Our man in Camelot

'When can I see her?'

'Very soon. Just one or two questions first.' Roskill grinned. 'How about that lunch?'

Mosby shook his head. 'Being arrested has taken my appetite away, Mr Roskill.'

'Good lord—you haven't been arrested, Captain! We simply want to know what you're up to.'

'Who's 'we'?'

'The powers-that-be.' Roskill waved a hand vaguely. 'The authorities. A rose by any other name…

Does it matter?'

Mosby studied the Englishman. This soft approach could be a carefully calculated phase of the breaking-down process, or it could be that they still genuinely weren't sure about him.

'To me it does. I'm a serving officer with the United States Air Force, attached to NATO—but I guess you must know that already, huh?'

Roskill nodded. 'Of course.'

'Uh-huh. Well, being—picked up, shall we say?—being picked up by your Special Branch isn't going to make me Man of the Year with my commanding officer.'

'Yes, I can imagine that.' Roskill smiled sympathetically. 'Commanding officers are notoriously—

narrow-minded.'

'That's right. No matter I haven't done one goddamn thing, I'm going to do the rest of my time on a weather station on Greenland. And up until this afternoon I've enjoyed it over here—so has my wife.'

'I'm gratified to hear it. But—'

Anthony Price - Our man in camelot

Mosby held up his hand. 'Let me finish, sir. My wife wanted me to phone the embassy when we were back at Dr Handforth-Jones's house. And if I was going by the book now I ought to be demanding you let me phone the base. But I have the impression that somehow I've got into something way over my head—I don't know what, but it's sure as hell not parking on a double yellow line.' He looked around him. 'All this… and now you, Mr Roskill.'

'Me?'

'You don't look like a cop to me.'

'What do I look like?'

'I don't know…' Mosby paused. 'But maybe someone I can make a deal with, I'm hoping.'

'Well, well… now you are beginning to interest me, Captain. What sort of deal?'

Mosby shrugged. 'You name it. You want me to answer questions—ask the questions. You want me to do something —within reason I'll do it.'

'In exchange for what?'

'In exchange for I don't make any trouble, phoning the embassy—and you don't make any trouble calling General Ellsworth if I've accidentally stepped out of line somehow.'

Roskill looked at him quizzically. 'You think you may have stepped out of line?'

Mosby grimaced. 'I don't know all your laws. I guess I'll know when you start asking the questions.'

'But you can't guess what?'

'I can't, no… Unless the Special Branch is interested in illegal archaeology—if there is such a crime.'

'And you've done that?' Roskill raised an eyebrow. 'Gone treasure hunting, you mean?'

'No.' Mosby shook his head. 'But someone might think I had, that's all.'

'I see.' Roskill considered Mosby thoughtfully for a moment or two. 'Well now… I'm not exactly empowered to make deals, but it seems reasonable enough. So let's just try it for size and see how it looks—right?'

'You mean a gentleman's agreement?'

'If you like—a gentleman's agreement.'

Mosby swallowed ostentatiously. 'Okay.'

'Fine. You're with the 7438th Bombardment Wing—F-llls with an attached Phantom Squadron?'

'Correct.'

'Stationed at RAF Wodden. Does the wind still blow up there six days out of seven?'

'You know it?'

'I knew it years ago. Built during the war as a basic training field—for Tiger Moths. But when I was there it was Jet Provosts.' .

'You RAF, then?'

'Once upon a time.' RoskiU's lip twisted as if the memory was painful to him. 'You must have done a lot of work on it since my day.'

'They haven't stopped since they moved in four years back. When the new runway's ready they'll be able to take anything that flies now.'