Touch the Devil (15 page)

"In theory. The homing system Brosnan mentioned is no problem. I have heavy connections with the smuggling business in this area. We often recover stuff dropped over the rail of a passing ship at sea using just such a device. And the boat is no problem. We took over a fishing company on the docks last year. We own six trawlers. I can have one at St. Denis tomorrow."

"In other words, there's no technical reason why it shouldn't work."

"True, but it's still a hell of a thing to step off the rock in that sea and take a chance that I would put at no better than fifty-fifty." "You seem cheerful enough about it."

"He's been in a stone tomb for fourteen years, Mr. Devlin. This is the only chance he'll ever get to beat the game. Who am Ito refuse him that? But there are other things to consider. Many important points which do not seem to have occurred to you."

There was a knock at the door and Big Claude, the doorman, looked in. "Doctor Cresson is here."

"Good, show him in."

Anne-Marie said, "What do we need a doctor for?"

Jean-Paul lit a Gauloise and smiled. "You'll see, Cherie. You'll see."

Andre Cresson was a large, fat man with dark, sad eyes and a double chin. His tan garbardine suit looked as if it hadn't been pressed in months, and he smoked incessantly, lighting one cigarette from the stub of another, his black shirt smothered with ash.

He said, "You say they intend to come out through the sewers?" "That's right," Devlin told him.

Cresson made a face. "Not good. Sewers are a bad scene at the best of times, but in a place like Belle Isle . . ." He shrugged. "Probably the original tunnels from the eighteenth century. The effluent of years."

"What are you saying?" Jean-Paul demanded.

"Well, there are often pockets of CO2 and methane. The first will suffocate. The second will not only suffocate, but will explode from a spark if conditions are right. But that's just a chance they have to take."

"The point is, no candles or matches?" Devlin said.

"Exactly. You will be seeing this man Brosnan again before the attempt, Monsieur?"

"That's right. I saw the assistant governor and made it clear there were further matters of business to iron out before I could finalize them with my client. There was no problem. I see Brosnan Thursday morning."

"Then I suggest a small pocket flashlight might be in order. A thing perhaps difficult to come by in prison. You see, the main danger would occur if they were to fall in the effluent. Nausea, vomiting and a rapid death within a few hours can occur due to a gutful of human pathogenes. There is also the possibility of viral hepatitis."

There was a profound silence. It was Anne-Marie who said, "And what can be done about all this, Doctor?"

"Oh, immediate drug therapy the moment they are retrieved." He smiled sadly. "If, indeed, they are retrieved. The waters of the. Mill Race, my friends, even on a calm night, will reduce body temperature rapidly. This would particularly affect my old friend Jacques who is not, to be frank, as young as he was."

Jean-Paul said, "All right, then you come with us on the trawler to administer whatever drugs are necessary the moment we have them over the side. Naturally, I'll see that you're well taken care of for this service."

Cresson shook his head. "No, Jean-Paul, your father and I go back more years than I care to remember. He was always my good friend. This one, I do for him."

Jean-Paul smiled. "Then, in his name, I gratefully accept." Devlin said, "Let's assume it works like a charm, and they make it. What happens next?"

"As I told you," Anne-Marie said. "I have a small farm in the hills above Nice. I use it when I want to get away from things. It's very remote and up high. You can see anyone approaching for miles. They can go there during the recovery period."

"What about your staff?" he asked:

"No problem. I only keep sheep there, a Spanish mountain variety. One shepherd, Old Louis, and he's away up in the hills most of the time."

"Sounds good to me."

Jean-Paul said, "I appreciate the offer, but I'll take care of my father."

"They'll need to lie low for some time," Devlin pointed out. "This thing will cause one hell of a stink. We'll have every cop in France looking for them and Interpol on the alert."

"True," Jean-Paul said. "But let's look at it another way. What if the sea claimed them? What if they died from exposure, and the Mill Race carried them in to the rocks outside of St. Denis?"

There was a long silence. Anne-Marie said in a low voice, "If you're implying what I think you are, there is the obvious proble
m t
hat the bodies would not be Jacques Savary and Martin Brosnan." "And wouldn't stand up to any kind of forensic examination," Devlin added.

"Battered beyond recognition, wearing prison uniforms, stenciled with their own numbers, floating in on stolen prison life jackets?" Jean-Paul shook his head. "I would think it unlikely that they would take the examination any further than that." He eased his back, staring down at the chart thoughtfully. "I make a considerable amount of money from the operation of gambling casinos. We always win because the odds favor the house. I'll make you a prophecy on this one--a gambler's hunch. I think that if the authorities recover those two bodies, they'll dispose of them as quickly as possible and simply announce that prisoners Brosnan and Savary have died, either from natural causes or perhaps in an accident at the granite quarry."

"What you're saying is that they would kill the escape story altogether?" Devlin said. "In other words, it never happened."

"Eminently sensible, if you think of it. That way the authorities are not left with egg on their face, and Belle Isle's reputation for being escape-proof is left intact."

Anne-Marie said, "He could be right. It makes a great deal of sense."

"Perhaps," Devlin said. "Only time will tell on that one. So, what's the next move?"

Jean-Paul turned to Cresson. "We're in your hands now, Andre. Scour the city. Mortuaries, undertakers, all the usual places. The trawler leaves for St. Denis tomorrow afternoon. When it does, I want two suitable bodies in its cold storage."

Andre Cresson lit
. A
fresh cigarette from the stub of the one he was smoking and took a pen and a small leather-bound notebook from his pocket. He said to Devlin, "I know where I am where Jacques is concerned. I was his doctor for years. Perhaps, Monsieur, in the interests of accuracy, you'd care to give me a description of your friend Brosnan?"

Chapter
Eight.

Frank Barry lay in bed smoking, staring up at the ceiling. It was seven o'clock in the morning, and cold November rain drifted against the window. Jenny Crowther slept beside him, breathing gently, her lips slightly parted. She looked, in repose, incredibly innocent, even childlike. He considered her dispassionately, his mind busy on important things.

He slid from between the blankets, padded to the chair on which he'd left his clothes, and pulled on slacks and an old sweater. He ran fingers through his hair and picked up his suitcases.

Jenny stirred and sat up. "You're going?" she said, and there was alarm in her voice.

He put the cases down and came to the bed. "No, you stay where you are. I don't want you up at the farm today, understand?" She gazed at him searchingly. "You'll be back?'

-Later," he said.

She flung her arms around his neck and kissed him passionately. It had no effect on him at all, and he was conscious of a strange feeling of regret.

"Be a good girl," he said, and he picked up his suitcases and went out.

There was a smell of bacon cooking. He found Salter in the kitchen at the stove.

"Ah, Mr. Sinclair," he said. "Can I offer you a little something?"

"Not really." Barry poured himself a cup of tea and drank i
t q
uickly. "I always prefer to work on an empty stomach."

Salter stopped smiling. "This is the big day then?"

"I'd have thought a devious old sod like you would have learned by now that the less you know the better off you are." Barry picked up the suitcases and went to the door. "I've told Jenny tastay away from the farm today. That applies to you as well."

The threat was implicit. Salter stood there clutching the frying pan, looking thoroughly alarmed. Barry went out and crossed the yard to the barn.

Fifteen minutes later he parked the Land Rover at the end of the jetty. The rain was fine and soft in the mist and, as usual, there wasn't a soul about. He slipped over the rail of the Kathleen and went into the wheelhouse. First, he dropped the inspection flap under the instrument panel to check that the Smith and Wesson and the Sterling were still there. Satisfied, he went outside. Kathleen's tender, a yellow inflatable with an outboard motor, swung at the stern on a line. He pulled it into the jetty, clambered down and cast off. The outboard, like everything else about Salter's boat, was brand new. It started with no trouble at all, and he headed away along the creek toward the sea.

He turned into a side channel, followed it for a while, then tried another, for some twenty minutes beating back and forth, even turning toward the land again, before he pushed through a bank of reeds and found what he wanted. It was a pool, roughly circular in shape, perhaps sixty or seventy feet across. It shelved steepl
y t
oward the center and at that point was about fifteen feet deep.

It was as if he were the first person to enter that place. There wasn't a sound, only the rain, and he shivered, remembering stories he'd heard as a child back home in Ireland of fairy pools and the like. Strange, but it was as if it had been waiting for him. As if he had been there before. Nonsense, of course, but in any case, it would suit his purpose admirably. He started the tender's engine again and made his way back to the boats.

Hedley Preston stood in front of the wardrobe mirror and adjusted the blue army beret to a suitably rakish angle. The camouflaged battle dress gave him a sinister appearance. He adjusted the webbing belt at his waist.

"Well, now," he said softly. "Who'd have thought it."

He went downstairs and found Varley, similarly attired, standing at the fire, a glass in his hand. Varley glanced over his shoulder and said sourly, "Look at you. Quite the hero."

"One thing's certain," Preston told him cheerfully. "You won't be if Sinclair finds you with that in your hand."

"Stuff Sinclair," Varley said, but at the sound of steps in the passageway he hurriedly put the glass on the mantlepiece behind a photograph.

Barry appeared in the doorway, one of the suitcases in his hand. The uniform suited him. He looked a soldier down to the last inch, and the Browning in the webbing holster at his waist fitted the picture perfectly.

"So, here we are," Preston said. "Now we get to know what it's all about."

"Just as much as you need to."

Barry put the brown suitcase on the table, opened it and took out a map of the area, which he unfolded. "One truck, possibly two, passing this point on the road to Wastwater. Half a dozen soldiers in one for certain. They'll also have an escort. I shan't know how many until later."

"Soldiers?" Varley said. "Here, what is this?"

"Don't wet yourself," Barry said. "They don't let armed soldiers go racketing around the countryside in Britain, so you've nothing to worry about. We block the road with the Land Rover to stop them." He took one of the gas grenades from the case. "Lob one of these in the back of the truck. The gas it contains works instantly. They'll be unconscious for an hour."

"And what about us?" Preston asked.

"All catered for." Barry held up a small khaki colored gas mask with a green canister dangling from it.

"So, they're all sleeping like babies," Preston said. "What do we do?"

"Off-load what we find in the truck into the Land Rover. Thirty minutes back to the coast where I've got a boat waiting. We load up, and you two are finished. You can get the hell out of it."

"With another five thousand pounds each," Preston said. "Let's not forget the most important item."

Barry took the Sterling submachine gun and the Smith and Wesson from the suitcase. "Both these are loaded for bear in case anything goes wrong, but no shooting, not unless I give the word. Understood?"

"Perfectly, Mr. Sinclair." Preston picked up the Sterling lovingly. "A thing of beauty is a joy forever."

Varley handled the Smith and Wesson gingerly, then slipped it into his webbing holster. "One thing I'd like to know," he said belligerently. "What's in this bloody truck that's so important?"

Barry closed the suitcase and stood looking at them, holding it against his leg. There was a long moment before he said, "Right, let's get going."

He walked out. "Now look here," Varley began, and Preston choked him off instantly.

"Cool it, Sam, understand? Everything comes to him who waits, as I've already told you, so for the moment let's just do as the man says." He picked up his Sterling and followed Barry out.

The funeral parlor was on one side of a small, cobbled square in th
e o
ld city. When Jean-Paul Savary, Devlin, and Anne-Marie approached there was a horse-drawn hearse outside, a splendid baroque creation in black, with weeping golden angels at each corner and black plumes stuck up between the horses' ears.