to their destination. He manoeuvred his car back down the track on to the road leading to Bridport. He rammed his foot down to catch them up.
A few minutes later a patrol car came towards him. Heavens, they had reacted. Then he saw the car was flashing its lights, waving him down. He had reduced speed when he'd seen it was a patrol car and now he stopped. The patrol car swung over to the wrong side of the deserted road, parked its front bumper inches from Marler's. A very young policeman got out, arrived as he lowered his window. Marler sat very still.
'Pushin' it a bit, weren't we, sir?'
'It isn't a built-up area.'
A second, equally young policeman arrived, a portly man who had the look of a man conscious of his importance. He was holding something, bent down to peer in at Marler.
'I'd like you to switch off your engine.'
Marler did so. Then he sat with his arms folded and tried to look expressionless.
'Been drinkin', 'ave we, sir?'
'Yes, this. And only this.'
Marler reached down for the bottle of mineral water. He held it up for the portly policeman to get a good look.
'Would you object to being breathalysed? The alternative is to accompany us to the station.'
Marler took a deep breath, reached out, took the nozzle. He blew into it with all his strength. Portly took out the breathalyser, studied it. The meter registered nothing.
'Thank you, sir. You can proceed now, when we've moved our car.'
'May I suggest,' Marler said politely, 'that you get in touch urgently with your Dorchester HQ?'
'Good night, sir…'
It was 3 a.m. when Marler arrived back at Park Crescent. He wondered where the time had gone. He was also surprised to find everyone waiting for him in Tweed's office. Paula, Newman, Butler, Nield and Mark were drinking coffee. Marler accepted a cup gratefully from Monica.
'You've done a good job,' Tweed began. 'Thank you for calling me on your way back. You must have found the police down there frustrating.'
'I could have strangled them.'
'Don't worry. As soon as you went off the line I phoned Roy Buchanan at the Yard, passed to him all your information. He's phoning the Chief Constable down there – has done – and called me back. They've sent up a helicopter to comb the area you mentioned in search of those two buses.'
'Doubt if they'll find them. From Bridport there are three or four different routes they could have taken.'
'I agree. If you can stand it I'll tell you what's been happening up here while you were down there…'
Marler listened, adopting his usual stance of leaning against a wall. After he'd drunk his coffee he lit a king- size.
'This is developing into an international conflagration. All over Europe and now it's started in the States.'
'We watched a bit on TV,' Monica interjected. 'The pics were frightful and Washington thinks there are other cities targeted. They're trying to guess which ones.'
'I have Keith Kent coming in any moment,' Tweed told her. 'You remember Keith, the brilliant analyst of movements of large sums of money, often secretly. It occurred to me all this is being financed by a fortune, a huge one. Thugs like to be paid for their dirty work. Never mind the slogans 'Down With Capitalism'. Then there's the transport to move them over long distances. What Marler has told us shows that is going on. So who is paying out these vast sums? And why?'
The phone rang. Monica told Tweed that Keith Kent had arrived and he asked her to tell him to come up right away.
'Poor devil,' commented Mark. 'It's the middle of the night.'
'He's an owl,' Tweed said. 'Works best through the early hours.. .'
Keith Kent walked in. Of medium height, he was slim and clad in an expensive business suit. In his late thirties, he was clean-shaven, had thick dark hair and grey eyes which concentrated on the person he was talking to. Tweed introduced him to Mark, then asked him who could be financing the carnage.
'My best bet,' Kent replied, sitting down, crossing his legs, 'is the Zurcher Kredit Bank.'
'What?' Tweed was taken aback. 'It's a Swiss bank.' 'Used to be. Thank you, Monica,' he said as she handedhim a cup of coffee. 'I'll need this. I happen to have spent a lot of time scrutinizing that bank. I have a strange story to tell you.'
Going back to the late 1790s, Mayer Amschel Rothschild was establishing the banking business, which was to grow into a colossus, in the Frankfurt Judengasse.
The Judengasse was the ghetto Jews were confined to and operated from. Enter Salomon Frankenheim, in his teens. Not a Jew, he had studied the Jewish faith, their rituals, their way of life. He then applied to Mayer for a job. Mayer put him through his paces, realized Frankenheim was a mathematical genius, took him on.
Frankenheim learned every trick of the Rothschild technique of trading. He was not thirty when he left Rothschild, slipped out of the Judengasse, formed what was to become the Frankenheim Dynasty in Paris.
Time passed. Frankenheim married, produced three sons. After their father's death they were running Frankenheim banks in Paris, Vienna and Rome, all of which were prospering.
More time passed until after several generations 1925 arrived. All the Frankenheims were long-lived but by then the head of the dynasty, Joseph, had no sons. Who was to take over, this highly successful, all-powerful and very secretive organization?
After so many generations history repeated itself. Joseph adopted a son, name and origin unrecorded, who proved later to be a mathematical genius like the founder, Salomon. When he was old enough to take control, still a young man, he followed the policies that had made the Frankenheims so rich.
Then, recently, he obtained control of the Zurcher Kredit Bank and changed the name from Frankenheim. What had been for so long the Frankenheim Dynasty now became the Zurcher Kredit. The present head was only known to a few – as Rhinoceros.
'That was a lot for you to absorb,' Keith Kent commented and gratefully accepted another cup of coffee from Monica.
'Why 'Rhinoceros'?' Tweed asked.
'Because one of the earlier Frankenheims liked going on safari in Africa. On one trip he shot a rhinoceros. The symbol of the Frankenheim banks then became the head of a rhinoceros, with an engraved plate of the animal outside every branch of the bank.'
'I don't understand this,' Tweed objected. 'How could he possibly take over a Swiss bank? The Swiss make a point that none of their banks can be controlled by anyone except a Swiss.'
'Rhinoceros was clever. He persuaded the Zurcher Kredit directors to invest larger and larger sums in valuable property outside Switzerland. They did not realize he was using his own lawyers – to put the properties secretly in companies he controlled – outside Switzerland. When he had eighty per cent of the capital he began selling the properties – at a profit, being Rhinoceros -and then he re-formed the Zurcher Kredit to replace his Frankenheim banks. In Hamburg, in Paris, Vienna, Rome, Berlin and also Brussels. He has branches in other major cities.'
'How did the Swiss react?' Tweed wondered.
'Rhinoceros treated the original Zurcher Kredit directors very generously. Made them all millionaires. Result? The directors used the remaining twenty per cent still in their bank to buy more properties abroad, properties which Rhinoceros suggested. This kept them inside Swiss banking law. In due course these remaining properties were sold and the proceeds absorbed by Zurcher Kredit, now totally controlled by Rhinoceros.'
'I find this intriguing,' commented Tweed. 'What I would like to know is who is Rhinoceros, where does he live, what is his nationality?'
'I don't know and I can't find out.'
The phone rang. Monica looked surprised as she indicated the call was for Tweed.
'It's a Mr Rondel.'
'Tweed here. I don't think I know you…'
'You don't. Not yet.' The voice was warm, buoyant. 'Is this a safe phone?'
