“That would be Dame Felicity Devonshire, the director.”
“How did you know that?”
“Well, there were, as I said, rumors — that and the fact that you were driving her motorcar when you decided to take a swim. If you weren’t friends, you’d have been driving a stolen vehicle and would now be reposing in a dank Scottish gaol, instead of this cozy inn.”
“You have superior powers of deduction,” Stone said.
“Once again, why were you training here, and for what?”
“I have, from time to time, done business with MI-6. And Dame Felicity, on an occasion when we had both taken strong drink, suggested — no, she dared me to do the course. With the reward being that I was allowed to drive the Aston back to civilization. I foolishly agreed. And when I had sobered up, she wouldn’t let me off the hook.”
“Are you perfectly serious?”
“Perfectly.”
“So you came up here and spent a week running about the Highlands, competing with a lot of twenty-two-year-olds?”
“Not quite. It was explained to me that there was a senior level of training available to those who are no longer twenty-two, so I was competing with thirty-five-year-olds, who are mostly in better shape than they have any right to be at their age.”
“How’d you do?” she asked.
“Not terribly well,” Stone admitted. “Oh, I did all right in the courses — near the top of my class, in fact. I thought I might redeem my physical prowess somewhat by agreeing to a timed drive around their defensive driving course, since I had the Aston Martin DB11 available to me.”
“We know how that turned out, don’t we?”
“I am reliably informed that, until I misread that turn by the bridge, I was on my way to a record-setting circuit.”
“Well, there was that turn, wasn’t there?”
“I also have no memory of that turn, or of anything after setting off.”
“Now someone will have to buy Dame Felicity a new motorcar. Her insurance company, I expect.”
“I fear that insurance companies are far too wily to cover automobile racing — even against the clock — in their policies.”
“So you are on the hook for a new Aston Martin?”
“I am, and deservedly so. This afternoon I phoned the London dealership of that marque and ordered her previous DB11 duplicated, for delivery in — well, it was going to be seven months, but when I mentioned her name, that was shortened to two weeks, so she will not long be without transport.”
“How much did that cost you?”
“Don’t ask.”
At that moment their dinner arrived, and they switched from the single malt to a sturdy claret.
They raised their glasses and said “Bon appétit!” together.
“Now,” Stone said. “Your turn.”
“All right,” she said, sampling his Scottish beef and approving. “Born, London, thirty-odd years ago, educated at what you Americans call a ‘private’ school, then Oxford, followed by medical school, followed by a surgical residency, followed by some years as a general surgeon.”
“And why are you here?” he asked.
“I have been on what the medical community here refers to as a locum — that is, replacing another physician while he is on leave. I thought this post might be enlightening, and it has been, in fits and starts.”
“That is a very short history,” Stone said.
“I’m sorry if I bored you.”
“Ever married?”
“Briefly, to another medical student. I came away from that feeling that physicians should never marry — not each other, anyway. You?”
“I am a widower. My wife was murdered several years ago by a former lover. I have a son who is now working in Hollywood as a film director and writer.”
“I’m sorry for your loss, but it is my gain.”
“You know,” Stone said when they were finishing dessert, “while I admire your charming little car that we came in, I confess that my temporary disability caused me to be less than comfortable in it. Perhaps it would be a good idea for us to remain overnight upstairs, in what was described to me as their finest bedroom, then hazard the return journey on the morrow.”
“Well,” she said, “since the morrow is a Sunday, I think that is an entirely sensible suggestion. I accept your kind invitation.”
They left their table and, once at the staircase, Stone was able to ascend to the upstairs floor using the banister, followed by Rose carrying his crutches. They entered an impossibly charming bedroom furnished with a large four-poster bed.
“Now,” she said, “either you have to sleep with one leg in your trousers, or we must find a way to get them off without causing you undue pain.”
“It’s good that you are a medic,” Stone said.
She met his gaze. “I am a physician, and you will kindly remember that, if you wish to remember this night fondly.”
“I am desolated at my faux pas,” Stone said. “Dr. McGill.”
“In Britain, specialists are not called doctor but are referred to as Mr., Mrs., or Ms.,” she replied. And in a trice she employed her medical training to free him from the boot, his trousers, and everything else.
6
They slept late, had a huge breakfast in bed, read the Sunday papers, then returned to the base.
“By the way,” Rose said as they alighted in the parking lot, Stone with some difficulty, “it’s not my car. It belongs to the base.”
He was about to ask how she had traveled to the base when a middle-aged woman appeared at the door of HQ and called out to him.
“Mr. Barrington, the colonel would be grateful for a moment of your time.”
“‘Grateful’?” Stone muttered. “I expect that is her word, not his.”
“He’s really not so bad,” Rose said. “Go and see him, and behave yourself.”
Stone swung along into the building and was ushered into a comfortable office where the colonel sat, gazing at some paperwork. He looked up. “Ah, Mr. Barrington, will you take a seat for a moment?” He indicated the chair on the opposite side of his desk.
Stone sat down and arranged his crutches so that they wouldn’t fall onto the floor. “Yes, Colonel?”
“I wish to apologize for my manner in the ward yesterday,” he said, sounding sincere.
Stone was taken aback. He had not been expecting conciliation. “Thank you,” he managed. “It’s possible that I overreacted just a bit.”
“Thank you, also. I have had news that caused me to reevaluate your driving skills.”
Stone couldn’t think of anything to say.
“You see,” the colonel said, ignoring Stone’s lack of a response, “upon closer examination of the wreckage of the Aston Martin, we have determined that your plunge into the river was caused — not by careless driving, but by a bullet into the right front tire from a rifle.”
“Fired by whom?” Stone asked.
“By a man on the riverbank, who had chosen his position poorly and was struck by the car on its way into the river. His body was found a couple hundred meters downstream from where the car came to rest.”
“Who was he?”
“His identity remains unknown, as it will probably continue to be, but we have surmised from other evidence that he was all or part of a black parachute operation launched by the Soviets — or, as they like to be called these days, the Russian Federation.”
“What is a ‘black parachute operation’?”
“It’s when someone jumps from an airplane at night, employing a black parachute, so as not to be noticed in the dark.”
“And how did you determine this?”
“It is not their first attempt on this installation,” the colonel said. “Also, we found his black parachute and backpack, concealed in some brush not far from the river. By the way, since you were not fully conscious at the time of your rescue, you should know that it was made possible because the driver of a heavy lorry with a powerful winch built into its front bumper was a witness to the event and used his winch to extract the car from the river.”