Part 9 (1/2)

Newby broke in with a shout, 'I demand to speak to my lawyer.' He tried to stand up, but Hood pushed him .down again.

'You've already wasted half the morning with him. Your lawyer's a busy man, Mr Newby. It's no good asking to see him while you're refusing to cooperate.'

Newby felt sick, his head ached with the vicious bombardment of words. 'But I have told you - I have told you everything I know. It is a relief operation, a mercy-mission! Six planes, six pilots - I tell you, what more do you want?'

'Pull the other one,' Punchie said, half-grinning.

'You've told us all right,' Hood said: 'Trouble is, we don't believe you. Justimagine it - s.e.x-fiend runs mercy-mission! If it isn't schoolkids, it's starving women and children. Don't make fools of us, Newby - we don't take kindly to that from your sort.'

They all looked up as a uniformed man came in. He handed Hood a note and stood whispering in his ear. Hood nodded, and gestured to Punchie, who stood up.

Hood was frowning. 'You wait here,' he told Newby.

Newby was left alone. Five minutes pa.s.sed, ten, fifteen. He went to the door, found it locked. It also had a Judas eye in it, which he had not noticed before. He called 'I want to see someone! I want to see someone in authority!'

He began to bang on the door. 'I demand my rights!'

A second man in uniform appeared and stood looking him up and down. 'You'll be seen presently. Now you sit down and keep quiet. I don't want any more noise from here.'

Sergeant Hood came back twenty minutes later. 'You're free to go, Mr Newby. A car will drive you to your hotel,- if you so wish.'

'What the h.e.l.l is happening? Is this one of your tricks?'

'There's no question of a trick, Mr Newby.' Hood's face had a numb, stony look. 'Just count yourself lucky - the charges against you have been dropped.

You're free to go.'

'But I demand an explanation!'

'You can do that through your solicitor. You have been held on suspicion during investigations. Now that these investigations are complete, it has been decided not to charge you. Do I make myself clear?'

'Get me a taxi.'

'I told you, sir, we have a car.'

'I don't want your b.l.o.o.d.y car. Get me a taxi.'

'I'm warning you,' the Minister said, patting his thighs and rocking back on his heels. 'If this thing blows up, it'll be your head that'll be on the charger. You'll be served up like John the Baptist. Providing, of course, that I accept your Department's recommendations.'

'Entendu,' Suchard said, wrinkling his eyes to make out the Minister's expression, as he stood framed against the tall period window overlooking the parking meters along Queen Anne's Gate.

'Right. Let's look at the map.' The Minister bustled up to the table; he was in his element now - he liked maps, he liked plans, they took him back to his Army days when he'd risen to Captain in a regiment distinguished only by the fact that it had not seen action this century.

'Eritrea? That's where the little sod said it was, didn't he?' The Minister's finger moved busily about on the bridge of the Horn of Africa. He frowned at the browny-grey smudged contours that marked mountains. 'Djibouti -Tigre Wollo - Asmara' - moving up the Red Sea. He paused. 'What is this? Oh for Christ's sake, Turner, it's a b.l.o.o.d.y Michelin road-map! Is that all you've got?'

'I'm sorry, sir. There's a Bartholomew's.' 'Get it.' He glanced up at Suchard. 'Djibouti - don't like the smell of that.

The French still have a lot of influence there. D'you know that Pol was attached to the Elysee Palace under Pompidou? Minister without Portfolio for the African Territories. The Frogs must have been pretty self-confident to have chanced their arm with a fat b.a.s.t.a.r.d like him!'

'What happened to Pol?' Suchard asked, sacrificing self-esteem for curiosity.

The Minister gave a little grunt of triumph. 'You mean there's actually something you boys don't know? Watch it, lad, you're slipping.' He grinned cunningly. 'Trouble is, I don't know what happened to him. n.o.body does, it seems. But if Pol was playing to form, it was probably some deal that he was involved in - muddy waters, Suchard, muddy waters. And that's what you think we've got here,' he added, as the lissom youth called Turner returned with a Bartholomew's map of the Middle East. The three of them stood over it, while the Minister's thick finger rifled through the pages. 'This is too detailed.

What we want is an overall picture. Cyprus to Ma.s.sawa.'

'Here we are, sir,' Suchard said.

'What's the scale? Let's compare it with the other map. We need a long ruler - tape measure would be better. Haven't you got anything in this place, Turner?'

'It's all right, sir,' Suchard said gently, 'I've got all the figures here.

Roughly four hundred miles from Larnaca to Cairo, on a more or less direct route. Cairo to Asmara - 1,134 miles.'

Ill The Minister stepped back, patting his hips. 'So. What's the range of a Hercules?'

”Four thousand seven hundred miles, sir. One thousand three hundred and sixty US gallon capacity for two external tanks, to be precise.' Suchard knew what was coming, and knew that the Minister was drawing it out, in order to enjoy the more his discomfort.

'Tell me something, Suchard. Have you got the tiniest -just the tiny-weeniest suspicion that this whole operation might be on the level?'

Suchard pursed his lips and managed to look suitably solemn. The Minister was a canny old devil - a hard political pro and a good fighter, one who could make out in the clinches, as Suchard's friends over at the annexe in Grosvenor Square would put it.

'I've considered the possibility, sir, of course. The fact that this man Pol's involved could point us in any number of directions. a.s.suming that Pol's a front. Or not, as the case may be. May I ask your opinion?'

'My opinion is that it smells. It stinks like a bag of old fish - and I don't want it dumped in my Ministry!' He stood glaring down at the map, playing for time. 'You've got me doing the splits across a very wide chasm - you realize that, don't you? I don't mind messing you people about - that's what you're there for - but I do mind p.i.s.sing on the Yard's boots, then telling 'em it's raining. That chap Muncaster isn't going to like us one bit. Nor are the SB.

They've been building up for a case of probable murder, plus holding a man under the Secrets Act. Not going to like it at all, they're not.'

'It was not on my instructions,' Suchard reminded him quietly.

'Oh d.a.m.n your' eyes! d.a.m.n the lot of you! You never instruct, Suchard - youdevise, insinuate, kiss the hem and whisper in the majestic ear. You're the smooth cloven-footed archangel of the secret realm. They wouldn't act without you. And even if you keep silent, they can read your silence like a memo.'

Suchard smiled. 'Permit me to say so, sir - but you ought to save that sort of thing for the House. It's a bit short on eloquence these days, don't you think?'

'I'm thinking, Suchard, that .either way HMG stands to get her t.i.ts in the wringer. On the one hand, we stand to be party to some kind of international conspiracy. But if, by a very remote possibility - and it is the remote possibility that you are here to guard against - this milk-run down to Eritrea turns out to be bonafide, it's hardly going to look good if we put the kibosh on a genuine humanitarian mission to save starving women and children.

Unlikely, I admit. But it has to be considered.'

Suchard bent forward, with his most solicitous smile. 'I can appreciate your anxiety, sir, from the purely political point of view. It could be embarra.s.sing -'

'It could be very embarra.s.sing.'

'Quite. Nothing is absolutely foolproof. There's always the zero in this game, whichever way we play it.'

'I'm not interested in your fancy metaphors! Either p.i.s.s or get off the pot!'

'Thank you, sir. What I would like to say, all things considered, is that at this stage we would do best to sit back a little longer and see what happens next. At least, that's what I think is perhaps expected of us,' he added slyly. The Minister coloured, but said nothing. Suchard went on, 'After all, we don't have much to worry about - yet. So one psychotic hit-man goes free?