October Men

'At Ostia?' Audley glanced briefly at Boselli. 'I'll tell you something for free, Peter: whatever may have happened at Ostia was none of my doing. I'm not responsible for homegrown Italian talent.'

There was an element of truth in that, thought Richardson irritably, but it hardly accounted for Audley's lack of cooperation when it must be obvious enough to him that the Italians had the whip hand.

Boselli drained his wine and stood up self-consciously.

'Excuse me, signori,' he mumbled. 'There are things I must do—excuse me. I will return shortly.'

Audley watched him off the terrace, then turned towards Richardson, one eyebrow raised ironically.

'Now you're not going to tell me he's gone for a quick pee, are you, Peter?'

'Not unless you twist my arm.'

'Good. So you both agreed on how to handle me.' He nodded to himself. 'But just because he's got you frightened that dummy2

doesn't mean I have to get talkative.'

'Him—? Got me frightened? Him?'

'You aren't? Well, don't be deceived by appearances, boy—

although I admit they certainly are deceptive.' Audley stared reflectively in the direction Boselli had gone. 'Unless I'm very much mistaken that little fellow is one of Montuori's top guns, specially imported for the occasion.'

Richardson goggled at him, and then down the empty terrace wordlessly.

'I could be wrong, of course.' Audley stood up. 'He's a new one on me I admit. . . . But let's take a turn among those olive trees down there by the cliff. They didn't mind me walking there—there isn't anywhere you can get out, but it's a little more private.'

Richardson followed him obediently down the white steps into the sparse little grove of olives until they came to a low stone wall. The roar of the traffic on the coast road far below rose to meet them. Away to the left Salerno spread out invitingly, and he remembered the last time he had been there, with a delectable Swedish girl he'd picked up at Amalfi

—

'I want you to get me out of here, Peter,' said Audley in his ear urgently. 'I don't care how you do it, but just get me out of here quickly.'

Richardson faced him. 'It can't be done, David. They've had a man killed, maybe two. Montuori phoned Sir Frederick, dummy2

person to person. He's out for blood. In fact they're both ruddy well out for blood—only it's yours Sir Frederick would like and Montuori isn't so choosy. I rather think it's someone else's he wants more than yours, anyway.'

Audley studied his face for a moment, then shook his head.

'Nobody'll get anything unless you get me out of here.

Without me you haven't got a prayer of a chance. You just don't understand what's going on—neither does Fred.'

Richardson looked at him in momentary surprise: this was the old Machiavellian Audley right enough—on the scaffold, but ready to bargain that what he had in his head was too valuable for anyone to dare cutting it off. It had worked well in the past, and it had been allowed to work, because in his own way Audley had always delivered the goods. But from the moment old Charlie Clark had pulled the trigger too much had happened, and too much was known, for it to work this time.

'You're dead wrong there, David.' It was brutal, but it would be quicker this way. And anyway, he owed Audley something like honesty for old time's sake. 'We know ruddy near the lot.'

In spite of the noise from below there was a silence between them for a moment.

'The lot?' Audley measured the word.

' 'Near,' I said.'

'How near?'

dummy2

'Ian Howard. Eugenio Narva. Neville Macready.' Richardson paused. 'And the Little Bird from East Berlin, of course—the Little Bird who sang in the wrong ear.'

Not Joseph Hemingway or Peter Korbel or Bastard Ruelle—

not yet. They were the second wave of attackers, ready if the shock troops failed to break through. Old times' sake didn't go all the way.

'I see.'

Audley turned away, staring out over the bay.

'So . . . Neville Macready,' he murmured to himself as though that one name accounted for the rest. Disquietingly he seemed almost relieved by it but still unbowed: the shock troops were not through yet.

'David, you've got to come clean with us now. There's no other way.'

'Come clean?' The sudden anger, cold and bitter, deepened Audley's voice. 'Come clean? Of all the goddam bloody stupid meddling fornicating idiots— blundering, fourth-rate, sanctimonious twats—'

'David—' Richardson was shaken by the sudden loss of control. On occasion he had heard Audley swear before, and more foully, but it had always been for effect, never from despair.