Tomorrow's ghost

'Hell, Princess - ' Paul's voice was suddenly edged with anger ' - doesn't it strike you as bad medicine that neither Hugh nor David are here just when we need them most?

And we can't even damn well talk to them either - and there are such things as communications satellites ... David's only in the embassy at Washington, not on Mars -

we could have him back here in the flesh by Concorde for tea-time, taxi-time included.

But... neither of them - you can call that bad management, if you like. Or bad luck. Or coincidence. But if you do, you'd better remember also what David taught us about them, Frances.'

Bad luck is what the Other Side wishes on you.

Coincidence is very often a damned liar.

And bad management -

Then Frances knew exactly what Paul was up to, why he was going to so much trouble to spell everything out, and - above all - what he intended her to do about it.

* * *

(She could recall not only the words, but the occasion; David, fairly tanked-up after dinner, and James Cable and Paul and herself, all relaxing after a hard day's work ... and Paul, very carefully not tanked-up at all, playing his favourite game of capping David's quotations, or anticipating them, and gently needling him.) ('And bad management,' David had said, 'is when you find yourself taking unnecessary risks.')

('And good management,' Paul had said, 'is presumably when you find someone else to take those risks?')

* * *

'All right, Paul, I take your point. We do have to talk.' She thought hard for a moment. 'You better make it after dark, quite late ... and by the back way, if there is one.

And if there are any complications I'll park my car pointing out of the driveway.'

'There's a careful princess, now! And just as well too, maybe ... if your friend Hugo is right.'

'My friend - who?'

'Hugo. Hugo Crowe.'

'Oh - Professor Crowe, you mean. He's not my friend, I've only met him once.'

'Well, he regards himself as your friend. He says you are a darling - even a Grace Darling, combining heroism with beauty. Just another passing conquest of yours.

Princess... but obviously you've stopped counting them - fairy princesses are traditionally cruel, of course.'

He was pleased with himself now that she had taken his point.

'If he's right? How should he be right?' Frances frowned. 'Right about what?'

'You told him a story - about a blind prince? A fairy story, presumably.'

The skin between her shoulder-blades crawled suddenly. 'Yes. Yes?'

'He says you shouldn't have told it. But particularly he says you mustn't point at anyone. And on no account must you kiss the third prince - you're to choose one of the other two. And don't ask me what all that means, because I don't know, and he wouldn't tell me. For my own good, that was, he said. A very superstitious fellow, your friend Hugo ... though no one has a better right to be, I suppose.'

Frances closed her eyes. 'I'm not with you at all, Paul. Why is - why has he the right to be superstitious?'

'You haven't done your homework. He's the author of The Psychology of Superstition...

why people won't walk under ladders, and all that stuff. Huh! But please don't worry about me, Frances dear - you can point at me any time, I'm not superstitious. And you can kiss me too, I'm not blind - it'll be a pleasure, I assure you... Maybe tonight, and make an honest princess of you.' A kiss sounded down the line. 'Watch out for yourself, Frances - save all your kisses for me.'

CHAPTER EIGHT

On the outskirts of Colonel Butler's village there was a big new garage, with a showroom full of gleaming Japanese cars and an unbeatable offer on its petrol.

Frances pulled on to the forecourt, just short of the pumps, and sat thinking for a moment, hypnotised by the empty phone box beyond the car-wash at the far end of the buildings.

All she had to do was to go to that box and lift the phone and dial the number and put the money in, and then say a few words. It would be just another phone call, and even if the Mossad line at the Saracen's Head was no longer secure it would be untraceable if she was quick.

Except it wouldn't be just another call, because once she'd made it she'd be more than halfway committed to one side of Paul's palace revolution and not to the side with the better odds at the moment. Not even, come to that, to the side that had the right on it for certain, notwithstanding her instinct - and William Ewart Hedges' blessing.

A tousle-headed young man came out of the petrol kiosk and stood staring towards her.

Paul, on the other hand, was hedging his bets with a vengeance. Though (to be fair to him) he'd gone a lot further than she might have expected him to go, with his ambitions, and with the promises of advancement they would have made to him, like those which had been made to her in return for results.

The young man pointed towards her, and then to the pumps.

Mustn't point at anyone.