Cross of Fire (33 page)

'Owned by millionaire Lord Dawlish. A very advanced design, the ship of the future. He berths it here. It is moored here now. What about it?'

'Ever search it? The drugs business.'

Heathcoate chuckled. 'You think millionaires are outside the law? Because they're not. Answer, yes. We searched it
twice over the past six months. Clean as a whistle. You
think we missed something?' Heathcoate enquired. 'That we
should keep an eye on that ship?'

'Waste of time. And it's not drugs I was thinking of.
Don't ask me what. Top secret.'

'You expect me to talk and then you clam up.' Heathcoate
grumbled with mock
seriousness.

'Buy you a Scotch next time we meet. Thanks anyway...'

'No good.' Tweed told Monica. 'Heathcoate searched the
catamaran twice in six months. Nothing. Dawlish is too smart to risk being caught. Looks like a dead end. But someone told me something which might be the loophole
and I'm damned if I can recall it.'

'You didn't hear a word I said a few minutes ago.'
Monica chided him. 'I said one murder has already been
committed where Paula is going back to. The murderer
could still be in the area.'

'I don't think that's at all likely.'

It was a remark Tweed was to regret in the near future.

The
Cercle Noir
was holding an emergency meeting at the
Villa Forban near Third Corps GHQ. It had been called by
General de Forge during Jean Burgoyne's absence from the
villa. He sat at the head of a table in the living room with
the curtains closed. Outside it was dark.

Seated round the table were Louis Janin, Minister of
Defence; General Masson, Chief of the Army Staff; General
Lapointe, commander of the atomic
force de frappe;
Emile
Dubois, leader of the new political party,
Pour France;
and
the man known as
Oiseau -
Bird.

Janin was a short, heavily built man with slicked-back
dark hair who wore rimless spectacles. He had the air of an-intellectual. Nominally de Forge's superior, he was awed by
the General's charismatic personality. General Lapointe was made of sterner stuff: a small lean-faced man, he believed only Charles de Forge could save France from domination
by an all-powerful Germany now unification had taken
place. Emile Dubois was squat and a natural orator. Given
to waving his arms to stress a point, he hoped one day to
become Premier under the Presidency of de Forge. General Masson was a second-rate soldier, greatly conscious of the dignity of his post.

'We have reached a crossroads in history.' de Forge
began. 'Now there is a growing state of turbulence in this
country there can be no turning back. There will be new
and more terrible riots in Lyons. Then the target is Paris
itself.'

'Are we moving too fast?' Janin queried.

De Forge held intellectuals in contempt. 'We must move
ahead faster now the momentum has built up. Caution is
the reaction of faint-hearts and cowards.'

'Navarre has the ear of the President more and more,'
Janin warned, nettled by the implication.

'Navarre may have to go,' de Forge informed him.

'Surely you do not mean Kalmar?' Janin protested.

'The General made no suggestion at all in that direction.' Lapointe said severely.

'My members are travelling
en masse
to Lyons.' Dubois
assured de Forge. 'We shall be there to play our part.'

'I had a visit from a lackey of Navarre.' de Forge
reported. 'Lasalle of the DST. He is trying to build up a case
against us. He will fail, of course. But when we take power he will be the first to be hurled into the street. We need men of strong patriotic fibre in all key positions. I need your agreement that in Lyons we light a furnace, ignite a beacon
which will be seen in Paris. And we must send advance
contingents inside the capital secretly.' He hammered a
clenched fist on the table. 'From this second on the momentum must be accelerated non-stop. All agreed, hammer their
fists on this table ...'

Five fists hammered the table with varying degrees of
conviction. Janin's, de Forge noted, was the feeblest
response. And now the Minister of Defence raised the
objections which were worrying him.

'As before, I still do not like the fact that one member of
the
Cercle
remains unknown to us.'

Oiseau
sat at the far end of the oblong table, facing de
Forge, his head concealed beneath a Balaclava mask. He was the one man who never spoke a word at the secret
meetings. Now he turned and gazed at Janin without saying
a word. De Forge exploded.

'I have told you before, Janin, time and again,
Oiseau
supplies us with the extra arms we need. More important
still, he supplies us with finance from his own funds -
finance
which is untraceable back to its source. Without that
finance
Pour France,
our vital civil arm, could never have
been built up. His identity is of no concern to you. And I
noticed his fist hammered the table with much greater force
than yours.'

'I feel it is dangerous to make a major move until we
know the reaction of the President.' Janin persisted.

'So we don't make a major move until we see how he reacts to the new Lyons riots.' De Forge's mood became mocking. 'You like discussion, Janin. It is decision that worries you. Just keep me informed about the Elysée...'

The meeting continued for another quarter of an hour.
Most of it was occupied by de Forge reinforcing morale,
working up a sensation of enthusiasm, a conviction that
victory lay just round the next corner.

As always, the members of the
Cercle Noir
left the Villa
Forban one by one, with a five-minute interval between each
departure.
Oiseau
was the first to depart. He bowed briefly to de Forge, collected his coat himself from the cupboard in the hall, walked out into the bitter night where a limousine waited to whisk him to the executive jet at Bordeaux Air
port. Only when the driver, Brand, dressed in a chauffeur's uniform, drove out between the villa gates did his passen
ger,
Oiseau,
remove his Balaclava helmet.

Inside the villa de Forge waited until the other members
had left. Then he opened the door into the next room and
closed it. Seated in the study Major Lamy was working
on papers at a desk while a cassette played Stravinsky's
Rite of Spring
softly. Lamy switched
off the machine and looked up.

'Are there any notepads I could use? I've checked the
desk - except the deep bottom drawer I can't open. I see it
has a special lock.'

'That is the drawer where Jean keeps her jewellery,' de
Forge told him. 'She has the only key. God save me from some of those cretins who have just left.'

'Anyone in particular?'

'Janin. I suggest Navarre might have to be removed -
Janin mentions Kalmar. Can't he remember Lapointe thinks
Kalmar is merely a thug who roughs up people causing us
trouble?'

'Lapointe would not approve of Kalmar's real talent.'

'Of course not. He'd leave the
Cercle
immediately.'

'Janin is a weak sister.' Lamy agreed. 'But there is nothing
to worry about - he's clever at playing up to the President.
Flattering him.'

'The President is the main stumbling block to our plan. I can't forecast which way he will jump. We'd better leave now. Back to Third Corps ...'

'I shall be away for about thirty-six hours from now on.'
Lamy informed his chief while they sat in the rear of the limousine moving off down the drive.

'So long - to organize Lyons?' de Forge, ever supicious, queried.

'You ordered that Lyons should be turned into an
inferno. I must check our contingent is in place, we cannot
rely on that Dubois with his amateurs. Also, our contact
inside Lasalle's HQ has reported a Paula Grey has met and
talked to Lasalle recently. My contact thinks she is a British
agent. He is providing me with a photograph he took of her
secretly.'

Lamy was staring out of the window away from de Forge
as he spoke.

'A job for Kalmar? The decision is yours. And you know.'
de Forge went on cynically. 'I think we can cope, however
long you are away.'

Chapter Twenty-One

At Park Crescent, Tweed was checking through sheets of data prior to arranging for teams to leave for France. Most of it was in his head but, meticulous, he relied on written
records in case he missed one detail. He looked up at
Monica. It was late at night.

'This man, Brand, seen by Newman and Paula at Grenville Grange. Later involved with Newman in that brawl at the Aldeburgh pub. Find out everything you can about him fast. I think he's Dawlish's right-hand man.'

'Needed yesterday, of course.' Monica commented.

'Or the day before that...'

Marler parked his Volvo station wagon beyond a bend in
the country road before he reached the entrance to Dawlish's factory. As a precaution for a quick getaway he had
executed a three-point turn so the Volvo faced the way they had come.

'At least the moon has gone behind clouds,' Newman
remarked as he followed Marler out of the car. 'Let's hope
it doesn't reappear at the wrong moment...'

Both men were armed. Newman carried a .38 Smith
Wesson in a hip holster. Marler was relying on his Armalite rifle. Both men carried duvets folded over their left arms as, in rubber-soled shoes, they walked slowly along the road.
They paused at the bend, listening, watching what they
could see of the fence which guarded the establishment. No sounds, no sign of guards patrolling with dogs.

'They won't expect us to try anything twice.' Newman
whispered.

'You hope,' Marler said drily.

They approached the fence and again, paused, to listen,
to look. There was no wind. The silence of the forest in the
night was oppressive, nerve-rattling. Newman took the
decision.

'Let's get on with it.' he whispered. 'Your move.'

Marler took a wooden-handled screwdriver from his
pocket, walked to the gate, turned, paced out the same
distance he had estimated on their previous visit. Reaching
up, he pressed the metal end against wires protruding from
a white plastic tube. There was a brief flash.

'Electrified wire fused.' he said to Newman, standing
behind him. 'Let's hope it doesn't set off an alarm.'