‘How, for God’s sake?’ asked Smith. ‘By now Charlie Muffin could be a million miles away.’
‘I had men at every port and airport within an hour,’ said Wilberforce, anxious to disclose some degree of expertise. ‘He’s still here, somewhere.’
‘But just where, exactly?’ asked Cuthbertson. The other man hadn’t offered any sympathy after the Vienna debacle, remembered the ex-soldier. At one enquiry he’d even sat openly smiling.
Wilberforce shook his head, impatient with the older man’s enjoyment of what was happening.
‘He’s shown us how,’ said Wilberforce, quietly. They could still recover, he determined. Recover and win.
‘You surely don’t mean …’ Snare began to protest, but the Director spoke over him.
‘He went into the bank with a document case,’ said Wilberforce. ‘And we know he opened a safe deposit because we’ve already checked.’
‘No,’ tried Snare again, anticipating his superior’s thoughts.
‘We haven’t got anything else,’ said the British Director.
‘We’ve carried out two robberies!’ protested Snare, looking to the others in the room for support. ‘We can’t risk another one. It’s ludicrous. We’re practically turning ourselves into a crime factory.’
‘What risk?’ argued Wilberforce. ‘You’ve gone in knowing the details of every alarm system and with every architect’s drawing. There’s never been any danger.’
‘We’re breaking the law … over and over again.’
‘For a justifiable reason,’ said Wilberforce, disconcerted by the strength of the other man’s argument.
‘I think it’s unnecessarily dangerous,’ said Snare, aware he had no support in the room. ‘What Charlie did was nothing more than an exercise to lose us … a trick to get us interested, like staying overnight in the Savoy — nothing more than that.’
‘But we’ve got to know,’ insisted Wilberforce.
‘Why can’t somebody else do it?’ asked Snare, truculently, looking at the Americans. He’d taken all the chances, he realised. It was somebody else’s turn.
‘How can it be someone else?’ replied Smith, impatiently. ‘You’re the only one who can operate with Packer.’
‘Too dangerous,’ repeated Snare, defeated.
‘It’s not the only lead,’ Ruttgers said quietly.
Everyone turned to him, waiting.
‘You’ve forgotten the wife,’ continued the former Director. ‘Eventually he’ll establish contact with her … she’s the key.’
Both Directors nodded. Cuthbertson shuffled through some papers, finally holding up that morning’s report from the Savoy Hotel.
‘There was a thirty-five minute telephone call to Zurich,’ he said.
‘To a number on the main exchange … a number upon which we could not have installed any device,’ enlarged Ruttgers.
Wilberforce’s smile broadened and he reached out for an unfortunate pipe.
‘It’s getting better,’ he said.
‘I’ll go,’ said Ruttgers, quickly. ‘I went before … know the apartment and the woman.’
He looked up, alert for any opposition.
‘All right,’ agreed Wilberforce immediately. He couldn’t remain in complete control any longer, he decided. Didn’t want to, either. Finding Charlie Muffin again was the only consideration now. That and spreading some of the blame if anything went wrong.
‘Yes,’ accepted Smith, doubtfully. It was going to be a difficult tightrope, he thought. So it was right that someone of Ruttger’s seniority should be in charge.
The American Director looked back to Snare.
‘It’s still vital to find out what’s in that bank,’ he said. ‘Even though the idea of a third entry offends me as much as it does you.’
‘I’ve already got men obtaining detailed drawings of the houses on either side from the architects involved and all the protection systems from the insurance companies,’ said Wilberforce.
So it had been a pointless objection anyway, Snare realised. They were bastards, all of them.
‘Could we be ready tomorrow night?’ asked Smith.
‘It would mean hurrying,’ said Wilberforce.
The American looked at him, letting the criticism register.
‘Isn’t that exactly what it does mean?’ he said.
When it became completely dark in the office garage, Charlie eased himself up gratefully from the floor, stretching out more comfortably on the back seat of the car. He catnapped for three hours, aware he would need the rest later, then finally got out, easing the cramp from his shoulders and legs. His chest hurt from being wedged so long over the transmission tunnel, he realised. And his new raincoat had become very creased. It seemed more comfortable that way.
Using the key that Willoughby had given him that morning, he let himself cautiously out of the garage side door, standing for a long time in the deep shadows, seeking any movement. The city slept its midnight sleep.
He walked quickly through the side-streets, always keeping near the buildings, where the concealment was better. He’d used the cover like this in the Friedrichstrasse and Leipzigerstrasse all those years ago, he remembered, when they’d tried to kill him before. They’d failed that time, too.
The mini, with its smoked windows, was parked where Willoughby had guaranteed the chauffeur would leave it.
The heater was operating by the time Charlie drove up the Strand. Gradually he ceased shivering. It was 12.15 when Charlie positioned the car in the alley which made the private bank so attractive to his purpose, aware before he checked that it would be completely invisible to anyone in the main thoroughfare.
Quietly he re-entered the vehicle, glad of its warmth. It probably wouldn’t be tonight, he accepted. But the watch was necessary. Would they be stupid? he wondered.
‘If they are, then it’ll be your game, Charlie,’ he said, quietly. ‘So be careful you don’t fuck it up, like you have everything else so far.’
TWENTY
Superintendent Law accepted completely the futility of the review when a detective sergeant from the Regional Crime Squad seriously suggested that the bank robbery had been Mafia inspired.
He sighed, allowing the meeting that had already lasted two hours to extend for a further fifteen minutes and then rose, ending it. He thanked them for their attendance, promised another discussion if there had been no break in the case within a fortnight and walked out of the room with Sergeant Hardiman.
‘Waste of bloody time, that was,’ he said, back in his office.
Hardiman waited at the door, accepting tea from the woman with the trolley.
‘Bread pudding or Dundee cake?’ asked the sergeant.
‘Neither,’ said Law.
Hardiman came carefully into the room, his pudding balanced on top of one of the cups.
‘Mafia,’ he echoed. ‘Jesus Christ!’
‘Funny though,’ said Hardiman. He pushed an escaping crumb into his mouth.
‘What is?’
‘The dead end,’ said the sergeant. ‘We get the biggest job we’ve had in this manor for years. Indications of a professional safebreaker are everywhere and after almost a month, we’ve got nothing. No whispers, no gossip, no nothing.’
‘So it was someone from outside. We decided that days ago,’ Law reminded him. He had spoken too sharply, he realised.
‘So who?’ asked Hardiman, unoffended. ‘Who, a stranger to the area, could set up a job like this?’
Law threw his hands up, wishing he’d accepted the bread pudding. It looked very good and he’d only had a pickled egg and a pork pie for lunch, he remembered.
‘It’s in there, somewhere,’ he said, gesturing towards the files stacked up against the wall. ‘All we’ve got to, do is find it.’
Hardiman carefully wiped the sugar from his lips and hands.
‘That was nice; you should have had some,’ said the sergeant. He looked towards the manila folders. ‘It might be in there, but we’re going to need help to see it.’