So he set out to find a woman he could train to become his ideal woman operator. She had to be beautiful, perfectly built, talented and to be prepared to dedicate herself to his work.
Shalik travelled extensively, and while visiting the major cities of the world, he was constantly on the look-out for the woman he needed. He came across several likely applicants, but when he approached them, they either would have nothing to do with his proposition or proved to be beautiful but brainless. After some six months, he began to despair, wondering if he had set his sights too high.
Then one day he had a letter from one of his rich, spoilt women clients, living in Tokyo, who asked him to buy her a leopard skin coat, a mink stole and a broadtail coat for evening wear. He was to get these furs from Finn Larson, a Copenhagen furrier who had her measurements and knew exactly what she required. Since the woman paid Shalik $21,000, a year as a retaining fee and since he charged fifteen per cent on all purchases made on her behalf and since he was in need of a brief vacation, he was happy to oblige.
Natalie Norman telephoned Finn Larson in Copenhagen to alert him that Shalik was coming and what he wanted. She was told that there was to be a lunch held at L'Angleterre Hotel for a number of Larson's special clients when models would display his furs and the clients would eat interesting Danish food, Larson hoped Mr. Shalik would attend.
Shalik arrived at the hotel the following day and went to theprivate room that Larson used for his excellent lunches and was welcomed by Larson, a balding, heavily-built Dane who gripped his hand and led him to a table before hurrying away to welcome yet another of his clients.
While Shalik was eating his lunch, girls came in to display Larson's beautiful furs.
Then suddenly, as a girl swept in, wearing a magnificent leopard skin coat, Shalik paused in his eating. After six months of searching, this was his moment of truth. He was certain this time this was the girl he was looking for.
Above average height, with tawny hair, hanging in silken waves to her shoulder blades, this girl — possibly twenty-six or so years of age — was the most sensationally, sensually beautiful feminine creation he had ever seen. Her jade green eyes, her full lips that gave promise of sexual excitement, her long tapering legs, her slim lovely hands made a picture of a male dream of desirability.
Shalik lost interest in his lunch as he watched her move with the arrogant walk of a trained model to the end of the room. She turned and walked back past him. He scarcely glanced at the leopard skin coat. When she had gone, to be replaced by another girl, wearing a seal skin coat, Shalik beckoned to Larson who came over.
"I'll take the leopard skin coat," Shalik said. "It is for Mrs. Van Ryan." He paused, then looked up and asked, "Who is the girl who modelled the coat?"
Larson smiled.
"Almost as magnificent as my coat, don't you think? She is Gaye Desmond . . . An American freelance model who comes here from time to time. I use her for my leopard skins . . . no other girl has such flair to show off leopard."
Shalik took out his wallet, extracted his card and handed it to Larson.
"Would you be so kind as to give her my card?" he asked. "I believe I can employ her should she need employment. You might mention to her who I am." Shalik regarded Larson. "You know, Mr. Larson, I am always serious. This is strictly business. You will be doing the girl a favour."
Larson, who knew Shalik, had no hesitation.
Later, while Shalik was sitting in his suite, reading a complicated legal document, the telephone bell rang.
He lifted the receiver.
"This is Gaye Desmond." He liked her rich contralto voice. "You sent me your card."
"Thank you for ringing, Miss Desmond. I have a proposition I would like to discuss with you. Could we have dinner together at the Belle Terresse, Tivoli, at 21.00 hrs?"
She said yes, and hung up.
She arrived punctually which pleased Shalik, and together they went to a table on the terrace that overlooked the lighted pool and the flowers that make Tivoli famous.
"It is a pity we didn't meet in Paris, Miss Desmond," Shalik said as he began to examine the menu. "The food here is indifferent. In Paris I could have offered you a meal worthy of your beauty."
She was wearing a simple blue dress with a mink stole. Diamonds glittered at her ears as she tossed her tawny coloured hair back from her shoulders.
"I believe in eating what a country offers," she said. "Why yearn for better food in Paris when you are in Copenhagen?"
Shalik liked that. He nodded.
"So what will you have?"
She had no hesitation, and this also pleased Shalik. Women who stare vacantly at a menu and can't make up their minds bored him.
She chose Danish shrimps and the breast of duck in wine sauce.
Having taken a little longer to examine the menu, Shalik decided her choice was not only safe, but sound. He ordered the same.
"Miss Desmond," Shalik said when the waiter had gone. "I am looking for a woman to help me in my work. I am a rather special agent who looks after extremely wealthy, spoilt people, clever business men and even princes. I boast that nothing is impossible. Nothing is impossible if you have money and brains." He paused, regarding her. "However, I believe my work would be made easier if I had a woman like yourself working for me permanently. I must warn you it would be exacting work: sometimes dangerous, but always within the law of the country in which I operate." This statement was untrue. Recently, Shalik had pulled off a number of illegal currency deals in London that could have landed him in jail had they been discovered, but Shalik's philosophy was that so long as he wasn't found out, any deal was within the law. "The pay will be good. You will have your own apartment at the Royal Towers Hotel in London, paid by me. You will have many opportunities to travel." He regarded her with his black, beady eyes. "And I assure you, Miss Desmond, this will be a strictly business association."
The tiny, pink, delicious shrimps now arrived with slices of toast, and there was a pause.
While Gaye buttered her toast, she asked, "What makes you imagine I am suitable for such a post, Mr. Shalik?"
Shalik nibbled at his shrimps. He regretfully avoided the toast. He was four kilos overweight and was determined to make a sacrifice.
"Instinct, I suppose. I think you are just the woman I am looking for."
"You say the pay will be good . . . just what does that mean?" He ate another three shrimps before saying, "Suppose you tell me about yourself. I can then make a valuation."
She sipped the chilled Hock and regarded him with her green eyes: thoughtful, shrewd, calculating eyes that pleased him.
"Well . . ." She suddenly smiled and her smile lit up her face, making it gay and charming. "As you can see, I am beautiful. I am intelligent. You will discover this. I speak French, Italian and Spanish fluently. I can get along in German. I was practically born on a horse. My father bred horses in Kentucky. I ski well. I can handle a sailing boat and, of course, any kind of motorboat. I have been a racing driver and there is nothing I don't know about cars. I understand men and what they what. Sex doesn't frighten me. I know how to please men if . . . and only if. . . I have to. I earn a comfortable living modelling specialized clothes, but I like money and want to make more."
Shalik finished his shrimps and then stroked his thick nose.
"Is that all?"
She laughed.
"Isn't it enough?"
"Yes, I think so. Can you handle firearms?"
She lifted her eyebrows.
"Why should I need to?"
"Since you are otherwise so well equipped, I think you should have weapon training and also training in self-defence. This I can arrange. When a woman is as beautiful as you and when she may have to mix with dubious types of men, it is sound for her to understand the art of self-defence."
They paused while the waiter served the duck and poured a Margaux '59 which Shalik had ordered in a moment of recklessness. The price was outrageous, but the wine excellent.
"Now it is your turn," she said. She cut into the duck and grimaced. "It's tough."
"Of course. What did you expect? This is Copenhagen, not Paris." He looked at her across the candle-lit table. "My turn . . . . for what?"
"Your turn to make a valuation. I've told you about myself. Value me."
Shalik liked her direct approach.
"If you are prepared to do exactly what I tell you, Miss Desmond," he said as he began to cut the duck into small pieces. "If you are prepared to be at my beck and call for eleven months in each year . . . the remaining month will be yours to do as you wish. If you are prepared to take a course in self-defence, then I will pay you $10,000 a year with a one per cent cut on whatever I make on assignments you help me with. At a rough guess this should net you $25,000 a year."
She drank a little of the Margaux.
"At least the wine is good, isn't it?"
"It should be, at the price they charge for it," Shalik said sourly. He hated wasting his money. "What do you say?"
She toyed with her glass as she considered his proposal, then she shook her head.
"No . . . I am not interested. I could become an old man's mistress for twice that sum. You are asking me to hand myself over to you as a slave for eleven months, leading no life of my own during those months, to be entirely at your beck and call." She laughed. "No, Mr. Shalik, that is no kind of a price for what you are offering."
Shalik would have been disappointed if she had said otherwise.
"So . . . suppose you tell me under what conditions you will work for me?"
He was pleased she told him without hesitation.
"$30,000 a year whether I work or not, and five per cent of whatever you make in the deals in which I am concerned."
Shalik shook his head slowly and sadly.
"Then I'm sorry, Miss Desmond. I must look elsewhere." They looked at each other and she gave him a charming smile, but he saw there was a jeering light in her eyes.
"Then I'm sorry too. So I must also look elsewhere."
Shalik now knew she was the woman he was looking for and he settled down to bargain, but here he found his master and this pleased him. He hated to be defeated, but he realized if she could defeat him, the men she would have to mix with at his bidding would be as pawns in her hands.
At the end of the meal, and after Shalik had paid the outrageous bill, they had come to an agreement. A basic salary of $30,000 a year, plus four per cent of Shalik's earnings which involved her cooperation, to be paid into a Swiss bank, tax free, which Shalik decided ruefully would net her at least seven per cent of his take.
Once this was agreed, she came to London and went through a self-defence course that Shalik arranged for her. Her instructors were delighted with her.
"This woman is now highly proficient in defending herself," they told Shalik. "She can cope with any emergency."
Completely satisfied with his find, Shalik installed her in a small suite on the floor below his at the Royal Towers Hotel, and within two months she had quickly proved her worth.
She handled two assignments not only successfully, but with a polish that delighted Shalik. The first assignment was to obtain a chemical formula required by a rival company. The second assignment was to obtain advance information about a big shipping merger which netted the client a considerable profit on the Stock Market: part of which he handed to Shalik. In both cases, Gaye had had to sleep with the two men who supplied the information required. Shalik asked for no details. He was only too pleased to turn the information she gave him into cash.
Now, she had worked for him for six months and she had more than earned her basic salary.
Delighted with her, he had sent her off on a skiing vacation. He was sure she hadn't gone alone, but what was left of her private life was no concern of his. Then the Borgia ring affair came up and he had sent a telegram to Gstaad telling her to return immediately.
She returned by the first available aircraft and when she walked into his office, burned golden brown by the Swiss sun, her tawny hair around her shoulders, Shalik thought she looked magnificent.
He explained about the Borgia ring and was pleased by her interest.
"You will like Natal," he said. "The country is splendid. The three men who will work with you are all experts and should present no difficulties for you." He stared at his evenly burning cigar. "I think I should warn you that there are risks. Kahlenberg is dangerous."
She shrugged her beautiful shoulders. Her smile was confident.
"Many men are dangerous," she said quietly, "so are many women."
As Gaye Desmond paused beside Shalik, the three men got to their feet. While Shalik introduced them, Gaye regarded them searchingly. She liked the look of Kennedy Jones. She decided he was harmless and would be easy to handle and could be fun. Her green eyes swept over Fennel. This man was not only dangerous but he could be tricky to handle. Her experience of men and the expression in his washed out grey eyes as he looked at her, told her sooner or later, there would have to be a showdown with him. Then she took in Garry Edwards who was looking at her with an appreciative expression that she found flattering and pleasing. He was all right, she decided. Well, they were a mixed bunch to travel with, but at least two of them could be handled. The fat one was bound to be a nuisance.
"This is Miss Gaye Desmond . . . our Trojan Horse," Shalik said.
"That I love," Gaye laughed. "I would rather be Helen than the horse."
"Sit down, please." Shalik drew up a chair for Gaye. "Miss Desmond will travel with you. You will be flying to Johannesburg on Tuesday. I have arranged for your rooms at the Rand. International hotel. You will stay there until Mr. Jones has organized the expedition. I have also arranged for the hire of a helicopter which Miss Desmond and Mr. Edwards will use." He touched ash off his cigar, then went on, "I have managed to obtain a certain amount of information about Kahlenberg's place, but none of this information is completely reliable. Before you can hope to get at the ring, it is essential for Miss Desmond to get into Kahlenberg's house and check the information I have obtained: this information is to do with various security measures and where the museum is located. Miss Desmond will pose as a professional photographer after wild game. I have arranged that she is credited to Animal World which is a sound, small American magazine for whom I have done past favours. It is possible that Kahlenberg might check, and it would be stupid not to be covered. Mr. Edwards will be her professional pilot. A helicopter is the ideal machine from which to get photographs of wild animals. Kahlenberg has an airfield. You two . . ." Here Shalik looked at Gaye and Garry, "will land on the airfield. Your story will be that you saw the house from the air and can you take photographs? You will be refused, of course, but I am certain Kahlenberg will want to meet Miss Desmond."
