nothing.” Although Crau lay roughly to the north of the capital, the main railway station did not, as one might have expected, lie to the south of the town: because of unfavourable terrain the railway line curved round the city and entered from the north. Consequently, when the black limousine of uncertain vintage set out for the Winter Palace, it drove due south along what, downtown, developed into the main thoroughfare of the city. This north-south street was, confusingly enough, called West Street.
Bruno sat in the back seat and beside him was Dr Harper. Wrinfield, whose gloomy expression was indication enough that his dark forebodings about Crau were in the process of being confirmed, sat silently beside the driver. The weather was hardly calculated to lend a certain buoyance to the spirits: it was just after dawn, a bleak and bitter dawn with snow swirling down from the darkly lowering clouds. Some hundred yards from the siding Harper, who was sitting in the right-hand corner, rubbed the steamy window, peered out and up, then touched Bruno on the arm.
“Never seen anything like it. What on earth is that?”
“I can’t see from here.”
“On top of those buildings. Bushes, shrubs — good heavens, they’ve even got trees growing up there.”
“Roof gardens. Very common in central Europe. Living in a flat doesn’t have to mean that you can’t have your own little plot of land. Lots of them even have lawns.” Bruno rubbed his own window. The building to his left was as grim, bleak and forbidding as any he had ever seen. He counted the storeys: there were nine of them. He saw the windows, each one heavily barred. He observed the curving menace of the steel spikes that surrounded the roof, the watch-towers at the north and south corners: from that angle it was impossible to see what might be on the roofs of those towers but Bruno knew there would be searchlights and klaxons mounted there. He looked at Harper and lifted an eyebrow: the driver had smilingly shrugged when addressed in English, but the chances were high that he was one of Sergius’s men and Sergius would not have picked a non-English speaker for the job. Harper caught his glance and nodded, although the confirmation was really superfluous: the reality of Lubylan all too dismayingly matched Harper’s description of it. The prospect of trying to effect an entry into the fortress was as chilling as the dawn. Some quarter of a mile farther on they passed by a row of stationary black cars lining the right-hand pavement. At the front was a wreath-covered hearse: the hour was not early but the day was: the cortege, Bruno reflected must have quite some way to go. Across the pavement from the hearse was an establishment with draped black velvet curtains in the windows, those being the framing for what the proprietor obviously regarded as being his choicest selection of wreaths, artificial bouquets under glass domes and unengraved marble tombstones, all in black. The adjacent door was also of the same cheerful colour, relieved only by a white cross. Bruno caught a glimpse of the door opening and the foot of a coffin on the shoulders of the two leading bearers. “How very convenient,” Bruno murmured.
Dr Harper appeared not to have heard him.
The Winter Palace was the pride of Crau, and deservedly so. Deliberately baroque in construction, both inside and out, it was in fact only three years old. It was a reinforced steel and concrete structure, cladded both inside and out with white marble veneer from which, presumably, the name of the building arose. The building itself consisted of a very large, elliptical covered forecourt, which gave on to the much greater elliptical stadium beyond it. The interior could not have been in greater contrast to the spires, minarets and gargoyles which so liberally be- festooned the exterior: here all the latest ideas in spectacle presentation had been incorporated, so that everything was modern, almost excruciatingly so, functional and above all adaptable. The permutations of staging and seating, always to the best advantage of performers and audience, were practically limitless. It could be and was used for opera, theatre, cinema and music-hall: it was also used for the presentation of sporting spectacles ranging from ice-hockey to covered court tennis: for the setting for a circus amphitheatre it was nothing short of superb. In the last capacity, the sharply tiered seats, each one upholstered and with its own armrests, could accommodate no fewer than eighteen thousand spectators. It was, Wrinfield declared, the finest auditorium he had ever seen, no mean compliment coming from a man who had seen the best in North America and Europe, especially when it was borne in mind that the population of Crau totalled just under a quarter million.
The mass fingerprinting of the entire circus staff took place during the course of the forenoon in one of the many restaurants and bars — empty at that time of day — that lined the inner side of the forecourt. Resentment and indignation at what was pretty well regarded as cavalier and unnecessary treatment ran high, and it required much of Wrinfield’s considerable tact and powers of persuasion to ensure co-operation. Sergius, supervising by remote control from the comparative comfort of Wrinfield’s prefabricated office and armoured in his seemingly pachydermatous hide, remained totally unmoved by the sullenness of the circus employees, the numerous, far- from-affectionate glances that were cast in his direction. Towards the end of the fingerprinting he received a telephone message, but as he spoke in his own language neither Wrinfield nor Maria, who were present with him, could understand the burden of the conversation.
Sergius drained his glass of vodka — he had the same osmotic affinity for his national drink as parched sand has for water — and said: “Where is Bruno Wildermann?”
“He’s in the stadium. But — but you’re not seriously thinking of fingerprinting him? His own brothers —” “Please. I look so foolish? Come. It concerns you, too.” As the two men approached, Bruno turned away from the supervision of the rigging of a low wire across the centre ring. He looked without expression at Sergius and said: “You have word, Colonel?”
“Yes. Both from the railways and the Air Force. But I’m afraid both reports are negative. No trace of any person lying alongside the railway tracks.”
“So that has to make it kidnapping?”
“There would appear to be no other obvious solution.” Late that afternoon, when Bruno was rehearsing his solo act on the newly slung high trapeze, he was summoned to Wrin-field’s office. He slid to the ground, put on his mentalist’s mandarin cloak and went to the office, which, as seemed inevitable, was only feet from the as yet empty tigers’ cage. Wrinfield was at his desk, Maria at hers. Sergius and Kodes were standing. The atmosphere was halfway between the tense and the funereal.
Sergius took a piece of paper that Wrinfield was studying and handed it to Bruno. It held a printed message, in English, which said: “The Wildermann brothers will be returned alive on the receipt of 50,000 dollars. Used bills. Any denomination. Instructions for transfer on Sunday, delivery Monday. Failure to deliver will result in delivery of two left little fingers Monday. Same fingers delivered if notes received but found to be treated for identification by infra-red, ultra-violet or X-ray. Two fingers on Tuesday. On Thursday, two one-handed trapeze artistes.”
Bruno handed the note back to Sergius.
“Your suspicions were correct.”
“I was right. No nerves. No feelings. Yes, it would appear so.”
“They seem ruthless.”
“They are.”
“And professionals?”
“Yes.”
“Do they keep their promises?”
Sergius sighed. “Are you so naive as to try to trap me into something? You are about to say that I seem to know a lot about them. If they are who I think they are — and this has all the hallmarks of previous ransom demands — then they are an extremely able and efficient gang of kidnappers who have carried out a number of such kidnappings in the past few years.”
“You know the members of this gang?”
“We think we know one or two.”
“Then why are they still at large?”
“Suspicion, my dear Wildermann, is not proof. One cannot ask for the death penalty on suspicion.”
“I did ask an earlier question. About their promises. Will they carry out their mutilation threats? If the ransom is paid, will they return my brothers alive?”
“I can offer no guarantee. But, judging by past experiences, the chances are high. It’s only logical and good business for them, as specialists in kidnapping operations, to do so. Sounds ridiculous in this context, but it builds up good faith and good will. If a kidnapee is returned promptly and unharmed after the payment of the ransom, then the parents and relatives of the next victim will meet the demands at once, knowing the chances are good that the victim will be returned. But if kidnappers were to accept the ransom and then kill the victim, then the relatives of the next victim might conclude that the paying of a ransom was a waste of time.”
