‘Partially. And what about Anna here?’
Pol turned to her, with his beatific smile. ‘Mademoiselle is an invaluable asset. She is a professional researcher — she knows how to dig for facts, the right facts. What is more important, she will know how to connect those facts, to bring them alive.
‘Besides, in difficult situations a pretty girl can be very useful. You see, I propose that you both play two roles. You can be investigating journalists one day, a happy young couple on holiday the next. Voilà! — those are two things I certainly cannot do.
‘Now this is what I propose. I am a generous man and I have assets. Besides your travelling expenses, it is probable that during your investigations you will interview people who will demand to be paid. Some of these people may cost a lot of money. I will provide that money. I shall not expect you to repay it, but I do make one condition. I expect you to follow my instructions without question. I shall tell you what you need to know, but no more. Is that agreeable to you?’
Hawn took his time answering. He was thinking about Anna — knowing that she would go along with him, would insist on going along with him — yet he had a sudden protective instinct towards her. ‘What are the risks likely to be?’
‘That is impossible to say. They are likely to be commensurate with our success. ABCO is an organization which knows how to protect itself, and its methods are not always conventional. Like most international companies, it operates above the law and beyond the law. There will be risks. But you have taken risks before. Nothing is won in life without risks.’
Hawn now described his meeting with Don Robak that morning. Pol did not look pleased. ‘Mon chèr, if you will permit me to say so, for a journalist that was a most indiscreet thing to do. You were virtually advertising to the enemy.’
‘I wasn’t taking the theory seriously — until now. I just wanted to see what Robak’s reaction would be.’
‘You say he mentioned a number of possible ways in which the Germans might have got oil from the West?’
‘Very possible ways. I think he was testing me. Then he began to turn nasty, without being actually threatening. He told me to keep my mouth shut, or get the facts.’
‘The facts. And when you do get the facts, Robak and his friends will be watching you. Be careful, Monsieur Hawn. Both of you. Above all, be discreet. You will not be playing with fire — you will be playing with vipers. One moment they will be coiled up asleep, the next…’ He sat back and patted his belly, which oozed over the edge of the table. ‘What is the name and address of your bank? I will have ten thousand dollars deposited there immediately. You will receive more when you need it.’ He handed Hawn an embossed card with his name, and that of an obscure bank in Annecy.
They parted five minutes later, with Pol giving them both a sweaty kiss on each cheek. He had made no arrangements to see them again, but promised to contact them at their flat in London. If they wanted to contact him they could do so through a PO number in Annecy.
As Hawn and Anna walked back through the heavy night, Anna said, ‘So — what do you think? It’s all so fantastic I can’t take it in.’
‘So fantastic that it has to be true.’
‘What about the difficulties?’
‘We haven’t come up against any — yet. Not ourselves, anyway. Remember what Churchill said — “Do not argue the difficulties, they will argue for themselves.”’
‘But what about your dead prince?’
‘Well he’s dead.’
They walked on, listening to the thick green water slapping against the slimy wall of the canal.
CHAPTER 5
It was the second day after they had returned to England. Hawn said, ‘I’m going to go in at the deep end, Anna — or as deep as I can, at this stage. Man called Shanklin — Toby Shanklin. That wretched Prince mentioned him. Ever heard of the man?’
‘I think I know the name. Something big in oil, isn’t he?’
‘He used to be, though he must be getting on a bit now. I’ve checked back on him. Spends most of his time on the Mayfair circuit — champion backgammon player, member of all the in-clubs, including Boodle’s and the Athenaeum when he wants to be respectable. He’s a bit of a rogue elephant. You can look up most of his past in Who’s Who, but not all of it. Nobody seems to know anything about his origins, although his lifestyle implies that he’s well connected. He joined ABCO before the war, as a junior executive. Then in 1940 he turned up in Cairo as one of the hush-hush boys in SOE — Special Operations Executive — Section Z which specialized in the Balkans. Turkey, Bulgaria, then Yugoslavia, where he got wounded, and picked up an MC on the way.’
‘Is this all in Who’s Who?’
‘No. But we’ve got a file on him at the paper. Not everything, but enough. Enough to convince me that Shanklin’s not just an ageing Berkeley Square playboy.
‘Anyway, he was invalided out of SOE in 1943 — at least, officially — and rejoined ABCO, who sent him to Venezuela where his job seems to have been keeping an eye on the Americans and seeing they didn’t muscle in on too much of our share of the action. But as an old Intelligence man
