Double Jeopardy tac-1

by Colin Forbes

  It could be any one of the four. You'll have to track through their dossiers back over the years…'

  Tweed gave the instruction to McNeil as they strolled together in Regent's Park after the clammy heat of the day. It was still light, the trees were in full foliage, the grass had a springy rebound which Tweed loved. Everything was perfect – except for the time-fuse problem he must solve.

  'O'Meara, Stoller and Flandres

  'Don't forget Howard,' Tweed said quickly.

  'What am I looking for?' McNeil enquired with a note of sharp exasperation.

  'A gap.' Tweed paused under a tree and surveyed the expanse of green. 'A gap in the life – in the records – of one of those four trusted men. Maybe as little as two months. Time unaccounted for. He will have been trained behind the Iron Curtain – I'm sure of that. This man was planted a long time ago…'

  'Checking Howard's dossier will be tricky…'

  'You'll need cover – a reason why you're consulting all these files from Central Registry. I'll think of something…'

  He resumed his walk, his shoulders hunched, a faraway look in his eyes. 'The funny thing, McNeil, is I'm certain we've already been given a clue – damned if I can put my finger on it…'

  `Tim O'Meara won't be any easier than Howard to check – he's only been head of the President's Secret Service detachment for a year.'

  'Which is why I'm taking Concorde to Washington tomorrow if I can get a seat. 1 know somebody there who might help. He doesn't like O'Meara. A little prejudice opens many doors…'

  'Howard will want to know why,' she warned. 'The expense of the Concorde ticket will be recorded by Accounts…'

  'No, it won't. I'll buy the ticket out of my own pocket. There is still something left from my uncle's legacy. I'll be away before Howard returns. Tell him I've had a recurrence of my asthma – that I went down to my Devon cottage..:

  'He'll try and contact you..'

  'About my signal via the Ambassador?' Tweed was amused. 'I've no doubt when he returns his first job will be to storm into my office. Make it vague – about my trip to the cottage. I felt I just had to get out of London. It will all fit,' he remarked with an owlish expression. 'He'll think I'm dodging him for a few days. He'll never dream I've crossed the Atlantic.'

  McNeil stared straight ahead. 'Don't look round – Mason is behind us. He's pretending to take that damned dog of his fora walk…'

  Tweed paused, took off his glasses, polished them and held them up as though checking his lenses. Reflected in the spectacles was the image of Howard's lean and hungry-looking deputy recently recruited from Special Branch. He also had stopped by a convenient tree which his Scottie at the end of a leash was investigating.

  'I prefer the dog to the man,' Tweed commented as he replaced his glasses and started walking again. 'Add him to the list. If anyone can find the vital discrepancy in the dossiers you can…'

  Howard had reserved a room for the night at the discreet and well-appointed Hotel de France et Choiseul in rue St. Honore.

  While he waited for his guest he put in a call to Park Crescent. When the night duty operator answered he identified himself and continued the conversation.

  'I want a word with Tweed,' he said brusquely.

  Just a moment, sir. I will put you through to his office.'

  Howard checked his watch which registered 2245 hours. He was disturbed: Tweed was still inside Park Crescent when the building would be empty. It was later than he had realised when he made the call. He had another surprise when McNeil's voice came on the line. He spoke quickly to warn her it was an open line.

  'I'm talking from my hotel room. I'd like an urgent word with Tweed…'

  'I'm afraid Mr Tweed has been taken ill. Nothing serious – a bad attack of asthma. He's gone down to the country for a few days…'

  'It's not possible to get him on the phone?'

  'I'm afraid not, sir. When can we expect you back?' 'Impossible to say. Goodnight!'

  Howard ended the call on a stiff note: he never liked questions about his future movements. Sitting on his bed he frowned while he recalled the conversation. That was an odd departure from McNeil's normal behaviour-asking a question she knew he would disapprove of.

  In the Park Crescent office Miss McNeil smiled as she replaced the receiver. She had been confident the final question would get Howard off the line before he probed too deeply. She returned to her examination of the dossier in front of her. It carried a red star – top classification – on the cover, and a name. Frederick Anthony Howard.

  In the Paris bedroom Howard was pacing impatiently when there was an irregular knocking on his locked door, the signal he had agreed with Alain Flandres. Despite the signal he extracted from his case the 7.65-mm automatic Flandres had loaned him and slipped it inside his pocket before opening the door. Flandres walked into the room.

  'Chez Benoit, mon ami!'

  The slim, springy Flandres was a tonic; always optimistic, his personalityfizzed. He walked round the room smiling, his dark eyes everywhere.

  'Chez What?' Howard enquired.

  'Benoit! Benoit! They serve some of the best food in all of Paris. The last serving is at 9.30 in the evening – but for me le patron makes the exception. The Police Prefect often eats there. You are ready? Good…'

  Flandres had a cab waiting at the entrance to the hotel. The journey took no more than ten minutes and the Englishman, sunk in thought, remained silent. Normally voluble, Flandres also said nothing but he studied his companion until they arrived and Were ushered to a table. They were examining the menu when Flandres made his remark.

  'My telex from London about the Carlos sighting this morning in Piccadilly has disturbed you? You wonder who he went there to meet? You were in London this morning?'

  Howard closed the menu. 'What the bloody hell are you driving at, Alain?' he asked quietly.

  'I have offended you?' Flandres was astonished. 'Always it is the same – I talk too much! And Renee Duval, the girl who sent me the telex – I have withdrawn her from London. She was only on routine assignment. Now, the really important subject is what we are to select for dinner…'

  Flandres chattered on, steering the conversation away from the topic of the telex. He was now convinced something else was disturbing the Englishman, something he was carefully concealing from his French opposite number.

  CHAPTER 18

  Saturday May 30

  Washington, DC, Clint Loomis…

  The extract from the secret notebook discovered on Warner's dead body had linked up with nothing so far, Tweed reflected.

  Concorde landed on schedule at Dulles Airport. Tweed was not among the first passengers to alight, nor among the last. He did not believe in disguises but before disembarking he removed his glasses. This simple act transformed his appearance.

  Clint Loomis was waiting outside. He ushered him straight into a nondescript blue sedan. The American, in his late fifties, had not changed since their last meeting. Serious-faced, his dark eyes penetrating and acutely observant, he wore an open-necked blue shirt and pale grey slacks. His hair had thinned somewhat.

  'We can say "Hello" when we get there,' he remarked as he drove away from Dulles. 'Maybe you'd better take off your jacket…'

  The sun was blazing, the humidity was appalling. It was like travelling inside a ship's boiler room.

  'Is it always like this in May?' Tweed enquired as he wrestled himself out of his jacket, turned to cast it on the seat behind and looked through the rear window, studying the traffic.

  'In Washington nothing is "always",' Loomis replied. 'In the US of A we're a restless lot – so we change the weather when we can't think of anything else to change. We'll talk when we get there-and no names.

  O.K.?'

  The car could be bugged?'

  'They're bugging everything these days – even clapped-out old CIA personnel. Just to keep someone in a job. You have to file a report to show the boss you're still in business.'

 
'Why the rush at the airport? My bag slung on the back seat…'

  'We could be followed, that's why. By the time we get where we're going we'll shake any tail…'

  'Like arriving in Moscow,' Tweed said drily.

  The signposts told him they were heading for Alexandria. Tweed looked through the rear window again and Loomis glanced at him with a frown of irritation.

  'We're not being followed if that's what's bothering you…' 'When we get to a place where you can stop, could I take the wheel for awhile, Clint?'

  'Sure. If that's the way you feel…'

  This was one of the many things Tweed liked about Loomis – if he trusted you he never asked questions. He did whatever you requested and waited for explanations.

  Later, as they stood outside the car prior to changing places, the Englishman glanced back up the highway. A green car had also pulled in to the side and one of the two male occupants got out to lift the bonnet. A blue car cruised past which also contained two men – neither of them spared the stationary sedan a glance, Tweed observed. He got in behind the wheel and began driving.

  'What make is that green car behind us – the one behind the truck? You'll see it as we go round this curve…'

  'A Chevvy,' Loomis replied. 'It pulled up when we did…'

  'I know. And that blue car ahead of us – which was cruising and is now picking up speed to keep ahead. They have a sandwich on us, Clint. Those two cars have been with us since we left Dulles. They keep changing places – one in front, one behind…'

  'Jesus Christ! I must be losing my grip…'

  'Just the fresh eye,' Tweed assured him. 'Better lose our friends one at a time, don't you think?'

  They were coming up to traffic lights at an intersection and the green Chevvy was still one vehicle behind them when Tweed performed. To his right was one of those damned great trailer trucks which transported half of America's freight coast to coast. He rammed his foot down…

  'Look out – the lights…!' Loomis yelled.

  There was a scream of rubber as Tweed shot forward like a torpedo. He swerved crazily to avoid the trailer which was coming out with the lights in its favour. A second scream – of airbrakes being jammed on. Loomis looked back and then at Tweed who had returned to his correct lane. To the American he looked so bloody unruffled.

  'You nearly got us killed back there…'

  'I don't see the green Chevvy any more,' Tweed commented with a glance in his rear view mirror.

  'Like hell you don't – it just rammed its snout into the side of that trailer. It was overtaking as you hit the lights…'

  'To change places with the blue job ahead of us. Now…' Tweed tapped his fingers on the wheel. we lose him and we're on our own, which will be more comfortable…'

  'Not the same way. Please! I thought you Brits were sober, law-abiding types. You realise what would have happened had a patrol-car been nearby…'

  'There wasn't one. I checked.'

  The meeting place was a white power cruiser moored to a buoy on the Potomac river. Tweed had followed signposts to Fredericksburg and then, guided by Loomis, turned off down a minor road to the east. By now he had lost the blue car in an equally hair-raising performance which had ended in their tail skidding off the highway. It was very quiet and deserted as Tweed switched off the engine, climbed out and savoured the breeze coming off the water.

  'That's yours?' he asked, pointing at the cruiser.

  'Bought it with my – severance pay, don't you call it? – when I left the Company. Plus a bank loan I'm damned if I'll ever pay off. It gives me safety – I hope…'

  'Safety?'

  Tweed concealed his sense of shock. His trip to Washington was developing in a way he had never expected. First they had been followed from Dulles by an outfit which had money at its disposal. It cost a lot of dollars to employ four men to do a shadow job. And ever since he had arrived Clint Loomis, retired from the CIA, had shown signs of nervousness.

  The Company doesn't like people who leave it alive.'

  Loomis was dragging a rubber dinghy equipped with an out-board which had been hidden among a clump of grasses down to the river's edge. He gave a lop-sided grin as the craft floated and he gestured to his visitor to get aboard. 'I suppose it comes from all those dumbos who got out and wrote books, revealing all as the publishers' blurbs say.'

  'You're writing a book?' Tweed asked as he settled gingerly inside the vessel and Loomis started up the outboard.

  'Not me,' Loomis said with a shake of his head. 'And when we get to the Oasis…' He pointed towards the power cruiser, that's when we shake hands.'

  'If you say so,' Tweed replied.

  They crossed the smooth stretch of water and Loomis slowed the engine to a crawl as the hull loomed up. Aboard the Oasis a huge Alsatian dog appeared, running up and down the deck, barking its head off. Then it stopped at the head of the boarding ladder and stared down, jaws open, exposing teeth which reminded Tweed of a shark.

  'Now we shake hands,' Loomis explained. 'That shows him you're a friend and you don't get chewed up.'

  'I see,' said Tweed, careful to make a ceremony of the display of friendship. The dog backed off as he mounted the ladder without too much confidence while Loomis tied up the dinghy and followed him on deck.

  'Over the side!' Loomis ordered.

  The dog dived in, swimming all round the boat until it completed one circuit. Loomis stretched over the side down the ladder, hooked a hand in the dog's collar and hauled it aboard as the animal pawed and scrambled up the rungs. It stood on the deck and shook itself all over Tweed.

  'Shows he likes you,' Loomis said. 'We'd better go below now that everything is safe. A beer?'

  'That would be nice,' Tweed agreed, following his host down the companionway where the American handed him a towel to dry himself. He was beginning to have serious doubts as to whether he had been wise to cross the Atlantic.

  'What was all that business about the dog?' he enquired.

  'The swim in the river?' The American settled himself back on a bunk, his legs stretched out, his ankles crossed. For the first time he seemed genuinely relaxed. 'Waldo has been trained to sniff out explosives. So, we get back and find him alone on deck. Conclusion? No intruders aboard the cruiser – or one of two things would have happened. Waldo would be dead – or a man's body would be lying around with his throat torn out. O.K.?'

  Tweed shuddered inwardly and drank more beer, 'O.K.,' he said.

  'Next point. Waldo is trained to stay aboard no matter what. So the opposition uses frogmen who attach limpet mines with trembler or timer devices to the hull – devices which detonate with the vibration of a grown man's weight walking on deck. I send Waldo overboard and he swims round once without a pause. Conclusion? If there were mines Waldo would be yelping, kicking up one hell of a row when he gets the sniff of high-explosives. Now we know we're clean…'

  'What a way to live. How long has this been going on? And who is going to attach the limpet mines?'

  'A gun hired by Tim O'Meara who kicked my ass out of the Company when he was Director of Operations – before he transferred to become boss of the Secret Service.'

  'And why would O'Meara do that?'

  'Because I know he embezzled two hundred thousand dollars allocated for running guns into Afghanistan.'

  In his Miinich apartment Manfred concentrated on the long-distance call. His main concern was to detect any trace of strain in the voice of his caller. Code-names only had been used.

  'Tweed knows there is a selected target,' the voice reported.

  'He has identified the target?'

  Manfred asked the question immediately, his voice calm, almost bored, but the news was hitting him like a hammerblow. He might have guessed that in the end it would be Tweed who ferreted out the truth. God damn his soul!

  'No,' the voice replied. 'Only that there is one. You might wish to take some action.'

  'Thank you for informing me,' Manfred replied neutrally. `And please
call me tomorrow. Same time…'

  Replacing the receiver, Manfred swore foully and then comforted himself with the thought that he had detected no breaking of nerve in the voice of the man who had called him. Checking in a small notebook, he began dialling a London number.

  This incident took place on the day before Tweed departed for Washington, late in the evening on the day the four security chiefs attended the conference at the Surety building in Paris.

  Tweed realised he had walked into a nightmare. The question he couldn't answer to his own satisfaction was whether Clint Loomis was paranoid, suffering from a persecution complex which made him see enemies everywhere. Hence the obsession with security aboard the Oasis.

  Against that he had to weigh the fact that they had been followed by four unknown- men in two cars when they left Dulles Airport. It was Loomis who changed the subject- much to Tweed's relief.

  'Charles Warner came to see me two weeks ago – he was interested in O'Meara. Have you also flown to the States just to talk to me? I'd find that hard to believe…'

  `Believe it!' Tweed's manner was suddenly abrupt. 'When O'Meara was CIA Director of Operations he manipulated your retirement?'

  'Bet your sweet life…'

  'You know his history. What is that history?'

  'He was an operative in the field early on. I was the man back home who checked his reports…'

  'After a period of duty at Langley he was stationed in West Berlin for several years? Correct?' Tweed queried.

  'Correct. I don't see where you're leading, Tweed. That always worries me..

  'Trust nter The Englishman's manner had a quiet, persuasive authority. He had to keep Loomis talking, to concentrate his mind on one topic. O'Meara's track record. 'You say you checked his reports from West Berlin. He speaks German?'

  'Fluently. He can pass for a native…'

  'Did he go undercover-into East Berlin?'

  'That was strictly forbidden.' There was a very positive note in Loomis' reply. 'It was written into his directive…'