The Hidden Target

by Helen Macinnes

  “I tried hard to avoid it,” Claudel said. He was worried by the way the cars had been parked. The Renault was too far from the Mercedes and the Citroën, too near the empty Fiat. “The man held in the Renault—he isn’t handcuffed.”

  “He heard me say I had only one pair. So I was reserving them for the one who needed them most.”

  Claudel looked sharply at Roy; then wisely said nothing. At the door to the Mercedes, he glanced back at the Renault. Shawfield was being forced inside. The door beside him was closed and locked. One man guarded it. Only one? On the other side of the car, Lavji should have been on guard, but he was now advancing on the crowd that had gathered, ordering it to stay back, keep away, go home. Roy seemed not in the least perturbed by this, or by his three remaining agents, who were walking slowly away from the Renault, their duty done, their prisoner secured. Wondering, Claudel followed Roy into the front seat of the Mercedes.

  Nina’s body tightened; she looked quickly at Renwick. “A friend,” he assured her. “It’s all right, it’s all right, Nina.”

  Roy handed her the bag and scarf she had left in the Fiat. “Yes, everything is all right. Your money, too.” He inclined his head. “My name is Roy.”

  Renwick said, “Did you mention extradition?”

  “Not a word. A nice little surprise to come. But now— please!” Roy put a finger to his lips for silence, switched on the car’s radio. The voices came in, quiet but clear. It was Shawfield speaking, Shawfield and Gopal.

  Shawfield was asking, “...the car keys?”

  “I have them. Did you think I’d leave them?”

  “Where are we being taken?”

  “The central office, I heard. They talked with themselves, not with me.”

  “Where’s that?”

  “I’ve never been there—how can I know? Police headquarters, perhaps. But what can they arrest me for? I told them I didn’t know where we were going, I didn’t—”

  “Listen! Your hands and ankles are free. There is no guard outside your door. It isn’t locked. Get to the Fiat—it’s near—no one watching it. Drive straight ahead, down that street, lose yourself in the city. Then telephone. Call the Malabar Hotel. Ask for Suite 12A. Give this message and only this message. Don’t add any words!”

  “Suite 12A. Malabar Hotel. And the message?”

  “Marco was arrested at four-forty-five on false charges of kidnapping. Will be taken to central office—perhaps police headquarters.”

  “That is all?”

  “All. After the ’phone call, get back to your house. You’ll find Kiley there. Tell him to get everyone out—all five. He knows where I planned to take them—he will instruct you—you’ll be in charge of them. And above all—ditch that Fiat. It’s hot.”

  “Money—I’ll need money.”

  “He will give you plenty. Get going—quick—quick—now!”

  There was silence, scarcely broken by the opening of a door. Gopal’s movements weren’t audible. But he must have stepped outside: quietly, the door clicked shut.

  Roy switched off the radio, rolled down a window, listened. The view of Gopal’s escape was blocked by the Citroën, but the Citroën would also block Shawfield’s clear view of the Mercedes. Roy smiled. His favourite game was chess. “Gopal won’t get far. There is a police car waiting out of sight—near the end of the street that Gopal must take, the street that faces the Fiat. The other exit from this place—” Roy’s smile increased—“we are blocking it. Ah, there he goes now!”

  There were shouts of general confusion as the Fiat shot recklessly into the narrow street straight ahead. Lavji was in his Citroën, trying to get it started. The Fiat was out of sight before he could begin to follow.

  Roy watched the scene with a look of triumph on his usually placid face. He stepped outside the Mercedes to get a better view of his driver, posted near the Renault, who had now come out of his daydream and swung around—belatedly—to face his prisoner. “Good show,” Roy said approvingly. “Not one smile, not one laugh. Very good.” He signalled to his driver to return as the other three agents reached Shawfield in the Renault. Within a minute, it was driving away, heading for the exit that had been barred to Gopal.

  “Damned neat!” Renwick said. Claudel was laughing, shaking his head. And Roy, tactfully avoiding any near approach to the white-faced girl who was still tense, still bewildered, squeezed into the front seat beside the driver (now grinning widely) and Claudel. The Mercedes left, too, with a cluster of curious diehards, obvious Muslims with heads covered by turbans or caps, staring after it in wonder, or perhaps with the increasing conviction that all infidels, whether Hindu or Christian, were crazy. That opinion would have been reinforced if they could have seen Roy pick up a ’phone and reach his office, miles away behind the Malabar Gift Shop, to start inquiries about Suite 12A. He had dropped his Oxford-accented English to speak volubly in a language that was strange even to the driver. “We’ll soon know,” he told Renwick when the call was over. “Before we reach the hotel, we will know.”

  “I’ve one serious reservation,” Renwick said. “In fact, it’s more than that. Nina—well, I don’t want her staying at that hotel.” And, his tone of voice said, that was final.

  “There’s no time to make other arrangements,” Roy objected. “Your hotel, Robert, is neither so comfortable nor so well protected. She would be alone there: you have much business to finish.”

  Renwick needed no reminder of that. “I have two friends who are on call for any emergency. They’ll guard Nina until Pierre or I can take over.” He looked at Nina. We’ve frozen her out of this conversation, he thought as he noticed she was uncertain and troubled once more. He drew her into it, said, “Remember the two Australians in the red Ferrari?”

  She nodded.

  “They’ll have you on a plane as soon as it’s safe enough. But not alone,” he added quickly. “There will be someone with you all the way home.”

  “You?”

  “If that is possible,” he could only say. If I’m still alive, he was thinking. He tightened his hand on hers, felt a small response. I’ll damned well make it possible: I’m not going to lose her this time.

  Suddenly she was relaxed. Her voice was almost normal as she said to Roy, “I’m sorry to be such a complication. I’ll stay at Bob’s hotel.”

  A most unnecessary complication, thought Roy, but at least she realises that. It seemed a good moment to press an urgent question. “Before you reach there, would you help us? Can you describe the district where you stayed? The street—do you know its name? The house—had it a number?”

  “I didn’t notice—didn’t see any names...” She shook her head, felt stupid.

  “Somewhere near Ballard Pier,” Claudel prompted her. “Wasn’t that where you telephoned, Nina? From a money exchange in the harbour area?”

  “Yes.” She tried to focus her thoughts, bring back a memory she wanted to dismiss forever. She made an effort. “If I saw it again, I’d recognise it. The house—” so many of these houses looked alike—“wasn’t far away. Quite near. Have you time to—”

  “Time? You could save us hours of searching,” Roy said, forgiving her completely for having upset his plans. “It will take only a few extra minutes,” he told Renwick, countering any objections from him. “And,” he clinched the matter, “we’ll drive past the house; we won’t stop.”

  Before they entered the harbour area, the return ’phone call from the Malabar came though. Roy had his information: Dr. Frederick Weber, an antique dealer from London, occupied Suite 12A. He had registered last Tuesday for a five-day visit, along with his secretary and his valet, who occupied the same accommodations. “All is well,” Roy reported. “He travels in style.” Later, his eyes told Renwick and Claudel, I’ll give you the details later. He glanced at his watch. Almost five o’clock. Just over two hours ago there had been nothing but apparent failure. He beamed happily at Nina.

  “Travels in style, does he?” Claudel murmured. “Some ex
pense account!”

  Yes, thought Renwick, that’s Theo.

  24

  Theo’s instructions, sent in code to the camper before it had entered Bombay, were precise. Kiley was to meet him at two o’clock in the Malabar Hotel. Kiley was to be circumspectly dressed. Kiley was to avoid the four large elevators (attended) and make sure that one of the smaller elevators (self-service) was empty before he used it. Kiley was to get out at the twelfth floor. Kiley would be met by a red-haired man who would greet him in Italian: “This is warmer than Rome in August.” Kiley would reply in Dutch: “And as hot as Jakarta.” Kiley would then be conducted to Theo’s rooms, pausing—if anyone should appear in the corridor—to chat with his guide until they judged it was safe to enter.

  In spite of a sense of urgency—why else had such an unexpected meeting been arranged?—Kiley felt amusement as he stepped into Suite 12A. Tony would blame that on Nina’s bad influence, he thought; and perhaps it was. Back in Essen, he wouldn’t have seen anything comic in the contrast between a secretive approach and an open rendezvous. For what else would you call a meeting in a luxury hotel? No shadowed Gothic pillars this time for Theo, no slipping into the aisles of the Minster.

  His escort entered a room on the left, where Kiley glimpsed a blond, thin-shouldered man at a table with elaborate equipment. The door closed. Kiley waited, looking at the elegance around him. The last comfortable hotel room he had seen—the only one, in fact, he had ever occupied—had been at Russell Square in London, and it looked like a hen house compared to all this. Then his critical study of Theo’s living quarters ended as the door to his right opened, and Theo appeared. The three minutes’ delay had been calculated, thought Kiley. He overcame his surprise at Theo’s appearance—apart from his height and weight, he was difficult to recognise. He was now a white-haired man without glasses, a white moustache on his short upper lip, slow in movement and dressed in a dark-grey silk suit.

  But Theo’s voice was as crisp as ever as he greeted Kiley in German. His grey eyes had the same strange alternation of bland innocence and calm scrutiny. “Four months since we met,” he said, shaking hands briefly. “You look well, Erik. They have agreed with you. Not too unpleasant a journey? Sit down, sit down. We have much to discuss without wasting time. I must leave here no later than three o’clock—an important meeting at three-thirty.” He pointed to a low chair on one side of a small gilded table, and selected the one (firmer, higher, more commanding) opposite.

  “I sent regular reports—” Kiley began slightly on the defensive.

  “Read with much interest. A successful trip on the whole. You had a tendency, however, to give more importance to the revolutionaries of the extreme left than to members of the Communist groups. In Iran, for instance, you saw only two of the Tudeh—”

  “I spoke with them.”

  “So the Soviet Embassy informed me.”

  It would, thought Kiley: it had agents and spies everywhere, the biggest intelligence network in all of Iran. “I found the Tudeh people waited too much for instructions. The militant revolutionaries may be more extreme, but they’ll take action on their own whenever they see the chance.”

  “And that appeals to you.” Theo shook his head. “Are you still unwilling to admit that anarchists won’t succeed—in the long run? That is what counts, Erik. Not today’s quick victories but tomorrow’s permanent success.” Theo smiled. “You’ll come around to seeing it yet.” He dismissed the topic with a wave of his hand. His mood turned solemn. “I have had some disquieting news. We have to alter our original plan.”

  “Which one?”

  Theo’s eyebrows were raised.

  “We had three objectives, hadn’t we?” As Theo kept a watchful silence, Kiley went on. “First: Marco and I were to drop out of sight completely, leave the West Germans baffled. Second: we were to recruit and encourage while we travelled, select the most promising material. Third: I was to gain acceptance into the O’Connell household, possibly as a future son-in-law.”

  There was a brief silence. The third objective had never been detailed. Erik was smart, thought Theo, sometimes too smart. “Have you actually asked the girl to marry you?”

  “Not exactly. Hinted at it. It seemed wiser to—”

  “Are you lovers?”

  “Not yet. I planned that for Bali.” Kiley was embarrassed. “Just making sure of the last stages in our journey to Washington.”

  “To bad that we must cancel your visit to Bali.”

  Incredulous, Kiley stared at him. “What? Cancel?”

  “You will go directly from here to America—to a training camp I have established in Southern California. One of my best agents was in charge, but he died—along with his chief assistant. I need two capable men to replace him: you and Marco. It’s an important assignment—the final training of students who have graduated from camps abroad, preparing them for specialised work in the United States.”

  Angrily, Kiley said, “What about the O’Connell project? You told me, back in Essen, that it was of top priority. You said it had approval and backing at the ‘highest levels’—wasn’t that what you said?”

  How much does he need to know to be kept in line? Theo wondered. “Yes,” he said smoothly, “my first suggestion was very well received at the highest levels. It was, quite simply, the idea that you would be a very useful son-in-law—for us—when Francis O’Connell becomes Secretary of State. He is in line for that; and, in fact, if his new wife has her way, he may even run for President.”

  “That’s not my kind of future, and you know it, Theo.”

  “Yes, I know it. And so, once I was given a small department of my own—necessary to prevent any leaks, any information about such a project being whispered around—I amended that original idea, added more action for you and Marco.”

  “Such as?”

  “A more explosive situation, shall we say?”

  “And is it approved by the highest levels?”

  Theo side-stepped that question. “I’ve been given full charge of this project.”

  “Of the original idea,” Kiley corrected him, and then frowned. “Very clever of them. They thought they’d keep me hanging around Washington for years. And who’d be leading Direct Action in Europe, then? One of their stooges, I bet.” Or one of yours, he added silently.

  “Relax, Erik. I changed all that.”

  “Do they know?”

  “Time enough for them to know when my plan succeeds. It will be far more devastating than having access to a future Secretary of State.”

  “O’Connell might learn he’s being used.”

  “What could he do? Let the world know that his daughter is married to a terrorist—of your reputation and importance, Erik?”

  Kiley wasn’t to be silenced by that compliment. “I don’t see why you have to ditch me now. If there’s some action ahead, I can handle it.” They must be big, bigger than O’Connell himself. In rising excitement, he added, “Don’t cut me out, Theo, You owe me—”

  “Arrangements have already been made,” Theo said. That was final. “The O’Connell assignment has been given to another agent.”

  “Are you sure that agent knows enough about explosives? You did mention an explosive situation, didn’t you?”

  Theo regretted his joke. “The agent will not have to deal with explosives. We have found other specialists for that job. All my agent will have to do is—substitute. Scarcely an assignment worthy of your talents, Erik.” And that should end his interest.

  Kiley almost laughed. Even if Theo believed in simple means backed by elaborate stratagems, a substitution was too damned simple. No use arguing that. Theo would answer that simple means were the hardest to detect: anything normal aroused no suspicion.

  “Yes?” Theo had noticed the fleeting amusement in Kiley’s eyes.

  Something normal, arousing no suspicion... Kiley’s quick mind made a stab at several possibilities. “Just speculating on what you’ve chosen to hold your bomb. Somethin
g portable, I’d imagine—unless you intend to blow O’Connell’s house to pieces. But that would be hardly worth the effort. Nothing of importance there.”

  “Really?” Theo was on guard. “And what would you use to conceal your explosives—something portable, you said?”

  “Well—” Kiley hesitated, spoke half-jokingly—“something like a briefcase. It’s just simple-minded enough to succeed—if the right man was carrying it into the right place.”

  “Amusing idea.” Theo managed a thin smile. “But forget it. A briefcase did not work with Hitler.” And that, he thought, ends all discussion.

  “I imagine—” Kiley ventured a touch of sarcasm—“there have been a few slight improvements in explosives since Hitler’s day.”

  “So I’ve heard,” Theo said coldly.

  “I could rig a briefcase with enough power to blast not only a large room apart but also every adjacent room and corridor.” Kiley’s confidence was returning. Yes, he thought, I’ll show him that Marco and I are as good a team as he could find for any O’Connell assignment. “How to set off the explosives? We could use a timer or remote control.”

  The best way to stop all speculation, thought Theo, may be to give him full rein, and then pull him up to a sudden and sharp halt. “Which would you choose? Supposing, that is, you were planning to use this hypothetical briefcase?”

  “Not a timer,” Kiley decided. “A meeting in a conference room could be delayed, or ended sooner than expected. Remote control is surer—with someone in a corridor nearby to see when everyone had entered the room. We’d need advance information, of course, to make certain the meeting was important and would be well attended.”

  “Of course,” Theo echoed, all innocence. “You’d have your sources for that information, I presume.”