The slim, springy Flandres was a tonic; always optimistic, his personalityfizzed. He walked round the room smiling, his dark eyes everywhere.
'Chez What?' Howard enquired.
'Benoit! Benoit! They serve some of the best food in all of Paris. The last serving is at 9.30 in the evening – but for me le patron makes the exception. The Police Prefect often eats there. You are ready? Good…'
Flandres had a cab waiting at the entrance to the hotel. The journey took no more than ten minutes and the Englishman, sunk in thought, remained silent. Normally voluble, Flandres also said nothing but he studied his companion until they arrived and Were ushered to a table. They were examining the menu when Flandres made his remark.
'My telex from London about the Carlos sighting this morning in Piccadilly has disturbed you? You wonder who he went there to meet? You were in London this morning?'
Howard closed the menu. 'What the bloody hell are you driving at, Alain?' he asked quietly.
'I have offended you?' Flandres was astonished. 'Always it is the same – I talk too much! And Renee Duval, the girl who sent me the telex – I have withdrawn her from London. She was only on routine assignment. Now, the really important subject is what we are to select for dinner…'
Flandres chattered on, steering the conversation away from the topic of the telex. He was now convinced something else was disturbing the Englishman, something he was carefully concealing from his French opposite number.
CHAPTER 18
Saturday May 30
Washington, DC, Clint Loomis…
The extract from the secret notebook discovered on Warner's dead body had linked up with nothing so far, Tweed reflected.
Concorde landed on schedule at Dulles Airport. Tweed was not among the first passengers to alight, nor among the last. He did not believe in disguises but before disembarking he removed his glasses. This simple act transformed his appearance.
Clint Loomis was waiting outside. He ushered him straight into a nondescript blue sedan. The American, in his late fifties, had not changed since their last meeting. Serious-faced, his dark eyes penetrating and acutely observant, he wore an open-necked blue shirt and pale grey slacks. His hair had thinned somewhat.
'We can say "Hello" when we get there,' he remarked as he drove away from Dulles. 'Maybe you'd better take off your jacket…'
The sun was blazing, the humidity was appalling. It was like travelling inside a ship's boiler room.
'Is it always like this in May?' Tweed enquired as he wrestled himself out of his jacket, turned to cast it on the seat behind and looked through the rear window, studying the traffic.
'In Washington nothing is "always",' Loomis replied. 'In the US of A we're a restless lot – so we change the weather when we can't think of anything else to change. We'll talk when we get there-and no names.
O.K.?'
The car could be bugged?'
'They're bugging everything these days – even clapped-out old CIA personnel. Just to keep someone in a job. You have to file a report to show the boss you're still in business.'
'Why the rush at the airport? My bag slung on the back seat…'
'We could be followed, that's why. By the time we get where we're going we'll shake any tail…'
'Like arriving in Moscow,' Tweed said drily.
The signposts told him they were heading for Alexandria. Tweed looked through the rear window again and Loomis glanced at him with a frown of irritation.
'We're not being followed if that's what's bothering you…' 'When we get to a place where you can stop, could I take the wheel for awhile, Clint?'
'Sure. If that's the way you feel…'
This was one of the many things Tweed liked about Loomis – if he trusted you he never asked questions. He did whatever you requested and waited for explanations.
Later, as they stood outside the car prior to changing places, the Englishman glanced back up the highway. A green car had also pulled in to the side and one of the two male occupants got out to lift the bonnet. A blue car cruised past which also contained two men – neither of them spared the stationary sedan a glance, Tweed observed. He got in behind the wheel and began driving.
'What make is that green car behind us – the one behind the truck? You'll see it as we go round this curve…'
'A Chevvy,' Loomis replied. 'It pulled up when we did…'
'I know. And that blue car ahead of us – which was cruising and is now picking up speed to keep ahead. They have a sandwich on us, Clint. Those two cars have been with us since we left Dulles. They keep changing places – one in front, one behind…'
'Jesus Christ! I must be losing my grip…'
'Just the fresh eye,' Tweed assured him. 'Better lose our friends one at a time, don't you think?'
They were coming up to traffic lights at an intersection and the green Chevvy was still one vehicle behind them when Tweed performed. To his right was one of those damned great trailer trucks which transported half of America's freight coast to coast. He rammed his foot down…
'Look out – the lights…!' Loomis yelled.
There was a scream of rubber as Tweed shot forward like a torpedo. He swerved crazily to avoid the trailer which was coming out with the lights in its favour. A second scream – of airbrakes being jammed on. Loomis looked back and then at Tweed who had returned to his correct lane. To the American he looked so bloody unruffled.
'You nearly got us killed back there…'
'I don't see the green Chevvy any more,' Tweed commented with a glance in his rear view mirror.
'Like hell you don't – it just rammed its snout into the side of that trailer. It was overtaking as you hit the lights…'
'To change places with the blue job ahead of us. Now…' Tweed tapped his fingers on the wheel. we lose him and we're on our own, which will be more comfortable…'
'Not the same way. Please! I thought you Brits were sober, law-abiding types. You realise what would have happened had a patrol-car been nearby…'
'There wasn't one. I checked.'
The meeting place was a white power cruiser moored to a buoy on the Potomac river. Tweed had followed signposts to Fredericksburg and then, guided by Loomis, turned off down a minor road to the east. By now he had lost the blue car in an equally hair-raising performance which had ended in their tail skidding off the highway. It was very quiet and deserted as Tweed switched off the engine, climbed out and savoured the breeze coming off the water.
'That's yours?' he asked, pointing at the cruiser.
'Bought it with my – severance pay, don't you call it? – when I left the Company. Plus a bank loan I'm damned if I'll ever pay off. It gives me safety – I hope…'
'Safety?'
Tweed concealed his sense of shock. His trip to Washington was developing in a way he had never expected. First they had been followed from Dulles by an outfit which had money at its disposal. It cost a lot of dollars to employ four men to do a shadow job. And ever since he had arrived Clint Loomis, retired from the CIA, had shown signs of nervousness.
The Company doesn't like people who leave it alive.'
Loomis was dragging a rubber dinghy equipped with an out-board which had been hidden among a clump of grasses down to the river's edge. He gave a lop-sided grin as the craft floated and he gestured to his visitor to get aboard. 'I suppose it comes from all those dumbos who got out and wrote books, revealing all as the publishers' blurbs say.'
'You're writing a book?' Tweed asked as he settled gingerly inside the vessel and Loomis started up the outboard.
'Not me,' Loomis said with a shake of his head. 'And when we get to the Oasis…' He pointed towards the power cruiser, that's when we shake hands.'
'If you say so,' Tweed replied.
They crossed the smooth stretch of water and Loomis slowed the engine to a crawl as the hull loomed up. Aboard the Oasis a huge Alsatian dog appeared, running up and down the deck, barking its head off. Then it stopped at the head of the boarding ladder and stared down, jaws open, exposing teeth which reminded Tweed of a shark.