Part 31 (1/2)

People don't kill friend o' mine and get away with it.' He switched on the radio 'This is where I start having to be polite to those gibbering monkeys down there.'

Rawcliff looked at his watch. Those five Hercules would be well over their target by now.

Four.

'I am not here to offer either apologies or explanations. Nor is the Department. If you're so unhappy about what's happened, then I suggest that you bypa.s.s the usual channels and submit your resignation directly to the Minister. You'll at least have the satisfaction of having it turned down flat.'

Suchard was tired and ill-tempered; he had drunk too much the night before, which was not his habit, and had slept badly. He was in no mood to smooth down the ruffled sensibilities of the SB or to parry the pusillanimous complaints of the Met in general.

Addison, in his capacity as torch-bearer for the Special Branch, sat across the room in St James' Square, stiff and silently furious - a taunt to Suchard's own secret sense of guilt, even horror. For despite his vain cynicism, his worldly indifference induced by a career spent in the black arts of deceit and distortion, even the occasional small iniquity, all in the supposed defence of the Realm, the reports that had begun to seep through on the wires that Friday morning had caused him a profound shock. Whatever the state of the world, and the precarious balance of forces, for both good and evil, the events of this morning had taken things too far, even for Simon de Vere Suchard. The fact that he had been only a minor unwitting accomplice to what had happened offered no comfort: indeed, it seemed to render his own role all the more contemptible.

The news was still sc.r.a.ppy and confused, coming in special flashes over the radio, and playing havoc with the early editions of the evening papers.

On-the-spot communications would be chaotic, even non-existent; and it was likely that the local authorities were deliberately trying to suppress the news in order to avert international panic.

As usual, the wires of the FO were vague and often contradictory; but if only part of the reports proved to be true, it would still add up to a stupendous, horrific outrage. so wanton, so truly infernal, that its implications and consequences were both terrible and impossible to calculate.

Yet here, at one of the nerve-ends of power, and as the truth began to dawn, was come this wretched policeman to nag Suchard about what amounted to no more than a small matter of professional etiquette.

Suchard had stood up and was making himself another cup of black sugarless Nescafe. 'All right, you've got two corpses - Mason, and that miserable Newby, who doesn't belong to us, anyway - and the Yard are whining because they'vebeen deliberately prevented from arresting the culprits. Just bung both on the ”unsolved” file! Two more won't make that much difference. And the press have got other things to worry about, after what's happened this morning.

'd.a.m.n it all,' he added, sitting down again, and crossing his legs: 'I am not responsible for policy. You can call me all the rude names you like - errand boy, the Minister's chief lickspittle and f.a.g, Government s.h.i.+t-shoveller by Royal Appointment. Just sticks and stones. Complain if you like, but not to me. Christ, man, I'm the last person you should be coming to! / know nothing - except that I'm meant to know nothing. I can't even read between the lines any more, because the official cables have stopped reaching this desk -all my sources have dried up. It's the same with the FO. And it's my guess that even the Minister and Number Ten haven't been too fully informed. Which means - again if my guess is right - that they preferred not to be informed.' He stopped abruptly: 'That's absolutely off the record, of course.'

Addison gave a short nod, this time barely concealing his rage. 'You misunderstand me,' he said gravely. 'My concern is purely with the police angle. I am anxious about the Rawcliff woman. To be quite blunt, I don't want another corpse, this time smack in my ”manor”. Nor am I going to spare a full detail to keep round-the-clock surveillance on her for the next ten or twenty years.'

Suchard closed his eyes, stiffening his jaw muscles against a yawn. 'All right, -so we scared her off. She's moved out of Battersea and gone to stay with a friend in Richmond. And taken the kid with her. Sensible girl. They'd be as likely to go for the kid as for her. Providing, of course, somebody twigs -which is only likely to happen if that b.l.o.o.d.y husband of hers decides to come prancing back, laughing all the way to the local bank, now they've lifted control restrictions.' He leant back, sipping his coffee.

'Otherwise, she's holed up in a nice comfortable house in a cul-de-sac of Richmond Park. Easy enough for surveillance - which, need I say, cuts both ways. The house owner's in merchant banking, and with Lloyds, so he might not like it if he found you boys trampling all over his lawn. That's about the full score, isn't it, Addison?'

'One of my men spoke to her this afternoon - report came in less than an hour ago. He had followed her to a local supermarket in Queen's Road. She had the kid with her and he gave her a hand with some of her things. Nothing obvious - no cheek, and no threats. Until they were outside, that is -then he put it to her, gently but straight. If she wanted to stay alive, and keep her son, she must forget everything that's happened to her in the last few days and get out.

Resign her job, sell up everything she had, and go a long, long way away.

Above all, keep clear of her husband. That included letters, telephone calls, telegrams, even messages through third parties.

'Pretty harsh words, I think you'd agree? My man was all set for a minor bout of hysterics, at the very least. But not at all. Know what the girl did? Half spat, half laughed in his face. Told him that she'd heard the news, and if he thought she had the least intention of standing by her husband, who was a ma.s.s-murderer, he had another think coming. All she seemed worried about was protection for the kid.'

'I suppose we ought to do something,' Suchard said wearily. 'Her house is probably in Rawcliff's name, and there's no doubt a mortgage. And even if Rawcliff's dead -and it can be proved - we can't p.i.s.s around with solicitors and insurance companies. It would take months. Some sort of ex gratia paymentcan no doubt be arranged. On strictly compa.s.sionate grounds, of course. I'll have a word with our Personnel Department. Needn't go through the Treasur books. In fact, under the circ.u.mstances, it's essential that i: doesn't.'

Suchard turned, gave Addison a very slight wink 'Enough to set her up somewhere, start again. Canada or Australia. She's an attractive girl, from what I hear. And it would get her off your back, wouldn't it?'

'It would,' Addison said sourly. 'Any news at all about Rawcliff and the other pilots?'

'Not a murmur. We're still expecting the Yids to come through with something.

Or the Americans, maybe. We haven't been running this show, remember - all we're trying to do is to keep our feet out of the s.h.i.+t.'

The Special Branch man stood up. 'Very well. I'll put a ”red” on the Rawcliff woman for one week - provisionally. And I'd appreciate it, if only as a courtesy, if you would let me know the moment you get anything on the husband.'

'Will do.' Suchard said, without getting up. 'I'll be interested to know what you'll charge him with, if he's fool enough to try and come home!'

But Addison had already left the room without replying.

Five.

Ryderbeit could pick up only a confused jabber and shouting from the ground, most of it in Arabic. It was so loud that he had to turn down the volume. One voice cut in, in English, and asked them to identify themselves. Ryderbeit did so, then the channel went dead. He tried several other frequencies, but it was like tuning into a very noisy party, sometimes even a yelling match.

'Sounds pretty wild down there,' he said, and shut off the radio. 'Seems we all do our own thing today in Cairo.'

He put the Beachcraft down on a corner of the enormous field that was evidently reserved for private aircraft, which included a number of sleek twin-engine jets; the playthings of the big absentee landlords, corrupt politicos, and probably a few of the rich brethren from Saudi and the Emirates who didn't want to risk advertising themselves on the civil airlines, now that Egypt was in the doghouse following the Camp David Agreement with Israel.

No one came out to meet them. It was a long walk through the shuddering heat, towards the ramshackle confusion of the terminal buildings, some, of which were derelict or half-pulled down, others only half-built.

Rawcliff immediately sensed that something odd was happening. A big international airport, at mid-day, should be one of the busiest, noisiest places anywhere on earth. But here there was a strange inactivity. Or rather, the wrong sort of activity. High above, through the dull yellow haze, came the roar and whine of 'stacking' aircraft; while on the ground, across the bleak wastes of concrete, there was no movement - no giant fuel-trucks, baggage trolleys, pa.s.senger buses crawling out from the terminal buildings; no mobile generators or brightly coloured runway controllers; no police or mechanics, no trace of an aircraft taxiing up to the holding position, nor of anything coming into land. It was like the approaches to a dead city - until they reached the terminal building.

They heard the noise first, like the muted roar from a football stadium.

Rawcliff sensed the vibrations of ma.s.s hysteria even before he reached the buildings. All the loudspeakers were bellowing simultaneously, in a cacophony of Arabic; while the floors were packed with people, many of them wailing and weeping, and some of them - including policemen and porters and cleaners, even the girls at the check-in desks - had flung themselves down on their knees and were praying towards the East. A few pockets of bewildered Western travellers could be seen huddled round the edges.

n.o.body stopped the two of them as they walked through the barriers, past the Customs and Immigration officers, who were all gathered round transistor radios, one of them howling like a wounded dog. Ryderbeit had grabbed Rawcliff by the arm and soon they were lost in the crowd. It was too noisy even to exchange words. Ryderbeit was heading for the bar, like a horse to water. He paused only to yell at a well-dressed Egyptian in a dark business suit, a transistor pressed to his ear. The man yelled back something in English, and Ryderbeit seized him furiously, forcing the man to repeat himself. This time Rawcliff heard enough to make the sweat all over his body turn cold.

Ryderbeit had released the man and struggled on towards the bar. He leant his face down next to Rawcliff's ear, and said with a long grin, 'You hear that, soldier? Holy Moses. that wasn't in the script! And that script's just rewritten history.'

Rawcliff shouted back, in a voice flat with shock: 'Let's try and get out of here! We're Europeans, remember. b.l.o.o.d.y infidels. And I've heard about the Cairo bomb.'

'Take it easy, soldier.' The bar was unattended, and for some reason it was quieter here. A group of small black-suited j.a.panese, each fondling a camera, blinked at them both through their spectacles. Between the two of them they were able to gather that a JAL flight from the Far East had been due to take off thirty minutes ago for Paris.

Ryderbeit cursed and spat ungraciously in full view of the j.a.panese. 'Well, by the looks of things I guess we're in no hurry. Before I do anything else, I'm going to have myself a drink. I'm going to have a couple of b.l.o.o.d.y drinks!'

And before Rawcliff could stop him, he had vaulted the bar, selected a quart sized bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label, and began drinking from the neck.

Sammy Ryderbeit was now drunk. Rawcliff had left him sprawled on his belly under a bench, sleeping like a cat.

It was mid-afternoon, and there were tenuous signs that the airport was returning to some degree of order, if not normality. Squads of fierce-looking riot police with batons, s.h.i.+elds and machine pistols at the ready, had been drafted in, with some effect. Those incoming aircraft which had not already been diverted were beginning to land. A skeleton staff of Customs and Immigration was back on duty. But most important, some of the check-in counters were now open.

Rawcliff concentrated his mind, forcing out the one memory he most feared - the final contemptuous words~of his wife. She'd known all along, and she'd been right. But this, of all moments in history, was no time for maudlin reappraisals, for self-indulgent regrets. He had to act, do something, anything: if he stopped now he would be like a man lost in a blizzard, sinking down, never to get up again. He discovered that several of the airport shops, run by the more greedy, or perhaps less religious local entrepreneurs, had reopened. He bought two airline bags, some cheap s.h.i.+rts, including one to replace Ryderbeit's grubby olive-drab combat tunic - from which he had not even bothered to remove the Red Cross insignia on the shoulder - and a couple of rudimentary toilet-kits.

He remembered, from his own experience, that the one sort of pa.s.senger who immediately arouses suspicion is one who travels with no luggage at all. He wasn't worried about heavy luggage - not at this end, at any rate. Those few officials on duty looked as though they had something else on their minds.

Then he went back to rouse Ryderbeit. The Rhodesian might pride himself on being the proverbial Wandering Jew who travelled strictly light, except for the odd throwing knife or elephant-gun. But he was also a born survivor - and a ruthlessly practical one - unlike that impulsive, gullible old plodder, Charles Rawcliff, who threw up everything, abandoning his wife and child, in the simpleton's quest for a crock of Swiss gold.

Ryderbeit stretched himself and yawned. Apart from his leery red eyes, he appeared none the worse for having consumed about half a pint of neat whisky.

And as Rawcliff expected, the Rhodesian was not short of money. But nothing fancy or traceable, like credit cards or travellers' cheques; nor anything so soft as sterling or dollars. Ryderbeit had two sewn-up pockets inside the front of his trousers, next to his zip-fly, each containing a wad of big thick one-hundred-franc Swiss notes.