Stephen Leather - The Double Tap

Marie did as she was told and Lynch accelerated. He pulled up behind the Mercedes, indicated that he was about to overtake, and passed it on a long, straight stretch of road. Marie put down the map. ‘So now they’re behind us, now what?’

‘Now they won’t think we’re tailing them,’ said Lynch. ‘We’re pretty sure they’ll stay on this road until the junction with the A4118, so we’ll go on ahead.’

Marie nodded. ‘What was the helicopter doing?’

‘I think it’s picking up the rest of the men at the school.’

‘Why didn’t they pick up Cramer, too?’

Lynch pulled a face. ‘I’m not a mind-reader.’

‘It’s not a normal helicopter, is it? The army ones are usually green, right?’

‘It belongs to the Ministry of Defence. It’s the one that brought Cramer to Wales.’

Lynch checked his driving mirror. The Mercedes was out of sight. He slowed a fraction and within a minute or so it came into view. Confident that he wasn’t going to lose his quarry, he accelerated once more.

Marie’s hand stroked his knee. ‘When, Dermott?’

‘I don’t know, Marie, love. You saw the two heavies in the front of the car?’ She nodded. ‘They’re tough-looking guys, right enough. I saw one of them talking to Cramer last night and he’s big. Looks like he can handle himself. Both of them are almost certainly Sass. They’re not the sort of odds I want to go up against. One on one, fine. But one against three, no chance.’

‘Two,’ said Marie, her voice almost a whisper.

‘What?’ said Lynch, checking his mirror again.

‘There are two of us. Don’t forget that. I’m in this as much as you now.’

Lynch was about to argue but he decided to say nothing.

Simon Chaillon wrapped his wool scarf tighter around his neck and hunched his shoulders against the cold breeze that was blowing off the River Limmat. He pulled back the end of his lambskin glove and took a quick look at his slim gold wristwatch. He was early, a clear sign of nervousness. Like most Swiss, Chaillon was punctual to the point of paranoia, and for him to be early was every bit as irritating as arriving late. He pushed his gloved hands deep into his overcoat pockets and went in search of a cafe. He found one in a side road and slid into an empty table. A waitress took his order and within two minutes a cup of hot chocolate was on the table in front of him.

He stirred the drink slowly, a slight frown the only sign of how troubled he was. The coded fax had been lying in his in-tray when he’d arrived, and once he’d deciphered its contents he’d been able to think of nothing else. Even the sight of Theresa in a white silk shirt and the flimsiest of bras hadn’t relieved his anxiety. She’d asked him if anything was wrong but he’d just shrugged and said that his ulcer was troubling him. She’d made sympathetic noises and leaned over his desk so that he could get a closer look at her breasts, but even that hadn’t cheered him up. He’d been unable to concentrate and had told Theresa to hold all his calls. Most of the time he’d sat staring out of his office window at the twin towers of Grossmunster Cathedral, wondering what was so urgent that the meeting had to be in Zurich and at such short notice.

He put his spoon down and looked at his wristwatch again. Five minutes. Chaillon hated to be unpunctual, hated it with a vengeance. Every minute in his life was accounted for as precisely as the funds in a company’s accounts, and five wasted minutes was time lost for ever. He picked up his cup of hot chocolate and raised it to his lips, but then put it back on its saucer, untouched. Normally there was nothing he enjoyed more than a cup of milky hot chocolate on a cold day, but today was special. Today was the day he’d been summoned to a meeting by a man he’d met only once before. A man who, to date, had paid Chaillon more than two million dollars in commissions for nothing more arduous than sending sheets of paper and photographs to accommodation addresses around the world. The fact that the people featured in the photographs were always murdered within days of the envelopes being sent was something which Simon Chaillon hadn’t dwelt on over the past two years. Since the arrival of the mysterious fax, he’d thought of little else.

The waitress came back and asked him if there was something wrong with the hot chocolate. Chaillon smiled and shook his head. No, he said, everything was fine. Just fine. He picked up his spoon and stirred it again. There had been no clue in the fax as to why the meeting was necessary. Apart from the first meeting more than two years earlier, the two men had communicated only by fax, computer bulletin boards, messages left on answering machines and couriered envelopes. Chaillon’s client hadn’t needed to spell out the importance of the two men never being seen together, which made the fax all the more worrying. Something must have gone wrong. He looked at his wristwatch again. It was time.

He pushed back his chair, dropped a handful of change onto the table, and left the cafe. The fax had given detailed instructions of where Chaillon was to go, but he was at least a hundred yards from the meeting point when he heard his name being spoken. Chaillon flinched as if he’d been struck across the face. He forced a smile and turned to face the man he knew only as Monsieur Rolfe.

‘A cold day, isn’t it?’ said Monsieur Rolfe. He spoke perfect French but Chaillon doubted that he had been born in France. Monsieur Rolfe was wearing horn-rimmed spectacles and a dark overcoat and looked like a mid-ranking bank official on his way to his office. There was something different about his hair, Chaillon realised. It was darker than he remembered from their first meeting, and curlier.

‘For the time of year, yes,’ said Chaillon. He swallowed. His throat was dry and he wished that he’d drunk the hot chocolate. ‘Is there something wrong?’ he asked.

‘Wrong?’ Monsieur Rolfe frowned. ‘Why do you think something is wrong?’

‘This isn’t where you said you wanted to meet. You said. .’

‘I changed my mind,’ interrupted Monsieur Rolfe. ‘Come. Walk with me.’

They walked away from the river, with Monsieur Rolfe leading the way confidently as if he was no stranger to the city. ‘I received your fax,’ said Chaillon. He regretted the words immediately they left his mouth and he cursed himself for his stupidity. Of course he’d received the facsimile. Why else would he be there?

‘Good,’ said Monsieur Rolfe as if unaware of Chaillon’s faux pas .

‘You received the details I sent you? The Vander Mayer contract?’ Chaillon wondered if there had been a problem with the last envelope he had couriered to London.

‘Yes. Yes, I did,’ said Monsieur Rolfe. There was something almost absent-minded about his conversation, as if his thoughts were elsewhere.

‘Business has been good, hasn’t it? It has been a very profitable arrangement. For both parties.’

‘Yes, it has,’ Monsieur Rolfe agreed. ‘Very profitable.’

Monsieur Rolfe turned into a side street. Chaillon noticed that from time to time his companion looked over his shoulder as if he feared that they were being followed. ‘Something is wrong?’ Chaillon asked.

‘No. Nothing is wrong.’

Chaillon swallowed nervously. Something was wrong. Something was most definitely wrong. Chaillon’s mind whirled. He pulled a handkerchief from his trouser pocket and blew his nose.

‘You have a cold?’ asked Monsieur Rolfe.

Chaillon wiped his nose and put the handkerchief back in his pocket. ‘Maybe. I’m not sure. I don’t feel well.’

‘You must take care of yourself,’ said Monsieur Rolfe.

‘I will. I will.’ Chaillon no longer recognised the streets they were walking through and it had been some time since he had seen anyone else on the pavement. Monsieur Rolfe took another look over his shoulder. ‘We are not being followed,’ said Chaillon.