“Well! Well!” Girland looked amazed. “No wonder you risk ulcers. You’re doing yourself pretty well, aren’t you?”
Dorey shrugged.
“So I take it you will do the job?”
“I’m not completely sold. From what I heard from Rossland, you have never given anything good away. How do I know this Swede isn’t fat and ugly? Even for ten thousand francs I wouldn’t want to be the husband of an unattractive woman.”
“You waste time, Girland,” Dorey said and took a glossy photograph from his desk drawer. He flicked it across his desk, knowing it was his trump card. “Here is part of her anatomy, showing the tattoo marks. Perhaps this will assure you that at least she isn’t fat.”
Girland studied the photograph, his eyes alight with interest. He gave a long, low whistle.
“Wow! Is her top as good as her bottom?”
Dorey passed over a U.S. passport.
“The photograph doesn’t do her justice, but it will give you the general idea.”
Girland studied the photograph on the forged passport, then he sat back.
“You have yourself a deal. When do I start?”
“Right now. I have arranged a car for you. You will go to the hospital, put her in the car and drive to Eze tonight. You should be there early tomorrow morning. The sooner we get out of Paris, the safer it will be. This is now your operation. Make sure there are no mistakes.”
“What car are you giving me?” Girland asked.
“A 202 Mercedes. It’s below in the car pool. Grafton will show you the various gadgets.” Dorey passed a folder across the desk. “These are all the papers you need. There is also a marriage certificate among them in your name.”
“I’m feeling married already.”
“The story broke in France-Matin. Watch out... I imagine the Chinese and probably the Soviets are now interested in this woman. So when I say watch out, I mean watch out.”
“I should have known there was a snag.” Girland got to his feet. “Wasn’t there something said about money?”
Dorey pushed a packet of one hundred franc notes across his desk.
“That’s two thousand on account. You’ll get the rest when you have some information for me.”
Girland stowed the money away in his hip pocket.
“How about expense money? I’ll have to buy a complete outfit. You don’t expect me to impersonate a rich businessman without the trimmings, do you? I’ll want at least...”
“You won’t get it,” Dorey said firmly. “Diallo, my servant will arrange what is necessary for you to have. I have already talked to him on the telephone and I have arranged with my bank for a sum for him to draw on. You don’t draw on it, Girland. Understand?”
“Your trust in me is touching,” Girland said cheerfully.
Dorey ignored this. He opened a drawer in his desk and took out a small plastic box.
“Here is a gimmick that might be useful.” He pushed the box across the desk. “It’s a radio pill... the size of a grape pip. Get this woman to swallow it. If you happen to be unlucky and lose her, with this pill, we can find her again.”
“That’s neat,” Girland picked up the box and opened it. He looked at the tiny black pill. “How does it work?”
“The heat of the body causes the transistor battery to become active. Anyone having a specially tuned radar receiver can pick up the bleeps within a radius of a hundred kilometres. The pill remains active for forty-eight hours. Carry it under your thumbnail and be careful you don’t lose it.”
As Girland fixed the pill under his thumbnail he said, “So you are expecting trouble?”
“I always expect trouble. Then if it doesn’t happen, I’m surprised. It’s better than the other way around. You won’t be on your own, Girland. My men will watching you. Your job is to get her to Eze. Don’t take any chances. Once you are at Eze, you should be safe.”
“Looks as if I’m going to earn my money after all,” Girland said ruefully. “Okay, I’ll get off. As soon as we arrive, I’ll call you.”
He left the office and walked to the elevator a little less enthusiastic than when he had arrived.
Pfc Willy Jackson shifted his automatic rifle from one arm to the other to look at his strap watch. The time was 10.10 p.m., and he stifled a sigh. He had more than two hours of duty before he was relieved. Still, he told himself, it could be a lot worse. Patrolling a hospital corridor was a damned sight better than standing in the rain outside SHAPE Headquarters. It was more than a darn sight better, he decided as a nurse came briskly down the corridor, giving him a friendly smile and passing on, swinging her hips and touching her hair with the practiced hand of a woman who knows she is being admired.
Pfc Willy Jackson was a well-disciplined soldier who had ambitions. All that talk about every soldier having a Marshal’s baton in his knapsack was food and drink to Jackson. He considered Eisenhower, Bradley and Patton the three greatest men who had ever lived. In another twenty years, he also could be a General. Willy Jackson was twenty-three. He was brimful of confidence: one of the best shots in the Army, the champion light heavyweight boxer of his Battalion and the best pitcher of the SHAPE baseball team. Jackson had everything that made an excellent soldier... and that was to be his downfall.
While he was thinking with some pleasure what he and the nurse who had just passed could do together if ever he had the opportunity of meeting her off duty, the elevator doors opened and a man, dressed in the uniform of an American Staff Colonel, stepped into the corridor.
Willy Jackson was susceptible to rank. A Captain made him tread carefully: a Major brought him out in a sweat: a Colonel reduced him to an inarticulate idiot.
It was his greatest ambition to reach the rank of Colonel when he was thirty years of age, and when he saw this squat, powerfully built man wearing an immaculate uniform with three blazing rows of combat ribbons, his mouth turned dry and he presented arms with a slap and a stamp that shook the corridor.
Smernoff, a little awkward in his brand new uniform, his hand hovering close to the butt of the gun he had on his hip, regarded him. He had already been informed about Jackson. He hoped he would have no trouble with him.
“What are you doing here, soldier?” he barked, coming to rest in front of Jackson.
“Guarding the corridor, sir,” Jackson said, sweat breaking out on his freckled face. This was the first time in his military career that an officer of a majority rank had deigned to speak to him.
“Where’s General Wainright’s room?”
“No. 147, sir.”
“You guarding General Wainright?”
“No, sir. This woman in No. 140.”
“Oh, yeah.” Smernoff relaxed a little. He hadn’t thought it would be this easy. “I’ve read about her. At ease, soldier.”
Jackson slightly relaxed. He allowed his blue, somewhat innocent eyes to meet Smernoff’s dark cruel, beady eyes, then he abruptly looked away.
What a man! he thought. Jackson! You have got to get with it! You’ve got to cultivate the way this guy looks!
“This woman,” Smernoff said, hooking his thumbs into his trousers pockets. “Have you seen her?”
“No, sir.”
“They say she has Chinese marks tattooed on her arse. Is that right?”
“I wouldn’t know, sir.”
“How’s the General?”
“I wouldn’t know, sir.”
“Soldier, let me tell you something: you’re lucky to be a Pfc.” Smernoff was beginning to enjoy himself. “You don’t have to worry about goddam Generals. What room did you say the old bull was in?”
Jackson flinched. He considered General Robert Wainright was a fine soldier. This disrespect shocked him.