“Okay, so it’ll cost us plenty. So can you deliver, that’s the point.”
“‘Yes, but I’m not entirely sure what you want to do. This bomb thing, you see, has altered things. They must know somebody’s on the trail. In fact, I know they do, because they’ve switched plans. I have friends in the police and Movement Control—that’s why I was so late. I was checking—”
“Sure, sure, sure. Just tell us what you found out.”
“They’ve taken the—consignment—in which you’re interested away from the caravan. They landed a helicopter and took it away.”
“They must be rattled to do something so obvious. D’you know where the helicopter went?”
“To Khartoum, in the Sudan. What do you want to do? How can I help you?”
“What happens to the stuff in Khartoum?”
“I don’t know. I think…I believe it will be concealed on another caravan leaving there in a few days.”
“What caravan? Heading where? How can I contact it?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know where it’s going. But I can give you a name in Khartoum. What do you want to do?
“I speak some Arabic,” Solo said slowly. “I want the name of someone who can identify that caravan, someone who can get me to the place it starts from, fix me up with the right kind of disguise, papers and so on, and finally fix it so that I can take someone’s place on the journey; bribe someone to change places with me, maybe.”
Mahmoud thought for a moment, drumming his fingers on the table. “There’s an Englishman called Rodney Marshel,” he said at last. “He lives in Khartoum—local correspondent for Eros newsagency, I think. He could help. I’m not sure about the papers, though. What kind did you want?”
“Two sets. One to justify my presence on the caravan…”
“Oh, Arab papers. Marshel could handle that, all right.”
“…another set which would satisfy the authorities if I had to leave the caravan and reassume some—er—Western identity.”
“Ah. That’s more difficult. The Sudan’s a troubled area just now, particularly in the south, and strangers are unwelcome.”
“Exactly. That’s why I need the best papers.”
“Marshel couldn’t help you there. You’ll have to go to someone more important…a man called Hassan Hamid. He’s very important—has a high official post. He also has a high standard of living. He is very interested in money.”
“…As if I didn’t know,” Solo murmured.
“Hamid can give you any papers you want—at a price. But you’ll have to have a good cover reason. And don’t on any account mention the caravan side of the business, because he’s the—”
Mahmoud was abruptly hurled backwards from his chair, crashing against the wall. He slid to the floor with blood blooming like an exotic flower from the lapel of his pale suit. In the same moment, their shocked senses registered the crack of a distant shot. Shards of glass tinkled to the floor from the shattered window.
Illya was out on the terrace by the time Solo had reached Mahmoud’s body. A moment later, he was back, shaking his head. From across the bay, the sound of a tuned engine accelerating fiercely in bottom gear cut through the murmurs of horrified astonishment with which the other customers were surrounding Solo and the shot man.
“Somebody in an Alfa Romeo,” Kuryakin said. “They were using a rifle with a telescopic sight.”
There was blood on Solo’s hands. “But, my God,” he exclaimed, looking up at the Russian, “the muzzle velocity of that gun…To send a man crashing back all that way…”
Illya nodded. “I know,” he said. “It was probably a Mannlicher. He’s quite dead, of course?”
“Beyond all recall.” Solo rose to his feet and looked down at the sprawled figure. “Poor devil. Rough on his wife and kids, too. He was so scared he didn’t even ask for his money.” He hesitated, and then drew a sealed envelope from his breast pocket and tucked it inside the dead man’s jacket. “I guess there are enough witnesses here to stop anyone lifting it,” he said.
While Solo and Illya were identifying themselves privately to the police, the two students left the cafe. Half a mile away, they went into another cafe and the girl walked through to a telephone booth. She dialed a number and waited. Then “You were a little late,” she said. “He had already begun to talk. But I don’t think he had time to say much.”
On the plane to Khartoum that evening, Solo turned to Illya and said, “You realize what was the most extraordinary piece of information given to us by Mahmoud?”
“You mean about Marshel?”
“Yes,” Solo said soberly. “An Englishman called Rodney Marshel—our man in the Sudan…”
Chapter 6
Marshel Aid
“WHAT I WANT to know, Marshel,” Napoleon Solo said crisply, “is exactly why your name should have been given to me by an Alexandria informer. Why should you have been the first person he thought of when I asked him for a contact to help me in certain illegal activities? How come you’re supposed to be the man who knows all about the movements of contraband camel trains? And if you do, why in God’s name haven’t you reported it to Waverly? What kind of game are you playing, anyway?”
“Well, I mean, because I wasn’t asked to, actually,” Rodney Marshel said, flushing slightly. He was a tall, thin young man with a hock of pale hair falling forward over one eye.
“Weren’t asked to? Well, for God’s sake! What are you supposed to be doing here for us, then, if it’s not to report things like that?”
“My briefing is to report anything I think would be of interest, Mr. Solo. It didn’t occur to me that this would, that’s all.”
“But, good grief—”
“‘By and large that means a situation report every month,” Marshel continued reasonably. “Plus fuller stuff on anything specific that I’m asked to cover. Plus liaison with people like yourself and Mr. Kuryakin when it’s required. After all, I’m not an Enforcement Agent like you.”
“I know, I know. But surely shipments of Uranium 235—”
“I didn’t know it was 235—only that it was some radioactive substance,” the young man said sullenly. “I’m sorry.”
“I know you’re only part time for the Command,” Solo said, “but even so—admitting that New York was at fault in not letting you know—even so, I’d have thought…” He broke off with an exasperated shrug.
“You said yourself, actually, that you’d no idea the stuff would be coming to Khartoum until yesterday—when Mahmoud told you.”
“That’s true. It doesn’t get away from the fact that you should have reported it on your own initiative.”
“Look, Mr. Solo: I can’t report everything shady that happens in Khartoum,” Marshel argued. “That would choke the airwaves every day. I mean, I made an error of judgment, that’s all.”
“I suppose so.”
Solo rose to his feet and walked to the French windows of the hotel room. Beyond the dense shade cast by the balcony awning, concrete buildings across the street shimmered in the blare of heat. From six floors below, the rumble of afternoon traffic drifted up.
“So far as Mahmoud knowing my name is concerned,” the voice drawled on behind him, “I really can’t see what you’re worrying about.”
“Oh, can’t you?”
“Absolutely not. I mean, you know my cover’s as a stringer for the Eros newsagency—well, that’s a job I actually have to do, you know. I have to file stories every day. Mahmoud’s simply one of my informants, that’s all—was one of my informants, rather.”