“Of course. What is it?”
“It’s called ‘Emergency Exit’. Inside you’ll find a passport. The photograph resembles you sufficiently. You’ll have to make a few small changes. Arrange your hair differently. That should be easy enough for a man of your talents.” A smile twitched the corner of Lady Lefroy’s mouth. “And wear glasses. You’ll find them in the packet too. There’s a wad of French and German money, and instructions as to what you’re to do when you get to Cologne. From there you’ll be flying to Berlin. There’s a second passport to use in Berlin, and a second set of instructions. After you open the packet – which you’re not to do until you’re back in London – all instructions are to be learned by heart and then destroyed. And the first passport is to be destroyed when you reach Cologne. Is that all clear?”
Michael let his breath out with a soft sigh. “All clear,” he said. “And thank you.”
“A final word. These things aren’t issued in duplicate. So look after it carefully.”
Michael made an unsuccessful attempt to stow the bulky oilskin-covered packet in his coat pocket. Lady Lefroy took it from him. She said, “Open the front of your shirt. That’s right. Stow it down there. Now button it up again. Right. Don’t open the curtains until I’ve turned the light off.”
She stood for a few moments after Michael had gone. She was taut as a violin string. The young dog, crouched at her feet, sensed it and growled, low in his throat. The sound broke the tension.
“All right,” said Lady Lefroy. “Back to bed. Nothing more to worry about.”
Among other irritating habits Mrs. Orbiston was accustomed to turning on her portable radio for the seven o’clock news, and retailing the choicer items to the company at breakfast. Lady Lefroy had not appeared, so her audience consisted of Captain Rowlandson, who was never fully awake until he had finished his after-breakfast pipe, and Mr. Behrens whose mind appeared to be elsewhere.
“Burglars,” she announced. “Stole jewellery worth fifteen thousand pounds. At Greystone House. That’s not far from here, is it?”
“I’ve no idea,” said Captain Rowlandson.
“Well, I’m sure it is nearby. Because the people were called Baynes, and I’ve heard Marcia talk about them.”
“Serve them right. When you go away you ought to put your jewellery in the bank.”
“That’s just it. That’s what made it so terrible. The men went into their bedroom, while they were there, and helped themselves to the jewel box off the dressing table. It makes your flesh creep. I was just saying, Marcia—”
“If it’s the Bayneses you’re talking about,” said Lady Lefroy, who had come into the room at that moment, “I’ve just heard. Mary Baynes was on the telephone.”
“One good thing,” said Captain Rowlandson, “they wouldn’t get away with it here. Sultan would see them off.”
“He’s a very light sleeper,” agreed Lady Lefroy. “All the same, I can’t help thinking that it might be better if he didn’t give the alarm.”
“Oh—why?”
“I gather these burglars are pretty desperate characters. And all my stuff is well insured.”
“That’s pure defeatism, Marcia. Don’t you agree, Behrens?”
Mr. Behrens said, “Defeatism might be preferable to being shot.”
Mrs. Orbiston, seeing the conversation drifting away from her, pulled it back sharply. She said, “And that wasn’t the only exciting thing that happened in this part of the country. Roysters Cross is quite close to here, too, isn’t it?”
“About four miles away,” said Lady Lefroy. “Why?”
“There was a terrible accident there last night. A man blew himself up.”
“Blew himself up?”
“That’s what the news commentator said.”
“Curious way of committing suicide,” said Captain Rowlandson.
“The possibility of accident has not been ruled out.”
“You can’t very well blow yourself up by accident,” said Mr. Behrens. “That is, unless you’re carrying some sort of bomb.”
“Perhaps it was a tyre blow-out,” said Lady Lefroy. “Would you mind passing the marmalade?”
“It didn’t sound like a tyre blow-out. They said the man and the car were blown to bits.”
“Amatol or dextrol,” said Mr. Calder. “Or just possibly good old-fashioned nitroglycerine. Although that’s got rather a detectable smell.”
“What sort of fuse?” asked Mr. Fortescue.
“Something silent. Wire and acid?”
“Very likely,” agreed Mr. Fortescue. “It’s notoriously inaccurate. I’ve no doubt the thing was intended to go off a lot further away from Lady Lefroy’s house. Or maybe he took longer to walk back to his car than she anticipated. How do you think she arranged it?”
“I imagine it was something she gave him to take back to London. A parcel of some sort.”
“The whole thing,” said Mr. Fortescue, “is most unfortunate. Michael was responding nicely to treatment. He would soon have been ready to co-operate.”
“Evidently Marcia thought so, too.”
“It demonstrates what we have always suspected – that she’s a ruthless and unscrupulous woman.”
“It demonstrates something else, too,” said Mr. Calder. “If she tumbled to what we were doing – twisting Michael’s tail so hard that he’d incriminate her – she must have suspected that we were onto her as well.”
Mr. Fortescue said, “Hmm. Maybe.”
“Not certain, I agree. But a workable assumption. And if it’s true, it must mean that she’s decided to stay put and brazen it out. Because if she had decided to quit she’d have kept Michael on ice for a day or two, while she made all her preparations.”
“It’s not a happy conclusion, Calder.”
“It’s a very unhappy conclusion. Now that she’s been warned she’ll sever all her contacts and lie low for a very long time. Possibly forever.”
“It would, I suppose, be a halfway solution,” said Mr. Fortescue. He didn’t sound very happy about it. “All the same, I don’t think it’s a chance we can take. Do you?”
“No,” said Mr. Calder. “I don’t.” He added, “I read in the papers that there’d been another burglary down in the Petersfield area. It’s some sort of gang. The police say that they’re armed, and dangerous. They’ve put out a warning to all householders in the neighbourhood.”
Mr. Fortescue thought about this for a long time. Then he said, “Yes. I think that would be best. It’ll mean keeping the Admiral up in London for another night. I’ll get the Minister to reconvene the conference.”
“How’s he going to get away with that one? He can’t keep senior admirals and generals in London on a Sunday. Not in peacetime.”
“Then we’ll have to declare war on someone,” said Mr. Fortescue.
Marcia sat up in bed and said, “Stop it, Sultan. What’s the matter with you?”
It had been a savage growl – no gentle rumbling warning, but a note of imminent danger.
The moon, cloud-racked, was throwing a grey light into the room. As her sight adjusted itself, Marcia could dimly see the figure at which Sultan was snarling.
She twisted one hand into his collar, and with the other she switched on the bed-table lamp. A man was standing beside the dressing table, examining an opened jewel case. He put the case down and said, “If you don’t keep that dog under control I shall have to shoot him. It won’t make a lot of noise, because this gun’s silenced, but I’d hate to have to mess up a nice animal like that.”
“If that jewel case interests you, you’re welcome to it. It’s got nothing but costume jewellery in it – stop it, Sultan – worth twenty-five pounds, if you’re lucky.”
“And insured for five hundred, I don’t doubt,” said the intruder. “I’m not really interested in jewellery. That’s just an excuse for meeting you. I wanted to get your version of what happened to Michael last night.”
“Michael? Michael who?”
“I’ve no idea what you’re talking about,” said Lady Lefroy. Her voice gave nothing away. Only her eyes were thoughtful, and the knuckles of the hand which held Sultan’s collar showed white.
The door opened quietly. Calder’s colleague, Mr. Behrens, looked in.
“You’ve come just at the right moment,” said the first intruder. “Have you got the tape?”
“I have it,” said Mr. Behrens, “and a recorder. I had to wire three rooms to be sure of getting it.”
Lady Lefroy’s look had hardened. She moved her head slowly, trying to sum up both men, to weigh this new development. It was the reaction of a professional, faced by a threat from a new quarter.
“You know each other, I see.”
“Indeed, yes,” said Mr. Behrens. “Calder and I have known each other for twenty years. Or is it twenty-five? Time goes so quickly when you’re interested in your work.”
“So you’re in this together.”
“We often work as a team.”
“You do the snooping and sneaking, and he does the rough stuff.”
“Exactly,” said Mr. Behrens. “We find it an excellent arrangement.” He was busy with the tape recorder. “Now perhaps we can convince you we’re not bluffing. Where shall we start?”
There was a click, and they heard Lady Lefroy’s voice say, “It’s called ‘Emergency Exit’. Inside you’ll find a passport—” They listened in silence for a full minute. “Open the front of your shirt. That’s right. Stow it down there—”
Mr. Behrens turned the machine off.
“A nice touch,” he said. “It must have been resting on his stomach when it went off. No wonder there wasn’t much of him left.”
Lady Lefroy said, “That tape recording proves nothing. You say it’s my voice. I say it’s a clumsy fake. It doesn’t even sound much like me.”
“You mustn’t forget that I saw Michael, both coming and going.”
“Lies! Why do you bother me with such lies?” Again her eyes turned from one man to the other. She was trying to estimate which of them was the stronger character, which one she should attack, what weapons in her well-stocked armoury she should use. It was confusing to have to deal with two at once.
In the end she said, with a well-contrived yawn, “Do I understand that this is all leading up to something? That you have some proposal to put to me? If so, please put it, so that I can get back to sleep.”
“Our proposal,” said Mr. Calder, “is this. If you will make a written statement, naming your employers, and your contacts, giving full details which can be verified in forty-eight hours, we’ll give you the same length of time to get out of the country.”
“We feel certain,” said Mr. Behrens, “that you have all your arrangements made.”
“More efficient, if less drastic, than the ones you made for Michael.”
All expression had gone out of Lady Lefroy’s face. It was a mask – a meticulously constructed mask behind which a quick brain weighed the advantages and disadvantages of the proposal. When she smiled, Mr. Behrens knew that they had lost.
“You’re bluffing,” she said. “I call your bluff. Go away.”
“A pity,” said Mr. Behrens.
“Very disappointing,” said Mr. Calder. “We shall have to use Plan Number Two.”
“You do understand,” said Mr. Behrens earnestly, “that you’ve brought this on yourself. We have no alternative.”
Lady Lefroy said nothing. There was something here she found disturbing.
Mr. Calder said, “It’s this gang of burglars, you see. Armed burglars. They’ve been breaking into houses round here. Tonight they turned their attention to this house. You woke up and caught one of them rifling your jewel case.”
“And what happened then?”
“Then,” said Mr. Calder, “he shot you.”
Three things happened together: a scream from Marcia Lefroy, cut short; the resonant twang of the silenced automatic pistol; and a snarl of fury as the dog went for Mr. Calder’s throat.
Mr. Behrens moved almost as quickly as the dog. He caught up the two corners of the blanket on which the dog had been lying and enveloped him in it, a growling, writhing, murderous bundle. Mr. Calder dropped his gun, grabbed the other two corners of the blanket, knotted them together.
“It was unpardonable,” said Mr. Fortescue.
“I know,” said Mr. Calder. “But—”
“There are no ‘buts’ about it. It was an unnecessary complication, and a quite unjustifiable risk. Suppose he is recognised.”
“All Persian deerhounds have a strong family resemblance. Once he’s fully grown there’ll be no risk at all. I’ll rename him of course. I thought that Rasselas might be the appropriate name for an Eastern prince—”
“I can’t approve.”
“He’s beautifully bred. And he’s got all the courage in the world. You should have seen the way he came for me. Straight as an arrow. If Behrens hadn’t got the blanket over him, he’d have had my throat for sure. What were we to do?”
“You should have immobilised him.”
“You can’t immobilise a partly grown deerhound.” “Then you should have shot him.”
“Shoot a dog like that,” said Mr. Calder. “You must be joking.”
3
One-to-Ten
The notice, in firm black letters on a big white board, said, “War Department Property. Keep to made tracks. If you find anything leave it alone. It may explode.” The last three words were in capital letters. Beside it a much smaller, older, faded green board said, “Hurley Bottom Farm – one mile.”
Mr. Calder read out both notices to Rasselas, and added, “You’d better keep to heel and leave the rabbits alone.” Rasselas grinned at him. He thought that Salisbury Plain was a promising sort of place.
Man and dog set off down the path. After half a mile it forked. There was nothing to indicate which fork to take. Mr. Calder decided that the right-hand one, which went uphill, looked more attractive.
It was a windless autumn day. As they reached the top of the rise they could see the Plain spread round them in a broad arc, wave behind wave, all soft greens and browns, running away to the horizon, meeting and melting into the grey of the sky. Two pigeons got up from a clump of trees and circled at a safe distance from the man and the dog. A big flock of fieldfares swung across the sky, thick as black smoke, forming and reforming and vanishing as mysteriously as they had come.
Mr. Calder unslung his field glasses and made a slow traverse of the area. Rasselas sat beside him, a tip of pink tongue hanging out of the side of his mouth.
When the voice spoke, it was unexpectedly harsh, magnified by the loud-hailer. “You there, with the dog.”
Mr. Calder turned slowIt was an army truck, and a blond subaltern in battle dress with the red and blue flashes of the Artillery, was standing beside the driver.
“If you go much farther you’ll be in the target area.”
Mr. Calder said, “Well, thanks very much for telling me.” By this time he had got close enough to the truck to see the unit signs. “I’m too old to be shot at. Don’t you think your people might have put up some sort of warning?”
“The red flags are all flying.”
“I must have missed them. I was looking for Hurley Bottom Farm.”
“You should have forked left a good quarter of a mile back. We ought to put up a notice there, I suppose. All the locals know it, of course. I take it you’re a stranger?”
“That’s right,” said Mr. Calder. “I’m a stranger, and if it’s crossed your mind that I might be a Chinese spy, I could refer you to Colonel Crofter at Porton. He’ll give you some sort of a character, I dare say.”
The boy sm
iled and said, “I didn’t think you were a spy. But I thought you might be going to get your head blown off. It causes a lot of trouble when it happens. Courts of Enquiry and goodness knows what. That’s a lovely dog. What sort is he?”
“He’s a Persian deerhound. They used them to hunt wolves, actually.”
“He looks as if he could deal with a wolf, too. Are you a friend of Mrs. King-Bassett? Or perhaps you were just going to ride?”
Mr. Calder looked blank.
“She owns Hurley Bottom Farm. The place you said you were going to. And runs a riding stable. A lot of our chaps go there.”
“To ride?”
“That’s right.” The boy, who seemed to think he had said too much, added abruptly, “You’ll find the turning’s back there.”
Mr. Calder thanked him and trudged off. As he did so, the battery, tucked into a valley to his right, opened up and a salvo of shells came whistling lazily over and landed with a familiar crump-crump in the dip to his left.
The path to Hurley Bottom took him away from the ranges and into farmland. The soil was Wiltshire chalk with a thin crust of loam. It would not be very productive, he imagined. At a point where the path ran between two thorn hedges he heard a sudden thundering of hooves behind him and, removing himself with undignified haste to one side, he tripped and landed on all fours.
“What the bloody hell do you think you’re doing?” enquired a magnificent female figure, encased in riding breeches, riding boots, a canary yellow polo-necked sweater and a hard hat, and mounted on what appeared to Mr. Calder, from his worm’s-eye view, to be about thirty foot superficial of chestnut horse.
He climbed to his feet, removed a handful of leafmould from his right ear and said, “This is a public footpath, isn’t it?”
“It also happens to be a bridle path,” said the lady.
Mr. Calder had had time to look at her now. He saw a brick-red but not unhandsome face. Sulky eyes, a gash of red mouth, and a firm chin.
“When you come round a corner as fast as that,” he said, “you ought to sound your horn. I take it you’re Mrs. King-Bassett?”
Mr. Calder & Mr. Behrens Page 5