“I know, I know.” Montefiore tired of baiting the two men as the problem claimed his mind and soul. “The author of these papers is likely to be a male adult, in good health and vigor, if the handwriting is anything to go by — when do we get the analyst’s report on the writing?”
“At any minute.”
“Good. He is also the possessor of a first-class mathematical brain. If I’m not mistaken that reduces the field from millions to thousands. And out of those thousands, one man — assuming the machine has been built — has recently spent a considerable sum of money on scientific equipment. Gas centrifuges, for instances, aren’t very common devices and there’s this business of using praseodymiumMontefiore walked toward the door.
McKenzie started after him. “Where are you going?”
“To the wine cellar,” Montefiore said peacefully “Make yourselves comfortable, gentlemen. I’ll be back within the hour.”
As the high-speed elevator dropped him to bedrock level, where MENTOR’s central-processing unit waited in its specially tailored and controlled environment, he felt a twinge of pity for the temporarily unknown man who had taken upon himself the role of Saviour, and who would shortly be nailed to cross. Forty minutes later, his own act of communion completed, he braced his legs as the elevator began its climb. He glanced at the single sheet of paper in his right hand.
“You may be a good man, Lucas Hutchman,” he said aloud. “But you’re certainly a fool.”
Detective Inspector James Crombie-Carson was unhappy. He clearly remembered describing Hutchman as a walking disaster area, but he had not foreseen that the man’s malign spell would encompass himself. Already he had been on the carpet before the Chief Inspector, made a butt of amusement in his own station, and had attracted the attention of the newspapers who — with their usual attention to trivia — were splashing minute details of Hutchman’s escape. Now there was to be an interview with the Chief Superintendent and a faceless man from London.
“What’s the holdup?” he demanded of the desk sergeant.
“I don’t know, sir. The chief said he would ring when he wanted you in.” The sergeant did not sound particularly sympathetic.
Crombie-Carson stared resentfully at the polished rosewood of the conference room door. “Bloody waste of time! Don’t they know I have other things to do?”
He paced the floor and tried to work out what had gone wrong with his career. His big mistake had been to relax his guard, to start thinking he had normal luck. The galling thing was that other men on the force casually accepted their own good luck, putting the success it brought them down to ability. There was a celebrated story that the complacent Chief Inspector Alison’s first arrest had been a man who tried to reverse the charges on obscene phone calls. Crombie-Carson savored the fable for a moment, then his thoughts were drawn back to Lucas Hutchman.
It was obvious that the man had been selling missile secrets, or preparing to do so. Crombie-Carson could recognize the type — university background, tennis and boating, married into money, too much of everything. Either had a Raffles complex, or the woman Knight had something on him. Rotten liar, too — never had the day-to-day practice that some people had to acquire just to stay alive. You could see him rearranging his scruples every time. Perhaps the Knight woman had got something really good out of him and had tried to cut herself an extra slice of cake by offering the goods elsewhere…
A buzzer sounded on the desk and the sergeant nodded gravely at Crombie-Carson. He took off his glasses, slipped them into his pocket, and went into the conference room where three men were seated at the long table. One of them was a watchful stranger in a dark suit.
“This is Mr. Rea of… ah… the Ministry of Defence,” Alison said. “He has come down from London to ask you some questions about the Hutchman case.”
Crombie-Carson shook hands. “How do you do? I had an idea we might be seeing somebody from Whitehall.”
“Had you?” Rea seemed to pounce on the remark. “What gave you the idea?”
“Hutchman works at Westfield’s. A guided-missile expert and queer goings-on with a group of Communists. It seems fairly obvious…
Rea looked satisfied. “Ah, yes. Now, you interviewed Hutchman at this station for several hours, as I understand it.”
“That’s correct.”
“Did he talk freely?”
Crombie-Carson frowned, trying to get the drift of the interview. “He spoke freely, but there’s the question of how much of what he said was true.”
“Quite. I expect he covered up certain things, but how did he speak about his wife?”
“It’s all in the transcript,” Crombie-Carson said. “He didn’t say much about her, though.”
“Yes, I have a note of his actual words, but you were talking to him before the interrogation and you’re accustomed to reading between the lines, Inspector Crombie-Carson. In your carefully considered opinion, is Mrs. Hutchman involved in this affair? Apart from the marital connection, of course.”
“She isn’t involved.” Crombie-Carson thought of Hutchman’s smooth, tawny wife and wondered what madness had come over the man.
“You’re positive?”
“I talked to Hutchman for several hours all told. And to his wife for a while. She doesn’t know anything about it.”
Rea glanced at Alison and the Chief Inspector gave a barely perceptible nod. Crombie-Carson felt a flicker of gratitude. At least the old man wasn’t going to let that ridiculous business with the mattress obscure twenty years of reliable service.
“All right.” Rea examined his hands, which were finely manicured but marred by sand-colored liver spots. “How would you say things are between Hutchman and his wife?”
“Not too good. There’s this Knight woman…”
“No emotional ties, then.”
“I didn’t say that,” Crombie-Carson said quickly. “I got the impression they were giving each other hell.”
“Is he likely to try getting in touch with her?”
“Could be.” Crombie-Carson’s eyes suddenly felt tired, but he resisted the impulse to put on his spectacles. “He might be able to hurt her a bit more by not getting in contact, though. I’m keeping a watch on the parents’ house, just in case…”
“We’ve withdrawn your men,” Chief Superintendent Tibbett said, speaking for the first time. “Mr. Rea’s department has assumed responsibility for the surveillance of Mrs. Hutchman.”
“Is that necessary?” Crombie-Carson allowed himself to sound offended, to demonstrate to the others that he had every confidence in his own arrangements.
Rea nodded. “My people have more experience in this particular type of operation.”
“Well, how about the phone-tapping unit?”
“That, too. We’ll handle the complete operation. You know how sensitive an area the guided-missile field is, Inspector.”
“Of course.”
When he left the conference room shortly afterward, CrombieCarson was pleased that Hutchman’s escape had not been mentioned, but he had a peculiar conviction that the case had ramifications about which he was not being told.
CHAPTER 12
There were several others staying in the Atwood house, but as Hutchman was the only one requiring full board he was invited to have his evening meal in the kitchen with the family. It would be much pleasanter for him, Mrs. Atwood had said, than sitting alone in the dining room, which was difficult to heat anyway. Hutchman was surrounded by a swarming cloud of his own thoughts, through which the conversation of other people reached him as a semimeaningless babble. He had his doubts about the eating arrangements. After a full day in the floralpatterned room, however, the prospect of warming himself at a hearth had become more attractive. There was also the fact that he wanted to avoid behaving in a way which would appear furtive or suspicious.