'I quoted too much. Seven or eight would be most acceptable.'
'A deal is a deal,' Tweed insisted, writing in the orig inally agreed amount.
Howard picked up the photos of both women as they had been in life. He sighed.
'I'd like to have taken either lady to dinner…' He gulped. 'God! That was in the worst taste. I do apolo gize. I'm off back to my office.' He held out his large pink hand.
'Mr Humble, I've seen the work of experts in other fields but words fail me to express my admiration for your quite unique skill.'
He hurried from the office, still embarrassed by his remark. Hector swallowed the rest of the coffee Monica had brought him, stood up, the cheque in his wallet. He grasped hold of Paula, kissed her on both cheeks.
'You're such a nice lady,' he murmured, blushing.
He darted out of the room before Paula could decide how to react. Tweed was sorting the photos into pairs, each pair comprising one photo of each murdered woman. He instructed Paula as the others returned to their desks.
'Every member of the team must have a copy.' He raised his voice. 'But everyone must be discriminating as to who sees them. Under no circumstances are you to reveal both women were murdered. It's identification of the victims that is holding up the investigation.'
'So not in the newspapers,' Newman suggested.
'Last place on earth,' Tweed replied emphatically.
'Well,' Newman insisted, 'this morning's Clarion has a big splash headline. It's my top newspaper friend, of course, Drew Franklin. Show him, Paula.'
TWO UNIDENTIFIED SOCIETY
Tweed looked up at Paula, who had spread the front page across his desk. Lower down on the same page something had been cut out. Tweed didn't waste time reading Franklin's lurid prose as he asked his ques tion.
'Among the few people who knew about this crime, who would be your choice for the informant who accepted a bundle of cash to call Franklin – probably from a public phone box?'
'Roadblock,' she said promptly. 'Chief Inspector Reedbeck.'
'My choice too, although we'd never prove it. And something was cut out lower down. What was it?'
'Archie MacBlade is back in town after weeks abroad.'
'I've just about heard the name.'
'MacBlade is just about the most successful oil prospector on the planet,' Newman broke in. 'Back from Brunei, the oil-rich nation in the Far East. Controlled by the Sultan, perhaps the richest man in the world. MacBlade prospected in the jungle, brought up the most gigantic gusher ever seen there. The Sultan is probably three times richer than he was before.'
'I only cut this out because I was impressed by the picture of him. Struck me as a man of exceptional character.'
Tweed glanced at the cutting she'd pushed in front of him. He agreed with her estimate. The photograph was of a man with shaggy hair, piercing eyes under bushy brows, a Roman nose, a shaggy moustache and a wide mouth, below that a strong jaw. He had a pleasant smile. Tweed nodded, pushed the cutting back to her.
'I agree,' he said in a bored voice, 'but it's nothing to do with our present problem…'
The phone rang. Monica picked it up, listened, looked excited as she pointed to Tweed's phone.
'You might want to take this call. It's Harry.'
'Great to hear from you,' Tweed began. 'Where the devil are you? Hobartshire? Could you repeat that?'
Paula had already returned to her desk with her cut ting. She hauled out a map from a desk drawer, waited.
It was a long conversation. Most of the time Tweed was scribbling data on a pad. Occasionally he said, 'Are you sure?' then he went on scribbling. Finally he asked, 'If Paula and I left now could we get there by lunchtime?'
'Yes, we could,' Paula called out.
'Did you say Gunners Gorge? Funny name,' Tweed commented.
'Got it,' Paula called out again. 'Small town on the River Lyne.'
'Can anyone hear this?' Tweed asked. 'Oh, you're on your mobile in a field. Sounds secure enough. If that's all, Paula and I will be starting out in five min utes. You've done well, Harry. Exceptionally well. See you…'
Tweed replaced the phone. His expression con cealed the relief, the excitement he was feeling. He looked round the room at the members of his team.
'I sense this is the breakthrough we've been patiently waiting for. Patiently? Didn't apply to me. I apologize to all of you for my flashes of temper yesterday. Now,
Harry. He has tracked Falkirk to – of all places – Hobartshire. To what he called the weirdest of small towns – Gunners Gorge. He's booking suites for Paula and me at a good hotel, the Nag's Head. All the data is on this pad, which I'll leave with Monica. If I need reinforcements, you all have Paula's mobile number. Use that if something happens down there…'
As he was finishing speaking he jumped up, put on his camel-hair coat. Paula had already picked up two suitcases kept for emergency departures, one for her self, one for Tweed. She was striding to the door when Tweed relieved her of his own case and Pete Nield spoke.
'You don't know what you're walking into. I sug gest you travel in the second Audi parked at the back. The one with armourplate on the body and armoured glass in the windows. Harry has souped up the engine.'
'Good thinking. I agree,' Tweed replied.
'I'll come down the back way with you – I've got the keys,' Pete added.
'Then,' Paula remarked, 'with the Audi the wrong people associate with us left parked out at the front they'll think we're still here.'
'More good thinking,' Tweed agreed.
Paula took the wheel, saying she knew the route. After crawling through the dense traffic of London, she drove faster through the suburbs, then accelerated as they reached the countryside. They were on a wide country road and Paula sighed with pleasure.
'Oh, this is wonderful. Away from the stench of petrol, the noise, young girls with mobiles pressed to their ears who walk into you, the pointless rush and bustle.'
'And the scenery,' Tweed added.
On either side were hedges in leaf, their twigs festooned with bright yellow honeysuckle. Through the gaps they saw endless slopes of green grass, copses of trees perched on isolated hillocks.
Above them the sun blazed down out of a clear duck-egg-blue sky. A large passenger plane had flown to a great height, was still climbing. Tweed pointed towards it as it changed direction, heading west.
'Look at what they're leaving behind, an earthly paradise.'
'Could be heading for the Bahamas,' Paula sug gested. 'Those yacht basins crammed with private boats, the narrow streets choked with shoppers. No, thank you…'
As they kept heading roughly north-eastward Paula occasionally used a motorway. Overtaking, overtaking, overtaking. Back into the slow lane, then up a slip road, leaving the torrent of huge trucks and fast cars behind. Back into countryside.
'Where is Hobartshire?' Tweed enquired.
'Middle of nowhere. Least populated county. Not one city – inhabited by people with large estates who hunt for exercise.'
'Sounds like large parts of Britain used to be.' 'I gathered from a girl friend once it's just that.' The scenery changed as they crossed from one county to the next. They passed an area of massive white rocks; here and there men with machines worked quarries. Then the road took them into a forest so dense and dark it blotted out the sun. Emerging from the forest, fertile and gently rolling grass-covered hills lay on either side. Tweed checked the
