Cross of Fire (49 page)

The solid double-glazed window was shaped like a cell in a bee-hive, was difficult to look out from at that height.
She moved quickly, lifted the lid of her case, took out a
large plastic bag. Inside were a few clothes she'd been on
the verge of throwing out.

She hung several things in the small cupboard. In the
bathroom she put a half-used tube of toothpaste in a glass,
tucked a worn toothbrush beside it and added one canister
of talcum powder. Anyone secretly entering the room would
conclude she was returning there shortly. Checking her
watch, she closed her suitcase, waited exactly thirty minutes,
and took the elevator back to the lobby.

Butler, having furnished his own room in a similar fashion with articles he never wanted to see again, was waiting behind the wheel of the Renault. Pete Nield sat in the back:
arriving later by taxi from the airport he'd furnished his
room with similar unwanted articles.

'Arcachon, here we come.' whispered Paula, sitting next
to Butler.

'Not yet. Cheroot and his Fiat are parked up the road. First south out of Bordeaux into the countryside...'

Half an hour later they were driving along a traffic-free country road. Free except for their Renault and the headlights of a car some distance behind them. As they drove on Paula began talking.

'I wonder what's happened to Marler? He seems to have
vanished off the face of the earth.'

'He's over here somewhere,' Butler responded. 'Don't ask me where because I haven't a clue.'

'Tweed had some very special mission for him. Love to know what it is. Most mysterious.'

'Why not ask Tweed when you next see him?'

'I suppose he's still in Paris. I got the impression he
intends to stay there for a while to maintain contact with Navarre. We really have arrived at a historic time. The
President
and the Prime Minister killed in that TGV crash.'

Paula had first heard the news from a Frenchman she'd
chatted to aboard the flight to Bordeaux. The few passengers
were all talking about it excitedly. She also thought she had detected signs of alarm.

'I suppose I could ask Tweed,' she said with a poker face.

'And get a flea in your ear,' Butler grinned. 'And I'm willing to bet Marler - wherever he is - doesn't have any idea where we are. Tweed is playing this one very close to his chest.'

He stiffened as the car crested a hill, glanced quickly in
his rear-view mirror. Nothing behind except Cheroot and
his Fiat. They descended a long straight slope. Nothing on
the road ahead as far as they could see by moonlight. Butler
slowed at the bottom of the hill, paused, manoeuvred his
car so it blocked the narrow road broadside on.

'As good a place as any.' he said in his matter-of-fact
manner.

'For what?' Paula asked.

'Wait and see.'

Butler checked the Walther in his hip holster, the weapon
Paula had handed to him in a briefcase in the Swiss res
taurant in Paris. Lasalle had been very accommodating and
Paula was carrying a .32 Browning hi her shoulder bag. Similarly, Nield was armed with another Walther. Butler
took a map from the door pocket, got out of the car, leaving his headlights full on.

He walked a short distance back the way they had come
and then stood in the road, holding up the gloved hand gripping the road map. The Fiat crested the hill, came
rushing down towards him, slowed, crawled cautiously as
Butler waved.

The Fiat stopped. Only the driver, Cheroot, behind the wheel. Butler walked confidently forward, displaying the map in the car's headlights. He came up on the side of the
driver who had lowered the window, was gazing at him
suspiciously. Butler began to gabble in French.

'We have lost our way. I don't even know where we are.
This map is no help. Maybe you could ...'

The fat little man, wearing a dark suit, kept the smoking cheroot clamped between his thick lips as he listened. Butler's right hand, encased in a motoring glove, struck like a snake. His clenched fist smashed into the Frenchman's jaw. There was a click as though something had been dislocated. The driver sagged behind his wheel.

Butler opened the door, felt around inside his overcoat,
hauled out a .32 Browning. He hurled it over a hedge into a field, then followed it with the mag he'd first extracted.

Continuing his search, Butler found an Army identity
card in his breast pocket.
Caporal Jean Millet.
He skimmed
the card after the weapon into the field. A soldier who loses his identity gets into a helluva lot of trouble. Butler then noticed Millet had bitten right through his cheroot, leaving
half of it presumably in his mouth - the other half lay
burning on the floor. Maybe it would set the Fiat ablaze.
With luck.

Butler ripped out the microphone apparatus attached to
the dashboard, reached up and broke the aerial off the roof.
Next he drew the key out of the ignition, hurled that into
the night. His last act was to open the bonnet, feel around with his gloved hand, ripping up wires. As he walked back
to the Renault he decided he could assume the Fiat had
been immobilized. He got in behind the wheel.

'Trouble?' enquired Paula.

'For Corporal Jean Millet, yes. Now we can double back to Arcachon. Let's hope the natives are more friendly there.'

Chapter Thirty-Two

General Charles de Forge was alone in his office at GHQ,
Third Corps, when the phone rang. Expecting Lamy, he
lifted the receiver, announced himself in a brusque tone.

'Manteau
speaking.' a voice said in perfect French. 'I did
the job for you. Not bad. The President
and
the Prime
Minister with one bomb. Which is what you wanted, I
know...'

'Who the hell are you?'

'Manteau.
I just said so. Wrecking the TGV should come
cheap to you for two million Swiss francs. I'd advise you to
pay up this time, General. You don't want me to turn my
attention to Third Corps GHQ, do you?'

'I need proof...'

'Which you will get shortly. When you are convinced I'll
tell you how to make the payment. In high-denomination
banknotes. I hope the serial numbers don't run in sequence.
I wouldn't like that.'

'Are you threatening me?'

'No, of course not. I never threaten. I act. Take it as a
piece of life-saving advice. Goodbye ...'

The connection was broken. Stunned by the audacity of
the call, de Forge sat still. Where the hell was Lamy? A
knock on the door jerked him out of his state of momentary confusion. He called out in a barrack-room tone.

'Enter!'

The door opened and Lieutenant Berthier, immaculate as
always in his uniform, walked in holding a sheaf of papers in his left hand. His hair was still browner than normal: the result of the colourant he'd used before travelling to Aldeburgh. Just in time he remembered to salute.

'Well? Is it important? I'm expecting someone else.'

'Major Lamy phoned on his way here. I told him about
the Reuters reports we'd just received and he said you
would wish to see them at once.'

'Then put them on my desk.' De Forge prided himself on his ability to think of three things at once. 'You were sent to Arcachon to locate Isabelle Thomas, the mistress of the spy, Henri Bayle. You succeeded?'

'Not yet, General. She is not in the phone directory...'

'Phone directory!' De Forge's fist crashed on his desk. 'I send you there to find someone. You have her description
from that barman at the Miami dive. And all you can do is
to check the phone directory?'

'I did more, I assure you. I made discreet enquiries - no shopkeeper in Arcachon I was able to contact had any
knowledge of her. I walked the streets in the hope of seeing
her. Walked the streets all night...'

'Then go back and walk the streets all day. She could be dangerous. We do not know what Bayle told her. Return to
Arcachon at once!'

'Yes, General...'

During the conversation de Forge realized the marked
map of Paris was spread open on
his desk. He folded it
while he gave Berthier his dressing down. Alone, he began to read the reports with growing amazement. An hour later
he was staring into space when there was another knock.
This time it was Major Lamy.

'Where the hell have you been?' de Forge demanded
'You have been absent for many hours.'

'I have just returned from Lyons. My return flight was delayed because of what happened. Have you read those reports?'

'I have read them.' De Forge sat very upright in his high-
backed chair. 'It says here some old man in a village near the viaduct was train-watching through binoculars. Some damned stupid hobby of his. He says he saw just a few
minutes before the TGV arrived a man in a cloak on the
viaduct.
Manteau!
Later, DST officers searched the village,
found a grey cloak stuffed in a litter bin. I don't understand
any of this. Kalmar was supposed to ...'

'Kalmar was assigned the mission ...'

'Don't interrupt me! While you were taking for ever to
return from Lyons I had a phone call. Guess who from?'

'Kalmar?' Lamy suggested.

'No! From
Manteau!
How the devil would he get hold of my private number?
Manteau
said he had wrecked the TGV.
I didn't believe him. Now I read these reports. That idiot of
an old man couldn't have invented his story - no one had
heard of
Manteau.
On the
phone he demands two million Swiss francs for destroying the TGV. You'll have to handle him when he calls again.'

'You don't mean we pay that enormous sum?' Lamy
queried.

Tell me, Lamy, just how much have we paid out to the
unknown Kalmar so far?'

'Three million Swiss francs. That is for various jobs.'

'I know that!' De Forge stared down his subordinate. 'I have handed over three million for you to pass on to the
ghost man, Kalmar.
Someone
has a lot of money in their
Swiss bank account. Haven't they, Major?'

'General!' Lamy protested, shaken. 'I have told you how Kalmar operates. I phone a number, a girl answers, tells me
the public phone box I have to go to, its number. Or, frequently, she asks me for names - the
targets.
Then she
tells me the remote phone box I must go to. I wait for
Kalmar to call me at that box at the agreed time. I give him
more detailed instructions about the target - or targets. He
speaks to me in English but with an accent I can't identify. I leave the money in a cloth bag behind the box. Every time
be warns me he is watching - that if I attempt to identify
him when he collects he'll kill me.'