Eve and me through. Cyril stepped forward at my nod, and ripped off the blindfold. Wilson looked like a startled deer. He could see the four of us standing, fully dressed, wearing our masks.
“Who are you?” came his strangled words. “What do you want? Just ask me.
Anything. I’ll tell you. I promise.”
This was too easy, if it was true. I nodded to Cyril.
“You took a friend of ours two days ago. Where is she?”
“Who? Who is it?”
“Ava Kaplan,” said Cyril.
Wilson’s body tensed. “Who? Who are you?”
Cyril reached over and gave him a smack. Wilson’s face flared.
“You bastard! You don’t know who I am! You’ll be sorry!”
“Where is she?”
“Never heard of her. You’ve got the wrong man.”
Stan stepped away and I wondered what he was up to. He was back in a trice with a painter’s blowlamp. Wilson’s face was a picture. I almost stopped Stan but thought I’d see what came of it. Stan pumped at the handle to get the paraffin up the spout. He took out his match and lit the wick. He pumped it again and adjusted the flame. A jet of blue heat shot out and roared nicely in the quiet warehouse. I could feel the heat from four feet away. Stan stepped forward and Wilson’s head jerked back.
Cyril asked him again. “Where is she?”
“I don’t know!” he gasped, his head as far back as he could get it. Stan did a quick pass with the flame. A mound of black hair on Wilson’s shoulder frizzled and burnt. Wilson shrieked. The smell of singed hair hung on the air. Stan moved the blowlamp down towards his groin. Wilson yelped and flung himself back. His chair tipped and he crashed to the ground. Midge and Cyril got him back on an even keel. Wilson was weeping and snivelling now. His vest had tucked up. A livid scar scrawled across his stomach and up to his chest; a reminder of his self-impalement on a chair leg the night he attacked me.
“So you remember who she is, then?” asked Cyril.
“Yes, yes. But I don’t know where she is. We didn’t take her.”
“Who did?”
“I don’t know.”
Stan did a neat sweep with the torch across his bare hairy legs. Wilson shrieked and the smell of burnt hair filled my nostrils again. It was time to put a stop to this, if only to stop the foul stink. Besides, Stan was enjoying it too much.
“It was the Americans! They wanted her out of the way.” He looked over at me.
“McRae? Is it you?”
Stan pumped his torch again. I raised my hand and shook my head.
“McRae? It’s you, isn’t it? I didn’t touch her. I swear. Let me go and I’ll say nothing about this. I promise.”
I had had enough of this masked ball. I ripped my hood off. “Keep yours on, lads.” I walked round his trembling body.
“You didn’t touch her, eh? What did you do to her in prison? I remember how gentle you were with me in a cell. Still up to your old tricks?”
“I swear, McRae. I didn’t touch her.”
“But you watched while they did! There are other ways of hurting a person. And by Christ, you hurt her!”
“McRae, I really don’t know where she is. As God’s my judge. It wasn’t my doing.”
“Is she alive?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know.” He was whimpering now. I could see blisters forming on his shoulder and leg. I tried a change of tack.
“Why are the Yanks so pissed off at her?”
“She was screwing up their network. She killed their top man in Berlin.”
“Why did you let her go, then. Why did you let her out?”
“Can you imagine the trial?”
“And besides, you knew the Yanks would take care of her once she was out.”
He was silent.
“Didn’t you?” I nodded to Stan who leaned forward with his flame.
“Can you blame them? This was the second agent she killed.”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“The Angel pub in Rotherhithe. The man you met.”
I froze. “He was American? Central Intelligence?” I remembered his one word to me – McRae? – and how it sounded Irish. It was. Boston Irish.
“That’s why they were after her.”
“She wasn’t there. She wasn’t there, I tell you.”
“But her Jewish pals were. She set them on him.”
“Why did he agree to meet me?”
“They’d lost track of her. Didn’t know what she was up to. They thought you could help track her down.”
“Why the hell would I do that?”
“Because you wanted her back. You’d had a fight. She dropped you.”
Why should I believe this man? He’d lied so often to me.
“And knowing all that, Wilson, you set her up in that flat. A sacrificial offering for your Yankee pals. Is that it?”
His silence was deafening. I’d had enough. I was past caring, one way or the other. The likelihood was that Eve was dead. And this man had put her in front of the firing squad. If I’d had a gun in my hand I would have shot him like a dog and left him to die. I was barely aware of the rattle of locks and the door opening behind me. The lads jumped and were quick to get into defence mode. Had the police tailed us after all? Then I smelled the cigar.
“Hello, Danny.” Pauli Gambatti stepped over the threshold followed by three of his men. They were all carrying guns.
“Hello, Pauli. Fancy meeting you here. We were just tidying up.”
“I can see.”
He walked over and stood alongside me, gazing at Wilson’s shaking body.
“Got what you wanted, Danny?”
“As much as I think I’ll get.”
“Then we’ll take over. You can leave him with us.” Stan handed over his blowlamp to one of the musclemen. The man grinned in anticipation.
“That wasn’t the deal, Pauli.”
“I gave you the premises. I didn’t say nothing about your guest. I owe this one.”
“What for?”
“We used to have some deals going. Him and me. Must have paid him a couple of grand in backhanders. For turning a blind eye. Ain’t that right, Bertie boy?”
Wilson’s wide eyes said it all. Gambatti continued. “Set you up too, Danny.”
“What?”
“He heard you was looking for me. And after our little rendezvous here, he called me. I told him we’d had words. He asked me to arrange the meeting at the Angel for you. Depending what you knew, they were going to kill you.”
I thought of the man’s knife dropping from his dead hand. “You bastard!” I said to Pauli, but it covered both of them.
Pauli shrugged. “Business. Shit-head here was holding my cousin and good friend Alberto. He said he’d fix things with the judge.”
“Let me guess…”
