‘We didn’t talk about it.’
‘I got the impression you did.’
‘I don’t remember it.’
‘But you gave a reason for its not being mentioned,’ said Wilson.
‘You’re twisting what I said.’
‘No, I’m not.’
Jill Walsingham walked over to one of the antique chairs bordering the fireplace. Her attitude altered when she spoke again, the anger evaporating. ‘Look,’ she said, inviting belief. ‘I suppose it must look bad, but it isn’t. I don’t know why Henry didn’t put it down but there’s nothing sinister in it. Honestly.’
‘Who was the man?’
‘What man?’
‘The one you joined the Communist party to be with.’
‘Ericson,’ she said after a long pause. ‘Stefan Ericson: his family were Swedish.’
‘Do you maintain contact with him?’
‘Of course not. I told you it was a schoolgirl thing that ended years ago.’
‘And the party let you go, just like that?’ Wilson snapped his fingers.
‘I was only a probationary member anyway. People other than Stefan came around a few times but I told them to push off. In the end they stopped bothering.’
Wilson started towards the door but she stopped him. ‘Sir Alistair.’
‘Yes?’
‘I’m sorry. For swearing and all that. I didn’t mean to be rude.’
Wilson paused at the kitchen door, jerking it aside abruptly. Walsingham sat at a table by the sink, too far away to have overheard the conversation. There was a glass and a whisky bottle on the table beside him and the director thought it was early to be drinking.
‘You can come back now,’ he said.
‘This is my home!’ said Walsingham indignantly.
‘And your job.’ Without waiting for a response, Wilson returned to the room in which he had left Jill Walsingham. She had not moved from the chair.
When Walsingham entered, Wilson said, ‘Your wife doesn’t remember any discussion about omitting to mention the Communist affiliation. She thinks it must have been your decision.’
‘It would have been something against me during annual review, wouldn’t it?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’d hated being in the army and I’d hated working for my father in the City. But I loved security; I didn’t want to lose that as well.’
‘So you lied?’
‘I didn’t lie: I just didn’t include it on the yearly paper.’
‘A lie,’ insisted Wilson. ‘There’s a specific question, about association with anything you consider might be subversive.’
‘I didn’t think of it as a lie.’
‘Have you, at any time subsequent to 1969, been involved with anything you know or suspect might have been subversive?’ Wilson was icily formal.
‘No.’
‘What about you, Mrs Walsingham?’
She responded slowly, as if she had been thinking of something else. ‘Definitely not,’ she said at last.
‘This isn’t serious, is it?’ said Walsingham. ‘I mean it won’t affect the job or anything like that?’
‘I’m not sure yet,’ said the director.
For several moments after Wilson left neither of them spoke. Then Walsingham drove his fist into the palm of his other hand and said, ‘Damn!’
‘We knew it might happen.’
‘Not after so long.’
‘He’ll get you, if he can.’
‘Don’t you think I hadn’t realized that already!’
‘There’s no need to fight with me.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘We’ve got to start being careful,’ she said. ‘Make sure nothing happens they can trick us with.’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘Very careful,’ she said.
19
Inspector Moro’s office was like the man, overflowing into untidiness. Against the far wall there was an ancient couch, leaking its horsehair stuffing through a collapsed sacking belly. The seat was confettied with papers that had dropped from the filing cabinets alongside. Moro’s desk was in front of the only window in the room, fly-stained and unwashed behind Venetian blinds. Papers were scattered over the desk and spilled, like a frozen waterfall, from a tiered set of plastic trays. There was a rust-spotted filing cabinet beneath framed diplomas made out in Moro’s name. Nearly all the drawers were half open. On top was a potted geranium which had died in disgust. Charlie had accepted coffee, which came in a polystyrene cup; now he didn’t know what to do with it.
‘It’s happening, just as we feared it would,’ said Moro. ‘The French have asked permission to send a contingent of their presidential security corps in addition to normal bodyguards, and the Germans want to send an anti-terrorist squad as well.’
‘Isn’t that an over-reaction?’ said Charlie. He’d suggested the meeting to convince the policeman of his intention to cooperate and reduce the possibility of Moro making inquiries about him in England. Being in a police station was not doing anything at all for his peace of mind.
‘Of course it is,’ said Moro. ‘But because of it there had to be a cabinet meeting this morning. Afterwards there was an assurance to all Common Market governments that they would be adequately protected…. But it’s still embarrassing.’
Charlie leaned forward and wedged his coffee cup onto Moro’s cluttered desk. The policeman appeared not to notice it was untouched.
‘We agreed to cooperate,’ said Charlie.
‘So what have you to tell me?’
‘Nothing,’ said Charlie. Certainly not that he intended to try it alone if there were a sell-back approach rather than risk the interfering involvement of the police. That could ruin any handover and trap him in Italy until the Summit arrival of the intelligence protection.
‘Then why are you here?’
‘I thought it was two-way cooperation.’
Moro absentmindedly moved some papers on his desk. ‘We’ve identified the blood group: it’s AB negative.’
‘It’s a common group.’
‘You got any police training?’ said Moro suddenly.
Charlie’s apprehension tightened several notches. He shook his head. ‘Sort of thing you pick up over the years.’
‘Common or not,’ Moro said. ‘It’ll be the link when we get him.’
‘You talked of fibres caught on the spikes.’
‘Nylon,’ said Moro. ‘The sort of stuff used in men’s jackets.’
‘Have you traced the firm?’
‘Only the manufacturers,’ said Moro. ‘They produce millions.’
‘What about street informants: there must be a lot of talk over this.’
Moro gazed steadily at Charlie. ‘That’s the surprising thing,’ he said. ‘We’re getting nothing back at all.’
The bastard still thinks I’m involved, thought Charlie. ‘What about the servants at the villa?’
‘All emphatic denials and good alibis.’
‘And the embassy staff who had knowledge of security and the safe?’
‘The only account we can’t confirm is that of the security officer, Walsingham. He says his wife was at the cinema with a friend and he stayed all evening at his apartment. But there’s no corroboration. Everyone’s under surveillance.’
That was giving art a bad name, thought Charlie. ‘It’s still only twenty-four hours,’ he said, unable to think of anything else.
‘And you’re still our best hope,’ said Moro.
It had taken Igor Solomatin several weeks of patient searching to find an apartment suitable for their needs. Four separate houses had been modified and knocked together over the years, creating a labyrinthine collection of rooms and flats, on different levels and linked by sudden corridors. Its most obvious advantage were three separate entrances at the front and a spider’s web of fire-escape grilles at the back. Vasily Leonov examined the empty, stale-smelling rooms with detached professionalism.
‘How long w
ill we be here?’ he said.
‘I’m allowing twenty minutes but I hope it will be over in fifteen,’ said the Russian controller. ‘The first is unimportant: we can take Fantani whenever we want. It’s the second that matters. We’ve rehearsed the run over the distance and at the same time on five occasions and always arrived within three minutes of schedule. We expect the Englishman will do the same.’
‘What’s our escape margin?’
‘Five minutes.’
‘That’s not long.’
‘But sufficient.’
Solomatin depressed the button of a stop watch and led the way back out onto the main corridor. The stairway that provided the only access was almost directly opposite. Solomatin turned away to the left, where a doorway led into a corridor. ‘It links with the next house,’ said Solomatin. They halted on an adjoining landing. ‘Down one flight and to the left is the rear fire escape.’ Solomatin set off again at a leisurely pace, stopping the watch at the window leading out to the back of the building. ‘Two minutes,’ he said. ‘Two more to get down. We’ll be in the street before they come in the front door.’
‘What if something goes wrong?’ said Leonov. ‘A breakdown? Or a puncture?’
‘The whole purpose of sending him up and down the autostrada is surveillance,’ reminded Solomatin. ‘We’ll be with him all the time. The alarm won’t be raised until he’s reached the city and we can judge his arrival here to the minute.’
‘There’s still the chance of a mistake.’ Leonov was unconvinced.
‘Nothing will go wrong,’ said Solomatin. ‘In two days we’ll be on our way back to Moscow to a hero’s welcome.’
They left the building separately through different exits, and Solomatin drove across the city to Fantani’s apartment in the Piazza del Popolo.
‘I can move my fingers,’ said the Italian, as Solomatin entered. ‘It hurts but I can do it.’
‘I told you it was only bruising.’
‘Everything ready?’
Solomatin nodded. ‘It’s time to make the call.’
Charlie moved about the hotel room without direction, experiencing a loneliness he hadn’t felt for a long time. He started opening and closing cupboards and doors. At the back of a shirt drawer was a pair of Clarissa’s tights. For a moment he ran the material through his fingers, and then he dumped them in the waste bin. It was right that he should have told her to go. He just hadn’t expected it to be like this.
Charlie sat on the edge of the bed, automatically removing his shoes and massaging his feet. He snatched out for the telephone when it rang, smiling in anticipation of her voice; then he recognized Billington.
‘I’ve been given a meeting place,’ said the ambassador. ‘And instructions.’
‘I didn’t get the impression that the ambassador was particularly pleased,’ said Naire-Hamilton. ‘He said today was impossible so I’ve arranged it for tomorrow.’
‘Does he know I’m with you?’
‘Yes,’ said the Permanent Under Secretary. ‘What about Walsingham?’
‘Circumstantially it looks strong.’
‘Good enough to ship him home?’
‘Possibly. But I’m going to leave him where he is. If he’s the one, he’ll panic to his control.’
‘What if he doesn’t?’
‘We keep on looking.’
20
The surveillance was more inept than before. They used an unmarked police car again but it was away from the designated parking area – parked over yellow lines, showing it could ignore official restrictions. The same small man in the blue suit was in the passenger seat when Charlie passed. Pricks, he thought.
At the top of the Spanish Steps the Via Sistina balloons out and there is a taxi rank. Charlie asked for the Piazza Navona, because it was the first place that occurred to him. The police car pulled out to position itself with only one vehicle between them. The congestion that Charlie wanted began almost as soon as the taxi started down the Via della Mercede. At the junction with del Corso it became so heavy they had to stop completely. Charlie took a crumpled wad of lire from his pocket, looked at the meter and counted out double, to avoid any delaying argument. The taxi turned left onto del Corso. Traffic was freer, but there was still a tailback. The block was perfect: just beyond Tritone, with no side roads to allow the following driver to turn, Charlie gestured the taxi to the side of the road, and pressed the money into the driver’s hand.
‘I’ll walk,’ he said.
Charlie was back level with the police car before they properly realized what had happened. He walked smartly past, and from a window reflection in the Via del Tritone Charlie saw that the small man had got out and was actually running from the police car, which was still pointing in the wrong direction with the driver gesturing and shouting, in a vain attempt to clear a path for a U-turn.
Charlie’s feet hurt, slowing him down. He stared about him for the right taxi arrangement. He let the first one go, because there was another close behind which the policeman could have taken. He was almost at the Crispi turning before he saw what he wanted, a vacant cab with only private vehicles behind. Charlie waited until it was practically level, then flagged it down. It was satisfying to watch the frustrated policeman run forward as if he half intended to stop the car, then gaze wildly around for a taxi of his own.
Charlie guessed Moro would trace the cab through the registration so he went all the way to the railway terminus rather than switch to another vehicle. He entered the station through one door, came out through another and picked up a third taxi which dropped him at the Borghese Gardens.
Traffic wasped around the piazza in front of him and Charlie decided against attempting to dodge his way through it. Instead he followed an old lady’s example and used the crossing.
He liked Rome. It might be frayed at the edges, but it had style. Something that was missing from Harry’s Bar. Charlie enjoyed beer in straight glasses in pubs without jukeboxes. Harry’s Bar didn’t have the jukeboxes, but it had pretensions that were deafening. It boasted chrome and mahogany and barmen who spoke eight languages. It was featured in all the guidebooks and a number of novels as the epitome of chic and was always crowded with people looking for the famous, who never came because people stood around looking for them.
Charlie made for the half-moon bar and saw that the stool stipulated for his identification was occupied. He ordered a whisky and took it to one of the minute tables against the wall. It was thirty minutes beyond the meeting time before Charlie was able to get the stool he wanted, reaching it a half-buttock ahead of a woman with a large hat and a poodle with a diamanté collar. She waited for Charlie to be gallant and then turned away tutting noisily. Charlie ordered another Scotch. With a better view of the bar, he tried to pick out his contact.
The woman with the poodle found a seat opposite him at the far curve of the bar. She looked at Charlie with positive hostility. Charlie smiled. Up yours, he thought.
Charlie had expected the approach to come from the direction of the door or the lounge beyond, the most crowded part, but it didn’t. He got an impression of someone behind him and turned to see the man at his left shoulder. The Gucci crest was on the shoes, belt and watch strap. The raw silk trousers were black and bum tight, worn with a shirt in contrasting white. It was silk and open at the neck, with several buttons undone to show a hairy chest cushioning a heavy gold medallion. A fawn jacket, worn the way that had always intrigued Charlie from those baffling Fellini films, was draped casually around his shoulders. But here there was a practical purpose: the jacket almost concealed a sling that supported a well-bandaged hand.
Seeing Charlie’s look, the man said, ‘It’s inconvenient.’
‘Particularly if a policeman sees it.’
The Italian shook his head. ‘My fingerprints are on record, not palm impressions.’ He was wiry and hard-bodied, with eyes that darted constantly. ‘I burned the clothes, too,’ he said. He nodded to the table. ‘Let’s sit away from
the bar.’
Charlie followed, carrying his drink. If the man’s fingerprints were on file, it wouldn’t be hard to get a positive identification from criminal records when he went through the photographic files with Moro.
‘I’m glad you came by yourself,’ said the man. The English was accented but good. The cologne was very strong.
‘You have the jewellery?’ said Charlie.
‘I might be able to arrange its return.’
Gangster-movie dialogue, thought Charlie. ‘Good,’ he said.
‘There would be some expense.’
‘How much?’
‘Twenty-five per cent.’
‘That’s a lot.’
‘Half a million is better for you than a full payout,’ said the man.
‘Yes,’ said Charlie. ‘It is.’
‘Sterling, of course.’
‘I want complete recovery.’
‘How long will it take to arrange the finance?’ asked the Italian.
‘A day.’
‘Tomorrow then?’
‘Should be possible.’
‘I’d like it to be tomorrow.’
Charlie intended to have the money numbered before he paid it over. That would make it useless and traceable. Moro could get his conviction. And Billington could recover his jewellery. Whether or not he made them available for any court exhibit would be a matter between him and the police. Willoughby wouldn’t have any remaining liability. Better still, he wouldn’t suffer any loss, because eventually the five hundred thousand would be returned. Everything would be tidied up nicely. Everything except Clarissa.
‘Where shall we meet?’ said Charlie.
‘Further down this street at the corner of the Via Ludovisi there’s a public telephone kiosk. Be there at noon. You’ll be called and told what to do.’
‘I’ll be there,’ said Charlie.
‘Be by yourself. You’ll be watched all the time. If there’s any sign of a policeman, it’s off.’
‘I’ll be alone,’ said Charlie.
‘Until tomorrow then.’ The Italian shrugged the jacket closer around his shoulders to keep the sling under cover and made an elegant exit from the bar. Probably danced a hell of a tango, thought Charlie. He didn’t hurry to leave, holding the glass before him in both hands and staring down into the amber liquid. Everything had gone according to plan. But it just didn’t feel right. It was a nagging, persistent uncertainty, like a stone in his shoe. Unable to resolve it, he beckoned the barman, paid and left the bar.
Madrigal for Charlie Muffin Page 14