Алистер Маклин - Circus

‘That night he met with the accident on deck–’

‘Kan Dahn was the accident. Then Harper told me he had keys for Van Diemen’s offices. He must have thought me a simpleton. You’d have needed a hundred skeleton keys to cover every lock. He’d keys for one reason only – he’d access to Van Diemen’s keys. And he kept asking me about my plans for entry. I kept saying I’d play it by ear. So eventually I gave him all my plans – a tissue of lies – by giving them to you in your cabin. You may remember Harper suggested your cabin as a rendezvous. And, of course, I didn’t trust you either.’

‘What!’

‘I didn’t distrust you. I just didn’t trust anyone. I didn’t know you were clean until you insisted that Harper had personally appointed you to this job. If you had been in cahoots, you’d have said your boss did.’

‘I’ll never trust you again.’

‘And why were we followed by the secret police everywhere. Someone gave them the tip-off. When I knew it wasn’t you, there wasn’t anyone else very much to suspect.’

‘And you still expect me to marry you?’

‘I’ll have to. For your own sake. After you’ve resigned, that is. This may be the day of women’s lib, but I think all this is a bit too lib for you. Do you know why Harper picked you – because he reckoned you were the person least likely to give him any trouble. He was right. My God, it’s never even occurred to you how Harper managed to drag Fawcett inside the tiger’s cage without being savaged.’

‘Well, since you’re so clever–’

‘He anaesthetized the tigers with a dart gun.’

‘Of course. Maybe I should retire at that. You don’t make many mistakes, do you?’

‘Yes. A major one. One that could have been fatal for many people. I assumed that the red dart-gun was the same as he’d used on the tigers. It wasn’t. It was lethal. If it hadn’t been for that Dobermann Pinscher – ah well, it was fitting that he died by his own hand, so to speak. Hoisted by his own petard, or those who live by the sword die by the sword or something like that.’

‘One thing – among, seemingly, many others – I don’t understand. This business of you having to take Van Diemen prisoner. Surely Van Diemen’s almost certain ability to reproduce the formulas would have been foreseen by the CIA back in Washington?’

‘It was foreseen. It was intended that I kill him with the lethal red pen. If not, Harper – who probably carried a vest pocketful of red pens – was slated to attend to him on Tuesday night, the supposed time of the break-in. He would have got off with it – he was as cunning as he was brilliant – and there would have been no one to testify against him. I would have been dead.’

She looked at him and shuddered.

He smiled. ‘It’s all over now. Harper told me a fairy story about Van Diemen’s heart condition and insisted that I used the black gas pen against him. The need to use either did not arise. It was Harper’s – and, of course, his masters’ – intention that Van Diemen should survive. As I said, Harper died by his own hand – and Van Diemen by Harper’s. Harper is totally responsible for the deaths of both Van Diemen and himself.’

‘But why – why did he do it?’

‘Who knows? Who will ever know? A dedicated anti-American? A million dollars on the nail? The motivation – or motivations – of a double agent lie beyond comprehension. Not that it matters now. Sorry, incidentally, that I jumped on you that night in New York – I had no means of knowing whether my family was alive or dead. You know, of course, why Harper sent us to the restaurant that night – so that he could have my stateroom bugged. Which reminds me – I must send a telegram to have Carter arrested. And Morley – Harper’s bogus electronics friend who bugged my stateroom on the train. And now, I have a delicate question for you.’

‘And that is?’

‘May I go to the men’s room?’

So he went to the men’s room. There he extracted from his inside pocket the papers he had taken from Van Diemen’s filing cabinet. He did not even look at them. He tore them into tiny pieces and flushed them down the toilet.

Captain Kodes knocked on the circus’s office door and entered without invitation. Wrinfield looked up in mild surprise.

‘I’m looking for Colonel Sergius, Mr Wrinfield. Have you seen him?’

‘I’ve just arrived from the train. If he’s inside he’ll be in his usual seat.’

Kodes nodded and hurried into the large exhibition hall. The late-night performance was in full swing and, as usual, it was a capacity house. Kodes made his way along to the section of the seats opposite the centre ring, but there was no sign of Sergius. For a few moments he stood there irresolute, then instinctively, almost inevitably, his eyes followed the gaze of ten thousand other pairs of eyes.

For long moments Kodes stood stock still, as if petrified, his mind at first blankly refusing to accept the evidence of his eyes. But his eyes were making no mistake. What he was witnessing was the impossible but the impossible was indubitably there: two of The Blind Eagles were going through their customary hair-raising trapeze act.

Kodes turned and ran. As he went through the exit he was met by Kan Dahn, who greeted him in genial fashion. It was questionable whether Kodes saw him. He burst into Wrinfield’s office, this time without the benefit of knocking.

‘The Blind Eagles! The Blind Eagles! Where in God’s name have they come from?’

Wrinfield looked at him mildly. ‘Their kidnappers released them. We notified the police. Didn’t you know?’

‘No, I damn well didn’t know!’ Kodes ran from the office and into his car.

Ashen-faced and stunned, Kodes stood on the seventh floor of the Lubylan detention block. The shock of finding gagged and bound men both at the open entrance below and in the guard-room had been shattering enough: but nothing could have prepared him for the sight of the three dead men lying there, Sergius and Van Diemen and Angelo.

A sure instinct led Kodes to the undertaker’s emporium. He was hardly conscious of the fact that the lights were on in the front office. They were also on in the back parlour. He made his way to the coffin that had been so briefly occupied by Bruno, and slowly removed the lid.

Dr Harper, hands crossed on his chest, looked curiously peaceful. The hands held the large black-bordered box that had been cut from the paper that had announced Bruno’s death.

The admiral leaned back in his chair in his Washington office and stared in disbelief as Bruno and Maria entered.

‘God! That suit!’

‘Beggars can’t be choosers.’ Bruno surveyed his suit without enthusiasm. ‘Chap in Crau gave it to me.’

‘He did? Anyway, welcome home, Bruno. And Miss Hopkins.’

‘Mrs Wildermann,’ Bruno said.

‘What the devil do you mean?’

‘Holy matrimony. They give you a special licence for people in a hurry. We are in a hurry.’

The admiral contained his near-apoplexy. ‘I have the outline of the past few days. The details, please.’

Bruno gave him the details and when he had finished the admiral said: ‘Magnificent. Well, well, it took a long time before we could put it all together. Van Diemen and your family.’

‘A long time.’

Maria stared from one to the other in puzzlement.

The admiral said briskly: ‘And now. The plans.’

‘Destroyed.’

‘Naturally. But your mentalist mind isn’t.’

‘My mentalist mind, sir, has gone into a state of total shock. Amnesia.’

The admiral leaned forward, his eyes narrowing, his hands tightening on the desk. ‘Repeat that.’

‘I destroyed them without looking at them.’