The handle of his overnight bag was looped with a strap, so that it could be supported on his shoulders. He gripped the top of the strap, whirling the bag around his head in clumsy arcs, forcing people away from him.
They drew back, easily, isolating him in a circle. Twenty at least, decided Charlie. Probably more. No way of knowing.
‘The briefcase,’ demanded the Chinese with the knife. He reached out, beckoning.
Charlie stared back, panting. His eyes locked on the knife in the man’s hand. He thought of the pain it would cause, thrusting into his body, and his stomach loosened.
‘Give me the briefcase,’ insisted the man. Again he motioned impatiently.
The other two had spaced further out, so that he was faced with a wider attack.
The knife-man moved to come forward and again Charlie swept the bag around in a wild, warding-off sweep. Aware that the artificial protests from the peasants had stopped, he screamed again, ‘Help. Please help me!’
He could even see the border, in the direction in which he was facing. Less than a hundred yards. The police and officials appeared unaware of what was happening.
It was a cry of shock, not pain, and as he fell Charlie saw that it was one of the long poles from which he’d seen many of the peasants supporting belongings and goods that had been swept across the back of his knees, crumpling his legs beneath him.
The overnight bag hampered him now, the strap becoming entangled with his wrist, and before he could free himself one of the three men he had first seen had got to him, clamping his arm to his side.
Charlie butted him in the face with his forehead, hearing the grunt of pain. He’d hurt himself, too, he realised, blinking. He tried to scramble up, but felt himself being grabbed behind by unseen hands. Because his eyes were watering, he could only half-focus on the man with the knife. Bending over him. Only feet away.
‘I said I wanted the briefcase.’
It was a scream of fear this time, with no articulate words.
Charlie thrust back into the people holding him from behind, trying to escape the knife, stomach knotted for the moment of pain. He kicked out, but half bent as he was he missed the man’s groin, hitting him harmlessly on the thigh. And then the attacker he’d butted grabbed his leg, twisting him completely over.
Charlie lay face down, sobbing his helplessness. He was almost unaware of the briefcase being snatched from him because of the pain that exploded in his head as something began smashing into his skull, urgent, hammering blows.
But not the pain that he had imagined from the knife, he thought, as he drifted into unconsciousness. Hardly any hurt at all, now that they’d stopped hitting his head.
So death wasn’t as painful as he’d always thought it would be.
‘Got it!’
Hodgson, who had brought their copy of the Chinese statement into the ambassador’s study so that the man could refer to it when preparing his report to London, stared down at Collins.
‘I’m sorry, sir?’
‘That man. I knew I’d met him before.’
‘Oh.’
‘Prague,’ declared the ambassador. ‘Four years ago in Prague.’
Hodgson waited, not knowing what was expected of him.
Collins had his eyes closed with the effort of recollection.
‘Attached to our Intelligence service,’ he added. ‘Actually had some sort of altercation with him.’
The ambassador opened his eyes, frowning at the memory.
‘What’s he doing as a director of a Lloyd’s underwriting firm?’ he demanded, as if the young lawyer would have the answer instantly available.
‘I don’t know,’ said Hodgson. He hesitated, then risked the impertinence.
‘Surely it can’t be the same man?’ he said.
Collins maintained his distant look.
‘Certainly looked like him,’ he said, his conviction wavering.
‘It would take years to attain the seniority that he appeared to have,’ pointed out Hodgson.
‘Quite,’ conceded Collins, turning back to his desk. ‘Quite.’
18
He hadn’t died.
The awareness came to him with the first burst of searing pain, as if his head were being crushed between two great weights. He tried to twist, to get the pressure to stop, but that only made it worse and then he heard a sound and realised he was whimpering.
‘It’ll ache,’ said a voice. Muzzy. As if the words were coming through cotton-wool.
Charlie could feel the strong light against his face and squinted his eyes open carefully, frightened it would cause fresh pain. It did.
There appeared to be a lot of people standing over him, but his vision was blurred, so he could not distinguish who they were.
‘How do you feel?’ asked the voice.
‘Hurts,’ managed Charlie. ‘Hurts like buggery.’
His voice echoed inside his own head, making him wince.
‘We’ve given him an injection, now we know there’s no fracture. It’ll get better soon.’
Charlie tried focusing again, feeling out with his hands as he did so. A bed. Hospital, then.
‘Do you feel well enough to talk?’
Another voice: Superintendent Johnson.
Cautiously this time, Charlie turned in the direction of the sound. Still difficult to distinguish the man, but the height was obvious.
‘Yes.’
‘There’s a shorthand writer present. He’ll record what you say.’
‘All right.’
‘Who did it?’
‘Chinese.’
‘Could you recognise them again?’
Charlie considered the question. In his fear, all he’d looked at was the knife. And their clothes. There was the one with the smile; he’d seen his face closely enough.
‘Probably,’ he said.
‘Mainland Chinese?’
‘They wore Westernised clothing,’ said Charlie. ‘Silk suits.’
‘Did they speak?’
‘One did. English.’
Whatever drug they’d given him was taking effect. The pain was lessening. And Johnson was becoming easier to see.
‘Hong Kong then?’
‘It would seem so.’
‘Why?’
‘I’d got the proof.’
Charlie blinked at the announcement, wanting very much to see the policeman’s face. Johnson was gazing down at him, keeping his face clear.
‘Proof?’
‘The cook was made available to me in Peking. It was just as the woman said. Everything.’
‘You brought the statement back?’
‘In the briefcase. That was what the man kept saying. He wanted the briefcase.’
‘When the border guards got to you, you only had a shoulder grip.’
‘So they got it.’
‘And the proof.’
Was there almost a sound of relief in Johnson’s voice? No, decided Charlie. That was unfair.
‘I won’t admit I was wrong. Not yet,’ said Johnson, identifying his attitude.
‘I didn’t ask you to,’ said Charlie.
‘I’ll need more than a statement made by a man to whom I’m refused access. I need facts. So far we haven’t even the affidavit you claim was sworn.’
Charlie almost shook his head in denial, stopping at the first twinge of warning.
‘It was notarised to make it legally admissible by a lawyer from the British embassy,’ he said. ‘They have a copy. You could get it from the Foreign Office, in London.’
‘What did the cook say?’
‘That the poison was given to him by John Lu… that he’d been told it would only make them ill. And that it would cancel his gambling debt.’
‘Just as the woman said,’ repeated Johnson reflectively.
‘It will be sufficient to make the enquiries,’ insisted Charlie.
He could see everything clearly now. Apart from Johnson and the shorthand writer, there was another policeman by the door. Standing near the third officer were a nurse and a white-coated man whom Charlie assumed to be a doctor. They were both Chinese.
‘Yes,’ agreed Johnson. ‘It will be sufficient to start enquiries. Do you think the Chinese will send the cook back?’
‘Definitely not,’ said Charlie.