DESMOND BAGLEY
Flyaway

COPYRIGHT

HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 1 London Bridge Street London SE1 9GF www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by Collins 1978

Copyright © Brockhurst Publications 1978

Cover layout design Richard Augustus © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017

Desmond Bagley asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of these works

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

Source ISBN: 9780008211318

Ebook Edition © JULY 2017 ISBN: 9780008211325

Version: 2017-06-22

CONTENTS

Title Page

Copyright

Flyaway

Dedication

Map

Epigraph

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen

Nineteen

Twenty

Twenty-One

Twenty-Two

Twenty-Three

Twenty-Four

Twenty-Five

Twenty-Six

Twenty-Seven

Twenty-Eight

Twenty-Nine

Thirty

Thirty-One

Thirty-Two

Thirty-Three

About the Author

By the Same Author

About the Publisher

FLYAWAY

To Lecia and Peter Foston of the Wolery

Two little dicky-birds,

Sitting on a wall;

One named Peter,

The other named Paul.

Fly away, Peter!

Fly away, Paul!

Come back, Peter!

Come back, Paul!

No man can live in the desert and emerge unchanged. He will carry, however faint, the imprint of the desert, the brand which marks the nomad.

Wilfred Thesiger

ONE

We live in the era of instancy. The clever chemists have invented instant coffee; demonstrating students cry in infantile voices, ‘We want the world, and we want it now!’ and the Staffords have contrived the instant flaming row, a violent quarrel without origin or cause.

Our marriage was breaking up and we both knew it. The heat engendered by friction was rapidly becoming unsupportable. On this particular Monday morning a mild enquiry into Gloria’s doings over the weekend was wantonly interpreted as meddlesome interference into her private affairs. One thing led to another and I arrived at the office rather frayed at the edges.

Joyce Godwin, my secretary, looked up as I walked in and said brightly, ‘Good morning, Mr Stafford.’

‘Morning,’ I said curtly, and slammed the door of my own office behind me. Once inside I felt a bit ashamed. It’s a bad boss who expends his temper on the staff and Joyce didn’t deserve it. I snapped down the intercom switch. ‘Will you come in, Joyce?’

She entered armed with the secretarial weapons—stenographic pad and sharpened pencil. I said, ‘Sorry about that; I’m not feeling too well this morning.’

Her lips twitched in a faint smile. ‘Hangover?’

‘Something like that,’ I agreed. The seven year hangover. ‘What’s on the boil this morning?’

‘Mr Malleson wants to see you about the board meeting this afternoon.’

I nodded. The AGM of Stafford Security Consultants Ltd was a legal formality; three men sitting in a City penthouse cutting up the profits between them. A financial joke. ‘Anything else?’

‘Mr Hoyland rang up. He wants to talk to you.’

‘Hoyland? Who’s he?’

‘Chief Security Officer at Franklin Engineering in Luton.’

There was once a time when I knew every employee by his given name; now I couldn’t even remember the surnames of the line staff. It was a bad situation and would have to be rectified when I had the time. ‘Why me?’

‘He wanted Mr Ellis, but he’s in Manchester until Wednesday; and Mr Daniels is still away with ‘flu.’

I grinned. ‘So he picked me as third choice. Was it anything important?’

The expression on Joyce’s face told me that she thought my hangover was getting the better of me. A Chief Security Officer was expected to handle his job and if he rang the boss it had better be about something bloody important. ‘He said he’d ring back,’ she said drily.

‘Anything else?’

Wordlessly she pointed to my overflowing in-tray. I looked at it distastefully. ‘You’re a slave-driver. If Hoyland rings I’ll be in Mr Malleson’s office.’

‘But Mr Fergus wants the Electronomics contract signed today,’ she wailed.

‘Mr Fergus is an old fuddy-duddy,’ I said. ‘I want to talk to Mr Malleson about it. It won’t hurt Electronomics to wait another half-hour.’ I picked up the Electronomics file and left, feeling Joyce’s disapproving eye boring into my back.

Charlie Malleson was evidently feeling more like work than I—his in-tray was almost half empty. I perched my rump on the edge of his desk and dropped the file in front of him. ‘I don’t like this one.’

He looked up and sighed. ‘What’s wrong with it, Max?’

‘They want guard dogs without handlers. That’s against the rules.’

He raised his eyebrows. ‘I didn’t catch that.’

‘Neither did Fergus and he should have. You know what I think about it. You can build defences around a factory like the Berlin Wall but some bright kid is going to get through at night just for the devil of it. Then he runs up against a dog on the loose and gets mauled—or killed.’ Charlie opened the file. ‘See Clause 28.’

He checked it. ‘That wasn’t in the contract I vetted. It must have been slipped in at the last moment.’

‘Then it gets slipped out fast or Electronomics can take their business elsewhere. You wanted to see me about the board meeting?’

‘His Lordship will be at home at four this afternoon.’

His Lordship was Lord Brinton who owned twenty-five per cent of Stafford Security Consultants Ltd. I got up and went to the window and stared at the tower of the Inter-City Building—Brinton’s lair. From the penthouse he overlooked the City, emerging from time to time to gobble up a company here and arrange a profitable merger there. ‘Four o’clock is all right; I’ll tell Joyce. Is everything in order?’

‘As smooth as silk.’ Charlie eyed me appraisingly. ‘You don’t look too good. Got a touch of ‘flu coming on?’

‘A touch of something. I was told the name of a man this morning and I didn’t know he worked for us. That’s bad.’

He smiled. ‘This business is getting bigger than both of us. The penalty of success.’

I nodded. ‘I’m chained to my damned desk seven hours out of eight. Sometimes I wish we were back in the bad old days when we did our own legwork. Now I’m shuffling too many bloody papers around.’

‘And a lot of those are crisp, crackling fivers.’ Charlie waved at the view—the City of London in all its majesty. ‘Don’t knock success on this hallowed ground—it’s immoral.’ The telephone rang and he picked it up, then held it out to me.

It was Joyce. ‘Mr Hoyland wants to speak to you.’

‘Put him on.’ I covered the mouthpiece and said to Charlie, ‘You might like to listen to this one. It’s about time you administrative types knew what goes on at the sharp end of the business.’

The telephone clicked and clattered. ‘Mr Stafford?’

‘Max Stafford here.’

‘This is Hoyland from…’

‘I know who you are, Mr Hoyland,’ I said, feeling like a con man. ‘What’s your trouble?’

‘I’ve come up against a funny one, sir,’ he said. ‘A man called Billson vanished a week ago and I’ve run into a blank wall.’

‘How critical is Billson?’

‘He’s not on the technical side; he’s in the accounts office. But…’

‘Have you checked the books?’

‘They balance to a penny,’ said Hoyland. ‘It’s not that, sir; it’s the attitude of the company. I’m getting no cooperation at all.’

‘Expand on that.’

‘Well, Billson is a bit of a dumb bunny and he’s getting paid a lot more than he’s worth. He’s on £8000 a year and doing the work of an office boy. When I asked Isaacson why, I got a bloody dusty answer. He said the salary structure is no concern of security.’

Hoyland was annoyed, and rightly so. I was annoyed myself because when we took on a contract it was stipulated that everything was the concern of security. ‘He said that, did he? Who is Isaacson?’

‘Chief Accountant,’ said Hoyland. ‘Can you get on the blower and straighten him out? He’s not taking much notice of me.’

‘He’ll get straightened out,’ I said grimly. ‘Let’s get back to Billson—what do you mean when you say he’s vanished?’

‘He didn’t turn up last week and he sent in no word. When we made enquiries we found he’d left his digs without explanation.’ Hoyland paused. ‘That’s no crime, Mr Stafford.’

‘Not unless he took something with him. You say he isn’t critical?’

‘Definitely not. He’s been a fixture in the accounting department for fifteen years. No access to anything that matters.’

‘Not that we know of.’ I thought about it for a few moments. ‘All right, Mr Hoyland; I’ll have a word with Isaacson. In the meantime check back on Billson; you never know what you might find.’

‘I’ll do that, Mr Stafford.’ Hoyland seemed relieved. Bucking top management was something he’d rather not do himself.

I put down the telephone and grinned at Charlie. ‘See what I mean. How would you handle a thing like that?’

‘Franklin Engineering,’ he said reflectively. ‘Defence contractors, aren’t they?’

‘They do a bit for the army. Suspension systems for tanks—nothing serious.’

‘What are you going to do about it?’

‘I’m going to blow hell out of this joker, Isaacson. No money-pusher is going to tell one of my security officers what concerns security and what doesn’t.’

Charlie tilted back his chair and regarded me speculatively. ‘Why don’t you do it personally—face to face? You’ve been complaining about being tied to your desk, so why don’t you pop over to Luton and do some legwork? You can easily get back in time for the board meeting. Get out of the office, Max; it might take that sour look off your face.’

‘Is it as bad as that?’ But the idea was attractive, all the same. ‘All right, Charlie; to hell with the desk!’ I rang Joyce. ‘Get on to Hoyland at Franklin Engineering—tell him I’m on my way to Luton and to hold himself available.’ I cut off her wail of protest. ‘Yes, I know the state of the intray—it’ll get done tomorrow.’

As I put down the telephone Charlie said, ‘I don’t suppose it is really important.’

‘I shouldn’t think so. The man’s either gone on a toot or been knocked down by a car or something like that. No, Charlie; this is a day’s holiday, expenses paid by the firm.’

TWO

I should have remembered Hoyland’s name because I remembered his competent, square face when I saw it. He was a reliable type and an ex-copper like so many of our security officers. He was surprised to see me; it wasn’t often that the top brass of Stafford Security appeared in the front line, more’s the pity.

His surprise was mingled with nervousness as he tried to assess why I had come personally. ‘Nothing to worry about,’ I assured him. ‘Only too glad to get away from the desk. Tell me about Billson.’

Hoyland rubbed his chin. ‘I don’t know much about him. You know I’ve only been here three months; I was transferred here when Laird retired.’

I didn’t know—there was too damned much about my own firm I didn’t know. It had grown too big and depersonalized. ‘Yes,’ I said.

‘I took over Laird’s files and checked his gradings. Billson came well into the green scale—as safe as houses. He was at the bottom of my priorities.’

‘But you’ve rechecked since he disappeared?’

Hoyland nodded. ‘Forty-four years old, worked here fifteen years. As much personality as a castrated rabbit. Lodges with a Mrs Harrison in the town. She’s a widow.’

‘Anything between him and Mrs Harrison?’

Hoyland grinned. ‘She’s seventy.’

That didn’t mean much; Ninon de L’Enclos was a whore at eighty. ‘What about girl-friends?’

‘Not Billson—the girls didn’t go for him from what I’ve heard.’

‘All right—boy-friends?’

‘Not that, either. I don’t think he was the type.’

‘He doesn’t seem much of anything,’ I said caustically.

‘And that’s a fact,’ said Hoyland. ‘He’s so insignificant he hardly exists. You’d walk past him and not know he was there.’

‘The original invisible man,’ I commented. ‘All the qualifications for a sleeper.’

‘Isn’t fifteen years too long?’ queried Hoyland. ‘Besides, he left everything in order.’

‘As far as we know, that’s all. Do the Special Branch boys know about this?’

‘They’ve been poking around and come to the same conclusion as me.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Billson is probably in some hospital, having lost his means of identification. But there is a mystery; why was he overpaid and why is management being coy about it?’

Hoyland nodded. ‘I talked to Stewart about it first—he’s Billson’s immediate boss—and he pushed me on to Isaacson. I got nowhere with him.’

‘I’ll see what I can do,’ I said, and went to find Stewart, who proved to be a sandy Scotsman, one of the new breed of bookkeepers. No dusty ledgers for him; figures were something which danced electronically in the guts of a computer.

No, he had no idea where Billson might have gone. In fact, he knew nothing about Billson, full stop.

‘Isn’t that a little odd for a department head? Surely you know something about your subordinates?’

‘He’s a very strange man,’ said Stewart. ‘Reserved most of the time but capable of the most frantic outbursts occasionally. Sometimes he can be very difficult.’

‘In what way?’

Stewart shrugged. ‘He goes on about injustice; about people not being given the proper credit for achievement. He’s very bitter about it.’

‘Meaning himself?’

‘No; it was always about others being repressed or cheated.’

‘Any political implications?’

‘Not at all,’ said Stewart positively. ‘Politics mean nothing to him.’

‘Did he do his work well?’

Stewart offered me a wary look and said over-carefully, ‘He did the work we asked of him to our satisfaction.’

‘Would you say he was an achiever himself?’ I smiled. ‘Was he in line for promotion, or anything like that?’

‘Nothing like that.’ Stewart seemed aware that he had spoken too quickly and emphatically. ‘He’s not a dynamic man.’

I said, ‘When did you join the firm, Mr Stewart?’

‘Four years ago. I was brought down from Glasgow when the office was computerized.’

‘At that time did you make any attempt to have Billson fired or transferred to another department?’

Stewart jerked. ‘I…er…I did something like that, yes. It was decided to keep him on.’

‘By Mr Isaacson, I take it.’

‘Yes. You’ll have to ask him about that,’ he said with an air of relief.

So I did. Isaacson was a more rarefied breed of accountant than Stewart. Stewart knew how to make figures jump through hoops; Isaacson selected the hoops they jumped through. He was an expert on company law, especially that affecting taxation.

‘Billson!’ he said, and smiled. ‘There’s a word in Yiddish which describes a man like Billson. He’s a nebbish.’

‘What’s that?’

‘A person of less than no account. Let me put it this way; if a man walks out of a room and it feels as though someone has just come in, then he’s a nebbish.’

I leaned back in my chair and stared at Isaacson. ‘So here we have a nebbish who draws £8000 for a job worth £2000, if that. How do you account for it?’

‘I don’t have to,’ he said easily. ‘You can take that up with our managing director, Mr Grayson.’

‘And where will I find Mr Grayson?’

‘I regret that will be difficult,’ said Isaacson in a most unregretful manner. ‘He’s in Switzerland for the skiing.’

He looked so damned smug that I wanted to hit him, but I kept my temper and said deliberately, ‘Mr Isaacson, my firm is solely responsible for security at Franklin Engineering. A man has disappeared and I find this lack of cooperation very strange. Don’t you find it odd yourself?’

He spread his hands. ‘I repeat, Mr Stafford, that any questions concerning Mr Billson can be answered only by my managing director.’

‘Who is sliding down hills on a couple of planks.’ I held Isaacson’s eye. ‘Stewart wanted to fire Billson but you vetoed it. Why?’

‘I didn’t. Mr Grayson did. He said Billson must stay.’

‘Surely you asked his reasons.’

‘Of course.’ Isaacson shook his head. ‘He gave none.’ He paused. ‘I know nothing of Billson, Mr Stafford, other than that he was…protected, shall we say.’

I thought about that. Why should Grayson be Billson’s fairy godfather? ‘Did you know that Billson was “protected” when Stewart wanted to fire him?’

‘Oh yes.’ Isaacson smiled a little sadly. ‘I wanted to fire him myself ten years ago. When Stewart brought up the suggestion I thought I’d test it again with Mr Grayson.’ He shrugged. ‘But the situation was still the same.’

I said, ‘Maybe I’d better take this up at a higher level; perhaps with your Chairman.’

‘As you wish,’ said Isaacson in a cold voice.

I decided to lower the temperature myself. ‘Just one more thing, Mr Isaacson. When Mr Hoyland asks you for information you do not—repeat not—tell him that what he wants to know is no concern of security. You give him all the information you have, as you have given it to me. I hope I make myself clear?’

‘Very clear.’ Isaacson’s lips had gone very thin.

‘Very well; you will allow Mr Hoyland access to everything concerning Billson, especially his salary record. I’ll have a word with him before I leave.’ I stood up. ‘Good morning, Mr Isaacson.’

I checked back with Hoyland and told him what I wanted, then went in search of the Widow Harrison and found her to be a comfortable motherly old soul, supplementing her old age pension by taking in a lodger. According to her, Billson was a very nice gentleman who was no trouble about the house and who caused her no heart-searching about fancy women. She had no idea why he had left and was perturbed about what she was going to do about Billson’s room which still contained a lot of his possessions.

‘After all, I have me living to make,’ she said. ‘The pension doesn’t go far these days.’

I paid her a month in advance for the room and marked it up to the Franklin Engineering account. If Isaacson queried it he’d get a mouthful from me.

She had not noticed anything unusual about Billson before he walked out ‘No, he wasn’t any different. Of course, there were times he could get very angry, but that was just his way. I let him go on and didn’t take much notice.’

‘He was supposed to go to work last Monday, but he didn’t. When did you see him last, Mrs Harrison?’

‘It was Monday night. I thought he’d been to work as usual. He didn’t say he hadn’t.’

‘Was he in any way angry then?’

‘A bit. He was talking about there being no justice, not even in the law. He said rich newspapers could afford expensive lawyers so that poor men like him didn’t stand a chance.’ She laughed. ‘He was that upset he overturned the glue-pot. But it was just his way, Mr Stafford.’

‘Oh! What was he doing with the glue-pot?’

‘Pasting something into that scrapbook of his. The one that had all the stuff in it about his father. He thought a lot of his father although I don’t think he could have remembered him. Stands to reason, doesn’t it? He was only a little boy when his father was killed.’

‘Did he ever show you the scrapbook?’

‘Oh yes; it was one of the first things he did when he came here eight years ago. That was the year after my late husband died. It was full of pictures cut out of newspapers and magazines—all about his father. Lots of aeroplanes—the old-fashioned kind like they had in the First World War.’

‘Biplanes?’

‘Lots of wings,’ she said vaguely. ‘I don’t know much about aeroplanes. They weren’t like the jets we have now. He told me all about his father lots of times; about how he was some kind of hero. After a while I just stopped listening and let it pass over me head. He seemed to think his dad had been cheated or something.’

‘Do you mind if I see his room? I’d like to have a look at that scrapbook.’

Her brow wrinkled. ‘I don’t mind you seeing the room but, come to think of it, I don’t think the book’s there. It stays on his dressing-table and I didn’t see it when I cleaned up.’

‘I’d still like to see the room.’

It was not much of a place for a man to live. Not uncomfortable but decidedly bleak. The furniture was Edwardian oversize or 1930s angular and the carpet was clean but threadbare. I sat on the bed and the springs protested. As I looked at the garish reproduction of Holman Hunt’s ‘The Light of the World’ I wondered why an £8000-a-year man should live in a dump like this. ‘The scrapbook,’ I said.

‘It’s gone. He must have taken it with him.’

‘Is anything else missing?’

‘He took his razor and shaving brush,’ said Mrs Harrison. ‘And his toothbrush. A couple of clean shirts and some socks and other things. Not more than would fill a small suitcase. The police made a list.’

‘Do the police know about the scrapbook?’

‘It never entered me head.’ She was suddenly nervous. ‘Do you think I should tell them, sir?’

‘Don’t worry,’ I said. ‘I’ll tell them.’

‘I do hope you can find Mr Billson, sir,’ she said, and hesitated. ‘I wouldn’t want to think he’s come to any harm. He really should be married with someone to look after him. His sister came every month but that really wasn’t enough.’

‘He has a sister?’

‘Not a real sister—a half-sister, I think. The name’s different and she’s not married. A funny foreign name it is—I never can remember it. She comes and keeps him company in the evening about twice a month.’

‘Does she know he’s gone?’

‘I don’t know how she can, unless the police told her. I don’t know her address but she lives in London.’

‘I’ll ask them,’ I said. ‘Did Mr Billson have any girl-friends?’

‘Oh no, sir.’ She shook her head. ‘The problem is, you see, who’d want to marry him? Not that there’s anything wrong with him,’ she added hastily. ‘But he just didn’t seem to appeal to the ladies, sir.’

As I walked to the police station I turned that one over. It seemed very much like an epitaph.

Sergeant Kaye was not too perturbed. ‘For a man to take it into his head to walk away isn’t an offence,’ he said. ‘If he was a child of six it would be different and we’d be pulling out all the stops, but Billson is a grown man.’ He groped for an analogy. ‘It’s as if you were to say that you feel sorry for him because he’s an orphan, if you take my meaning.’

‘He may be a grown man,’ I said. ‘But from what I hear he may not be all there.’

‘I don’t know,’ said Kaye. ‘He held down a good job at Franklin Engineering for good pay. It takes more than a half-wit to do that. And he took good care of his money before he walked out and when he walked out.’

‘Tell me more.’

‘Well, he saved a lot. He kept his current account steady at about the level of a month’s salary and he had nearly £12,000 on deposit. He cleared the lot out last Tuesday morning as soon as the bank opened.’

‘Well, I’m damned! But wait a minute, Sergeant; it needs seven days’ notice to withdraw deposits.’

Kaye smiled. ‘Not if you’ve been a good, undemanding customer for a dozen or more years and then suddenly put the arm on your bank manager.’ He unsealed the founts of his wisdom. ‘Men walk out on things for a lot of reasons. Some want to get away from a woman and some are running towards one. Some get plain tired of the way they’re living and just cut out without any fuss. If we had to put on a full scale investigation every time it happened we’d have our hands full of nothing else, and the yobbos we’re supposed to be hammering would be laughing fit to bust. It isn’t as though he’s committed an offence, is it?’

‘I wouldn’t know. What does the Special Branch say?’

‘The cloak-and-dagger boys?’ Kaye’s voice was tinged with contempt ‘They reckon he’s clean—and I reckon they’re right.’

‘I suppose you’ve checked the hospitals.’

‘Those in the area. That’s routine.’

‘He has a sister—does she know?’

‘A half-sister,’ he said. ‘She was here last week. She seemed a level-headed woman—she didn’t create all that much fuss.’

‘I’d be glad of her address.’

He scribbled on a note-pad and tore off the sheet. As I put it into my wallet I said, ‘And you won’t forget the scrapbook?’

‘I’ll put it in the file,’ said Kaye patiently. I could see he didn’t attach much significance to it.

I had a late lunch and then phoned Joyce at the office. ‘I won’t be coming in,’ I said. ‘Is there anything I ought to know?’

‘Mrs Stafford asked me to tell you she won’t be in this evening.’ Joyce’s voice was suspiciously cool and even.

I hoped I kept my irritation from showing. I was becoming pretty damned tired of going home to an empty house. ‘All right; I have a job for you. All the Sunday newspapers for November 2nd. Extract anything that refers to a man called Billson. Try the national press first and, if Luton has a Sunday paper, that as well. If you draw a blank try all the dailies for the previous week. I want it on my desk tomorrow.’

‘That’s a punishment drill.’

‘Get someone to help if you must. And tell Mr Malleson I’ll meet him at four o’clock at the Inter-City Building for the board meeting.’

THREE

I don’t know if I liked Brinton or not; he was a hard man to get to know. His social life was minimal and, considered objectively, he was just a money-making machine and a very effective one. He didn’t seem to reason like other men; he would listen to arguments for and against a project, offered by the lawyers and accountants he hired by the regiment, and then he would make a decision. Often the decision would have nothing to do with what he had been told, or perhaps he could see patterns no one else saw. At any rate some of his exploits had been startlingly like a magician pulling a rabbit out of a hat. Hindsight would show that what he had done was logically sound, but only he had the foresight and that was what made him rich.

When Charlie Malleson and I put together the outfit that later became Stafford Security Consultants Ltd we ran into the usual trouble which afflicts the small firm trying to become a big firm—a hell of a lot of opportunities going begging for lack of finance. Lord Brinton came to the rescue with a sizeable injection of funds for which he took twenty-five per cent of our shares. In return we took over the security of the Brinton empire.

I was a little worried when the deal was going through because of Brinton’s reputation as a hot-shot operator. I put it to him firmly that this was going to be a legitimate operation and that our business was solely security and not the other side of the coin, industrial espionage. He smiled slightly, said he respected my integrity, and that I was to run the firm as I pleased.

He kept to that, too, and never interfered, although his bright young whiz-kids would sometimes suggest that we cut a few corners. They didn’t come back after I referred them to Brinton.

Industrial espionage is a social disease something akin to VD. Nobody minds admitting to protecting against it, but no one will admit to doing it. I always suspected that Brinton was in it up to his neck as much as any other ruthless financial son-of-a-bitch, and I used the firm’s facilities to do a bit of snooping. I was right; he employed a couple of other firms from time to time to do his ferreting. That was all right with me as long as he didn’t ask me to do it, but sooner or later he was going to try it on one of our other clients and then he was going to be hammered, twenty-five per cent shareholder or not. So far it hadn’t happened.

I arrived a little early for the meeting and found him in his office high above the City. It wasn’t very much bigger than a ballroom and one entire wall was of glass so that he could look over his stamping ground. There wasn’t a desk in sight; he employed other men to sit behind desks.

He heaved himself creakily out of an armchair. ‘Good to see you, Max. Look what I’ve gotten here.’

He had a new toy, an open fire burning merrily in a fireplace big enough to roast an ox. ‘Central heating is all very well,’ he said. ‘But there’s nothing like a good blaze to warm old bones like mine. It’s like something else alive in the room—it keeps me company and doesn’t talk back.’

I looked at the fireplace full of soft coal. ‘Aren’t you violating the smokeless zone laws?’

He shook his head. ‘There’s an electrostatic precipitator built into the chimney. No smoke gets out.’

I had to smile. When Brinton did anything he did it in style. It was another example of the way he thought. You want a fire with no smoke? All right, install a multi-thousand pound gadget to get rid of it. And it wouldn’t cost him too much; he owned the factory which made the things and I suppose it would find its way on to the company books under the heading of ‘Research and Development—Testing the Product’.

‘Drink?’ he asked.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘The working day seems to be over.’

He pressed a button next to the fireplace and a bar unfolded from nowhere. His seamed old face broke into an urchin grin. ‘Don’t you consider the board meeting to be work?’

‘It’s playtime.’

He poured a measured amount of Talisker into a glass, added an equal amount of Malvern water, and brought it over to me. ‘Yes, I’ve never regretted the money I put into your firm.’

‘Glad to hear it.’ I sipped the whisky.

‘Did you make a profit this year?’

I grinned. ‘You’ll have to ask Charlie. He juggles the figures and cooks the books.’ I knew to a penny how much we’d made, but old Brinton seemed to like a bit of jocularity mixed into his business.

He looked over my shoulder. ‘Here he is now. I’ll know very soon if I have something to supplement my old age pension.’

Charlie accepted a drink and we got down to it with Charlie spouting terms like amortization, discounted cash flow, yield and all the jargon you read in the back pages of a newspaper. He doubled as company secretary and accountant, our policy being to keep down overheads, and he owned a slice of the firm which made him properly miserly and disinclined to build any administrative empires which did not add to profits.

It seemed we’d had a good year and I’d be able to feed the wolf at the door on caviare and champagne. We discussed future plans for expansion and the possibility of going into Europe under EEC rules. Finally we came to ‘Any Other Business’ and I began to think of going home.

Brinton had his hands on the table and seemed intent on studying the liver spots. He said, ‘There is one cloud in the sky for you gentlemen. I’m having trouble with Andrew McGovern.’

Charlie raised his eyebrows. ‘The Whensley Group?’

‘That’s it,’ said Brinton. ‘Sir Andrew McGovern—Chairman of the Whensley Group.’

The Whensley Group of companies was quite a big chunk of Brinton’s holdings. At that moment I couldn’t remember off-hand whether he held a controlling interest or not. I said, ‘What’s the trouble?’

‘Andrew McGovern reckons his security system is costing too much. He says he can do it cheaper himself.’

I smiled sourly at Charlie. ‘If he does it any cheaper it’ll be no bloody good. You can’t cut corners on that sort of thing, and it’s a job for experts who know what they’re doing. If he tries it himself he’ll fall flat on his face.’

‘I know all that,’ said Brinton, still looking down at his hands. ‘But I’m under some pressure.’

‘It’s five per cent of our business,’ said Charlie. ‘I wouldn’t want to lose it.’

Brinton looked up. ‘I don’t think you will lose it—permanently.’

‘You mean you’re going to let McGovern have his way?’ asked Charlie.

Brinton smiled but there was no humour in his face. ‘I’m going to let him have the rope he wants—but sooner than he expects it. He can have the responsibility for his own security from the end of the month.’

‘Hey!’ I said. ‘That’s only ten days’ time.’

‘Precisely.’ Brinton tapped his finger on the table. ‘We’ll see how good a job he does at short notice. And then, in a little while, I’ll jerk in the rope and see if he’s got his neck in the noose.’

I said, ‘If his security is to remain as good as it is now he’ll have to pay more. It’s a specialized field and good men are thin on the ground. If he can find them he’ll have to pay well. But he won’t find them—I’m running into that kind of trouble already in the expansion programme, and I know what I’m looking for and he doesn’t. So his security is going to suffer; there’ll be holes in it big enough to march a battalion of industrial spies through.’

‘Just so,’ said Brinton. ‘I know you test your security from time to time.’

‘It’s essential,’ I said. ‘We’re always doing dry runs to test the defences.’

‘I know.’ Brinton grinned maliciously. ‘In three months I’m going to have a security firm—not yours—run an operation against McGovern’s defences and we’ll see if his neck is stuck out far enough to be chopped at.’

Charlie said, ‘You mean you’re going to behead him as well as hanging him?’ He wasn’t smiling.

‘We might throw in the drawing and quartering bit, too. I’m getting a mite tired of Andrew McGovern. You’ll get your business back, and maybe a bit more.’

‘I hope you’re right,’ said Charlie. ‘The Whensley Group account is only five per cent of our gross but it’s a damned sight more than that of our profits. Our overheads won’t go down all that much, you know. It might put a crimp in our expansion plans.’

‘You’ll be all right,’ said Brinton. ‘I promise.’ And with that we had to be satisfied. If a client doesn’t want your business you can’t ram it down his throat.

Charlie made his excuses and left, but Brinton detained me for a moment. He took me by the arm and led me to the fireplace where he stood warming his hands. ‘How is Gloria?’

‘Fine,’ I said.

Maybe I had not bothered to put enough conviction into that because he snorted and gave me a sharp look. ‘I’m a successful man,’ he said. ‘And the reason is that when a deal goes sour I pull out and take any losses. You don’t mind that bit of advice from an old man?’

I smiled. ‘The best thing about advice is that you don’t have to follow it.’

So I left him and went down to the thronged street in his private lift and joined the hurrying crowds eager to get home after the day’s work. I wasn’t particularly eager because I didn’t have a home; just a few walls and a roof. So I went to my club instead.

FOUR

I felt a shade better when I arrived at the office next morning. I had visited my fencing club after a long absence and two hours of heavy sabre work had relieved my frustrations and had also done something for the incipient thickening of the waist which comes from too much sitting behind a desk.

But the desk was still there so I sat behind it and looked for the information on Billson I had asked Joyce to look up. When I didn’t find it I called her in. ‘Didn’t you find anything on Billson?’

She blinked at me defensively. ‘It’s in your in-tray.’

I found it buried at the bottom—an envelope marked ‘Billson’—and grinned at her. ‘Nice try, Joyce; but I’ll work out my own priorities.’

When Brinton had injected funds into the firm it had grown with an almost explosive force and I had resolved to handle at least one case in the field every six months so as not to lose touch with the boys on the ground. Under the pressure of work that went the way of all good resolutions and I hadn’t been in the field for fifteen months. Maybe the Billson case was an opportunity to see if my cutting edge was still sharp.

I said abruptly, ‘I’ll be handing some of my work load to Mr Ellis.’

‘He’ll not like that,’ said Joyce.

‘He’d have to take the lot if I was knocked down by a car and broke a leg,’ I said. ‘It’ll do him good. Remind me to speak to him when he gets back from Manchester.’

Joyce went away and I opened the envelope and took out a four-page article, a potted history of the life and times of Peter Billson, Aviation Pioneer—Sunday Supplement instant knowledge without pain. It was headed: The Strange Case of Flyaway Peter, and was illustrated with what were originally black-and-white photographs which had been tinted curious shades of blue and yellow to enliven the pages of what, after all, was supposed to be a colour magazine.

It boiled down to this. Billson, a Canadian, was born appropriately in 1903, the year the first aeroplane took to the sky. Too young to see service in the First World War, he was nourished on tales of the air fighting on the Western Front which excited his imagination and he became air mad. He was an engineering apprentice and, by the time he was 21, he had actually built his own plane. It wasn’t a good one—it crashed.

He was unlucky. The Golden Age of Aviation was under way and he was missing out on all the plums. Pioneer flying took money or a sponsor with money and he had neither. In the late 1920s Alan Cobham was flying to the Far East, Australia and South Africa; in 1927 Lindbergh flew the Atlantic solo, and then Byrd brought off the North and South Pole double. Came the early’ thirties and Amy Johnson, Jim Mollison, Amelia Earhart and Wiley Post were breaking records wholesale and Billson hadn’t had a look-in.

But he made it in the next phase. Breaking records was all very well, but now the route-proving stage had arrived which had to precede phase three—the regular commercial flight. Newspapers were cashing in on the public interest and organizing long-distance races such as the England-Australia Air Race of 1934, won by Scott and Campbell-Black. Billson came second in a race from Vancouver to Hawaii, and first in a mail-carrying test—Vancouver to Montreal. He was in there at last—a real heroic and intrepid birdman. It is hard to believe the adulation awarded those early fliers. Not even our modern astronauts are accorded the same attention.

It was about this time that some smart journalist gave him the nickname of Flyaway Peter, echoing the nursery rhyme. It was good publicity and Billson went along with the gag even to the extent of naming his newborn son Paul and, in 1936, when he entered the London to Cape Town Air Race he christened the Northrop ‘Gamma’ he flew Flyaway. It was one of the first of the all-metal aircraft.

The race was organized by a newspaper which beat the drum enthusiastically and announced that all entrants would be insured to the tune of £100,000 each in the case of a fatality. The race began. Billson put down in Algiers to refuel and then took off again, heading south. The plane was never seen again.

Billson’s wife, Helen, was naturally shocked and it was some weeks before she approached the newspaper about the insurance. The newspaper passed her on to the insurance company which dug in its heels and dithered. £100,000 was a lot of money in 1936. Finally it declared unequivocally that no payment would be forthcoming and Mrs Billson brought the case to court.

The courtroom was enlivened by a defence witness, a South African named Hendrik van Niekirk, who swore on oath that he had seen Billson, alive and well, in Durban four weeks after the race was over. It caused a sensation and no doubt the sales of the newspaper went up. The prosecution battered at van Niekirk but he stood up to it well. He had visited Canada and had met Billson there and he was in no doubt about his identification. Did he speak to Billson in Durban? No, he did not.

All very dicey.

The judge summed up and the case went to the jury which deliberated at length and then found for the insurance company. No £100,000 for Mrs Billson—who immediately appealed. The Appellate Court reversed the decision on a technicality—the trial judge had been a shade too precise in his instructions to the jury. The insurance company took it to the House of Lords who refused to have anything to do with it. Mrs Billson got her £100,000. Whether she lived happily ever after the writer of the article didn’t say.

So much for the subject matter—the tone was something else. Written by a skilled journalist, it was a very efficient hatchet job on the reputation of a man who could not answer back—dead or alive. It reeked of the envy of a small-minded man who got his kicks by pulling down men better than himself. If this was what Paul Billson had read then it wasn’t too surprising if he went off his trolley.

The article ended in a speculative vein. After pointing out that the insurance company had lost on a legal technicality, it went on:

The probability is very strong that Billson did survive the crash, if crash there was, and that Hendrik van Niekirk did see him in Durban. If this is so, and I think it is, then an enormous fraud was perpetrated. £100,000 is a lot of money anywhere and at any time. £100,000 in 1936 is equivalent to over £350,000 in our present-day debased currency.

If Peter Billson is still alive he will be 75 years old and will have lived a life of luxury. Rich men live long and the chances are that he is indeed still alive. Perhaps he will read these words. He might even conceive these words to be libellous. I am willing to risk it.

Flyaway Peter Billson, come back! Come back!

I was contemplating this bit of nastiness when Charlie Malleson came into the office. He said, ‘I’ve done a preliminary analysis of the consequences of losing the Whensley Group,’ and smiled sourly. ‘We’ll survive.’

‘Brinton,’ I said, and tilted my chair back. ‘He owns a quarter of our shares and accounts for a third of our business. We’ve got too many eggs in his basket. I’d like to know how much it would hurt if he cut loose from us completely.’ I paused, then added, ‘Or if we cut loose from him.’

Charlie looked alarmed. ‘Christ! it would be like having a leg cut off—without anaesthetic.’

‘It might happen.’

‘But why would you want to cut loose? The money he pumped in was the making of us.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘But Brinton is a financial shark. Snapping up a profit is to him as mindless a reflex as when a real shark snaps up a tasty morsel. I think we’re vulnerable, Charlie.’

‘I don’t know why you’re getting so bloody hot under the collar all of a sudden,’ he said plaintively.

‘Don’t you?’ I leaned forward and the chair legs came down with a soft thud on to the thick pile carpet. ‘Last night, in a conversation lasting less than four minutes, we lost fifteen per cent of Brinton’s business. And why did we lose it? So that he can put the arm on Andrew McGovern who is apparently getting out of line. Or so Brinton says.’

‘Don’t you believe him?’

‘Whether he’s telling the truth or not isn’t the point. The point is that our business is being buggered in one of Brinton’s private schemes which has nothing to do with us.’

Charlie said slowly, ‘Yes, I see what you mean.’

I stared at him. ‘Do you, Charlie? I don’t think so. Take a good long look at what happened yesterday. We were manipulated by a minority shareholder who twisted us around his little finger.’

‘Oh, for God’s sake, Max! If McGovern doesn’t want us there’s not a damn thing we can do about it.’

‘I know that, but we could have done something which we didn’t. We could have held the Whensley Group to their contract which has just under a year to run. Instead, we all agreed at the AGM to pull out in ten days. We were manoeuvred into that, Charlie; Brinton had us dancing on strings.’

Charlie was silent.

I said, ‘And you know why we let it happen? We were too damned scared of losing Brinton’s money. We could have outvoted him singly or jointly, but we didn’t.’

‘No,’ said Charlie sharply. ‘Your vote would have downed him—you have 51 per cent. But I have only 24 to his 25.’

I sighed. ‘Okay, Charlie; my fault. But as I lay in bed last night I felt scared. I was scared of what I hadn’t done. And the thing that scared me most of all was the thought of the kind of man I was becoming. I didn’t start this business to jerk to any man’s string, and that’s why I say we have to cut loose from Brinton if possible. That’s why I want you to look for alternative sources of finance. We’re big enough to get it now.’

‘There may be something in what you say,’ said Charlie. ‘But I still think you’re blowing a gasket without due cause. You’re over-reacting, Max.’ He shrugged. ‘Still, I’ll look for outside money if only to keep you from blowing your top.’ He glanced at the magazine cutting on my desk. ‘What’s that?’

‘A story about Paul Billson’s father. You know—the accountant who vanished from Franklin Engineering.’

‘What’s the score on that one?’

I shook my head. ‘I don’t know. At first I had Paul Billson taped as being a little devalued in the intellect—running about eighty pence in the pound—but there are a couple of things which don’t add up.’

‘Well, you won’t have to worry about that now. Franklin is part of the Whensley Group.’

I looked up in surprise. ‘So it is.’ It had slipped my mind.

‘I’d hand over what you’ve got to Sir Andrew McGovern and wish him the best of British luck.’

I thought about that and shook my head. ‘No—Billson disappeared when we were in charge of security and there’s still a few days to the end of the month.’

‘Your sense of ethics is too strongly developed.’

‘I think I’ll follow up on this one myself,’ I said. ‘I started it so I might as well finish it. Jack Ellis can stand in for me. It’s time he was given more responsibility.’

Charlie nodded approvingly. ‘Do you think there’s anything in Billson’s disappearance—from the point of view of Franklin’s security, I mean?’

I grinned at him. ‘I’ll probably find that he’s eloped with someone’s wife—and I hope it’s Andrew McGovern’s.’

FIVE

I went down to Fleet Street to look for Michael English, the journalist who had written the article on Peter Billson. His office thought he was at the Press Club, the Press Club invited me to try El Vino’s. I finally ran him to ground in a pub off the Strand.

He was a tall, willowy, fair-haired man whom I disliked on sight, although what he had written about Billson might have influenced my feelings. He was playing poker dice with a couple of other journalists and looked at me doubtfully when I gave him one of my business cards to prick his curiosity.

‘Security!’ he said. There was a shade of nervousness.

I smiled reassuringly. ‘I’d like to talk to you about Billson.’

‘That little twit! What’s he put you on to me for?’ Apprehension surrounded English like a fog.

‘You’ve seen him recently?’

‘Of course I have. He came to the office making trouble. He threatened a law suit.’ English snorted with unhumorous laughter. ‘Our lawyer saw him off smartly on that one.’

I was deliberately obtuse. ‘I’m surprised he bothered you. If your article was correct he stands a good chance of a jail sentence—although his grey hairs might save him, I suppose.’

English looked at me in surprise. ‘It wasn’t the old man. It was someone who claimed to be his son—said he was Paul Billson. He made quite a scene.’

I looked around and saw an empty corner table. ‘I’d like to talk to you about it. Over there where it’s quiet. What will you have?’

English hesitated, then shrugged. ‘I don’t mind. Make it a double scotch.’

As I ordered the drinks he said, ‘I suppose you’re investigating for the insurance company.’ I made an ambiguous murmur, and he said, ‘I thought they gave up years ago. Isn’t there a time limitation on a crime like that?’

I smiled at him as he splashed water perfunctorily in his glass. ‘The file is still open.’

English had been called into his editor’s office the day after the article had appeared—the day before Billson went missing. He found the editor trying to cope with an angry and agitated man who was making incoherent threats. The editor, Gaydon, said in a loud voice, ‘This is Mr English who wrote the article. Sit down, Mike, and let’s see if we can sort this out.’ He flicked a switch on the intercom. ‘Ask Mr Harcourt if he can come to my office.’

English saw trouble looming ahead. Harcourt was the resident lawyer and his presence presaged no good. He cleared his throat and said, ‘What’s the trouble?’

Gaydon said, ‘This is Mr Paul Billson. He appears to be disturbed about the article on his father which appeared in yesterday’s issue.’

English looked at Billson and saw a rather nondescript man who, at that moment, was extremely agitated. His face was white and dull red spots burned in his cheeks as he said in a high voice, ‘It was nothing but outright libel. I demand a retraction and a public apology.’

Gaydon said in a calming voice, ‘I’m sure that Mr English wrote the truth as he saw it. What do you say, Mike?’

‘Of course, you’re right,’ said English. ‘Every matter of fact was checked against the original court records and the contemporary newspaper reports.’

‘I’m not complaining about the facts,’ said Billson. ‘It’s the damned inferences about my father. I’ve never read anything so scurrilous in my life. If I don’t get a public apology I shall sue.’

Gaydon glanced at English, then said smoothly, ‘It shouldn’t come to that, Mr Billson. I’m certain we can come to some arrangement or agreement satisfactory to all parties.’ He looked up as Harcourt entered the office and said with a slight air of relief, ‘This is Mr Harcourt of our legal department.’

Rapidly he explained the point at issue, and Harcourt said, ‘Do you have a copy of the article?’

He settled down to read the supplement which Gaydon produced and the office was uneasily quiet until he had finished. Gaydon tapped restlessly with his forefinger; English sat quite still, hoping that the film of sweat on his forehead didn’t show; Billson squirmed in his seat as the pressure within him built higher.

After what seemed an interminable period Harcourt laid down the magazine. ‘What exactly are you complaining about, Mr Billson?’

‘Isn’t it evident?’ Billson demanded. ‘My father has been blackguarded in print. I demand an immediate apology or I sue.’ His finger stabbed at English. ‘I sue him and the newspaper.’

‘I see,’ said Harcourt thoughtfully. He leaned forward. ‘What do you believe happened to your father?’

‘His plane crashed,’ said Billson. ‘He was killed—that’s what I believe.’ He slammed his hand on the magazine. ‘This is just plain libel.’

‘I believe that you will be unable to sue,’ said Harcourt. ‘You can sue only if your own reputation is at stake. You see, it’s an established principle of law that a dead man cannot be libelled.’

There was a moment of silence before Billson said incredulously, ‘But this man says my father is not dead.’

‘But you believe he is dead, and you would be bringing the case to court. It wouldn’t work, Mr Billson. You needn’t take my word for it, of course; you can ask your own solicitor. In fact, I strongly advise it.’

‘Are you telling me that any cheap journalist can drag my father’s name through the mud and get away with it?’ Billson was shaking with rage.

Harcourt said gravely, ‘I should watch your words, Mr Billson, or the shoe may be on the other foot. Such intemperate language could lead you into trouble.’

Billson knocked over his chair in getting to his feet. ‘I shall certainly take legal advice,’ he shouted, and glared at English. ‘I’ll have your hide, damn you!’

The door slammed behind him.

Harcourt picked up the magazine and flipped it to English’s article. He avoided looking directly at English, and said to Gaydon, ‘I suggest that if you intend to publish work of this nature in future you check with the legal department before publication and not after.’

‘Are we in the clear?’ asked Gaydon.

‘Legally—quite,’ said Harcourt, and added distastefully, ‘It’s not within my province to judge the moral aspect.’ He paused. ‘If the widow takes action it will be different, of course. There is a clear implication here that she joined with her husband in cheating the insurance company. How else could Peter Billson profit other than with his wife’s connivance?’

Gaydon turned to English. ‘What about the widow?’

‘It’s okay,’ said English. ‘She died a little over a year ago. Helen Billson married a Norwegian during the war and changed her name to Aarvik. It was when I stumbled over that fact that I decided to write up the story of Billson.’

Harcourt snorted and left, and Gaydon grinned at English. ‘That was a bit close, Mike.’ He picked up a pen. ‘Be a good chap and pick up that chair before you leave.’

I bought English another drink. ‘So Paul Billson didn’t have a leg to stand on.’

English laughed. ‘Not a hope. I didn’t attack his reputation, you see. Christ, I’d forgotten the man existed.’

I said mendaciously, ‘I’m not really interested in Paul Billson. Do you really think that Peter Billson faked his death to defraud the insurance company?’

‘He could have,’ said English. ‘It makes a good story.’

‘But do you believe it?’

‘Does it matter what I believe?’ He drank some scotch. ‘No, of course I don’t believe it. I think Billson was killed, all right.’

‘So you were pretty safe in issuing that challenge to come forth.’

‘I like to bet on certainties,’ said English. He grinned. ‘If he did defraud the insurance company he wasn’t likely to rise to the bait, was he? I was on sure ground until his son popped up.’

I said, ‘About that insurance. £100,000 is a hell of a lot of money. The premium must have been devilish high.’

‘Not really. You must remember that by 1936 aeroplanes were no longer the unsafe string-and-sealing wax contraptions of the ‘twenties. There wasn’t a great deal of doubt that an aircraft would get to where it was going—the question was how fast. And this was at the time of a newspaper war; the dailies were cutting each other’s throats to buy readers. Any premium would be a drop in the bucket compared with what they were spending elsewhere, and £100,000 is a nice headline-filling sum.’

‘Did Billson stand a chance in the race?’

‘Sure—he was a hot favourite. Flyaway—that Northrop of his—was one of the best aircraft of its time, and he was a good pilot.’

‘Who won the race?’

‘A German called Helmut Steiner. I think Billson would have won had he survived. Steiner only won because he took a hell of a lot of chances.’

‘Oh! What sort of chances?’

English shrugged. ‘I don’t remember the times personally—I’m not that old—but I’ve read up on it. This was in the times of the Nazis. The Berlin Olympics were on and the Master Race was busy proving its case. German racing cars were winning on all the circuits because the Auto-Union was State subsidized; German mountaineers were doing damnfool things on every Alpine cliff—I believe some of them dropped off the Eiger at the time. It didn’t prove they were good climbers; only that they were good Nazis. Germany had to beat everybody at everything, regardless of cost.’

‘And Steiner?’

‘Subsidized by the Hitler regime, of course; given a stripped military plane and a crackerjack support team seconded from the Luftwaffe. He was good, all right, but I think he knew Billson was better, so he took chances and they came off. He pressed his machine to the limit and the engine blew up on him as he landed in Cape Town. He was lucky it didn’t happen sooner.’

I thought about that. ‘Any possibility of Billson being sabotaged?’

English stared at me. ‘No one has come up with that idea before. That really is a lulu.’

‘What about it?’

‘My God, the lengths to which insurance companies will go! What will you do if Billson was sabotaged? Sue the German government for £100,000? I doubt if Bonn would fall for that one.’ He shrugged. ‘Billson’s plane was never found. You haven’t a hope.’

I drained my glass. There wasn’t much more I could get out of English and I prepared a sharp knife to stick into him. ‘So you don’t think you’ll have any trouble from Paul Billson.’

‘Not a chance,’ he scoffed. ‘Harcourt may be pious and sanctimonious but he tied Billson into knots. You can’t libel a dead man—and Billson swears his father is dead.’

I smiled gently. ‘A man called Wright once wrote about William Ewart Gladstone imputing that he was a hypocrite, particularly in sexual matters. This was in 1927 and Gladstone was long dead. But his son, the then Lord Gladstone, took umbrage and also legal advice. Like Paul Billson, he was told that the dead cannot be libelled, but he nailed Wright to the cross all the same.’

English gave me a wet-eyed look. ‘What did he do?’

‘He libelled Wright at every opportunity. He called Wright a liar, a fool and a poltroon in public. He had Wright thrown out of his club. In the end Wright had to bring Gladstone to court to protect his reputation. Gladstone had Norman Birkett appear for him, and Birkett flayed Wright in open court. When the case was finished so was Wright; his professional reputation was smashed.’ I slid the knife home. ‘It could happen to you.’

English shook his head. ‘Billson won’t do that—he’s not the man for it.’

‘He might,’ I said. ‘With help.’ I twisted the knife. ‘And it will give me great pleasure to appear for him and to swear that you told me that you thought his father to be dead, in spite of what you wrote in your dirty little article.’

I rose and left him. At the door of the pub I stopped and looked back. He was sitting in the corner, looking as though someone had kicked him in the belly, knocking the wind out of him.

SIX

I had an early lunch and then belatedly thought to ring Paul Billson’s half-sister. I had expected to find her absent from home in the middle of the working day but the telephone was picked up on the third ring and a pleasant voice said, ‘Alix Aarvik here.’

I told her who and what I was, then said, ‘I take it you haven’t heard from your brother, Miss Aarvik.’

‘No, I haven’t, Mr Stafford.’ ‘I’d like to talk to you about him. May I come round?’

‘Now?’ There was uncertainty in her voice.

‘Time is of the essence in these matters, Miss Aarvik.’ A platitude, but I find they tend to soothe people.

‘Very well,’ she said. ‘I’ll be expecting you.’

‘Within the half-hour.’ I rang off and took a taxi to Kensington.

With a name like hers I had envisaged a big, tow-headed Scandinavian, but she was short and dark and looked in her early thirties. Her flat was comfortable, if sparsely furnished, and I was interested to see that she was apparently moving out. Two suitcases stood in the hall and another on a table was open and half-packed.

She saw me looking around and said, ‘You’ve caught me in the middle of packing.’

I smiled. ‘Found another flat?’

She shook her head. ‘I’m leaving for Canada. My firm has asked me to go. I’m flying tomorrow afternoon.’ She made a gesture which was pathetically helpless. ‘I don’t know if I’m doing the right thing with Paul still missing, but I have my job to consider.’

‘I see,’ I said, not seeing a hell of a lot. Her mother had come into a windfall of £100,000 but there was precious little sign of it around, either sticking to Paul Billson or Alix Aarvik. I made a little small talk while I studied her. She was not too well dressed but managed to make the most of what she had, and she didn’t overdo the make-up. You could see thousands like her in the streets; a typical specimen of Stenographica londiniensis—the London typist.

When I married Gloria I had not a bean to spare and, during my rise to the giddy heights of success, I had become aware of all the subtle variations in women’s knickknackery from the cheap off-the-peg frock to the one-off Paris creation. Not that Gloria had spent much time in the lower reaches of the clothing spectrum—she developed a talent for spending money faster than I earned it, which was one of the points at issue between us. But I knew enough to know that Alix Aarvik was not dressing like an heiress.

I took the chair she offered, and said, ‘Now tell me about Paul.’

‘What do you want to know?’

‘You can start by telling me of his relationship with his father.’

She gave me a startled look. ‘You’ve got that far already?’

‘It wasn’t difficult.’

‘He hero-worshipped his father,’ she said. ‘Not that he ever knew him to remember. Peter Billson died when Paul was two years old. You know about the air crash?’

‘There seems to be a little doubt about that,’ I said.

Pain showed in her eyes. ‘You, too?’ She shook her head. ‘It was that uncertainty which preyed on Paul’s mind. He wanted his father to be dead—rather a dead hero than a living fraud. Do you understand what that means, Mr Stafford?’

‘You tell me.’

‘I arranged for Paul to have psychiatric treatment. The psychiatrist told me that it was this that was breaking Paul in two. It’s a dreadful thing to hero-worship a man—your father—and to wish him dead simultaneously.’

‘So he had a neurosis. What form did it take?’

‘Generally, he raged against injustice; the smart-aleck kind of injustice such as when someone takes credit for another’s achievement. He collected injustices. Wasn’t there a book called The Injustice Collector? That’s Paul.’

‘You say generally—how about specifically?’

‘As it related to his father, he thought Peter Billson had been treated unjustly—maligned in death. You know about the court case?’ I nodded, and she said, ‘He wanted to clear his father’s name.’

I said carefully, ‘Why do you talk about Paul in the past tense?’

Again she looked startled and turned pale. ‘I…I didn’t know…’ She intertwined her fingers and whispered, ‘I suppose I think he’s dead.’

‘Why should you think that?’

‘I don’t know. But I can’t think of any reason why he should disappear, either.’

‘This neurosis about injustice—did he apply it to himself? Did he think that he was treated unjustly?’

She looked straight at me and said firmly, ‘Never! He was always concerned about others. Look, Mr Stafford; I’ll come right out and say that Paul wasn’t—’ she caught herself—‘isn’t too bright. Now you’re in security at Franklin Engineering and I’ll tell you that Paul isn’t a thief or anything like that. He may not be an entirely balanced man, but he’s honest.’

‘I have no doubt about it, Miss Aarvik,’ I said. ‘My enquiries are as much on behalf of Paul as they are for Franklin Engineering. The management of Franklin are very much concerned about what happens to their employees.’

That was pious piffle which I hoped she’d swallow. Neither Stewart nor Isaacson had shown a whit of concern.

She said, ‘Paul knew…knows he’ll never make his way in the world, but he never showed resentment. I knew he found it hard to make out on only two hundred a month, but he never complained.’

I opened my mouth to contradict her and then closed it firmly. I waited the space of ten heart beats before I said, ‘Is that all he got?’

‘£2400 a year—it was all he was worth,’ she said a little sadly. ‘But you must have checked.’

‘Yes,’ I said bemusedly. ‘The exact figure had slipped my memory.’

So Paul had been cheating on his sister. He had told her he earned £2400 a year when he got over three times as much, although according to Hoyland, and now his sister, that was probably as much as he was worth. You think you have a man taped, his life spread before you like a butterfly pinned in a showcase, and he surprises you with an inconsistency.

I said, ‘Did you ever help him financially?’

She hesitated. ‘Not directly.’

Slowly I coaxed the story from her. She had been supporting their mother in her last illness. Mrs Aarvik had been dying of cancer painfully and protractedly. Alix paid for a nurse and private hospital treatment and, towards the end, for the services of a specialist—all beyond the stark necessities of the National Health Service. It was very expensive and her savings ran out.

‘Then Paul needed treatment,’ she said. ‘The psychiatrist I told you about.’

The psychiatrist was also in private practice and also expensive. Miss Aarvik had an understanding bank manager who allowed her a sizeable overdraft in spite of the prevailing credit squeeze. ‘I’m paying it off as quickly as I can.’ She smiled ruefully. ‘That’s why I’m pleased about the Canadian job; it’s at a much higher salary.’

Paul Billson contributed nothing.

‘I knew he couldn’t save,’ she said. ‘So what else could I do?’

What else, indeed? I thought of the £12,000 tucked away in Paul’s deposit account and marvelled at the curious quirks of mankind. Here was a man whom everybody agreed to be a nonentity—a spineless, faceless creature hardly distinguishable from a jellyfish—and he was proving to be human, after all, just like the rest of us. Human enough to have an eye for the main chance and to batten mercilessly on his sister. Which may only go to show that my view of humanity is jaundiced, to say the least of it.

Anyway, it accounted for Miss Aarvik’s sparsely furnished flat and for her neat but somewhat aged dress. If she was paying off a big overdraft she wouldn’t be spending on luxurious fripperies. Which was a pity—she deserved better.

I said, ‘Did the treatment do Paul any good?’

‘I think so. He’s been much quieter of late, until…’

Until English wrote his poisonous article and Paul blew up, nerved himself to tackle a newspaper editor, and then vanished.

‘Think carefully,’ I said. ‘You probably know your brother better than anyone else. If he went off the rails for any reason, what would he be likely to do?’

‘I can’t think of anything. Unless…’ She shook her head. ‘No, that’s silly.’

‘It may not be,’ I said encouragingly.

‘Well, when he was a boy he used to dream of clearing his father’s name by finding the aeroplane; actually going out to Africa and looking for it. It was never found, you know. Not a very practicable dream, I’m afraid; but Paul was never a practicable man.’

I thought about it. Somewhere south of the Mediterranean and north of the Congo. The Sahara. Not at all practicable.

‘Of course, he gave up the idea long ago,’ she said. ‘Even Paul realized it was futile. It would need a lot of money, you see, and he never had the money.’

To tell her that her brother had his pockets stuffed with boodle would have been needlessly cruel. But now I had a lead, for what it was worth. ‘1936 is a long time ago,’ I said. ‘I doubt if there’d be anything to find now. What did your parents think of Paul’s obsession?’

‘My mother always said he’d grow out of it, but he never did. She lived with me and didn’t see very much of him. She didn’t like him talking so much about his father; she thought it was unhealthy. I suppose it was. He never knew his father, you see.’

‘And your father—what did he think?’

She gave a wry smile. ‘You must think we’re an odd family. I never knew my father, either. He died before I was born. My mother married him during the war and he was killed in action. He was Norwegian, you know.’

‘Your mother had a tough life,’ I said. Two husbands killed leaving small children to bring up wasn’t my idea of a bed of roses.

‘Oh, she was always cheerful—right up to the end.’

‘One thing puzzles me,’ I said. ‘Your mother was awarded £100,000 by the court. What happened to it? There must have been something left to keep her more comfortable in her old age.’

‘I don’t know,’ said Miss Aarvik sombrely. ‘I’ve wondered about that myself, but Mother never talked about it. You must realize that I only knew about it years afterwards when I was about thirteen. It didn’t mean much then; children don’t think of things that happened before they were born—the present is much more exciting.’

‘But later—didn’t you ask her?’

‘I tried, but she would never talk about it.’ She looked at me squarely. ‘I think I take after my father, Torstein Aarvik; I never knew him, of course, so I can’t be certain. But Paul took after Mother; they’re alike in so many ways. She could be very silly and thoughtless at times. Not wilfully, you understand; but she did things without thinking too far ahead. Perhaps something happened that she was ashamed to talk about. She wasn’t very bright, but I loved her very much.’

So Paul was the not too bright son of a not too bright mother. That didn’t get me far. I stood up. ‘Well, thank you, Miss Aarvik, for all the information. You’ve been very frank.’

She rose with me. ‘I must thank you for your interest, Mr Stafford.’ She smiled wanly. ‘You’ve certainly been more thorough in your inquiries than the police. Do you think you can find Paul?’

That put me in a moral dilemma. As far as Franklin Engineering was concerned the case was finished; Billson hadn’t embezzled the petty cash nor had he breached security as far as I knew and I couldn’t load further investigation costs on to the Franklin account. Nor could I load the costs on to Stafford Security Consultants Ltd—that wouldn’t be fair to Charlie Malleson or Brinton who weren’t in business for charity.

Neither was I. As far as I was concerned, Paul Billson was an unbalanced man whom I had discovered to be of an unscrupulous disposition and, as far as I could see, Alix Aarvik was better off without him. I decided to give what I had to the police and call it a day.

I said diplomatically, ‘Your information will make it more likely.’

‘If I give you a Canadian address will you write to me?’ she asked. ‘I’ve been wondering whether I should go at all while Paul is still missing.’

It struck me that Canada was the best place for her—somewhere away from the leeching of her brother. ‘There’s nothing you can do if you stay here,’ I said. ‘I’ll certainly write to you.’

She scribbled an address on a stenographic note-pad. ‘I don’t have a home address yet, but that’s the firm I’ll be working for.’

I glanced at the sheet. Apparently she’d be with the Kisko Nickel Corporation of Vancouver; I’d never heard of it. I folded the paper and dutifully put it into my wallet as she escorted me to the door. Already the street lights were on as darkness descended. I thought of the quiet fortitude with which Alix Aarvik faced a not too happy life. She had not paraded her troubles before me; indeed, it had taken quite a bit of my not inconsiderable skill to extract many of the details from her. I hoped she’d be happy in Canada; she was good value.

I deliberated about the best way to go to find a taxi and turned in the direction of Kensington High Street. As I walked a man got out of a car parked by the kerb just ahead. He waited until I came abreast of him, then said, ‘Your name Stafford?’ He had a rough Cockney voice.

A door slammed on the other side of the car as someone else got out. ‘Yes, I’m Stafford.’

‘Got a message for yer, mate. Keep yer bleedin’ nose outter fings wot don’t concern yer. This’ll ‘elp yer remember.’

He suddenly drove his fist into my midriff, just below the sternum, and I gasped and doubled up, fighting for breath. I didn’t have much of a chance after that. There were three of them and when I went down they got to work with their boots. It wasn’t long before I passed out—but long enough to feel the pain.

SEVEN

A lot of people came to see me in hospital, some of whom surprised me by their appearance. The police came, of course, but they were followed by a man from the Special Branch checking on Billson because of the defence work done at Franklin Engineering. My wife didn’t show up but she took the trouble to spend two minutes on the telephone ordering flowers to be sent to the hospital, which surprised me mildly.

Lord Brinton came, his hands behind his back. ‘Don’t want to drink this London water,’ he said, and put a bottle of Malvern water on the bedside table. ‘Spoils the taste of the scotch.’ A bottle of Talisker joined the Malvern water.

I smiled—a painful process at the time. ‘My doctor might not approve.’

‘Better than bringing bloody grapes.’ He pulled up a chair and sat warming his ancient and expensive bones at the wall radiator. ‘Not as good as a real fire,’ he grumbled.

‘Hospitals don’t like open fires.’

‘Well,’ he said. ‘What the hell happened, Max?’

‘I was beaten up,’ I said patiently.

‘So I see,’ he said with a straight face. ‘Why?’

‘I don’t know. It seems I was “poking my nose into fings wot don’t concern me”, to quote the spokesman of the assault committee. He neglected to be more specific.’

‘Mistaken identity?’

I began to shake my head and hastily decided against it for fear it should fall off. ‘He made sure he knew who I was first.’

‘What were you doing in Kensington?’

‘Following up on a case.’ I told him about Billson and what I had done. ‘Miss Aarvik will be in Canada now,’ I said.

‘Good country,’ observed Brinton. ‘I was born there.’ He said it as though the act of his being born there had conferred a distinction on Canada. ‘I don’t see how all this relates to your being beaten up.’

‘Neither do I. Neither do the police or the Special Branch.’

His eyes sharpened. ‘What’s their interest?’

‘Franklin Engineering makes bits and pieces of tanks.’

‘And they’re following up on Billson?’

‘So it seems—but they’re not pushing too hard. For all anyone can find out he hasn’t committed a crime—yet.’

‘You think he might?’

‘Who knows what a man like Billson might or might not do. He’s lived like a vegetable for fifteen years at least, and now he’s gone charging off God knows where. He could be up to anything.’

‘Well, you’re out of it,’ said Brinton. ‘By the time you get out of here Andrew McGovern will have taken over responsibility for the security of Franklin Engineering.’

‘How big a piece of the Whensley Group have you got?’ I asked.

‘About thirty per cent. Why?’

‘Then you’ll be a big enough shareholder to ask why Billson was paid three times as much as he’s worth and why there’s a mystery made of it.’

‘I’ll look into it,’ said Brinton. ‘Can’t have the shareholders diddled like that. All right, if you weren’t beaten up because of Billson, what else have you been doing recently to get you into trouble?’

‘My life has been blameless.’

Brinton grunted in his throat. ‘Don’t try to con an old sinner. Nobody’s life is blameless. You’re sure you haven’t been sleeping in any of the wrong beds?’ I just looked at him and he said, ‘Not that I’d blame you under the circumstances.’

Soon after that he went away.

Charlie Malleson came to see me. He inspected my assortment of bruises, and said, ‘Better not go out into the streets just yet. Someone from the Race Relations Board might get you for trying to cross the colour line.’

I sighed. ‘You can do better than that, Charlie. If you have to make jokes they’d better be good. How’s business?’

‘We’re coping. How long do you think you’ll be laid up?’

‘Nobody tells me anything—you know what hospitals are like. From the way I feel now it’ll be about six months, but I’ll probably be back in a couple of weeks.’

‘Take your time,’ Charlie advised. ‘Jack Ellis is trying on your shoes to see if they fit.’

‘Good—but that will teach me to prophesy.’ Charlie raised an eyebrow and I explained. ‘I told Joyce that Jack was to take some of my work load. When she queried it I said that if I got knocked down in the street he’d have to take the lot. But this wasn’t the sort of knocking down I had in mind.’ I thought about Jack Ellis, then said, ‘It’s about time we made him a director, anyway. He’s become very good and we don’t want to lose him.’

‘I agree,’ said Charlie. ‘And I think old Brinton will. Max, when did you last take a holiday?’

I grinned. ‘That’s a funny-sounding word. Maybe two years ago.’

‘It’s been four years,’ he said positively. ‘You’ve been knocking yourself out. My advice is to take some time off right now while you have a good enough excuse to fool your subconscious. Take a trip to the Caribbean and soak up some sun for a couple of months.’

I looked out of the window at the slanting rain. ‘Sounds good.’

Charlie smiled. ‘The truth is I don’t want you around while Jack is finding his feet in a top job. You can be a pretty alarming bastard at times and it might be a bit inhibiting for him.’

That made sense, and the more I thought about it the better it became. Gloria and I could go away and perhaps we could paper over some of the cracks in our marriage. I knew that, when a marriage is at breaking-point, the fault is rarely solely on one side, and my drive to set up the firm had certainly been a contributing factor. Perhaps I could do something to stick things together again.

‘I’ll think about it,’ I said. ‘But I’d better see Jack. There are one or two things he ought to know before he gets his feet wet.’

Charlie’s face cracked into a pleased smile which faded as he said, ‘Who assaulted you, Max?’

We kicked the Billson case around for a while and got nowhere. So Charlie left, promising to send Jack Ellis to see me.

The really surprising visitor was Alix Aarvik.

I gaped as she came in and then said, ‘Sit down, Miss Aarvik—you’ll excuse me if I don’t stand. I thought you were in Canada.’

She sat in the leather club chair which Brinton had had installed for his own benefit. ‘I changed my mind,’ she said. ‘I turned down the job.’

‘Oh! Why?’

She inspected me. ‘I’m sorry about what happened to you, Mr Stafford.’

I laughed. By this time I was able to laugh without my ribs grinding together. ‘An occupational hazard.’

Her face was serious. ‘Was it because of your enquiries about Paul?’

‘I can’t see how it could be.’

‘The police came to see me again. And some others who…weren’t ordinary police.’

‘Special Branch. Paul did work in a defence industry.’

‘I didn’t know what to think. They were so uncommunicative.’

I nodded. ‘Their job is to ask questions, not to give answers. Besides, they revel in an aura of mystery. May I ask why you turned down the Canadian job?’

She hesitated. ‘About a quarter of an hour after you left my flat I went out to post a letter. There was an ambulance not far from the street door and you were being put into it.’ She moistened her lips. ‘I thought you were dead.’

I said slowly, ‘It must have given you a shock. I’m sorry.’

There was a rigidity about her which betrayed extreme tension. She opened her mouth and swallowed as though the words would not come, then she made another attempt and said, ‘Did you see who attacked you?’

The penny dropped. ‘It wasn’t your brother, if that’s what you mean.’

She gave a long sigh and relaxed visibly. ‘I had to know,’ she said. ‘I couldn’t leave without knowing, and the police wouldn’t tell me anything.’

I looked at her thoughtfully. ‘If you thought your brother might attack anyone homicidally you should have warned me.’

‘But I didn’t think that,’ she cried. ‘Not when we talked together. It was only afterwards, when I saw you in the ambulance, that it occurred to me.’

I said, ‘I want the truth. Have you seen Paul since he disappeared?’

‘No, I haven’t—I haven’t.’ Her face was aflame with her vehemence.

I said gently, ‘I believe you.’

She was suddenly in tears. ‘What’s happened to Paul, Mr Stafford? What is he doing?’

‘I don’t know. Honestly, I don’t know.’ It took me some time to quieten her, and lying flat on my back didn’t help. In order to divert her I said, ‘You were being transferred to Canada. Will the fact that you turned down the offer affect your present job?’

‘I don’t think so,’ she said. ‘Sir Andrew was very good about it.’

A frisson ran down my back. ‘Sir Andrew?’

‘Sir Andrew McGovern. I’m his secretary.’

‘You do mean the Chairman of the Whensley Group?’

‘That’s right. Do you know him?’

‘I haven’t had that pleasure. How did you come to work for him, Miss Aarvik?’

‘I started work at Franklin Engineering eight years ago.’ She smiled. ‘In the typing pool. I like to think I’m good at my job—anyway I didn’t stay long in the typing pool, and four years ago I was transferred to Group Head Office in London—that’s Whensley Holdings Ltd.’

‘I know,’ I said. ‘We handle the security.’ But not for long I thought.

‘Oh! You mean you employ the men who come around and make sure I’ve destroyed the executive typewriter ribbons?’

‘Sort of. What made you start with Franklin Engineering? How did you get the job?’

‘I was with a firm which went bust,’ she said. ‘I needed another job so Paul suggested Franklin. He’d been working there for quite a while and he said it was a good firm.’

So it was—for Paul Billson. Seeing that I’d started to open the can of worms it seemed a good idea to take the top right off. For instance, was Miss Aarvik’s salary as inflated as her brother’s? ‘Do you mind telling me your present salary, Miss Aarvik?’

She looked at me with some surprise. ‘I don’t think so. I get £4200 a year—before tax.’

I sighed. That was fairly standard for a top secretary; certainly nothing out of the ordinary. And it was the most natural thing in the world to be introduced into the firm by Paul. ‘Why the Canadian transfer?’ I asked. ‘Isn’t it a bit odd for the secretary of the boss to be asked to move to another country? Or were you going with Sir Andrew?’

She shook her head. ‘The way Sir Andrew put it, I was doing him a favour. The company I was going to—Kisko Nickel—is undergoing reorganization. I was to organize the office procedures, but only on loan for a year.’

‘You must have been pleased about that. Wasn’t it a step up? From secretarial to executive?’

‘I was bucked about it,’ she admitted. ‘But then Paul…’ Her voice tailed away.

‘When were you offered the job?’

‘It came up rather suddenly—last Monday.’

I wrinkled my brow. That was the day Hoyland rang to tell me of Billson’s disappearance. There was something bloody funny going on but, for the life of me, I couldn’t see how it hung together.

I smiled at her. ‘Well, you see that I am very much alive. In the opinion of the police and of my associates at Stafford Security the attack on me had nothing to do with your brother.’

She looked at me squarely. ‘What of your opinion?’

I lied. ‘I am of the same opinion. If you want my advice you’ll go straight to Sir Andrew McGovern and tell him you’ve reconsidered and you’ll take the Canadian job after all.’

‘And Paul?’

‘There’s nothing you can do about Paul, as I said before. He’ll be found, but it’s better for you to leave it to the professionals. I’ll write to you in Canada.’

She nodded. ‘Perhaps that would be the best thing to do.’

‘One thing—I wouldn’t mention to Sir Andrew that this is my advice, or that you’ve even seen me. My firm and Sir Andrew aren’t on very good terms right now; he’s fired Stafford Security and is setting up his own security organization for the Whensley Group, so I think any mention of me would be tactless, to say the least.’

Her eyes widened. ‘Was this because of Paul?’

‘Not at all. It happened before…’ I stopped short. It hadn’t happened before I knew about Billson. Brinton had sprung it on us at the board meeting on the afternoon when I had just returned from Franklin Engineering. I picked up quickly. ‘Nothing to do with your brother at all, Miss Aarvik.’

When she had gone I stared at the ceiling for a long time. Then I opened the bedside cupboard, stripped the lead foil from Brinton’s bottle of scotch, and poured myself three fingers. Brinton may have been right about it tasting better with Malvern water, but it tasted even better neat. I suddenly really needed that drink.

EIGHT

I soon became very damned tired of that hospital and especially of the food. I had just been served a so-called lunch which began with a watery soup which looked like old dishwater and ended with an equally watery custard which resembled nothing on God’s earth when my doctor walked in, full of that synthetic bonhomie which is taught in medical schools as the bedside manner.

I thrust the tray under his nose. ‘Would you eat that?’

He inspected it, his nose wrinkling fastidiously. ‘What’s wrong with it?’

‘That wasn’t the question,’ I snarled.

His eyes twinkled. ‘Well, possibly not,’ he conceded.

‘That’s good enough for me,’ I said. ‘I’m discharging myself.’

‘But you’re not ready.’

‘And I never will be if I have to eat this slop. I’m going home to get some decent food in my belly.’ For all Gloria’s faults she wasn’t a half-way bad cook when she wanted to be.

‘The food can’t be all that bad if you’re beginning to feel your oats.’ I glared at him and he shrugged. ‘All right, but the prescribed regimen is another week’s rest and then I want you back here for inspection.’

I said, ‘Where are my bloody trousers?’

So I went home by taxi and found Gloria in bed with a man. They were both naked and he was a stranger—I’d never seen him before to my knowledge but Gloria had a lot of odd friends. There weren’t any fireworks; I just jerked my thumb at the bedroom door and said, ‘Out!’ He grabbed his clothes and disappeared, looking like a skinned rabbit.

In silence I looked at the heap of tousled bedclothes into which Gloria had vanished. Presently the front door slammed and Gloria emerged, looking aggrieved and a little scared. ‘But the hospital said…’

‘Shut up!’

She was stupid enough to ignore me. She informed me at length about the kind of man I was or, rather, the kind of man I wasn’t. She embroidered her diatribe with all the shortcomings she could find in me, culled from seven years of married life, and then informed me that her bedfriend hadn’t been the first by a long shot, and whose fault was that? In short, she tried to work up the familiar instant Stafford row to the nth degree.

I didn’t argue with her—I just hit her. The first time I had ever hit a woman in my life. An open palm to the side of her jaw with plenty of muscle behind it. It knocked her clean out of bed so that she lay sprawling in a tangle of sheets by the dressing-table. She was still for a few moments and then shook her head muzzily as she pushed against the floor to raise herself up. She opened her mouth and closed it again as she caught my eye. Her fingers stroked the dull red blotch on her face and she looked at me unbelievingly.

I ignored her and walked to the wardrobe from which I took a suitcase from the top shelf and began to pack. Presently I broke the silence. ‘You’ll be hearing from my solicitor. Until then you can have the house.’

‘Where are you going?’ Her voice was soft and quiet.

‘Do you care?’

She had nothing to say to that so I picked up the suitcase and left the bedroom. I went downstairs to my study and unlocked the bureau. As I took out my passport I was aware of Gloria standing by the door. ‘You can’t leave me,’ she said desolately.

I turned my head and looked at her. ‘For God’s sake, go and put on some clothes,’ I said. ‘You’ll die of pneumonia.’

When I put the passport and a few other papers into my pocket and walked into the hall she was trudging disconsolately up the stairs. As I walked towards the front door she screamed, ‘Come back, Max!’

I shut the door gently on her shout, closing an era of my life. Sic transit Gloria mundi. A lousy pun but a true one.

NINE

I suppose if I hadn’t left Gloria I wouldn’t have gone on with the Billson case. Billson himself had ceased to be a security matter and was merely a half-way maniac gone on an ancestor-worshipping bender. He was of no concern to anyone but himself and, possibly, Alix Aarvik.

But I had left Gloria, which put me in a somewhat ambiguous position. It had already been agreed that I would take a holiday, partly for my own benefit and partly to give free rein to Jack Ellis. The trouble was that I didn’t feel like a holiday; I couldn’t see myself toasting on the sands of Montego Bay, as Charlie had suggested. And so the devil found work for idle hands.

Besides, I had been assaulted, and if nothing else demanded that something should be done, company policy did.

So I asked Jack Ellis to come and see me at my club. Ellis had joined us four years earlier—young, bright and eager to learn. He was still young, but that didn’t worry me; Napoleon was only twenty-six when he was General of the French Army in Italy and licked hell out of the Austrians. Jack Ellis was twenty-seven, something that might hinder him when negotiating with some of the stuffier chairmen of companies, but time would cure that. In the meantime he was very good and getting better.

I took him aside into the cardroom which was empty in the afternoon. For a while we talked about his job and then I brought him up-to-date on the Billson story. He was puzzled as anyone about the whole affair.

‘Jack,’ I said. ‘I want you to find Billson.’

He gave me an old-fashioned look. ‘But he’s not our pigeon any more. Apart from the fact that Whensley are running their own show now, Billson is out of it.’

I said, ‘When this firm was started certain rules were laid down. Do you remember Westlake, the security guard we had at Clennel Enterprises?’

Ellis’s face was grave. ‘I remember. It happened just after I joined the firm. Shot in the leg during a pay-roll snatch. He had to have it amputated.’

‘But do you remember what happened to the man who shot him? We got to him before the coppers did. We handed him to the law intact, although I’d have dearly loved to break his leg. We also made sure that the story got around. And that’s the rule, Jack—we look after our own. If any gun-happy bandit hurts one of our men he knows he has to cope with the police and our boys. And to coin a phrase—“we try harder”. Got the picture?’

He smiled faintly and nodded. ‘In this business it makes sense,’ he acknowledged.

‘The top-ranking coppers aren’t too happy about it,’ I said, ‘because they don’t like private armies. But we rub along with the middle level very nicely. Anyway, a member of Stafford Security Consultants Ltd has been assaulted, and the fact it was the boss makes no difference to the principle. I’m not on a personal vendetta but I want those boys nailed.’

‘Okay—but Billson!’

‘He’s got to be connected somehow, so dig into him. The police aren’t doing much because it’s no crime to leave a job. They’ve got him on a list and if they come across him they’ll ask him a few polite questions. I can’t wait that long. All the villains in London know I’ve been done over, and they’re laughing their heads off.’

‘We should be able to get a line on Billson,’ said Jack. ‘It’s not easy for a man to disappear into thin air.’

‘Another thing; no one is to know any of this except me, you and the man you put on the job.’

‘Not even Charlie Malleson?’

‘Not even him. I suspect jiggery-pokery at high levels.’ I saw the expression on Ellis’s face, and said irascibly, ‘Not Charlie, for God’s sake! But I want to cut out even the possibility of a leak. Some of our top industrialists are doing some queer things—Sir Andrew McGovern for one. Now, I want a thorough rundown on him; particularly a survey of any relationship he might have had with Paul Billson and with his secretary, Alix Aarvik.’

‘Okay,’ said Jack. ‘I’ll get it started right away.’

I pondered for a moment. ‘Open a routine file on this. Your clients are Michelmore, Veasey and Templeton; send them the bills in the normal way.’ As he raised his eyebrows I said shortly, ‘They’re my solicitors.’

‘Right.’

‘And good luck with the new job.’ It wouldn’t be fair to Jack if he got the idea that when I came back everything would be as it was before, so I said, ‘If you don’t drop too many clangers it’s yours for good. I’m destined for higher things, such as busting into Europe.’

He went away a very happy man.

It’s not easy for a man to disappear into thin air.

Those praiseworthy citizens who form and join societies dedicated to the preservation of civil liberties are quite right in their concern about the ‘data bank’ society. At Stafford Security we weren’t a whit concerned about civil liberties; what we were doing was preserving the industrial secrecy of our clients, which doesn’t amount to the same thing at all. As a corollary, because we protected against snooping we understood it, and were well equipped to do some snooping ourselves should the mood take us.

The bloodhounds were turned on to Paul Billson. No man living in a so-called civilized society can escape documentation. His name, and sometimes a number attached to his name, is listed on forms without end—driving licence, radio and TV licence, dog licence, income tax return, insurance applications, telephone accounts, gas and electricity accounts, passport applications, visa applications, hire purchase agreements, birth certificate, marriage certificate, death certificate. It seems that half the population is pushing around pieces of paper concerning the other half—and vice versa.

It takes a trained man with a hazy sense of ethics to ferret out another man’s life from the confusion but it can be done, given the time and the money—the less time the more money it takes, that’s all. Jack Ellis hoisted Michelmore, Veasey and Templeton’s bill a few notches and the information started to come in.

Paul Billson applied for a passport the day after he disappeared, appearing in person at the London Passport Office to fill in the form. The same day he applied for an international driving licence. The following day he bought a Land—Rover off the shelf at the main London showroom, paid cash on the barrel and drove it away.

We lost him for a couple of weeks until he picked up his passport, then a quick tour of the consulates by a smooth operator revealed that he had applied for and been granted visas for Niger, Mali, Chad and Libya. That led to the question of what he was doing with the Land—Rover. He had got his green insurance card for foreign travel but a run around the shipping companies found nothing at all. Then our man at Heathrow turned up an invoice which told that a Mr Billson had air-freighted a Land-Rover to Algiers.

Whatever had happened to Paul had blown him wide open. After a lifetime of inactive griping about injustice, of cold internal anger, of ineffectual mumblings, he had suddenly erupted and was spending money as though he had a private mint. Air freight isn’t cheap.

What Jack had dug up about Billson’s finances was fantastic. The £12,000 in Paul’s deposit account was but the tip of an iceberg, and he had nearly £65,000 to play around with. ‘I don’t know where the hell he got it,’ said Jack.

‘I do,’ I said. ‘He saved it. When he vanished he was on £8000 a year and spending about £2500. You do that for enough years and are careful with your investments and you’ll soon rack up £65,000.’

Jack said, ‘I’ll tell you something, Max; someone else is looking for Billson. We’ve been crossing their tracks.’

‘The police?’

‘I don’t think so. Not their style.’

‘The Special Branch, then?’

‘Could be. They move in mysterious ways their wonders to perform.’

I stretched out an arm for the telephone. ‘I’ll ask.’

Because some of our clients, such as Franklin Engineering, were into defence work, contact with the Special Branch was inevitable for Stafford Security. It was an uneasy relationship and we were tolerated only because we could take off them some of their work load. If, for example, we saw signs of subversion we tipped them off and were rewarded by being left alone. A strictly confidential relationship, of course; the trades unions would have raised hell had they known.

The man I rang was politely amused. ‘Billson is no concern of ours. We checked back on what you told us; we even interviewed that bloody journalist—now there’s a slimy bit of work. As far as we’re concerned, Billson is a semi-paranoiac who has gone off the rails a bit. He might interest a psychiatrist, but he doesn’t interest us.’

‘Thanks.’ I put down the telephone and said to Jack, ‘He says they aren’t interested, but would he tell me the truth?’ I frowned as I turned the pages of the report ‘Algiers! Why didn’t Billson apply for an Algerian visa?’

‘He didn’t need to. British citizens don’t need visas for Algeria.’ Jack produced another thin file. ‘About Sir Andrew McGovern. Relationship with Billson—apart from the fact that they’re remotely linked through Franklin Engineering—nil. Relationship with Alix Aarvik—nil. It’s a straight master-and-servant deal—they’re not even “just good friends”. The Kisko Nickel Corporation is undergoing an internal reorganization due to a merger which McGovern engineered. But Alix Aarvik didn’t go to Canada; she’s still operating as McGovern’s secretary.’

I shrugged. ‘As I once said to Brinton, the best thing about advice is that you needn’t take it.’ I smiled sourly. ‘It turned out that his advice was good, but that’s no reason for Alix Aarvik to take mine.’

‘Apart from that there’s not much to get hold of in McGovern,’ said Jack. ‘He does seem to live in Brinton’s pocket.’

‘Not quite,’ I said absently. ‘Brinton has been having trouble with him. That’s why we lost the Whensley account.’ I was thinking of the Sahara; of how big and empty it was.

Jack sniffed. ‘If they have quarrelled no one would notice it. McGovern entertained Brinton at his home two days ago.’

I said, ‘If Brinton pats Andrew McGovern on the back it’s just to find a good spot to stick the knife. Thanks, Jack; you’ve done a good job. I’ll take it from here.’

When he had gone I rang Whensley Holdings and asked for Miss Aarvik. When she came on the line I said, ‘Max Stafford here. So you didn’t go to Canada, after all.’

‘Sir Andrew changed his mind.’

‘Did he? Miss Aarvik, I have some information about your brother which I think you ought to know. Will you have dinner with me tonight?’

She hesitated, then said, ‘Very well. Thank you for your continued interest in my brother, Mr Stafford.’

‘I’ll call for you at your flat at seven-thirty,’ I said.

After that I went down to the club library, took down The Times Atlas, and studied a map of the Sahara for a long time. It didn’t take me as long as that to find out that the idea burgeoning in my mind was totally fantastic, utterly irresponsible and probably bloody impossible.

TEN

I picked up Alix Aarvik that evening and took her to a French restaurant, an unpretentious place with good food. It was only after we had chosen from the menu that I opened the subject over a couple of sherries. I told her where Paul Billson was.

‘So he is trying to find the plane,’ she said. ‘But it’s totally impossible. He’s not the man to…’ She stopped suddenly. ‘How can he afford to do that?’

I sighed. Alix Aarvik was due to receive a shock. ‘He’s been holding out on you. Probably for a long time, judging by the cash he squirrelled away. He was getting £8000 a year from Franklin Engineering.’

It took a while for it to sink in, but as it did her face went pale and pink spots appeared in her cheeks. ‘He could do that!’ she whispered. ‘He could let me pay his bills and not put up a penny for Mother’s support.’

She was becoming very angry. I liked that; it was time someone got mad at Paul Billson. I wasn’t so cool about him myself. I said, ‘I’m sorry to have administered the shock, but I thought you ought to know.’

She was silent for a while, looking down into her glass and aimlessly rotating the stem between her fingers. At last she said, ‘I just don’t understand him.’

‘It seems he didn’t abandon his boyhood dream. He saved up his money to fulfil it.’

‘At my expense,’ she snapped. She gave a shaky laugh. ‘But you must be wrong, Mr Stafford. I know what Paul was doing at Franklin Engineering. They wouldn’t pay him that much.’

‘That’s another mystery. It seems they did. Your brother had damn near £60,000 to his name when he pushed off—and he turned it all into hard cash. If he’s taken it with him to Algiers he’s put a hell of a crimp into the currency regulations. I think Paul is now a law-breaker.’

‘But this is ridiculous.’

‘I agree—but it’s also true; Paul has gone to look for his father’s plane. I can’t think of any other reason why he should shoot off to Algiers with a Land-Rover. He’s looking for a plane which crashed over forty years ago and that’s a hell of a long time. I was looking at a map this afternoon. Do you know how big the Sahara is?’ She shook her head and I said grimly, ‘Three million square miles—just about the same size as the United States but a hell of a lot emptier. It’ll be like searching the proverbial haystack for the needle, with the difference that the needle might not be there.’

‘What do you mean by that?’

‘Suppose Hendrik van Niekirk really did see Peter Billson in Durban after he was supposed to have crashed. You can lay ten to one that Billson wouldn’t have left that plane lying around for anyone to find. If he was a faker after that insurance money my guess is that he’d ditch off-shore in the Mediterranean. He’d row himself ashore in a collapsible dinghy—they had those in 1936, I’ve checked—and get himself lost. So Paul might be looking for something in the desert that’s not there.’

‘I don’t like that,’ she said coldly. ‘You’re implying that my mother was party to a fraud.’

‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘I don’t like it much myself, but it’s a possibility that has to be considered. I do it all the time in my business, Miss Aarvik.’

A waiter interrupted us by bringing the first course. Over the onion soup I said, ‘Anyway, that’s where your brother is—somewhere in Algeria if he isn’t already in Niger or Chad or somewhere else as improbable.’

‘He must be brought back,’ she said. ‘Mr Stafford, I don’t have much money, but is it at all possible for your detective agency to look for him?’

‘I don’t run a detective agency,’ I said. ‘I run a security organization. Lots of people get the two confused. Frankly, I don’t see why you want him back. You’ve just heard of how he’s been deceiving you for years. I think you’re better off without him.’

‘He’s my brother,’ she said simply. ‘He’s the only family I have in the world.’

She looked so woebegone that I took pity on her. I suppose it was then the decision was made. Of course I hedged it about with ‘ifs’ and ‘maybes’ as a sop to my conscience should I renege, but the decision was made.

I said carefully, ‘There’s a possibility—just a possibility, mind you—that I may be going to North Africa in the near future. If I do, I’ll ask around to see if I can find him.’

She lit up as though I’d given her the key to the Bank of England. ‘That’s very good of you,’ she said warmly.

‘Don’t go overboard about it,’ I warned. ‘Even if I do find him your troubles aren’t over. Supposing he doesn’t want to come back—what am I supposed to do? Kidnap him? He’s a free agent, you know.’

‘If you find him send me a cable and I’ll fly out. If I can talk to Paul I can get him to come back.’

‘No doubt you can, but the first problem is to find him. But we have some things going for us. Firstly, there are large areas of the Sahara where he will not look for the aircraft.’ I paused and then said acidly, ‘Not if he has any sense, that is, which I beg leave to doubt’

‘Oh! Which areas?’

‘The inhabited bits—the Sahara is not all blasted wilderness. Then there’s the course Peter Billson intended to fly—that should give us a rough indication of where the plane is likely to be. Is there anyone who’d know such an odd item of information after forty years?’

She shook her head despondently, then said slowly, ‘There’s a man in the Aeronautical Section of the Science Museum—Paul used to talk to him a lot. He’s some sort of aeronautical historian, he has all sorts of details in his records. I don’t remember his name, though.’

‘I’ll check,’ I said. ‘The other point in our favour is that in a relatively empty land a stranger tends to stand out. If Paul is buzzing about remote areas in a Land-Rover he’ll leave a pretty well-defined trail.’

She smiled at me. ‘You’re making me feel better already.’

‘Don’t raise your hopes too high. When…if I go to North Africa I’ll send you an address where you can contact me.’

She nodded briefly and we got on with the meal.

I took her home quite early and then went back to the club to bump into Charlie Malleson who was just coming out. ‘I thought I’d missed you,’ he said. ‘I was just passing and I thought I’d pop in to see you.’

I glanced at my watch. ‘The bar’s still open. What about a drink?’

‘Fine.’

We took our drinks to an isolated table and Charlie said, ‘I rang you at home but no one was in, so I took a chance on finding you here.’ I merely nodded, and he cleared his throat uncomfortably. ‘Is it true what I hear about you and Gloria?’

‘Depends what you’ve heard, but I can guess what it is. Bad news gets around fast. It’s true enough. Where did you hear it?’

‘Brinton was saying something yesterday. Gloria’s been talking to him.’

‘Getting her version in first, no doubt. She won’t impress Brinton.’

‘Well, I’m truly sorry it happened this way. Are you starting a divorce action?’

‘It’s in the hands of my solicitor now.’

‘I see,’ he said slowly. I don’t know what he saw and I didn’t really care. ‘How are you feeling otherwise?’ he asked. ‘You’re not long out of hospital.’

I looked at him over the edge of my glass. ‘Have you ever been beaten up, Charlie? Given a thorough going-over by experts?’

‘I can’t say that I have.’

‘It’s the most degrading thing that can happen to a man,’ I said flatly. ‘It isn’t so much what they do to the body; that can stand a lot of punishment. It’s the feeling of utter helplessness. You’re no longer your own man—you’re in the hands of others who can do with you what they like. And you ask me how I feel.’

‘You’re bitter about it, aren’t you, Max? You know, I didn’t expect that of you.’

‘Why not?’

‘Well, you have the reputation of being a pretty cold fish, you know. You run your end of the business like a computer.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with being logical and acting logically,’ I said.

‘No.’ There was a pause before Charlie said, ‘I suppose the divorce will keep you in England.’

I drained my glass. ‘I don’t see why it should. I’m thinking of taking your advice to soak up some sun. I’ll be glad to get away from London for a while.’

Charlie looked pleased. ‘It’ll do you good; you’ll come back like a new man.’

‘How is Jack Ellis settling in?’

‘Very well. I’m glad you said what you did to him about the job; it’s cleared the air and makes things easier all round. How long do you expect to be away?’

‘I don’t really know. Hold the fort, double the profits and bank the proceeds. Expect me when you see me.’

We talked idly for a few more minutes and then Charlie took his leave. I had an obscure feeling that he had not ‘dropped by in passing’ but had come for a reason, to get some question answered. About the divorce? About my health? I went over the conversation and wondered if he had got his answer.

I had an uneasy night. I thought of myself as seen by others—Max Stafford, the cold fish. I hadn’t known Charlie had thought of me in that way. We had always been personal friends as well as getting on well with each other in the business. To get a flash of illumination on oneself through the eyes of another can sometimes come as a shock.

I slept and woke again after having bad dreams of vaguely impending doom. I lay with open eyes for a long time and then, finding sleep impossible, I turned on the bedside light and lit a cigarette.

I prided myself on thinking and acting logically, but where in hell was the logic of goose-chasing to Algiers? The sexual bounce, maybe, from Gloria to Alix Aarvik? The desire to be the parfit, gentil knight on a white charger going on a quest to impress the maiden? I rejected that. Alix Aarvik was a nice enough girl but there was certainly no sexual attraction. Maybe Max Stafford was a cold fish, after all.

What, then?

Maybe it was because I thought I was being manipulated. I thought of Andrew McGovern. He had tried to send Alix to Canada. Why? In the event he didn’t send her. Why? Was it because I had been a bit too quick and caught her and talked to her the day before she was supposed to leave? If the damage had been done there would be no reason to send her away. I had been beaten up immediately after I had seen her. If McGovern had been responsible for that I’d have to think up some new and novel punishment for him.

Was McGovern deliberately putting pressure on me through Brinton? Brinton, on the day of the board meeting, had said he was under pressure from McGovern. What sort of a hold could McGovern have over a shark like Brinton? And if McGovern was doing the squeezing, why was he doing it?

Then there was Paul Billson. Before he entered my life I had been moderately happy, but from the moment Hoyland rang me up to have his hand held there had been nothing but trouble. Everything seemed to revolve around Paul, a man obsessed.

Logic! If everything revolved around Paul Billson, maybe he was the person to talk to. Maybe going to Algiers wasn’t such a bad idea, after all.

I put out the light and slept.

Three days later I flew to Algiers.

ELEVEN

Algiers is the only city I know where the main post office looks like a mosque and the chief mosque looks like a post office. Not that I spent much time in the mosque but I thought I had made a major error when I entered the post office for the first time to collect letters from poste restante. I gazed in wonder at that vast hushed hall with its fretted screens and arabesques and came to the conclusion that it was an Eastern attempt to emulate the reverential and cathedral-like atmosphere affected by the major British banks. I got to know the post office quite well.

Getting to know the whereabouts of Paul Billson was not as easy. Although my French was good, my Arabic was non-existent, which made it no easier to fight my way through the Byzantine complexities of Algerian bureaucracy, an amorphous structure obeying Parkinson’s Law to the nth degree.

The track of my wanderings over Algiers, if recorded on a map, would have resembled the meanderings of a demented spider. At the twentieth office where my passport was given the routine fifteen-minute inspection by a suspicion-haunted official for the twentieth time my patience was nearly at snapping point. The trouble was that I was not on my own ground and the Algerians worked to different rules.

My hotel was in Hamma, in the centre of town near the National Museum, and when I returned, early one evening, I was dispirited. After a week in Algiers I had got nowhere, and if I couldn’t track Billson in a city what hope would I have in the desert? It seemed that my cutting edge had blunted from lack of practice.

As I walked across the foyer to collect my room key I was accosted by a tall Arab wearing the ubiquitous djellaba. ‘M’sieur Stafford?’

‘Yes, I’m Stafford.’

Wordlessly he handed me an envelope inscribed with my surname and nothing else. I looked at him curiously as I opened it and he returned my gaze with unblinking brown eyes. Inside the envelope was a single sheet of paper, unheaded and with but two typewritten lines:

I believe you are looking for Paul Billson.

Why don’t you come to see me?

There was a signature underneath but it was an indecipherable scrawl.

I glanced at the Arab. ‘Who sent this?’

He answered with a gesture towards the hotel entrance. ‘This way.’

I pondered for a moment and nodded, then followed him from the hotel where he opened the rear door of a big Mercedes. I sat down and he slammed the door smartly and got behind the wheel. As he started the engine I said, ‘Where are we going?’

‘Bouzarea.’ After that he concentrated on his driving and refused to answer questions. I gave up, leaned back in cushioned luxury, and watched Algiers flow by.

The road to Bouzarea climbed steeply out of the city and I twisted to look through the back window and saw Algiers spread below with the Mediterranean beyond, darkening towards the east as the sun set. Already strings of lights were appearing in the streets.

I turned back as the car swung around a corner and pulled up against a long wall, blank except for a small door. The Arab got out and opened the car door and indicated the door in the wall which was already swinging open. I walked through into a large walled garden which appeared to be slightly smaller than Windsor Great Park, but not much. In the middle distance was a low-slung, flat-roofed house which rambled inconsequently over the better part of an acre. The place stank of money.

The door behind closed with the snap of a lock and I turned to confront another Arab, an old man with a seamed, walnut face. I didn’t understand what he said but the beckoning gesture was unmistakable, so I followed him towards the house.

He led me through the house and into an inner courtyard, upon which he vanished like a puff of smoke into some hidden recess. A woman lay upon a chaise-longue. ‘Stafford?’

‘Yes—Max Stafford.’

She was oldish, about sixty plus, I guessed, and was dressed in a style which might have been thought old-fashioned. Her hair was white and she could have been anyone’s old mother but for two things. The first was her face, which was tanned to the colour of brown shoe leather. There was a network of deep wrinkles about her eyes which betokened too much sun, and those eyes were a startling blue. The blue eyes and the white hair set against that face made a spectacular combination. The second thing was that she was smoking the biggest Havana cigar I’ve ever seen.

‘What’s your poison? Scotch? Rye? Gin? You name it.’ Her voice was definitely North American.

I smiled slowly. ‘I never take drinks from strangers.’

She laughed. ‘I’m Hesther Raulier. Sit down, Max Stafford, but before you do, pour yourself a drink. Save me getting up.’

There was an array of bottles on a portable bar so I went and poured myself a scotch and added water from a silver jug. As I sat in the wicker chair she said, ‘What are you doing in Algiers?’

She spoke English but when she said ‘Algiers’ it came out as ‘el Djeza’ir’. Then she was speaking Arabic. I said, ‘Looking for Paul Billson.’

‘Why?’

I sipped the scotch. ‘What business is it of yours?’

She offered me a gamine grin. ‘I’ll tell you if you tell me.’

I looked up at the sky. ‘Is it always as pleasant here in winter?’

She laid down her cigar carefully in a big ashtray. ‘So okay, Stafford; you’re a hard trader. But just tell me one thing. Are you here to hurt Paul?’

‘Why should I want to hurt him?’

‘For Christ’s sake!’ she said irritably. ‘Must you always answer a question with a question?’

‘Yes, I must,’ I said sharply. ‘Until you declare your interest.’

‘So, all right; let’s quit fencing.’ She swung her legs off the chaise-longue and stood up. Her build was stocky and she was a muscular old bird. ‘I was a friend of Paul’s father.’

That sounded promising, so I gave measure for measure. ‘His sister is worried about him.’

Her voice was sharp. ‘His sister? I didn’t know Peter Billson had a daughter.’

‘He didn’t. His widow remarried during the war to a Norwegian who was killed. Alix Aarvik is Paul’s half-sister.’

Hesther Raulier seemed lost in thought. After a while she said, ‘Poor Helen; she sure had a tough time.’

‘Did you know her?’

‘I knew them both.’ She went over to the bar and poured a hefty slug of neat rye whisky. She downed the lot in one swallow and shuddered a little. ‘Paul told me Helen had died but he said nothing about a sister.’

‘He wouldn’t.’

She swung around. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

‘He treated her pretty badly. People don’t talk about those to whom they’ve been unkind. I’ll tell you this much—Paul wasn’t much help to his mother in her last years.’ I picked up my glass again. ‘Why should you think I’d hurt Paul?’

She gave me a level stare. ‘I’ll have to know a lot more about you before I tell you that, Max Stafford.’

‘Fair enough,’ I said. ‘And I’ll need to know a lot more about you.’

She smiled faintly. ‘Seems we’re going to have us a real gabfest. You’d better stay to dinner.’

‘Thanks. But tell me something. Where is Paul now?’

‘Come with me,’ she said, and led me into the garden where she pointed to the south at a low range of hills just visible in the twilight. ‘See those? Those are the foothills of the Atlas. Paul Billson is way to hell and gone the other side.’

By the time we went in to dinner our stiff-legged attitude had relaxed. I was curious about this elderly, profane woman who used an antique American slang; any moment I expected her to come out with ‘twenty-three, skidoo’. I gave her a carefully edited account and ended up, ‘That’s it; that’s why I’m here.’

She was drinking whisky as though she ran her own distillery at the bottom of the garden but not one white hair had twitched. ‘A likely story,’ she said sardonically. ‘A big important man like you drops everything and comes to Algiers looking for Paul. Are you sweet on Alix Aarvik?’

‘I hardly know her. Besides, she’s too young for me.’

‘No girl is too young for any man—I know. You’ll have to do better than that, Max.’

‘It was a chain of circumstances,’ I said tiredly. ‘For one thing I’m divorcing my wife and I wanted to get out of it for a while.’

‘Divorcing your wife,’ she repeated. ‘Because of Alix Aarvik?’

‘Because the man in her bed wasn’t me,’ I snapped.

‘I believe you,’ she said soothingly. ‘Okay, what’s your percentage? What do you get out of it?’

‘I don’t know what you mean.’

A cold blue eye bored into me. ‘Look, buster; don’t give me any of that Limey blandness. You tell me what I want to know or you get nothing.’

I sighed. ‘Maybe I don’t like being beaten up,’ I said, and told her the rest of it.

She was silent for a moment, then said, ‘That’s a hell of a concoction—but I believe it. It’s too crazy to be a spur-of-the-moment story.’

‘I’m glad to hear you say that,’ I said feelingly. ‘Now it’s my turn. How do you happen to live in Algiers—for starters.’

She looked surprised. ‘Hell, I was born here.’ It seemed that her father was of French-Arab mixture and her mother was Canadian; how that unlikely match came about she didn’t say. Her mother must have been a strong-minded woman because Hesther was sent to school in Canada instead of going to France like most of the children of the wealthy French colonists.

‘But I haven’t been back in years,’ she said. That would account for her outdated slang.

She had met Peter Billson in Canada. ‘He was older than I was, of course,’ she said. ‘Let’s see; it must have been 1933, so I’d be seventeen.’

And Billson was thirty. Hesther was on vacation, visiting the home of a schoolfriend, when Billson came into her life. She was the guest of McKenzie, a wealthy Canadian who was interested in the development of air travel, particularly in the more remote parts of Canada. Billson had begun to make a name for himself, so McKenzie had invited him for a long weekend to pick his brains.

Hesther said, ‘It was like meeting God—you know what kids are. These days they go nuts over long-haired singers but in those days the fliers were top of the heap.’

‘What sort of a man was he?’

‘He was a man,’ she said simply. She stared blindly back into the past. ‘Of course he had his faults—who hasn’t?—but they were the faults of his profession. Peter Billson was a good pilot, a brave man ambitious for fame, an exhibitionist—all the early fliers were like that, all touting for the adulation of the idiotic public.’

‘How well did you get to know him?’

She gave me a sideways look. ‘About as well as a woman can get to know a man. 1933 was the year I lost my virginity.’

It was hard to imagine this tough, leathery woman as a seventeen-year-old in the toils of love. ‘Was that before Billson married?’

Hesther shook her head. ‘I felt like hell when I had to talk to Helen over the coffee cups. I was sure I had guilt printed right across my forehead.’

‘How long did you know him?’

‘Until he died. I was supposed to come back here in 1934 but I managed to stretch out another year—because of Peter. He used to see me every time he was in Toronto. Then in 1935 I had to come back because my mother threatened to cut off the funds. The next time I saw Peter was when he landed here during the London to Cape Town Air Race of ’36. I saw him take off from here and I never saw him again.’ There was a bleakness in her voice when she added, ‘I never married, you know.’

There wasn’t much to say to that. After a few moments I broke the uncomfortable silence. ‘I hope you won’t mind telling me a bit more about that. Did you know his flight plan, for instance?’

‘I don’t mind,’ she said a little wearily. ‘But I don’t know much. I was a girl of twenty, remember—and no technician. He had that beefed-up Northrop which was a freight carrier. Jock Anderson had installed extra gas tanks in the cargo space and the plan was to fly south from Algiers to Kano in Nigeria. The desert crossing was going to be the most difficult leg, so Jock came here with a team to give the plane a thorough check before Peter took off.’

‘Jock Anderson—who was he?’

‘The flight mechanic. Peter and Jock had been together a long time. Peter flew the planes and pushed them hard, and Jock kept the pieces together when they threatened to bust apart. They made a good team. Jock was a good engineer.’

‘What happened to him afterwards?’

‘When Peter disappeared he broke up. I’ve never seen a man get drunk so fast. He went on a three-day splurge, then he sobered-up and left Algiers. I haven’t seen him since.’

I pondered on that but it led nowhere. ‘What do you think of Paul Billson?’

‘I think he’s a nut,’ she said. ‘Hysterical and crazy. Totally unlike his father in every way.’

‘How did you get to know him?’

‘Same way as I got to know you. I have ears all over this city and when I heard of a man looking into Peter Billson I was curious so I sent for him.’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘Where is he?’

‘Gone looking for his Daddy. By now he’ll be in Tammanrasset.’

‘Where’s that?’

Hesther gave me a crooked smile. ‘You go south into the desert until you’re going out of the desert. That’s Tammanrasset, in the Ahaggar about two thousand kilometres south of here. Plumb in the middle of the Sahara.’

I whistled. ‘Why there?’

‘If you’re looking for something in the Ahaggar, Tam is a good place to start.’

‘What’s the Ahaggar like?’

Hesther looked at me for a moment before she said, ‘Mountainous and dry.’

‘How big?’

‘Christ, I don’t know—I haven’t measured it lately. Wait a minute.’ She went away and returned with a book. ‘The Annexe du Hoggar—that’s the administrative area—is 380,000 square kilometres.’ She looked up. ‘I don’t know what that is in square miles; you’ll have to figure that yourself.’

I did, and it came to nearly 150,000 square miles—three times the area of the United Kingdom. ‘Paul Billson is crazy,’ I said. ‘What’s the population?’

Hesther consulted the book again. ‘About twelve thousand.’

‘There doesn’t seem much to administer. People are thin on the ground out there.’

‘If you go there you’ll find out why,’ she said. ‘Are you thinking of going after him?’

‘The idea has crossed my mind,’ I admitted. ‘Which makes me as crazy as he is, I suppose.’

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