by John Denis
With studied deliberation, Graham reached out his free hand, and coolly ripped away from Claude’s chest the electronic metal safety tag.
Claude had been expecting anything but that. His body froze, and all movement ceased in him as the moonlight fell on the weaving laser-gun fifty feet above him. The mouse-ears searched out and found this unprotected foreign body in its territory, and sent a beam of blinding white light lancing through the Frenchman’s heart.
* * *
In the restaurant, Smith was standing with Pei at the computer console. Pei reported that a Lap-Laser had fired. He used the evidence of his eyes: he had seen the series of glowing lights crossing the screen of the console — a sure sign that one of the guns had operated.
Smith scanned the console intently … it could have been a bird — or it might mean something infinitely more dangerous to him. Then for a second time the screen pulsed with light, registering the death of Claude Légère.
‘There it is again!’ Pei shouted. ‘It’s fired twice.’
‘Give me the position,’ Smith ordered. ‘The exact position.’
He strode from the little stage, fuming, to gather his closest lieutenants around him. He couldn’t see Claude in the restaurant, and was hurrying out to the railed gallery when he almost collided with Leah coming in.
‘Where is Claude?’ Smith demanded. Leah replied that she thought Claude had been with Smith in the restaurant.
‘If he was in there I wouldn’t be asking for him!’ Smith shouted. ‘Now if you can’t be more helpful than that, call him on the bleeper.’
Leah hurried to the radio, and sent out a signal which would activate Claude’s personally-coded communicator. There was a pause, and she signalled again. Smith paced over to the desk and pushed her roughly aside. He operated the keys himself.
‘Why isn’t he answering?’ he gritted.
‘Maybe …’
‘Maybe what?’
‘Maybe he — can’t,’ Leah whispered.
* * *
Sabrina scuttled over the face of the tower like a human fly. A rope was looped around her body, and she dropped lightly on to the platform where she was to have met Graham, to see him dragging Claude’s body back along the catwalk.
She gasped, ‘What’s happened? Are you all right?’
Mike looked up, and whistled in relief. ‘Christ,’ he said, ‘you’re a sight for sore eyes. I ran into trouble with Claude, and I had to administer a rather drastic remedy to stop him kicking me silly.’
Sabrina looked at him questioningly, and Mike opened his hand and showed her the metal tag. She caught her breath, and shone her torch on Claude’s face … then brought it slowly down his body. ‘Oh, my God,’ she said.
‘Don’t feel sorry for him,’ Mike whispered. ‘He was trying to kill me. Just help me get rid of him.’
Sabrina said, ‘Where’s C.W.?’
‘Still in the VIP room with Mrs. Wheeler, I guess,’ Mike answered. ‘Why?’
Sabrina unslung the rope from her shapely frame. ‘Let’s send him a present.’ Mike grinned, and pinned the metal tag back on Claude’s body. They tied the rope round his waist, balanced him once more on the cross-strut, and lowered him gently down the side of the tower. Mike peered at the splash of light coming from the window of the VIP room, and said, ‘A few more feet, perhaps.’ They paid out more line carefully, until Graham ordered, ‘Halt. That should just about do it.’
Adela Wheeler’s hand flew to her mouth when she caught sight of the dangling corpse. ‘Dear God,’ she cried, ‘what now?’
C.W.’s eyes darted to the window, and he said, ‘Oh, oh. Somebody’s been having trouble.’
He crossed the room and peered closer. ‘But nothing compared with the trouble poor old Claude’s been having,’ he murmured. He gestured to Mrs Wheeler. ‘Watch the door, sweetie. We have an uninvited guest.’ C.W. opened the window and hauled the body inside.
At that moment, Smith’s voice echoed around the tower through the loud-hailer. ‘This is Mister Smith. All personnel come to the restaurant now.’
Sabrina dropped the rope over the side, and she and Mike flattened themselves in the shadows of I-beams as the second level patrol scorned using the elevator, and clattered down the staircase to the first landing. After a suitable interval, Mike and Sabrina followed them.
The entire commando crew were lined up by Smith, and Sabrina and Graham made up the numbers. Smith did a quick head-count.
‘Right,’ he snapped, ‘has anyone seen Claude Légère in the past fifteen minutes?’ There were blank looks or head-shakes up and down the line.
‘Or C.W.?’ Again, negative. Smith’s eyes darted from man to man, woman to woman. They rested longest on Graham and Sabrina.
‘There is nowhere on this tower,’ he said slowly, ‘that they could possibly be, where they would have been unable to hear the announcement I made just now, and which all of you plainly heard. So, either they are off the tower — which is inconceivable — or something has happened to one, or the other, or both. I want them found. I want them found now.’
Smith allocated various commandos to search appointed sectors of the tower, and directed his last command at Graham: they would go together to the VIP room to check on Mrs Wheeler. Leah trailed dutifully in Graham’s wake, and Sabrina, whose search area included the block where the VIP room lay, followed some distance behind. It meant circumnavigating the first level gallery, and they arrived to find Tote standing guard.
‘Why did you not answer my summons?’ Smith snapped. ‘And leave my post?’ Tote queried, with a touch of studied insolence. Smith bristled, but chose to ignore both the insolence and the improper form of address. Privately, he admitted that his troops had become more and more informal the longer the operation lasted, and this tended to make him lose his iron control. Nonetheless, Tote had been correct to stay.
‘Is everything all right, then?’ he enquired. ‘Nobody’s been near here,’ Tote grunted, ‘not while I’ve stood guard.’ Smith instructed him to unlock the door.
Adela Wheeler’s chair was facing three-quarters to the window. They could see her hands folded in her lap, and the shapely ankles, and her feet in their high court shoes. Her face and hair were hidden, both enveloped in the big, soft cushion. She was clearly asleep, and, irrationally, this infuriated Smith.
‘Stay by the door, Graham,’ Smith ordered. ‘Leah — wake her. I find the sight of her offensive.’
Mike stood at the open door, hands clasped behind his back. His muscles clenched and his eyes widened as the door moved of its own volition, the handle coming to rest neatly in his hand. He pressed back tentatively on the door — and met solid resistance.
Leah could still not see Mrs Wheeler’s face. She said, ‘Are you awake?’ When she got no response, she repeated, more loudly, ‘Mrs Wheeler — are you awake, I said?’
She bent down slightly, and shook the velvet cushion. It dropped to the seat of the chair past the drooping figure’s arms. With its support gone, the head lurched sideways — and Claude’s dead, agony-filled eyes stared back at her.
Leah screamed, and screamed again. The sight of the corpse grotesquely dressed in the party gown, stockings and fashion shoes of an elderly woman completely unnerved her. Even Tote, at her shoulder, hissed and swore.
Smith rushed forward, beads of sweat starting along his forehead. His eyes took in the body, and then flew to the window. Leah screamed once more, and Smith struck her with uncaring strength across the face with the back of his hand.
‘Now!’ Graham hissed, and moved away from the door.
‘Obliged, buddy,’ C.W. whispered. He and Mrs Wheeler — she now wore Claude’s clothes, and shoes, and his metal safety tag — slipped out of the room.
‘Shut up, you fool,’ Smith shouted, and Leah subsided to a whimper. Smith crossed to the window, Tote at his elbow. Tote pointed, and Smith peered into the night. There was a rope, running up to an I-beam. Smith jerked the window open, and poked his h
ead out. As far up the tower as he could see, nothing was there that shouldn’t have been there. No movement, no tell-tale flash of light; he strained his ears … no instrusive footsteps rang out on the metal treads.
He turned back to Graham. Smith was sweating freely now, and spittle started to form at the corners of his mouth. His eyes ranged wildly from Leah to Graham to Tote, and back down to Claude. It was simply not even remotely possible that one of his projects could go wrong. ‘Do you hear, whoever you are?’ he muttered. ‘It is not possible.’
Graham raised his eyebrows at Smith, and Smith’s control snapped. ‘Search!’ he screeched. ‘Search, damn you! Search everywhere, everything!’
He turned on Tote, and grasped his shirt-front. ‘You say no one came came in, or out, while you were here?’ Tote nodded, dumbly. ‘Then how did she get out of the room?’ Smith asked, icily. Tote pointed towards the window.
‘It’s impossible,’ Leah said. ‘At her age? She isn’t a mountaineer, for God’s sake.’
‘No, but C.W. is,’ Tote said. ‘He can climb anything, up or down.’
Smith swore, in a language he was confident none of them recognized. He charged across the room to a sofa, and ripped the cushions off. ‘There must be something here, there must!’ he shouted. He ran to a closet, pulled open the door, and yanked out towels, table-cloths and napkins. The other three stood rooted to the spot as Smith lost his cool. Then Leah went to him, and put her hand on his arm. ‘Liebchen,’ she said, ‘stay calm. This is not you. Be still, and think. We depend on you — only you.’
The flattery was therapeutic. Smith breathed hard and deeply, and slowly the fury left his eyes. He licked his lips, and almost visibly pulled himself together, his chest rising and settling, his shoulders squaring.
‘You’re right, Leah,’ he said, ‘this is no time for hysteria. We have to be methodical. They are still on the tower. We shall find them. Graham, Tote … at the first sight of Whitlock — kill him, instantly. I have no wish to know for whom he is working. I want him dead.
‘Do not, however,’ he cautioned, ‘make a mistake. Mrs Wheeler is presumably wearing Claude’s clothing. In the dark, she could be taken for the negro. Be careful. Now go! And get help. Everyone is to search for them!’
Graham and Tote hurried from the room — Graham to try to locate C.W., Tote to link up with Pei, who had been left on duty by the telephone. On the far side of the landing, a shadowy figure in battle-dress came out of the shadows. Smith stopped in the doorway, and levelled his machine pistol.
‘Who is that?’ he demanded. ‘Advance, or I’ll fire. The lasers can’t stop bullets here, as you must know.’
Sabrina stepped into the light, holding a metal object in her hand. ‘I don’t know what’s going on,’ she said, ‘but I found this over there by the railing,’ she nodded her head behind her. She offered the slim steel box to Smith. It was Claude’s communicator.
Graham had covered no more than three yards when C.W.’s voice reached him from the shadow of an open door next to the VIP room. ‘So what now?’ C.W. said.
Mike turned on his heel, to see Smith and Leah engrossed in the examination of Claude’s communicator, as if it could speak to reveal some hidden secret of how the Frenchman had met his death. ‘Come,’ Graham replied, ‘and hurry.’
C.W. and Adela Wheeler followed him, and Mike’s body effectively masked their return to the VIP room from the group standing at the railing. Once inside, C.W. switched off the light. Mike locked the door, and immediately regretted it. It should have been locked from the inside, with C.W. in charge of the key.
He made a second move towards the door, but Smith strode suddenly from the railing to stand beside him. ‘You’ve locked it?’ he said. Mike nodded. ‘Good,’ Smith remarked, pulling the key from the lock.
‘We know for an absolute certainty that Mrs Wheeler is not in there,’ he said. ‘Every other inch of this tower will be searched until we find her, even if you have to pull the rivets apart with your bare hands.’
Mike gulped and darted a sidelong glance at the VIP room. ‘What are you waiting for?’ Smith snarled. ‘Get on with it.’
Graham turned away in despair, and trotted back to the restaurant. There was little he could do about it now, except hope to relieve Smith of the key later on.
Until then, C.W. and Adela Wheeler were trapped.
* * *
The President’s mother and the black agent of UNACO crouched behind the sofa that Smith had assaulted, away from prying eyes at the glass door. ‘Do you have any ideas, Mr Whitlock?’ Mrs Wheeler asked gently.
‘One,’ C.W. replied. ‘While we’re still undisturbed, I’ll get in touch with my boss.’
He swathed a three-quarter shield around the light-bulb, and crossed to turn on the light. Just a chink of light from the bulb was all that was visible … but it was pointing out of the window. And C.W. knew that Philpott would be watching for it.
Sonya Kolchinsky lay flat on top of the communications van command centre, trying to adjust to a more comfortable position. She took her weight on her elbows, and fixed the binoculars to her eyes. She let out an exclamation, and Philpott, from inside the van, shouted, ‘What is it?’
‘A light flashing from the tower,’ she answered. ‘It must be a code … yes, it is. And it’s C.W.’
Philpott and Poupon hurried out, and looked anxiously up at her, ‘Well, what’s he got to say?’ Philpott asked.
‘Hang on …’ Sonya replied, ‘he’s repeating it. ‘We — have — a — new — recruit. Gray? No — Graham. It’s Mike Graham,’ Sonya burst out excitedly, ‘he’s on our side after all.’
Philpott breathed a huge sigh of relief. ‘Then Sabrina’s still OK,’ he grinned at Poupon, ‘and we’ve got a real team working in there. We can still win, Poupon old bean. We can still do it.’
‘There’s more,’ Sonya said. ‘“We — are — going — to — try — to — bring — Mrs — Wheeler — out,”’ she pronounced slowly. ‘He’s going on: “Can — you — arrange — diversion — now — question mark. Suggest — paying — first — half — of — ransom. Is — possible — question mark.”’
Philpott turned urgently to the Commissioner. ‘Is it possible? It’s got to be. It might be the only chance we have of saving Mrs Wheeler. And if anyone can get her off that damned tower, it’s C.W. Make it possible, Poupon. Don’t take no for an answer.’
Poupon reached for the phone. ‘Do not worry, my friend,’ he assured Philpott. ‘When Poupon says “jump”, they go up a long, long way. Allo, allo. Conference room? Get me the Finance Minister. I’ll give you ten seconds.’
* * *
Smith paced the restaurant floor, a walkie-talkie clasped in his fist, the riding crop (which someone had brought from the château) incongruously dangling from the other hand. Smith seemed to draw comfort from it, and occasionally lashed a table top or chair-back. Graham was receiving a ’phone report, and Sabrina and Leah Fischer manned walkie-talkies, making notes on jotting pads.
‘Has anyone found anything?’ Smith asked querulously. Mike shook his head; Leah lifted her finger from the communicator button, and did likewise.
‘How could C.W. have slipped through all our checks?’ Smith mused, agitatedly. ‘He’s a thief, an international thief — a master criminal. Who could he be working for? Who could possibly pay him more than I’m paying him? Unless —’
‘Unless what?’ Leah said.
‘Unless he’s not C. W. Whitlock, but some other black,’ Smith supplied.
‘No,’ Leah stated, positively. ‘Fingerprints, voice-print, pictures … everything checked. I don’t know why he’s doing what he’s doing, but he’s Whitlock. I’d bet my life on it.’
Smith grinned, evilly. ‘You may yet find that you have, Leah. Whitlock was willing to take the chance when Graham made the same arrangement with him over the Lap-Laser tag. Shall we find a test for you to take, my dear?’
Leah felt the blood drain from her face. She, and
not Smith, had okayed all five new members of the team. The computer had been specific: they were whom they claimed to be … but the computer could not read their minds. What if any of them — all of them — were agents of some intelligence power, as well as the criminals they were clearly identified as being? It was a frightening thought, and she dismissed it.
‘You know you can rely on me, sir,’ she whispered huskily. ‘I have never let you down, have I? Ever?’
Smith shook his head. ‘But those who serve me, Leah, can afford only one mistake,’ he replied. ‘You might have made yours. We shall see. We shall see.’
He stepped down from the little platform on to the floor of the restaurant, walking casually from Leah to Sabrina, Sabrina to Graham, Graham to Leah — to Sabrina.
‘You were — how shall I put it? — friendly with C.W., were you not, Sabrina? Perhaps a little — too “friendly”. Would you think too friendly, my sweet?’ He touched her face gently, caressing her with the thong of the riding crop, trailing the leather loop down her cheek, across her mouth, up her other cheek, then tracing the straight line of her nose, and coming to rest in the dimple of her chin.
It was a disturbing experience. Sabrina was mesmerized, like a rabbit trapped in the coruscating jewels of a snake’s eyes. She breathed, ‘Please don’t touch me like that. I have done nothing to betray you. You have my word.’
Smith drew the whip away. The girl’s lips parted, and the relief oozed uncertainly from her mouth.
‘Mister Smith,’ Graham put in. Smith turned to him. ‘I thought the same thing,’ Mike explained, ‘about Sabrina and C.W. After you said close contacts could be unwise. I’ve been following her like a shadow ever since, just watching. She’s clean. Tough luck, but she is.’
Smith turned away from Sabrina, and paced the floor again. ‘Maybe … maybe …’ he muttered. Then he spun on his heel and brought the riding whip cracking down on a glass table top. Leah jumped; Sabrina started involuntarily. Even Graham blinked.
‘Find them!’ Smith shouted. ‘We’ve got to find them!’