Soldier No More

end.'

A hideous suspicion had been spreading inside Roche, much nastier than anything French security could have imagined.

'You knew. . . about me?'

'Oh yes—Clinton did. From way back.'

'From way back?' The steadiness of his voice surprised him.

'From Japan onwards—it was the company you kept, you see. That's why you never got any decent jobs. . . only the ones where we were already compromised—or when we dummy5

wanted something passed on ... In fact, in a way, getting the d'Auberon stuff was the first really important job you were ever given. Clinton had to have it, but he knew Etienne would never give it up—not to us. But he also knew there had to be a copy snugged away in the KGB files in Paris. The trick was to get you to winkle it out—from them or d'Auberon, it didn't really matter which. But he reckoned you could do it—he's a lot like King Gaiseric of the Vandals, really. . . and in more ways than one, too.' Audley smiled. 'Sitting there, waiting for the winds to carry his fleet to the country that God desired to ruin, I mean. Only, like King Gaiseric, Fred Clinton was pretty damn sure which way the wind ought to blow, that's all.'

It wasn't as bad as he'd expected, it was much worse. But he had to blank out the pain before it became unendurable in order to press his questions while Audley was willing to answer them. 'I was set up—from the start?'

Audley nodded. 'Very comprehensively. And he had all sorts of other things going to back you up—rumours dropped, bits of information available . . . people briefed to say the right things—'

The pain was unendurable. 'People?'

'All sorts of people, yes—'

'Who?'

'Stocker . . . people you've never met . . . me, latterly.' Audley shrugged. 'Lots of people.'

dummy5

'Major Ballance?' The thought of Bill despising him was horrible, yet not the unkindest cut because it was Bill's job to screw the enemy. But he couldn't bring himself to the worst straight away.

'I think he had the general task of looking after you—yes.'

Audley seemed unaware of the damage he was doing.

Roche's chest itched under the bandages, with the wounds of every single mortar-bomb fragment registering individually.

He gritted his teeth. 'Major ... Mr Willis?'

Audley frowned. 'I think ... I think he was just ordered to answer your questions. But—'

'Jilly?' The itch was graduating to discomfort.

'No. She had her instructions, that's all. Only, about old Wimpy—'

'Colonel Stein?' Roche didn't much care about the Israeli, and Bradford must be career-CIA and didn't matter. But he still couldn't work himself to her. 'Where was he?'

'At the Tower?' Audley shrugged again. 'He was away somewhere taking his prehistoric pictures.' He shook his head. 'Davey's got nothing to do with intelligence—never has had, never will have. Davey takes pictures and flies planes.

He's just a very nice man, and a good friend of mine.'

The discomfort became physical pain, joining the agony inside his head as he came to her at last. 'Lady Alexandra?'

'Lexy?' Audley looked at him incredulously. 'Oh, come on, man! Lexy couldn't keep a secret—or obey an instruction—if dummy5

her life depended on it! And you were an ultra secret—

Clinton couldn't take chances on you, for God's sake!'

The pain abated just when it was beginning to blur his vision.

Lexy didn't know—

'Besides which, Fred didn't dare give you everything on a plate. The whole aim was to let you come to your own conclusions, to work things out for yourself—to get at the truth in your own way—'

The truth?'

'Ninety per cent of it, yes! All the best lies are made up of truth—that's what makes them stick—nothing else will do ...

So almost everything you were given was true ... as well as almost everything you were allowed to find out—' Audley leaned forward, his face twisted into a curious expression, half sly and half shy '—the risk was that you'd see clear through to the other side. And that's why you had to be hindered as well as helped— right?'

'Hindered?' Roche was sweating with relief about Lexy.

' Side-tracked is better. That's why they gave you me to get your teeth into, don't you see?'

With an effort, Roche shook himself free of her. 'You?'