The Martyr’s Curse

Chapter Forty-Two

The Peugeot burst out of the tunnel, back into the sunlight. They’d won three minutes, maybe five. The moment the young guy emerged from the other side in the Subaru and was accosted, the cops would be right back on them and they’d know exactly what they were looking for. Ben spotted a minor junction on the left that they’d blazed past earlier without seeing. He threw the nimble little sports car into it; the narrow road snaked steeply downwards.

‘Sorry if you got a scare back there,’ he said.

‘That was nothing,’ said Silvie.

‘You had your eyes shut.’

‘I did not.’

Within less than two kilometres they were descending into thick pine forest. Ben looked up. The trees formed a canopy overhead that would shield them effectively from watchers in the air. Another two kilometres and he took another junction that led down a single-track country lane with passing places every few hundred metres, alternating right and left. No sign of anyone following them, either by road or by air. That was good news, and he intended to keep it that way. He pulled up in the next passing place and hauled his bulging green bag out from the space behind the seats. The little car’s engine idled in a civilised purr. He dumped the heavy bag on his lap, leaned it against the steering wheel and opened it up.

‘Now what?’ she asked.

‘Not much point in depriving the enemy of their communications if they can use them to track us,’ he said, rooting around inside. With six more fully loaded handguns to add to their arsenal, plus the money and the gold bar acting as ballast in the bottom of the strained canvas, the bag was getting pretty full. His fingers felt a familiar shape and he took out the Browning Hi-Power that he’d removed from one of the cops. Ben was no gun worshipper, but the Browning was an old friend from days gone by. Its shape, weight and balance fitted his hand like an extension of his arm after the countless hours of training he and it had put in together. It was good to feel one again. He slipped it in his pocket.

Then he sifted out the small collection of phones and radio handsets they’d captured from the cops and laid them in a row on the dashboard. He checked the radios. Still no activity. He flung each in turn high over the windscreen of the open-top Peugeot, watched it arc down and hit the road and bounce and break apart into shattered fragments of brittle plastic and circuit board. That left the phones. He smashed one, two, three, four. The road ahead was littered with debris.

‘I’m sure there’s a more environmentally friendly way to dispose of those,’ Silvie said.

Ben just grunted. He picked up the fifth phone and was about to send it hurtling along the same destructive parabola as the others, when it started to ring shrilly in his fist. He stared at it, wondering who the hell could be calling.

‘Should we answer it?’ Silvie said.

Ben hesitated. It was just some cop’s phone. Could be the guy’s wife calling, to remind him to pick up groceries on the way home from work, or to tell him the washing machine had started leaking, or the cat was sick again. Then again, it could be someone who knew he had the phone now. Someone in the loop. With something specific and important to say.

Ben hit the reply button and pressed the phone to his ear, waited for the caller to speak. He wasn’t too surprised when he heard who was at the other end.

‘We can’t go on like this,’ Luc Simon’s voice said in his ear. He sounded harried and demoralised, as if he’d just received news of what had happened back there at the railway line.

‘I can,’ Ben said. ‘For as long as it takes. If a hundred more of your goons have to end up stripped to their undies for Joe Public’s entertainment, then that’s what’ll happen.’

‘You’re a loose cannon, Ben. I have a serious job to do, and you’re not making it any easier. It’s distracting my people from the main issue at hand and diverting resources that could be far better used elsewhere.’

‘I could say the same,’ Ben said. ‘Last thing I needed was your Keystone Cops getting under my feet.’

‘Then we agree that it has to end, for everyone’s sake. Before this gets ugly.’

‘I didn’t hurt anyone,’ Ben said. ‘I hope you appreciate that.’

‘But someone will get hurt. It’s only a question of time. Help me stop this thing now, while it’s still possible.’

‘Are we negotiating?’ Ben asked.

‘I’m open to reasonable suggestions.’

‘Such as?’

‘Well, for a start, such as you agreeing to abandon this reckless course and releasing Agent Valois into the hands of the authorities. In return for which, I’ll agree to hold the dogs off as long as I possibly can. Give you time to disappear.’

‘Like a sporting chance? Close your eyes and count to ten to give me a head start?’

‘A count of ten would be more than a man like you needs.’

‘I thought I could run but I couldn’t hide? I thought the long arm of the law would reach out and scoop me up, wherever I went?’

Luc Simon chuckled. ‘Well, you know how it is. That kind of talk usually intimidates people into giving themselves up. You can’t blame me for trying.’

‘Problem is,’ Ben said, ‘running and hiding isn’t my thing. And I have a job to take care of.’

‘Then let’s deal,’ Simon replied. ‘We have a common objective. We both want Streicher. I know we have different approaches to achieving that goal. I want to see him brought to justice through the official channels and locked away for a very, very long time. You have something … shall we say … more permanent in mind.’

‘That’s for sure,’ Ben said.

‘But maybe we can worry about the details later. Leave our differences aside for now. In the meantime, we can work together. Call a truce. Pool our resources and our skills, instead of pitting them against each other.’

‘Which would naturally involve me giving myself up at the nearest police station and cooling my heels in a cell until the government boys come for me.’

‘Inevitably, that would have to be the first step.’

‘Doesn’t sound like much of a deal so far,’ Ben said. ‘And then what?’

‘Arrangements could be made. Unofficially speaking. Wouldn’t you rather be an accredited law-enforcement official than a fugitive?’

Ben smiled and shook his head. ‘What are you trying to say, Luc? You want to pin a tin star on me? Deputise me, like in the Wild West?’

‘There are ways and means,’ Simon said. ‘I have more influence than you perhaps realise.’

‘You still haven’t even told me what Streicher means to you people. Must be something pretty big, to be kept from DGSI undercover agents. What did he do … snatch a compromising photo of the French President snorting lines of coke with a couple of prostitutes?’

‘You’ll be fully briefed once you’re on board. We can come up with a suitably euphemistic title for you. Advisory Consultant, or something.’

‘I don’t do advisory.’

‘All right, then we could work out a better compromise.’

‘I don’t do much of that either,’ Ben said. ‘And the fact of the matter is, Luc, I don’t really give a damn what Streicher’s done that’s such a big deal to you people. I know what he’s done to my friends, and that’s enough for me.’

Simon sighed. ‘Play the game, my friend. There are checks and balances. There are rules. Even you have to respect those.’

‘I have my own rules,’ Ben said. ‘You want co-operation from me? Then call off the heat and leave me alone to get on with this, my way. Carte blanche. No comebacks.’

‘So I just sit back and give you free rein to devastate half of Europe, is that the idea?’

‘Who said anything about half?’ Ben said. ‘Maybe just a third.’

‘You’re crazy. No chance.’

‘Then no deal,’ Ben said, and threw the phone. It flew up high in an arc and dropped and hit the road and smashed apart.

‘That’s one way to end a conversation,’ Silvie said.

‘Let’s go,’ Ben said, and slammed the RCZ into gear.

The road kept winding ever downwards, until they reached a small village filled with the kind of Alpine chalets that appear on postcards. ‘Next right,’ Silvie said, pointing. ‘There’s a bus.’

The silver tour coach was pulled up at a stop, its big diesel idling, indicator flashing. The name of a Swiss travel company emblazoned on its side. Ben parked behind it, killed the engine, and they climbed out of the car.

‘You think it might be travelling our way?’ Silvie said.

‘We don’t have much choice in any case,’ he replied. He took off his leather jacket, stuffed it in his bag and put on the Italian silk one in its place. It was tailored for a scrawnier frame and too tight around the shoulders, as well as a bad clash with the cap he was wearing. But he was more concerned about disguising himself than about scoring fashion points. He discreetly stuffed the FAMAS into the holdall, zipped it up, and the two of them made a run for the coach before it pulled away from the stop.

‘Heading over the border?’ Ben asked the driver.

‘All the way up to Lausanne,’ the driver replied with a beaming smile. ‘Due in at eight o’clock this evening.’

‘Got room for two more?’

‘Plenty. Hop aboard.’