Ryderbeit was now standing directly over him, drinking and watching. He saw the crumbled particles in Packer’s hand and nodded solemnly. ‘So they’re being really serious, eh? Nothing crude like jelly or old dynamite — but our old friend, “la plastique”. Must be a couple of years since I last saw that stuff. How have they set it, d’you think?’
‘Well, it’s certainly not a trembler, or we wouldn’t be here now. And I doubt it’s on a time fuse, because they’d hardly want the scandal of blowing us up in the hotel. In any case, they’d have no guarantee they’d get us together. No, my guess is that it’s a simple percussion fuse —’ Packer tapped the point of the stick — ‘with this thing sliding in on a spring and setting off the detonator. But it’s pretty firm, and it would take pressure to set it off. Like pushing oneself through heavy snow.’
‘So the bastards were calculating that we couldn’t resist using a pair of Hartmanns, and would blow ourselves up on the slopes? Nice and tidy, and not too many innocent casualties.’
‘Well, at least we know the score.’ Packer was carefully pouring the particles of explosive back into the stick, then picked up the pliers and squeezed the ends together again. He had just finished when the telephone rang. He grabbed it, but did not have time to answer. Sarah’s voice came over clear and fast, with that familiar tone of apology masking wilful determination.
‘…it’s the most lovely chalet in Klosters, and this man Steiner has some beautiful early Italian furniture. And there should be lots of interesting people there…’ Packer started to interrupt, but she cut through him like an actress. ‘One thing — are you still with that frightful colonial — Sammy something? — because if you are you’ll have to get rid of him.’
Packer yelled into the phone: ‘We’re not going to any lovely chalet, Sarah! We’re checking out! — tonight — now! And don’t argue. Your packing’s all done. I’ll meet you at the desk in three minutes.’
‘Why? What’s happened?’
‘I can’t explain on the phone. Just believe me — it’s serious. Okay?’
‘I suppose so,’ she said doubtfully; then added, ‘What on earth am I going to tell the others?’
‘As little as possible,’ Packer said, and hung up.
He finished parcelling up the two booby-trapped ski sticks and piled them up with the rest of the luggage. ‘You wait here,’ he told Ryderbeit; ‘I’m going down to settle the bill and get someone to bring our things down. Don’t answer the telephone, or the door, except to the porter.’
Downstairs, while the cashier was making out the bill, Packer went outside and returned the monkey wrench, wire and pliers, and retrieved his 100-franc deposit. He then fetched the Fiat and brought it up to the hotel entrance. He went inside in time to see the porter struggling down the stairs, laden with Sarah’s cases and Packer’s hold-all; while Ryderbeit followed with all four ski bags, and the box of walkie-talkies under his arm. While he and the porter went outside to load the car, Packer stood at the top of the stairs down to the bar and looked furiously at his watch. If Sarah had decided to go with her friends to this chalet after all, he wondered how he could stop her. To try and force her away, in front of D’Arcy-James and the others, would not only be embarrassing, but would harden her will conclusively. The one card he still had to play was the Grima necklace; but he wanted to save that for a more propitious occasion.
She appeared quite suddenly beside him, unsmiling but serene. He was carrying her coat and scarlet beret, and helped her on with them.
‘Now perhaps you’ll tell me what this is all about,’ she said, as they reached the door.
‘Later,’ he said, and hurried her into the back of the Fiat. Something about his manner must have convinced her that he was in earnest.
From the front passenger seat Ryderbeit grinned at her under the brim of his hat, but her expression remained neutral. Packer headed the car down towards the river, into the drab street where Ryderbeit was lodging. He let him out at the door of his pension and turned the car round. While they waited, Sarah sat well back in the corner, arrogant and aloof.
Ryderbeit was evidently as adept at his own packing as at other people’s, and was inside less than ten minutes. For most of these, Sarah sat in silence smoking a Gitane. Finally she said, ‘Owen, I don’t understand what’s going on, except that you’re behaving very oddly. I just hope you haven’t been drinking.’
‘I have not been drinking. I’ll tell you the whole story when we’re out of here.’
Ryderbeit’s tall shape appeared a few moments later, lugging an immense misshapen grip-bag of bandolier-like complexity, its brown leather stained and scarred, the whole thing bound up and bulging with straps and buckles and zipped-up pockets. He had some difficulty forcing it into the boot; and when he got back into the car he had the whisky bottle out again, now nearly empty, and offered it to Sarah. She refused it. Ryderbeit smiled and touched his fingertips to her cheek. ‘Holy Moses! It’s real!’ he muttered, and she flinched away.
Ryderbeit cackled and drank from the bottle, while Packer drove back up into the town, heading for the road down to Landquart.
‘We’re not going to Davos?’ Ryderbeit asked.
Packer shook his head. ‘Too obvious.’
‘Where, then?’
‘Chur.’
‘Chur! Nobody ever goes to Chur — it’s the arsehole of the Alps.’
‘That’s just why we’re going there,’ said Packer.
CHAPTER 19
Charles Pol had missed the last train to Landquart, with its connection to Zürich, and instead had had to hire a taxi. For one of the disadvantages of Swiss life, he had discovered, was that it is the only country in Europe where trains do not run at night.
It was after twelve when he arrived at Geneva’s Cointrin Airport. In various pockets of his voluminous clothes he was carrying the total equivalent of US $800,000, in high denomination Swiss, French and German notes. He went to the MEA desk and found that the next flight to Beirut left at eight in the morning. He booked himself a first-class single ticket in the name of Monsieur Cassis, which corresponded to that in one of his passports.
His choice of destination was deliberate; for Pol recognized that the Ruler would not think at once of hunting down his quarry in his own backyard. Besides, Pol had friends in Beirut — powerful friends among the old Franco-Arab fraternity who had no love for this arrogant despot, this self-deified Croesus who had suddenly flourished all-powerful close to their more humble borders. Let the Ruler make his own plans. Pol would make his.
He checked in at the Airport Hotel, and put in for a 6.00 a.m. call with a substantial breakfast.
CHAPTER 20
The hotel in Chur was a cheerless establishment where a stout unsmiling woman took charge of their passports and made them pay in advance. Sarah complained that she had not yet eaten, but the kitchen was closed, and there was nothing but salami and cheese. Packer arranged to have some sent to their room.
They carried up their own luggage. While Ryderbeit had taken charge of the Armalites and the radios, Packer preferred to keep the ‘plastique’ Hartmann equipment in his own room. It was not that he exactly distrusted Ryderbeit; but he had a nasty image of the Rhodesian finishing the bottle of Scotch, then attempting to test Packer’s theory about the percussion fuses.
Ryderbeit had been given a room next to theirs. Packer was anxious to be rid of him, and be alone with Sarah. To his relief Ryderbeit made no effort to inflict his presence.
‘Goodnight, children! If you run out of ideas, or need any help, just wake me.’ He waved a free hand, cast a lewd grin at Sarah, then disappeared into his room.
Sarah sat down on the double bed and waited until Packer had closed the door. ‘All right,’ she said at last. ‘What’s going on?’
‘We’re in trouble, angel.’
‘Trouble?’ She sounded half amused. ‘You mean you’re frightened of something, here — in Switzerland?’
‘I didn’t say I wa
s frightened. I just don’t want to get killed. And someone’s trying to kill us — Sammy and me, that is.’
‘You’re mad.’
He shook his head. ‘I wish I were.’ He waited for her to light a cigarette, then went on: ‘It began in Amsterdam — when we first met Charles Pol.’ He kept his voice level, matter of fact, as at a military briefing; for this was one of those rare occasions when he had complete mastery over her.
He told the story in careful chronological order, leaving nothing out; and she listened with that maddening inertia that could so easily be mistaken for boredom. She listened without interrupting, chain-smoking. When he had finished she just nodded and said, ‘What did you do with the sticks?’
‘Over there —’ he nodded at the pile of luggage in the corner.
‘But aren’t they dangerous?’
‘Very. But not unless they’re used.’
She was silent for a moment; then looked suddenly worried. ‘But isn’t it dangerous just having them here?’
He smiled. ‘I could put a match to the stuff,’ he said easily, ‘and it wouldn’t burn. I could throw it in a fire — bash it with a hammer — even eat it — and it’d still be quite harmless.’
‘So how do you get it to go off?’
‘It needs a detonator. As I said, that only goes off if you push in the points at the end — when you go skiing.’
‘And that’s what they hoped you’d do?’ There was a faint note of panic in her voice now, which pleased him.
‘Don’t worry. We’re in no danger here.’
‘And if you don’t go skiing, and don’t get blown up, what then?’
‘Then they’ll no doubt try something else.’
She sat sucking the tip of her thumb. ‘But do you really believe the Ruler’s behind all this?’ she asked finally. ‘It sounds so fantastic, I mean, these people I was with tonight — those friends of DJ’s — they’ve got friends who know him. He’s a very civilized man.’
‘I’m sure he is. He’s even been to Buckingham Palace a few times.’ There was another pause. He decided the time had come to frighten her. ‘I told you there was that secret agent of the Ruler’s down in the bar tonight,’ he said slowly. ‘The one who saw me and Sammy in France, and who was supposed to have been murdered. Well, he saw us together at Le Touquet — which might have been a casual weekend — but he saw us together again tonight. That’s why he was sent to Klosters — to find out if Sammy and I had any accomplices.’
‘What are we going to do, then?’
‘We’re going to kill the Ruler.’
‘We?’ Her mouth, usually so mobile, had gone slack.
‘I want you to listen to me very carefully, Sarah.’ And he explained to her how she was to ride up to the Gotschnagrat restaurant tomorrow afternoon, and be there at four o’clock when the Ruler arrived; and how she was to send a simple message over the R/T radio. ‘That’s all you have to do — just wait for him to leave the restaurant, and say a couple of words.’
‘Very nice —’ her voice had become quiet and sulky — ‘for you and Sammy and Charles Pol. You’ve all been paid a lot of money.’
He went over and took her gently by the shoulders. Her body felt strangely frail. ‘Sarah, love, if you do what I’m asking, I’ll buy you that latest Porsche convertible, silver-grey with a black hood.’
She looked up at him with a funny crooked smile. ‘You’re bloody sure of yourself, aren’t you, Owen?’ Her voice gave him the uncomfortable feeling that she was holding something back. He decided now was the moment to produce his ace.
He went over to his hold-all and took out the Grima case, concealing it from her view as he walked back to the bed; then, with a little bow, he laid it on her lap. She opened it, lifted the tissue wrappings, and looked at the necklace as though it were some household utensil. She made no move to try it on. ‘When did you get this?’ she said at last.
‘Does it matter?’
‘The only branches Grima have outside London are in New York, Paris and Geneva. I suppose you sneaked off to Geneva while you were pretending to be skiing?’ She replaced the tissue paper and snapped the box shut. ‘And no message? No billet doux? You don’t believe in treating a girl with much delicacy, do you, Mister Packer?’ There was a chill in her voice now. ‘Do you?’ she repeated.
He stood in front of her, not moving, not speaking.
‘You shit!’ she yelled. ‘You mean little shit!’ She looked up at him with ferocious triumph. ‘You never went to Geneva. But I did! I went the day before yesterday, with Charles Pol. We went into France and had lunch at Père Bise. And on the way back, through Geneva, he stopped at the Grima shop, and he made me wait in the taxi.’ She threw her head back and laughed. ‘And how are you going to worm your way out of this one? You should have stuck to the Porsche.’
Packer nodded and sat down on the corner of the bed, not looking at her. ‘What were you doing with Charles Pol?’
She gave him a bright taunting smile. ‘Enjoying myself. He brings out the little girl in me. And he’s wonderful company.’
‘And you spent the whole day with him just enjoying his wonderful company?’
She shrugged irritably. ‘I was bored and glad of something to do.’
‘And what did you do — talk? And what did you talk about, Sarah?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Just what I said. You didn’t just spend the whole day looking into each other’s eyes and singing duets.’
She gave him a look of flagrant dislike. ‘We talked about lots of things. I can’t remember.’
‘Try and remember.’
Suddenly she shook her head so that her hair dropped across her face, half hiding her eyes. ‘Oh, this is bloody silly! I go out for the day with a mutual friend and I have to remember every damned thing we talked about.’
‘One of the things you talked about,’ Packer said slowly, ‘was the little matter of the radio message from the Gotschnagrat restaurant tomorrow afternoon.’
There was a long pause, broken by a rumble and cough from the plumbing. A truck changed gear outside in the street. Sarah sat with her shoulders hunched forward, again sucking the tip of her thumb.
‘All right!’ she cried at last. ‘If you know, why do you bloody well ask?’
‘What was the message he told you to send?’
She hesitated. ‘Something in French. We thought it would sound better. Something like: “It’s getting cold. I’m going home”.’ Her tone was again sulky and evasive.
‘And how much is he paying you?’
‘I don’t think that’s any of your business.’ She had pulled her shoulders back and addressed him as though he were some insolent servant.
‘Everything to do with this operation is my business,’ he told her patiently. ‘For a start, I want to make sure that Pol’s not under-paying you.’
‘Like buying me a Porsche, I suppose? Well, Owen Packer, I can tell you that Charles Pol is a lot more generous than that.’
‘And has he paid you yet?’
‘He’s made the arrangements, thank you. And don’t worry, they’re quite satisfactory.’
Packer did not try to argue. As a banker’s daughter she probably knew more about such affairs than he did; and whether she could trust Pol or not was her business, not his.
She yawned and started to take off her bracelets. ‘I’m going to bed. We’ve got a lot to do tomorrow.’
‘You’re sure you still want to go through with it?’
‘Why not? Don’t you?’
‘The situation’s changed since the day before yesterday, Sarah. Pol’s buggered off, for a start.’
‘Well, there was nothing for him to do hanging around Klosters. I thought he was leaving all the planning to you?’
For a moment Packer wondered whether, deliberately or otherwise, she had misunderstood everything he had told her. The alternative was that Pol had already begun to draw her into his own secret plans for the future: what he cal
led the ‘other, subtler element’. But at this stage Packer decided that it would be too dangerous to question her further. He said, ‘I mean, the situation with the Ruler has changed. He has cancelled the operation.’
‘You’re not taking orders from the Ruler. You’re arranging things for Charles Pol.’ She stood up and fetched her grip-bag. ‘And as Pol agrees, if the Ruler wants us all killed, I suggest we get on with the job as quickly as possible. Oh bloody hell!’ She had opened her case, and now rounded on him, her face taut with fury. ‘Did you pack this?’
He shook his head. ‘Sammy did. He’s a mercenary, not a valet.’
She paused, then began quickly undressing. ‘Goodnight, Captain Packer. I always knew you were an officer and a gentleman.’
CHAPTER 21
It was 3.32 by Sarah’s watch, which was two minutes ahead of the clock in the Gotschnagrat restaurant. They had stopped serving lunch half an hour earlier than usual, and the waiters were discreetly making out bills before they had been demanded. On the terrace the tables were empty, except for a few lizard-skinned sun-addicts sitting with their oiled faces tilted west, sopping up the last of the ultraviolet before the sun slid behind the peak of the Weissfluh.
Sarah was sitting on a bench about 200 yards above the restaurant building. The sky was clear and it was very cold. She wore a smart white windcheater above her black stretch-pants, a fur hat with earflaps turned down, and a pair of the largest dark glasses she had been able to find in town that morning. She realized, with some irony, that it was probably the first time in her life that she had ever wished to conceal her attractions.
She was also carrying her own Instamatic camera, which she occasionally pretended to use; and beside her on the bench was her Gucci handbag, containing her make-up, pill case, purse, a packet of Gitanes, a headscarf, and the Hitachi R/T set.
Shah-Mak Page 20