Colin Forbes - Deadlock

'I happen to know Klein may be skilled at throwing out a smokescreen to cover his real operation. We'd better watch it. Under Klein's instructions – if she is – Lara could be leading us astray.'

'Don't follow that.'

'She could already have visited the target – in France. I'm suspicious she may now be pointing us in the wrong direction. Further north than the real target.'

'I tell you something in confidence,' Lasalle replied. 'We have sent out a general alert to all ports from Marseilles up the Atlantic coast to Le Havre. Two more things which may be of interest. Lara Seagrave is staying at the Plaza Hotel in Antwerp. And Interpol told me a number of known hard cases have disappeared from Luxembourg City.'

'Interesting. You know one of the Luxembourger's favourite sports?'

Tell me.'

'Scuba diving. And Luxembourg is close to the Meuse.'

They had eaten an excellent lunch of salmon steak aboard the Evening Star. Newman was getting the hang of the set-up on the vessel. Alfredo was a skilled dogsbody – he acted as cook as well as barman and general factotum. Sergeant Bradley did little except give orders to the crew. Josette did damn-all except look beautiful and listen to Ralston's pronouncements.

Under the surface he sensed an atmosphere of tension. He put it down to the colonel's sudden choleric outbursts of temper when something displeased him. Finishing off his lunch at the head of the table with a couple of cognacs, he was in a good humour as he stood up and beckoned to Newman to follow.

On deck he extended one short thick arm towards the right bank. The boat had changed course, was heading diagonally across the river as the hooter sounded continuously, warning other craft that might lie behind a nearby bend..

'Brand's estate at Profondeville,' Ralston barked. 'Ten acres he's got – and land here costs gold dust.'

'Being a banker maybe he's got plenty of gold bullion,' Newman remarked casually.

'What's that you said? Plenty of?'

'Gold bullion. After all, you said he's a banker.'

'Don't know a thing about his business. Except his HQ is in Brussels – with a branch in Luxembourg City. Lives in a fabulous mansion in Brussels on the Avenue Franklin Roosevelt. Park Lane of Brussels. Here he comes.'

The sun was shining out of a clear blue sky as Bradley ran about issuing orders. The cruiser was approaching a landing stage at the foot of a vast sloping green lawn. Spaced out across the trim green were shrubs sculpted in the shapes of various animals. There were life-like boars, stags, leopards and lions. A tall slim man wearing white flannels and holding a tennis racquet stood waiting on the landing stage.

'Christ!' Ralston burst out. 'Damn helmsman is bringing her in at the wrong angle…'

He bounded up the steps to the bridge. Inside the wheel-house Newman watched him push the helmsman aside, take over the wheel himself. He'd drunk a whole bottle of red wine with lunch, preceded by two double Scotches, to say nothing of the cognacs. Head like a rock.

The cruiser slowed, its course changed a few degrees, then it glided in, bumping the stage gently. Crew members leapt off holding ropes fore and aft, expertly looping the ropes round bollards. The man in flannels remained quite still, erect.

Ralston led the way once the gangway was in position. Shaking hands, he introduced his guest.

'Peter, brought a passenger. Robert Newman. Foreign correspondent chappie.'

'I don't normally permit reporters on my property.'

Brand's expression and tone were sardonic as he shook hands. Pale eyes under thin dark brows studied Newman, who took an instant dislike to the banker. In his thirties, a long lean face, a thin aquiline nose, a mobile mouth, he'd be a wow with a certain kind of woman who went for the matinee idol type. His voice was a stretched out drawl, his movements slow and easy.

Plenty of intelligence, Newman thought – and he'd know that. Not a man to underestimate, but maybe too clever by half.

'You've had a bad experience?' Newman responded. 'An interview that went wrong?'

'Something like that. It's the women who are the real bitches. Well, since you're here, you'd better come up to the house for a drink, I suppose.'

'Only if I'm welcome,' Newman said neutrally.

'Wouldn't have asked you had it been otherwise.' They had left the landing stage, were walking up a gravel path towards a two-storey white-walled mansion. The path was wide but on either side beyond the gravel Newman noticed deep wheel ruts in the lawn.

'Something's spoilt your grass,' he remarked, walking alongside Brand. Ralston was stumping ahead, doubtless in need of more liquid refreshment.

'That's what I mean,' Brand replied in his slow careful tone. 'Reporters are always noticing things, remarking on them.'

'Must have been a heavy vehicle,' Newman persisted.

'Jesus!' Brand slapped his leg with the racquet. 'It's a machine I have for levelling the gravel. Its axis is too wide. Obvious solution, widen the path. Which I'm going to have done. Any more questions?'

'Know a man called Klein?'

'Several. Common name on the continent. What's his first name?'

'Oscar,' Newman invented.

'No. Friend of yours?'

'I've been asked to interview him. He's an authority on the Meuse.'

'Is he now? I think we'll have drinks on the terrace. The Colonel makes himself at home, as you'll see.'

The terrace was raised up and a central flight of steps led up to the elevation which ran the full width of the mansion. To the left of the building Newman saw a tennis court. A large swimming pool with a blue tile surround occupied the centre of the terrace. Garden chairs were placed round it and Ralston was helping himself from a decanter on a table laden with bottles and glasses.

'What are you drinking – if anything?' Brand enquired in a bored tone, throwing down the racquet on a swing couch.

'A Scotch. Water. No ice. Nice little place you've got here.'

Brand flashed him a look as he reached for the decanter. The hostility between the two men crackled like static electricity. Newman had no intention of touching his forelock to this sarcastic sod. And if you needle a man long enough he sometimes says more than he wishes.

'I'm glad you like my pied-a-terre,' Brand responded as he poured the drink, planted the glass on the table and plonked a heavy jug of water beside it. The jug, Newman noted, was the finest Swedish glass. 'You should,' he went on, mixing himself a drink, 'it cost four million.'

'Francs?' asked Newman innocently.

'Christ no! Pound sterling.'

Ralston sat down, crossed his chunky legs. He had sensed the animosity and his eyes studied Newman who occupied one of the garden chairs.

'Newman,' he told Brand, 'is interested in whether your outfit handles gold bullion.'

'Is he now?' Brand swallowed half his drink before he replied. 'May I ask the reason for your interest? Thinking of tucking away some of your book profits in a few bars the tax man will never find?'

'Oh, I'm just intrigued in how the other half lives. Could I use the loo?'

'Round that side of the house. Second door on the left and straight ahead. You can't miss it. I hope…'

Newman grinned amiably, walked along the rim of the swimming pool and round behind the house. He looked down as he walked. The wheel rims of the heavy-tyred vehicle had continued from the lawn up the gravel but were fainter. As though someone had brushed the gravel to eliminate the traces.

He walked on past the second door. The wheel impressions continued past the house across the front drive. They only disappeared where they met a tarred road which wound its way past more millionaire-style mansions behind trim hedges.

He returned quickly to the house, checking the mullion-paned windows. There was no sign of life, no sign that anyone had seen him. He walked inside the house in search of the toilet. A tall slim girl in her twenties, hair the colour of golden corn, dressed in tennis blouse and shorts, met him, coming the other way down the corridor.