had disappeared inside the elevator he had palmed the pad and walked out. Back at the Hotel Reisen the careful scraping of a pencil had brought up the impression on the next sheet of the pad, showing clearly the words Skottvangs Gruva. Now the plan had worked. Cottel's watcher at Bromma had been bought, the information passed to Sholto, who had directed him in turn to pass the misinformation to Cottel, implying that Beaurain was Hugo.
After twenty minutes he drove away towards the mine. In due course he would swing round in a loop which would bring him back onto the E3. A cautious man, Sholto had no desire to encounter any survivors of the forest shooting on his way back to Stockholm — and then on to Trelleborg.
Chapter Twenty
The following morning it was a main item on the news. The mystery lay in the identity and — more precisely — the occupation of the two foreigners who had shot each other. Jules Beaurain had fired the first shot with a. 38 Smith amp; Wesson revolver, so the theory went. A Belgian, he had at one time been in the Brussels police and had risen to the rank of Chief Superintendent. This detail alone was enough to give the item major billing in a news editor's eyes.
The American, a visitor to Stockholm identified as Edward Cottel, had fired one shot at Beaurain from a. 765 Walther which, oddly enough, was the hand-gun carried by the police. There had been a second bullet from the Smith amp; Wesson found in Cottel's body and presumably Jules Beaurain had transported him from the scene of the shooting in a hired Renault.
The macabre location of the American's body was the bottom of a deep hole close to the mine. A wire railing which normally protected visitors from any risk of falling into the hole had been flattened, again presumably when Beaurain man-handled the body out of the car and into the pit.
The Belgian's own corpse had been found a short distance away, collapsed as he tried to reach the Renault. End of story. The detective interviewed had been very firm on this last point. 'The investigation is proceeding… no further information available at this stage.'
Harvey Sholto used a payphone on his way to Bromma Airport, dialled the Trelleborg number, and identified himself as soon as the familiar voice came on the line. 'It worked,' he said, hardly able to conceal his satisfaction. 'You've seen the news bulletins?'
'Several times. A classic case of the mirror image technique. You show a man what he's waiting to see and he reacts logically.'
'Except that the logic isn't there.'
'But has it ever been there since we started?' the voice enquired. 'I will see you in Trelleborg. The sea is most pleasantly calm.'
They watched them flying into the airstrip outside Trelleborg. Using the laundry van which had been Telescope's temporary and mobile headquarters in Stockholm, they sat in a concealed position behind a clump of trees. And they recorded in a notebook the identities of some of the most powerful and wealthy figures in the western world.
'That's Leo Gehn,' said Palme, staring through his binoculars from the front passenger seat. 'He's chairman of…'
'International Telecommunications and Electronics — I.T.E. for short,' Albert said crisply as he noted the details name, time of arrival, type of aircraft and whether guards accompanied the newcomers.
'He's brought someone with him as a passenger — Count Luigi d'Arlezzo, the husband of that poor woman who was strung up at the Grand.'
'Does he look very upset?' Albert enquired.
'He looks relaxed and relieved, the bastard. I suppose now his wife is conveniently out of the way he's playing at running his own banking empire. Hence Gehn taking an interest in someone he wouldn't normally give the time of day to bet you anything Gehn is making a play to take over the controlling interest.'
'Look at this one who's just arrived aboard a Cessna all by himself,' Palme said. Tunny thing is he's landed on a quite different part of the airstrip as though he isn't with the main party. Dr. Henri Goldschmidt of Bruges.'
A car was waiting for the coin dealer. It was only later that they learned Goldschmidt had been driven straight to a hotel, that he had stayed in Trelleborg after strolling round the harbour area as though interested to see who was attending the conference. He did not even stay at the hotel overnight; very late in the day he proceeded on to Copenhagen.
And on the sea-front at Trelleborg another Tele scope team was similarly checking the passengers arriving from the airstrip in a steady flow of limousines. The two-man team, sitting in a Peugeot equipped with a transceiver which kept them in direct touch with Henderson, were compiling their own record as the passengers transferred to waiting powerboats which immediately put to sea.
Henderson, who had returned from his second visit of the day to Firestorm, took a cab to within a hundred yards of the Savoy Hotel. There he paid off the vehicle, waited until he was sure he was not being followed, and walked the rest of the way to the hotel.
Room 12 was his destination. He had a brief word with the receptionist who phoned Room 12 and then informed Henderson that M. Chavet would be glad if he would go up immediately. The Scot ignored the lift and ran lightly up the stairs. He paused outside Room 12 and then rapped on the door with an irregular tattoo. The door opened almost at once.
'Come in, Jock,' said Beaurain. 'Louise and I thought you'd have news for us soon.'
'And this is Ed Cottel,' Beaurain said to Henderson, introducing the American. 'He's officially in Room 14, registered under the name Waldo Kramer. You can talk freely in front of him.'
The trio — Beaurain, Louise and Cottel listened in concentrated silence while Henderson reported on the intense activity at the airstrip and then on the water front. He handed Beaurain a list of names of all the people who had arrived for the Syndicate's summit conference. Cottel looked over Beaurain's shoulder, ran his eye down the list and whistled.
'God Almighty, there are men there I'd have sworn were completely above suspicion.'
'Which is what makes the Syndicate so dangerous,' Beaurain murmured.
There were two lists — the one recorded by Stig and Albert and the check list compiled by the two men sitting on the sea-front watching the VIPs transferring from their limousines to the power-boats.
It was the second list Beaurain was studying with a frown; where the watchers had been unable to identify someone and there were very few such cases they had written a brief description of the unknown arrivals. One description read, Two men. One dressed like an American with a straw hat. His companion carried a brief-case. With his thumb underlining the comment, he showed the sheet to Henderson.
'That has to be Gunther Baum and his companion, the one who carries the Luger in the brief-case until Baum is ready for it.'
'Gunther Baum?' Ed Cottel was interested. 'He's reputed to be one of the most professional assassins in the world. From East Germany but nothing to do with the Commie regime according to our information. Not something to be added to the asset side.'
'He's in charge of security aboard Kometa. I'm convinced of it.' Beaurain looked at Henderson. 'When you hit the hydrofoil don't underestimate Baum.'
'What are we going to do now we know where they're meeting?'
Henderson looked at Beaurain who opened a drawer in the dressing-table, took out a ship's chart and unrolled it on the double bed while Louise held the other end. 'This was obtained from a Polish member of Kometa's crew, a man who needs help to get his wife out of East Germany. Remember, Captain Buckminster has stood off Trelleborg for several days. During that time various gunners have been sent ashore in the guise of tourists and made it their business to frequent the waterfront bars. That is how the Pole was found. He is just the man we need secretly working on board that vessel he controls and watches over the radar de fences I'm not even giving you his name, Ed.'
'My question was, what are we going to do?' Cottel repeated.
