ever, and a fat, sweaty sort of man in a dinner jacket pouring whiskey for the Italians and trying to say 'Honestly, I can't tell you how sorry I am that such a thing should happen in
Lady Swyven fought for, and finally gained, her self
control.
'What on earth,' she asked, 'is happening?'
Linton said: 'The lady here, Signorina Busoni, has lost a diamond brooch. It seems very likely that you have it, madam.'
Lady Swyven said, 'How dare you!' and at once pondered the fact that in real life too, there is a use for theatrical cliche.
'You think you haven't?'
'I know I haven't,' Lady Swyven said. 'The whole business is quite ridiculous.' She paused, then added: 'I should like my husband to be here. He's waiting for me outside.'
Linton shrugged, then went to the door and spoke to a brisk, alert, young detective sergeant, the kind who gets ulcers because he still isn't a superintendent and here he is turned thirty already. He was back in minutes, and all the time the two Italians talked; the manager poured Scotch and tried and failed to get into the duologue.
Swyven came in slowly, unhurried, because hurrying impeded his thinking and there was obviously something wrong.
The sergeant said loudly: 'This is Lord Swyven, sir. I'm afraid he's rather hard of hearing.'
Swyven's words cut across the sergeant's. 'I'm bloody deaf,' he said, 'but it's no good shouting like this idiot. Just let me see you speak.'
Linton said: 'It's your wife, sir. We have reason to believe she's stolen a diamond brooch.'
'You're either mad or drunk,' Swyven said. 'Or
both.'
'It's in her handbag, sir.'
Swyven looked at his wife and grinned.
'Better let them look, Jane,' he said. 'Then we can go and get a bite at the Caprice or something. You like the place and I can't hear them anyway.'
Lady Swyven opened her handbag, took out a handkerchief and cigarettes, lipstick, powder compact, lighter and a rose diamond brooch made by Carrier in Paris, approximate value three thousand pounds.
'Great God Almighty!' said Lord Swyven.
'Ecco,' Miss Busoni shouted in triumph. 'E—ceo.'
The very handsome man with her said, 'That's Pia's brooch, all right. I'd recognize it anywhere.'
Linton said: 'I'm afraid I must ask you to come with us to the Station, madam,' and Lady Swyven burst into tears.
» Chapter 18 *
Well,' said Loomis. 'We're doing very nicely. Chubby Chal-lon planted the brooch on her when he bumped into her, you're on hand to identify it, and the Busoni person gets a lot of free publicity.'
'There's just one point, sir,' Grierson said. 'She's Italian.'
'Nothing could be more obvious,' said Loomis. 'And I am wanted for murder in Italy.' 'Didn't I tell you? Naxos explained all that,' Loomis said. 'You're in the clear now. But don't do it again.' 'No, sir,' said Grierson. 'Thank you, sir.'
'Yes. Well. We also planted some more stuff in Swyven's place. Stuff Chubby knocked off for us. She could get seven years for this. Now all we got to do is leak it to the press.'
'You think it'll draw Swyven out?'
'It must,' Loomis said. 'You don't think I want to send an old woman to prison, do you?'
'As soon as he sees Pia's name he'll know it's a plant,' said Grierson.
'You are an old misery this morning,' Loomis said. 'Of course he'll know it's a plant and hell come all the quicker. He'll assume we're the same as he is, d'you see? And that means jail for his old ma. What you got for the press?'
Grierson handed over a typewritten release. It read: 'Last night a daring attempt was made to steal a priceless diamond brooch belonging to glamorous Italian film star Pia Busoni when she attended a first night at the Duke's Theater.'
'We've got a sexy picture to go with it,' said Grierson.
'I'll bet you have,' said Loomis.
'The attempt was frustrated by Detective Chief Inspector Linton, C.I.D. It is understood that Lady Swyven, wife of Rear Admiral Lord Swyven, is assisting the police in their inquiries. It is reported that Detective Chief Inspector Linton believes that the robbery may be linked with other recent society thefts.'
'That'll do nicely,' said Loomis. 'I never knew you could be so vulgar, Grierson. Now all we have to do is wait.'
'Suppose Lady Swyven just calls me a liar?'
'How can she?' said Loomis. 'You're an ex-captain of the Royal Marines, you hunt with the Quorn, you've an uncle who's an Archdeacon. How can you possibly be a liar?'
« » «
Swyven flew in next morning at dawn, in an El-Al Trident. He had a car waiting for him, a big Russian Zim from the Zaarbist Embassy. He cleared Customs slowly, but when he reached the car it moved away at once. Swyven took comfort from its CD plates, and as it neared London began to breathe more easily. Beside him Zaarb's eleventh cultural attache, an expert on the manufacture, maintenance, and use of small arms, explained how Zaarb would never let down their good friend Swyven, who had done so much for the latest and best of people's republics. He did not explain that Swyven had only been allowed to come because it was feared that he might have done so on his own if he'd been refused help; nor that it was too early for him to die—there was still work for him to do; nor that even so the cultural attache's orders were to kill him if there were any chance of his being captured.
The Zim moved up to seventy, and Swyven felt happier still. The Skyways Hotel was behind them now, the dual carriageway was almost empty, the petrol stations clicked by in fast blobs of color. Swyven permitted himself a cigarette, then the big car slowed. There was a 'Road Up' sign ahead, and a diesel road roller clanking slowly down. The Zim braked down harder as the road narrowed even more. The car moved level with the road roller, which was moving flat out at twelve miles an hour, then, incredibly, the road roller swerved into them.
The front of the bonnet disappeared before the car hit the middle of the carriageway. The chauffeur stamped on his foot brake, the back-wheel brakes engaged and slued the car round faster, slamming him into the steering wheel. The cultural attach^ received Swyven's head in his chest as his hand groped for his gun, and fell sideways, to slam his head into the rear door. Swyven pulled him clear, and reached for the door handle, but the door opened before he could touch it, and a man in overalls stood framed inside it. The man looked familiar to Swyven, but he was too terrified to think where he had seen him before. The workman had his hands on the cultural attach^ who was struggling feebly, then he struck, and the cultural attache was unconscious, and the workman was taking a gun from inside the cultural attache's coat. There was another man busy in the front of the car, a man in ambulance uniform, and he was dragging out the unconscious chauffeur.
Swyven whimpered as the cultural attache was hauled out, and handed over to other ambulance attendants. At last he made a dive through the open door, and the workman turned and tripped him, almost contemptuously, then hauled him to his feet and ran him up to a waiting ambulance, pitched him inside, leaped in after him and slammed the doors. The ambulance moved off at once, its bell clanging.
'Hello, Swyven old man,' said the workman. 'How are all the Carpaccios?'
After an hour they arrived at a nursing home, a quiet, discreet building, with oak trees, ivy parterres and the best alarm system in the United Kingdom. Electronic eyes winked, a gate swung open, and the ambulance went inside, behind the shelter of the trees, and pulled up by the main doors. Craig opened the doors and jumped down._
'Out,' he said. 'Time to see the doctor.'
The cultural attache and the chauffeur stepped down, and automatically put their hands on the back of their necks. Swyven came out last, his face hidden by a handkerchief. He was weeping.
They went inside, and one of the ambulance attendants came with them. Swyven recognized Grierson, but it
