Алистер Маклин - Red Alert

The telephone rang.

‘That could be C.W.,’ Sabrina said, jumping up to answer it.

‘Sabrina?’

She immediately recognized Philpott’s voice.

‘Morning, sir,’ she replied in surprise and glanced at her watch. It would be just past 4 a.m. in New York.

‘Is Sergei there?’

‘Yes sir,’ she replied, handing the receiver to Kolchinsky who was already standing at her side.

‘Morning, Malcolm,’ Kolchinsky said, gesturing to Sabrina to pass him his cigarettes and matches. ‘I wasn’t expecting to hear from you until this afternoon.’

‘Bad news, I’m afraid,’ Philpott answered. ‘I’ve just had a call from Major Lonsdale of Scotland Yard’s anti-terrorist squad. Alexander’s escaped.’

Kolchinsky sat on the edge of the bed and dropped his unlit cigarette into the ashtray.

‘That’s all we need.’

‘Lonsdale’s confident that he’ll be rearrested if he tries to leave the country but I still think C.W. should be told in case he does manage to slip through the net.’

‘I’ll get a message to him as soon as possible.’

‘Any new developments since I last spoke to you?’

Kolchinsky told him briefly what Sabrina had found out from Conte earlier that morning.

‘I’ll call Reinhardt Kuhlmann, the Swiss police commissioner. We go back a long way. I’ll tell him to expect a call from you this morning. You can fill him in on the details when you talk to him. I know he’ll give you his full cooperation. And you better get hold of Jacques in Zürich and tell him the news as well. He can always liaise with Reinhardt until you get to Switzerland.’

Kolchinsky promised to call Philpott later in the morning, then hung up and told the others about Alexander’s escape.

‘But how are you going to warn him without blowing his cover?’ Paluzzi asked.

‘I wish I knew.’ Kolchinsky looked at Graham and Sabrina. ‘Well, any suggestions?’

‘Yeah,’ Graham announced. ‘It involves Sabrina.’

‘I might have guessed,’ she said, eyeing Graham suspiciously. ‘Well, what wonderful scheme have you come up with this time?’

Graham held out his empty cup towards her.

‘How about a refill before I start?’

‘That’s where C.W.’s staying,’ Graham said, pointing out the boarding house to Sabrina as they passed it in the car. He drove around the corner then pulled into the first available parking space he saw and killed the engine.

‘This had better work,’ she muttered, reaching down for her bag.

He looked at her and smiled to himself. She was dressed in a tight-fitting white blouse, a black leather mini-skirt, black stockings and black shoes with three-inch stiletto heels. Her hair was loose on her shoulders and she had purposely overdone the make-up, marring her naturally fine features. It had to be realistic, much as she hated the idea of impersonating a prostitute.

‘I’m glad to see you find it funny,’ she said sharply, reaching behind her for the black leather jacket on the back seat.

‘You look great,’ he said with a grin.

‘You would think so. You’re a man.’ She opened the door. ‘I’ll see you back at the hotel.’

‘Sabrina?’

She looked back at him.

‘Good luck.’

‘Who needs luck dressed like this?’

‘You’ve got a point there,’ he replied, then started up the car and drove away.

She took a deep breath as she walked towards the boarding house, well aware of the attention she was attracting from passing male motorists. She ignored the wolf-whistles even though she knew a real prostitute would have gladly stopped to trade insults with her leering admirers. It would only have made her feel even cheaper than she already felt. She was the first to admit she enjoyed wearing eye-catching clothes, but she always dressed for herself, not for anyone else. With these clothes she felt as if she was dressed for every man in the city. She hated the feeling. It was degrading.

She reached the boarding house and climbed the steps to the open door leading into the foyer. The receptionist gave her an indifferent look as if she’d seen it all before and returned to her knitting. Sabrina climbed the stairs to the first floor where she paused to get her bearings from the directional board on the wall. A door opened and an elderly couple emerged from their room. They eyed her disapprovingly as they walked to the stairs. She waited until they had laboriously descended, then pushed a stick of gum into her mouth and made her way to Whitlock’s room, where she rapped loudly on the door.

The door was opened. It was Young. What was he doing there? Had Paluzzi’s men got the two room numbers mixed up?

‘I look for Signore Anderson,’ she said in a strong Italian accent. ‘You Anderson?’

‘Hell, no,’ Young replied, then ran his eyes the length of her body and whistled softly to himself. ‘But right now I wish I was. Anderson, you’ve got company.’

Whitlock’s eyes widened in amazement when he saw Sabrina but he quickly checked himself and approached the door, waiting for her to give him a cue.

‘You call agency and ask for girl who speak English,’ she said, chewing methodically on the gum. ‘But who your friend? You say nothing about friend on phone. It cost more.’

Young grinned at Whitlock. ‘Well, I’ll be damned. When did you reserve this little beauty?’

‘Last night, after we got back. I fancied a bit of company but they told me none of the English-speaking girls were available until this morning.’

‘Company, is that what you call it?’ Young ran his fingers through her hair. ‘You’re something else, sweetheart.’

‘You touch, you pay,’ she said sharply.

‘Some other time,’ Young said with a sneer. He slapped Whitlock on the arm. ‘I’ll see you later.’

Whitlock waited until Young had disappeared down the stairs, then closed the door and crossed to the bedside table and switched on the radio. He found a music channel and beckoned Sabrina towards him.

‘Is the place wired?’ she whispered, dropping the gum into the ashtray.

He shook his head.

‘No, I checked it this morning. It’s the walls. They’re paper thin. If Young comes back I wouldn’t put it past him to try and listen through the wall. The radio will drown out any noises we’re supposed to be making.’

‘That’s a relief,’ she said with a wry smile.

‘Whose idea was it for you to dress up like this?’

‘Mike’s, naturally. I picked up the clothes on approval from a boutique half an hour ago. They’re going straight back again this afternoon, believe me.’ She sat down on a wooden chair and put her bag on the dressing-table behind her.

‘It worked, though, just as he predicted it would. It was the one sure way of seeing you alone.’

‘How long have I been under surveillance?’

She smiled. ‘How did you know that?’

‘How else would you have known I was in?’

‘A couple of Fabio’s men have had the boarding house under surveillance since the hit last night. I hear you’ve already changed getaway cars?’

‘I did it first thing this morning. We couldn’t be sure whether it was spotted or not last night.’

‘Not according to the police report Fabio got through this morning. But whether the Red Brigades know is another matter altogether. Calvieri’s being very secretive.’

‘Wouldn’t you if you were in his position?’

‘I suppose so. That’s one of the reasons I’m here.’ She went on to explain first about Alexander’s escape from custody, then about Calvieri’s theory about the gunman’s black accomplice.

‘And Calvieri’s sure to have a better description of me than the police if it came from that guard I knocked out,’ he said once Sabrina had finished speaking.