“Do you have a passport?” Carroll looked doubtful.
“Yeah.”
“I’ll have Jan put you on a flight for London. Do you have a preference?”
“I don’t care for biplanes.”
“No, I suppose not. If it doesn’t matter I’ll have Jan arrange for flight fifty-five, Pan Am, leaves every night for London at eight. First class all right?”
“That’ll be fine. How do you know there will be room?”
“Mr. Dixon’s organization flies extensively. We have a somewhat special status with the airlines.”
“I’ll bet you do.”
“Mr. Michael Flanders will meet you at Heathrow Airport tomorrow morning. He’s from Mr. Dixon’s London office and will be able to fill you in.”
“I imagine you have a somewhat special status with Mr. Flanders.”
“Why do you say so?”
“How do you know he’ll be free tomorrow morning?”
“Oh, I see. Yes. Well, everyone in the organization knows how strongly Mr. Dixon feels about this business and everyone is ready to do anything necessary.”
I finished my beer. Carroll took another sip of his. A man who sips beer is not trustworthy. He smiled at me, white teeth in perfect order, looked at his watch, two hands, nothing so gauche as a digital, and said, “Nearly noon. I expect you’ll have some packing to do.”
“Yeah. And maybe a few phone calls to the State Department and such.”
He raised his eyebrows.
“I’m not going over to look at the Beowulf manuscript in the British Museum. I gotta bring a gun. I need to know the rules on that.”
“Oh, of course, I really don’t know anything about that sort of thing.”
“Yeah, that’s why I’m going and you’re not.”
He flashed his perfect caps at me again. “The tickets will be at the Pan Am counter at Logan,” he said. “I hope you have a good trip. And… I don’t quite know what one says at such a time. Good hunting, I suppose, but that sounds awfully dramatic.”
“Except When Trevor Howard says it,” I said.
On the way out I gave Jan the thumbs-up gesture like in the old RAF movies. I think she was offended.
3
My first move was to call the airline. They said I could bring a handgun as long as it was disassembled, packed in a suitcase and checked through. The ammunition had to be separate. Of course it couldn’t be carried aboard.
“Okay if I chew gum when my ears pop?” I said.
“Certainly, sir.”
“Thank you.”
Next I called the British Consulate. They told me that if I were bringing in a shotgun there would be no problem. I could simply carry it in. No papers required.
“I had in mind a thirty-eight caliber Smith and Wesson revolver. A shotgun in a hip holster tends to chafe. And carrying it around London at high port seems a bit showy.”
“Indeed. Well, for a handgun the regulations state that if you are properly licensed it will be held at customs until you have received authorization from the chief of police in the city or town of your visit. In this case, you say London?”
“Yes.”
“Well, that is where you should apply. It is not permitted of course to bring in machine guns, submachine guns, automatic rifles or any weapon capable of firing a gas-disseminating missile.”
“Oh, damn,” I said.
Then I called Carroll back. “Have your man in London arrange a permit for me with the London cops.” I gave him the serial number, the number of my Mass carry license and the number of my private detective license.
“They may be sticky about issuing this without your presence.”
“If they are they are. I’ll be there in the morning. Maybe Flanders can have softened them up at least. Don’t you people have a somewhat special status with the London fuzz?”
“We will do what we can, Mr. Spenser,” he said, and hung up.
A little abrupt for a guy with his breeding. I looked at my watch: 2:00. I looked out my office window. On Mass Avenue a thin old man with a goatee was walking a small old dog on a leash. Even from two stories up you could see the leash was new. Bright metal links and a red leather handle. The old man paused and rummaged through a little basket that was attached to a lamppost. The dog sat in that still patient way old dogs have, his short legs a little bowed.
