Out of the Sun (21 page)

"You mean '

"You have a chance, Harry," Donna went on. "One we don't. Lazenby doesn't know you. Fredericks doesn't have your face on file. To Globescope you're nothing. If you could talk your way into Lazenby's office .. ."

"You're not serious."

"I am. Two of you have an excellent chance of pulling it off. One distracts Lazenby while the other '

Two of us?"

"You and Woodrow."

"You've asked Woodrow?"

"Not yet. But he'll agree, I'm sure of it."

"It's you we're not sure of," put in Ablett.

"You're crazy."

"That's what I said," Ablett threw back at him.

"But we said it could work," Steiner contributed as she took a leisurely right round a redundant roundabout.

"How could it work? How could we even get onto the premises?"

"It can be done," said Donna in her softest most reasonable tone. "We set you up as chairman and managing director of a London-based investment company. Woodrow poses as your American partner. You fax Lazenby saying you're going to be in Washington for a few days and want to discuss using Globescope's services. You quote some big figures. Lazenby invites you in. Woodrow keeps him talking while you retrieve the tape. Then you go away to think over his offer, taking the tape with you."

"Can we be sure he'd agree to see us?"

"I think so. He's about as resistant to business as a cat is to fish."

"But what business? He'd expect to have heard of our company, surely."

"And he will have done. We know which database he buys into for background information about clients. And Makepeace has a friend on the senior technical staff there who'd be willing to insert a fake company file for us. So, when Lazenby consults them about you, he'll learn what we want him to learn: enough to make him bite."

"You just have to pray he doesn't ask around more widely," said Ablett. "And learn enough to make him bite your heads clean off."

"We won't give him time," Donna countered. "Besides, it's not his way. He likes to play his cards close to his chest."

"But what if he recognizes Woodrow? He may have seen him perform on stage, for God's sake."

"Unlikely. And even less likely that he'd realize who Woodrow was even if he had seen Mr. Nemo."

"What about me, then? My name's been in the papers in connection with Torben's death. Globescope have been asked if they know me. It won't be long before a photograph of me's in circulation."

"Nice point," sneered Ablett. "But it doesn't stand up. The result of the second autopsy on Torben came through this morning." He paused, scanning Harry's features as if for some hint of foreknowledge. "Natural causes."

"Natural causes?"

"Some kind of brain haemorrhage, evidently."

"That's absurd."

"Maybe. But it puts you in the clear. The Danish police won't want to interview you now, will they? So there'll be no photograph of you sliding out of fax machines around the world."

"Even so '

"Unless you think there's some other reason why Lazenby should recognize you."

"What do you mean?"

"He means he doesn't trust you," said Steiner over her shoulder.

"But we do, Harry," said Donna. "And Rawnsley's willing to go along with us."

True," said Ablett. "Largely on the grounds that if you are working for Lazenby we're finished anyway and the tape's nothing but a figment of your imagination,"

"I'm not working for anyone."

"Prove it, then. Go and get the tape."

"We can't force you to do this," said Donna. "We're not trying to blackmail you."

"No? Well, it seems to me that's what you are doing, whether you want to or not. If I don't co-operate, you won't try to get Sandoval interested in David's case, will you?"

"I won't be able to."

"But is blackmail worse than treachery?" Ablett fixed Harry with an accusing glare. "Remember it was your son who obliged us to bury ourselves in this hell-hole. So don't get picky about the methods we employ to dig ourselves out."

"Don't mind him," said Steiner. "He's just a grouchy old Bostonian with withdrawal symptoms."

"It's true Texas doesn't agree with me," Ablett replied. "But then neither do traitors. Or their fathers."

"You seem to have as big a mouth as you do an opinion of yourself," Harry snapped. "If there's something personal in this you want to settle, then I'll be happy to oblige."

This we don't need," Steiner intervened. "Jesus, will you listen to yourselves?"

But Ablett went on staring straight at Harry. "Put up or shut up."

That's no problem," Harry replied, not stopping to consider the consequences. "If Woodrow's game, then so am I."

"Listen to the details first," said Donna, twisting round in an effort to make Harry look at her rather than Ablett. "I want you to be satisfied the plan will work."

"I don't need to be satisfied."

"For heaven's sake, Harry '

"I'll do it, OK? What more do you need to know?"

Steiner braked sharply to a halt and turned to look at him. "We need to know you mean it," she said with quiet emphasis.

"I mean it," said Harry, returning her gaze. He glanced across at Ablett. "OK?" Ablett nodded. Leaving Harry to close the circle by fixing his eyes on Donna's and letting them rest there for as long as it took for his intention to be as clear as it was irrevocable. "I mean it."

THIRTY-ONE

It was early Friday evening and the revolving lounge in the dome at the top of Reunion Tower was three-quarters filled with Dallasites celebrating the arrival of the weekend. Below them, a trail of headlamp beams marked out the snarled freeways like an illuminated street-map, while at eye level the downtown skyscrapers showed off their spotlit profiles against the inky Texan sky.

Customarily, at this time on a Friday, Harry would have been standing at the bar of the Stonemasons' Arms, Kensal Green, with a pint of London Pride in his hand. Contrary to what he would have predicted, the thought was unaccompanied by any sense of deprivation. Given the sarcasm his new hairstyle would have attracted from the clientele of the Stonemasons', he was in some ways relieved to be surrounded by strangers. Also, the Reunion Tower waitresses were much prettier than Terry's un alluring assortment of barmaids. And Shiner Bock beer was turning out to taste better with every bottle he drank. Which was just as well, considering how many bottles he had drunk since Wednesday. A consistent state of mild inebriation had enabled him to maintain an attitude of blithe optimism about what he had agreed to do. So much so that when he saw Makepeace Steiner striding towards him along the slowly rotating aisle between the tables, the last thing he wanted to hear her announce was that the whole madcap scheme was off.

"Hi, Harry," she said, sliding quickly into the seat opposite him. "How's it going?"

"Extravagantly. I've blown two thousand dollars of your money on three sea-island cotton shirts, two silk ties, a designer suit, a cashmere overcoat, a pair of lounge lizard shoes, a fancy suitcase and something called an executive grip. Plus the haircut, of course."

"Yuh. Very Harvey Keitel."

"You recommended the salon, as I recall."

"True. Don't worry. It looks great. Exactly what you need."

"I do need it, do I?"

"Yuh." She nodded. "It's on." She broke off to order a drink, then took one of his cigarettes, lit it and said: "I seem to have taken these up again. Stress, right?"

"Aren't I the one who should be feeling under stress?"

"You won't have the chance. By this time next week, it'll be all over." She leant forward and lowered her voice. "Donna called a few hours ago. She had no difficulty persuading Woodrow to help us. Seems he sees this as an ideal outlet for his untapped acting abilities. Undertook to rig himself out at Bloomingdale's this weekend. We're bankrolling him too. On Monday-, you both fly to Washington and book into the Hay-Adams Hotel. Ritzy sort of place just across from the White House. There are reservations for a week in the names of Norman Page and Bill Cornford of the Page-Muirson Investment Company. A fax will reach Lazenby the same day asking if the two of you can meet with him soonest to discuss applying Globescope's predictive techniques to the Far East and Latin American markets you're thinking of diversifying into. This is a print-out of what he'll find on the Page-Muirson file my friend has set up for us." She slid a stapled tranche of papers across the table. "Along with extracts from recent press and investment magazine articles about the kind of business you'll be claiming to be in. Futures trading. Arbitraging. Interest-rate swaps. The whole derivatives jungle. Try to get familiar with the phraseology. Then you'll at least sound as if you understand it. Keep the whole thing general, though. Avoid specifics. But don't worry too much. Lazenby will talk as if he knows much more about it than he really does. You can afford to bluff a little. Depending how well you do your homework. Probably best to leave most of the talking to Woodrow. That's his forte. Concentrate on getting hold of the tape. If you can walk out of there with the tape in your pocket, it doesn't much matter if you leave Lazenby thinking you're the biggest dope he's ever met."

"Just as well." Harry leafed sceptic ally through the pages, the abundance of graphs and pie-charts giving him a queasy sense of inadequacy. "How do we know Lazenby will respond?"

"Because the information we've planted paints Page-Muirson in his favourite colours. Cash-laden and unworldly. I've accessed his appointments file and confirmed he's in town all week, with a lightish schedule. My guess is he'll go for this before his Monday morning coffee's cooled. There'll probably be an answer to your fax waiting for you at the Hay-Adams."

"What about Donna? Will she be waiting for us at the Hay-Adams?"

"No. She can't risk being seen in Washington. She'll stay in Baltimore. But that's less than an hour away by train. When you reach Washington, she'll call and give you a contact number. For use when you get hold of the tape." Makepeace smiled stiffly and clunked her bourbon on the rocks against his beer glass. "Here's to your success."

"Would Rawnsley share the toast if he were here?"

"Leave me to worry about Rawnsley, Harry. Just get the tape if it's there to be got."

"I'll do my best."

"How about better than your best?"

"OK. I'll try for that as well."

"Great." The stiffness dropped out of her smile and she took an unladylike gulp of bourbon. "That I like the sound of."

THIRTY-TWO

Norman Page, chairman and managing director of Page-Muirson Ltd, financial adviser to the quality, flew into Dulles Airport early the following Monday afternoon. His suit was dove-grey, his shirt powder-pink, his tie richly striped, his hair elegantly styled. A pre-hired limousine sped him and his brand-new luggage through twenty-six miles of damp green Virginia and across the Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Bridge into the spacious heart of Washington. He glanced up at the pale slopes of Arlington Cemetery as he passed, down at the grey waters of the Potomac and all around him at the tree-screened federal buildings, the low-rise office blocks, the trimmed and trained regularities of the capital. At length he was delivered to the door of the Hay-Adams Hotel, just the sort of lavishly appointed establishment to which such a gentleman would naturally be used, and was ushered into its walnut-panelled lobby.

After signing his name in a vellum-paged register, he was escorted to a suite overlooking Lafayette Square. The view of the White House, though not the intervening vista of the homeless camping out in the park, was drawn to his attention. The push button availability of multiple electronic media was deferentially explained to him, as were the hot-and-cold mysteries of the marbled bathroom. He administered a five-dollar tip and was left alone pending the arrival of his suitcase. This brief interval allowed him to peer at the framed reproduction above the fireplace of L'Enfant's 1792 Plan for the Federal City, test the broad acres of the firm yet yielding bed and squint in awe at the printed tariff on the back of the door.

The suitcase delivered and another five-dollar tip dispensed, he telephoned reception and asked if his colleague, Bill Cornford, had yet booked in. He was told he had not. Mildly surprised, he proceeded to unpack and take a leisurely bath. He emerged from the bathroom an hour or so later to find an envelope had been slipped beneath his door, addressed to him by name and room number. It turned out to contain a fax. From Byron Lazenby, President of Globescope Inc." predictive consultant to the corporate elite.

Dear Norman Page

I would be delighted to meet with you during your stay in Washington and to outline the kind of forecasting package my organization could offer a company such as yours. Perhaps you would call my secretary, Ann Mather, to fix a date.

Sincerely

Byron E. Lazenby

It was not yet five o'clock and Harry was tempted to telephone Ann Mather straightaway. "If it were done when 'tis done, then 'twere well it were done quickly' surfaced in his mind as a sound principle more than forty years after its accidental absorption during a desultory reading of Macbeth in the dying days of his school career. In the end, though, the only call he made was to reception, to learn that Bill Cornford had still not arrived.

Harry was now beginning to feel badly in need of a drink. He could not risk going in search of the bar for fear of missing Donna's promised call. The mini-bar it therefore had to be, yielding two bottles of Budweiser and a Jim Beam chaser for each. Leafing through Makepeace's notes under the influence of this self-assembled cocktail, he felt the onset of a strange illusion: that he was actually developing a grasp of high finance. The pros and cons of the Mexican bond market as against Californian earthquake futures started to resemble a subject he could coherently discourse on. Then the telephone rang.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Harry." It was Donna. "Everything OK?"

"Not exactly. Do you want the good news or the bad news?"

"Just tell me."

"Lazenby's sent a fax agreeing to see us."