Hawn was at first too confused to react. In any case, he knew it would be futile to seek an explanation — even if the two policemen spoke enough English, which he now doubted.
They drove for perhaps another ten miles, when the headlamps picked out the rear reflectors of a stationary car, parked in a layby a few hundred yards ahead. The driver slowed down again, but this time he flashed his lights three times, on high beam.
Hawn was sitting very straight, beginning to sweat, despite the cold damp slip-stream flowing through the car. He felt Anna reach for a handkerchief and wipe her eyes. The driver was pulling into the layby behind the other car. Hawn could just make out, under the dipped headlights, a wide dark-coloured American sedan, with what looked like smoked windows. It had a Geneva number plate.
The driver switched off the engine, and there was a moment of total silence. Then the door on the driver’s side of the sedan opened. A man got out and came walking towards them. He was a big man, oddly, hilariously familiar: a man in an astrakhan hat and knee-high boots. Only this time he was sober.
When he had almost reached them, the policeman in the back opened the door and got out; and in the dead stillness Hawn heard them murmuring to each other. Then the man in the astrakhan hat leant down and said, in heavily accented French, ‘You will both accompany me.’ There was no trace of recognition in his voice or face, let alone a flicker of humour.
Hawn climbed out and helped Anna, who was still suffering from shock and pain. Outside, the man in the astrakhan hat nodded towards the American car. As Hawn passed the driver who had brought them from Istanbul, he tried to catch his eye: but the man sat rigid behind the wheel, the window closed, the blue stain showing livid under the headlamps, covering his grey-cropped hair and narrow military face like a monstrous birthmark. His eyes stared ahead. Almost a scholarly face, Hawn thought.
Together the three of them began to walk towards the sedan. The air, after the lingering fumes of ammonia, was fresh and cold and smelt of eucalyptus.
The man reached the car, opened the rear door and gestured them to get in. Anna entered first, with Hawn close behind. It was very warm inside with a cloying stench of perfume. Then, from an enormous shape in the corner, came a peal of girlish laughter.
‘Welcome, my friends! I hope you did not have too bad a journey?’
Pol was plunged in a vicuna coat, holding a hip flask which he offered them both. He was in good spirits. ‘No doubt you both require an explanation?’ he said cheerfully.
Hawn was trying to think of an appropriate reply when Anna said, ‘I want to go to the lavatory.’ Together they waited while she got out and walked away under the eucalyptus trees. Hawn turned on Pol. ‘They beat her up — you know that? Your gorillas — your hand-chosen help. Is that their idea of a bonus — beating up a girl? Or is that what you call looking after us? Unique protection, a la Charles Pol.’
‘Mon chèr,’ the fat man laid a hand on Hawn’s shoulder; ‘do not be unreasonable. You undertook these inquiries of your own free will. You were warned that there would be risks, dangers, and you have encountered both. You cannot now turn and blame me. What have I done? I have snatched you from the scene of a very ugly murder in which you might well have been implicated. And what chance do you think you would have stood with them? How do you think they would have received your little story — or rather, your many stories? You should thank me, my friend.’ And again he offered Hawn the hip flask, while the man in the astrakhan hat climbed into the driving seat.
Hawn drank deeply; it was brandy and tasted like the best. ‘We’re not out of it yet, you know. We’re still in Turkey.’
‘The frontier is less than an hour away. Before dawn we will be in Salonika. There your problems will be over.’
Hawn remembered that he still had his passport, from his visit to the American Express that afternoon; but he wasn’t so sure about Anna. He had the impression that she hadn’t collected her passport since leaving it at the hotel desk on that first morning, five days ago. He waited anxiously, peering out under the dark trees: through the smoked glass it was like looking into an unlit fish tank. He did not see her until she had opened the door: her movements were stiff, as though suffering from cramp. He waited until she had tucked herself in beside him, then said, ‘Have you got your passport?’
‘It’s back at the hotel.’
Pol answered, his voice soft and soothing through the warm dark car: ‘Do not concern yourselves. Everything has been arranged.’
‘What about the hotel — and our luggage?’
‘That, too, is taken care of.’ He patted Hawn’s arm. ‘You must trust me.’ Then he gave what sounded like an order, in a heavy patois which Hawn did not understand. The headlamps flared on, the engine started with a powerful hum, as the car drew out into the road. Pol relaxed, and rubbed his fat little hands together. ‘Our chauffeur is Monsieur Serge Rassini. I believe you have both already made his acquaintance? He is a native of Corsica, but has the advantage of looking
