The Money That Money Can't Buy

'We're going to pick up a man called Jean-Luc Calvet,' said Craig. 'You know him.'

'Of course I do,' said Allen. 'He's a French painter. One of these beatnik types. Lives down the road in Estepona.'

'You never told us about him,' said Craig.

'Nothing to tell,' Allen said. 'He's just a painter. Sells little sketches of landscapes and fishing boats and that. Does very well too.'

'He's a Russian,' said Craig. 'He also sells little

sketches of Gibraltar, and he's a paymaster for Spanish Communists.'

'You're joking,' said Allen, and added quickly: 'I mean he's a very good painter.'

'He's a very good spy, too,' said Craig.

3

That night Calvet was giving a party. His little house was crammed with expatriate Swedes, Germans, and Englishmen, including a couple of officers from Gibraltar who were laying down Calvet oils as their ancestors had laid down port. The gin and whisky, smuggled from Gib, were excellent, and the kef, brought from Morocco that day, mixed deftly enough to ensure that it brought nothing but peace, and perhaps a little too much laughter. There were never any fights at Calvet's parties. Craig drove down there at two in the morning, and the party was loud indeed. He left the car in the square, and walked down to the quayside. A group of fishermen were unloading boxes of fish from a caique-like craft with an enormous and antiquated diesel engine; others were watching from a cafe, part house, part awning, and with them were a beat-poet, an anti-novelist, a musique concrete composer, and their disciples, who drank local brandy and deplored Calvet's party, to which they had not been invited. Craig drank coffee, and listened to their chatter. The party should be through by four.

He finished his coffee, walked out of the village to a headland, sat down and waited. His patience was absolute. He could wait for days, and be as swift and deadly at the end as if he had just arrived at the fight. At last, very faintly, he heard the throb of engines, and saw the riding lights of Allen's cruiser. The engines stopped, and there was the squeak of wood on metal as Allen moved his dinghy to the shore, beached it and scrambled up. His breath reeked of cognac.

'All set,' said Allen. 'Ready when you are, squire.' He lurched into Craig as he moved, and Craig reacted at once to the dense weight of metal on his body. His hand moved, quickly and precisely, and came out with the gun that Allen carried. A Beretta. An Italian automatic, eight-shot, with a light and nervous trigger. The safety catch was off. Craig took the magazine from the butt, put it in his pocket, and gave the gun back to Allen.

'If I want a gun I'll bring a gun,' he said.

'Just making sure,' Allen said. 'He could be tough.'

'He is,' said Craig. 'But we don't want him dead.'

He led Allen back to the car, and they drove out of town, then waited in the dark till four, while Allen fidgeted and whined for cognac, and Craig just sat, not smoking, not speaking, waiting until it was time to move. They went back into Estepona and parked near Calvet's house just after four. By twenty past, seven people had left, by half past the record player had ceased.

Craig drove up to the house, got out, and looked at the windows. They were small and steel-framed.

The door was three heavy slabs of olive wood, with a hand-forged lock that he could open with a hairpin, but he had heard the thick slam of metal bolts as the last guests left. He pounded on the door with his fist. The noise boomed and echoed in the empty street. At last he heard footsteps, and his muscles tensed for action.

A girl's voice asked: 'Who is there?' and Craig continued to pound on the door. 'What is it?' the girl asked again, and Craig shouted in half-incoherent Spanish about guests at the party, an accident on the Marbella road, and a man dying, perhaps dead, and my God why did they have to drive when they had drunk so much?

There was a gasp, the bolts shot back, and Craig lunged at the door as it opened. The girl's weight gave under his, he reached out and his hands were merciful and swift. She collapsed with little more than a sigh. He picked her up and climbed the stairs, up to where one light glistened softly, and, to the left of it, an opened door. His footsteps were firm and loud as he moved, and at the third stair from the top he called out: 'I say, is anyone there?' There was no answer, he reached the top, and turned. The room at the top of the stairs was a bedroom. In it was a young man in denim pants, a faded blue work shirt and combat boots. The young man was lean and rangy, clean-shaven, his hands and clothes grimy with paint. In one of them was a Star Model A automatic that pointed where Craig's shirt should have been visible, had he not been carrying the girl. The fact of the girl disconcerted the young man. He had been about to make love to her. Craig walked into the room.

'Oh I say,' he said. 'Look here.'

The young man took two cautious steps backwards, beyond the reach of Craig's hands.

'This young woman's ill,' said Craig. 'For God's sake, come and help me man. You don't need that thing.'

'Put her on the floor,' said Calvet.

'On the floor?'

The automatic tilted, aimed at a point between Craig's eyes. Slowly, carefully, Craig put the girl down on the floor, bending his head as he did so. She was a slight girl, too thin for his taste but easy enough to carry. Her hair was fine and golden, and her eyes would be blue, or gray, he thought, and waited for Calvet's move.

The young man was fast. He covered the distance to Craig in two silent strides, and the gun-barrel swung. Craig rolled to one side, the gun's sight clipped the skin of his forehead and Craig, balanced on one arm, reached out the other to grab Calvet's wrist, using the force of the descending blow to pull him further downward, twisting the fingers of the wrist open as he pulled until the automatic spilled from them. Calvet countered with a blow at his neck, a chop that would have killed him, but he lay back as it came, and took it, gasping, on the close-packed muscles of his shoulder, the lancing pain loosening his wrist hold. Calvet wriggled free, and aimed a kick at Craig's head, but Craig was already spinning away toward the automatic and the kick went wide. Immediately Calvet hurled himself at Craig, the one chance he had to stop him reaching the gun, and Craig moved with the kind of reflex action that comes only from day after day at the dojo mat, days that grow into months and years. The toe of his shoe landed in the young man's belly as his hands grasped the sailcloth on his shoulders. His leg straightened, his hands heaved, and Calvet hit the wall, smashed from it and was still straightening, looking for his enemy, when the edge of Craig's hand struck at a point just below his nose. He fell then, a slack heap of flesh in paint-stained clothes. Craig got up, winced when he put weight on the shoulder Calvet had hit, and walked over to him, felt his wrist. It was steady enough. He hadn't hit too hard. He tried the girl's wrist then; it was fast and fluttering. Espionage was hardest on innocent bystanders.

He listened for Allen then; but there was no sound. Craig swore, softly but adequately, took some wire from his pocket, and tied up Calvet. His movements were neat and precise, the knots as sure as only a fisherman's knots can be. He looked at the girl again, then picked her up and tied her to the railings of the bed. She'd wanted to be there anyway. Then he began to search Calvet's house. Time was vital, and his movements were swift enough, but he was thorough. Room by room, drawer by drawer, case by case, he searched Calvet's belongings.

First he found money—a drawerful of neat piles of twenty-dollar bills. He put them aside and went on searching: under floorboards, behind cupboards, behind walls that sounded hollow but were only plaster. The radio transmitter he discovered inside the record player. It was a little beauty, neat, light, and portable. He disconnected it and took it back toward the bedroom, then froze. There were footsteps on the stairs. Craig faced the necessity of having to hurt a third human being that evening. The idea neither attracted nor repelled. It was simply a necessity. If he had to do it, he would do it well. The footsteps moved to the bedroom. Craig followed, soundless. Allen stood in the doorway, his eyes moving from the pile of money on the table to the girl on the bed.

'So many good things,' said Craig. 'You don't know where to start, do you?'

Allen whirled. His movements were clumsy, fuzzy with alcohol. He stared into the flat gray of Craig's eyes that looked at him without pity, hate, or even dislike.

'Where were you?' asked Craig.

'I was scared,' said Allen. 'I'm all right now.'

His gaze went back to the money.

'You've found a fortune,' he said.

'Yes,' said Craig.

'I mean—we could live the rest of our lives on that,' said Allen.

'Yes,' said Craig, 'we could. There's an R/T set next door. Take it down to the car. Then wait for me.'

Allen didn't move. He was looking at the girl now. She was still unconscious, but she'd moved a little, and the