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Anthony Price is editor of the Oxford Times. His first novel The Labyrinth Makers, won the Silver Dagger Award of the Crime Writers' Association. His subsequent novels include the award-winning Other Paths to Glory and War Game.
Anthony Price
The Alamut Ambush
Macdonald Fumra Publishers
Copyright © 1971 by Anthony Price
To Katherine, James and Simon
PROLOGUE
JENKINS WALKED SLOWLY round the Princess, fumbling with the buttons of his overalls.
It was late – he had heard the chimes of midnight on his way in from Blackheath – and he was dog-tired. And it was also an imposition to be called out during what were at least technically dummy2
the last hours of his leave, which he had purposed to spend getting some order into his new flat.
Yet he knew that it was neither the hour nor the imposition which were sapping his concentration, but the suppressed excitement of the day's events. For a year now he'd felt ambition stirring, and for the last three months he'd sensed the faint scent of promotion trailing him like after-shave. Tonight it was strong in his nostrils: he had the feeling that life hadn't let him down after all.
The trick was to do things right, and there he had Hugh Roskill to help him. Hugh could be trusted to advise him without trying to steal any of the credit – although it wasn't like the old days, Hugh was still almost family.
He ran his finger idly along the thin buff-gold line that ran the whole length of the Princess, just below the meeting place of the black and the grey, the line that was the last lingering memory of the great days when there was coachwork to car bodies.
He'd never quite been able to make his mind up about Hugh. Up on the Eighth Floor they all had some sort of fagade, and Hugh's was the familiar, nonchalant R.A.F. one that he'd long grown accustomed to during his childhood, when Hugh and poor old Harry had been inseparable. Yet Harry had been no great brain, and it was certain that nonchalance alone never got anyone to the Eighth – which was where he himself intended to go. So there had to be a lot more to Hugh somewhere, as Aunt Mary had always maintained there was ...
He shrugged, running the finger down from the line into the mud splashes.
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The mud was the most obviously interesting thing about the Princess. No rain for ten days, and the gale tonight blowing miniature dust devils in the dry gutters, but nevertheless the lower half of the car was thickly coated with mud, and undeniably recent mud.
It might be this that had alerted someone, even though it was the oldest and crudest cover-up trick in the book. But the Special Branch man who'd delivered the Princess had been uncommunicative. It was far more likely that the unknown but influential owner of the car had delusions of grandeur...
Jenkins yawned, rubbed his eyes and looked down at the red rexine-covered handbook, with its gold lettering – another subtle touch of class there. It reminded him that he'd never had a Princess through his hands before — a few months ago that would have been a challenge in itself, to prove that no matter what came along, he was the best. But now it was just another car to be cleared, just routine, and he was mildly niggled that Maitland had found himself some other pressing engagement while McClure and Bennett were still snarled up in Northern Ireland.
Abstractedly, his mmd still half on Roskill, he plugged in the tape recorder and began to unwind the flex ... It was true that Hugh did seem more serious these days, almost preoccupied, on the occasions they had met. But that wouldn't make any difference now; It was serious advice he wanted.
He shook his head. Best to get the matter in hand over quickly, to salvage some horns from the night. For tomorrow he'd need to be dummy2
on top form...
He picked up the little microphone.
'Vanden Plas Princess 4-litre-R, black and grey, registration number...'
I
THE RATTLE OF the chain was much louder than the bell itself: after one dull clunk the bell had jammed, but the chain went on rasping and clattering against the stonework.
It was, thought Roskill, almost the last bit of Audley's old house that hadn't yet been transformed by his new wife. The carpets were new and the curtains were new, and the new central heating roared away in the distance. The splendid old furniture was still in place, but now it shone with polish in the candlelight. The house even smelt different, with the mustiness of age overlaid by an amalgam of odours suggesting female efficiency. And there didn't seem to be any back-teasing draughts any more – the place was almost cosy.
But the bell was a genuine piece of Audley before the Age of Faith, as eloquent as a 'Do not disturb' sign.
The only other unchanged object was – surprisingly – Audley himself, for the evening had so far revealed exactly the same confusing mixture of arrogant humility and courtly rudeness which had first fascinated Roskill years before the famous Mirage briefing, when the big man had casually forecast Israeli intentions dummy2
with such uncanny accuracy.
Roskill had marked him then as an acquired taste worth cultivating for the future and possibly one day the man who'd take Sir Frederick's job. It was only when he had come to know him better that the doubts had been born: the ruthlessness was there, and the brains, but the singleminded drive was lacking. At heart Audley was an amateur.
Yet out of this insight had come a curious, almost masochistic affection. He didn't really trust Audley, but he liked him.
'That frightful bell!' Faith grinned at Roskill as she rose from the table. 'I must get it fixed so that David can't just sit there ignoring it. You know, Hugh, I sometimes think he's got — what do you call it? – xenophobia, is that it?'
Audley regarded his young wife tolerantly.
'Xenophobia? Perhaps I have. But then it's an ancient and very sensible disease, love. The xenophobes survive long after the xenophils have been knocked on the head during the night by the strangers they've let into their homes.'
Roskill gestured to the table in front of him. 'And the law of hospitality? Isn't that ancient too?'
'A simple extension of the laws of self-preservation, Hugh. And a fiction more often than not: "The raven is hoarse that croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan under my battlements". That's the true face of hospitality. And the other face shows the guests quietly opening the back door for their friends outside after lights out.'
The bell chain rattled again and the clapper briefly un-jammed dummy2
itself.
'And I suppose I should say "the bell invites me" now!' Faith started for the dining room door. 'I wish I could tell you that he doesn't believe what he's saying, Hugh, but I'm afraid he does believe it. Only I'm miscast as Lady Macbeth, hopelessly.'
Audley watched her out of the room. 'And I'll tell you something else. Bells that ring after ten at night are alarm bells.'
Roskill frowned across the candlelight towards the grandfather clock which ticked away heavily in the shadows. The front door banged and there was a murmur of voices.
'So now it's only a question of whether the trouble is yours or mine.
Probably mine, but I can still hope it's yours. In fact it puts me in mind of the old tale of the Rake and the Hounds – do you know it?'
Roskill shook his head. He had heard and disbelieved that there was an irrational side to Audley, and now here it was. Perhaps the flicker of the candles brought it out.
'It's a Hebridean tale. The rake was coming home over the hills early one morning after a night's debauch when he saw a man running in the valley below, looking over his shoulder all the while. And although there was nothing else to be seen the rake knew at once that the man was being pursued by the hounds of Hell.