The Predators

by Brian Freemantle

  André Poncellet picked up as soon as Smet finished, describing as ‘overwhelming’ the response within Brussels to the previous night’s television and that day’s newspaper publication of the kidnap computer graphics. It was going to take several days – maybe even longer – to investigate every one.

  Claudine always regarded what she did as a contribution to an investigation, not its most important element, and was content for the practical discussions to dominate the meeting. It was, she acknowledged, the first time this supposed overall planning group had been given the opportunity to operate in anything like a proper, practical way. Consciously Claudine let the discussion swirl about her, always aware of it, listening to it, but at the same time instinctively lapsing as well into people-watching.

  From their earlier encounters she hadn’t expected quite such a forceful emergence from Jean Smet, although she accepted Blake’s direct approach that morning had lifted the Justice Ministry lawyer’s participation beyond its original liaison remit. André Poncellet was showing no surprise at the other Belgian’s occupying centre stage: seemed prepared, even, to surrender a leading role to the man.

  Claudine’s greatest concentration was upon John Norris. When she’d first entered the room in which Norris was already waiting she’d been briefly gripped by the fury she’d felt finding herself tiptoeing around her hotel room, actually taking care to avoid cupboard-closing or clothes-rustling noises. She was completely controlled now, still angry but able to find an excuse for what had happened in the man’s illness. She hoped it wouldn’t be too much longer before she was able to reach Sanglier: certainly before the day was out. His not being available was a nuisance.

  Norris appeared as attentive as everyone else, but there was an artificial studiousness about the way he was avoiding her gaze: several times it seemed difficult for the man to stop himself smiling in a situation in which there was no reason to smile. And he was making no contribution to the discussion.

  She was frightened, Norris decided: guessing how close he was although there was no way she could know how he’d got there. She’d have to wait to learn that: wait for the confrontation. He’d look directly enough at her then. Face her down: force an admission. He had enough on tape from the hotel recording. Words that could only have one meaning: words that told him she was involved in the kidnapping and how scared she was at being caught out.

  The Americans send a negotiator?

  He’s the problem.

  She didn’t know the half of it. She’d even conceded that, too. There are a lot of problems we didn’t expect.

  Other parts of the conversation presented themselves in his mind, each as damning as the other.

  Can you handle it?

  I’m going to have to.

  She wasn’t going to be able to, though. Not after that morning’s computer chase that they were all so excited about: that he was excited about, because it had given him the positive tie-in. From Bonn to Rome: to Rome and the convenient money-managing expertise of an American Express office. Which fitted perfectly with another part of last night’s taped exchange.

  Aren’t you going to Rome?

  ‘What about the message itself?’ Norris was suddenly conscious that Poncellet was directing the question not to him but to the woman.

  Claudine did not bother with the pretence of including Norris, consciously subjugating her still lingering medical distaste. ‘It worries me,’ she admitted bluntly.

  ‘Why?’ demanded Smet.

  ‘It hasn’t taken us any further forward,’ said Claudine. ‘The ambassador and his wife performed brilliantly last night. Psychologically it should have got a different response.’

  ‘Perhaps your advice was wrong,’ said Norris at once. McBride was a separate issue but Norris was sure he had something there, too. The indictments against Luigi della Sialvo were all for illegal arms dealing with Baghdad during the Gulf War, obtaining weaponry from a corporation that at the time had been McBride’s chief rival and was now the subject of four separate and enjoined indictments. Norris found it difficult to believe that whoever in the Bureau had checked out McBride before the ambassadorial appointment hadn’t taken the inquiry further, comparing the computer-recorded volume of material leaving McBride’s company against End User certificates for the Far East – della Sialvo’s favoured route – during Operation Desert Storm. He’d put an ‘Utmost Priority’ tag on his request, after studying the indictments, so he expected to hear within twenty-four hours. It didn’t matter whether McBride was a close personal friend of the President or a major campaign contributor. If he’d broken the law he had to answer to it.

  ‘My advice wasn’t wrong,’ insisted Claudine, confronting the American verbally as well as physically. ‘This isn’t a response to the broadcast. This is an angry message.’

  ‘What’s there to be angry about?’ queried Harding. ‘McBride pleaded: virtually said he’d pay anything.’

  ‘I don’t think the anger is directed at us,’ said Claudine. ‘I think there’s some disagreement among the people who’ve got Mary: irritation that subconsciously came through in the message.’

  Oh, this was clever, thought Norris: trying to confuse them all with psychological double-talk no one could recognize except him.

  ‘Couldn’t it be reasserting the control you say is so important to them?’ suggested Smet.

  The lawyer now very clearly considered himself an active player in the group, decided Claudine. Why not? He was a lawyer and all his questions and comments so far had been valid. She said: ‘There’s an aggression that wasn’t in the earlier contacts. And this one, incidentally, was written by yet another person, so we know there are at least three.’

  ‘What could the disagreement be about?’ wondered Blake.

  ‘The most obvious reason is that they’re not unanimous over how to continue the situation,’ said Claudine.

  ‘What situation?’ protested Harding. ‘They’ve hardly started yet!’

  ‘That’s another thing that worries me,’ conceded Claudine quietly.

  ‘You think the danger’s sexual? Or worse even than that?’ asked Poncellet.

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Claudine, unhappy at a further admission. ‘But I think there’s more now to the arrogance that I talked about in the beginning.’

  ‘Like what?’ demanded Smet.

  Claudine paused, briefly unsure whether to express the fear. ‘They’ve snatched a child: not just a child, the daughter of an American ambassador. They should be frightened: apprehensive at least. But they’re not: not enough. So they’ve done it before: snatched a child and not been caught.’

  ‘We’re still working through investigations over the past three years, re-interviewing child sex suspects against whom no charges were brought as well as convicted paedophiles,’ said Poncellet. ‘Everyone will be compared to the computer graphic, obviously.’

  ‘Any women involved?’ demanded Blake.

  Poncellet looked uncomfortable. ‘Not that I’m aware of: I’ll make a specific check.’

  ‘Could the sort of disagreement you think this message shows be making them careless?’ asked Harding, smiling apologetically to the German in advance. ‘Kurt wasn’t able to follow a trail before.’

  ‘They had to risk it this time,’ said Claudine quickly, seeing Volker’s offended frown. ‘They had to let us pick up the school address: that’s the proof the message is genuine, not a crank response from last night’s broadcast. They had to leave it on the screen long enough for it to be recognized: Kurt’s genius was in having created a program that identified it in seconds – far more quickly than they probably expected – and then being able to follow it back as far as he did.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Volker, the frown replaced by an even-toothed smile.

  She was extremely convincing, thought Norris, in reluctant admiration. But that was hardly difficult for her, knowing it all from the inside as she did. This was going to be one of his most successful investigations –
spectacular even – exposing her for what she was.

  ‘But the fact that they used the school for proof could be another cause for concern,’ Claudine continued. ‘The first two messages had identification that could have only come from Mary herself. Why didn’t the third, to maintain the pattern?’

  ‘You think she’s dead?’ demanded Harding.

  Was she trying to soften them up, prepare them for something that had happened? wondered Norris. That couldn’t be right: he couldn’t save Mary – prove to everyone that he’d been right – if she was already dead. So it couldn’t be true. It didn’t fit. ‘No! She can’t be.’

  Blake and Harding regarded the American psychologist in surprise, as if they’d forgotten he was in the room. Seemingly abruptly aware of their attention, Norris said: ‘I don’t read the message as Dr Carter does. In my opinion Mary Beth’s still alive.’

  There were discomfited looks between Blake and Harding. Poncellet openly shook his head. Only Smet gave no reaction.

  Forcefully Claudine said: ‘The lack of anything that must have come from the child herself is the strongest indicator so far that Mary’s dead. It could even be the reason for the anger that I believe is there.’

  ‘How much more difficult will it be to find them if she is dead? If the body is buried or disposed of?’ queried Smet.

  Harding looked sideways, inviting Norris to respond. When he didn’t the local FBI man said: ‘I think it would make Washington doubly determined to catch them. The investigation would increase rather than decrease.’

  ‘If this morning’s message hasn’t carried any negotiation forward what do we do?’ asked Poncellet.

  Claudine was positive. ‘Now’s the time to wait.’

  ‘What if they don’t come back to us?’ said Blake.

  ‘She’ll definitely be dead,’ declared Claudine. ‘And we’ll have failed.’

  ‘You’ll have failed,’ said Norris.

  Jean Smet kept his house as the venue but individually warned the others that Félicité would be attending too. She had to know – they all had to know – everything that had happened. It didn’t change the need to get rid of the child – it made it all the more necessary, despite Harding’s bravado – and when she heard how close the investigation was getting Félicité would have to agree. That way they’d all be in it together, without any falling out. Which he wanted as much as the rest of them.

  He expected Félicité to arrive last, which she did, but wasn’t prepared for the triumphal entrance, a diva commanding the stage. ‘Well?’ she demanded.

  It was Henri Cool, the one most worried about identification, who first realized Félicité actually had her hair in a chignon, although crossed in the way she always wore it, not as it had been shown in the computer picture. ‘You’re mad! Totally mad!’

  She laughed at the schoolteacher. ‘I walked here by the longest route I could find. I started in the Grande Place and actually obliged two tourists by taking their pictures in front of the Manneken Pis, imagining what fun we could have had with a chubby little chap with a prick like that.’ She smiled towards Smet. ‘Just for you I wandered by the Palais de Justice – it really is the ugliest building in Europe, isn’t it? – and went through the park to the royal palace before making my way here.’ She paused again, surveying them all. ‘And even with my hair like this no one looked at me a second time.’ She snapped her fingers. ‘So that for the pictures you were all shitting yourselves about.’ She slumped into a chair, shaking her clamped hair free of its pins. ‘I’m totally exhausted.’ She looked at Henri Cool. ‘Anything happen to you?’

  ‘I called in sick. Stayed home.’

  ‘That was very clever!’ sneered Félicité. ‘That wouldn’t cause any curiosity in anyone who might have seen a resemblance, would it, you bloody fool!’ She made a languid gesture towards Smet and said: ‘I’ll have champagne.’

  Smet had two bottles already cooling in their buckets. He gestured for Michel Blott to serve, wanting to concentrate entirely upon the woman. ‘Today was incredible. It’s gone a long way beyond computer pictures.’

  ‘What is it now?’ she sighed wearily.

  It was not something he would have admitted to the rest – he was reluctant to admit it to himself – but Smet had actually come close to enjoying that afternoon. Of course he had been frightened, weighing everything he said and heard, but the fear had even added to the sensation. He found it difficult to define precisely – a combination of power, at perhaps being able to influence the very people hunting him; and mockery, at being able to laugh at their stupid ignorance; and the tingling fear itself, at actually being there, so close to them, talking to them, being accepted by them – but supposed it was akin to what Félicité felt. The difference between himself and her was that he didn’t constantly need the experience, like an addict permanently in search of a better and bigger high. There was even something like a physical satisfaction – another manifestation of power, he supposed – at the varying, horrified reactions from everyone except Félicité. He’d anticipated that, too.

  ‘There was only one more cut-out, after Menen,’ disclosed Dehane, hollow-voiced. ‘If he’d got through that he would have been back to me! Oh my God!’

  ‘It was stupid, using the school,’ said Félicité.

  ‘What else did I have? You didn’t give me anything to identify her with!’ retorted Smet. ‘That was stupid.’

  Félicité didn’t like being so openly opposed, certainly not in front of the rest. Nor did she like having to admit, if only to herself, that the man was right: she had been stupid. To Dehane she said: ‘You’ve got a relay bug in the café system?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Could you get it out?’

  Dehane shook his head doubtfully. ‘They would expect me to do it. Be waiting for an unauthorized entry.’

  ‘Would it lead to you, if they found it?’

  ‘No. It’s a one-way system: I’ve got to access it.’

  ‘So there’s no danger, even if they find it?’

  ‘Not really. And it would take a very long time, no matter how good this man Volker is.’

  ‘So we can use what they think is a breakthrough to our advantage again,’ said Félicité. ‘We simply leave dozens of policemen wasting their time in a part of the country we’re never going to go near again.’

  The insane bitch still didn’t intend changing her plans, Smet realized. The others had to hear her say it, to convince them later what was necessary. ‘We mustn’t go on with it.’

  ‘It doesn’t alter anything,’ chanted Félicité, like a mantra.

  ‘We’ve got to get rid of her.’

  ‘There’s nothing to discuss. I’ve told all of you what’s going to happen. And it will. Exactly as I say.’

  ‘You can’t be serious!’ protested the other lawyer. ‘This doesn’t make any sense at all.’

  Félicité was extremely serious, although still outwardly showing the sangfroid with which she’d arrived an hour earlier. The investigation – everything – was very different from the last time. Nothing was like what had happened then: not so technical nor as determined nor with such an inexhaustible supply of police and specialists to be called upon at a moment’s notice.

  So it would be madness to prolong it much further: madness to try to recapture the exquisite, first-time pleasure of last night, being with Mary but ultimately holding back from touching her. Ecstasy from abstinence: priestly fulfilment.

  She couldn’t – wouldn’t! – give the slightest indication that they’d been right, of course. They hadn’t been right. It was the investigators who had been better: investigators she still had to confront to prove who, ultimately, was best.

  ‘We’ll further confuse them, beyond Menen,’ she announced. ‘Now they’ve got so much manpower invested in e-mail, we’ll change our approach.’ She turned to Dehane. ‘How many Belgacom mobile telephones get stolen every day, not just here in Belgium but throughout Europe?’

 
Dehane snorted in disbelief. ‘Thousands. Tens of thousands.’

  ‘And all the losses – and the numbers – get recorded, to prevent their unauthorized use, don’t they?’

  The telephone executive shifted uneasily. ‘Eventually.’

  ‘Exactly!’ smiled Félicité. ‘I want you to programme newly reported stolen numbers into unprogrammed telephones for me. We’ll only use a number once, before switching to another. Even if a number is scanned and the holder identified, it won’t lead to us. All it will do is compound the confusion we started at Menen.’ Her smiled widened. ‘Now isn’t that the cleverest thing!’

  No one replied immediately.

  Smet said: ‘Who’s going to make the telephone contact?’

  ‘Me, of course! Unless any of you want to volunteer.’

  The silence this time was longer.

  ‘That’s settled then,’ said Félicité, hurrying now as she came to another decision: it would be easy enough to bring forward that night’s dinner with Pieter Lascelles. Everyone ate unnaturally early in Holland anyway. ‘And I’ll go to the house again tonight to look after Mary.’