Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less (21 page)

Adrian handed round the final schedule of
rehearsals at Harley Street and St. Thomas’s, and consulted the green file
again.

“I have booked four single rooms on
different floors at the Hotel de Paris and confirmed all the arrangements with
the Centre Hos-pitalier Princesse Grace. The hotel is reputed to be one of the
best in the
world–it’s
certainly expensive enough–but
it is very near the Casino. We fly to Nice on Monday, the day after Harvey is
due to arrive on his yacht.”

“What do we do for the rest of the week?”
enquired James innocently.

Stephen resumed control.

“We master the green dossier–backwards,
frontwards and sideways for a full dress rehearsal on Friday. The most
important thing for you, James, is to get a grip of yourself and let us know
what you intend to do.”

James sank back into gloom.

Stephen closed his file briskly.

“That seems to be all we can do tonight.”

“Hang on, Stephen,” said Adrian. “Let’s
strip you off once more. I’d like to see if we can do it in ninety seconds.”

Stephen lay down slightly reluctantly in the
middle of the room, and James and Jean Pierre swiftly and carefully removed his
clothes.

“Eighty-seven seconds.
Excellent,” said Adrian, looking down at
Stephen, naked except for his watch. “Hell, look at the time. I must get back
to Newbury. My wife will think I have a mistress and I don’t fancy any of you.”

Stephen dressed himself quickly while the
others prepared to leave. A few minutes later, James stood by the front door,
watching them depart one by one. As soon as Stephen was out of sight, he
bounded downstairs into the kitchen.

“Did you listen?”

“Yes, darling.
They’re rather nice and I don’t blame them
for being cross with you. They are being very professional about the whole
venture. Frankly, you sounded like the only amateur. We’ll have to think up
something good for you to match them. We’ve over a week before Mr. Metcalfe
goes to Monte Carlo.”

James sighed: “Well, let’s enjoy tonight. At
least this morning was a triumph.”

“Yes, but not yours. Tomorrow we work.”

“
Passengers for Flight 017 to Nice are now
requested to check in at Gate Number Seven,” boomed the loudspeaker at Heathrow
Airport.

“That’s us,” said Stephen.

The four of them ascended the escalator to
the first floor, and walked down the long corridor. After being searched for
guns, bombs or whatever terrorists are searched for, they boarded the aircraft.

They sat separately, neither looking nor
speaking one to the other. Stephen had warned them that the flight could well
be sprinkled with Harvey’s friends, and each imagined himself to be sitting
next to the closest of them.

James gazed moodily at the cloudless sky and
brooded. He and Anne had read every book they could lay their hands on that
even hinted at stolen money or successful duplicity, but they had found nothing
they could plagiarise. Even Stephen, in the intervals of being undressed and
practised upon at St. Thomas’s, was becoming daunted by the task of finding a
winning plan for James.

The Trident touched down at Nice at 13:40,
and the train journey from Nice to Monte Carlo took them a further twenty
minutes. Each member of the team made his separate way to the elegant Hotel de
Paris in the Place du Casino. At 7 P.M. they were all present in Room 217.

“So far, so good,” said Adrian. “Jean
Pierre, you will go to the Casino tonight and play a few hands of baccarat and
blackjack. Try to acclimatise to the place and learn your way round it. Do you
foresee any problems?”

“No, Adrian. I may as well go now and start
rehearsing.”

“Don’t lose too much of our money,” said
Stephen.

Jean Pierre, resplendent in beard and dinner
jacket, grinned and slipped out of Room 217 and down the staircase, avoiding
the lift. He walked the short distance from the hotel to the famous Casino.

Adrian continued:

“James, you take a taxi from the Casino to
the hospital. On arriving at the hospital leave the meter running for a few
minutes and then return to the Casino. You can normally rely on a taxi taking
the shortest route, but to be sure, tell the driver it’s an emergency. That
will give you the opportunity of seeing which traffic lanes he uses under
pressure. When he has returned you to the Casino, walk the route from there to
the hospital and back. Then you can assimilate it in your own time. After you’ve
mastered that, repeat the same procedure for the route between the hospital and
Harvey’s yacht.”

“What about my knowledge of the Casino on
the night of the operation?”

“Jean Pierre will take care of that. He’ll
meet you at the door because Stephen won’t be able to leave Harvey. I don’t
think they will charge you the twelve franc entrance fee because of your white
coat and the stretcher. When you have completed the walk, go to your room and
stay there till the meeting at eleven o’clock tomorrow. Stephen and I will be
going to the hospital to check that all the arrangements have been carried out
as cabled from London.”

Just as James left Room 217, Jean Pierre arrived
at the Casino.

It stands in the .heart of Monte Carlo,
surrounded by beautiful gardens looking over the sea. The present building has
several wings, the oldest of which is the one designed by Charles Garnier, the
architect of the Paris Opera House. The gambling rooms, which were added in
1910, are linked by an atrium to the Salle Garnier, in which operas and ballets
are performed.

Jean Pierre marched up the marble staircase
to the entrance and paid his twelve francs. The gambling rooms are vast and
display the decadence and grandeur of Europe at the turn of the century.

Massive red carpets, statues, paintings and
tapestries give the building an almost royal appearance and the portraits lend
an air of a country home still lived in. The clientele were of all
nationalities–Arabs and Jews played next to each other at the roulette wheel
and
it
looked more like a gathering
of the United Nations than a casino. Jean Pierre was totally at ease in the
unreal world of the wealthy. Adrian had summed up his character very quickly
and given him a role he would master with aplomb.

Jean Pierre spent over three hours mastering
the layout of the Casino–its gambling rooms, bars and restaurants, the
telephones, the entrance and exits. Then he turned his attention to the
gambling itself. Two shoes of baccarat are played in the Salons Prives at 3
P.M. and 11 P.M., and Jean Pierre discovered from Pierre Cattalano, the head of
the public relations department of the Casino, which of the private rooms
Harvey Metcalfe played in.

Blackjack is played in the Salon des
Ameriques from 11 A.M. daily. There are three tables, and Jean Pierre’s
informant told him that Harvey always played on table number two at seat number
three. Jean Pierre played a little blackjack and baccarat, to discover any
slight variations there might be from Crockford’s. There were in fact none, as
Crockford’s still adhere to French rules.

Harvey Metcalfe arrived noisily at the
Casino just after eleven o’clock, and blazed a trail of cigar ash to his baccarat
table. Jean Pierre, inconspicuous at the bar, watched as the head croupier
first showed Harvey politely to a reserved seat, and then walked through to the
Salon des Ameriques to the No. 2 blackjack table and placed a discreet white
card marked “Reservee” on one of the chairs. Harvey was clearly a favoured
client. The management knew as well as Jean Pierre which games Harvey Metcalfe
played. At eleven twenty-seven Jean Pierre left quietly and returned to the
solitude of his hotel room, where he remained until eleven o’clock the next
day.

James’s evening went well. That taxi driver
was superb. The word “emergency” brought out the Walter Mitty in him: he
travelled through Monte Carlo as if it were the Rally. When James arrived at
the hospital in eight minutes, forty-four seconds, he genuinely felt a little
sick and rested for a few minutes in the Entree des Patients before returning
to the taxi.

“Back to the Casino, but much slower,
please.”

The journey back to the Casino along the Rue
Grimaldi took just over eleven minutes and James decided he would settle for
trying to master it in about ten. He paid off the taxi driver and carried out
the second part of his instructions.

Walking to the hospital and back took just
over an hour. The night air was gentle on his face, and the streets were
crowded with lively people. Tourism is the chief source of income for the
principality, and the Monegasques take the welfare of their visitors very
seriously. James passed innumerable little pavement restaurants and souvenir
shops stocked with expensive trinkets of no significance. Noisy groups of
holiday makers strolled along the pavements, their multilingual chatter forming
a meaningless chorus to James’s thoughts of Anne. James then took a taxi to the
harbour to locate
Rosalie,
and from
there, once more to the hospital. Like Jean Pierre, he was safely in his room
before midnight, having completed his first task.

Adrian and Stephen found the walk to the
hospital from their hotel took just over forty minutes. On arrival Adrian asked
the receptionist if he could see the superintendent.

“The night superintendent is now on,” said a
freshly starched French nurse. “Who shall I say is asking him for?” Her English
pronunciation was excellent and they both avoided a smile at her slight
mistake.

“Doctor Wiley Barker of
the University of California.”
Adrian began to pray that the French superintendent would not happen to
know Wiley Barker, ex-President Nixon’s physician and one of the most respected
surgeons in the world, was actually touring Australia at the time, lecturing to
the major universities.

“Bon soir, Docteur Barker.
M. Bartise a votre service.
Votre visite fait grand honneur a notre humble hopital.”

Adrian’s newly acquired American accent
stopped any further conversation in French. “I would like to check the layout
of the theatre,” said Adrian, “and confirm that we have it booked for tomorrow
from eleven o’clock at night to four o’clock in the morning for the next five
days.”

“That is quite correct, Docteur Barker. The
theatre is off the next corridor. Will you follow me, please?”

The theatre was not unlike the one the four
of them had been practising in at St. Thomas’s, two rooms with a rubber swing
door dividing them. The main theatre was well equipped and a nod from Adrian
showed Stephen that he had all the instruments he needed. Adrian was impressed.
Although the hospital had only some 200 beds, the theatre was of the highest
standard. Rich men had obviously been ill there before.

“Will you be requiring an anaesthetist or
any nurses to assist you, Docteur Barker?”

“No,” said Adrian. “I have my own
anaesthetist and staff, but I will require a tray of laparotomy instruments to
be laid out every night. However, I will be able to give you at least an hour’s
warning.”

“That’s plenty of time. Is there anything
else, sir?”

“Yes, the special vehicle I ordered. Can it
be picked up by my driver at twelve o’clock tomorrow?”

“Yes, Docteur Barker. I will leave it in the
small car park behind the hospital and your driver will be able to pick up the
keys from reception.”

“Can you recommend an agency from which I
can get an experienced nurse for post-operative care?”

“Bien sur, the Auxiliare Medical of Nice
will be happy to oblige–at a certain price, of course.”

“No problem,” said Adrian. “And that reminds
me to ask, have all the expenses been dealt with?”

“Yes, Docteur.
We received a cheque from California last
Thursday for seven thousand dollars.”

Adrian had been very pleased with that
touch, which had been so simple. Stephen had contacted his bank at Harvard and
asked them to send a draft from the First National City Bank in San Francisco
to the hospital secretary at Monte Carlo.

“Thank you for all your help, M. Bartise.
You have been most obliging. Now, you understand I am not quite sure which
night I shall bring my patient in. He’s a sick man, although he doesn’t know
it, and I have to prepare him for the ordeal.”

“Of course,
mon
cher docteur.”

“Finally, I would appreciate it if you would
let as few people as possible know that I am in Monte Carlo as I am trying to
snatch a holiday at the same time as working.”

“I understand, Docteur Barker. I can assure
you of my discretion.”

Adrian and Stephen bade farewell to M.
Barrise and took a taxi back to the hotel.

“I’m always slightly humiliated by how well
the French speak our language compared with our grasp of theirs,” said Stephen.

“It’s all the fault of you bloody Americans,”
said Adrian.