Rhinoceros

CHAPTER 30

'Lisa has gone. She just vanished. I should have kept a closer eye on her. We've got to find her.'

Pete Nield was in the Grosse Strasse. Tweed had never seen him look so panic-stricken. He was staring everywhere, his face distraught.

'Calm down,' said Tweed as they were joined by Paula and Newman. Marler and Harry arrived a moment later. 'Now where was she when you last saw her, Pete?'

'I dropped my Walther out of my pocket. I stooped to get hold of it and out of sight before anyone saw it. When I looked for her again she'd gone. I seem to remember she walked on ahead of me.'

'Harry, Marler, you come with me,' Tweed ordered. 'I want the rest of you to stroll up and down this section. She could have gone into a shop.'

'No, she wouldn't do that,' Nield protested. 'Not without telling me.'

'She walked ahead of you.' Tweed repeated what Nield had recalled. 'So we'll go that way slowly…'

He led the way while Harry and Marler followed close behind him. Tweed was walking slowly, trying to reconstruct what could have happened. It did occur to him that Delgado, Barton and Panko could be within the area. He stopped by an archway, looked through it, saw the small square beyond.

'This looks nice. Could have attracted her attention.'

He continued plodding along, frequently looking down at the ground. He passed the Tourist Office, went on through another archway. His old instincts from the days when he had been a detective were coming back. His eyes missed nothing. He'd glanced into the Tourist Office but hadn't expected to see her there.

'She'd be entranced by the beauty of this square,' he said aloud. 'Then she'd arrive here. What's that?'

Just beyond an entrance to an alley he'd seen a spot of colour at the foot of a closed wooden door. He picked up a handkerchief with lace edging and a bluebell in one corner. From his own pocket he took out a replica, complete with a bluebell in a corner. He showed it to Harry.

'In the car I wanted to blow my nose, found I hadn't got a handkerchief. Lisa gave me one. She's in here.' He pushed at the closed door but it was as solid as a rock. 'We've got to get in there and quickly.'

'Leave it to me,' said Harry.

He moved the short distance to the other side of the alley, took a deep breath, then threw his bulk against the wooden door. It gave way, came off the hinges, the whole door falling inwards, exposing a long stone staircase. Tweed walked in over the door, his Walther in his hand, listened. He heard nothing. Harry shone the powerful beam of the torch he'd taken out of his satchel. It illuminated a closed door at the top of the long flight of steps. Tweed ran up them, followed by Harry and Marler.

They made a lot of noise hurrying up the old stone steps. Standing by the door Tweed heard a faint knocking, then an equally faint voice.

'Help me. I can't get out. Help me…'

'Stand well back from the door,' Harry shouted. 'As far back as you can…'

He had no space to manoeuvre and Tweed was now holding his torch. Harry put his shoulder to the door on the opposite side to the hinges. He leaned into it with all his strength. The hinges held fast but the door split on the other side, flew open. Tweed walked in and Lisa was standing at the far end. She pointed to what lay on the table.

'It's Delgado. I killed him. He was going to torture me. I strangled him with the handcuffs he'd put on my wrists. I found the key in his pocket and freed myself.' she said calmly, too calmly for Tweed's liking.

'Marler,' he said quickly, 'take her back to Paula, then… get back here fast…'

'This is a problem,' he said to Harry when Marler had escorted Lisa out of the building. He felt Delgado's neck pulse and there wasn't one. 'The problem is someone could notice the smashed door downstairs, come up and find the body. We want to be well clear of Flensburg before that happens.'

'We'd better get rid of the body, then.'

'How?'

Harry was examining the thick canvas sack that had fallen over, spilling caulk. Then he went over to the strange double doors on the far side of the table. He fiddled with a rusty metal catch, carefully opened both doors, looked down.

'This is one of those ancient warehouses,' he told Tweed. 'They used to – ages ago – bring cargo in on horse-drawn wagons and haul it up here for storage.'

Tweed went over, looked down the drop into a deserted street. Then, without hope, he cranked a wheel attached to the wall. It was stiff, but it turned. Rust fell on the floor and outside a hook at the end of a chain began to descend. He stopped turning the wheel.

'Newman brings the car round into this street,' Harry suggested. 'Parks it below here. I can put the body into that sack, attach the hook to it, lower the sack into the boot of the car.'

'It's risky…'

'It's more risky leaving the body here…'

Three-quarters of an hour later Newman had found his way through the labyrinth of old streets and parked the car below the hoist. In the meantime, Tweed had held open the large sack while Harry thrust the body inside. He then added sections of old chains he'd picked up off the floor.

'Why the chains?' Tweed asked.

'There's a river or a harbour nearby. The chains are to add weight so when we dump the sack in the water it will sink immediately.'

'That won't be easy…"

'None of this is easy but we've got to do it…'

Marler had explained the situation to Newman, who had co-opted Nield to stand as watchdog in the street with a whistle Harry had produced from his satchel. He would sound the alarm if anyone was approaching. Harry had tied up the top of the sack firmly with lengths of rope lying on the floor. They were now coming to the really nerve-racking part – lowering the sack attached to the hoist's hook down into the open boot of the car below. Tweed had dropped the handcuffs which had imprisoned Lisa into the sack.

Harry kept looking down as he motioned Tweed to operate the hoist. The sack swung out of the open doorway and Tweed cranked the handle. Would the hoist work properly? Would it stick half way, leaving the sack suspended in mid-air? Tweed secretly wished, as he started to crank the handle, that he hadn't agreed to this mad idea. The sack swung out into space. It stayed there. Tweed grabbed the crank handle with both hands, gave it a mighty twist.

Without warning, the handle started turning at high speed and Tweed had to let it go. The sack plunged down, landed just above the boot of the car with a heavy jerk. The sack and contents had ripped free from the now suspended hook. Newman closed the boot quietly, his hands dripping with sweat. Tweed had peered down the long drop, hardly able to believe they had managed it.

Then he started to reverse the handle to haul the chain back up. The handle wouldn't move. Harry, wearing the gloves he'd put on to deal with the body, grabbed hold of the handle, tried to force it to rewind the chain. It wouldn't move an inch.

'We can't leave the chain dangling over the street,' said Tweed.

'We can't do anything else,' Harry told him. 'We just want to get the hell out of here so Newman can drive us to the river, wherever it is. You go down now and get into the car. I'll close the doors.'

'Where are Lisa and Paula?' Tweed asked Marler who had just re-entered the room.

'In a restaurant in the pedestrian street. Lisa's OK now. I'll go and fetch them.'

'Don't say anything about what's in the boot,' Tweed warned.

'And you get out of this damned room,' Harry growled.

When they had gone, he was very careful closing the double doors. He didn't want them giving way and collapsing down into the street. He gave a sigh of relief when he'd closed them. Leaving the room, he stood outside on the top step and pulled open gently the door he'd broken. It was still held by the hinges and swung shut without any trouble. It might be splintered but he couldn't do anything about that. He used his torch to see his way down. The last thing he needed now was a sprained ankle.

As he walked over the flattened street door Marler arrived with Paula and Lisa. Tweed had the car door open for them to get inside. Lisa looked up at the hook at the end of the chain swinging just above her head.

'What's that?'

'Don't ask silly questions,' Harry said quietly. 'Get in the car. We're leaving Flensburg.'

Guided by Tweed, who had the street plan open on his lap, Newman drove round the end of the hafen – or harbour – and along Hafendamn. They had entered a new world. The town was across the water from them and there were hardly any buildings on this side of the water. Instead, they had a view of little old houses across the water, houses freshly painted and well looked after.

'The body's in the boot, isn't it?' Lisa suddenly asked.

Tweed turned round and looked at her. She seemed to be her normal self. Her brain was ticking over very well. 'Yes, it is,' he said. 'We lowered it, using an old hoist, into the boot. Inside a canvas sack. Then I couldn't manage to haul the chain back up again, the one you saw hanging over the street.'

'How are you going to get rid of it?'

'Dump it in the harbour, which is why we drove round here.'

'So it will be gone.' She sounded relieved. 'For ever…'

A little further on they passed a cluster of fishing craft, then some pleasure boats. No one was about on the barren shore. Newman drove on and then slowed. A group of ramshackle huts and sheds stood just off the road on the harbour side. He stopped behind them, masked from the houses on the distant shore opposite.

'Did you see what I saw?' he asked.

'Yes,' Harry replied. 'A large old rowboat. Ideal for the purpose. Let's get on with it…'

At Tweed's suggestion Paula left the car with him and they strolled further along the road. Behind them Lisa followed with Nield. It gave a reason for the car stopping, just in case someone across the water had noticed. Marler had stayed behind to help Newman and Harry.

They first inspected the rowboat, lying behind the first hut.

'Looks pretty ropy,' Newman observed. 'The bottom could fall out.'

'We'll have to risk it,' replied Marler, opening the boot.

Between them they lifted the heavy weight out of the boot, transferred it to the inside of the boat. Harry checked the top of the sack. When the sack had been lowered to within six feet of the boot it had ripped itself away from the hoist's hook. That was when the hoist stopped working. Harry decided the top of the sack was very secure.

'It's a narrow beach,' Newman reported, 'but it's made up of pebbles and stones. They could rip the bottom out before we reach the harbour.'

Harry had found a pair of old rubber boots behind the hut. He managed to get them on. He got back to the others in time to hear Newman's remark.

'So,' he told them, 'we carry the boat to the water. I'll take the stern, one of you takes the port side, the other the starboard. Do let's get on with it.'

In the blazing heat it was a physical ordeal as the three men slowly carried the boat with its cargo towards the water line. When they reached it and the prow was in the harbour, Newman and Marler, still holding on, moved further back. The boat was in the water when Harry, in his boots, kept pushing, then gave it a mighty shove. He nearly went under as the slope shelved steeply. He stepped back quickly, joined the others on the shore as they watched.

'Lord,' said Newman, 'it's keeping going, heading for the far shore. This harbour leads out into the Baltic. There could be a current keeping it moving.'

It was another nerve-racking experience as the boat drifted steadily across the harbour. Newman took out a pair of binoculars and scanned the opposite shore. No one was in view in front of the neat little houses but there was a restaurant with people sitting outside at tables. Luckily a deep blind obscured their view. Not that this would make any difference if the boat reached the shore.

'Sink, you devil. Sink,' Harry growled.

It must have heard him because at that moment, watching the boat through his binoculars, Newman saw the bottom give way, the sack plunging down out of sight. With no bottom, the boat began to break up and soon was no more than shards of driftwood.

'I vote we move off,' said Harry. 'Where has Tweed got to?'

He looked along the road and the four strollers were quite a distance along it. Paula turned round and Harry waved frantically for them to come back fast.

The strollers changed partners for the walk back. Tweed joined Nield while Paula and Lisa followed a distance behind them. Tweed had diought one advantage of walking away was that Lisa wouldn't see what happened to the body. Despite her outward calm he felt sure it would take several days for her to get over her hideous experience with Delgado.

'Lisa,' Paula said quietly, 'there is something I've wanted to ask you and this is a good opportunity. If you don't mind.'

'Ask away.'

'When you were badly concussed and in the clinic back in London you tried to tell us something. You made such an effort I really admired you. What you said was Ham… Dan… 4S. We eventually worked out Ham meant Hamburg and 4S meant the Four Seasons Hotel. But what did Dan mean?'

'I said that? I've got no recollection of this.' Lisa looked at Paula. 'I can see the Hamburg bit and the hotel. Even though it's all gone from my memory.'

'Could Dan have been Danzer, the chauffeur to one of the partners controlling the Zurcher Kredit Bank?'

'Never heard of Danzer. Chauffeur to which partner? The one with the gold-rimmed spectacles?'

Paula almost missed a step. Lisa had, they thought, no knowledge at all of the partners. And the only time Paula had seen Milo wear gold-rimmed spectacles was when he had paid the bill at the Fischereihafen restaurant down by the Elbe docks. She had to say something.

'I don't know which partner he's chauffeur to – Danzer, I mean. It's a detail.'

But as they walked back all Paula's earlier doubts about Lisa flooded back into her mind. She was badly shaken.

The Sikorsky helicopter was within half an hour of taking off from its remote location at Hamburg's airport. All four VIP passengers were aboard. They were waiting for permission from the control tower to start their flight. The aircraft was luxuriously equipped with leather armchairs and the armed guard had brought down the wide aisle a trolley of every kind of drink imaginable. Gavin Thunder had asked for a stiff brandy.

He was seated next to the American Secretary of State, squat and with a high-domed forehead and a hard face expressing great intelligence. Not surprisingly, the Prime Minister of France and the Deputy Chancellor of Germany sat together several rows ahead.

'You seem nervous, Gavin,' the American remarked.

'I'm not too keen on helicopters.'

'Use them frequently. Useful for short urgent trips in the States. Something important in that case in your lap?'

'Only the complete operational plan.'

Thunder had the executive case open and inside were sheaves of typed papers, clipped together so there were seven copies of the document. He extracted one sheet and the rest came loose from the clip and scattered. He handed the sheet to his colleague.

'That's the important one. The rest are details.'

The American read the close-typed page divided methodically into sections. He was a fast reader.

'I like it. We're thinking on similar lines. You've divided up your country into six control areas, each commanded by a Governor with wide powers. And a secret apparatus of informers to report to the governor any dangerous protesters. Plus a Bill for Parliament which declares martial law without appearing to do so. Who is this Supreme Governor – Brigadier Barford?'

'A very experienced soldier who has also run Special Branch, our equivalent to your FBI. His views coincide with ours.'

'So all we need, which will happen soon, are riots such as the world has never seen. Then the Elite Club will take over. I presume preparations for the outbreak are well advanced. I have been informed they are.'

'Very well advanced. They are an essential element in our plan – to scare the populations of our countries witless to such an extent they will accept anything. Rather like the way Hitler came to power because the German middle classes were desperate to stop the Communists assuming power. I have replaced the man in charge of the earlier riots. A man I have great faith in witnessed them and thought they were feeble. I have put him in sole charge.'

'Anyone I know?'

'I doubt it. A man with a brilliant brain called Oskar Vernon. With Vernon and Brigadier Barford running the operation we cannot fail.'