own money.'
She examined the idea, and found it flawless.
'Now you are thinking,' she said. 'That is really very good.'
'You'll be coming with us?' Craig asked.
'I must,' she said. 'I am Brodski's fiancee.' Craig started at that, and she laughed. 'It was love at first sight. Very romantic—just what one would expect from a Pole. I was here when he arrived, you see. A Polish refugee, persecuted by the wicked Russians. How I escaped from them is a tremendous adventure. You would not like it very much, I think. You have no sensibility.'
'None,' said Craig.
'Also you do not like women.'
'What makes you think so?'
'Because I am a woman.' She hesitated. 'No. That is the sort of stupidity I keep for Brodski. Because I have been trained to make men like me, and want me, and I cannot reach you though I have tried very hard.'
'It's not important,' said Craig. 'I'll get you out and I'll kill Simmons for you.'
'And Brodski?'
Craig shrugged.
'Maybe it is better if Boris killed Brodski—and Istvan,' she said. 'We cannot use Istvan as evidence if we use your idea, but he must still die.'
'Just as you like,' said Craig.
'There is one more thing,' said Tania. 'I wish you to stop speaking Arabic to servants. That is how they tell you what is happening, is it not?'
'That's how,' said Craig. 'The porter told me you had come in here.'
'How unkind,' said Tania. 'After I had bribed him not to. He is one of yours then?'
'No,' said Craig. 'I just offered him more money.' He paused. 'I'll stop speaking Arabic if you'll stop having me followed.'
'I agree,' she said. 'And you'll stay here tomorrow?'
'Most of the time,' Craig said. 'I've got to lay on the powerboat.'
She nodded. 'I'll call Boris tomorrow and arrange about the bank. You will be ready as soon as it is dark.'
'All right,' he said. 'But tell me one thing. Why have you people bothered to work with us at all?
Why not just do it yourselves?'
'We needed you to take us to Simmons,' she said, and watched for a reaction to the name, but his face stayed closed. 'We knew he existed, of course, but not who he was. Also, if things go wrong, we shall need you to get us out.' He said nothing. 'You can do that?'
'After I've fixed Simmons,' he said.
She came up to him and kissed him on the
mouth, her lips and tongue a skillful torment. He
made no move.
'No,' she said. 'You do not like women at all.' * * *
The nursing home was expensive. Its doctors were all consultants, its nurses not only qualified but pretty, its furniture of the kind that belongs to the newer luxury hotels. Loomis found it oppressive and said so. He didn't like mobiles, or Utrillo prints, or flowers arranged as if they were objects to be disliked, and he detested the receptionist in a mini skirt, no matter how flawless her legs. He began to indulge his anger, and three minutes later they were alone with Airlie, the nurse who had admitted them ruthlessly removed.
Airlie wore a black silk dressing gown like a kimono, white silk pajamas, white slippers. The bandage round his head looked like a turban. Wetherly salaamed.
'Who the hell are you?' Airlie asked.
'We're friends,' said Loomis. 'By God we must be to go to all this trouble.'
His hand groped in his pocket and came out bearing a crumpled letter.
'Have a look at that,' he said. 'Credentials.'
Airlie read it and looked at them, his face wary.
'Don't tell me you're—agents,' he said.
'Nothing so grand,' said Loomis. 'I'm a civil servant. My friend here's a doctor.'
He turned to Wetherly. 'Go over him. Make it look official.'
Wetherly went over him.
'It's a question of what the hell you think you're playing at, d'you see,' said Loomis. 'Mucking around with Simmons.'
'I'm engaged to his daughter,' Airlie said.
'You tried to beat up a feller,' said Loomis.
The earl touched the bandage Wetherly was re-fastening.
'I ended up with this,' he said.
'The other feller ended up with a bit more,' said Loomis.
'I could do with a bit of good news. Tell me about it.'
Loomis told him about it, and Airlie turned as white as his bandage.
'I don't believe it,' he said at last.
'I do,' said Wetherly. 'I treated him.'
'But-but why should Simmons—'
'Two reasons,' said Loomis. 'He's a sadist, and the other feller had information.' He refrained, carefully, from any mention of Jane.
'One of yours?' asked Airlie.
'One of mine. You'd better tell it, son.'
Airlie said: 'Simmons called it a crusade. To stop communism. We pooled our resources—for me that was mostly brawn, I suppose, till your chap came along. But he had others—bankers, lawyers, those sorts of chaps. They had brains. Expert knowledge. The idea was to use that knowledge. Against Russia.' 'How?' asked Loomis.
'Bits in his papers, on his TV station. The brains would work on information Simmons got from somewhere and use it to knock Russia. That was all.'
'This somewhere,' said Loomis. 'Was it a chap called Brodski?' Airlie looked stubborn.
'Look,' Loomis said. 'I know you think the secrets of the Black Hand Gang are sacred, but they're not. It's too bloody serious for that.'
'I gave my word,' said the earl.
Loomis turned to Wetherly.
'Well, good for him,' he said savagely. 'He gave his word. I suppose that means we better go.' He scowled at Airlie. 'Look, son, I'm doing you a favor. I could have sent the chap Simmons worked on to ask the questions. Or had you forgotten about him?'
'I don't understand that,' Airlie said. 'According to Simmons, Zelko and I just had to knock him out and search him.'
'He wanted you in deep,' said Loomis. 'So deep you could never get out.'
'But why?' Airlie asked.
'He wants a war,' said Loomis. 'Cold or hot, it's all the same, so long as it is war. The West on one side, Russia on the other. Tension and isolation—on and on for ever.'
'But why on earth—'
'We think we know now,' Wetherly said. 'He was in Yugoslavia during the war. Had a girl there.
The Russians captured her village and raped her until she died. The village was anti-Communist, you see. Simmons found her after they'd finished.'
'He wants revenge,' said Loomis. 'The whole of Russia for one girl. Just like Brodski wants revenge for Poland the way it used to be. Only they're not worried about who's innocent and who's guilty. They want the lot. They want arrests and trials and blockades and incidents. They want uprisings in Prague and Leipzig and Warsaw. They want us involved, and Western Europe and the United States. And at the end of it all they want war.'
