A Woman Involved (28 page)

He was astonished.

‘No you’re not. The plane’s coming back for you tomorrow.’

‘And I’m flying into Switzerland as crew?’

‘Correct.’

‘Then I can fly as crew tonight. You jump, I’ll stay with the plane all the way, as crew.’

‘You agreed this morning! –’

‘And I’ve been awake all afternoon rethinking it. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t come. Flying back here for me will cost a bomb. It’s the same plan, only easier. And cheaper.’ She added, ‘And I’m paying for it.’

Morgan seethed. ‘Anna, you’ve entrusted the planning to me. And it’s going to be the way I say! Jesus – there’re too many cooks for this broth. Me, Makepeace, now Danziger, now you!’ He sat angrily and pulled on his shoes.

‘It’s my broth! And I’m the paymaster.’

‘Anna, I’m not having you in Zurich until I’ve seen the lie of the land.’

‘I’m coming,’she said quietly. She turned for the door. Morgan
bounded off the bed at her, and grabbed her arm. He pulled her back to the bed and firmly pushed her down onto it. She tried to scramble up and he firmly pushed her down again. He snatched up his jacket and turned for the door. He snatched the big key out of the lock. Anna bounded up and grabbed the door. He shoved out his hand to push her away, and she grabbed his arm, and the next moment he was rolling through the air. In one movement she had caught him off balance and dropped her shoulder and rolled him over her back, onto the floor.

He hit the stone tiles with a thud. He looked up at her, absolutely amazed. He said, ‘How did you do that?’

She stood over him, hair awry.

‘Oh Jack, are you all right?’ She dropped to her knees beside him to help him up. ‘Oh, I’m sorry! Are you hurt?’

Morgan clambered to his feet.

‘When did you learn judo?’

’ I’m sorry, I just did it naturally

‘Nonsense, you did it expertly.’

‘I learned it at university.’ She tried to dust him off.

‘Any other accomplishments I don’t know about? Alligator-wrestling, maybe? Sword-swallowing?’

‘Jack,, I’m coming.’

Morgan closed his eyes. Then realized what to do.

‘All right,’ he sighed. He waved his hand at the bathroom. ‘Go’n get your things.’

She turned and hurried across the dungeon.

Morgan strode through the door, and slammed it behind him. He rammed the key in the lock and turned it. He leant against it.

‘Hey!’ Anna pounded on the door. ‘Hey – open it, you bastard!’

‘Anna?’ he said. ‘I love you.’

He turned and bounded the stone steps, two at a time.

‘
Jack, you bastard! … 
’

Morgan emerged through the door under the stairs. There were bangs from below. He closed the door shakily behind him.

Xaviera was the same height as Anna. Under a raincoat, she could have been of a similar figure. She wore a headscarf.

‘Pity we can’t dress you up as a whore,’ she said, ‘but we don’t go in for bull-dykes here.’

The bar was in half-darkness; there were three girls, in overcoats, waiting to go home. Jesus, he didn’t like all these people knowing, Xaviera went to the front door and looked out through the spy hole. ‘Do these girls know who we are?’ he whispered.

‘They don’t even know Anna’s still downstairs. They just think you’re a sado-masochist who’s had enough for the day. The only one who knows is Erik.’

‘They’re not coming in the same car with us, are they?’

‘No. Another car.’

Morgan turned to Erik. He was a big man in his mid-forties, tough and neat in a dinner jacket. Morgan led him aside. He handed him the key. ‘Anna’s a bit upset. In about an hour will you take her a nice bottle of wine?’

‘Certainly, sir.’

Morgan said, ‘She’s very worried and wants to come with me. I’ve persuaded her against it, but she may change her mind. Will you see she doesn’t leave the house, under any circumstances?’

‘Certainly. I keep the keys to all outside doors, anyway.’

‘Good. Be kind to her, Erik.’ He slipped two hundred and fifty dollars into his hand. ‘You get the other half when we come back for her.’

Xaviera was looking through the spy hole again.

‘Here it is.’ She unlocked the door. ‘Come.’

Morgan hurried down the front steps beside her, his eye sweeping the dark canal. There were many parked cars in the shadows.

Their driver was Joop who had first driven him last night. He drove off down the canal street. Morgan looked through the windows. All was still. Then a car reversed out of the shadows on the other side of the canal.

‘Here we go …’ he muttered. And he felt exhausted again. And furious with Makepeace again for shooting his mouth off to Xaviera. And sick about leaving Anna like that.

Their car was approaching the end of the block. He looked back again, and he saw something else: a motorboat was cruising down the canal. He sat back angrily. ‘Have you seen the boat?’

‘
Ja
,’ Joop said.

‘Well that’s the first job – lose the boat. Go where it can’t follow us. Then lose that car. Where’s the canal we pick up our boat?’

‘On the other side of town.’

He thought shakily: So the Dutch police have tipped off the British. And some nice bent Dutch copper has probably tipped off the Comrades as well …  But there was one consolation: the Dutch police had not raided the Yab Yum. Which meant that the British were definitely playing a waiting game, to see where they went. Which meant that they had not cracked the Swiss code of banking secrecy.

Joop turned down a narrow street towards the Royal Palace. And the boat was lost. As easy as that.

Morgan looked back. The car following them turned onto the bridge. It was a Citroën.

Joop swung right out of Mozes en Aaronstraat, in the Damrak, at normal speed. The Citroën turned after them. Joop turned right again, into Duitersteeg. ‘
Hou vas!’
he said, and he trod on the accelerator.

The car roared up the short one-way street. Ahead was Kalver Straat. Parked on the corner was an old Renault, its engine running. Joop swung right into Kalver. The Citroën was just turning into Duitersteeg. The Renault pulled away and swung into Duitersteeg, towards the Citroën. The Citroën slammed on its brakes, its horn blasting.

‘Bloody well done! Whose plan was that?’

Joop was driving fast down Kalver. ‘Dan Danziger.’

Morgan looked back. Nobody was following them. The streets were quiet, at eleven o’clock on a Sunday night.

He sat back, with a tense sigh of relief. And tried to put Anna out of his mind.

Joop drove fast across Amsterdam, turning left and right, and right again and left again. Street signs, canals, bridges, lights sped past. Morgan kept looking back, but nobody was following them. Ahead now was the wide Amstel canal. Joop drove along the left bank, then turned into a narrow street. A canal ran alongside it, with houseboats and barges moored.

‘Your boat is at the end.’

Morgan gripped Xaviera’s hand. ‘Thank you. Look after Anna.’

‘Erik won’t let her out of his sight.’

‘She’s very upset. Almost irrational. Be kind to her.’

Joop stopped the car. ‘Out.’

Morgan scrambled out of the car. A speedboat was moored to the embankment, a man behind the wheel. Morgan clambered down into the boat. The man slipped the mooring line, and shoved off. The boat surged away.

It turned left into the Muidergracht. There was a bridge. The Dutchman opened the throttles, and the bows came up.

Ahead was the harbour. The boat sped down the dark canal. Now they were in dockland, big warehouses, barges, cranes. Behind them were the lights of central Amsterdam, the IJ haven, the railway terminus. The boat swung into the Mond, and the harbour opened out. They sped through the locks. And ahead lay the IJ-meer, big and black, and the Dutchman opened up the throttles wide.

Morgan felt limp with relief. ‘Thank you! What’s your name?’

‘No names, no comebacks,’ the man grinned.

The boat sped over the black inland sea, the bows smack-smacking. Way ahead to the east was a sprinkling of shore lights.

For fifteen minutes the boat smacked out into the blackness, without any lights. Then the Dutchman slowed the engines to idle. The boat settled, gently putt-putting. There were no lights of other boats. The Dutchman produced a torch from under the seat.

He pointed to the north-east. ‘That’s where he’ll come from.’

The Grummond twin-engined seaplane came roaring low out of the night, no lights on. The Dutchman flashed his torch.

The floats hit the water and spray flew up. The Dutchman eased open the throttles on the boat.

The seaplane went churning across the dark sea, the radio angrily rasping at it; then it turned around, spluttering. The boat swung out and went churning around the back of it. The boat eased into the blast of the propellers. Morgan grabbed the float. He clambered onto it, clutching the strut. Makepeace
had the door open. Morgan flung his bag up, then clambered up.

‘Where’s Mrs Hapsburg?’ Makepeace shouted.

‘She’s not coming.’

The Dutchman was already churning away. Morgan clambered into a rear seat and the pilot eased out the throttle and the seaplane surged forward. Morgan pulled on the headset and heard Schipol control rasping: ‘
Repeat – where are you? –’

The seaplane went roaring across the sea, faster and faster, the spray flying, then the pilot eased back the yoke. And up she came, and the lights of Amsterdam began to unfold. The pilot pressed his radio button and said:

‘Terribly sorry about that, Schipol. I had a spot of engine trouble and just had to put down, but I’m all right now. This is seaplane Alpha Victory Zulu three four two proceeding to Lake Como, Italy, as per my filed flight plan …’

A few minutes later, an air traffic control officer at Schipol airport was taking his hourly break. He went down to a public telephone. He dialled the home number of a policeman.

‘I think I have your man. It’s the only aircraft that has made an unauthorized landing and take-off tonight. I’ll give you the flight plan he filed in Copenhagen …’

Forty minutes later the Dutch policeman was sitting in his car alongside a dark canal, talking to Vladimir Ustinov and a cultural officer of the Russian embassy.

‘The flight plan gives the destination as Lake Como in Italy. They’re flying a Grummond Twin, which means they can only cruise at about a hundred knots, so they’ll get there just after sunrise. You have ample time to alert your people in Italy. Meanwhile, as a policeman I can telephone the Italian police at Lake Como and tell them I’m very interested in where the people on this plane go. And tell them to ask the Italian air traffic control for the details of further flight plans this aircraft files …’

The pilot’s name was Ole Eriksen. He had a round, creased face and a scraggly blond beard.

The lights of Amsterdam slipped by below. Makepeace handed Morgan a can of beer, then clambered out of the co-pilot’s seat and came back to him. ‘Why didn’t you bring Mrs Hapsburg?’

Morgan took a long swallow of the beer. He hardly tasted it. ‘Too dangerous. We saw what happened in New York.’

‘But, I thought she had to get into her safety-deposit box?’

Morgan’s nerves were tight. ‘She’s given me a Power of Attorney to open it. It’s perfectly legal.’ He did not know whether Makepeace believed that and he did not care.

‘I see,’ Makepeace said. ‘So, after you’ve been to the bank, where do we go?’

‘Back to Amsterdam to fetch Anna.’

Makepeace shook his head. ‘And then? Still to England?’

Morgan sighed. It depended on what was in that goddam box. He could not bear to think about what he was going to do with that. ‘I hope so.’

‘You
hope
so? You better think about it pretty damn quick. Danziger is not going to like flying back to Amsterdam to fetch Anna. He’s planned a direct flight from Zurich to Ireland.’

Morgan’s anger flared. ‘Ireland, huh?’

Makepeace said earnestly, ‘He’s got a safe place for the seaplane to land, a safe house for you to hole up in. From Ireland to England there’re no immigration formalities. Perfect.’

‘So you’ve spoken to him since last night?’

‘He called me in Copenhagen. To check everything was All Systems Go.’

‘And what did he say?’

‘He told me about Ireland. And that everything is A-okay his end. Cars, boats, escape route, everything.’

‘Was the telephone line secure?’

‘Sure. It was pay-phone to pay-phone.’

Morgan sighed.

‘Okay, Dougie. Thank you. But there’s something else I’ll thank you to remember.
I’m
the paymaster, not Danziger. So, you hired Dan, and he seems to have taken over the planning. So far he’s done well. But
don’t
tell me Danziger is not going to like this or that change of plan. I’ll fly to goddam Timbuktu if I like! I call the shots around here, Douglas. Understood?’

Makepeace glowered. ‘Understood,’ he muttered. ‘But it’s going to be no simple matter picking up Mrs Hapsburg, we can’t keep dropping out of the sky like tonight, they’ll be wise to us – it’ll take
planning. That’s
what this whole operation has lacked so far. Everything’s off the cuff.’

‘Everything’s
happened
off the cuff! So tell the pilot and start planning.’

‘I wish I knew what all this was about,’ Makepeace grumbled ‘– then I could plan better.’ He added: ‘Personally, I don’t think you should go to England, if the heat’s still on. Maybe you should lie low for a bit:’

‘Like where?’

Makepeace said, ‘Like my farm in France. I mean
your
farm, now. It’s nice there, up in the mountains. Not a soul would know you’re there. No neighbours. Forest.’

‘That’s no good. I own the place, that must be known to the French authorities.’

‘Is it? Registered in your name already?’

‘I gave the title deeds and our contract to a solicitor in London, and told him to fix it all up.’

‘There you are!’ Makepeace said. ‘So it’s still registered in my brother-in-law’s name.’

‘Your brother-in-law? I bought the bloody place from you!’

‘Yes, but
I
bought it from my brother-in-law. But I never actually registered it in my name because I was broke. I only did that when I sold it to you, so that legally I could sell it … So the French are still working this lot out. It takes
years
in France.
I
haven’t yet had any papers from the Frogs, you know – transfer taxes and all that crap.’