She had managed to talk to two professors at the School who both knew something about wartime economy, and after sparring around for a bit, she had asked them direct how they thought the Nazis had got their oil. Both men were evasive: it was obviously a subject to which they had never applied their full academic skills, and they were forced to improvise. They trotted out the same answers as Logan, Robak and Shanklin: reserves built up before the war; captured supplies in Occupied Europe; natural sources in Russia and Rumania; synthetic fuel.
‘Tom, I’m going to take each one of those factors and destroy it, systematically, rationally, by means of hard facts and statistics — and not just random ones, but ones that check and doublecheck.’
Hawn then described to her his own day’s findings.
He felt reasonably satisfied. He already had a number of plausible leads. Toby Shanklin — wartime secret agent and ABCO executive in the Caribbean; de Vere Frisby, ditto secret agent, killed in mysterious circumstances (relevant file missing) by Shanklin and German double-agent, Rice. Furthermore, both Shanklin and Frisby had spent periods of the war in Istanbul and Vera Cruz — both highly sensitive and strategic seaports, one commanding the Eastern Mediterranean, the other the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic.
Anna put the dinner on, then afterwards began working through a complex table of oil consumption statistics for Western Europe in 1939.
CHAPTER 8
When Hawn had first arrived in Fleet Street, the Economics Correspondent had been an elderly colonel who had spent the Second World War in an obscure Whitehall ministry called MI14, which dealt with Economic Warfare. He was a quiet Scotsman named MacIntyre: and on one occasion early in Hawn’s career the old man had gently corrected a serious error in his copy — a slip which would probably have led to the sack.
After that MacIntyre assumed an almost paternal role, and gave him innumerable pieces of advice, as well as much practical information. Hawn had never been adept at economics, and whenever one of his stories touched on this bleak subject, it was to Colonel Angus MacIntyre that he turned.
The man had retired from the paper three years ago; and after a brief correspondence, Hawn lost touch with him. The last he heard was that MacIntyre had gone to earth in a small riverside house in Teddington; he was widowed, childless, and probably bored. Hawn knew that the old man was also loyal and decent; and he felt sure that if he approached him tactfully, and put his thesis to him as cogently as possible, MacIntyre would at least listen with sympathy. Above all, Hawn knew that he could trust him.
He found the man’s number in the book. The familiar Scots voice answered: ‘Tommy, my lad! So what are you doing wi’ yourself?’
‘I’d like to come and see you, Mac. To discuss a few things with you. Draw on your wisdom.’
‘Any time, laddie. When can I expect you?’
‘Would this afternoon be too soon?’
‘Never too soon. You know Teddington? Fielding’s Lane, and I’m second on the right after the post office — last house.’
‘I’ll be seeing you, Mac.’
Hawn left his flat shortly after lunch, driving through a thin rain. After Shepherd’s Bush, he cut south towards Hammersmith and the river. He was a swift driver, but an observant one. His ancient Citroën was fitted with both side and wing mirrors, so that it was difficult for any speed-hog to creep up on his inside without being seen.
It was just beyond the scramble after the Hammersmith roundabout, as he was turning under the legs of the flyover, that he first suspected that he was being followed. It was a grey Ford Escort which had been behind him now since before Shepherd’s Bush. Just the driver, and the usual radio aerial.
Hawn put on speed over Hammersmith Bridge, then opened up fast once he reached Barnes Common. The Ford had kept its distance at first, and now began to drop back. Hawn shot the lights on amber at Roehampton Lane, and on the long stretch to Richmond he knew that the Ford had lost him. But he had taken the precaution of scribbling the car’s number down on the back of his A to Z.
Five minutes later, in the snarled one-way system at Richmond, he spotted a second Ford — a white one this time, again only the driver, and an ordinary aerial. It stayed three cars behind, manoeuvring skilfully.
Hawn’s training as a journalist had taught him most of the tricks of following cars, and of being followed. Usually it had been tailing film stars and top celebrities to and from London Airport, and if necessary, shaking off the opposition. The techniques he had learnt had never been very subtle. You just kept the car behind in sight, then pulled up as close as you could when it looked as though some lights were going to change.
But this time he had a feeling that things were different.
At the turning to Richmond Bridge he slowed down, noting that the white Ford did the same. Most of the traffic had filtered right, and Hawn was now on the narrow winding road along the river. The Ford was directly behind him, but had been able to drop back. There was little room for overtaking here. He came up behind a heavy lorry, and slowed still further. This time the car behind closed in enough for him again to note its number.
Then a couple of miles on, just before the main road to Teddington and Kingston, the Ford disappeared. Hawn felt almost a sense of anti-climax. He had passed the sign to Teddington, and was reaching for his map to find Fielding’s Lane, when he saw a third
