Deadlock (5 page)

'Bomb Squad. They'll come down this road. Either from Lakenheath or Heathrow.'

She drank more coffee. 'God, I'm thirsty.'

'Dehydration. Delayed shock.' He drank coffee from the chinaware mug she handed him. 'Me, too. I'm parched as the Sahara. Did that woman volunteer the breakfast?'

'Actually, no. I asked her.'

'You really are a practical girl,' he commented. 'And I noticed how you kept your cool back at the house. Good for you.'

'Did you read the card attached to that plastic bag on my doorstep?'

'No.'

'It said,
For Paula. With love
. In strange handwriting.'

4

The Heathrow Bomb Squad arrived first. Tweed climbed out of the Mercedes as the two police cars he'd arranged to wait at Langham airfield drove past the car park. He ran, catching them up as they stopped a few yards behind the rope barrier. A three-pipper in Army uniform alighted, carrying a large box, followed by a sergeant and a corporal.

'Captain Nicholls?' Tweed panted.

The officer, tall and unsmiling and with alert grey eyes turned round. He looked Tweed up and down. 'Yes,' he replied in a clipped tone. 'What is it?'

'I'm Tweed.' He showed his Special Branch folder produced in the documents section in the Park Crescent basement. 'I called you on the phone. I'll show you exactly where it is . . .'

'Any idea how long the thing's been sitting there?'

'It could have been parked on the doorstep any time after ten last night. There's a plant sticking out. A large plastic bag.' They were walking side by side and the Captain grasped Tweed's arm as they reached the rope.

'No need for you to proceed any further, sir. If you'd just locate it . . .'

'Come to the other end of the rope.' Tweed pointed. 'It is parked on a doorstep exactly opposite that lamp-post. The whole immediate area has been evacuated.'

'Then I'd go back and stay in your car, sir. Our job now.'

'I'd appreciate a report on what you find.' Tweed paused. 'Good luck.'

Nicholls stared hard at Tweed. A wintry smile appeared briefly. 'You seem to know a bit about these jobs. Luck
does
come into it. See you later, sir.' On this optimistic note he turned to his men. 'Let's get cracking, lads.'

Tweed returned to the car. Paula would be under pressure. It was important to see how she was coping. He found her with a sketch-pad on her knee, drawing with a felt-tip pen. 'I use this for working out new pottery designs,' she said without looking up. 'Carry it with me everywhere.'

Tweed checked the time by his watch and drank the last of the coffee. Ten minutes later he checked his watch again. Paula closed her book and folded her arm inside his as she asked the question. 'Something's bothering you?'

'Yes. I want to warn you. The police will question you soon. They may be London men from the Anti-Terrorist Squad. Shrewd as a barrel of monkeys. So let's get your story straight. No mention about following that chap who may - or may not - be Lee Foley. Start your story with going to the front door. I was on holiday and you offered me a bed for the night. Then jump to this morning. Tell them how it happened. The way I grabbed you, etc. Keep it simple.'

'They may be curious you spent the night in my house.'

'Who cares?' He hastily corrected himself. 'You mean your local reputation could go down the drain?'

'I couldn't give an "f" for my local reputation. I'll do as you say. I won't let you down. Now answer my question -the one you dodged.'

'Which one?'

'Something's bothering you - something else. You keep checking your watch and your mouth tightened the third time.'

'All right. They've been there over half an hour. If it had been all right - a harmless package - they'd have been back before now. It is a bomb.'

Three hours later Captain Nicholls appeared alone beyond the rope. Ducking under it, he walked to the car park, glanced at Paula and frowned at Tweed. Climbing out of the car, Tweed bent down and spoke to Paula before closing the door.

'Won't be long. I think the captain wants a word with me.'

'Take your time . . .'

Nicholls strolled up to the deserted top of the car park with Tweed. He lit a cigarette and waved the pack before replacing it in his pocket. 'Don't normally use them any more. This one tastes very good.'

'It was a bomb?'

'Forty pounds of TNT. It would have converted that house into a pile of powdered rubble. NO hope for anyone inside. Same for the houses on either side. A bit tricky, this one. My chaps are taking the TNI out on to the marshes for a controlled detonation. They'll have to walk miles. Conservation area and all that.'

'Instant detonation if the woman living there had picked it up?'

'Oh, absolutely. She'd have been blown -into a million pieces. Bit of a bore, the time we took - but it had been tricked out with all kinds of gadgets. You did say Special Branch?'

Silently Tweed handed over his folder. Nicholls examined the document very carefully this time. He compared the photo with its subject, then handed back the folder.

'What was so special about that bomb that made you double-check my identity?'

'You want the details?' Nicholls took a deep drag on the cigarette.

The lot, please.'

'First, it had a plate of steel lined with lead facing towards the waterfront. That would create
implosion
- most of the blast would have gone into and up the house.'

The harbour would have suffered?'

'Not a chance. Second - and this is particularly confidential-it was not the work of
any
kind of terrorist. Absolutely not.'

'How do you know that?'

The new and highly sophisticated mechanism. Perfected no more than a year ago. Of course, normally the explosive wouldn't be TNI - but it was just right for taking out that house. The one item which could be improved - in my opinion - is the timer . . .'

Nicholls sported a small trim moustache. He fingered it with the nail of his index finger. Apart from the cigarette, Tweed could detect no trace of the enormous tension the officer must have laboured under. The professional had taken over and his tone was full of enthusiasm as he went on.

'Devilish clever device though. Really a weapon of war - for use by saboteurs on major naval targets when the balloon goes up.'

'It sounds pretty heavy - all that steel and lead,' commented Tweed. 'Surely no plastic bag would hold it?'

'Very cunning, these johnnies. Inside that plastic bag was a smaller one. Made of reinforced leather - with a carrying handle. You do have a point. No one could have carried it far. Probably transported by car. Maybe they parked it a few yards back from the target house, then carted it the rest of the way.'

'Or brought it in by boat. The deep-water channel is opposite that house, and I noticed a metal ladder attached to the sea wall.'

'That's something I didn't think of. Yes, it could be brought in that way. This is going to create a stink in high places.'

'Why?'

'Well, you mentioned luck - and we were lucky. We would have been plastered all over Blakeney but for Naval Intelligence. They smuggled a sample to us a few months ago. The lab boys took it apart - under the guidance of a naval commander - so we knew what we were doing.'

'Does this naval commander have a name?'

'Well . . .' Nicholls chewed his lower lip, then smiled. 'Seeing as you chappies are concerned with the internal security of the State I suppose it is your business. Though it foxes me why the device was used here. It's main purpose is use as a sea-mine. Commander Bellenger is your man.

My job now is to get the shell - complete with mechanism - back to Admiralty. Anything more?'

'This sounds something entirely new. You said it couldn't be any kind of terrorist. Where was the blasted thing made?'

'Moscow, old boy. Compliments of the Soviet Union.'

5

The bad news came in a telephone call. It so often did, Tweed thought.

Blakeney had returned to normal. Rope barriers had vanished, as had the uniformed police. The Lakenheath Bomb Squad team came and went, relieved that someone else had done the dirty work. The coaster on the front had resumed unloading its soya bean meal.

Tweed stood staring out of the front room window. Low tide. Masted boats were scattered along the creek banks, heeled over in the mud at drunken angles. An elderly man, well-wrapped against the brisk wind, wearing a deerstalker hat with field glasses looped from his neck, walked along the front. Birdwatcher.

'Paula,' Tweed began, 'if you still want the job with me it's available . . .'

'Great,' she said coolly. 'I'll start packing. And I'll call the buyer of my pottery business to clinch the deal . . .'

'Why not delay that?' he warned. 'You'll join on six months' probation. It's the regulation . . .'

'I'll take my chances. I've built that business as far as I want to. I've thought up God knows how many designs for pots for the Californian market. There's nothing ahead but more and more expansion. I want something new - a fresh challenge.'

'Monica might be a problem,' he warned again. 'She could resent the arrival of a younger woman. She's been with me forever.'

'I've talked with her on the phone. She sounds nice. That's my problem - and I'm confident I can handle it.'

'And this house?'

'I'm keeping it on. Somewhere quiet to visit when I can . . .'

The phone rang. 'That will be my buyer,' she continued. 'I gather he's keen as mustard. The profits for the past three years are very good. And don't forget - we have to visit Mrs Massingham at Cockley Cley, get all the gossip about Cockley Ford for you . . .'

She was in the narrow hall, lifting the phone. Tweed stood watching the wasteland, thinking why he'd decided to employ her. Two main reasons. One, the calm, controlled way she'd reacted to the bomb and the later period of waiting. Two, and it was a very secondary consideration - had to be - he liked her.

'It's for you,' she called out. 'Monica. Says it's urgent.'

'Blast!'

'I hoped I was safe here,' were his opening words when he took the call.

'I'm frightfully sorry . . .'Monica sounded nervous,'But you did say you were going to Paula's. There's a crisis, Major, over a new insurance contract. They're running round in circles since they found you'd gone.'

'Who are "they"?'

Top management. And Howard is frantic.'

Monica knew she was talking on an open line. Translation: a summons from the PM, no less. Howard in a dither. Something very serious.

'All right.' He sighed audibly. 'I'll be back by nightfall. It was a bloody short holiday.'

'You grumbled enough about going,' she said waspishly.

'I'll be back,' he repeated. 'With a new recruit.'

He put down the receiver before she could ask about that - and immediately felt guilty. Monica was only doing her job. He ran upstairs where Paula was packing swiftly in her bedroom.

'A major crisis back at the ranch. We have to be at Park Crescent by nightfall. Looks as though you're going straight in at the deep end.'

'Best way to learn to swim,' she replied, deftly folding more clothes, laying them neatly in the case. 'That would give us time to call in at Cockley Cley, wouldn't it?'

'I suppose I'd better just check. It was a weird business - and it could just be linked with the bomb.'

'Don't follow . . .'

'The Porsche driver took your picture. Dough-face carried a photo of you when he was tracking down where you lived. So, there's your link.'

Cockley Cley was almost the twin of Cockley Ford. The same grassy green shaped like a triangle, the same huddle of old cottages, the same approach up a long narrow road. But no gate, no inn, no stream.

Tweed let Paula do the talking while he studied Mrs Massingham. Must be close to eighty, a tall, thin woman with grey hair and the face of a golden eagle. Her legs were thin as a couple of sticks but she had a commanding presence, a clear mind. He wasn't surprised to hear she'd been a senior Civil Servant, a Principal.