By Stealth

23

Marler had decided to take a risk. It was very late, and sitting in his parked car, he'd seen no sign of life from the Bellevue Palace. He needed to clean up ready for the morning.

He took off his shabby windcheater, his beret, revealing his smart sports outfit underneath. Getting out of the car he opened the boot, shoved beret and windcheater inside, collected what he needed from his case, locked up the car.

He left two windows an inch or so down. The atmosphere inside was pretty fetid with the smoke from his king-sized cigarettes. An icy breeze was blowing in the right direction. Clad in his Aquascutum trench coat and clutching his shaving-kit case, he walked down the Avenue Louise, crossed to the Boulevard de Waterloo, entered the Hilton.

He mingled with a party of late-nighters just returning, smelt whiffs of alcohol, heard their none too sober conversation. He walked straight up to the reception and spoke to the man behind the counter.

`I've been driving non-stop for hours. I want to get a shower and clean up before I drive on to Ostend. I need a single room -which I'll pay for-for the night. Even though I'll only be there an hour…'

Paying in cash, he went to the elevator, stepped out at the right floor, used the blasted computer card – which he loathed – to open the door. Then he moved swiftly, stripping down, stepping into the shower, and towelling himself five minutes later.

He used his electric razor to remove the stubble from his face, put on the rest of his clothes. He checked his appearance in a long mirror. Now he looked quite different – even respectable.

Returning to the lobby, he ordered sandwiches and coffee. Eating everything, he drank the last drop of coffee, paying for the meal before he walked out again and returned to his parked car.

When he got behind the wheel the first thing he did was to feel under his seat. The Armalite rifle was still there. Using a copy of the Herald Tribune he had picked up in the Hilton, he spread sheets out over the weapon, further concealing it.

He then settled down to rest, but not to fall asleep: Marler could survive for forty-eight hours without one wink of real sleep. When morning came he was glad he'd taken the precautions of making himself look like a respectable tourist. Very glad indeed.

It was the middle of the night and Dr Wand was fast asleep when the phone rang. He woke instantly, switched on the bedside lamp, put on his pince-nez, glanced at his clock, and guessed who was calling. He picked up the receiver.

As he had expected it was long distance – from Hong Kong. The operator informed him Moonglow Trading amp; Mercantile were on the line. So it would be in the morning in Hong Kong, and urgent for them to call him at this hour. He identified himself and listened to the caller who spoke in English.

`Philip Cardon, did you say? Could you please repeat?' he asked after a short conversation which appeared to concern a business transaction.

`I see,' he continued after listening to a few more words. 'Here are my instructions. Kindly terminate Mr Cardon's contract. Yes, terminate. He is totally redundant…'

Having ordered the murder of another human being, Wand took off his pince-nez, placed them carefully on the table, switched off the light, and fell fast asleep.

Tweed paced slowly round his room as he spoke. Newman and Paula had both come to see him early in the morning after Helen Claybourne had disappeared inside an elevator. They had given Tweed a resume of their conversations with Helen and Willie. In return, Tweed had tersely reported his experience with Lee Holmes.

`It appears we still don't know the truth,' Tweed began, `but we do know one of those women is a liar.'

`You mean about the Guerlain Samsara,' Newman suggested.

`Exactly. Lee told me Helen had a bottle and had let Lee try some of the perfume. Helen said the exact opposite. That is sinister.'

`It means then,' Paula said grimly, 'that one of the two of them could be a murderess twice in one evening?'

`Exactly,' Tweed repeated. The victims being Andover and the cab driver found in Marolles. Presumably – if it was one of them – she injected the cabbie with cyanide to use his cab to drive to Liege, then brought it back here. It could be significant that it was abandoned a few minutes' walk from this hotel. Not conclusive – but why should one of them lie about the perfume?'

`And Willie and Burgoyne?' Newman asked.

`They could be liars too. Willie tells Paula it was his idea that the four of them came together to Brussels. Helen confirms this arrangement with Bob while talking in the bar. On the other hand Lee told me quite clearly it was Burgoyne's idea. So we don't know about that either.'

`Helen hinted to me,' Newman recalled, 'that Burgoyne is mixed up in arms deals. Sounds plausible – with his military background. And he seems to be loaded with money. It must come from somewhere.'

`I think the important thing is to concentrate on the two women,' Paula emphasized. 'You two had them on your own, so what impression did they make?' She looked at Tweed. 'I suppose Lee played the coquette with you madly?'

`As a matter of fact, she didn't. I was surprised – she isn't the dizzy blonde I'd imagined. She talked a lot of horse sense and has a native shrewdness. Lee can look after herself.'

`And Helen?' Paula asked Newman.

`She was like I expected her to be. A mature woman with her feet planted firmly on the ground.'

`You know,' Paula said, 'when we were all gathered round the poker game in the lounge I had the same impression I had when we visited them in the New Forest. That we were witnessing an elaborate charade put on for our benefit.'

`You mean that the four of them are in it together?' Tweed queried.

`Maybe. I'm not sure yet,' she said, frowning with concentration. 'But at least one of them isn't what he or she seems. I'm damned sure of that. And it's creepy – this idea that either Helen or Lee could be a three-time murderess. Hilary Vane, the cab driver in Marolles, and Andover.'

`You caught a glimpse of the driver who mowed down poor Andover,' Tweed reminded her. 'You seemed sure it was a woman wearing a crash helmet and goggles. Surely that cancels out Lee – with her long mane of blonde hair.'

`Which just shows how little men know about women. She could have worn her hair piled up on top of her head under the helmet. That doesn't cancel out Lee.'

`We've talked enough for one night,' Tweed decided. 'I suggest you all get off to bed now…'

It was the middle of the night when the phone woke Tweed. Earlier, on arrival in his room at the Hilton, he had made a brief call to Monica in London, giving her his hotel and room number. He switched on the light, picked up the phone, and it was Monica. She phrased her message carefully.

`Sorry to disturb you, but I've had a call from Cardon, our Far Eastern representative. From Bangkok. He's had a three-day holiday in Chengmai. He's flying home later today via the Persian Gulf. He'll be calling me before he boards his flight to give me his ETA.'

Tweed's blood ran cold. Chengmai. The Thai centre of drug distribution from the notorious Golden Triangle area. What on earth had drugs to do with this crisis? Nothing at all, he'd have thought.

Tweed's sixth sense was working overtime. He had the most awful foreboding. All this flashed through his mind in seconds while Monica waited for him to reply. He took an instant decision.

`He's travelling under his own credentials?' he asked. `I gather so.'

`Monica, when he calls you again give him this order. Stress in the strongest terms it is an order. He is to fly straight back to Hong Kong – using his other credentials. He is then to take the Pacific route, repeat, the Pacific route, to San Francisco, cross the States, catch Concorde to London.'

`I'll tell him. Rely on me. Good-night – or rather, good morning…'

If Tweed had been asked, he couldn't have explained why he had taken this decision. But he had learnt over the years his sixth sense never let him down – that it could be fatal to ignore it.

Sitting up in bed against a propped pillow, he reached for his copy of Anthony Trollope's Barchester Towers. He didn't go to sleep again. The shadowy pattern formed in his mind of what was going on had been shattered. Drugs? On a huge scale? That meant vast sums of money. A glimmer of an idea twitched at the back of his mind, then faded.

It was still dark when he got up, had a leisurely bath, dried himself, got dressed slowly. Then he watched dawn break over the muddled mess of a city which was Brussels.

Marler made his move some time after dawn broke but before the city had woken up. If Dr Wand was going anywhere he wasn't likely to start out as early as this.

It was cold and the streets were pretty much deserted as he hurried along the Avenue Louise between tall, boring- looking buildings. After a night inside the confines of the car he welcomed walking into the spaciousness of the Place Louise with its two main one-way highways – the first one he crossed to the wide pavement island in the centre dividing it off from the Boulevard de Waterloo.

He walked briskly up to the Hilton. He still had the room he'd paid for and the computer-card key was in his wallet. The uniformed doorman saluted him, suppressing a smile. He thinks I've had a night out on the tiles with some girl, Marler thought.

He continued his brisk pace past the empty lounge on his left, heading for the bank of elevators. Then he slowed down. A familiar figure, hands clasped behind its back, was pacing slowly up and down near the entrance to the Cafe d'Egmont. Tweed.

Marler was stunned. He paused as Tweed saw him, walked swiftly towards him, took his arm, guided him to the bank of elevators, pressed a button. No. 20.

`You're on top of the world,' Marler remarked to say something.

`Twentieth floor,' Tweed replied once they were inside the elevator and the doors had closed.

There was no more conversation until Tweed had ushered Marler into Room 2009. Marler spread his hands in amazement and smiled ironically.

`You won't believe this but I came here to phone Monica to find out where you were…'

He explained tersely how he had tailed Dr Wand from the airport, the incidents at the Bellevue Palace, how he had taken a room at the Hilton. Tweed listened, then spoke.

`I woke very early. I was downstairs waiting for the coffee shop to open. You have done very well – very well indeed. So Dr Wand is a mere ten-minute walk or less from here. I find that interesting – in view of what has happened.'

`If you can tell me later, I think I'd better hoof it back to the Bellevue Palace. If Wand goes somewhere I want to know where to.'

`Agreed. But you need some back-up. No, don't argue.. Tweed phoned Newman's room. The phone was answered but Newman's tone was disgruntled.

`What is it, Tweed? At this hour?'

`Come and see me immediately.'

`I was in the shower. I'm in my birthday suit. Be with you in ten minutes…'

Tweed had just put down the phone, was going to explain the situation to Marler, when someone tapped three times on the outside door lightly. Tweed looked through the spyhole, opened it. Paula, dressed in a navy blue suit, carrying a trench coat, her shoulder-bag over her arm, walked in.

`Couldn't sleep,' she said. 'I wondered whether you'd be up. Marler, you look dressed for action.'

`He is…'

Tweed swiftly explained the problem. Marler was spreading prints of Dr Wand taken at London Airport on a table. The special small camera designed in the Engine Room in the Park Crescent basement automatically developed and produced high-definition prints.

`Here is the devious bastard,' he said cheerfully. 'I will keep one, leave the rest to you.'

`We can't wait for Newman,' Tweed said impatiently. `So Paula is coming with you instead.'

`Then let's get out of here fast before Newman comes rushing in,' Marler snapped.

Paula settled herself in the passenger seat beside Marler and handed him one of the two covered plastic cups containing coffee. She had slipped into a nearby bar while Marler moved the car a few yards.

`They had ham rolls,' she said. 'I could go back.. `Don't. Thanks, but I'm up to here with ham. I've eaten nothing else for the past twelve hours or more.'

`Me too.'

Paula liked Marler. On the continent, with his upper- crust drawl and London clothes, he was often taken for the typical Englishman, an impression he cultivated. Paula was also amused at the speed with which he'd hustled her out of the Hilton. Newman and Marler were old sparring partners, neither really liking the other – but in an emergency they knew they could rely on their colleague to the limit.

They chatted animatedly and Paula gave Marler a brief outline of their grim experience in Liege and, later, their encounter with Burgoyne, Willie, and their two women. Marler watched her as she eyed him through her long lashes while she talked.

`Something's happening,' he said suddenly.

It was almost two hours since they had reached the car. Marler was glad he'd slipped into the toilet while Tweed was phoning Newman. In those two hours Brussels had come alive. Street cleaners wearing yellow jackets and trousers, pushing rubber-wheeled trolleys carrying tall rubbish bins had appeared. Small ochre-coloured trams were trundling towards Place Louise.

`What is it?' Paula asked.

`That big Mercedes 600 coming up out of the garage. It brought Dr Wand here from Zaventem Airport.'

Paula watched as the huge black limo paused half-way out of the exit. A car was blocking the way. The uniformed chauffeur with a peaked cap and dark glasses opened his door, got out to call to the doorman. Marler stared as the doorman, a guest's keys in his hand, rushed to move the vehicle.

`There's no one else in the car,' Paula objected. 'Do we want to know where a chauffeur is going?'

`No. Except I don't think that is the chauffeur. His build is too bulky, he moves more ponderously. Someone is playing Clever Dick.'

'I don't get it.

`I'll bet a month's salary that's Dr Wand inside that uniform. So where is he off to that he doesn't want anyone to know about? Here we go. Hold on to your hat.'

The Merc. 600 reached the Place Louise, turned right up the Avenue de la Toison d'Or, running parallel to the Boulevard de Waterloo where traffic moved in the opposite direction. And there was traffic now. Marler was in his element, weaving in and out among private cars and rumbling juggernauts. Belgian drivers are aggressive but Marler beat them to it every time, leaving behind tooting horns as he skilfully kept one vehicle between himself and the Merc. 600.

Dr Wand – Marler was convinced it was him – was a mean driver himself, using the size of his car to make smaller cars give way. Sooner than Paula expected they were outside Brussels. She saw a signpost. Gent (French version), then Gand (Flemish version) underneath.

`Lord, he's moving,' Paula commented.

`So are we!' Marler said breezily.

They passed through turn-offs to numerous villages, and the Mere. 600 kept going. Marler had a juggernaut in front of him and ahead of that was the limo. They passed through flat open countryside – ploughed fields and colonies of greenhouses, their slanting roofs reflecting a glare from the sun. Above them was a clear blue sky and the air was cold and fresh.

Beyond Ghent the limo turned off the main highway down a tarred country road. Marler dropped back: concealment was now more tricky. The frequent bends in the road helped – he could just keep in sight the roof of the outsize limo. He came round a corner and stopped.

When he switched off the engine a heavy silence descended. Paula sat erect in her seat, staring, as though hypnotized.

`What's the matter?' Marler asked.

A hundred yards or so ahead was a new village. On either side of a freshly tarred road stood a row of small two-storey houses. They were built of red brick with steep-pitched roofs of grey slate.

The limo had been driven round the back of the first house on the left. The 'chauffeur' reappeared, walking slowly. Marler guessed he had the key in his hand because he opened the door quickly, disappeared inside, shut it.

Paula counted the houses which faced each other along the sides of the ruler-straight road. Eight dwellings on either side. And not a sign of life anywhere. Not even a single shop. She blinked, shook her head.

`I don't believe it,' she said.

`Don't believe what?'

`They're new, not old, of course. But they remind me -the atmosphere – of Moor's Landing on the Beaulieu River in Hampshire.'

`Tweed told me about that place.' Marler lit a king-size. `Incidentally, there's a canal just over there.'

Paula looked in the direction he'd indicated. A barge was waiting to pass through a lock. The uncanny silence persisted. Marler switched on the engine, backed his car almost out of sight of the village at a point where he could turn round.

`That was Dr Wand,' he told her, 'inside the chauffeur's uniform. I could tell from the way he moved. I watched him pacing up and down outside the Lear jet at London Airport.'

And that place is a Flemish version of Moor's Landing,' Paula said. 'All the houses are curtained and I'm sure people live there. But no sign of any of them. Creepy – like Moor's Landing.'

`Let's go back into Ghent. I'll show you the Old Town. And if we find a restaurant or bar we'll ask a few questions about this place.'

`Wait a sec. I'm going to mark its position.' Paula picked up her map, made a cross at the approximate location of the village. 'It's not even marked on the map..

Marler turned the car round and soon they were back on the highway, driving towards Ghent. He glanced several times in his rear-view mirror.

`You saw that blue Audi parked on the verge at the entrance to the side road?'

`Yes. Why?'

`We have company. It's following us…'