newspaper matched which clothes, and when to order beer and when to stick to Scotch. He and the others had had their hair cut for three months by a barber who had worked in Croydon. The clothes they were wearing had been bought a piece at a time from sports shops in London, Switzerland, Inverness: windcheaters, heavy nailed boots, windproof trousers, knitted hats. Their climbing rope was supple and well-used, their ice ax old and carefully maintained. Their very suntans had been applied with care, layer after layer of sun and wind against pale skin, so that they looked as if the mountains had called them from childhood. Their eyes, it is true, were wary, and blinked little, but climbers also are cautious men.

They turned left at a sign that said "keswick— 7 miles ," drove on through the gaunt, pure beauty of the Lake District, and ignored it utterly. At their first glimpse of Derwentwater, their talk was still of knights and bishops, W formations, and Spectre de la Rose. Only when they reached the little town they grew silent, until the man beside the driver called out directions from the map he had spent a week in memorizing, and the Volkswagen nosed its way past hotels and sports shops and shops that sold Lakeland jet, woollens and rum butter and postcards and watercolors, into a twisted skein of side streets that the navigator knew as well as the face of his son who might soon play for the factory team, though he had never seen them before. They reached their destination at last, and the driver of a

Volkswagen van which had sprawled across two parking places pulled up and gave them room to park. There was perhaps a certain delicacy in the choice of German transport for such an internationally flavored operation.

The driver and co-driver got out, and the man in the back seat followed them. They stood together, stretched, and lit cigarettes, English cigarettes, king-size tipped. The lighter the driver used was English. He'd been told he could keep it, but they hadn't given him any fuel, and butane was difficult to obtain at home. The driver nodded at a restaurant across the street. The co-driver nodded agreement, but the third man shook his head and moved into the driver's seat. The other two men crossed the street toward the restaurant. It was April in the week before Easter, a cold day, with the threat of snow, and the street was very quiet. The third man pulled the gloves tight over his hands, and felt down the space between the two front seats. The ice ax was there. He pulled the latch of the car door open, laid the ice ax on his lap, and watched the big picture window of the restaurant.

It was a new restaurant, with a decor of plastic designed to look like undressed pinewood. It sold eggs, bacon, hamburgers, sausages, baked beans, and chips in quantities designed to cope with the limitless appetites of walkers and climbers. When the driver and co-driver entered the restaurant and sat at the table nearest the door, it held a party of young men and girls in one corner who had already walked eleven miles that day and were waiting in impatience for their waiter. They could hear him talking in slow, patient English to a woman cook whose Lakeland accent was difficult for him to understand, hear also the sputter of frying fat and the clatter of crockery. They gobbled bread and wondered aloud if they had ordered enough, laughing to hide their embarrassment that they should crave so desperately anything as mundane as food. The two men by the door smoked king-sized tipped cigarettes and waited.

The waiter was Chinese. He was young, tall, long-muscled, and deft at his job. He carried a tray piled with food, and he moved surely and neatly. As he skirted a table, he faced, for perhaps two seconds, the driver and co-driver. The driver spoke one phrase in Cantonese dialect. It had taken him three days to learn to say that phrase exactly right: Cantonese is difficult for any European. The group in the corner didn't hear what he said. Their embarrassment of laughter increased when they saw the object of their desire: rich gold of chips, pale gold of eggs, ham blush-pink, and the bold brown of sausage. But they did notice that the waiter stiffened, and the long, elegant lines of his body hardened with close-packed muscle, that his face showed first astonishment, then despair.

And then the waiter moved. He threw the trayful of food, their beautiful, yearned-for food, at the two men by the door, and next did something even more crazy. He crossed his arms over his face and dived through the window. Glass flew like throwing knives at the group in the corner. One of the girls screamed, and the co-driver shouted "What's going on?" then rushed for the door with the driver. They ran out into the street, the Volkswagen van backed up and they jumped inside. Half a minute went by before one of the hungry ones went out. There was no living thing there: only a youngish Chinese waiter in white mess jacket and black trousers, an ice ax in the back of his head. The hungry one discovered that empty as his stomach was he could still be sick.

* * *

Craig disliked going to Queen Anne's Gate. It meant conferences and paperwork, most of it futile, and rows with a fat, angry man who could never find enough men for the things he had to do. He walked up to the front door and looked at the row of brass plates: Dr. H. B. Cunnington-Low, Lady Brett, Major Fuller, The Right Reverend Hugh Bean. The sort of people you expected to find in Queen Anne's Gate—except that they didn't exist. He pressed the bell marked "Caretaker," and the door opened at once. The man who opened it was short, muscular, and fast-moving, an excommando sergeant who was there because he had killed neatly, precisely and without emotion. Beneath the overalls he carried a Smith and Wesson revolver and a commando knife. From time to time, Craig practiced unarmed combat with him. The caretaker dreaded these sessions.

"Morning, guv," said the caretaker. "His nibs is in."

"How is he?" asked Craig.

"Funny," said the caretaker. "Half the time he's mad, other half he's—well, he acts like something's happened and he can't believe it. Then he gets mad again."

Craig took a tentative step backward. "There's a chap I promised to see," he said.

"I'm to log you in," said the caretaker, "and you've to stand by."

Craig sighed and went up the stairs to his office. The caretaker scowled. He hated to bring bad news to Craig. Their practice sessions on the dojo mat were bad enough without that.

Craig's office was the flat marked "Lady Brett." It, and his secretary, a grim widow called Mrs. McNab, had once belonged to Philip Grierson. Grierson had been an easy, elegant, amusing man, and Mrs. McNab had loved him, wordlessly and utterly. Grierson and she both had been adjusted to the fact that he might die at any time. Operators of Department K tended to live useful, violent, short lives, and M.I.6 recruited them with this end in view. Department K was the most ruthless branch of the service, the branch that handled the jobs that were too dangerous—or too dirty—for anyone else. The people who worked for it presented no problems for the gerontologist. And Grierson, like the others, had been aware that death was always near, and had been prepared for it. What he hadn't been prepared for was that his nerve would crack, and he would go crazy—utterly, completely, incurably. That too much violence and dirt and secrecy would break loose at last, wrap him in a cocoon of apathy, and that every attempt to break it would be met by tears, that Grierson in fact, without ever being sane enough to know it, might live on to old age, and be a problem for the gerontologist after all. Grierson had been working with Craig when his nerve and reason had left him, and Mrs. McNab knew this. She hated

Craig, and treated him exactly as she had treated Grierson.

She watched Craig slump at his desk and frown at the neatly stacked mound of files that waited for him. She watched the sure strength of his hands, the violence that lurked beneath the elegant suit. He's left Saville Row, she thought. That looks like Sloane Street. Well, well. Let's hope he's not going mod on us. She looked at the face then: a strong face, with a good nose, the mouth fuller than you would expect, and pale-gray eyes, eyes that told you nothing, eyes the color of cold seas. She could never love this man: he was too strong for her, but she could hate him, for Grierson's sake.

"Mr. Loomis asked me to tell you to stand by, sir," she said. "Would you like coffee?"

"No thank you," said Craig. There would be enough coffee when Loomis received him. He looked at the files. Today it was Morocco. Drugs, homosexuals, banks, smuggling, prostitution, bars. Something for everybody.

Loomis sent for him at ten thirty. He went into the great man's room with its superb stucco ceiling and sash windows, sat or became immersed in a huge overstuffed armchair covered in flowered chintz, and looked at the man who faced him across a Chippendale desk. Loomis was vast: a gross monster of a man with a face the color of an angry sunset, pale manic eyes, red hair dusted with white like snow on a wheat field, and an arrogant nose. In rage he was both spectacular and cunning. He reminded Craig of a charging rhinoceros with a high I.Q.

Loomis said: "Pour coffee," and Craig fought his way out of the chair to obey. The coffee was as hot, as dark, as bitter as Loomis himself. He put a cup down on Loomis's desk, then waited as the fat man, grunting with effort, produced a crumpled packet of cigarettes from his pocket and gave one to Craig as if it were rubies.

"Got them from the minister," said Loomis, "duty-free."

"Thanks," said Craig. The cigarette was cracked in the middle.

"Smoke it then," Loomis said. "Ruin your wind. I don't care." Craig broke the cigarette in two, and lit the larger end.

"Damn silly thing's happened," said Loomis. "Up in the Lake District. Somebody's murdered a Chinaman." Craig choked on the cigarette.

"You don't by any chance think it's funny?" Loomis asked.

"No, no. A little unusual," said Craig.

"Very," said Loomis. "The only Chinaman for miles and somebody goes and murders him. Belts him over the head with an ice ax. One blow. It was still stuck in him when they found him."

"Any leads?" asked Craig.

"Oh yes. Three fellers drove up in one of those beetles—a Volkswagen. Two got out, went into the cafe where the Chinky worked, and spoke to him. The Chinky threw a trayful of food at them and jumped through the window. The third feller belted him with the ice ax. At least that's what the Cumberland police think. The witnesses aren't all that reliable."

"They go off in the Volkswagen?"

"No," said Loomis. "A Volkswagen van picked

them up. The police have it now—and the car." "Fingerprints?"

Loomis shook his head. "They were both absolutely clean," he said.

"One blow could be luck or it could be skill," said Craig. "No fingerprints at all—that means experts." He paused. "You did say an ice ax?"

Loomis grunted.

"Don't they use them for glaciers?" Craig asked. "They do."

"I used to live seventy miles from the Lakes," said Craig. "I didn't think they had glaciers."

"They don't," said Loomis. "But the three blokes were dressed as climbers. They had all sorts of kit. The ice ax was a mistake really. Except they kept it hidden in the car." He paused for a moment, and Craig saw that he was struggling for words. This surprised Craig. The fat man was usually much too fluent.

Loomis said at last: "If you laugh at what I'm going to say I'll—" He hesitated, then said: "No. It has to be said anyway. A Russian trawler put into Whitehaven the day of the kill. Minor engine trouble. They let a few men ashore. Whitehaven's twenty miles from Keswick. The trawler sailed seventy minutes after the murder."

"Russians?" said Craig, a question in his voice. "Murdering a Chinaman? In Keswick?"

"These men were pros," said Loomis. "Quick, neat job. One blow, no fingerprints, no murderers even. We can't touch them."

"But they were seen," said Craig. "They killed in front of witnesses. The Russian Executive ne ^v .r does that."

"Maybe they wanted us to know," said Loomis. "Did any of the witnesses suggest they were Russians?"

"Very British, they said they looked. But they would for a job like this." "And the Chinese?"

"His name's Soong, James Soong. Thirty. Hong Kong passport. I've got their police working on it."

"He came here straight from Hong Kong?"

"If the passport's telling the truth," said Loomis. "He'd worked in Keswick for six months. Big, tough lad, their police say. But kept himself to himself. No friends. No enemies either. Except a bloke with an ice ax."

"But if the Russians really did do this—"

"I know, cock. Right in our own back yard. I don't think I could stand it," said Loomis. His vast body heaved in uncertainty, and the chair beneath him groaned.

"I'm sending you up there," he said. "Take Linton—then it can all be police business if things get normal."

"Normal?"

"As in 'News of the World,' " said Loomis wearily. "Even Chinamen must do some things that make people want to kill them. Let's hope it's that."

"And if it isn't?"

"I'll have those bloody Russians—" Loomis said, and his voice was a battle cry. "I'll have them on toast for breakfast."

2

The Mark X took them North in a smooth surge of power, and Detective Chief Inspector Linton was content to listen as Craig talked and drove. It was nice doing a job with Craig, he thought. Always a good car, and food and drink in proportion. For the survivors.

. Craig said: "Loomis thinks there may be something in it."

"He's got no evidence," said Linton. "No real evidence."

"He's got a hunch," said Craig. "I think it's a good one. If we find he's right he'll hit the roof."

Linton sighed. "There's one thing," he said. "Soong's passport was forged. We had it checked at the forensic lab."

"Does Loomis know?"

"Yes," said Linton. "I telephoned him myself. He was delighted."

They drove on to Keswick, and stayed at the George, an old, staid, leathery, overstuffed hotel like a fat colonel, where the food was excellent and very English, and the central heating nonexistent. Linton approved of it, and Craig noted only that

from time to time he slept, or was fed. The job had begun to fascinate him.

Their suite had a small sitting room, and it was here that they talked to the walking party, seeing them one at a time, taking them patiently through the story, over and over again, stolidly enduring the timid complaints of the educated and respectable young when confronted by policemen investigating murder. They learned two things. The first came from Dr. Arthur Hornsey, aged twenty-seven, the elder statesman of the party, now engaged in research in the department of psychology at the University of Lancaster. Hornsey had observed the two men in the restaurant well. Craig showed him a series of photographs—a weird assortment of Russians and Russian-looking types, including dancers, strong men, Orthodox priests, and a genuine prince now working in advertising, and he identified the two men in the restaurant at once. Neither picture was good, and in neither case did the men wear climbing clothes, but Hornsey was sure although Linton pressed him hard.

"I'm absolutely positive," he said. "I've always had a fantastic memory for faces."

"Are they foreign?" Hornsey asked.

"No," said Craig.

Hornsey looked at him. The word was a flat, almost brutal denial of further discussion. To Hornsey, who had been trained for research, such a denial was unacceptable.

"I mean they do look foreign," he said.

Craig said nothing, and Hornsey felt himself blushing. He was a big, muscular young man who had gone out of a restaurant to face a mad Chinese who jumped through windows. His strength and courage were things he had always taken for granted. Yet he blushed at Craig's silence, and the force of will behind it.

"We may need you later as a witness, sir," Linton said.

"Oh yes. Identification Parade. That sort of thing, eh?" Hornsey asked.

"Something like that," said Linton, and Hornsey left. It was only when he got outside that he realized that he knew Linton's rank, and had observed his questioning techniques. (Linton was well above average, he thought. At least beta plus.) He also realized that all he knew about Craig was his name and beyond that only a sensation, nothing more, of brooding, terrible power. Hornsey had a good mind, and it had been trained well. It would be best, he thought, to keep out of Craig's way.

The second piece of information came from a girl. Her name was Jane Simmons, aged twenty, Linton noted, educated at Priory Close School for Girls and L'Ecole des Jeunes Filles, Lausanne, Switzerland, a capital investment of at least five thousand pounds. At present she wore a shaggy sweater that surrounded her like a parcel, heavy wool trousers, socks, and nailed boots. No employment. She had tried to paint, but now Daddy gave her an allowance. Daddy was in newspapers and television. Linton trod with infinite caution.

She failed with the photographs— perhaps as well, thought Linton, that she has given up painting —and her only clear visual memory was of the shape the glass made when the Chinese had jumped through it. Linton prepared to let her go.

Craig asked: "Did either of the two men speak to the waiter?"

She looked at him. Currently she was in love with Frank Sinatra, a golden retriever called Jackson, and Rudolf Nureyev. She added Craig to the list. The little finger of his left hand was stiff, she noticed, as if it had been broken, then set badly. But both his hands were beautiful.

"You'll think this is awfully sill—" she said.

"Try me," said Craig, and her heart turned over. If only she'd thought to have her hair done. But who would have thought that necessary, just to meet two policemen?

"I thought one of them did speak to the waiter," she said at last. "Only it wasn't really speaking. More singing, really. I mean, I didn't hear much, and we were all making such a row—I mean we were absolutely starving. We'd walked miles—but I do remember thinking how silly it was. The singing, I mean. When we were all so hungry. And then —then he died."

Linton thought it was silly too, and wanted to leave it at that, but Craig kept on about it, oblivious to the girl's mistrust of herself, and to her father, who was in newspapers and television, and hence to be doubly avoided by chief inspectors of the Special Branch. Craig sang to her. He sang pop tunes and Rodgers and Hart, gems from Verdi and Russian folk songs, Beethoven and Bach and Bacharach, and to all of them, Jane Simmons said no, and Linton worried. At last he let her go, and Linton asked if he was crazy, but. already Craig had the telephone and talked to a fascinated Loomis, who found him an old man in retirement at Grasmere, and they drove there in a powder of snow, and the old man sang into a tape recorder and told them it was nonsense, but nevertheless gave them some astonishing cherry brandy.

That evening Craig sent for Miss Simmons again. This time she had had time to prepare, and wore a neat little number in silk jersey that still looked good even after four days in a rucksack, the pearls Daddy had given her for Christmas—Daddy was old-fashioned; he thought pearls were safe, whereas if one were dark and suntanned, they were in fact very sexy, in a Tahitian sort of way—and a dollop of Je Reviens. Jane knew she looked good, but the pale eyes told her nothing, and she was so disappointed that she even forgot to scowl when she found that Linton was joining them.

Craig bought her one martini at the bar, then they took her in to a dinner of game soup, salmon, roast duckling, and strawberries. With the dinner he allowed her one glass of hock and one of claret. No liqueur, though she absolutely adored Grand Marnier. He might have been her father, Jane thought, then realized that it could in fact be possible. She knew no way of finding out his age. But his sexiness—the passion of his mouth, the cold brutality of his eyes—of that there could be no doubt. She breathed in, and the silk jersey clung becomingly to her, and Craig continued to talk of islands in Greece, and the high cost of villas there, now that everyone knew about them. By the end of the meal she was a little angry, but clear-headed and very much alert, which was exactly what Craig had intended.

After dinner they went back to the private sitting room, and Craig made more coffee, which was heaps better than the stuff they'd had in the dining room. Then he produced the tape recorder and Jane wondered what on earth had got into him. How could he possibly start playing that sort of music with all the lights still on and that grisly Linton sitting there like a duenna or something? Craig ran the tape back to the beginning and switched it on to playback. An old man's voice came through, high and clear. It wasn't singing exactly, but it wasn't talking either; just the same phrase repeated over and over, as if the old man were a priest chanting in some service or something.

After she'd heard the old man's voice twice, Jane said: "I think so," then, after the tenth time, she said: "Yes, that's it all right."

Craig switched off the tape.

"But what does he mean?" said Jane. "What's he chanting about?"

"I'm afraid I can't tell you just yet," said Craig.

"I suppose it's sub judice, or whatever you call it."

"Something like that," said Craig.

Not even the daughter of a man in newspapers and television could be told what the tape had said. The voice was that of a retired inspector in the Hong Kong police. The message was neither singing nor chanting, but spoken Cantonese. And what the inspector had repeated, over and over, was: "Comrade Soong, we have come here to kill you."

"I hope I've been able to help you," said Jane.

"Oh yes," said Craig. "Enormously."

Three Russians, he was thinking. Sent here to kill an agent. The Chinese must be an agent. Loomis will run amok.

"I don't know what we'd have done without you," said Craig. "Have some more coffee."

"Actually I think I'd better get back to the youth hostel," said Jane. And she added carefully: "Is it still snowing?"

"I'll give you a lift," said Craig.

In the Mark X she gave him every opportunity she knew, but he just wouldn't see her. Later, at home in Surrey, she examined herself in the mirror one day: thick darkness of hair, eyes, wide and trusting and brown as a sweet sherry (far too spanielly of course, but at least you could see the love in them), and her body firmed by youth, and with the first hint of ripeness. And all of it offered on a plate. As if she'd been a roast beef sandwich or something. Only he wasn't hungry. All she got was "Thank you very much, Miss Simmons," and when she asked if he'd need to see her again, "Oh yes. It's very possible."

And then the tail lights of the Jag, glowing in the dark. It really wasn't enough.

Loomis was delighted. His delight lasted for at least ten minutes, and then he gave way to an ecstasy of rage. The Russians on his patch, knocking off a Chinky without even saying "God bless you," and a Chinky, moreover, about whom he, Loomis, knew nothing. A Chinky who could have served baked beans and chips forever, for all Loomis knew or cared. Except that now he cared passionately. And they had nothing to go on. Nothing at all. Everything James Soong possessed had been searched, dismembered, searched again, analyzed, fingerprinted, spectrographed. And it told them nothing. James Soong had lived only in the present. His past, like his future, did not exist.

"You can't stop the Russians from trying to kill people," said Loomis. "I know. I've been through it all before. But this is the first time they've done it and I haven't known why. We've got nothing on this Soong character at all. Neither have any of the other departments. I had to go and ask." He shuddered at the memory. "It won't do." He hesitated. "I wonder if he ever went to Morocco?"

Craig remembered the files on his desk the day Soong was reported killed. They had all been about Morocco.

"Anyway, I got somebody working on that,"

said Loomis. "I got another idea as well. I think it's

about time we started chucking our weight about.

And I know just where we can chuck it. How

would you like to kidnap a Russki for me, son? Be

a bit of an interest for you. You knock off a

Russki, and they'll have to come and ask for him

back. And then," Loomis lay back like a basking

whale, "and then we can talk."

* * *

The Comet 4B landed on time at Barajas airport. Everything about it had been predictable: its punctuality, its comfort, the size of its drinks, the dullness of its food, the uncertain glory of its hostesses. Craig walked down the steps and hurried to the waiting bus—the wind from the Sierras was cold. The other passengers, like himself, huddled into their coats, as the bus jolted toward the administration building. There were only twenty of them.

It wasn't enough. Craig preferred the anonymity of a crowd, but this time there wasn't a chance. Loomis was in a hurry, and this was the fullest flight he could get.

That day the two Spanish officials had time to spare. They looked at his passport photograph three times and criticized the photographer, read slowly and earnestly through the details of his fiche, and at last let him in to Customs, where a thin, elegant Madrilefto ignored him completely as he scrawled on his two suitcases. One man had ignored him; two had looked at him, and his photograph, with care. Craig didn't like the odds. He took a taxi into Madrid, and stopped off at a car-hire place near the Puerto del Sol. They had a Fiat 1800 waiting for him, and once again he waited while Spaniards struggled with his passport—his name this time was Jameson, which they assumed began with a noise like a percussive "H"—then he signed the documents and drove out into the city and to the main highway to the south.

The car seemed good for 120 kilometers an hour, which for a hired car is excellent, and Craig enjoyed the almost empty road, the harshness of the high Sierras as he drove through New Castile. This was a country made for war, hard and pure and arid, its mountains gaunt and white-tipped still, their winter snow matte as a bandage on a wound, so that by comparison the Lake District seemed gentle as the mountains of a dream. He drove on to Toledo and stopped there and got out, as a tourist should, to buy paper knives of Toledo steel, and ate lunch, which was hot, aggressive, and yet eager to please, a very Spanish lunch. Then on again, through Ciudad Real to Valdepeflas, and there he spent the night. Valdepenas was quiet, restful, and almost devoid of tourist attractions. On the other hand, a vine grew there which produced an excellent wine. Craig drank it and in limping Spanish congratulated his waiter, who, being a Spaniard, took the matter as a personal compliment, and suggested another bottle, then apologized that the town should have nothing else to offer the foreigner. But the gentleman was going on to Granada? Ah, then tomorrow he really would see something worth seeing. The waiter was a Castilian, and despised Andalusia totally and comprehensively, but the customer had been nice about the wine. He thanked the Englishman again, and told him to the centimo how much his tip should be.

Craig woke next morning early, drove on to Granada, and hired a guide who gave him enthusiastic and quite often accurate information about the Generalife, the churches, the old town, Moorish architecture in general, and the Moorish contribution to the culture of Spain, then took him to a souvenir shop, and beamed with a schoolmaster's pride in a boy who had learned his lessons while Craig bought purses and marquetry boxes and mantillas and combs, and the shopkeeper and the guide said: "Tipico, ttpico," and when he had bought enough let him go. He lunched late and well, then set off again in the warmer air, driving on south, where orange and lemon groves were coming into blossom, through village after village where already the preparations for Easter were approaching the frantic, and petrol was scarce and not very good, and the mountains of the Sierra Nevada enfolded it all, an eternity of rock and snow. He bypassed Malaga, and turned west along the coast road, past the little seaside resorts where the foreigners—English, Germans, French, Americans, Swedes—were already arriving with their donations of pesetas to stabilize the Spanish economy, and asking in return only the sun, the opportunity to wear dark glasses, to dress in bright, weirdly cut clothes that they would never, never wear at home. He passed Torremolinos and Fuengirola, and arrived at last at Marbella. There was a bar he had to find, off the Calle Mayor, and he found it at last in a street of whitewashed houses, a bar bright with neon and a jukebox stuffed with the top twenty, and wrought-iron tables with marble tops, and portraits of the Queen and Union Jacks, and Watney's Red Barrel on the counter. Outside, in daylight, one could see an inn sign, with a picture. The bar was called "The Dog and Duck." It was full of Englishmen drinking beer, and Englishwomen drinking gin. Craig went inside, ignored two Spanish barmen, and waited for the attention of a squat, slow-moving, chunky man with pale, thin, nondescript hair and skin still pink from the sun, pale skin that would never darken to more than a fiery, ill-tempered red. When the man turned, Craig recited his formula.

"Forgive me, but you must be George Allen," he said.

The chunky man continued to wash glasses beneath the bar for a second, then said carefully: "I'm George Allen. Yes. Who might you be?"

Craig said: "Norman Jameson—Linda's brother."

Allen said, counting out each word: "Well, well, well." Then added: "How is Linda?"

"Fine," said Craig. "She sends you her love."

"What would you like?" asked Allen.

"Scotch," said Craig. "Teacher's for preference. No ice. Water on the side."

Allen nodded then and brought him his drink. Craig was accepted. Even so, he felt like a fool. Passwords to Craig could never ever sound like conversation, much less replace it. He knew that the men and women around him had heard and forgotten what he had said, but he remembered. He talked for a while about Linda, her husband Frank, and their children—Arthur had failed "O" level French again; Elaine still had a brace on her teeth—went out to dine on gazpacho, arroz a la Valenciana, and fruit, then returned to the bar. Allen was waiting for him, and came at once from behind the counter and took him into the living room behind it. The living room was furnished throughout by Liberty's, and on the walls were pictures of George Allen: Allen at school, Allen in the first fifteen, Allen as house prefect. Then more pictures: Allen in the RAF regiment in Aden, Singapore, Hong Kong; Allen as a tea planter, a PRO man, a car salesman; and finally Allen as publican, shaking hands with pop singers, bullfighters, film stars. Craig liked the setup less and less. Allen poured Spanish brandy and Craig asked for ginger ale. When it came, Allen said: "I heard you were on your way. What do you want?"

There was a tycoon's preoccupation in his voice: so much to be done, so little time to do it in. Craig watched as Allen's neat brandy disappeared, and another, larger shot replaced it. He said nothing.

"Look sport," said Allen. "I'm a busy man. I'm running a bar. The bar makes money. I don't live in Wogland because I like it—and this is my high season. Now what do you want? If I can help you I will."

"Your bar makes you thirty pounds a week from April to September," said Craig. "Your boat makes you another twenty—smuggling. That's fifteen hundred a year. We've paid you a couple of thousand for the last three years. You're not doing me any favors, Allen. You're paying off six thousand quid."

Allen picked up his glass and poured down the brandy. His face at once turned a fierce, banked-down red, and he opened his mouth to yell.

"If you start anything," said Craig, "I'll knock you unconscious. And you won't work for us again. Ever."

Allen sat at the table, his hands groping for the brandy bottle. Craig eased it away from the searching fingers, stood up, walked round the table, and hauled Allen to his feet. Allen's body resisted the thrust of the hand in his shirt collar, but he came up anyway.

"I want politeness," said Craig. "And cooperation. And I want them now. We've heard about, you, Allen. You're lazy. You want the money. You don't want the work. We don't see it like that. We want you to start earning, old son."

Allen said: "All right. All right. This shirt cost me a hundred and sixty pesetas."

Craig let him go; and Allen smoothed out his shirt collar.

"Just tell me what you want," he said. "If I can help you I will."

Craig's right hand reached for Allen's neck, the V formed by the splayed forefinger and thumb across the throat, the thumb depressing the carotid artery, the forefinger hard on the nerve behind the ear. Pain exploded in Allen's face, but he learned at once how foolish he would be to yell as the pressure of thumb and forefinger increased. Craig spoke to him, his voice unhurried and utterly certain. "You belong to us, Allen. We own you. When we say jump, by Christ you jump. We know all about your smuggling, remember. You try it on and we give you to the Spaniards. On a plate, old boy." The pressure of thumb and forefinger increased, and the pain boiled in Allen's neck, then was suddenly, mercifully gone.

"I'm sorry," Allen began.

"Don't be," said Craig. "You hate me. But I can destroy you. Just accept that."

Reluctantly, hating himself, Allen agreed.

"We're going to pick up a man called Jean-Luc Calvet," said Craig. "You know him."

"Of course I do," said Allen. "He's a French painter. One of these beatnik types. Lives down the road in Estepona."

"You never told us about him," said Craig.

"Nothing to tell," Allen said. "He's just a painter. Sells little sketches of landscapes and fishing boats and that. Does very well too."

"He's a Russian," said Craig. "He also sells little

sketches of Gibraltar, and he's a paymaster for Spanish Communists."

"You're joking," said Allen, and added quickly: "I mean he's a very good painter."

"He's a very good spy, too," said Craig.

3

That night Calvet was giving a party. His little house was crammed with expatriate Swedes, Germans, and Englishmen, including a couple of officers from Gibraltar who were laying down Calvet oils as their ancestors had laid down port. The gin and whisky, smuggled from Gib, were excellent, and the kef, brought from Morocco that day, mixed deftly enough to ensure that it brought nothing but peace, and perhaps a little too much laughter. There were never any fights at Calvet's parties. Craig drove down there at two in the morning, and the party was loud indeed. He left the car in the square, and walked down to the quayside. A group of fishermen were unloading boxes of fish from a caique-like craft with an enormous and antiquated diesel engine; others were watching from a cafe, part house, part awning, and with them were a beat-poet, an anti-novelist, a musique concrete composer, and their disciples, who drank local brandy and deplored Calvet's party, to which they had not been invited. Craig drank coffee, and listened to their chatter. The party should be through by four.

He finished his coffee, walked out of the village to a headland, sat down and waited. His patience was absolute. He could wait for days, and be as swift and deadly at the end as if he had just arrived at the fight. At last, very faintly, he heard the throb of engines, and saw the riding lights of Allen's cruiser. The engines stopped, and there was the squeak of wood on metal as Allen moved his dinghy to the shore, beached it and scrambled up. His breath reeked of cognac.

"All set," said Allen. "Ready when you are, squire." He lurched into Craig as he moved, and Craig reacted at once to the dense weight of metal on his body. His hand moved, quickly and precisely, and came out with the gun that Allen carried. A Beretta. An Italian automatic, eight-shot, with a light and nervous trigger. The safety catch was off. Craig took the magazine from the butt, put it in his pocket, and gave the gun back to Allen.

"If I want a gun I'll bring a gun," he said.

"Just making sure," Allen said. "He could be tough."

"He is," said Craig. "But we don't want him dead."

He led Allen back to the car, and they drove out of town, then waited in the dark till four, while Allen fidgeted and whined for cognac, and Craig just sat, not smoking, not speaking, waiting until it was time to move. They went back into Estepona and parked near Calvet's house just after four. By twenty past, seven people had left, by half past the record player had ceased.

Craig drove up to the house, got out, and looked at the windows. They were small and steel-framed.

The door was three heavy slabs of olive wood, with a hand-forged lock that he could open with a hairpin, but he had heard the thick slam of metal bolts as the last guests left. He pounded on the door with his fist. The noise boomed and echoed in the empty street. At last he heard footsteps, and his muscles tensed for action.

A girl's voice asked: "Who is there?" and Craig continued to pound on the door. "What is it?" the girl asked again, and Craig shouted in half-incoherent Spanish about guests at the party, an accident on the Marbella road, and a man dying, perhaps dead, and my God why did they have to drive when they had drunk so much?

There was a gasp, the bolts shot back, and Craig lunged at the door as it opened. The girl's weight gave under his, he reached out and his hands were merciful and swift. She collapsed with little more than a sigh. He picked her up and climbed the stairs, up to where one light glistened softly, and, to the left of it, an opened door. His footsteps were firm and loud as he moved, and at the third stair from the top he called out: "I say, is anyone there?" There was no answer, he reached the top, and turned. The room at the top of the stairs was a bedroom. In it was a young man in denim pants, a faded blue work shirt and combat boots. The young man was lean and rangy, clean-shaven, his hands and clothes grimy with paint. In one of them was a Star Model A automatic that pointed where Craig's shirt should have been visible, had he not been carrying the girl. The fact of the girl disconcerted the young man. He had been about to make love to her. Craig walked into the room.

"Oh I say," he said. "Look here."

The young man took two cautious steps backwards, beyond the reach of Craig's hands.

"This young woman's ill," said Craig. "For God's sake, come and help me man. You don't need that thing."

"Put her on the floor," said Calvet.

"On the floor?"

The automatic tilted, aimed at a point between Craig's eyes. Slowly, carefully, Craig put the girl down on the floor, bending his head as he did so. She was a slight girl, too thin for his taste but easy enough to carry. Her hair was fine and golden, and her eyes would be blue, or gray, he thought, and waited for Calvet's move.

The young man was fast. He covered the distance to Craig in two silent strides, and the gun-barrel swung. Craig rolled to one side, the gun's sight clipped the skin of his forehead and Craig, balanced on one arm, reached out the other to grab Calvet's wrist, using the force of the descending blow to pull him further downward, twisting the fingers of the wrist open as he pulled until the automatic spilled from them. Calvet countered with a blow at his neck, a chop that would have killed him, but he lay back as it came, and took it, gasping, on the close-packed muscles of his shoulder, the lancing pain loosening his wrist hold. Calvet wriggled free, and aimed a kick at Craig's head, but Craig was already spinning away toward the automatic and the kick went wide. Immediately Calvet hurled himself at Craig, the one chance he had to stop him reaching the gun, and Craig moved with the kind of reflex action that comes only from day after day at the dojo mat, days that grow into months and years. The toe of his shoe landed in the young man's belly as his hands grasped the sailcloth on his shoulders. His leg straightened, his hands heaved, and Calvet hit the wall, smashed from it and was still straightening, looking for his enemy, when the edge of Craig's hand struck at a point just below his nose. He fell then, a slack heap of flesh in paint-stained clothes. Craig got up, winced when he put weight on the shoulder Calvet had hit, and walked over to him, felt his wrist. It was steady enough. He hadn't hit too hard. He tried the girl's wrist then; it was fast and fluttering. Espionage was hardest on innocent bystanders.

He listened for Allen then; but there was no sound. Craig swore, softly but adequately, took some wire from his pocket, and tied up Calvet. His movements were neat and precise, the knots as sure as only a fisherman's knots can be. He looked at the girl again, then picked her up and tied her to the railings of the bed. She'd wanted to be there anyway. Then he began to search Calvet's house. Time was vital, and his movements were swift enough, but he was thorough. Room by room, drawer by drawer, case by case, he searched Calvet's belongings.

First he found money—a drawerful of neat piles of twenty-dollar bills. He put them aside and went on searching: under floorboards, behind cupboards, behind walls that sounded hollow but were only plaster. The radio transmitter he discovered inside the record player. It was a little beauty, neat, light, and portable. He disconnected it and took it back toward the bedroom, then froze. There were footsteps on the stairs. Craig faced the necessity of having to hurt a third human being that evening. The idea neither attracted nor repelled. It was simply a necessity. If he had to do it, he would do it well. The footsteps moved to the bedroom. Craig followed, soundless. Allen stood in the doorway, his eyes moving from the pile of money on the table to the girl on the bed.

"So many good things," said Craig. "You don't know where to start, do you?"

Allen whirled. His movements were clumsy, fuzzy with alcohol. He stared into the flat gray of Craig's eyes that looked at him without pity, hate, or even dislike.

"Where were you?" asked Craig.

"I was scared," said Allen. "I'm all right now."

His gaze went back to the money.

"You've found a fortune," he said.

"Yes," said Craig.

"I mean—we could live the rest of our lives on that," said Allen.

"Yes," said Craig, "we could. There's an R/T set next door. Take it down to the car. Then wait for me."

Allen didn't move. He was looking at the girl now. She was still unconscious, but she'd moved a little, and the movement had pulled back her skirt over her knees. Allen went over to her, pulled it back further, to reveal the black line of her garter against the pale thigh, the neat V of her panties.

"She's all right," he said. "Bit skinny maybe."

His hand moved again, then Craig grabbed his wrist, turned him round.

"I was only looking," said Allen.

"Jesus you're nasty," said Craig. "Take the R/T set to the car. Then wait for me."

"All right," said Allen. "What about the money?"

"I'll take that," said Craig. "And Calvet. Move."

Allen moved, and Craig stuffed the money, the gun, and the steel box into a duffle bag, and slung it over one shoulder. He went to the girl then, untied one wrist, hesitated, then pulled her skirt down over her knees. Calvet next, still unconscious. He eased the limp body over his other shoulder, and started for the stairs. As he went, he noted with satisfaction that his hands were quite steady, he wasn't sweating, and his footsteps were still soundless.

He opened the house door one inch and listened. From down the street came the sound of voices. Allen was talking bad Spanish to a guardia civil. The guardia, talking much better Spanish, was advising Allen to go home. Allen promised to do so, as soon as he could get the car to start, and the guardia left him. Craig counted ten, then moved out into the street. Allen had cleared the back seat of the car and Calvet rested on it, at peace. He looked drunk. Craig covered him with Allen's coat, took Allen's bottle and poured brandy over his face and shirt. The car reeked. He walked over to the co-driver's seat then. The R/T set was on it.

Allen said: "Don't worry. I told the guardia it was a new car radio I was fitting."

"I hope he's as big a fool as you are," said Craig. "Move over."

Reluctantly Allen obeyed, taking the R/T set on his lap, then Craig slung the duffle bag into the back beside Calvet.

"That the money?" Allen asked.

Craig switched the ignition on and drove toward the seashore. At the first corner, he flashed his headlights. A guardia civil stood in a doorway, watching the car. He didn't look stupid. Craig drove on sedately; he wanted no trouble.

They reached the sea road, and parked the car. Once again Allen picked up the R/T set, and this time he held Craig's case as well, and scrambled down toward the beach. Craig followed, the duffle bag over his shoulder, the still body of Calvet in his arms. The cliff was soft soil and they moved quietly, then suddenly Allen struck a patch of shale, and stumbled. Craig swore under his breath, but they reached sand at last, and Allen's boat, and loaded it up and launched it into the dark, whispering sea. Craig scrambled into the bows and took the oars; Allen in the stern held the tiller. The oars squeaked softly as the boat moved out into the Mediterranean, toward the dark mass of Allen's motor-boat, its riding lights clear and brilliant as jewels.

They reached it, tied up, and transferred Calvet, the money, and the R/T set, then Allen's hand moved to the starter switch.

"Wait," said Craig. "Switch off your riding lights."

Allen obeyed, as Craig looked out toward the land, to the thin probe of two headlights, undipped, pushing in to where the Morris was parked. He heard the sound of car doors slammed, and men in uniform moved through the headlight beams, toward the little car. They had guns in their hands.

"We'd better get out of here," said Allen. "Not yet," Craig whispered. "They can't see us. We'll wait till they go." "But—"

"Keep your voice down," whispered Craig again. "Sound travels at sea."

And at that moment Calvet returned to consciousness and yelled.

Calvet was a Ukrainian. He spoke Ukrainian, Russian, and French—all three as if they were his mother tongue—and his German, English, and Spanish were near perfect, but all he produced then as he struggled from the blackness of Craig's blow into the blackness of the boat's cockpit was a high-pitched yet very masculine scream: a scream compounded of fear and horror of terrible things that had happened to him, to Calvet, and which he could neither control, understand, nor, at that moment—and here was the real terror—even remember. So Calvet screamed, and the scream died almost at once, crushed out beneath Craig's fingers, but it warned the men on the cliff, and a spotlight on their car snapped on almost at once, its long accusing finger probing out to sea, searching for the sleek twin-screwed cruiser that lay too far out for the light to touch.

Again Allen wanted to go, and again Craig made him wait, until at last the car revved up and went, and then the cruiser's motors too could fire, the twin propellers chop the water into foam. Craig took the small, neat wheel in his hands and set course for Gibraltar. As he let in the throttle, he could feel the twin engine's thrust. Allen must have been sober when he bought this one, he thought. She's just about perfect. He let in more throttle and the speedometer moved to fifteen knots.

"Let's put on the searchlight—see where we're going," Allen said.

"No," said Craig.

"But she'll do five knots better than this if we see where we're going." "No," said Craig.

The cruiser forged on, and the false dawn came, a pink smudge across the horizon, pink and yet cold. The cruiser moved on, and Craig strained his ears for the sound of other boats. There had to be other boats, and if the land police had done their job they would pick them up soon.

Twice he thought he heard them and throttled back the engine—his hands were still steady, but they were wet, now, and he was breathing more quickly than he had need—but when at last it came, he was in no doubt. It was a low-pitched, drumming note, deep and steady, and when he heard it he could look, and when he looked he could see the two sets of red and green riding lights, tiny and brilliant. Even as he saw them, the other boats' lights switched on, and began to pierce the darkness section by section, their beams crossing then engaging, like the swords of duelists. At once Craig gave his boat more throttle, and she screamed her eagerness to go. The speedometer needle moved, faster, faster, from fifteen to twenty to twenty-two. Slowly then it dragged on to twenty-five, but still Craig could sense behind him the drum note of bigger engines, the thrust of wider propellers. It was ridiculous, of course: no other noise could survive when Allen's cruiser hit full power, and yet Craig knew the pursuing ships were there, so that when their lights snapped on again and stroked the blackness of the sea to a cold, pure, silvery blue, Craig almost sighed his relief—until one searchlight flicked him, and he began to fling the cruiser all over the water to lose those sure, serene lights that probed the blackness of the sea.

And then one brushed the side of the cruiser from the right, lighting up Craig at the wheel, and Allen crouched beside him. Craig swerved again, but the boat on his left found him, hesitated, and then held until the one from the right could bore through the dark once more, and Craig struggled to find a course in the blinding, silver light. A voice over the loud hailer boomed out in Spanish, and Craig tried the throttle again. There were no more revs in the engines. The boats behind nosed up closer— Jesus, they must be big —and again the loud hailer voice boomed out, and Allen was gibbering with fear, and Craig too busy to understand a word. He tried to swerve again, and there was a crackle of gunfire, a stream of tracers drifting across the black sky to disappear at last into the black sea, twenty yards from the boat. Craig threw the port engine into neutral, then into reverse, and the cruiser's weight lunged viciously as she swerved to the right across the bows of the pursuer, then Craig swerved again and tried in vain to coax out more revs. The cruiser's speedometer read twenty-seven knots, and there it stuck. There just wasn't any more.

Craig risked another look behind at the searchlights criss-crossing the sea. The false dawn had faded. Daylight was only minutes away, and those minutes were vital.

"Do you carry a gun aboard?" he yelled.

''You bloody fool," Allen screamed back, "that's Spanish navy stuff chasing us."

"Do you have a gun?"

"Just a rifle," Allen said. "A Lee-Enfield."

"Get it," said Craig. Allen made no move.

"Have you ever been in a Spanish prison?" asked Craig.

Allen sighed, and fetched the rifle, then Craig made him take the wheel. He lay down in the stern of the boat, checked the rifle, and waited. The Lee-Enfield was old—ten years at least—but it seemed in good nick, and Craig was used to it. The standard service weapon of the Second World War, it was the first of the long series of rifles, carbines, pistols, revolvers, and automatic weapons that had passed through his hands. He had learned its care and maintenance when he was seventeen years old, and he had not forgotten. Magazine, bolt, safety catch were all working well. The barrel, all the rifle parts were clean, bright, and slightly oiled, the way the manual said they should be. It seemed that Allen loved a weapon as much as he loved his cruiser.

Craig waited, knowing that this time it wouldn't be for long, while the Spanish navy flogged the sea with their searchlights, then came at them again. Craig snuggled down, the rifle steady against his shoulder. The leading pursuer came up from behind, and its searchlights pointed an accusing finger of light. He fired down its beam, and the light went out. Allen swung the cruiser as he had seen

Craig do, across the bows of the other boat. They made it with yards only to spare, but the other searchlight found them, two machine guns chattered, arid Allen watched in horror as lumps of varnished decking flew past his head. Craig fired again, but the cruiser veered too much and the light clung on to him, pitiless. He had to hit it with his next shot: his eyes would be blinded soon.

"Hold her steady," he yelled to Allen, and worked the bolt of the Lee-Enfield. The cruiser settled down on the easy sea, and Craig fired again. Again the light went out; again there were no screams—and, he hoped to God, no casualties. An act of war wouldn't exactly fill Loomis with joy: a wounded Spaniard would drive him demented. Craig looked at Allen by the wheel, then took off the Lee-Enfield magazine. The smell of cordite increased, whipped past him by the cruiser's slipstream, as his fingers fumbled the bullets free and dropped them into his pocket. He took the wheel from Allen again, and held course for Gibraltar.

Allen said, "They got bloody close."

"Good radar," said Craig.

"Think they'll find us again?"

Craig said nothing. There was no way of knowing. When he did know he would act. Until then, his whole being was concentrated on coaxing one extra knot—half a knot—out of the cruiser. As dawn came up they were doing twenty-eight and a half knots, and Allen was ashen. The sun grew brighter, kinder, and two miles away they could see their pursuers, hull down. Ahead of them lay Gibraltar. Craig reckoned that they could just about do it.

"Congratulations," he said to Allen. "We just defeated the armada again."

Allen was looking at what two Vickers machine guns had done to his deck.

"This'll cost a fortune," he said.

"Send us the bill," said Craig.

Allen prowled past him, examining the damage, working his way back to the bows. Craig sighed. He was pathetic. Allen picked up the Lee-Enfield.

"I think you should pay me now," he said. "You've got the money." Craig said nothing. "Or, better still, take me over to Tangier." Craig held his course, and above the engines' whine came the crisp smack of the bolt being worked. "I mean it," said Allen. The boat held course.

"Look," Allen said, "I'm desperate. Those Spanish bastards saw me. I can't go back to Marbella. I need money. You've got it. Damn it, man—all you really want is Calvet."

Craig held his course.

"I'll kill you," said Allen.

Craig said, "The gun isn't loaded." Allen laughed. "Try it." Allen squeezed the trigger.

"You see?" said Craig.

He risked a look at Allen then. He was sidling toward him, holding the Lee-Enfield by stock and barrel, a foolish, inefficient way to turn it into a club.

"You're stupid," said Craig, "but you're not that stupid. You start something now and I'll put you overboard." Allen halted. "That means you'll either drown or the Spanish navy will get you. Put that thing down."

Allen let it fall, and it banged on to the deck.

"Now take the wheel," said Craig, and again Allen obeyed.

Craig went down into the cabin. Calvet lay there, wriggling in a furious burst of energy to reach the ropes that tied his feet.

"It's too late," said Craig.

Calvet froze, and rolled over to look at him. His eyes were brown, melancholy, Slavic, and they were bright with hate.

"You lost," said Craig. "You were bound to lose eventually. Now lie still. I don't want to hurt you again." Calvet stayed rigid. "You want a cigarette?" Calvet gave no sign that he had heard. Craig left him and went back up top, then risked a look round. Once more Calvet was trying to bend his legs and arch his back, to reach the knots that tied his feet. The Russian, Craig thought, had qualities that made him infinitely preferable to Allen, but he didn't like his taste in girls.

Allen was very close to tears when Craig took the wheel from him again. He could see the great streak of concrete now that flowed out to sea, the runway that opened up Gibraltar to the Viscounts and Vikings and the tourists on their way to Tangier and the Costa del Sol. And behind was the boredom of Gibraltar, the correct little bars and gloomy hotels, which the magic words "duty-free" alone rendered habitable. And behind it all was the Rock, symbol of empire and insurance companies, and the wild yet formal gallantry of eighteenth-century sieges. Now all it held was the apes.

Craig eased back the throttle, and the revs diminished. A white naval patrol boat shot toward them, and a voice on the Tannoy yelled: "Mr. Jameson?" Craig nodded vigorously, and the patrol boat shot ahead of them, piloted them past the liner in the bay, the long line of tramp steamers, into the inner harbor of launches, tugs, and motor-boats, to a quay between two moles patrolled by marine sentries. The patrol boat swung in, and Craig responded to a leading seaman's signal, stopped the starboard engine, revved up the port, and eased broadside up to the quay, while the leading hand hooked on and another sailor flung ropes to Allen, and they were tied up at last. Craig stopped the engines, and waited. A commander, R.N., and a surgeon commander left the patrol boat and dropped into the cruiser. The commander's eyes flicked from the rifle to the bullet-torn deck.

"You're a bit conspicuous, Mr. Jameson," he said. "Your people promised the admiral that you wouldn't be."

"Sorry about the rifle," said Craig. "We thought we might have a pop at a dolphin. Unfortunately," his eyes flicked to the damage on deck, "it started to fire back." He kicked the Lee-Enfield down the companionway out of sight.

"Where's my patient?" said the doctor.

Craig jerked his thumb toward the cabin.

"He's violent," said Craig, and the commander, R.N., sighed and followed the doctor. Craig took out cigarettes and offered one to Allen. They smoked in silence, then Allen said: "I'm sorry."

Craig drew on his cigarette. If the doctor got a move on they could catch the morning plane, be in London by teatime. He might even have time for a bath, do something about his shoulder where Calvet had hit him. He knew how to hit. That was inevitable. The KGB Executive trained its members with absolute thoroughness.

Allen said: "I was told I'd be paid when we finished the job."

"Oh yeah," said Craig. "You want money."

He took a check out of his pocket. It was already signed. He dated it.

"Five hundred for the job, five hundred for the boat. All right?"

"That's fine," said Allen.

Craig wrote in words and figures. "One thousand pounds," and gave him the check.

Allen took it, folded it in three, and put it carefully in his wallet.

"I suppose I can cash it in Gib?" he said.

"Of course," said Craig.

"That's fine then," said Allen as he stood up and climbed onto the quay. "I think I'll trot along now. Have some breakfast."

"Do that," said Craig.

"Then I thought I'd pop into the bank."

"Good idea."

"You don't mind if I leave you for a bit?" "You're leaving us forever," said Craig. "We don't need you any more."

4

The navy ambulance nosed its way toward Gibraltar airport with the ponderous yet swift-moving dignity that only Daimler knows how to build. Inside it were Craig, the doctor, and the commander, who had changed into mufti, and Calvet. Calvet was on a stretcher, asleep, and comprehensively bandaged from thorax to head. Both his legs were in splints. The money Craig had taken was inside the bandages.

"I've given him a sedative," said the doctor. "He shouldn't give you any trouble."

"Thanks," said Craig.

"He's quite considerably bruised," said the doctor. "Particularly in the stomach and just below the nose. Forgive me, but what did you hit him with?"

"I just hit him," said Craig.

The commander stared gloomily at the notices scrawled on painted walls: "260 Afios de Liber-tad," and "Gibraltar es Espanol," one canceling out the other, over and over again. They stopped at a policeman's signal at the corner of Winston Churchill Avenue, and the commander looked at his watch.

"You mustn't miss your plane," he said.

"I won't," said Craig.

The policeman signaled them on.

"I suppose it has to wait for you?"

"No," Craig said. "But there's lots of time and lots of planes."

"The admiral wants you off the Rock," said the commander. "It's my business to see that you go."

"You mean he doesn't like me?"

"Of course he doesn't like you. I don't like you."

"I find that incredible," said Craig.

The doctor snorted.

"You're in a dirty business," said the commander. "I realize it has to be done, but you can't expect me to approve of it. Of course it's different for you—you seem to enjoy it."

Craig thought of the way he had terrorized, used, and finally abandoned Allen; the blow that had struck the girl; the impact of his shoe into Calvet's belly. He said nothing.

"But the navy shouldn't be asked to help you. The whole enterprise is sheer piracy."

"You talk a lot," said Craig. "The trouble is you never say anything much."

The ambulance arrived then, nosed in past a flurry of taxi drivers and porters, and Craig got out to collect tickets for himself and David Lloyd, the battered victim of a motor accident now being flown back to his parents in Merioneth. He bought cigarettes, Scotch, and perfume at the duty-free shop, and went back to the ambulance. The doctor had gotten out and was escorting a mobile stretcher with Calvet in it up to the ticket barrier.

The commander said: "You'd better leave now."

"Can't I say good-bye to the admiral?" asked Craig.

"He doesn't know you exist. None of us do," the commander said. "It makes me very happy."

Craig said: "I'm a bit sad myself. Four hours in Gibraltar—and I only saw one monkey."

"Go away," said the commander. "Just go away."

"Okay," said Craig, and dropped the perfume in the commander's lap. "Think of me when you wear it, won't you?"

The perfume was called "Our Secret."

Craig walked after the doctor, and showed his tickets at the barrier. Passports and Customs had waved him through. He and Calvet were the first to arrive at the turboprop Viking, and Craig waited while the stretcher was eased into the first-class compartment and the doctor went in, checked, and came down again.

"I've had a look at him," the doctor said. "He won't move till you get to London."

"Thanks," said Craig.

"No really, I've enjoyed it," said the doctor. "It makes a change from picking broken glass out of drunken sailors."

Craig gave him the bottle of Scotch and climbed aboard. A trickle of tourists followed, then the Viking revved up at last, taxied out, and roared over the airstrip and out to sea: Africa was on one side, Europe on the other. It was raining on two continents. The plane climbed, the warning lights went out, and Craig unfastened his seat belt. In three and a half hours he'd be in London, and Calvet would be someone else's problem. He smoked, yawned, drank Scotch and ginger ale, then fell asleep.

There was another Daimler waiting in London,

with another doctor, and a man whom Craig didn't

know. He handed Calvet and the evidence over,

and took a taxi to his flat in Regent's Park. He still

hadn't had time to have a bath, and his shoulder

hurt like hell. He went home to rest.

* * *

Four days later Loomis sent for him. Craig drove to see him in the latest one of the series of black Mark X Jaguars with the 4.2-liter engine he had used ever since he'd been established in Department K. It was a ridiculously large automobile for one man, expensive to drive and impossible to park, but it suited his cover—that of a retired manufacturer of machine tools—and it enabled him whenever necessary to convey four or five other large men to where they were needed, and to do it quickly—at a hundred and thirty miles an hour, if the need arose. He parked in a mews, and walked back to Queen Anne's Gate, the wary caretaker, and Loomis's vile-tempered coffee.

"You did all right," Loomis said grudgingly. "He's coming along nicely."

"You've got him up at the nursing home?"

Loomis nodded.

"It's lovely up there just now," he said. "The daffodils are at their best. He didn't take to it at first, but he's doing fine now."

"What did you use?"

"Oh, different things," said Loomis. "Bit of this, bit of that. There's nothing like variety, cock. Now he's mostly on pentathol. Seems to like it. His name's Oleg Dovzhenko. Born in the Ukraine, 1938—you were giving a few years away. The KGB spotted him at Moscow University—brilliant linguist, good gymnast—and they gave him the usual tests. All that Pavlovian stuff. He worked in France for a while, then he did a bit in South America, then he went to Marbella. We've got it all down."

"Did he find much stuff about Gibraltar?"

"There's not a hell of a lot to find," said Loomis. "But he did his best. He was busier paying people to do things about Franco."

"Any good?"

"Oh yes," said Loomis. "He'd found out quite a bit about how far they'll support America, and he'd done some research on the Fifth Fleet, too. He had a man on the spot when the Yanks lost their H-bomb, and he'd done quite a bit of work on airfields. He was looking to the future, as well. Very forward-looking feller. Spotting blokes he could work on when Franco goes."

"What about the girl?" asked Craig.

"The young person you tied to the bed? She's a designer of expressionist jewelry. That means sequins in your belly button, sort of thing. She's clean. From what I hear she didn't even see you. You did all right." Loomis looked surprised.

"And Allen?"

"Bloody fool," said Loomis. "He went back to Spain. Had some money hidden in Marbella, so he put on a false beard and pretended he was invisible. The Spanish police picked him up in an hour. I expect he told them all about you. Not that it matters. You don't exist. They'll do him for smuggling and shooting at their navy. Now then"—he dismissed Allen with a wave of a meaty paw, and glowered at Craig—"that stuff you brought us. The R/T's nice, but we got a better one already. The money's better. We're always short of money here. Twenty-five thousand quid in dollars. Pity!"

"What's wrong?" Craig asked.

"They're all forged." He reached into his inside pocket with a fat man's economy of movement, then threw four twenty-dollar bills on to the desk in front of Craig. "See for yourself."

Craig picked them up and looked at them. They were crisp and clean, with the hard feel of good paper, the portrait of President Jackson sharp and well defined. The color was good, the printing excellent.

"Pretty," said Craig.

"Would you take one if it was offered?" Craig nodded, and Loomis nodded back, a one-inch inclination of the head that was regal in its dignity.

"Me too. Trouble is, there's three thousand bills and only four serial numbers between them. I've had them looked at. Chap at Scotland Yard specializes in this sort of thing. He liked them. Got very excited. Nearly wet himself." Loomis paused, then added: "Thin feller," as if in explanation. "Seems they've had one of these passed in London. He's got some of his young men working on it now. I think you'd better go and help them. It'll be a bit of an education for you."

Craig's tutor was Detective Sergeant Millington, a young, eager copper with an unquenchable thirst for promotion. Craig met him in a pub in Chelsea, a dim, chilly little place where even the feeling of decay was, if not elegant, at least expensive. Mill-ington was drinking beer and eating a sausage. He looked weary yet brimming with excitement, the energy fighting the weariness: as it must do when you work a sixty-hour week every week, and the assistants and equipment you need are eternally promised but never arrive. He was hatless and his shoes were not unduly large for his big man's weight, and yet Craig had spotted him at once for a copper. He had the look of a born hunter. Craig went over to him; he sensed the quick appraisal of the other's eyes. It had been the same when he'd gone to see him at Scotland Yard. Millington was afraid of Craig and disliked him because of it.

"I don't like this idea," Millington said. "It's asking for trouble. Anybody can see you're not a copper." He looked at Craig's hand-stitched gray suit, the white Sea Island cotton shirt, and Dior tie. "You're too well dressed for one thing."

"I thought I might look more like a crook," said Craig.

Millington scowled.

"I can't take you with me to interview people when you look like that."

"I don't want to be with you," Craig said. "Just show me who they are and let me work it out for myself."

"I don't think I can do that," Millington said. "After all, I'm responsible for you."

"Oh no," said Craig. "I don't think so."

Millington looked at him again, not trying to hide his dislike.

"Okay," he said, "I'll show them to you. But what good'll that do? They'll see you with me."

"No," said Craig. "They won't. We've got just the thing for that."

What he had was a Bedford van, with one-way black glass panels in the sides and back. A chain of roses was painted round the van, and on each side was the name "BLOSSOMS UNLiMiTED "jMillington wasn't amused. The interior of the van was furnished like a caravan with a camp bed and chairs; there were three Leica Ikon cameras with telefoto lenses, a 16-millimeter Eclair movie camera, two Ferrograph tape recorders, and a radio as well. Millington lusted after that van. It would have saved him hours of questioning, miles of walking. The driver got in, and the van drove away. They were going to Soho.

The twenty-dollar bill had been passed in a strip club, a small place just off Greek Street with seats for fifty, a tiny stage, and an enormous bar. Currently its name was "Nuderama." The man who had passed the bill had looked and talked like an American. He had used it to buy champagne for the three stars of the show, and it had cost him five pounds for a magnum. He'd given the barman ten shillings, kept thirty shillings in change, and had never gone back, though the stars looked for him daily. So did the barman. Millington thought he might be a man called Tony Driver, an unusually versatile crook who had done time in Great Britain and Canada for such varied offenses as blackmail, larceny, and the con game. Driver dressed well, lived anywhere, and played poker at least four hours a day. Usually he won. On the day before the bill had been passed, Driver had played for six hours and had lost five hundred pounds, Millington had learned. Then, apart from his one visit to Nuderama, he had disappeared for two days, come back with stake money, played poker again, and won. He handed Craig his photograph.

"You haven't tried to have him identified yet?" Craig asked.

"We were going to—until you came along. Now we've been asked to hold back."

"It's good of you to wait."

"It's orders," said Millington.

The van turned off Shaftesbury Avenue, along Old Compton Street and into Greek Street, then parked at a meter. It was three o'clock and Nuderama was preparing to face a new day. Craig took a pair of Zeiss glasses from a rack, gave another pair to Millington, looked at a yellow door framed in electric light bulbs, and around the light bulbs a wooden frame. At the top of the frame was the name "NUDERAMA" in rainbow lettering; the two sides sported pictures of girls. Mostly they were simply naked, except for that look of outraged hauteur—like a duchess whose bottom's being pinched by a servant—that strippers always wear when they pose. One or two wore muffs, or a pair of doves, or what Craig took to be a piece of salmon net. The most enterprising appeared about to administer the Irish whip to a gorilla.

As Craig watched, a man with the very white skin of one who rarely sees daylight went up to the doorway, opened it and went in. Craig took his photograph.

"That's the barman," said Millington.

He was followed by a chunky, bad-tempered woman—the cashier—and another man.

"That's the barker," said Millington. "He stands outside and cons in the customers."

Craig continued to take photographs.

A Bentley Continental whispered up to the curb and a tall, thin man got out. He was gray-haired, elegant, a white carnation in the buttonhole of his dark-blue suit. He limped slightly as he walked up to the doorway, and there was a smeared scar on one side of his face that suggested unsuccessful plastic surgery.

"That's the owner," said Millington. "Julek Brodski. He's a naturalized Pole."

"Any form?" asked Craig.

"No. He was a squadron leader in the Polish air force during the war. Got a D.S.O. Matter of fact, he's supposed to be a count or something. No, Brodski's all right," Millington said. He looked at a photo of a girl whose inability to handle a sunshade was causing her some embarrassment. "As a matter of fact he runs a nice, clean place."

"That the lot?" Craig asked, and Millington nodded. "What time do the girls arrive?"

"Four thirty," said Millington.

"Let's go and look at the place where Driver plays cards," said Craig.

Driver played in the basement of Luigi's, a sad, ineffective little cafe three blocks from the strip club. On the ground floor there was a soda fountain and seats that looked like the pews of the Methodist chapels Craig remembered from his boyhood. Three tired waitresses, who looked as if they hadn't left the building for weeks, shambled back and forth serving meals whose cheapness did nothing to compensate for their nastiness. Craig sat in the van and took more pictures—of the waitresses, of everybody who seemed at ease in the place, of a fat man who visited the cash register every half hour and rang up "NO CHANGE," then counted the take. The fat man was the proprietor. His name wasn't Luigi; it was Arthur. Fat Arthur. He was very fat indeed, but he didn't look soft. Downstairs was exactly the same, Craig learned, except that there was a little room behind the dining area, and in that room a poker game went on, sometimes for days. It was a quiet game, restricted to friends of Arthur's, dishonest men who kept their dishonesty to themselves. The police weren't interested. Millington suddenly looked restless.

"What's wrong?" Craig asked.

Millington flushed. "I drank too much beer," he said.

"The loo's in that cupboard," said Craig, and pointed.

Millington, half-believing, opened the cupboard door. It was true.

"You think of everything," he said.

"We try," said Craig. "We have to, in our business."

He looked again into the street as Millington voided his bladder.

"Come here," he said, and began taking pictures.

"I can't," said Millington.

Craig took more pictures, and at last Millington came over to him and looked out of the window at a tall young man in a Brooks Brothers gray-flannel suit, knitted silk tie, and button-down collar.

"That's Driver," said Millington.

Craig looked down at Millington's unzipped fly.

"You do pick your times, don't you?" he said.

The van drove off at last, and Craig set up the developing tank inside it, curtained it off, and switched on the infrared lights. The photographs came out well enough, even the photographs of photographs of the stars of Nuderama, Karen and Tempest and Maxine. Craig numbered each picture and took notes on the names as Millington talked. For the first time Millington became aware of Craig's fury of concentration, his utter disregard of everything but the job on hand. Millington began to wonder what a man had to do to afford a fifty-guinea suit, a Longines-Wittnauer watch, Guerlain cologne. He looked for the hundredth time at Craig's hands. They were big hands, for Craig himself was big—six feet two and thirteen stones at least, with a heaviness of shoulder that stretched his suit glove-tight across the back—but they were neat hands too, long-fingered, deft in their movements. The knuckles were strange: each was flattened, so that across the back of each hand there was a continuous ridge of bone, and the skin that covered it looked like leather. The edge of each hand was odd too, because it was not rounded but straight and flat, and covered from wrist to fingertip in the same leathery skin. It reminded Millington of the blade of an ax.

The van pulled over to the curb by a tube station, and Craig finished his notes.

"All right," he said. "This is where you leave us."

"What are you going to do now?" Millington asked. "Can you tell me?"

"I'm going back there," said Craig. "Our people see this as a rush job. So I'll rush it." He grinned. "That's where I've got the edge on you. I can go in there and make things happen. You have to wait and pick up the pieces."

"I have to go back there myself," said Mill-ington. "Not after Driver," he added hastily. "We're laying off him till we get clearance from you. But I may see you."

"You won't know me," said Craig.

"Naturally not," Millington stood up, and surprised himself by holding out his hand.

"Good luck," he said.

"You too," said Craig^ and shook his hand.

Millington said: "Yes, well—" and scrambled out of the van. A moment later his head reappeared in the doorway.

"You're parked on a yellow line," he said.

5

The room was bare, efficient, and utterly devoid of decoration. On one cream-washed wall a darker patch showed where a picture had once hung. It had been a portrait of Stalin. Chelichev was glad that such extravagant idolatry was no longer necessary. It was idiotic, and it interfered with the clean lines of his room. So did the dark patch, but he refused to have it painted out. It reminded him of days that had not been gone for very long, days that might, if one was not careful, come back. He settled back in his chair; he looked like an ad for superior whisky, a lean, leathery, handsome horseman; a tough and well-preserved Fifty who could still play hell with the ladies. His Soviet army general's uniform had been cut and tailored by an expert. It, like everything else in the room, was fanatically clean, as if room and owner had been purged by fire. He looked at the one note on his desk, tore it into four neat squares, murmured into a desk phone, then sat back, at once at ease and watchful, as a cat sits.

The woman who came in was beautiful. Tall and deep-bosomed, green-eyed, with thick, heavy hair

so blond as to be almost white. A former prima ballerina assoluta of the Bolshoi had taught her to move, a film makeup man had taught her how to make up, a Hungarian couturier had spent weeks showing her how to choose and match clothes, gloves, handbags, shoes. The result was at once beautiful and splendid: a woman of superb proportions and exquisite taste. Chelichev looked pleased.

The woman said: "This is an honor, comrade-general."

The voice was deep, melancholy, beautiful. An actor of the Stanislavsky method had made it so.

Chelichev said: "For me it is a pleasure. A very great pleasure." The woman lowered her head, acknowledging a tribute that could never be commonplace.

"Soong is dead," he continued. "You did remarkably well in Morocco."

"Thank you, comrade-general."

"The information you passed on to Dovzhenko was relayed here. We knew he had gone to Britain of course—it was just good luck that we found him —but the execution, that was remarkably efficient. Except"—he scowled—"that somebody thought it would be amusing to have one of the executives speak to him in Cantonese. We are not here to be amusing. To be amusing is to betray a secret. In this case I think it betrayed who killed Soong to Department K."

"The British intelligence organization?"

"Exactly. Department K is very good. Very original. They never make jokes." He paused. "No. That is not true. The British always make jokes, but it is part of their technique. Their minds work that way. Soong is a good lead for them." He paused again, and the woman knew she was on trial. It was her turn to speak.

"You mean it might lead them to BC?"

"It might. Yes. Their leader, Loomis, is a terrible man. He is also very clever. Everything that happens he turns to his advantage. How would such a man react if he knew that a foreign group was doing all it could to attack the USSR?"

"There have been more incidents?"

"Two cases of sabotage," he said. "One very spectacular. The theft of a certain archives—they were recovered, and the man who stole them killed himself. That was a pity—but to retain the archives was essential. They were about Beria, and very revealing. BC exists all right."

"Of course," the woman said.

"Of course." Chelichev's voice was ironic. "But there are certain people, even in the Presidium, who do not think so. They blame it all on the Americans and the British. If it were true, it would be an act of war. We must stop BC before our masters start demanding reprisals."

He looked at the woman again, noting the fact of her youth and beauty. His look was not one of desire but of pity.

"Another war could destroy us all," he said, "including those of our masters who say it couldn't happen. Just because we take reprisals against those who have done nothing to us. We must find BC and destroy it. Soon."

The woman said: "Dovzhenko had a lead. BC has a bank account in Tangier. I heard about it and brought in Dovzhenko to find out."

"In a bank called Credit Labonne," said Chelichev. "They have a million pounds in Deutschmarks."

"A million pounds sterling?" He nodded. "What a strange way to put it. Why not just say however many million Deutschmarks it is? Unless—"

"It's about eleven million," said Chelichev. "Unless what?"

"Unless Dovzhenko found out from an Englishman—or an Englishman put the money in the bank," answered the woman.

"I want you to go to Tangier again and find out," said Chelichev.

"Why not send Dovzhenko too? He's good," the woman said.

"Very good. Unfortunately Department K took him from us two days ago. That is why I feel so sure they'll know about BC by now."

"They kidnapped Dovzhenko?" Somehow she stopped herself from adding the stupid "But that's impossible."

"He did, not they. A man called Craig, from Department K."

"He must be a remarkable man."

"Very. He could—quite literally—kill you with one finger. We have a file on him. Read it."

"Do you think Loomis will use the BC information to hurt us?"

"No," said Chelichev. "He doesn't want a war any more than I do. I might even get him to help us find out who the BC members are. At a price."

"You think they're based in England?"

"Soong went to England, and we know he was trying to contact the BC."

He looked at his watch and said: "That is all, I think. You will study the situation here for a few more days, then go back to Tangier."

"Yes, comrade-general," she said, and added, because the thought of Dovzhenko being overcome by one man was too incredible, "but may I ask—"

"Quickly," said Chelichev.

"Are you quite sure this man Craig kidnapped Dovzhenko? He didn't defect?"

"Craig took him," said Chelichev. "There can be no doubt. Loomis sent word to me himself."

Craig took a taxi to Soho. He wore the same gray suit, and over it a vicuna coat he had bought in Rome. He wished he had Grierson's elegance. Grierson wore clothes with a casual distinction that took two hundred years of selective inbreeding to achieve. Beside him, Craig knew he looked a peasant. Grierson looked asleep all the time, yet was as fast as a cat. He had a way of smiling that was lazy too, as if the world was a hell of a good place to be in, if only he could wake up. Grierson was in a psychiatric home now, lying in bed, tying knots in a piece of string, untying them, retying them. All day, every day. If anybody asked Grierson to do anything else, he began to cry. Deliberately Craig blotted Grierson from his mind. He walked past the club, and the cooing enticements of the barker. "Show starting any minute, sir. Eleven lovely ladies inside. Nonstop strip, sir. Show you all they've got—and they've got everything, sir, believe me."

Craig hesitated. "How much is it?" he asked.

"Twenty-five bob, sir. Includes entrance to the bar. You can watch the show from there, sir. All mod cons at the Nuderama."

Craig gave the half-embarrassed shrug every man gives when he decides to enter a strip show. The movement was perfectly natural. He was half embarrassed. He paid twenty-five shillings to the woman behind the cash desk. The woman had had a henna rinse and wore a black silk dress and pearls. She also had the figure and muscles of a sumo wrestler. Craig decided not to pick a fight with her, and walked down a corridor with wall-to-wall carpeting. The corridor was two feet wide. From time to time, it seemed, the sumo wrestler sprayed it with My Sin. At least there was an atomizer of it beside her, and the place reeked of the stuff. He felt for the handle of the door leading to the theater—the lighting was what the management called discreet—and fumbled his way into what the eighteenth century would have considered an adequate drawing room. Now it contained a stage, a raked auditorium for fifty people who didn't mind each other's company, and a runway down the middle of the auditorium. Behind the auditorium was a raised bar that looked straight into the theater. Stage, auditorium, and bar alike were cheap and nasty. The walls were distempered a vile yellow; the stage curtains, bought as a job lot before Garrick retired, had once been of red velvet but were now the kind of pink that clashed viciously with the yellow walls; the seats had long since lost their springs, and the bar seemed mostly matchwood. The only thing that surprised Craig was how clean it all was.

There were perhaps twenty men sitting in the auditorium. Piped music whispered love to them, but they were all on their own, and all sat either staring straight ahead or looking at their programs, which cost five shillings to buy, six-pence to print, and contained photographs of Karen, Tempest, and Maxine on every page. Their sense of embarrassment was overwhelming: Craig took shelter in the bar. The customers at the bar were in groups. They drank light ale and rubbed their hands and behaved like men who were in for a treat. Each of them seemed to be selling something to the others in his group. Craig eased through them, and went up to the barman, who had "HARRY" embroidered on the left breast of his dinner jacket and a gold loop earring in his right ear.

"Scotch and dry ginger," said Craig.

"Yes, sir," said the barman, and reached for an anonymous bottle of Scotch and a large Schweppes Dry Ginger. He took six shillings from Craig, and went back to opening light ales. Craig sipped the Scotch. It was watered. He drank it and ordered another, straight. The barman reached for the anonymous bottle again, and set a glass in front of Craig. When the measure on the bottle had dropped into the glass, Craig grabbed his wrist. The barman tried to pull away, and found he couldn't.

"I like you," said Craig softly. "You're cute." He sipped his whisky and pushed it back to the barman. "Change this for me, Harry," he said. "I only drink water when I'm thirsty."

The barman said: "I don't understand, sir." The hand on his wrist tightened and he almost yelled out. But he couldn't yell out, not with all the customers watching. They thought the man who held his wrist was teasing him—everybody knew he was gay: it was worth a lot of tips in a strip club—and if he started screaming Mr. Brodski would go berserk. Harry whimpered, and Craig leaned across to him.

"You're too pretty to be dishonest," Craig whispered. "Pour me a proper drink."

"Yes, sir," said Harry, "I'm very sorry, sir."

"You should be," said Craig. "I might have hurt you, Harry."

The barman poured him a Teacher's. Again Craig sipped, but this time he smiled. Harry shuddered and looked down at his wrist. The marks of Craig's fingers lay across it like red bars. Harry took the other glass away, and sold it three minutes later to a man in the costume-jewelry game from Edgebaston. He didn't notice a thing. Craig waited till the barman came past him, then said: "Why don't you buy me a drink, Harry? You can afford it." This time he hadn't lowered his voice, and the group on either side of him watched in awe as Harry poured a double for Craig, dug into his pocket, and put twelve shillings into the till. Every habitue of Nuderama knew that Harry never, never bought anybody a drink.

Then the bar lights dimmed, the lights in the auditorium went out, and a drummer, a pianist, and a guitar player scrambled into a space the size of a coffin for the lady sumo wrestler. The piped music faded and died, the pianist struck an E, and the guitar player tightened his strings with the air of a man who has worked in strip clubs long enough to know that the audience seldom listens to the music. Some of the men at the bar left then, to try for seats near the runway. The rest took their drinks to the edge of the auditorium, and watched in silence, and with care. After all, twenty-five shillings is a lot of money. The drummer struck a roll, the curtains jerkily parted, and the show was on.

It was memorable solely in that it was utterly devoid of talent. None of the girls involved, not even Karen, Tempest, or Maxine, made the slightest effort to sing, mime, or dance. Their movements were the movements of women, not of dancers. They were tired, bored, and utterly without grace. As entertainment the show failed to achieve the standard of a Girl Guide Gang Show on the first day of rehearsal. But what Girl Guide ever finishes a number naked on a runway, with the nearest cash customer a foot away? And that was the way Karen, Tempest, and Maxine finished every number, while often as not the eight supporting lovelies did the same behind them. Karen was brunette, Tempest was a blonde, and Maxine was a redhead, so there was something for everybody. They were young enough, and prettily fleshed, and the clothes they removed were pretty too. Long gloves, fur stoles, bras and panties of lace and nylon: they were all designed to excite. Their postures too, should have been exciting: the crook of a leg to emphasize the curve of calf and thigh and buttock, the shoulders thrown back to emphasize the sheer fall of a breast, the tightness of the under-curve, the slow recline on a pink divan. // only, Craig thought, they weren't so bored. But they were bored, and made no move to hide it as they stood under the spotlights and filled the world with nippies and navels, bellies and buttocks and breasts, and thought of nothing but how cold it was if you copped the draught from stage right.

The show finished in an hour and a quarter exactly, and the piped music crashed into the dream world of "Harem Nights" and "The Lady Takes a Bath" with a brass band Sousa medley that scattered the customers faster than a burst from a machine gun. Craig sat on alone, and drank Scotch.

"The show's over," said Harry. "If you want to stay on it'll cost you another twenty-five bob."

"When's the next show?" Craig asked.

"Half an hour," said Harry, and added, "sir."

"I was wondering if those three young ladies would take a drink with me," Craig said.

"They'd take a barrel with you," said Harry, "so long as you're paying."

"Go and ask them," said Craig. Harry went to the bar, and walked toward the stage. "And Harry—" the barman turned around. "Do it nicely," said Craig.

Harry must have done it nicely, because the three girls came back in no time at all. All three had changed into loose-fitting dressing gownsthat from time to time slid disconcertingly over the nude flesh beneath, and all three had mink coats slung over their shoulders as casually as fighting troops wearing field equipment. They came up, smiled at Craig, and sat beside him, white legs flashing as they moved. Tempest had belted her gown tightly beneath her bosom: the twin points of her breasts pointed at him like guns. Craig ordered champagne.

"A bottle?" asked Harry.

"For four? Make it a magnum," said Craig.

Maxine said: "I think he's sweet. Don't you?"

"He's lovely," said Karen, and wriggled into her chair. The movement was a comprehensive one that kept her in motion from shoulders to rump. Craig began to sweat.

Tempest said: "I bet he's ever so strong." Her hand ran up his arm to his biceps, squeezed the hard muscle. "O-o-o he is," she said.

"What's your name, honey?" asked Maxine.

"John Reynolds," said Craig.

"And what do you do?" asked Tempest.

"Oh—business," said Craig, and the girls left it at that. And anyway the champagne came, and there wasn't much time, so they drank it in half-pint mugs. Craig stuck to Scotch, and then they had to go.

"Last show's at twelve," said Tempest. "I'm free after that." "Me, too," said Maxine. "And me," said Karen.

They stood up then, and rearranged their minks. It was a better show than the one Craig had paid for. He sat back and enjoyed their exit, the slow tick-tock of their buttocks as their long legs moved, then called for his bill as new customers drifted in. Harry brought it at once, and Craig added it carefully. Harry had got it right.

Craig reached for his wallet, pulled out a five-pound note and put it back again, then took out a twenty-dollar bill.

"Change that for me," he said.

Harry looked at it with the horror he normally reserved for spiders, draught beer, and the amorous advances of women.

"It's a twenty-dollar bill," said Craig. "Don't tell me you don't take American money. That's not what I heard."

"What did you hear, sir?" asked Harry.

"You'll take anything," said Craig. "Including rubles."

"Just a moment, sir," said Harry.

He left the bar, taking the note with him, and was back almost at once.

"Mr. Brodski would like a word with you," he said. "His office is just next to the auditorium."

"Who's Brodski?" asked Craig. "The feller who makes your whisky?"

Harry looked shocked.

"He's the proprietor, sir," he said.

"I don't want to see him," said Craig. "Give me my bill back. I'll pay in pounds."

"Mr. Brodski's got it," said Harry.

Craig leaned over the bar, and the new customers listened avidly. Craig looked a little drunk, but he also looked very dangerous.

"I'm going off you, Harry," he said. "You shouldn't give my money away. Now I'm going to see Brodski—and if he isn't nice to me I'm going to come back here and thread you through your earring."

He walked out of the bar and into the auditorium. He knew that every man in the place was watching him, and that was what he wanted: the threat of a scene, a violent scene, in a place where even the tiniest tantrum was bad for business. He reached the door, and hesitated for a moment. Something was wrong. There was somebody in the audience he had seen before. But there was no time to look back now. He walked on into the corridor. Mr. Brodski was waiting for him, his office door open. And Mr. Brodski also looked as if the last thing he wanted was a scene.

"Please come in, Mr.—"

"Reynolds," said Craig. "John Reynolds."

"How do you do? It's nice of you to spare me some of your time."

Brodski's voice was soft, low-pitched, with very little accent. He held the door open invitingly, and stood to one side. Craig went up to him, and his arm came round the Pole's shoulders.

"That's all right, old friend," he said. "I feel like a chat anyway."

His arm pushed suddenly, and Brodski lurched forward. They went into the room together.

Inside the room the fat woman stood. What Craig had thought to be a black dress turned out to be a smock. Beneath it she wore the most enormous pair of trousers Craig had ever seen. She was standing feet apart, her hands by her sides.

"I see you've called in your financial adviser," said Craig. It was quite incredible and all that, but the woman was standing like a fighter. He released Brodski, and stood just out of range of her short, thick arms. At once Brodski walked over behind his desk and picked up the twenty-dollar bill.

"I can't accept this," he said.

"Why not? It's a good one," said Craig.

"Is it?" Brodski asked. "I am not a naive person, Mr. Reynolds. Look here, for instance, and here."

It was very nicely done. Brodski held up the bill, and pointed to it, then held it out to Craig. If he had reached for it, the woman would have got him. Instead, he merely looked, and for a split second only. In that split second she aimed a blow at his face, an old-fashioned roundhouse swing that was meant for his chin. He ducked, and a fist like a ball of rock cracked into his shoulder where Calvet had hit him. Craig gasped, then flung himself sideways to avoid a kick from a steel-tipped shoe. She moved into him then, and he backed off. He was giving away weight and she had bigger shoulders, but she was a woman.

"Now look, lady," he began. He had never felt more foolish.

She aimed another blow, and he warded it off with the edge of his hand on her forearm. At once she grabbed his wrist and threw him—a perfect hip throw that was supposed to send him crashing into the wall. But Craig had learned how to fall from Hakagawa, a black-belt seventh dan. He floated to the ground like a leaf, and waited for the kick to the groin that was bound to follow. When it came, he pushed up on his forearms, hooked her foot between his and threw his weight to one side. She went down like the Titanic. Craig got up, brushed dust from his coat, and waited. The woman came up slowly, gasping, then shuffled forward once more.

"Please, love," said Craig, trying to keep the hysteria out of his voice. "Please, love, don't make me do it."

She feinted with a left, then her right moved across his ribs in a blur of pain. Craig gasped, and ·;ae drew back her left again. As she did so, he aimed for her solar plexus in a three-finger strike.

The blow sank into her vast stomach, and her eyes went glassy. Her squat, massive weight was still evenly planted on her steel-shod feet, but there wasn't any more fight in her. Craig pushed her into a chair and she sat there unblinking. When he turned around, Brodski had produced a revolver from the drawer in his desk. It was a Webley 455, the type used by army officers in World War II. It was wildly inaccurate but it could blow holes in brick walls. Brodski handled it with a confidence that made Craig more wary than ever. He straightened up behind the chair.

"Oh no," he said. "Not the gun bit."

"I know how to use it," said Brodski.

"I can see that," said Craig. "On the other hand, are you prepared to?"

"Yes," said Brodski.

"For a twenty-dollar bill?"

The woman in the chair moaned.

"You hurt her," Brodski said.

"She didn't leave me much choice," said Craig. "And you shouldn't employ a lady bouncer."

"Jennifer's very good," said Brodski.

"Who?"

"You find the name incongruous? I did also, at one time. I thought Butch perhaps, or Spike, or even Rocky. But she insists on Jennifer. Men go out more easily when it is a woman who throws them. Particularly this woman." He nodded at Jennifer, now blowing like a beached porpoise.

"Put the gun down. We can talk," said Craig.

"Can we? I'm not nearly as strong as Jennifer. And look what you did to her—with three fingers."

"She shouldn't eat so much starch," said Craig.

"Give me my money back."

"No," said Brodski. "When Jennifer has recovered you must learn a lesson, Reynolds. People don't come into my place and pass forged money."

Jennifer groaned again, and began to rub her stomach; her hard, stubby fingers for once solicitous and tender.

"She will hold you," said Brodski, "and I will beat you. With this." He waved the Webley, very slightly.

"That bill isn't snide," said Craig.

"You are the second one. Did Driver send you?" Brodski asked.

"I don't know any Driver. That's good money," said Craig.

Brodski stood up.

"Ready, Jennifer?" he asked.

Craig said quickly: "You better be, love. Because I'm not taking a gun-whipping. Not even to oblige a lady." Jennifer groaned for the third time and sat where she was. "Maybe you'd better shoot me," said Craig.

Brodski said something emphatic in what Craig took to be Polish, and sat looking puzzled. He didn't seem the sort of man who looked puzzled often. He resented it. At last he put the revolver back into the drawer.

"I run a quiet place," he said. "None of the girls on the batter, no hustling drinks, no reefers, no brasses, nothing." In his soft, slightly accented voice the vocabulary of Soho was as strange as Jennifer. "Just women with no clothes on."

"The show's lousy," said Craig.

"Oh, I agree," said Brodski. "But you are the one customer in ten thousand who notices this. And I take 62 £ lOs.od. five times a day, six days a week. The amount of profit I show is almost embarrassing. What do I need with crime? The keynote of my place is discretion, Mr. Reynolds. A discreet promise of bliss, without the tiresome athletics of fulfillment. And then Driver came in. He ordered champagne for Karen, Tempest, and Max-ine. He himself drank whisky. He paid his bill with a forged American note. A week later you come in. You order champagne for Karen, Tempest, and Maxine. You drink whisky. You pay with a forged American note."

"Have it tested," said Craig, "or give it back."

Brodski ignored him.

"I would have taken the loss," he said. "But a policeman was here when it happened. You would be surprised, Mr. Reynolds, how often policemen find it necessary to check up on the morality of my little entertainments."

"What you want to avoid is theater critics," said Craig.

"I had to go to New Scotland Yard," said Brodski. "I had to fail to identify Driver. And now you come along and start it all again."

"Who is this Driver?" Craig asked.

Brodski sighed. "A man not unlike yourself who plays cards at Luigi's."

"You mean he can lick Jennifer?"

"I mean he dresses well, as you do, but without the distinction you do. And I suspect his honesty, as I do yours."

"Will he be at Luigi's now?"

"Why?" Brodski asked.

"I'd like to meet him," said Craig. "I mean it's an enormous coincidence—"

"He will be at Luigi's," Brodski said. "Please go away now, Mr. Reynolds."

"All right," said Craig. "I enjoyed the chat. Mind if I give you some advice?"

"Even with a Webley in my hand, I doubt, if I could stop you," said Brodski.

"You ought to put your heavy on a diet."

Jennifer burst into tears.

Craig left then, and walked down the corridor and past the barker.

"Enjoy the show, sir?" he asked.

"I've never seen anything like it in my life," said Craig, and meant every word.

He walked down toward Greek Street and a burly young man who was waiting at the corner.

"Hallo, Mr. Craig," said Arthur Hornsey. "I was hoping I'd run into you again. Lucky I spotted you at the show."

Craig said: "Nein, danke," and kept on walking. He had no time to waste on enthusiastic young men who enjoyed walking trips. It was time to call on another Arthur: Fat Arthur.

6

He went into the cafe and down the stairs. The downstairs tables were all unoccupied, the one aged waitress behind the counter knitted a sock with concentrated venom, as if it were a victim. Craig thought of Madame Defarge and opened the door to the private room. The old crone made no attempt to stop him. The room was empty. In the middle of it was a table, scarred with cigarette burns, stained with a chain mail of overfilled glasses; above it a trio of 150-watt lamps threw light on to it. It was hot in the room, and it smelled of whisky and cigarettes and excited men. But now it was empty. There were cards on the table; two poker hands—a royal flush and a full house, aces and eights. Beside them were fifty pounds in notes and silver.

The room was windowless, and very still. The blaring Soho noise—wide boys in search of money, mugs too late aware of its loss—had faded to a hungry whimper. Craig moved to a cupboard in front of him. It was shut with a swivel bolt from outside, but he moved warily, his fingers feather-soft as he turned the swivel, then dived to one side

as the door swung open. Inside the cupboard, hanging neatly by his collar from a coat hook, was Driver. He had the dazed, innocent look of an insurance clerk playing Find the Lady. Even without the switchblade protruding from his heart it was apparent that he was dead. Craig reached inside his pocket, and Driver swung dully from the coat hook, his heels rapped softly on the back of the cupboard as Craig removed his wallet. There were ten ten-pound notes in it, but no twenty-dollar bills. Craig reached forward to return the wallet, and the heels drummed again as a voice behind him spoke.

"That Driver," said the voice. "He never could stand losing money. I suppose that's why you killed him. Or did he find out you were cheating?"

Craig turned, very slowly, his hands by his sides. In the doorway were Fat Arthur and, behind him, for the doorway was narrow, two other poker players. In his right hand Arthur carried a piece of lead pipe bound with insulating tape. Craig couldn't see the hands of the others.

"It's up to us to make a citizens' arrest," Arthur said. "What you've done is a felony. We're bound by law to take you in." He smiled, and the smile was a blend of joy and wonder, as if he'd backed three long-shot winners, then found a gold watch. "You only get one chance like that," said Fat Arthur, and slapped his palm with the lead pipe.

"I didn't kill him," said Craig.

"After we get through with you you won't care what you did," Fat Arthur said. "We ain't women and there's three of us—and we're going to hurt you, boy. Hurt you bad."

As he spoke, he sidled into the room. All his experience told him that Craig should cower now, but Craig stood his ground. Fat Arthur tapped his palm again with the pipe, and it made a noise like bone breaking, then he stepped forward again as his two followers filled the doorway. And it was at that moment that Craig jumped him, erupting into him with a kick that swung all the way from his thigh so that the edge of his shoe sank into the fat man's belly, slamming him back into the two men in the doorway, and still Craig came in at him, to grab one meaty forearm and swing him round. The whole weight of Craig's body went into it, but even so it was like throwing a horse as Arthur spun round the pivot of Craig's body, then screamed as Craig threw his weight the other way, and the fat man's arm broke, the lead pipe fell, and Craig let him drop. He moved toward the other two, and one lashed at Craig with a razor that split his vicuna coat from shoulder to forearm, then spun into the other man as Craig's elbow smashed into his throat. And the other man, off-balance, looked at the murder in Craig's eyes, and dropped the cosh he was carrying. There was a sound from the stairs, and Craig spun the cosh man round, holding him before him as a shield as Hornsey stepped carefully down the stairs. He looked at the razor man writhing on the floor, both hands clasped to his throat, and at Fat Arthur flat on his back in the doorway, looking like a mountain range.

"Is everything all right?" asked Hornsey, and behind him appeared the official feet and the elderly raincoat of Detective Sergeant Millington.