‘No.’
‘Do anything bad to me?’
‘No.’
‘I won’t love you, if you do.’
‘Don’t say that: not that you don’t love me.’
‘Then don’t hurt me.’
Claudine listened, astonished, to Peter Blake, cutting him off before he finished. ‘Peter! They don’t know each other! That’s what Smet said: how they protect each other! If a lot of strangers are going in, your only problem is the gatehouse.’
And by then that had been minimized.
CHAPTER THIRTY
At last they moved from Namur to where the communication centre had been established, along the Gembloux road. Although the cars were obviously unmarked they still staged their arrival to avoid the appearance of a convoy to any participant on his way to the chateau.
Blake, Harding and Rampling were in the lead car, anxious to reach the electronics expert whose scanner had picked up the mobile conversation from the gatehouse to the chateau at the first arrival, the Citroen with the French registration.
It was an American technician, a fat, bearded man named Marion Burr who wore a check shirt and cowboy boots and emerged from the vehicle smoking a small cigar. A Europol technician flown in that morning from The Hague took over the scanner inside the truck. Another FBI man replaced McCulloch.
Burr’s accent was strongly Southern. ‘It’s a man, speaking French. Good job I come from good old Louisiana. We’ve counted fifteen through so far. He says different things at different times, with no reason why as far as I can see. Sometimes it’s “How does your garden grow?” Other times it’s “With silver bells and cockle shells.” And then there’s “pretty maids all in a row”, whatever the hell that all means.’
‘The rest of Felicite’s original nursery rhyme,’ identified Blake at once.
‘Jesus, what a sick, screwed-up bitch!’ said Harding.
Blake disagreed. ‘No. It means something. It’s us who’re screwed unless we work out what it is.’
‘Who responds to the man in the gatehouse, male or female?’
‘A man,’ said Burr. ‘Always a man.’
‘The same man?’ pressed the CIA chief.
Burr hesitated. ‘Yes.’
‘You’re sure? It’s important.’
‘Always the same man,’ insisted Burr.
‘And we got the first call, so it has to be Lascelles,’ said Harding. ‘Sneaky bastard hid his car away in a garage.’
‘Why are the phrases different?’ wondered Blake.
Burr shrugged. ‘No idea.’
‘What’s the response from the chateau?’ asked Blake. Behind him other cars began arriving. He moved to the side of the road to allow them to pass out of sight further along the tree-canopied track. Hillary McBride was in the last vehicle, with Ulieff and Sanglier.
‘Not much. “Thank you,” mostly. Sometimes just “I understand” or “That’s good.”’
Ulieff, Sanglier and Hillary came up to join them.
‘What’s happening?’ demanded Sanglier. Things were moving of their own volition and he knew he’d made the right decision about telephoning the chateau from Namur. It was important to go on giving the impression of still being in operational charge.
‘We don’t know,’ replied Rampling, honestly but unhelpfully. At once he said: ‘It’s some sort of identification. It’s got to be.’
‘You’re not making sense,’ said Sanglier.
Rampling shouldered his way past the man, towards the communications van close to which Burr and McCulloch stood. Inside, at McBride’s demand, McCulloch’s replacement increased the volume for the discussion to be relayed to Brussels.
‘Fifteen cars?’ he demanded.
‘Fifteen that made uncertain turns towards St Marc, as if they were strangers to the area looking for an unfamiliar address, and fifteen telephone intercepts,’ answered McCulloch, ahead of the other man with whom he’d shared the communication vehicle.
Blake smiled doubtfully. ‘And each time you logged the registration, French or Dutch?’
‘To trace the identity of the owners,’ agreed the Texan.
‘And additionally those you think carried children?’
‘Yes,’ replied the man, curiously. ‘Three, to my count.’
Blake switched to the scanner technician. ‘And you recorded each line of the nursery rhyme against each arrival?’
‘Yes.’
‘Let me see the sheets,’ demanded Blake. Around him everyone was quiet, no one understanding except Rampling. Blake didn’t have to go further than the first comparison. ‘The first car was a French-registered Citroen, possibly with a child.’ He looked at McCulloch. ‘There was a child.’ He went to Burr. ‘You didn’t tell us that sometimes there were two lines recited to the mansion. There’s two on that first message, but they’re not consecutive: between “How does your garden grow?” there’s a line missing before “And pretty maids all in a row.”’
‘What the hell are you talking about?’ demanded Hillary.
Blake continued comparing the two record sheets for several minutes before looking up. ‘“How does your garden grow?” identifies the French group. “With silver bells and cockle shells” is the Dutch identification. “Pretty maids all in a row” designates cars carrying a child.’ He offered the papers generally. ‘It’s all there. Felicite knows she hasn’t got anyone coming. Lascelles has a count of his people. So has whoever’s organized the French. If the count doesn’t tally, they’ve got trouble.’
‘Brussels wants to talk to you,’ called the liaison man from inside the van.
Blake put on the headphones to hear Claudine say: ‘You’re right! That’s how I read it!’
‘I know I’m right,’ said Blake.
‘Be careful. No kamikaze stuff.’
‘Speak to you later.’
He emerged to hear Harding, forgetting Hillary’s presence, say: ‘So how the fuck do we get past that barrier?’
Blake went back to the scanner record. ‘“Not much longer,”’ he read aloud.
‘That was the last reply from the chateau,’ said Burr.
‘They haven’t all arrived!’ declared Blake. He jerked hurriedly round to Ulieff and the local police chief. ‘We want cars, with French plates. They must be French because if Lascelles is talking to the gatehouse he’ll know how many of his own people to expect: they might all have already arrived. And Felicite hasn’t included any of hers.’ He gestured towards the main road. ‘Stop anyone. Persuade them, pay them, arrest them, whatever. Just get cars.’ He included Sanglier. ‘We can’t see the gatehouse from the road, which means the gatehouse can’t see the road. Any vehicle on that road from now on gets stopped and the occupants arrested. The party’s over for them.’
At Ulieff’s shooing gesture the local police chief moved off towards the main road, beckoning Namur officers to follow.
‘It’ll work,’ agreed Rampling. ‘There’s a lot of people ahead of us so there’ll be a lot of movement inside the house. And let’s not forget as we did in Namur that we’re all strangers. Once we’re out of the car the Dutch will think we’re French and the French will think we’re Dutch and Felicite will think we’re one or the other. It still won’t give us much time but we’ll be inside.’
