The Satan Bug

CHAPTER NINE

"What in the name of God are you talking about?" Dr. Roger Hartnell, a young man with a face suddenly old and tired and strained, stared at us, then at his wife who was standing rigidly beside them, then back at us again. "Accessory after murder. What are you talking about, man?"

"It's our belief that you know well enough what we are talking about," Wylie said calmly. It was the Inspector's bailiwick and it was he who had just read out the charge and was making the formal arrest. He went on, "I have to warn you that what you say now may be used against you at your trial. It would help us if you made a full confession now, I admit: but arrested men have their rights. You may wish to take legal advice before you speak." Like hell he was going to take legal advice: he was going to talk before he left that house and Hardanger, Wylie and I all knew it.

"Will someone please explain what this — this nonsense is about?" Mrs. Hartnell said coldly. The slightly supercilious incomprehension, the well-bred distaste were done to a turn, but the hostile rigidity of the figure overdone, the gripping hands so tightly clasped that the tremor showed. And she was still wearing the elastic stockings.

"Gladly," Wylie said. "Yesterday, Dr. Hartnell, you made a statement to Mr. Cavell here to——"

"Cavell?" Hartnell did some more staring. "That's not Cavell."

"I didn't like my old face," I said. "Do you blame me? Inspector Wylie is talking, Hartnell."

"— to the effect," Wylie went on, "that you made a late trip night before last to see Mr. Tuffnell. Intensive investigation has turned up several people who were in a position to have seen you had you travelled in the direction you said you did at the time you said you did. Not one of those people saw you. That's point number one." And quite a good point it was, too, even if the purest fiction: the check had been made all right, but not a single witness found to confirm or deny Hartnells story, which had been just as expected.

"Point number two," Wylie went on. "Mud was found last night under the front mudguard of your motor-scooter, a mud which seems to be identical with the red loam found locally only outside Mordon. We suspect you went there early in the evening to reconnoitre. Your machine is at present being moved to police laboratories for tests. Point number——"

"My scooter!" Hartnell looked as if a bridge had fallen on him. "Mordon. I swear to——"

"Number three. Later that night you took your scooter— and wife — to a spot near Chessingham's house. You almost gave yourself away to Mr. Cavell — you said that the policeman alleged to have seen you on your scooter could back up your story about the trip to Alfringham and then you remembered, almost too late, that if he had seen you he would also have seen your wife on the pillion seat. We found the imprint of your scooter's wheels among bushes not twenty yards from where the Bedford had been abandoned. Careless, Doctor, very careless. I note you're not protesting that one." He couldn't. We'd found the imprints less than twenty minutes previously.

"Points four and five. Hammer used to stun the guard dog. Pliers used to cut the Mordon fence. Both found last night in your tool-shed. Again by Mr. Cavell."

"Why, you filthy, sneaking, thieving—" His face twisted, the hair-trigger control suddenly snapped and he flung himself at me, clawed hands outstretched. He didn't get three feet, Hardanger and Wylie just moved in massively from either side and pinned him helplessly between their bulks. Hartnell struggled madly, uselessly, his insane fury increasing. "I took you in here, you — you swine I entertained your wife. I did—" His voice weakened and faded and when it came again it was another man talking. "The hammer used to stun the dog? The pliers? Here? In my house? They were found here? How could they have been found here?" He couldn't have been more bewildered if he'd heard the late Senator McCarthy declaring himself to be a lifelong Communist. "They couldn't have been found here. What are they talking about, Jane?" He'd turned to his wife and his face was desperate.

"We're talking of murder," Wylie said flatly. "I didn't expect your co-operation, Hartnell. Please come along, both of you."

"There's some terrible mistake. I–I don't understand. A terrible mistake." Hartnell stared as us, his face hunted. "I can clear it up, I'm sure I can clear it up. If you have to take anyone with you, take me. But don't drag my wife along. Please."

"Why not?" I said. "You didn't hesitate to drag her along a couple of nights ago."

"I don't know what you're talking about," he said wearily.

"Would you say the same thing, Mrs. Hartnell?" I asked. "In view of the statement made by your doctor, who saw you less than three weeks ago, that you are in perfect health?"

"What do you mean?" she demanded. She was under better control than her husband. "What are you getting at?"

"The fact that you went to a chemist's in Alfringham yesterday and bought a pair of elastic stockings. The gorse outside Mordon is pretty vicious stuff, Mrs. Hartnell, and it was very dark when you ran off after decoying the soldiers from their truck. You were pretty badly scratched, weren't you? And you had to cover those scratches, didn't you. Policemen are just naturally suspicious — especially in a murder case."

"This is entirely ridiculous." Her voice was flat, mechanical. "How dare you insinuate—"

"You are wasting our time, madam!" Hardanger spoke for the first time, his voice sharp and authoritative. "We have a policewoman outside. Must I bring her in?" Silence. "Very well, then, I suggest we leave for the police station."

"Could I have a few words with Dr. Hartnell, first?" I asked. "Alone, that is?"

Hardanger and Wylie exchanged glances. I'd already had their permission but I had to have it again to make things right — for them — if the need arose at the trial.

"Why?" Hardanger demanded.

"Dr. Hartnell and I used to know each other fairly well," I said. "We were on fairly friendly terms. Time is desperately short. He might be willing to talk to me."

"Talk to you?" It's no easy feat to sneer and shout at the same moment, but Hartnell achieved it. "By God, never!"

"Time is indeed short," Hardanger agreed sombrely. "Ten minutes, Cavell." He nodded to Mrs. Hartnell. She hesitated, looked at her husband, then walked out, followed by Hardanger and Wylie. Hartnell made to follow but I swung across and blocked his way.

"Let me past" His voice was low and ugly. "I've nothing to say to people like you." He gave a short description of what he thought people like me were like, and when I showed no signs of stepping aside he swung back his right fist for a clumsy round-house swing that a blind octogenarian could have parried or avoided. I showed him my gun and he changed his mind.

"Have you a cellar in your house?" I asked.

"A cellar. Yes, we—" He broke off and his face was ugly again. "If you think you're going to take me—"

I swung my left fist in imitation of his own cumbersome effort and when he lifted his right arm in defence I tapped him with the barrel of the Hanyatti, just enough to take the fight out of him, caught his left arm up behind his left shoulder and marched him down towards the rear of the house where a flight of steps led down to a cellar. I closed the door behind us and shoved him roughly on to a rough wooden bench. He sat there for some seconds, rubbing his head, then looked up at me.

"This is a put-up job," he said hoarsely. "Hardanger and Wylie — they knew you were going to do this."

"Hardanger and Wylie are hampered," I said coldly. "They're hampered by regulations concerning interrogation of suspects. They're hampered by the thoughts of careers and pensions. I have no such thoughts. I'm a private individual."

"And you think you'll get away with this?" he said incredulously. "Do you seriously think I won't talk about it?"

"By the time I have finished," I said impersonally, "I doubt whether you will be able to talk. I'll have the truth in fifteen minutes — and I won't leave a mark. I'm an expert on torture, Hartnell — a group of Belgian quislings gave me a course of instruction over a period of three weeks. I was the subject. Try hard to believe I don't care much if you are badly hurt."

He looked at me. He was trying hard not to believe me but he wasn't sure. There was nothing tough about Hartnell.

"Let's try it the easy way first, though," I said. "Let's try it by reminding you that there's a madman on the loose with the Satan Bug threatening to wipe out God knows how much of England if his conditions aren't met — and his first demonstration is due any hour."

"What are you talking about?" he demanded hoarsely.

I told him what Hardanger had told me and then went on, "If this madman wipes out any part of the country the nation will demand revenge. They'll demand a scapegoat and public pressure will be so terrific that they'll get their scapegoat. Surely you're not so stupid as not to see that? Surely you're not so stupid that you can't visualise your wife Jane with the hangman's knot under her chin as the executioner opens the trap-door. The fall, the jolt, the snapping of the vertebrae, the momentry reflex kicking of the feet — can you see your wife, Hartnell? Can you see what you are going to do to her? She is young to die. And death by hanging is a terrible death — and it's still the prescribed penalty for a guilty accessory to murder for gain."

He looked up at me, dull hate and misery in the sick eyes. In the half-light of the cellar his face was grey and there was the sheen of sweat on his forehead.

I went on, "You realise that you can retract any statement you make to me here. Without witnesses, a statement is valueless." I paused and dropped my voice. "You're deep in this, aren't you?"

He nodded. He was staring at the floor.

"Who's the killer? Who's behind all this?"

"I don't know. As God is my judge, I don't know. A man rang me up and offered me money if I'd cause this diversion. Jane and myself. I thought he was crazy and if he wasn't something stank about it… I refused. Next morning £200 arrived by post with a note to say there would be £300 more if I did what I was told. A — a fortnight went by and then he came on the phone again."

"His voice. Did you recognise his voice?"

"It was deep and muffled. I've no idea who it was. I think he was talking with something over the mouthpiece."

"What did he say?"

"The same as his note. There would be this other £300 if I did as he asked."

"And?"

"I said I would." He was still looking downwards. "I–I had already spent part of the money."

"Received the extra £300?"

"Not yet."

"How much have you spent of the £200 you received?"

"About forty."

"Show me the rest of it."

"It's not here. Not in the house. I went out last night after you had been here and buried the remainder in the woods."

"What was the money in? Denominations, I mean."

"Fivers. Bank of England fivers."

"I see. All very interesting, Doctor." I crossed to the bench where he was sitting, screwed my hand into his hair, jerked his head savagely Upwards, jammed the barrel of the Hanyatti into his solar plexus and, as he gasped in pain, brought up the barrel and thrust it between his teeth. For ten seconds I stood like that, motionless, while he stared up at me with eyes crazy with fear. I felt slightly sick.

"One chance is all you get from me, Hartnell," I said in a low voice. "You've had that chance. Now the treatment. You rotten contemptible liar. Expect me to believe a crazy story like that? Do you think the brilliant mind behind this would have phoned asking you to make a diversion knowing very well that the chances were high that you would at once go to the police, put them and the Army at Mordon on their guard and so ruin all his plans? Do you think this man, in an area where automatic exchanges are not yet installed, would have spoken to you when any operator with time on her hands could have listened in to every word he said? Are you so naive as to imagine that I would be so naive as to believe that? Do you believe this man, with a genius for organisation, would leave everything, the success of all his plans, dependent on the last-minute factor of the strength of your greed? Do you believe he would pay in fivers, which can as often as not be traced and which could also have, if not his prints, then those of the cashier issuing them? Do you expect me to believe that he would offer £500 for the job when he could get a couple of experts from London to do it for a tenth of that. And, finally, do you think I'd believe your yarn about burying the money in the woods at night — so that come the dawn if you were told to dig them up by the police you would be unable to find them again?" I stood back, taking the gun from his face. "Or shall we go and look for that money now?"

"Oh, God, it's useless." He was completely crushed, his voice a moan. "I'm finished, Cavell, I'm finished. I've been borrowing all over the place and now I'm over two thousand in debt."

"Cut the sob-story," I said harshly. "It doesn't interest me."

"Tuffnell — the money-lender — was pressing me hard," he went on dully. He wasn't looking anywhere near me. "I'm mess secretary at Mordon. I've embezzled over six hundred pounds. Someone — God knows who or how — found out and sent me a note saying that if I didn't co-operate he'd lay the facts before the police. I co-operated."

I put the gun away. The ring of truth is far from having the bell-like clarity some innocents would believe, but I knew Hartnell was too beaten to prevaricate further. I said, "You have no clue at all as to the identity of the man sending the note?"

"No. And I swear I don't know anything about the hammer or the pliers or the red mud on the scooter."

My leg was now hurting so badly that they'd given me a police car and police driver but even so I didn't enjoy the trip across to Dr. MacDonald's house. Time was running out and all I could see was a brick wall. That evening there would appear in all the evening papers a carefully worded account of how two Mordon scientists had been arrested and charged with murder and that the final solution of the theft of the Satan Bug was only hours away, and while it might, we hoped, lull the suspicions of the real killers, it wasn't advancing our cause very much. Blind men in a fog at midnight. And no leads, just no leads at all. Hardanger was going to open an intensive investigation in Mordon to find out who might have had access to the mess accounts: probably, I thought bitterly, only a couple of hundred people or so.

I was met at the door of Dr. MacDonald's house by his housekeeper. She was in her middle thirties, more than passably good looking and gave her name as Mrs. Turpin. Her face was like thunder, the face of the faithful retainer powerless to defend her master's property against ravage and assault. When I showed my false credentials and asked to be allowed in she said bitterly that another prying nosy-parker more or less couldn't do any harm now.

The house appeared to be alive with plain-clothes policemen. I identified myself to the man in charge, a detective-sergeant by the name of Carlisle. "Found anything interesting yet, Sergeant?"

"Hard to say. Been here over an hour, starting from the top, and we've found nothing that strikes me as suspicious in itself. Dr. MacDonald does seem to do himself pretty well, I must say. And one of my men, Campbell, who'd dead keen on all this art rubbish says that a lot of the pictures, pottery and other junk about the place is worth a fair bit of anyone's money. And you ought to see the dark-room he has in the attic: there's a thousand quid's worth of photographic equipment there if there's a penny's worth."

"Dark-room? That might be interesting. Never heard that Dr. MacDonald was interested in photography."

"Lord bless my soul, yes. He's one of the best amateur photographers in the country. He's the president of our photographic club in Alfringham. There's a cabinet through in his study there that's fair loaded with trophies. He makes no secret of that, I can assure you, sir."

I left him and his men to their search — if they couldn't find anything neither could I — and went upstairs to the dark-room. Carlisle hadn't exaggerated any, Dr. MacDonald did himself as well in the way of cameras as he did in the other material things of life. But I didn't spend much time there, I didn't see how cameras came into the business at all. I made a mental note to bring an expert police photographer down from London to check the equipment in the one in a thousand chance that something might turn up, and then went downstairs to see Mrs. Turpin.

"I'm really most sorry about all this upset, Mrs. Turpin," I said pleasantly. "Just pure routine, you know. Must be a pleasure for you to look after a beautiful place like this."

"If you've got any questions to ask, ask them," she snapped, "and none of your smart-alecky beating about the bush."

That didn't leave much room for finesse. I said, "How many years have you been with Dr. MacDonald?"

"Four. Ever since he came here. A finer gentleman you wouldn't find anywhere. Why do you ask?"

"He has a great deal of valuable stuff here." I listed about a dozen items, ranging from the magnificient carpeting to the paintings. "How long has he had those?"

"I don't have to answer any questions, Mr. Inspector." The helpful type.

"No," I admitted. "You don't. Especially if you wish to make things unpleasant for your employer."

She glared at me, hesitated, then answered my questions. At least half the stuff MacDonald had brought with him four years ago. The rest he had bought at fairly regular intervals since. Mrs. Turpin was one of those formidable women with a photographic memory for all the more monumental irrelevancies of life, and she could more or less quote the date, hour and the weather conditions at the time of the delivery of each item. I knew I'd be wasting my time even trying to confirm her statements. If Mrs. Turpin said such and such was so and so, then it was and that was all there was to it.

This certainly helped to set MacDonald in the clear. No sudden suspicious influx of wealth in recent weeks or months, he'd been buying on this lavish scale over a period of years. Where he got the wherewithal to buy on this lavish scale I couldn't guess, but it hardly seemed important now. As he'd said himself, as an independent bachelor without relatives, he could afford to live it up.

I moved back into the sitting-room and saw Carlisle coming towards me with a couple of large files in his hands.

"We're giving Dr. MacDonald's study a thorough going-over now, sir. Listing everything, of course, but I thought these might interest you. Seems to be some sort of official correspondence."

It did interest me, but not in the way I expected. The more I turned up about MacDonald, the more innocuous he seemed. The file contained carbon copies of his letters to and replies from fellow-scientists and various scientific organisations throughout Europe, mainly the World Health Organisation. There was no doubt from these letters that MacDonald was a highly gifted and highly respected chemist and micro-biologist, one of the top men in his own field. Almost half of his letters were addressed to certain affiliations of the, W.H.O., particularly in Paris, Stockholm, Bonn and Rome. Nothing sinister or unpatriotic about that, this would be unclassified stuff and the frequent co-signature of Dr. Baxter on the carbon was guarantee enough of that. Besides, although it was supposed to be a secret, all the scientists in Mordon knew that then, mail was under constant censorship. I glanced through the file again and put it aside as the phone rang.

It was Hardanger and he sounded fairly grim. What he had to say made me feel grim, too. A phone call to Alfringham had stated that if police investigations weren't suspended for twenty-four hours something very unpleasant was going to happen to Pierre Cavell, who, as they would be aware, had disappeared. Proof that the caller knew where Cavell was would be forthcoming if police investigations were not halted by six o'clock that evening.

It wasn't the first part of it that made me feel grim. I said, "Well, we were expecting something like it. With all the threats I was dropping at the crack of dawn to-day they must have thought that I was making too much progress for their comfort."

"You flatter yourself, my friend," Hardanger said in his gravelly voice. "You're only a pawn, the call wasn't made to the police but to your wife at the Waggoner's Rest, telling her that if the General — he gave his full name, rank and address — didn't pull in his horns then she, Mary, would receive a pair of ears in the mail to-morrow. The caller said that he was sure that though she had been married only a couple of months she would still be able to recognise her husband's ears when she saw them."

I felt the hairs prickle on the back of my neck and that had nothing to do with any imagined sensation of ear-cropping. I said carefully, "There are three things, Hardanger. The number of people in those parts who know we have been married only two months must be pretty few. The number of people who know that Mary is the General's daughter must be even fewer. But the number of people who know the General's true identity, apart from yourself and myself, can be counted on one hand. How in God's name could any criminal in the land know the General's true identity?"

"You tell me," Hardanger said heavily. "This is the nastiest development of the lot. This man not only knows who the General is but knows that Mary is his only child and the apple of his eye, the one person in the world who might be able to bring pressure to bear on him. And she'd bring the pressure, all right: the abstract ideals of justice don't matter a damn to women when their men's lives are in danger. The whole thing stinks, Cavell."

" o high heaven," I agreed slowly. "Of treason — and treason in high places."

"I don't think we'd better talk about it over the phone," Hardanger said quickly.

"No, Tried tracing the call?"

"Not yet. But I might as well waste time that way as any other."

He hung up and I stood there staring at the silent telephone. The General was a personal appointee of the Prime Minister and the Home Secretary. His identity was also known to the chiefs of espionage and counter-espionage — it had to be. An Assistant Commissioner, Hardanger himself, the Commandant and security chief at Mordon — and that ended the list of those to whom the General's identity was known. It was an ugly thought. I wondered vaguely how General Cliveden was going to enjoy the next couple of hours — I didn't require any powers of telepathy to know where Hardanger would be heading as soon as he had put down that phone. Of all our suspects, only Cliveden knew the General's identity. Maybe I should have been paying more attention to General Cliveden.

A shadow darkened the hall doorway. I glanced up to see three khaki-clad figures standing at the head of the outside steps. The man in the centre, a sergeant, had his hand raised to the bell-push but lowered it when he caught sight of me.

"I'm looking for an Inspector Gibson," he said. "Is he here?"

"Gibson?" I suddenly remembered that was me. "I'm Inspector Gibson, Sergeant."

"I've something here for you, sir." He indicated the file under his arm. "I've been ordered to ask for your credentials first of all."

I showed them and he handed over the file. He said, apologetically, "I'm under orders not to let that out of my sight, sir. Superintendent Hardanger said it came from Mr. Clandon's records offices and I understand it's highly confidential."

"Of course." Followed by the sergeant who was flanked by a couple of hefty privates, I walked into the living-room, ignoring the outraged glare of Mrs. Turpin who had belatedly appeared on the scene. I asked her to leave and she did, glowering savagely.

I broke the seal and opened the file. It contained a spare seal for re-sealing the cover and a copy of Dr. MacDonald's security report. I'd seen the report before, of course, when I'd taken over as head of security from the vanished Easton Derry, but had paid no particular attention to it. I'd had no special reason to. But I had now.

There were seven pages of foolscap. I went through it three times. I didn't miss a thing the first time and if possible even less the next two. I was looking for even the tiniest offbeat jarring note that might give me even the most insubstantial lead, Senator McCarthy sniffing out a Communist had nothing on me, but I found not the slightest trace of anything that might have been helpful. The only odd thing, as Hardanger had pointed out, was the extremely scanty information about MacDonald's Army career, and to information Easton Derry — who had indeed compiled the report — must have had access. But nothing, except for a remark at the foot of a page that MacDonald, entering the Army as a private in the Territorials in 1938, had finished his Army career in Italy as a lieutenant-colonel in a tank division in 1945. The top of the following page held a reference to his appointment as a government chemist in north-east England early in 1946. This could have been just the way Easton Derry had compiled the report: or not.

With the blade of my penknife, and ignoring the sergeant's scandalised look, I pried open the buckram corner holding the top left hand corners of the pages together. Under this was a thin wire staple, the kind of staple that comes with practically every kind of commercial stapler. I bent the ends back at right angles, slid the sheets off and examined them separately. No sheet had more than one pair — the original pair — of holes made by the stapler. If anyone had opened that staple to remove a sheet, he'd replaced it with exceptional care. On the face of it, it looked as if that file hadn't been tampered with.

I became aware that Carlisle, the plain-clothes detective-sergeant, was standing beside me, holding a bundle of papers and folders. He said, "This might interest you, sir. I don't know."

"Just a moment." I clipped the sheets together again, pushed them into the file-holder, resealed it and handed it back to the army sergeant who took himself off along with his two companions. I said to Carlisle, "What are those?"

"Photographs, sir."

"Photographs? What makes you think I'll be interested in photographs, Sergeant?"

"The fact that they were inside a locked steel box, sir. And the box was in the bottom drawer — also locked — of a knee-hole desk. And here's a bundle found in the same place— personal correspondence, I would say."

"Much trouble in opening the steel box?"

"Not with the size of hacksaw I use, sir. We've just about tied it all up now, Inspector. Everything listed. If I might venture an opinion, you'll find little of interest in the list."

"Searched the whole house? Any basement?"

"Just about the filthiest coal-cellar you ever clapped eyes on." Carlisle smiled. "From what I've seen of Dr. MacDonald's personal tastes he doesn't strike me as the type of man who would keep even coal in a coal-cellar if he could find a cleaner and more luxurious place for it."

He left me to his finds. There were four albums. Three of them were of the innocuous squinting-into-the-sun type of family albums you can find in a million British homes. Most of the photographs were faded and yellow, taken in the days of MacDonald's youth in the twenties and thirties. The fourth album, of much more recent origin, was a presentation given to MacDonald by colleagues in the World Health Organisation in recognition of his outstanding services to the W.H.O. over many years — an illuminated address pasted to the inside front board said so. It contained over fifty pictures of MacDonald and his colleagues taken in at least a dozen different European cities. Most of the photographs had been taken in France, Scandinavia and Italy, with a sprinkling from a few other countries. They had been mounted in chronological fashion, each picture with date and location caption, the last having been taken in Helsinki less than six months previously.

The photographs in the album didn't interest me: what did interest me was one photograph that was missing. From its place in the album it had almost certainly been taken about eighteen months previously. Its caption had been all but obliterated by horizontal strokes made in the same white ink used for all captions. I switched on the light and peered closely at the obliteration. No question but that the place name had once started with a T. After that it was hard to say. The next letter could have been either an O or a D. O, I felt sure — there was no city in Europe beginning with TD. The remainder of the word was completely obliterated. TO… About six letters in length, possibly seven. But none of the letters projected below the line, so that cut out all words with p's and g's and j's and so forth.

What cities or towns in Europe did I know beginning with the letters TO and six or seven letters in length? Not so very many, I realised, at least not of any size, and the W.H.O. didn't hold its meetings in villages. Torquay — no good, letters projecting below. Totnes — too small. In Europe? Tornio in Sweden, Tondor in Denmark — again both relatively insignificant. Toledo, now — no one could call that a village: but MacDonald had never been to Spain. The best bets were probably either Touraai in Belgium or Toulon in France. Tournai? Toulon? For a moment or two I mulled the names over in my mind. I picked up the bundle of letters.

There must have been thirty or forty letters in the Bundle, faintly scented and tied, of all things, with a blue ribbon. Of all the things I would have expected to find in Dr. MacDonald's possession, this was the last. And, I would have bet a month's salary, the most useless. They looked like love letters and I didn't particularly relish the prospect of making myself conversant with the good doctor's youthful indiscretions but just at that moment I would have read Homer in the original if I thought it would be any good to me. I untied the bow on the ribbon.

Exactly five minutes later I was speaking on the phone to the General.

"I want to interview a certain Mme. Yvette Peugot who was working in the Pasteur Institute in Paris in 1945 and 1946. Not next week, not to-morrow, but now. This afternoon. Can you fix it, sir?"

"I can fix anything, Cavell," the General said simply. "Less than two hours ago the Premier put the entire resources of all the services at our disposal. He's as windy as hell. How urgent is this?"

"Maybe life-or-death urgent, sir. That's what I've got to find out. This woman appears to have been on very intimate terms with MacDonald for about nine months towards and after the end of the war. It's the one period of his life about which information is lacking. If she's still alive and traceable she may be able to fill in this period."

"Is that all?" The voice was flat, disappointment barely concealed. "What of the letters themselves?"

"Only read a couple so far, sir. Seem perfectly innocuous though not the sort of stuff I'd care to have read out in court if I had written it."

"It seems very little to go on, Cavell."

"A hunch, sir. More than that. It is possible that a page has been abstracted from the security dossier on MacDonald. The dates on those letters correspond to the missing page— if it is missing. And if it is I want to find out why."

"Missing?" His voice crackled sharply over the wire. "How could a page from a security dossier possibly be missing. Who would have — or have had — access to those dossiers?"

"Easton, Clandon, myself — and Cliveden and Weybridge."

"Precisely. General Cliveden." A significant pause. "This recent threat to Mary to let her have your head on a charger: General Cliveden is the only man in Mordon who knows both who I am and the relationship between myself and Mary. One of the only two men with access to security dossiers. Don't you think you should be concentrating on Cliveden?"

"I think Hardanger should be concentrating on Cliveden. I want to see Mme. Peugot."

"Very well. Hold on." I held on and after some minutes his voice came again. "Drive to Mordon. Helicopter there will fly you to Stanton airfield. Twin-seat jet night-fighter there. Forty minutes from Stanton to Paris. That suit you?"

"Fine. I'm afraid I've no passport with me, sir."

"You won't require it. If Mme. Peugot is still alive and still in Paris she'll be waiting for you in Orly airport. That I promise. I'll see you when I return — I'm leaving for Alfringham in thirty minutes."

He hung up and I turned away, the bundle of letters in my hand. I caught sight of Mrs. Turpin by the open door, her face expressionless. Her eyes moved from mire down to the packet of letters in my hand, then met mine again. After a moment she turned and disappeared. I wondered how long she had been there, looking and listening.

The General was as good as his word all the way through. The helicopter was waiting for me at Mordon. The jet at Stanton took exactly thirty-five hair-raising minutes to reach Orly airport. And Mme. Peugot, accompanied by a Parisian police inspector, was waiting for me in a private room there. Somebody, I thought, had moved very fast indeed.

As it turned out, it hadn't been so difficult to locate Mme. Peugot — now Madame Halle. She still worked in the same place as she had done in the later months of her acquaintanceship with MacDonald — the Pasteur Institute — and had readily agreed to come to the airport when the police had made plain the urgency. She was a dark, plump, attractive forty, and had readily smiling eyes. At that moment she was hesitant, unsure and slightly apprehensive, the normal reaction when police start taking an interest in you.

The French police officer, made the introductions. I said, wasting no time, "We would be most grateful if you could give us some information about an Englishman whose acquaintance you made in the middle forties—'45 and '46, to be precise. A Dr. Alexander MacDonald."

"Dr. MacDonald? Alex?" She laughed. "He'd be furious to hear himself described as an Englishman. At least, he would have been. In the days when I knew him he was the most ardent Scottish — what do you call it?"

"Nationalist?"

"Of course. A Scottish Nationalist. Fervent, I remember. Forever saying, 'down with the old enemy'—England — and up with the old Franco-Scottish alliance.' But I do know he fought most gallantly for the old enemy in the last war, so perhaps he was not so terribly sincere." She broke off and looked at me with an odd mixture of shrewdness and apprehension. "He — he's not dead, is he?"

"No, madame, he is not."

"But he is in trouble? Police trouble?" She was quick and clever, had seized at once on the almost imperceptible inflection in my voice.

" I'm afraid he may be. How and when did you first meet him, Madame Halle?"

"Two or three months before the war ended — the European war, I mean. Colonel MacDonald, as he was then, was sent to examine a munitions and chemical factory that had been run by the Germans for years at St. Denis. I was working in the research division of the same factory — not from choice, I assure you. I did not know then that Colonel MacDonald was himself a brilliant chemist. I took it upon myself to explain to him the various chemical processes and production lines and it wasn't until I'd finished the tour of the factory that I found out that he knew far more about it than I did." She smiled. "I think the gallant colonel had rather taken a fancy to me. And I to him." I nodded. Judging from the highly combustible tone of her letters she was considerably understating the case.

"He remained for several months in the Paris area," she continued. "I don't quite know what his duties were, but they were mostly of a technical nature. Every free moment we had we spent together." She shrugged. "It's all so long ago, it seems another world. He returned to England for demobilisation and was back inside a week. He tried to find employment in Paris, but it was impossible. I think he eventually got some sort of research job with the British Government."

"Did you ever know or hear or suspect anything shady or reprehensible about Colonel MacDonald?" I asked bluntly.

"Never. If I had I would not have associated with him." The conviction of the words, the dignity of manner, made it impossible not to believe her. I had the sudden hollow feeling that perhaps the General had been right after all and that I was just wasting valuable time — if, on bitter reflection, my time could be called valuable — on a wild-goose chase. Cavell returning home with his tail between his legs.

"Nothing?" I persisted. "Not the slightest thing you can think of?"

"You wish to insult me, perhaps?" Her voice was quiet.

"I'm sorry." I changed my approach. "May I ask if you were in love with him?"

"I take it Dr. MacDonald didn't send you here," she said calmly. "You must have learnt of me through my letters. You know the answer to your question."

"Was he in love with you?"

"I know he was. At least he asked me to marry him. Ten times at least. That should show, no?"

"But you didn't marry," I said. "You lost touch with him. And if you were both in love and he asked you to marry him, may I ask why you refused? For you must have refused."

"I refused for the same reason that our friendship ended. Partly, I'm afraid because, in spite of his protestations of love, he was an incurable philanderer, but mainly because there were profound differences between us and we were neither of us old enough or experienced enough to let our heads rule our hearts."

"Differences? May I ask what differences, Madame Halle?"

"You are persistent, aren't you? Does it matter?" She sighed. "I suppose it does to you. You'll just keep on until you get the answer. There's no secret about it and it's all very unimportant and rather silly."

"I'd still like to hear it."

"No doubt. France, you will remember, was in a most confused state politically after the war. We had parties whose views could not have been more divergent, from the extreme right to the very furthest left. I am a good Catholic and I was of the Catholic party of the Right." She smiled deprecatingly. "What you could call a true-blue Tory. Well, I'm afraid that Dr. MacDonald disagreed so violently with my political opinions that our friendship eventually became quite impossible. Those things happen, you know. When one is young, politics become so terribly important."

"Dr. MacDonald didn't share your Conservative viewpoint?"

"Conservative!" She laughed in genuine amusement. "Conservative, you say! Whether or not Alex was a genuine Scottish Nationalist I cannot say, but this much I can say with complete certainty: outside the walls of the Kremlin there never existed a more implacable and dedicated Communist. He was formidable."

One hour and ten minutes later I walked into the lounge of the Waggoner's Rest in Alfringham.