He came out into the courtyard, and sniffed the morning air with approval. It was a day of premature spring weather. The Colonel had never been able to understand why the English complained about their weather. It was variable, but almost entirely temperate and agreeable.
He unlocked the garage door, and the door of his car. As he was about to get in, he checked. It was such a brief pause, such a tiny cessation of movement, that a watcher would hardly have noticed it. At one moment he was getting into his car. At the next he was leaning over the back of the driving seat, picking up the light overcoat from the back seat.
Then he backed out of the car, shut the door very gently, and locked it. He locked up the garage again, pocketed the keys, and put on the overcoat. It was such a nice day that he had evidently decided to walk or use public transport.
A sensible decision, one might have felt, in view of the congested streets of central London and the near impossibility of parking.
‘So that’s the position,’ said Ringbolt. ‘Bertie will tell you if I’m painting with too broad a brush.’
An extremely pleasant luncheon, served by a middle-aged housekeeper, had been followed by coffee and brandy. Hugo lit the cigar which was offered to him and tried to keep his defensive mechanisms in trim. It was not easy.
Whether Lord Twinley was in the Secret Service or not, he had certainly been in the Gulf, and he knew what he was talking about. Bob seemed to have done his homework too.
‘When you decided to withdraw from the Gulf,’ he said. ‘And I’m not criticising the decision – it was pretty inevitable I guess – you left a vacuum. And nature, as I was taught at school, abhors a vacuum. Moreover, there was no shortage of people waiting to fill it. The United States has got more money invested in those parts than they’d care to see threatened. Our main ally in Saudi Arabia. The Russians are pressing down on Iran. They’re pretty unwilling partners in some ways, but a competitive situation makes strange bedfellows, and I happen to know that Kedried, their Minister for Oil and Fuel, has been in Teheran these last few months. And last, but by no means least—’ Ringbolt tapped off the ash of his cigar with a composed gesture which suddenly made Hugo realise that he was a lot older than he looked— ‘last but not least, the Chinese are moving north from their first outpost, Aden, and getting their feet under the table in Iraq. The Ba’ath party are just natural colleagues for them. The smaller states line up with the bigger ones. Bahrain with Saudi, Qatar with Iran, and so on.’
‘And Umran?’
‘If I was a cartoonist,’ said Lord Twinley, ‘I’d draw the whole thing for you in a picture. Tiny little Umran, wearing a mini-skirt, and a bashful smile. Three enormous suitors, pressing forward to demand her hand in marriage. Each of them with a bunch of flowers in one fist and a sub-machine gun in the other.’
Hugo said, ‘That hardly fits in with my impression of Sheik Ahmed bin Rashid bin Abdullah al Ferini. I don’t see him in a mini-skirt somehow.’
‘He’s quite a boy,’ said Ringbolt. ‘But he’s still only got half a division of troops.’
‘His idea seems to be that a small army that’s prepared to fight is better than a large one sitting on a pile of atomic weapons it daren’t use.’
‘Something in that,’ said Lord Twinley. ‘And he’s certainly got them at the spot where it counts. Have you ever worked out what would happen if someone did blockade the mouth of the Gulf. Suez would be peanuts to it. The oil companies got round that one by building big tankers and routing their oil round the Cape. There’s no alternative route out of the Gulf. Except by pipe-line across the desert. Which could be blown up half a dozen times a week.’
It was at this moment that the telephone rang. Ringbolt lifted the receiver, listened for a moment, and said, ‘It’s for you Hugo.’
‘Can’t be,’ said Hugo. ‘Who is it?’
‘Mrs. Geest,’ she said.
It was his mother. She said, ‘I’m so sorry to chase you like this, darling. But I rang up that American Club and they gave me this number. They were terribly sticky about it, but when I told them how urgent it was—’
‘What’s happened?’
‘It’s this terrible American. I can’t make him go away.’
‘What American?’
‘He said, Mr. Ringbolt—’
‘I’m with Mr. Ringbolt now.’
‘No, no. He isn’t Mr. Ringbolt. He mentioned Mr. Ringbolt’s name, and I knew you were having lunch with him, so I let him in. Now I can’t get rid of him. Hugo, you’ve got to come back and cope.’
When his mother spoke in that tone of voice, the discipline of the nursery reasserted itself. He said, ‘All right. I’ll be back.’
When he got back to Richmond he went straight in by the front door on his mother’s side of the house. His mother was waiting in the hall. She said, in a whisper, ‘I couldn’t sit there just looking at him. In the end I had to come out. Do get rid of him.’
‘Who is he?’
‘He gave me this.’
The card, which was twice the size of an ordinary visiting card, said, ‘Urban L. Nussbaum’, in large letters and in smaller letters at the bottom right-hand corner, ‘Suite 1005, Grand Central Building, Topeka, Kansas, U.S.A.’
‘All right,’ said Hugo. ‘I’ll deal with him.’
He strode into the drawing room and Mr. Nussbaum rose to greet him. Rose was the appropriate word. He came imperceptibly upward, like a balloon from its moorings. He was such an odd shape that Hugo got the impression that he was smaller when standing up than when sitting down. His bulk was encased in a grey suit and he was wearing a tie which put Sayyed Nawaf’s in the shade.
His face, nut-brown shading to grey black round the jowls, broke into a warm smile at the sight of Hugo.
‘I certainly am glad to meet you, Mr. Greest.’
‘I can’t say the same until I know what it’s all about.’
‘Of course, of course.’
‘And I don’t usually talk business in my mother’s drawing room.’
‘Naturally not, and I wouldn’t have intruded if I hadn’t assumed this was all your residence. I had no idea that part of it belonged to your mother. A fine old lady. I hope she soon recovers.’
‘Recovers?’
‘I detected that she was not quite herself. She informed me that she was suffering from a migraine.’
‘It comes and goes,’ said Hugo. ‘Suppose we move to my side of the house.’ He led the way up the stairs, through a door and into his quarters. ‘You are from Target, I take it?’
Mr. Nussbaum’s eyes twinkled in the depths of his cheeks. He said, ‘I must congratulate you on your intelligence system. You know of our little organisation.’
‘I heard the name for the first time yesterday. I’m afraid you’re too late.’
‘I’m never too late,’ said Mr. Nussbaum genially. ‘If I miss one train, I catch the next. If I miss that one, I hire a special. You haven’t signed any papers I hope.’
Hugo admitted that he had not signed anything. It was apparently a mistake in the arms business to sign papers.
‘In that case, I’m not too late. Any offer Abacus made you, I can cut five per cent off it. Maybe ten.’
‘Not Abacus. A gentleman called Colonel Leroy Delmaison.’
In so far as it was possible to read any expression in the involuted surface of his visitor’s face, Hugo thought he detected the beginnings of a thoughtful look. It was as though a cloud had passed across an upland valley, removing the warmth, bringing with it a hint of snow.
‘The gentleman you have mentioned is a very able operator. Fast off the mark too. But you have to appreciate, Mr. Greest, that he is only a middleman. He has no sources of supply himself.’
‘He seemed to think that he would be able to organise them. We had a long talk last night.’
‘Colonel Rex can certainly talk. But talk won’t produce articles which he hasn’t got. Did he mention anti-aircraft guns? Or medium guns on mobile mountings?’<
br />
‘Not specifically, no.’
‘Did he think to tell you that these particular items were only obtainable from one firm in Sweden? And that Target had exclusive distribution rights in all the products of that firm?’
‘No,’ said Hugo slowly. ‘No, he didn’t tell me that. Is it a fact?’
‘Why should I lie to you, when you can check on it so easily? You can ask him yourself.’
‘I could do that.’
‘Now, I’m not saying anything against Colonel Rex, you understand. He’s a smart operator. He’s entitled to make you a proposition. I’m entitled to make you a proposition. You select the one which suits you best. Right?’
‘The only thing is, I did give him a sort of option—’
‘Not in writing?’
‘No, not in writing. But I don’t like going back on my word.’
‘It does you credit,’ said Mr. Nussbaum heartily. ‘Here’s an idea to play around with. Why don’t you do business with both of us?’
Colonel Rex was turning into Riverside Avenue, Richmond, when he stopped. Parked opposite No. 17 was a red American Studebaker saloon. It was a distinctive sort of car. Not only was it twice as long as the average English car, but it seemed to bulge in unexpected places. The Colonel examined it with interest for some seconds, and then walked back the way he had come, retired down a side-turning, and settled down to wait.
Chapter Six
Urban L. Nussbaum
When Hugo woke next morning, the weather had broken. The first days of false spring had flattered to deceive. The pale sunlight was gone. The winds of March were blowing bleakly, and they had brought rain with them.
‘What an extraordinary man!’ said his mother.
Hugo, as was his habit when he was not working, had walked down to spend the half-hour after breakfast with her.
‘I’m sorry you got lumbered with him.’
‘It was an experience. He wasn’t offensive, you know. Quite the contrary He was very polite. But it all went on rather long.’
‘Did you notice his tie?’
‘It was very striking. He told me about it. It was based on a painting by Picasso. He told me about everything. It was like the Poles during the war. Of course you were too young to remember them. They told you about everything, too. The most terrible things had happened to all of them.’
‘I hope Mr. Nussbaum didn’t tell you anything terrible.’
‘On the contrary. He seems to have had a very happy life. Both his children are at a university. Can you imagine?’
‘In America everyone goes to university.’
‘He started in the army in the ranks and rose to be a Master Sergeant Gunner. Or it might have been Sergeant Master Gunner. Then, after the war, he sold vacuum cleaners for a bit, and then he started selling other things.’
‘Did he tell you what things?’
‘I think he said something about guns.’
‘That’s right.’
‘He’s a gun-runner?’
They’re more politely described as arms dealers.’
‘How very interesting.’
Hugo had noticed before that things which ought to shock or upset his mother hardly worried her at all. It was the minor irritations and stupidities of life which infuriated her. People who drove their cars too fast, or too close to the pavement on wet days, or signed their names to multiple letters in The Times.
She said, ‘You mustn’t tell me about it, of course, if it’s confidential.’
‘I don’t see why I shouldn’t,’ said Hugo.
His mother listened to him, with her head slightly on one side, in a bird-like attitude. It was from her that Hugo had inherited his artistic flair rather than from his father, a large, silent man, who had been killed by the Japanese at Imphal.
She said, ‘Do I gather that the choice is between buying all these things from the government, or buying them from a private firm?’
‘That’s more or less what it amounts to.’
‘Well I know which I’d choose.’
‘The government?’
‘Certainly not. Civil Servants have no business morality at all.’
‘Business men don’t seem to have much morality either.’
‘No. But they have some. Even if it’s only based on self-protection. They don’t swindle other business men, because the people they’ve swindled might get their own back. But a government doesn’t mind about that. It’s so big it thinks no one can hurt it. It’s like doing business with a boa-constrictor.’
‘You sound as though you have been dickering with government departments all your life.’
‘I had a good deal to do with them when your father was killed. I remember when I tried to get some money out of them to send you away to school. They were totally unhelpful. I can still see that silly little man saying to me, “The State provides a perfectly adequate education, Mr. Greest.” I just picked up the inkpot on his desk and threw it at him.’
‘I don’t suppose that made him any more helpful.’
Mrs. Greest gave a throaty chuckle and said, ‘It made me feel a lot better. And what happened? The very same day your uncle came along and told me he’d got a nomination to Christ’s Hospital. They were marvellous. Give me private enterprise every time—’
At ten o’clock that morning Colonel Rex telephoned the hotel at which he had discovered that Mr. Nussbaum was staying, and was told that he had gone out, but would be back within the hour.
At eleven o’clock he telephoned again. Mr. Nussbaum had returned, and was somewhere in the hotel. Would he like to have him paged?
The Colonel said, ‘no’. He did not think that this would be advisable. But perhaps Reception would give him a telephone number to ring back. Reception said it could do this.
At twelve o’clock Mr. Nussbaum telephoned the Colonel. Mutual courtesies were exchanged, mutual friends remembered, enquiries made about each other’s families. Mrs. Nussbaum was in excellent health. The Colonel’s old father was still alive. A wonderful man for his age.
Protocol having been observed Mr. Nussbaum suggested that it might be to both their advantages if they had a little talk. The Colonel thought that this might be a good idea. But when, and where?
‘I don’t think,’ said Mr. Nussbaum, ‘that it would be a very good idea if we were seen talking together. You know how tongues wag in our line of business.’
‘They certainly do,’ said the Colonel. ‘I’ll tell you what. I’ve got a quiet little flat here. Why don’t you come along? I’d suggest about eight o’clock this evening. We could have a little drink, and talk things over.’
‘Seems a good idea,’ said Mr. Nussbaum.
‘After that, maybe we could go along together and put a proposition to our mutual client.’
‘Our mutual client?’ said Mr. Nussbaum cautiously.
‘I was referring to a Mr. Greest, who resides at No. 17, Riverside Avenue, Richmond. I believe you spent some time with him yesterday. He will have told you that I saw him the day before.’
There was a short pause, and then Mr. Nussbaum said, in a much more business-like voice, ‘O.K. We’re in this together. We’ll have to work out the split. Right?’
‘Right. And as soon as we’ve worked it out, we put it to Mr. Greest and sign him up, before anyone else gets ideas about coming in on the act. Right?’
‘The sooner the better.’
‘I had an open date to go along and talk to him after dinner tonight. We might go along together. I suggest—’ At this point anyone observing the Colonel would have noticed a curious repetition of what had taken place the day before, when he opened the door of his car. On that occasion he had started to do one thing and it had changed, easily and almost imperceptibly, into something else. This time the same thing happened to what he was saying. ‘I suggest,’ he said, and there was the barest pause after the word, ‘that I run us both up in my car. It’s one I hired when I came over. There’s nothing to connect it with me.’
‘Fine,’ said Mr. Nussbaum.
Hugo thought that it would be easier if he dealt with Major Gilliland on the telephone. He rang him up and recognised the voice of his secretary. She said that the Major was on the outside line, and would he mind holding. Hugo said he didn’t mind at all. In fact, it gave him time to think out exactly what he was going to say.
When the Major’s dry voice said, ‘Mr. Greest. You wanted me?’ he was ready. He said, ‘You very kindly offered to introduce me to your Ordnance people. The idea being that they could improve on my non-existent technical knowledge. I wonder if you’d put it off for a bit.’
‘I haven’t fixed anything yet.’
‘Oh, good.’
‘Has there been a change of plan, then?’
‘In a way. I’m taking on an adviser. A man who seems to know about these things. I thought I ought to listen, first, to what he has to tell me before making my mind up.’
‘Quite right. Don’t hesitate to come back here if you think we can help.’
‘I’ll do that,’ said Hugo, and rang off. It had been easier than he had expected.
Major Gilliland replaced the receiver at his end, and said to his secretary, ‘I’m afraid someone’s got in ahead of us. Pity.’
‘They certainly keep their ears to the ground,’ said his secretary.
Mr. Nussbaum was not sorry that Colonel Rex had suggested eight o’clock that evening for their meeting. He had much to do.
First he had to compose a long and complicated telex message. This could go direct from the hotel, which he had chosen for its telex facilities, to his headquarters in Topeka. There would be time for an answer to reach him before he set out for his rendezvous.
After attending to this he had his second shave of the day and a facial massage in the barber’s shop attached to the hotel, and took a cup of tea in the lounge. Despite his size and shape he was not a gross eater. He drank alcohol solely in the line of business. When he was by himself he preferred soft drinks.
The 92nd Tiger Page 5