Colin Forbes - By Stealth

Her eyes saw only a scruffy wood-block floor passing below her, a floor with several blocks loose and which hadn't seen a smear of polish for ages. Starmberg, one hand holding her roughly round the neck, used the other to open a door. She blinked as bright fluorescent light hit her.

Starmberg descended a flight of wood-plank steps in the basement area. Against one wall was a long leather seat. He dumped her without care on the seat, stretched her out. He began talking to someone she couldn't see as he removed the handcuffs from her hands and replaced them with leather thongs and then performed the same action with her ankles. Remembering something Butler had said during the tough training course, she compelled herself to relax as the thongs were applied. The gag was removed.

`Well, Dr Hyde,' Starmberg stated in his guttural English, 'this is your new patient, Miss Grey. You will be operating on her.'

`I have the most precise instructions,' an oily voice replied. 'It is only a question of timing.'

`You will be told when. It will be within three days. I leave her in your tender hands…'

Sounds of heavy feet tramping back up the plank stairs, a door opening, slamming shut. At the last sound Paula's morale sank. And that macabre sentence. You will be operating on her.

`Now, my dear Miss Grey, are you comfortable?' the oily voice enquired and the speaker came into view, staring down at her.

Clean shaven, he wore rimless glasses, had a high forehead and thinning brown hair. Smiling down at her, he exposed a perfect set of large teeth. The smile was as phoney as a con-man's but she thought she detected in the smile a streak of sadism.

`What the blazes do you mean by asking if I'm comfortable?' she burst out. 'And do you know the penalty for kidnapping? The crime took place in Germany so you'll be tried there. And while we're on the subject, where am I?'

`Oh, dear me…' The hideous smile became pronounced, reminding Paula of a shark's open mouth. 'You must calm yourself,' Hyde rebuked her. 'If you become hysterical I will have to give you something to put you to sleep. Lie still, I have to complete my examination of your condition.'

He leaned further over her and she saw he was a large man, heavily built and with a paunch. He wore a white jacket like those used by surgeons. His fingers were long, slim and sensitive, like talons. They pulled her jacket off her right shoulder and paused.

`You will be supplied with good food and plenty of liquid. It is essential you do drink a lot of liquid. One hand will be freed at meal-times. Are you left- or right- handed?'

`Right-handed,' Paula said without thinking.

`Wrong shoulder.'

Hyde's fingers pulled her jacket back into place, turned their probing attention to her left shoulder. Removing her jacket, he pulled her blouse free, slid the shoulder strap of her slip down her left arm. His fingers felt, prodded her left shoulder, grasped its bareness, squeezed it.

Paula stopped herself shuddering with revulsion under his searching touch. Then it flashed into her mind that Irene Andover's left arm had been severed close to the shoulder. She fought back a feeling of faintness. You loathsome pervert, she said to herself. She made herself speak in a controlled tone.

`If you spare me it will be taken into account at your trial.'

`You stupid bitch!'

As he spat out the venomous words his fingers dug savagely into her flesh. She gritted her teeth to stop screaming with the pain. The smile had gone. He stood up and used one finger to push his rimless glasses higher up his nose, which was slightly hooked. He disappeared out of view for a few moments. Then she felt a hand grasp her right wrist. At that moment the door into the basement was opened, closed, and she heard clumsy elephantine footsteps treading down the planks.

`Ilena, come here,' Hyde called out. He looked down at Paula. 'Ilena is the nurse who will help me when your time comes. Meantime she will attend to your needs – so, Ilena, come and meet our latest patient.'

A nurse? Looking up Paula saw a woman, also wearing a white hospital-like coat, leaning over her. A short and stocky woman whose arms bulged like tree trunks under the sleeves. Her face was slab-like, Slavic, Paula guessed.

A Romanian? Certainly from Eastern Europe. Hard eyes without humanity stared down at her. She was built like an ox. With a feeling of despair Paula realized she'd be no match for this peasant-like horror if it came to a struggle between them. The woman's hair was dark, trimmed very short.

`Does she speak one single word of English?' Paula burst out again. 'She's going to be a hell of a lot of use.'

'Ilena speaks a little English – enough to understand what you have just said,' Hyde remarked in his worst bedside manner.

He handed the hypodermic he had been going to use himself to the woman.

`You might as well practise on the patient now – so you give her the injection.'

Ilena seized Paula's wrist in an iron grip. Without any consideration she rammed the hypodermic home, pressed the plunger. Paula stifled a scream of agony. The world blurred again. I mustn't go under this time, she told herself. But the whole world faded away into nothing.

Kuhlmann, still at Berliner Tor, reacted with great speed and energy after listening to Newman's phone call. A small group of detectives, dressed in jeans and anoraks, was driven in a plain van and deposited in a side street near the Four Seasons.

Waving empty beer bottles, they staggered into the Neuer Jungfernstieg opposite the Four Seasons Hotel and started a mock fight. Patrol cars with uniformed police appeared, battled with the pseudo-punks, eventually `arrested' them.

While this was going on an unmarked police car stopped at the entrance to the hotel. A plain-clothes detective went inside and straight into an elevator up to Tweed's room. He showed his identity card, produced a floppy-brimmed hat of German make and a German trench coat.

`Put these on please, sir. I'm taking you to Berliner Tor. It's a precaution – in case the opposition is watching the hotel…'

Inside the vehicle, with Tweed beside him as he drove at speed round the lake, he explained.

`This is a very special car. All the windows are one-way glass. We can see out, no one outside can see in. And Mr Newman has taken a taxi to Berliner Tor. He told Chief Inspector Kuhlmann he could disguise himself with a cap and some glasses he was carrying…'

Arriving at Berliner Tor, he drove the car to a rear entrance, escorted Tweed inside the building, took him in an elevator to the large office Tweed had used to phone Inspector Nielsen in Copenhagen. Newman was smoking, pacing the office while Kuhlmann spoke on the phone. Finishing his call, Kuhlmann jumped up as Tweed removed the hat and coat.

`No one will know you have been here. Sit down. I have a lot to tell you.' He glared at Newman, waved his cigar at him. 'And you sit down now. I know you're worried – so listen. Wheels are turning at top speed.'

`Paula has been kidnapped,' Tweed said quietly as he sat down.

`I'm afraid so,' Kuhlmann agreed. 'I know this will have hit you hard – you do have all my sympathy. But action is the order of the day.'

`Absolutely right.' Tweed stiffened himself. 'What do you know so far?'

`I phoned a friend of mine at Inter-Vision TV. They work late too. He told me no film was being made on any location within miles of the Four Seasons. He has also checked his transport and no Inter-Vision vehicle has been stolen. Obviously the kidnap gang plastered similar white vans with stickers printed with the company's name. They'll have peeled them off hours ago. It was an audacious ploy. We are dealing with someone very clever.'

`Any trace of one of those vans?' Tweed asked.