Spain cleared his throat as he saw Vicky Hutchman approaching. He judged his moment, then stepped out of the doorway where he had been waiting and collided with her.
“Excuse me,” he said. “Why… it’s Mrs. Hutchman, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” She looked down at him with ill-concealed distaste, in a way which reminded him of her husband, strengthening his resolve. “I’m afraid…”
“Donald Spain.” He cleared his throat again. “I’m a friend of Hutch’s. From the office, you know.”
“Oh?” Mrs. Hutchman looked unconvinced.
“Yes.” She’s just like big Hutch, Spain thought. He wouldn’t sully himself with ordinary people, either — except when he thought nobody was looking. “I just wanted to say how sorry everybody is about the trouble he’s in. There must be a simple explanation…”
“Thank you. Now if you’ll forgive me, Mr. Spain, I have an appointment.” She began to move away, her blonde hair smooth as ice in the watered-down, railway station light of the arcade.
It was time to strike. “The police haven’t found him yet. I see. I think you did the right thing in not telling them about your summer cottage. That’s probably…
“Summer cottage?” Her brow wrinkled slightly. “We have no cottage.”
“The one in Hastings — 31 Channing Waye, isn’t it? I remember the address because Hutch asked my advice about the lease.”
“Channing Waye,” she said in faint voice. “We have no cottage there.”
“But…” Spain smiled. “Of course — I’ve said too much already. Don’t worry, Mrs. Hutchman. I didn’t mention it to the police when they interviewed me, and I won’t mention it to anyone else. We all think too much of Hutch to let… .” He allowed his voice to tail off as Mrs. Hutchman hurried into the crowd, and when he turned away he was filled with a pleasant, scouredout feeling, as though he had just written a poem.
Nothing has changed, Vicky Hutchman told herself as she lay back in the big chair and the warm water flowed downward across her scalp. The nortriptyline will help. Dr. Swanson says the nortriptyline will help if I only give it time to build up in my system. The past is really the past…
She closed her eyes and told herself she could not hear the beginnings of that thin, sad song.
CHAPTER 14
Beaton had been born in the town of Oradea, near the northwest border of Rumania, the son of a pottery worker. His name for the first thirty-two years of his life had been Vladimir Khaikin, but he had been known as Clive Beaton for a long time now and his original name sounded foreign even to his own ears. He had joined the army at an early age, worked hard, and shown certain aptitudes and attitudes which brought him to the attention of a discreet organization known, in some places, as the LKV. The offer of employment he received was sufficiently interesting for him to agree to quit the army while still a captain, and to disappear from normal life while he was being retrained. At that point his new career became less exciting and less glamorous — he had found himself spending a lot of time observing the activities of tourists and visiting Western businessmen. Khaikin was becoming thoroughly bored when a door, not to a new career, but to an entirely new life swung open.
It happened when a coach full of British tourists went off the road and smashed its way down a hillside less than a hundred kilometers from his hometown. Some of the party were killed instantly and a few died later in hospital from burns. As is customary in such cases, the LKV ran a thorough check on all the dead and — as only occasionally happens — they found one victim who was worth resurrecting. He was Clive Beaton, age thirtyone; unmarried, no close relatives, occupation — postage-stamp dealer, hometown — Salford, Lancashire. The LKV then went through their files of members who were cleared for unlimited service and came up with one whose height, build, and colouring matched those of the dead man.
Khaikin had no hesitation in accepting the assignment, even when he learned that a certain amount of plastic surgery would be performed on him and that some of it would simulate heat scars on his face. He spent three weeks in an isolated room in the hospital, while surgeons supposedly fought to restore his ravaged face. This period gave the surgeons a chance to simulate severe injuries without actually destroying facial tissue, but it was more valuable to the LKV who used the time for an intensive study of Clive Beaton’s background, friends, and habits. Every scrap of information they garnered was memorized by Khaikin, and a voice coach overlaid his standard English with a Lancashire accent. Khaihin’s retentive mind absorbed everything without effort and when he was flown to London, and eventually reached Salford, he settled into his new life in a matter of days. There were times during the following years when he almost wished that some difficulty would arise to exercise and test him, but there were compensations, among them — absolute freedom.
The LKV made few demands beyond requiring him to live in obscurity as Clive Beaton, to be in England, and to wait. He allowed the stamp dealership to die a natural death and devoted himself to other pursuits to which his instincts were more attuned. His native love of horses, coupled with a flair for probability maths, led him into the penumbra of occupations surrounding the turf. He gambled successfully, worked as a private handicapper for several small stables, and opened his own book when betting shops became legal. This was something he would have done earlier but for the fact that one of his prime directives forbade any conflict with authority. Once established as a bookmaker he attracted, almost against his will, a wide range of associations with men who lived beyond the law; but Beaton never set a foot across the finely drawn line. Although he thought of himself as Clive Beaton, although he had learned to like Scotch whisky and English beer, he never married — and he never answered a telephone without half-expecting to hear a voice from the past.
The special calls came very rarely. Once, when he had been in England about two years, the nameless caller — who was identified by code only — instructed him to kill a man who lived at a given address in Liverpool. Beaton had found the man, who looked like a retired sailor, and had knifed him the same night in a dark street. Back in Salford, he had read all the papers carefully, but the police seemed to be treating the affair as a simple dockland stabbing; it quickly faded from the regional news and there were no repercussions of any kind. Beaton wondered afterward if the killing had had no motive other than the checking of his own efficiency and loyalty, but such thoughts troubled him infrequently. In general the sort of assignments he received, at roughly yearly intervals, reminded him of his old tourist watching days — tasks like making sure that a given individual really was staying at a given hotel.
The Hutchman case, however, had all the portents of a major job right from the start. It had begun a day earlier with a notification of a high priority number, a statement that Hutchman was considered a focus of “continuing interest”, and an instruction to place himself on round-the-clock standby. Since then Beaton had not strayed more than a few paces from his private telephone.
The voice, when it came, sounded both urgent and grim.
“Mr. Beaton,” it said, “I’m a friend of Steel’s. He asked me to call you about the outstanding account.”
Beaton acknowledged the code by responding with his own credentials. “I’m sorry I haven’t paid — can you send me another statement?”
“This is ultimate priority,” the voice said without preamble. “You have been following the news about the disappearance of the mathematician, Lucas Hutchman?”