Bagley, Desmond - The Spoilers Read online

  I confirm it,' said Warren. 'If it weren't for Andy and Johnny it would have been two tons instead of one." . 'You'd better tell me about that,' said Hellier.

  Warren did so, not leaving anything out. When he came to what had happened to Ben Bryan he said bitterly, 'It was a damn" silly thing to do. I blame myself; I should never have let him go back.'

  'Nuts!' said Follet. 'It was his own choice.'

  Warren completed the tale of their adventures and when , he stopped Hellier was pale. 'That's about the lot,' said Warren dispiritedly. 'We missed all along the line.'

  Hellier drummed his fingers on the table. 'I don't think we can go any further with this. It's a police matter from now on -- let them handle it. We have more than enough evidence for them now.'

  Tozier's voice was hard. 'You can't bring the police into this -- not the way the evidence was collected.' He swung around on Warren. 'How many men have you killed, Nick?'

  'None that I'm aware of,' said Warren, but he knew what Tozier meant.

  'No? What about coming through Fahrwaz's place in Iran, the night we blew hell out of the laboratory? Johnny is pretty certain you ran down a man.'

  Follet said, The way we hit him he wouldn't have a chance. Anyway, I saw him lying in the road when we went back in.'

  The map was shooting at us,' said Warren angrily.

  Tell that to the Iranian police,' said Tozier scornfully. 'As for me, I'm not pussyfooting around the truth. I've killed men on this jaunt. Ahmed was killed with my bomb, which Warren helped to make; we mortared hell out of another group -- I think that between us we killed a dozen, all in all.' He leaned forward. 'Normally I'm covered -- I'm employed by a government which gives me a killing licence. But this time I'm not and I can hang as high as Haman under the civil law, and so can the rest of us.' He jabbed a stiff finger towards Hellier. 'Including you. You're just as guilty -- an accomplice before the act, so think of that before shouting copper.'

  Hellier snorted. 'Do you really think we'd be prosecuted because of the death of scum?' he said contemptuously.

  'You don't understand, do you?' said Tozier. Tell the silly bastard, Tom.'

  Metcalfe grinned. 'It's like this. People around here are touchy about their national pride. Take the Iraqis, for instance; I don't suppose President Bakr is going to shed any tears over a few dead Kurds -- he's been trying to polish off the lot himself -- but no government is going to stand for a crowd of foreigners bursting into their country and shooting the place up, no matter how high the motives. Andy's dead right -- you shout copper now and you'll start a diplomatic incident so big that there's no knowing where it will end. Before you know it the Russkies would be accusing Johnny of being a CIA agent and casting you as the secret head of British Intelligence. And, by God, it would take a hell of a lot of explaining away.'

  Follet said, 'No cops.' His voice was final.

  Hellier was silent for a while, digesting this and finding it hard going. He said at last, 'I see what you mean. Do you honestly think that your activities in Kurdistan could be construed as interfering in the internal affairs of another country?'

  'By Christ, I do!' said Tozier forcefully. 'What the hell would you call it?'

  'I must admit you've convinced me,' said Hellier regretfully. 'Although I still think we could plead justification.' He stared at Metcalfe. 'Some o f us, that is. Smuggling arms is quite another thing.'

  'Your opinion of me doesn't matter a fart in a thunderstorm,' said Metcalfe calmly. 'Anything I do I carry the can for myself. And if I'm going to stay with this crowd you'd better keep your fat-headed opinions to your fat self.'

  Hellier flushed. 'I don't know that I like your attitude.'

  'I don't give a stuff if you like it or not.' Metcalfe turned to Tozier. 'Is this chap real or has someone invented him?'

  Warren said sharply, 'That's enough. Shut up, Hellier; you don't know enough about it to criticize. If Metcalfe wanted to take arms to the Kurds that's his business.'

  Metcalfe shrugged. 'So I picked the wrong bunch of Kurds -- that was a mistake which doesn't alter the principle. Those boys have been having a rough time at the hands of the Iraqis and someone has to help them out.'

  'While making money at it,' Hellier sneered.

  'The labourer is worthy of his hire,' said Metcalfe. 'I risk my skin doing it.' * Tozier stood up and looked at Hellier with dislike. 'I don't think we can do much more here, Tom -- not with this bag of wind around.'

  'Yeah,' said Follet, pushing back his chair. 'It's a bit stuffy in here.'

  Warren's voice was cutting. 'Sit down, everybody.' He looked at Hellier. 'I think an apology is in order, Sir Robert.'

  Hellier subsided and mumbled, 'No offence meant. I'm sorry, Mr Metcalfe.'

  Metcalfe merely nodded, and Tozier sat down. Warren said, 'Let's stick to the real issue. How do you suppose we should go about finding Abbot and Parker, Andy?'

  'Find Delorme and she'll lead you there," said Tozier promptly.

  'I've been thinking a lot about this woman,' said Warren. 'You know more about her than anyone, Tom. What can you tell us that we don't know?'

  'I've been wondering a bit myself,' admitted Metcalfe. 'There are some things about this lark that don't add up. Jeanette is pretty good, but she's never been a smash success. Everything she's pulled off has made money, but the overheads are crippling, and I doubt if she has accumulated a lot of capital. All the time I've known her she's been a big spender.'

  'What's the point?' asked Hellier.

  'How much opium did Fahrwaz collect in Iran?'

  Twenty tons or more,' said Warren.

  There you are,' said Metcalfe. "That's worth a hell of a lot of boodle. Where would she get it?'

  'She wouldn't need it,' said Tozier. 'Not the way she's been working the deal. It was a straight swap for arms. She didn't have to put up the money for the opium -- Fahrwaz would -- and it wouldn't cost him a lot on his home ground and with his connections.'

  'I agree it was a barter transaction,' said Metcalfe exasperatedly. 'But I delivered half a million quids' worth to Fahrwaz. That wasn't the first consignment I'd pushed -into Kurdistan. Where would Jeanette get half a million?'

  'Wait a minute,' said Hellier, and scrabbled in his briefcase. 'One of Abbot's early reports said something about a banker.' He flipped pages. 'Here it is. She had lunch with a man called Fuad who was traced back to the Inter-East Bank.' He picked up the telephone. 'I could bear to know something more about him. I have good financial connections here.'

  'Don't make it too obvious,' warned Warren.

  Hellier favoured him with a superior smile. 'Give me the credit for knowing my own job. This is a perfectly normal financial enquiry -- it's done all the time.'

  He spoke briefly into the telephone and listened for a long time. Then he said, 'Yes, I'd like that; anything to do with him would be welcome. Directorships and so on especially. Thank you very much. Yes, I think I'll be coming in later this week -- we're making a film here. I'll ring you as soon as I'm settled and we must have lunch. You'll send the dossier on Fuad immediately? Good.'

  He put down the telephone and smiled broadly. 'I thought Fuad might be the manager of Inter-East, but he's not -- he owns it. That makes this interesting.'

  'How?' asked Warren.

  Hellier smiled jovially. 'You bank with the Midland, don't you? When did you last take the Chairman of the Midland Bank to lunch?'

  Warren grimaced. 'I never have. I doubt if he knows I exist. I don't swing the financial weight to create interest in such rarefied circles.'

  'And neither does Delorme, according to Metcalfe -- and yet she lunches with Fuad who owns Inter-East.' Hellier tented his fingers. 'Banking in the Lebanon is conducted along lines which would cause grey hairs in the City of London. Ever since the spectacular fall of Intrabank the Lebanese government has been trying to clean up its financial image, but this man, Fuad, has been playing fast and loose with the proposed Code of Conduct. The rules, by which he works are
considered normal in the relaxed atmosphere of the Middle East, but it means that anyone who shakes hands with him had better count his fingers afterwards. My friend on the other end of that telephone keeps a permanent dossier on Fuad's doings -- just for his own safety. He's sending it up to us.''So you think he's financing the whole deal,' said Warren.

  'I think it's likely,' said Hellier. 'We'll know better when I study the dossier. It's surprising what a list of directorships tell about a man."

  'That's one angle to be worked on,' said Tozier. 'But there's another. The morphine has still to be converted into heroin. What are your views on that, Nick?* They have to do it somewhere. It's my bet they'll do it here in Beirut.* 'Without Speering?'

  There are other chemists, and it's not too difficult -- not nearly as difficult as the extraction of morphine from opium. You acetylate the morphine and convert the base to hydro-chloride. All you need are a lot of plastic buckets, and it requires as much chemical knowledge as you get in a sixth-form stinks class.'

  They discussed it for a while and came up with no positive solution. Heroin could be made practically anywhere, and it was impossible to search the whole of Beirut or, possibly, the entire Lebanon.

  Warren brought up the disappearance of Abbot and Parker. 'If Delonne fell for the torpedo scheme, then Parker will be busy. I think that's why they're not in plain sight.'

  'Getting torpedoes would be no trouble to Jeanette,' observed Metcalfe. 'She's been running arms all over the Mediterranean for quite a few years. But that brings up something else -- she'll need a ship. That cuts down the search area to the coast and the ports.'

  'Not much help,' said Follet. 'There are a lot of ships.'

  The telephone rang and Hellier picked it up. 'Send him up,' he said. Presently there was a discreet knock at the door which Hellier answered, and he returned with a fat envelope. The Fuad dossier,' he said. 'Let's see what we can find.'

  He pulled out the sheaf of typescript and studied it. After a while he said in disgust, 'This man has the ethics of a Byzantine bazaar trader -- he's making a lot of money. He even runs a yacht -- the Stella del Mare.' He flipped the pages. 'According to this list of directorships he has a finger in a lot of pies -- hotels, restaurants, vineyards, a couple of farms, a shipyard . . .' He looked up. 'That might bear investigation in view of what we've been discussing.'

  He made a note and continued. 'A condiment and pickle factory, a garage, a general engineering works, housing developments . . .'

  Warren broke in. 'Say that again.'

  'Housing developments?'

  'No -- something about a pickle factory.'

  Hellier checked back. 'Yes, sauces and pickles. He bought it quite recently. What about it?'

  'I'll tell you,' said Warren deliberately. 'The acetylation of morphine makes a hell of a stink, and it's exactly the same stink you find in a pickle factory. It's the acetic acid; it smells just like vinegar.'

  'Now we're getting somewhere,' said Tozier with satisfaction. 'I suggest we split this lot up. Nick investigates the pickle factory -- he's the expert there. Johnny keeps tabs on Delorme, and I'll help him with that if necessary. Tom takes the shipyard angle.' He turned to Metcalfe. 'You'd better steer clear of the woman. Fahrwaz will have been screaming blue murder and she must know about it by now, and of your implication.'

  'All right,' said Metcalfe. 'But I'll want her later.' 'You'll get her,' said Tozier grimly. 'Sir Robert can keep digging into Fuad because that's already paying dividends and might pay more. He's also HQ staff -- he stays here and we telephone in; he correlates the operation.'

  II. Parker hummed happily as he prepared to tackle the last torpedo. He had been working long hours, eating bad food, and had been confined to the shed and its immediate vicinity for a long time, but he was supremely happy because he was doing the work he liked best of all. He was sorry the job was coming to an end for two reasons -- the pleasurable part would be over and the really dangerous part beginning. But right now he was not thinking of what would happen on the other side of the Atlantic, but concentrating on opening the warhead.

  Abbot was becoming increasingly edgy. He had not been able to get out of Jeanette anything concerning the operation on the American side. He badly wanted to know the place and the time, but that valuable information she kept to herself. He did not think that Eastman knew, either. Delorme played her cards very close to her beautiful chest.

  Ever since the night he had taken her to the Paon Rouge he had been confined, like Parker, to the shed. He had seen a copy of the newspaper and knew that his advertisement trick had worked, but what good it would do he did not know. He frowned irritably and turned his head to see the Arab, Ali, leaning on the rail at the top of the stairs and watchi ng him with unblinking brown eyes. That was another thing -- this sense of being continually watched.

  He became conscious of a sudden stillness in the workshop and looked at Parker who had his head down and was looking at the warhead. 'What's the matter?'

  'Step over here,' said Parker quietly.

  He joined Parker and looked down at the warhead, and at Parker's hands which trembled a little. Parker put down the tool he was holding. 'Don't make a scene,' he said. 'Don't do anything that'll attract the attention of that bloody Arab -- but this thing is full.' ; 'Full of 'what?' asked Abbot stupidly.

  'TNT, you bloody fool. What do you suppose a warhead would be full of? There's enough in here to blow this whole place a mile high.'

  Abbot gulped. 'But Eastman said they'd be delivered empty.'

  Then this one got through by mistake,' said Parker. 'What's more -- it has a detonator in it which I'm hopin' isn't armed. It shouldn't be armed, but then, it shouldn't be there at all -an' neither should the TNT. You'd better do your walkin' around here very quietly until I take it out.'

  Abbot looked at the warhead as though hypnotized, and Parker did the necessary operation very carefully. He laid the detonator on a bench. That's a bit better -- but not much. I don't know why this hasn't blown before. To leave a detonator in a warhead is criminal, that's what it is.'

  'Yes,' said Abbot, and found himself sweating. 'What do you mean -- it's not much better?'

  'TNT is right funny stuff,' said Parker. 'It goes sour with age. It's not so stable any more. It becomes that sensitive it can explode on its own.' He looked sideways at Abbot. 'It's best you don't go near it, Mike.'

  'Don't worry; I won't.' Automatically Abbot took a cigarette packet from his pocket, and then changed his mind at the unspoken look in Parker's eyes. 'No smoking, either, I suppose. What do we do about it?'

  'We get it out. In the service they'd steam it out an' flush it away, but I want to hold on to this little lot -- it could come in useful. I don't want Ali to know about it, either.' 'It's hardly likely that he'd know,' said Abbot. 'He's not a technical type. But Eastman might if he came in and saw what we were doing. What you want the stuff for, Dan?'

  'It's in my mind that a torpedo ought to explode,' said Parker. 'That's what it's made for, an' it don't seem right it shouldn't. When these fish are launched I want them to go off wi' a bang. That this one is full o' TNT is an act o' providence to my way o' thinkin','

  Abbot thought of four torpedoes, each loaded with heroin worth $25,000,000 and each exploding on the American shore before the unbelieving eyes of the waiting reception committee. It would be a good ploy. 'What about your weights? You've bitched about the difficulties often enough.'

  Parker winked. 'Never tell the whole truth. I've been keepin' somethin' in reserve.'

  'You have only one detonator.'

  'A good artificer can always make do,' pronounced Parker. 'But like as not I'll probably blow us both to hell gettin' the stuff out, so let's leave that problem until later. It may never come up.' He studied the warhead. 'I'll need some brass tools; I'll start makin' those up now.'

  He went away, and Abbot, after looking at the warhead for some time, also left -- walking very quietly.

  Four days later Eastman su
rveyed the torpedoes with satisfaction. 'So you reckon we're ready to go, Dan.'

  'All ready,' said Parker. 'Bar loadin' the warheads. Then you can stick the fish in the tubes an' shoot.'

  'Putting that other tube in the Orestes improved her handling,' said Eastman. 'The skipper says she's not as cranky.'

  Parker smiled. 'It equalized the turbulence. I'm ready to begin loadin' if you've got the stuff.'

  'The boss is a bit worried about that,' said Eastman. 'She wants to do it herself -- just to make sure.'

  'Well, she can't -- an' that's flat,' said Parker abruptly. 'It's a tricky job. I have to see that the centre o' gravity comes in the right place because if it doesn't I can't guarantee how the fish will behave. They have to be balanced just right.'

  To have someone prying into the warheads was the last thing he wanted. 'She can stand over me an' watch while I do it,' he said at last. 'I don't mind that.'

  Abbot said, 'Dan was telling me that if the balance isn't right the torpedo might dive to the bottom.'

  'It would affect the steering, too,' said Parker. 'They'd be bloody erratic.'

  'Okay, okay,' said Eastman, holding up his hands. 'You've convinced me -- as usual. Jeanette will be here pretty soon with the load for one fish. See if you can convince her.'

  Jeanette took a lot of convincing but at last she agreed, bowing to the superior weight of technical know-how which Parker dazzlingly deployed. 'As long as I'm here when you do it and the warhead is sealed,' she said.

  Abbot grinned. 'You don't trust us very much.'

  'Correct,' she said coolly. 'Help Jack to get the stuff in here.'

  Abbot helped Eastman to haul a big cardboard box into the shed and down the stairs, and then they went back for another. Jeanette delicately tapped the box with a neatly shod foot. 'Open it.'

  Parker took a knife and ripped open the top of the box. It was full of polyethylene bags, all holding a white powder. 'Those bags hold half a kilogram each,' she said. There are five hundred of them -- one torpedo load.'