Her French was halting – occasionally she had to have the question repeated.
The four passengers were told that the Baghdad plane took off that afternoon. They would be driven now to the Abbassid Hotel for a rest and lunch.
Grete Harden was sitting on her bed when a tap came on the door. She opened it and found a tall dark young woman wearing BOAC uniform.
‘I’m so sorry, Miss Harden. Would you come with me to the BOAC office? A little difficulty has arisen about your ticket. This way, please.’
Grete Harden followed her guide down the passage. On a door was a large board lettered in gold – BOAC office.
The air hostess opened the door and motioned the other inside. Then, as Grete Harden passed through, she closed the door from outside and quickly unhooked the board.
As Grete Harden came through the door, two men who had been standing behind it passed a cloth over her head. They stuffed a gag into her mouth. One of them rolled her sleeve up, and bringing out a hyperdermic syringe gave her an injection.
In a few minutes her body sagged and went limp.
The young doctor said cheerfully, ‘That ought to take care of her for about six hours, anyway. Now then, you two, get on with it.’
He nodded towards two other occupants of the room. They were nuns who were sitting immobile by the window. The men went out of the room. The elder of the two nuns went to Grete Harden and began to take the clothes off her inert body. The younger nun, trembling a little, started taking off her habit. Presently Grete Harden, dressed in a nun’s habit, lay reposefully on the bed. The younger nun was now dressed in Grete Harden’s clothes.
The older nun turned her attention to her companion’s flaxen hair. Looking at a photograph which she propped up against the mirror, she combed and dressed the hair, bringing it back from the forehead and coiling it low on the neck.
She stepped back and said in French:
‘Astonishing how it changes you. Put on the dark spectacles. Your eyes are too deep a blue. Yes – that is admirable.’
There was a slight tap on the door and the two men came in again. They were grinning.
‘Grete Harden is Anna Scheele all right,’ one said. ‘She’d got the papers in her luggage, carefully camouflaged between the leaves of a Danish publication on “Hospital Massage”. Now then, Miss Harden,’ he bowed with mock ceremony to Victoria, ‘you will do me the honour to have lunch with me.’
Victoria followed him out of the room and along to the hall. The other woman passenger was trying to send off a telegram at the desk.
‘No,’ she was saying, ‘P A U N C E foot. Dr Pauncefoot Jones. Arriving today Tio Hotel, Good journey.’
Victoria looked at her with sudden interest. This must be Dr Pauncefoot Jones’ wife, coming out to join him. That she was a week earlier than expected did not seem to Victoria at all extraordinary since Dr Pauncefoot Jones had several times lamented that he had lost her letter giving the date of arrival but that he was almost certain it was the 26th!
If only she could somehow or other send a message through Mrs Pauncefoot Jones to Richard Baker…
Almost as though he read her thoughts, the man accompanying her steered her by the elbow away from the desk.
‘No conversation with fellow travellers, Miss Harden,’ he said. ‘We don’t want that good woman to notice that you’re a different person from the one she came out from England with.’
He took her out of the hotel to a restaurant for lunch. As they came back, Mrs Pauncefoot Jones was coming down the steps of the hotel. She nodded without suspicion at Victoria.
‘Been sight-seeing?’ she called. ‘I’m just going to the bazaars.’
‘If I could slip something into her luggage…’ thought Victoria.
But she was not left alone for a moment.
The Baghdad plane left at three o’clock.
Mrs Pauncefoot Jones’ seat was right up in front. Victoria ’s was in the tail, near the door, and across the aisle sat the fair young man who was her gaoler. Victoria had no chance of reaching the other woman or of introducing a message into any of her belongings.
The flight was not a long one. For the second time, Victoria looked down from the air and saw the city outlined below her, the Tigris dividing it like a streak of gold.
So she had seen it less than a month ago. How much had happened since then.
In two days’ time the men who represented the two predominant ideologies of the world would meet here to discuss the future.
And she, Victoria Jones, would have a part to play.
II
‘You know,’ said Richard Baker, ‘I’m worried about that girl.’
Dr Pauncefoot Jones said vaguely:
‘What girl?’
‘ Victoria.’
‘ Victoria?’ Dr Pauncefoot Jones peered about. ‘Where is – why, God bless me, we came back without her yesterday.’
‘I wondered if you’d noticed it,’ said Richard.
‘Very remiss of me. I was so interested by that report of the Excavations at Tell Bamdar. Completely unsound stratification. Didn’t she know where to find the lorry?’
‘There was no question of her coming back here,’ said Richard. ‘As a matter of fact, she isn’t Venetia Savile.’
‘Not Venetia Savile? How very odd. But I thought you said her Christian name was Victoria.’
‘It is. But she’s not an anthropologist. And she doesn’t know Emerson. As a matter of fact, the whole thing has been a – well – a misunderstanding.’
‘Dear me. That seems very odd.’ Dr Pauncefoot Jones reflected for some moments. ‘
‘I can’t understand it,’ said Richard Baker, frowning and paying no attention to Dr Pauncefoot Jones’ speculations. ‘She went off in a car with a young man, it seems, and she didn’t come back. What’s more, her baggage was there and she hadn’t bothered to open it. That seems to me very strange – considering the mess she was in. I’d have thought she’d be sure to doll herself up. And we agreed to meet here for lunch…No, I can’t understand it. I hope nothing’s happened to her.’
‘Oh, I shouldn’t think so for a moment,’ said Dr Pauncefoot Jones comfortably. ‘I shall start going down in H. tomorrow. From the general plan I should say that would be the best chance of getting a record office. That fragment of tablet was very promising.’
‘They’ve kidnapped her once,’ said Richard. ‘What’s to prevent their having kidnapped her again?’
‘Very improbable – very improbable,’ said Dr Pauncefoot Jones. ‘The country’s really very settled nowadays. You said so yourself.’
‘If only I could remember the name of that man in some oil company. Was it Deacon? Deacon, Dakin? Something like that.’
‘Never heard of him,’ said Dr Pauncefoot Jones. ‘I think I shall change over Mustafa and his gang to the north-east corner. Then we might extend Trench J –’
‘Would you mind awfully, sir, if I went into Baghdad again tomorrow?’
Dr Pauncefoot Jones, suddenly giving his colleague his full attention, stared at him.
‘Tomorrow? But we were there yesterday.’
