The buzz-buzz stopped with a click at last and Faith answered rather breathlessly.
'You want David? Who's calling – who shall I say? Isn't that – '
Faith stopped short, turning Roskill's Christian name into an exhalation of air. It was odd how although she affected to despise the rigmarole of security she was quick to apply the rules.
'I'll get him,' she concluded grimly.
Again Roskill waited. She'd probably been in the bath or the lavatory and Audley himself had been sitting in the room next to the phone, obstinately deaf to it.
dummy2
It couldn't be 'tabernacle', but without knowing what 'propositum'
was there was no way of guessing. He rather sympathised with the other anonymous commentator who had scrawled 'Sod the Students' directly underneath the inscription – the authentic voice of Bunnock Street.
'Hullo, Hugh!' Amdley's voice rang loud and clear in his ear, disdainful of rules and caution alike.
'Is this a safe line?' Roskill exclaimed, more in surprise than annoyance.
'Safe? Safe line?' Audley repeated vaguely. 'I haven't the faintest idea. But if it isn't, then some poor devil's been wasting an awful lot of time listening to nothing. What's up?'
Roskill gritted his teeth. 'I think I'm blown, for a start,' he said.
'Somebody recognised me at – at that meeting I went to.'
'The Ryle do?'
Roskill beat his fist against the side of the telephone box. Audley had to be doing this deliberately.
'You're quite sure this line's safe?'
'I tell you – I haven't a clue,' said Audley. 'But it doesn't matter anyway. All that sort of thing is grossly exaggerated. Nobody's got the manpower or equipment to tap phones just on the off-chance –
they only tap when they're sure. And if anyone's on my line, God help them – they'll have had a job breaking the code Faith uses when she orders her groceries. I tell you, Hugh, you're all hagridden with bugging and half the time it's a lot of cock!'
He snorted derisively down the line at Roskill. 'And if they've got dummy2
one of those voice-actuated things clipped on somewhere, how do they know we don't know about it? We could be staging this for their sole benefit... So you were spotted. Well, who spotted you?'
Roskill carefully described the fat Arab.
'A Lebanese?' Audley demurred. 'No, he's certainly not a Lebanese.
Before I was kicked out I'd already been sidetracked there for six months and I know all their top men – he can't be all that new. But never mind: I'll identify him for you tomorrow morning. It shouldn't be difficult. Now – tell me about the Ryle Foundation.
Obviously Cox was right about that!'
'Yes, but – ' The trouble was that Havergal's memory had proved suspiciously disappointing when it came down to hard identifications. The session had left him with the feeling that the old man had to some extent outsmarted him in the end, and he tried hard to conceal this now in reporting the dialogue.
But Audley merely grunted approvingly as he listened.
'A neat line of reasoning – I think I'd like this Colonel Havergal of yours, Hugh. He was before my time, of course, but I can see why Fred would have wanted to get hold of him – if it was Fred. And I agree with you it might be Elliott Wilkinson he's gunning for. The Arabs would be damn difficult to unseat with things as they are, but Wilkinson's not quite invulnerable.'
'You know him?'
'I used to. But I didn't know he was mixed up with the Ryle people.
It doesn't surprise me one bit that he's up to no good, though.'
'He's pro-Arab?'
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'He isn't pro anything – it wouldn't be so bad if he was. He's just old-fashioned anti-semitic. Thirty years ago he'd have ended up behind the wire on the Isle of Man – if he hadn't got to Berlin first.
Horrible bloody character. If it wasn't Jews it'd be Catholics or blacks – if he'd lived in the sixteenth century he'd have been a champion witch-smeller. The devil of it is that he's got some very close contacts with our Arab section now – too damn close. And Llewelyn trusts him, the fool.'
'But there's still nothing to connect him with Hassan. We've only got Cox's instinct and a handful of names.'
'Cox is a good man, Hugh. And we've got more than that now.
Things are beginning to come together.'
'Things?'
It was all very well for Audley to retire comfortably to his country seat to think beautiful, complicated thoughts while he, Roskill, crouched in smelly Bunnock Street.
'I've been doing my homework, Hugh – catching up on Master Llewelyn.'
Llewelyn. Always the Welshman was uppermost in Audley's thoughts. Alan Jenkins's killers were probably a
