'What's it say?' said Glodstone, almost killing a pedestrian on a zebra crossing in his anxiety to get away.
'Nothing much. Just that the French government have assured the State Department that the killers of Professor Botwyk will be caught and brought to justice. The Russians appear to be taking a dim view too. Apparently your boyfriend shot their delegate as well, which must confuse the issue more than somewhat.'
'Oh my God,' said Glodstone and turned down a side street and stopped. 'What on earth possessed you to write those bloody letters?'
'Keep moving. I'll tell you when to stop.'
'Yes, but...'
'No buts. You do what I say or I'm cutting loose and calling the first cop I spot and you and Master C-B will be facing an extradition order inside a week. Turn right here. There's a parking lot round the corner.'
Glodstone pulled in and switched off and looked at her haggardly.
'Firstly I didn't write those letters,' said the Countess, 'and I want to see them. Where did you stash them?'
'Stash them? I didn't. You told me to burn them and that's what I did.'
The Countess breathed a sigh of relief. But she wasn't showing it. 'So you've no proof they ever existed?'
Glodstone shook his head. He was almost too tired and frightened to speak.
'Well, get this straight. You can think what you like but if you seriously imagine I needed rescuing you've got to be insane. Right now, you're the one in need of a rescue operation and with what you've got between the ears that's not going to be easy. Every cop in Europe is going to be hot on your trail before the day is out.'
Glodstone dragged his mind out of its stupor. 'But no one knows we were at the Chateau and...'
'Whoever wrote those letters does, doesn't he just. You've been set up, and a little anonymous call to the police is all it's going to take to have you in the net. You haven't a plastic bag's hope in hell of getting away. One glass eye, this old banger and a youth with an IQ of fifty. You were made for identification and if you ask me that's why you were chosen.'
Glodstone gazed at a bowling green and saw only policemen, court rooms, lawyers and judges and the rest of his life in a French prison. 'What do you suggest we do?' he asked.
'You do. Count me out. I don't mind thinking for you but that's as far as it goes. First off, I'd say your best bet is to do a Lord Lucan but I don't suppose you've got the money or the friends. And anyway that still leaves that juvenile mobster on the loose. What's his background?' Glodstone told her.
'Then one eminent solicitor is in for a very nasty shock,' said the Countess when he'd finished, 'though from what I've seen of his offspring I'd say he'd been cuckolded or his wife had a craving for lumps of lead when she was pregnant. Doesn't make your situation any cosier. Mr Clyde-Browne's going to have his son plead insanity and hurl the book at you.'
'What on earth can I do then?' whimpered Glodstone.
The Countess hesitated. If she suggested going to the police he might just do it and she wasn't having that. 'Isn't there any place you can hang out for a few days and nobody ever comes?'
Glodstone tried to concentrate. 'I've got a cousin near Malvern,' he said, 'She may be away and anyway she'd put us up.'
'Until the police came. Think, for Chrissake. Think where you wouldn't go.'
'Margate,' said Glodstone suddenly, 'I wouldn't be seen dead there.'
'Then that's where you'll go,' said the Countess, with the private thought that he probably
