Cell (38 page)

'What the devil happened? Who is this guy? He looks
dead.'

'He is,' Newman told him. 'We had a gang of burglars
who came armed.'

'How long have you been out here?' Beaurain asked. 'And
I see you're fully dressed at 3 a.m.'

'How observant of you,' Martin sneered as he stood up. 'I don't think we've met before.' He looked back at Paula.
'And what are you doing inside Billy's bungalow? Where
is Billy?'

'He decided to take a holiday,' Paula said, smiling acidly.
'Loaned us his place - I don't think he wanted to leave it empty.'

'Didn't say a word to me.'

'Maybe he doesn't always tell you about his plans,' Paula suggested sweetly.

'The police will have to be informed,' Martin snapped. 'I'll call them

'Don't bother,' the Belgian told him. 'We have already
done that. And I'm Commissioner Beaurain.'

'I see. And I dress quickly. Heard the gunshots.'

'Very quickly,' Beaurain commented. 'Down to inserting
a clip in your tie.'

Tin going back to bed,' Martin snapped and walked
back to his bungalow. He slammed the door shut once he
was inside.

A tall figure came striding round the end of the lake. His
eyes glared from behind his pince-nez. The Minister wore
a heavy overcoat with an astrakhan collar and a silk scarf
round his long bony neck. He stopped close to them, as tall as Beaurain. His hands were inside his coat pockets and his
manner was regal.

'Will someone be so kind as to inform me what has happened? I heard gunfire. I also saw you come out of Billy Hogath's bungalow. So what is going on?'

'The police are on the way,' Newman told him. 'Al-Qa'eda sent four killers to attack us. They are all dead.'

'So,' Paula said pointedly, 'al-Qa'eda have arrived in
Britain . . .'

'What proof have you that the men belong to that Organ
ization? You'd better be careful before you spread that sort
of speculation.'

'They have brown skins and were wearing black turbans,'
Newman snapped. 'Didn't you know that is their favoured
uniform?'

'Must have slipped through our net at Dover,' Warner asserted. 'I repeat, this must be kept very quiet. We don't
want to start a panic in London. Incidentally, I have
arranged a full security meeting for the morning. Ten
o'clock at my place.'

'Penthouse or Whitehall guardhouse?' enquired Newman.

'I find your sense of humour rather crude.' He turned to
Paula. 'As Tweed is coming I suppose you'll be there too,'
he went on in a tone lacking enthusiasm. 'Then you can tell
me what you were doing in Billy Hogarth's bungalow. I shall
require a complete explanation of your presence here.'

He turned his back on them and strode off to Garda
before anyone could reply. Newman looked furious, while
Beaurain was smiling as though amused.

'I presume that is your Minister of Security. Not in the best of tempers.'

'Well, I really am not all that surprised,' a smarmy voice
said behind Beaurain.

'Jules,' Paula said quickly, 'this is Peregrine Palfry, the
Minister's personal assistant.'

'I was going on to say,' Palfry continued, annoyed at her
intervention, 'that the Minister works all hours and gets
very little sleep. On my way here I passed a nasty body. I was
also woken by gunfire. What on earth has been going on?'

'Armed robbers, dear boy,' said Beaurain, who had taken
an instant dislike to Palfry. 'It doesn't just happen in
London. And before you ask, the police are on their way.'

'But what exactly happened?' Palfry insisted. 'You have
told me nothing.'

'That burglar tried to shoot me. I shot him first,' Beaurain
said in a bored tone.

'How absolutely frightful. How extremely mind-boggling.
We thought we were safe here. The people who live in this
village, I mean.'

Palfry was dressed as though he'd just got up. Below his
overcoat, buttoned to the neck, protruded a pair of pink
striped pyjamas. But Paula noticed that below them were
were the cuffs of a dark suit. Did he really sleep in his suit under pyjamas? Palfry was lying.

'The gunfire woke you then?' she enquired.

'I'll say it did. Pretty awful way to start the day if you ask
me.' He turned to Paula. 'I heard the Minister inviting you
to come with Tweed to the meeting tomorrow morning at
his Belgravia apartment. You'll be hungry when it's all over.
Maybe you would join me for a little lunch afterwards?'

'Kind of you. Let's see how it goes.'

Palfry walked back towards his 'tub' house. Paula noticed he took a route which kept him well clear of the body lying
outside the bungalow.

'I wonder whether he will come over to see us?' Beaurain
said.

He pointed across the lake to the cube house. A red MG
was emerging from a garage under one of the cubes. In
the moonlight she could see the distinctive figure of Drew
Franklin behind the wheel. The car sped round the end of
the lake and drove at speed towards them. Drew braked feet before he reached them. As he alighted from the car
he took off his hat and bowed to Paula.

'So, gentlemen, the war has started.'

'We shot a burglar . . .' Newman began.

'Burglar my foot.' His headlights were beamed on the body. 'Native clothes and a black turban? That's al-Qa'eda
come to town. The lot of you could have been murdered.'

'Yes, we were lucky,' Beaurain said with a smile.

'That will light a fire under Victor Warner. I've called
my editor, told him to delay my column twenty-four hours.
The headline?
Al-Qa'eda Strike in North Downs.
How many
of 'em?'

'You only see one body,' Beaurain pointed out.

'How many?' Drew demanded again. 'All that gunfire.'

'Four bodies — like that one,' Newman admitted.

'Bigger headline.
Massacre of al-Qa'eda near London.
The
Minister will love that. None of you were hit?'

'We hit them,' Paula said.

'Good for you.' He put his arm round her. 'And I'll bet
this lady scored a bull.'

'It was a bull - in every sense of the word,' Beaurain
replied.

'I'm off. To rewrite my article. Might just bully the editor
into reworking the paper so it will hit today's edition.'

He leapt back behind the wheel of his MG. The car
roared off towards London and was gone. Beaurain looked thoughtful.

'That Drew Franklin could be the brightest brain up here.
I think someone should interrogate him for a long time.'

'I could do that,' Newman said. 'We're both reporters. . .'

Paula packed quickly, remade the bed in her room, checked
the interior of the bungalow to make sure it looked neat.
Swift as she was, two ambulances arrived before dawn.
Buchanan jumped out, listened while Beaurain and Newman
gave him a quick description of what had happened, where the bodies were. Within twenty minutes, under Buchanan's
urging, both ambulances were occupied with their cargo.

'I want to get these bodies out of this village, heading
back to London before the inhabitants appear. I know
they've been up once but from what you've told me they
don't know all that much.'

'Except Drew Franklin,' Beaurain reminded him.

'That's great,' Buchanan said, smiling. 'He'll splash what has happened up here. Finally wake up people to the grim
threat al-Qa'eda poses to London.'

'Tweed will be rubbing his hands,' Paula commented.

'And that idiot, Victor Warner, will be wringing his. You
will all be leaving, I hope,' Buchanan went on, turning
to get aboard one of the ambulances. 'You've done the
trick. Rattled al-Qa'eda's cage - and that of the master
planner . . .'

They were leaving. Beaurain locked the front door of
Billy's bungalow. He paused, his satchel and 'violin' case
looped over his shoulder, his case in his other hand.

'You going back to the Peacock?' Newman asked.

'No, I want to get to London. Paula's car is inside Mrs Goggle's shed. What about you?'

'I left my car at the triangle at the other end of what Paula
calls the rabbit warren.'

'Then we'll all drive there in my car so you can pick up
your car,' Paula decided. 'I wonder how Billy is getting on
in some hotel in town?'

30

Pete Nield shifted his position behind the wheel of his parked car. He was stiff. In the Bloomsbury district of
London it was still dark. No streaks of another cold dawn
appeared in the heavy sky.

For hours he had waited opposite the front entrance to
the Pink Hat, a small hotel in a side street. Its frontage
was narrow, four storeys high with steps leading up to
the entrance, which had a light glowing over it. In front
of grubby net curtains a notice hung hopefully.
Vacancies.

The Pink Hat? Silly name for a building which had stood
there since Victorian days. It was the obscure hotel Nield had, in the evening, escorted Billy Hogarth to. On arrival
Pete had accompanied Billy to
check his bedroom. On the
second floor it had only one window which overlooked
the street where Pete had parked. No fire escape. Pete
had checked that. So the only way anyone could get into
the place was up the front steps. Pete was a stickler for
details.

He checked his Walther for the sixth time, slid the
magazine back into the butt. Something to do, to keep
him awake. He didn't expect any trouble but on their way there he thought he'd been followed down from Carpford.
Nerves. He slumped down further so any passer-by would assume the vehicle was empty.

The two men appeared out of nowhere. Incredibly silent in their movements. A tall thin man in a grey overcoat, his
companion short and tubby, wearing a shabby raincoat. They were too quiet. Reaching the foot of the steps to the Pink Hat, they turned suddenly, went up the steps, vanished inside like ghosts. Pete slipped out of the car, closed the door quietly, crept up the steps in time to hear what they said to the night clerk, a plump dopey-looking woman.

'Our brother, Billy Hogarth, is staying here. We bring bad news. His mother has just died.'

'How awful,' the woman said, not really interested.