The Hidden Target Read online

  Roy’s gloom gave way to laughter. “You have a point there, Robert. I’ll see you tomorrow before you leave—won’t manage an office visit tonight.” He paused, added, “Too bad about Theo: he told us nothing. Not that I expected it. Ah, well— good night. It has been quite a day, wouldn’t you say?”

  Renwick replaced the receiver. Theo, he was thinking, told us a great deal. Something was most definitely planned against Washington. Something so big, so important that he wouldn’t risk being questioned. Surely he didn’t expect Roy’s people to use the brutal methods that he knew from his early KGB days—God knows, Theo had enough practice. But he did know what clever interrogation can do with hypnosis or truth serum or the new wonder drugs that can drag the facts out of any man. Questions about this Washington project? He made sure they’d have no answers. Not from him.

  Claudel asked, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Bob?”

  “Probably. Let’s discuss it on our way home.” A strange slip: home? A small hotel run by a retired British sergeant and his Pondicherry wife? But Nina was there. Safe in his room. That was home enough for him.

  27

  The guard was still posted at the end of Renwick’s corridor, and he was staying there—that was obvious by the way he smiled politely, vaguely, when Renwick suggested the alert was over— until Roy himself countermanded the order. The Australians’ room had its door wide open: Mahoney sat just inside, with a clear view of Renwick’s room opposite, while Benson had been doing his stint of watching down in the Back Bay Hotel’s lobby among its wicker chairs and potted palms.

  Mahoney rose briskly. He looked at Renwick and said, “So it’s going well?”

  “Two arrested. One dead: Herr Otto Remp—Theo, no less.”

  “Who got him?” Mahoney lowered his voice to a whisper as Renwick had done.

  “Himself.”

  “Well, I’ll be—”

  “How’s everything here?” Renwick glanced over at his room. The door was slightly ajar.

  “She wanted it that way,” Mahoney said quickly, “so that I could hear her. She slept. Then she woke, and I had Madame smuggle up a tray of food. She didn’t eat much, but she’s recovering rapidly. What happened?”

  “Claudel will brief you. He’s in the dining-room. Benson is joining him. Why don’t you?”

  “You don’t expect trouble?”

  “Not here. The Bombay assignment is over.”

  “So we push off—”

  “Claudel will brief you,” Renwick repeated. “See you later. And thanks, Mahoney.”

  “Anytime.” Mahoney pulled his room door shut. “It was a pleasure,” he said and left for one of Madame’s hot curries.

  Renwick hesitated. Then he knocked lightly to warn Nina if she were awake. There was no answer. He pushed the door quietly open, closed and locked it behind him. She was asleep.

  He went over to the bed, looked down at her. She had been reading a newspaper, its pages slipping over the sheet that barely covered her. Her hair lay loose and tangled on the pillow, her cheeks were flushed like a child’s, her arms stretched out for coolness. Smooth firm arms, smooth and firm as her shoulders and breasts.

  He folded the pages of newspaper, placed them on the table beside her. Carefully, he drew up the sheet, left her shoulders bare for the breath of air that came through the heavily screened window. He didn’t switch off the light—let her see him when she opened her eyes and not have a wild moment of panic in a strange dark room. Then he dropped into the high-backed wicker chair facing the bed, pulled off his tie, pulled off his jacket, and let them fall beside him. He listened to the soft whirring of the fan overhead, to the gentle play of water from the small fountain in the courtyard below. Peace. Peace and thankfulness.

  He opened his eyes. Nina was propped up in bed, watching him with a smile. “How long have I been asleep?” Incredulous, he looked at his watch. Almost eleven o’clock.

  “I wouldn’t know—I only woke up five minutes ago.”

  “Why didn’t you wake me, too?”

  “I hadn’t the heart to do that. You were so completely out of this world.”

  With one hand she pushed back the sweep of hair that had fallen over her brow; with the other, she clasped the bed sheet over her breast. Above the white linen, her sun-tanned skin was the colour of golden honey. Renwick steadied his voice. “I was,” he admitted. “Just slipped away without knowing it.” And that’s a first, he thought: I’ve never fallen asleep in a chair with someone else in the room; my guard was really down. “Fine watchdog I make,” he added with a smile. “Just as well the door was locked.”

  “I know.” She was laughing now. “I went to look—make sure we were safe.” Then the laughter vanished. Blue eyes were anxious, questioning. “Are we?”

  “Yes.” He was still watching her.

  “Then your—your business is all over?”

  “In Bombay, yes.” He rose, took the few steps that separated them; then he halted, unsure, uncertain, as she looked abruptly away.

  “I have so many things to ask.” About Madge and the others, and Jim Kiley. And Tony Shawfield... Her voice became low, strained. “I thought he was going to leave me there. In that street. He nearly did. As a lesson. Educational, he said.”

  “Don’t, Nina. That’s all over.” All over, Renwick told himself, too. He crushed down the memory: his hand outstretched, Nina turning away.

  “But it was educational. In this room when I was awake, I lay and thought and—” She broke off. Then her voice strengthened. “I know more about myself than I ever did. I know that I—” She raised her head, let her eyes meet his. I know that I love you, she ended silently. “Oh, Bob—” She held out her hand.

  He grasped it, took both her hands, held them tightly, felt her draw him nearer. His arms went around her, and he kissed her mouth, her eyes, her cheeks, her slender neck, her mouth again—long deep kisses lingering on yielding lips. Her arms encircled him, pressed him closer.

  Nothing else matters, he thought, nothing else in this whole wide world.

  ***

  He had showered and shaved, pulled on trousers and shirt to let him bring in the two breakfast trays he had ordered before he woke Nina with gentle kisses to draw her slowly out of sleep. “Yes, it’s early, I know,” he told her, “but there’s some business to be finished before we leave.” Pleasant business: thanks and goodbye to Roy; last messages from Merriman’s to be collected; warm clothes to be bought for Nina to let her face an October arrival in London. “Now come and have breakfast. It’s waiting and ready.”

  “When do we leave?” She slipped out of bed, headed for the little bathroom, as lithe and graceful and unconcerned as a nymph on a Greek frieze.

  “Today if possible.” There was an Air India direct flight at nine o’clock this evening. Before, he hoped, any of Theo’s agents in Bombay came out of shock, tried to put things together. “We’ll go to London first. I have some things to clear up at the office.” Mostly a matter of sending inquiries to Washington, of trying to find any possible clues to the question that kept nagging him: why was Francis O’Connell so important to Theo’s plan? O’Connell’s job was not so sensitive as all that. If he had been in defence or intelligence, that would have, made sense. But for Theo—and Kiley—to have taken such infinite trouble to reach O’Connell, that was a real puzzler. Or was Kiley to have been a long-term infiltrator, a mole burrowing his way into O’Connell’s circle? That didn’t feel right to Renwick: Theo’s sudden suicide didn’t match with something that could wait for a year, two years, before it was put into effect. No, thought Renwick, that doesn’t feel right: there’s a reason beyond anything I can latch on to. I’m just stuck with this goddamned hunch—no more than that, but it’s biting deep.

  Nina had washed the sleep out of her eyes and was now combing her hair as she came back into the bedroom. She watched him curiously. So serious now—how many men is he? It would take a lifetime with him to find out. A long long life, she prayed
, and then laughed with the joy of it. But did Bob feel that way? The thought ended her laughter.

  He noticed her change of mood. “What is it, honey?”

  “I hate leaving so soon.” She looked around the little room. “I wish we could stay here forever.”

  “Leaving it won’t end what we’ve begun,” he said softly, and kissed her. “I’m not going to let you get away from me, ever. Ever,” he repeated, and kissed her again. “So don’t try.”

  The laughter was back in her eyes. “Or else you’ll put all of Merriman’s bloodhounds on my trail?”

  For a moment he was startled, and then amused. “That’s one job I’ll do entirely by myself. And I’d find you,” he warned her. “More easily than I found you this time.” He kissed her again, ruffled her newly combed hair. “Now come and have breakfast before the omelette turns to cotton wool.”

  “Omelette?” Nina picked up a sheet from the bed to wrap around her, sarong style. “However did you manage that?”

  “Madame did. She’s Pondicherry French.”

  Nina went over to the table at the window and looked at the heaped little dishes that almost overflowed two trays.

  “Parathas,” Renwick identified the whole-wheat bread. “And these are jalebis—doughnuts to you.” The omelettes, flecked with parsley, had been well covered and still looked edible. “I don’t know what the rest of this stuff is. But we’ll soon find out.”

  “Actually,” Nina said, “I’m famished. I could even eat cotton wool—if I had some of that jam over it. What is it? Marmalade, for heaven’s sake!”

  “That’s the ex-sergeant’s touch of home.”

  “I really didn’t eat much yesterday. Did you?”

  “Not much.” Nothing since yesterday’s breakfast, in fact. Quite a day, as Roy had said. Quite a day.

  ***

  “Now tell me about Madge,” Nina reminded him as the last plate was emptied. “Where is she? And the others? Did Mr. Roy get them out of that place, put them up at his hotel? He owns one, doesn’t he?”

  “I shouldn’t be surprised.” Renwick poured the last of the coffee into Nina’s cup.

  “Not fair,” she said, and emptied half of the coffee back into his cup. “Madge must have been terribly upset when she heard about Tony Shawfield’s arrest.”

  “She hasn’t heard. None of them have. They left before the police arrived at the house. That was just about the time I was bringing you here.”

  “But where—” Nina began in horror.

  “We don’t know. All that Roy could learn was that the five of them drove away in a Fiat—one of the two cars that brought you into Bombay yesterday. The police are searching. Perhaps we’ll hear something this afternoon.”

  “And if we don’t, Bob? If they have left Bombay?”

  “They’d need money for that. Have they any?”

  She shook her head. “I think they’ve spent most of what they had.” Drugs, those damnable drugs, she thought. “Shawfield was going to buy their fares.” No, Shawfield had never returned. “Jim Kiley always had a lot of extra money after we arrived at certain places. That’s the first thing he did: cash cheques or something. Was Jim at the house? He might have sent them all away. But why?”

  Because of orders, Renwick thought: new orders, obviously. “He could have. He was there.” Renwick hesitated, then said, “The police came to arrest him. He escaped, left a dead policeman behind him, and was caught later. He may face a murder charge here—if the weapon he used can be proven to have killed—but in any case, after that, he will be extradited to West Germany. Like Shawfield.” Renwick caught her hand. “I’m sorry, Nina. But you’d learn the truth sometime.”

  “Extradited—for what? For spying? Was that what they were—agents?” She remembered a courtyard near Tabriz, the voices in German, and Pierre listening... “Against whom?” Her hand had tightened under his. Her voice had risen.

  “Against most of the world,” Renwick said very quietly. “They are terrorists. They are being extradited for bombings, arson, murders, and a brutal kidnapping.” There it’s out, he thought unhappily. He raised her hand to his lips.

  For a long moment she stared at him. “I could believe that of Tony,” she said slowly. “But Jim?... Oh, I knew he could lie—he had an explanation for everything. Yet, I had to like him. He was kind. He looked after me—he really did. He was thoughtful. Bob—he was gentle. Except once, she remembered. But that was my fault perhaps—I was uncertain, indefinite. “Oh, I don’t know,” she said helplessly. “It’s just hard to believe.”

  “Have you ever heard of the People’s Revolutionary Force for Direct Action?”

  “But of course! It was in all the newspapers last winter. They kidnapped and killed—”

  “Kiley is Erik. Shawfield is Marco. Erik was the leader. Marco was second-in-command.”

  “Oh, no!” She turned to point at the bedside table where yesterday’s folded newspaper still lay: Ilsa Schlott, known as Greta; once a member of Direct Action; connected with Erik and Marco—terrorists; a green camper delivered in a Camberwell garage. “Ilsa Schlott invited Madge and me to a concert,” Nina began. Then Ilsa had backed out at the last moment. And her seat was taken by James Kiley. “That’s how we met,” she said. “At that concert.” Her eyes met his, her lips trembled. “Oh, God!” she said. “What an idiot! What a complete and total idiot I was.”

  He caught her around her waist, pulled her on to his lap, held her close. “We have all been idiots at one time or other. It’s the human condition, my love.” He smoothed back her hair.

  “Not you, Bob. Never you.”

  “Oh, yes, me, too.” He kissed her ear.

  “When?”

  He hesitated. “For months on end, my sweet. Not just for a few weeks.”

  “Was she beautiful?” Nina tried to laugh.

  Well, he was into it now, right up to his neck. “Yes.” When Nina said nothing more, he went on. “She was a widow, lived in Brussels, ran an interior decorating business.”

  “She sounds entrancing,” Nina said with a most definite lack of enthusiasm.

  Renwick threw back his head and laughed.

  In spite of herself, Nina joined in.

  “As entrancing, it turned out, as a black widow spider,” he said and drew Nina closer. My God, I’m actually laughing about Thérèse Colbert, he thought; talking about her and laughing. “You’re good for me, darling—good in every way.” His hand slid over her thigh, gently caressed her. “Nina—will you marry me?”

  Her face turned towards him. Her eyes searched his.

  “Will you?” His voice had tightened.

  “Yes and yes.” She threw her arms around him. “And yes.”

  ***

  “Look, darling,” Renwick said, “it’s almost ten. We’d better get organised around here.” Quickly he began dressing again.

  “Oh, Bob—”

  “I mean it, love. There are a few things I must do before we leave. I want you to stay here—”

  “But why?”

  “Because you’ll be safe. There’s a plain-clothes policeman still on duty at the end of the corridor. I don’t want you to be seen walking through Bombay.”

  “I thought the danger was over,” she said slowly. “I mean, Tony Shawfield isn’t around any more. Or Jim Kiley.”

  “I’m just making sure there’s no danger. I’m taking no chances with you. Trust me, honey.”

  She nodded. “I’ll shower and wash my hair and wait for you.” Then she remembered her muslin dress, hanging on the back of the bathroom door, and thought of London in late October. “And you know what? I haven’t a thing to wear.” That sent her into a fit of giggles. I’m already sounding like a married woman, she thought.

  “You’d be a smashing success at Heathrow. But I’ll get something for you—a skirt, shirt, sweater, coat? In shades of blue, if possible. It won’t take long.” Roy’s gift shop had a variety of departments and helpful assistants.

  “But
the fit—” she began doubtfully.

  “I’ve got your sizes—approximately.” He grinned and added, “Don’t worry about the styles. Claudel has a sharp eye for women’s fashions.”

  “Claudel?”

  “Pierre.”

  “Then he is French?”

  “As Parisian as they come.”

  “Is he an engineer, too?”

  “Sure.”

  “And these nice Australians? Or are they Australians?”

  He evaded the last question by answering the first. “They are pretty good engineers.” Mahoney knew a lot about planes; Benson had once helped design submarines.

  “Are they all flying back to London with us?”

  “Claudel will be there. But separate. So don’t speak to him, or even look at him.”

  “Not the tiniest smile?” she teased. “Oh Bob—before you go—would you help me put a call through to Father? I really should let him know.”

  “Yes, I suppose so.” Not through Merriman’s—Gilman wouldn’t want the firm to be connected openly with Francis O’Connell. Not through A.K. Roy’s gift shop, either: the Washington problem wasn’t in Roy’s field of inquiry; there had been no need to spread Renwick’s interest—the less known about it, the better.

  She noted his hesitation. “Would it be so difficult?”

  “We may have to place a call, wait a little. And there’s the time element, too. A rough guess—” He calculated quickly, checked his watch again. “I’d say it is now half-past eleven yesterday in Washington.” ’Phone from this room? Well, we should be out of here before any interested party starts trying to trace any calls. “Where would we find your father near midnight? I’ve got his new number somewhere.” Renwick went over to the chair that held his jacket, found his small book of innocuous addresses. “They’ve just moved into a house in Georgetown.”

  A new house? What was wrong with the old one? And how does Bob know its number—has he been in touch with Father? Yes, it was Father who sent him chasing after me. Her eyes lost their smile, her lips were strained. “He may be at home, perhaps even gone to bed. Oh, it doesn’t matter. And you haven’t got the time to waste on a call. Let’s forget it.”