talking about when I read about the disaster in the world's press tomorrow.'
Beaurain thrust both hands into the pockets of his jacket, one of his characteristic stances when he was undergoing deep emotion. 'And I presume other people in high places were also phoned the same message?'
'I know they were. Before Miss Hamilton and yourself arrived at my office I had just completed making a number of discreet calls.'
'A white cabin-cruiser,' Beaurain began in a blank monotone, 'flying the Danish flag when last seen, moving at speed on a southerly course about a mile off the Danish shore in the direction of Copenhagen. We believe we saw Benny Horn aboard. It took off like a bat out of hell almost at the moment of the explosion.'
'So,' Marker replied, 'by now he will have been put ashore at any of a dozen landing-stages along the coast where a waiting car will have picked him up — unless he has crossed the Sound to Sweden once out of sight of Elsinore. Still, I will put out an alert. Excuse me a moment.'
Marker went over to his car parked nearby, took the microphone from inside and leant against the car while he radioed his report. The driver was staring at the crowds of people who had appeared from nowhere and were growing denser as they gazed seaward where futile rescue activity was going on.
'You think it was definitely Benny Horn?' Louise asked after a silence lasting several minutes.
'I think he was probably the instrument. Whether he was the prime mover is another question,' he told her abruptly and turned to Marker who had now returned. 'Bodel, when you arrived here you said you thought you had bad news as though you were going to tell us something else before the ferry was blown up,'
'It seemed horrific… before this.' Marker waved a resigned hand towards the debris out at sea as Beau-rain watched him closely. 'I told you I was going to have a word with the inspector who radioed that patrol-car to go to the ferry terminal by the railway station. I found I was just too late. There had been an accident.'
'What kind of accident?'
'He received a call purporting to come from his wife. After taking it he left the police station alone by car. They have just dragged the car out of the sea — the inspector was inside it. He was murdered. I know he was murdered because something has also happened to the two Danish railway men you asked me to keep out of circulation for three days. They never reached the police station.'
'What happened?' asked Louise. She felt her hair standing on end. Beaurain continued to study his old associate as the Dane went on with his story.
They were in the patrol-car with the policemen. On their way to the station they were flagged down by a man in front of a garage. A woman happened to be watching from about five hundred metres away — fortunately for her. The man who flagged down the car went inside the garage to fetch someone and then there was an almighty explosion. The car just disintegrated — rather like that…' Again the resigned hand made a gesture towards the sea.
In a deceptively detached tone, Beaurain said, 'They are killing everyone who has knowledge of the heroin. First the inspector they bought or intimidated. Then the two railway men both of whom must have known the approximate location of the suitcase. That is the Syndicate's method of protecting its investment. Effective, you must admit.'
'It's overkill.'
'Face it, Marker — the Syndicate runs one of the most efficient killing machines known in history — and each death is exploited to terrorise the maximum number of people who can be of service to the Syndicate in the future. Someone has thought up a foolproof system. Louise and I must go now,' he ended coldly.
'I will give you a lift to the railway station.'
During the journey Beaurain only spoke once, seated in the back of the car with Louise. She was looking out to sea when he asked for a cigarette: bits of bodies were beginning to float through the harbour entrance and he didn't want her subjected to any more harrowing experiences. During the ride to the railway station Marker relapsed into a sombre silence, staring through the windscreen without seeing anything. Beaurain was relieved when the Dane told his driver to drop them a distance from the station and wait for him. The three of them walked slowly towards where it had all started — the exit from Elsinore railway station.
It's such an attractive town,' Louise said. 'All the houses old but freshly painted…'
She ended in mid-sentence and Beaurain gave her elbow a reassuring hug. She had been going to add something like, 'for such a ghastly horror to be perpetrated here,' Beaurain noticed that both his companions studiously avoided looking to their left over the harbour to the sea beyond. There was also an unnaturally quiet atmosphere among the people walking about who were staring seaward. Probably a number of them were in the habit of crossing over to Sweden from time to time. Using the car-ferries.
'While at the police station I asked about the enquiries I made about Dr. Benny Horn,' Marker said in a dull voice. 'About his background and history, what he was like when he lived here in Elsinore. I must say they had responded to my request quickly. And they had showed around the photo I had taken of Horn in Copenhagen — I sent that out by despatch rider before I left the city.'
'And what did you find?'
'A few people who knew him when he lived here recognised the photo, others didn't.'
'What proportion?' There was an eager alertness in Beaurain's voice and manner.
'Fifty-fifty. The normal proportion,' Marker replied in the same dull tone. He was, Louise realised, still in a state of semi-shock, overwhelmed by the power and ruthlessness of the Stockholm Syndicate. 'Horn lived the same sort of hermit-like existence in Elsinore that he does in Copenhagen,' Marker continued. 'He was unmarried, had no relatives and spent a lot of time away from the place travelling presumably to sell and buy rare editions,'
'How long had he lived in Elsinore?' Beaurain persisted.
'About twenty years. And he had his place a short distance outside the town in a very quiet area. That's all I could find out.' He stopped suddenly on the sidewalk and turned to Beaurain, his brow crinkled in perplexity and frustration. 'It doesn't make sense at all, does it?' he burst out.
'No, it doesn't.'
'What doesn't? Am I being dim?' Louise enquired.
'No,' Beaurain replied, 'but I think Bodel means this. For at least twenty years we have a man leading an apparently respectable and sober existence. All right, he keeps himself to himself, a bit like Silas Marner. Then this same man moves to Copenhagen — when would you say, Bodel?'
'About two years ago.'
'He moves to Copenhagen two years ago,' Beaurain went on, 'and what happens — almost overnight? He becomes one of the three men we think control the Stockholm Syndicate,'
'I see what you mean,' Louise said slowly. 'No, it doesn't make any sense.'
They had reached the concourse in front of the station where they had left the 280E parked, and Marker forced himself to speak with false exuberance. 'Well, what are you going to do now, Jules? Is there any way in which I can help you?'
'Drive back to Copenhagen after we've had lunch and think things over a bit. Thanks for your help and I know where to find you. I suppose you'll be staying on here for a while,'
Beaurain nodded in the direction of where a fleet of rescue and police craft were beyond the harbour poking around among the rapidly dispersing wreckage. Marker said yes, he would be staying on in Elsinore, shook them both solemnly by the hand and walked away slowly back to where his car was waiting.
'What are we actually going to do?' Louise asked. 'I know you didn't tell Marker the truth. And where are Henderson and his team of gunners?'
'Back on board Firestorm by now. I told him to leave once we had seen the ferry carrying the heroin depart. And Captain Buckminster has fresh instructions — to sail through the Oresund and wait at anchorage off Copenhagen. As for us, you are right, of course. I wasn't at all frank with Marker and not because I don't trust him. But suppose the Syndicate did locate where he has hidden his family. How long do you think he would resist their pressure for information?'
'How long could you expect him to?' Louise shuddered and compelled herself to look out to sea where the flock of boats was milling round aimlessly. One large launch was trawling over the side what looked to Louise like a shallow net. 'What is that thing, Jules? The boat with a loud-hailer keeping other craft away?'
'That will be Forensic. They will be gathering specimens of the debris for later analysis in the laboratory.
