Brian Freemantle - Madrigal for Charlie Muffin

‘This is a large sum of money,’ said Charlie, hefting the case as if the man needed proof. ‘Despite the precaution with the listing, I’m still nervous of carrying it unguarded.’

‘You want a security guard?’

‘A security van,’ said Charlie. ‘It’s a comparatively short distance; little more than three or four kilometres.’

‘I suppose that can be arranged,’ said the manager reluctantly.

It was the turn of the deputy manager to escort Charlie through the rear of the building into a completely enclosed yard. There was a burst of hurried Italian and Charlie saw one of the drivers grimace at the interruption to his routine. The armoured, grilled vehicle had no windows at the rear doors and only a small barred aperture, with a microphone to communicate with the driver. Charlie climbed in and smiled his thanks.

It took less than five minutes to reach the Via Ludovisi, and Charlie was beside the box ten minutes early. From the same pavement table at Doney’s where he had identified the Italian to Leonov three evenings before, Igor Solomatin sipped an espresso and watched. With a minute to go before the arranged time, he raised the copy of Il Messagero, giving the signal to Fantani inside.

To ensure the line had not become blocked, Charlie had entered the kiosk at five to twelve, going through an elaborate performance of consulting dialling-code instructions. The telephone rang promptly at noon.

‘Very good,’ said the voice he recognized from the previous day. ‘You’re alone.’

‘I said I would be,’ reminded Charlie. ‘Do you have what I want?’

‘Do you?’

‘Can’t you see the case?’

‘I don’t know what’s inside.’

‘It’s all there,’ said Charlie.

‘You’ll need a car. To your right is an Avis sign. Once you’ve hired the car, go north out of the city. The autostrada to Milan is numbered Al. Almost as soon as you join, there’s an Agip gas station. Ignore it. Drive on for about fifty kilometres. There is a slip road to your right. Just after the indicator sign is another Agip station. Stop there.’

‘Then what?’

‘Go into the station shop. Be by the telephone there at four.’

Another entrapment precaution. ‘Aren’t we letting this drag on?’ said Charlie.

The response was immediate. ‘We don’t want anything to go wrong, do we?’

A man trained in diplomacy can convey offence as well as avoid it. Billington conveyed it extremely well. He came stiffly forward to meet them, the handshakes a passing formality. He ignored the desk area, leading the director and Naire-Hamilton to part of the embassy office furnished with leather, club-like chairs. Before they sat he said, ‘I consider you have been extremely discourteous.’

Wilson and Naire-Hamilton remained standing. ‘That wasn’t our intention,’ said Wilson.

The ambassador’s face was flushed. ‘There is protocol,’ he said. ‘If you wished to question one of my staff, then I should have been informed in advance.’

‘An unfortunate oversight,’ said Naire-Hamilton.

Belatedly Billington indicated chairs and they sat. ‘Is there anything wrong with Walsingham?’ he said.

‘His wife had some Communist contact, when she was a student in Australia,’ said Wilson.

‘In the thirties flirting with Communism was a popular pastime’ Billington’s sarcasm was pointed.

‘This was in 1969,’ said Wilson. ‘And he didn’t declare it on his personnel records.’

‘I should have hardly thought this justified your coming all the way from London,’ said Billington.

‘There’s also the Summit,’ said Naire-Hamilton.

A secretary arrived with coffee. She put it on a table between them and poured. No one spoke until she left the room.

‘I understood you’d already sent people to look after that,’ said the ambassador. ‘They’ve been here for days.’

‘That was before the robbery,’ said Wilson.

‘What’s the robbery got to do with it?’

‘I thought you might be able to tell me.’

Billington edged forward on his seat. ‘You’re being obtuse.’

‘Was anything more than jewellery taken?’

‘I beg your pardon!’ Billington’s face was getting redder.

‘Work sometimes gets taken home; records show that various members of the embassy travel quite regularly to Ostia. It’s slightly unusual for an ambassador to spend so much time away from the official residence.’

‘Nothing leaves the security vault which isn’t cleared to do so,’ said Billington. ‘I resent the implication of it even being considered. There was not nor has there ever been any authorized documentation kept in my personal safe. It would have been a direct contravention of all security regulations, as you are perfectly well aware.’

‘I’m glad of the reassurance,’ said Wilson. ‘You appreciate, surely, that the inquiry had to be made?’

‘No, I do not,’ said Billington. ‘And I intend to protest most strongly to the Foreign Office about both the manner and implication of this visit.’

As they walked back along the wide corridor towards the main exit, Naire-Hamilton said, ‘What on earth was the point in behaving like that?’

‘There’s no security classification on a complaint,’ said the director. ‘Within half an hour of it being sent, there won’t be anyone in the embassy unaware of our presence. If it isn’t Walsingham we’ve got to cause someone else to panic’

Fantani had emerged from Doney’s by the time Charlie completed the hiring formalities and took a seat beside the Russian. Fantani strained to identify the car, but the rental office was too far away and he gave up.

‘My people know what they’re doing,’ said Solomatin. ‘He’ll be covered all the way. And back.’

‘It all seems very complicated.’ Fantani gently attempted finger exercises with his damaged hand.

‘We’ve got to be absolutely sure there’s no police involvement,’ said Solomatin.

‘I make the next call from the Via Salaria?’ said Fantani.

Solomatin counted out some coins to pay for his coffee, feeling a reluctance to take the man there. It was the first time he had been so closely involved with violence and he was nervous. ‘We’d better go,’ he said.

He was having to wave his arms and legs when the strings were pulled, and Charlie Muffin had never liked the puppet’s role: he preferred to be the one in control, the manipulator. He took the car angrily from the link road onto the autostrada, careless of the blare of protest from a Fiat on the inside lane. Charlie knew he was going to get a lot of pleasure screwing that shifty-eyed little sod.

For several kilometres he concentrated upon the cars travelling around him at the same speed, then without warning pulled over onto the hard shoulder. There was another screech of horns from behind but Charlie ignored it. He got out of the hire car and kicked the front offside tyre, as if to check a possible puncture. Appearing satisfied, he got back in, waited for a gap in the traffic and rejoined the motorway. Charlie was confident he would have been too quick for any following vehicle to avoid passing him, so he drove looking for any familiar car that might be waiting ahead for him to catch up. He clocked ten kilometres and detected nothing. Bugger them, he thought.

Charlie saw the service station ahead, indicated and turned smoothly into the forecourt. He was thirty minutes early, so he topped up the petrol and moved the car away from the pumps into the parking area. It was a busy station, cars and lorries and people swirling around. Well chosen, thought Charlie: greater professionalism than he would have expected, in fact.

He found the telephone in the vending area and went to it, the card Walsingham had given him ready in his hand. The security man came curtly on the line, the eagerness obvious in his voice.