“Si, señorita.”
“A moment, Pablo… has Madame, the keeper of this house, questioned you about why you come here?”
“No, señorita.” A frown appeared between the boy’s eyes, and his voice held a note of query when he added, “She has seemed curious, that is all.”
“Remember, she is to know nothing.”
“Si.” For a moment the boy hesitated, licking his lips. The voice came sharply then, commandingly: “Pablo, go now.”
When the boy had slipped away Karina came out from behind the screen and walked slowly over to a long wall glass where she studied her body intently. She was quite naked.
Esmonde Shaw when younger had been susceptible, and more than susceptible. He had appreciated the slim lines of that body which, as Karina now saw, was just as seductive as ever. Critically she looked at the long flanks, the beautiful flat stomach, and the full, rounded breasts which were as firm as a bride’s; she caressed the soft gold of her skin, the narrow strips of whiteness where her sun-suit had covered her. The cloud of hair set off the pale face; the lips were still full and red, the mouth was wide, eyes clear, and the flesh tight, teeth showing small and good when the lips parted slightly.
The years had been kind enough.
Karina turned slowly, lifted her arms, saw the sharp angle of the breasts. She took a backward glance as she twisted away farther, and was satisfied. Pivoting slowly back, her mind went on to the job ahead. There was a reckoning to come with Esmonde Shaw, and for a moment the glass showed spots of red in the cheeks, sharp lines between the eyes, and a mouth turned downward into a thin line which gave away the latent cruelty below the veneer. Something told her that this encounter to come, an encounter after so long, was going to be a fight to the finish. It wasn’t going to be her finish.
A few miles away, in Gibraltar, Shaw came down the stairs from his bedroom in the Bristol Hotel holding a newly arrived cable in his hand. That cable read:
Flying Gibraltar on business to-morrow will be at Rock Hotel love Debbie.
Shaw didn’t know what to make of that. He knew Debon-nair well enough to guess that she’d wangled it, wangled that business trip from her firm, and he wasn’t quite pleased at having a girl around when he was on a job. Maybe he’d cable her to use some sense and keep away… maybe. He knew she wouldn’t take any notice if he did. Probably couldn’t, now she’d fixed it with her office.
Shaw went into the bar, frowning.
He looked casually over the customers having a late lunchtime session. As he drank a long gin-and-lime, with ice floating in it to turn the tumbler to frosted crystal, he asked the barman off-handedly if a Mr Ackroyd was in the crowd.
The man was fat, cheery, with a brisk voice. He said, “No, sir.” He polished a glass carefully. “May be along yet. He does come in quite often, though come to think of it I haven’t seen him for a couple of days.”
“Uh-huh.” Shaw flicked his lighter, slid a white cuff up his lean brown arm and looked at his watch. “I won’t wait.”
“If he comes in shall I say you were inquiring?”
Shaw shook his head. “Thanks, but it’s not important. I believe I met him some years ago, and I thought we might have a drink if it’s the same Mr Ackroyd. I’ll run into him some time or other.”
“Righto, sir.”
Shaw wandered away from the bar, sat down in a corner. The job hadn’t begun yet, and he felt nervy, strung-up, had that old damnable sensation in the pit of his stomach, a feeling of nausea which the gin didn’t help. He ought to have had brandy… hell, that damned pain. He felt his features tightening up, knew he looked ill. Once he started it would be all right. Well, the first thing to do was to make his number with Humphreys, the Superintending Naval Armament Supply Officer, and establish his cover-story to satisfy any flapping ears and prying eyes which may have noted his arrival that morning. His appointment with Humphreys had already been fixed by signal from the Cambridge before he’d disembarked, and now, leaving his gin, he got up abruptly, feeling sweat in the palms of his hands. He decided to walk along to S.N.A.S.O.’s office, even though the sun was at its hottest, for he wanted to get the feel of Gibraltar again, and after the two days at sea he felt the need to stretch his legs.
When his preliminary business with S.N.A.S.O. was concluded Shaw asked, just as casually as he’d asked the barman at the Bristol, if S.N.A.S.O. could tell him where he’d be most likely to meet a man called Ackroyd.
“Ackroyd?” Humphreys frowned. “Admiralty Ackroyd, d’you mean?”
“That’ll probably be him — I believe he’s with the Admiralty,” Shaw murmured off-handedly.
Humphreys grinned. “He’s a curious little cove, works underground or something.” He seemed about to add something more, and then thought better of it. “I should think you’d most likely find him in the bar of the Bristol or the Yacht Club.”
Shaw looked quizzical, and Humphreys hastened to explain, “It’s not that he drinks much more than most, really. Er… how well d’you know him, Commander?”
“Hardly at all.” Shaw repeated what he’d said to the barman.
“Well, d’you see, it’s companionship he feels in need of, I think, boosts him a bit to be with what he’d call the ‘nobs,’ and that’s why he’s there such a lot, mostly in the evenings… matter of fact, though, now I come to think of it, I haven’t seen him for a day or so.”
The Alameda Gardens were a blaze of colour — scarlets and reds and blues and yellows; shady beneath the dark green of the trees, the little paths ran between rock. Fairly high up even here, you could look over the tops of the hivelike flats of the Government rehousing scheme, built on what once had been Red Sands, where the military columns had formed up for a great attack on the Spanish lines during the siege of some hundred and eighty years before to write a page into British history. Beyond the flats were the dockyard, the harbour, and the blue water of Algeciras Bay, beyond again the jagged Andalusian mountains. Behind, almost overhead, the great Rock towered, looming over the town sheltering beneath. It came to Shaw that Gibraltar had been lucky in the War not to have had more bombs dropped on it; a few biggish ones, blowing out chunks of that stupendous, rearing Rock, would have done quite a lot of damage in the town as the boulders fell on the flat, water-catching roofs of the sand-coloured houses bordering the narrow streets— streets so steep that many of them were cut into steps. Shaw would have liked more time to look round Gibraltar again. There was romance and colour in the very place-names of the Rock — names that had their origins in history, names that commemorated the regiments and the men who had served the Rock through her long years as a British fortress-outpost: Chatham Counterguard, Cornwall’s Parade, Forbes’s Battery, Hesse’s Demi-Bastion, Green’s Lodge…
Later that day Shaw discovered that Ackroyd hadn’t been in the Yacht Club either for the last twenty-four hours; further discreet inquiries told him that this could be considered somewhat unusual. It was then that Shaw, in the circumstances, began to feel a little natural concern — a concern which became real worry when he got back to the Bristol and found a coded cable waiting for him. Quickly he broke it down. The cable read:
Contact Defence Security Officer soonest possible.
It was from the Old Man himself.
The security policeman at the desk in the D.S.O.’s outer office was sorting forms. He said, “I’m sorry, sir, Major Staunton is out with the Chief of Police and I don’t know when he’ll be back.”