Colin Forbes - The Stockholm syndicate

"Where did you get the boiler suit from, Stig?" Louise asked.

Palme looked apologetic. "I found a cleaner in the toilets,"

"You knocked him out cold and hid him in a closet," Louise told him.

"Yes. But in this I was able to wander everywhere — especially when I was carrying the pail. No-one ever notices a man in a boiler suit carrying a pail," Only Beaurain appeared unperturbed. Palme looked round to make sure they were unobserved, then produced from his jacket underneath the boiler suit three guns a Colt. 45, a Luger and a small 9-mm. pistol which Louise promptly grabbed as Beaurain took the Luger.

"The mechanic who handled the chopper when we landed here," Palme explained, 'is a friend of mine and keeps weaponry for me so he can slip it to me after we've passed through what are pompously known as official channels," "Ed Cottel is going to take us out through his own troops," said Louise. She took a firm grip on the pistol with her right hand and covered the weapon with her folded coat. "Any objection?" she asked Beaurain.

"Go ahead,"

She walked briskly back into the main reception hall and Beaurain followed more casually. She made no attempt to conceal her presence and marched straight towards where Ed Cottel was still standing pretending to read his magazine. Not for the first time Beaurain admired her sheer nerve, her audacious tactics. She reached Cottel who looked up and spoke.

"Don't any of you leave the airport, Louise, for God's sake. It is surrounded by extremely professional killers."

"Under this coat I have a gun aimed at you point-blank. Now, as a matter of academic interest, who are these killers?"

"They're the American connection," said Cottel matter-of-factly. "But that's not me. I guess I still have some explaining to do."

Beaurain was behind her. He took Louise's arm and squeezed it.

"I'm going to use that payphone over there for a minute," he said. "While I'm doing it, why don't you two exchange experiences — and maybe it would be safer to walk back further inside the building complex and join Sag and the rest of them."

They sat on a seat by themselves while Cottel explained it to Louise. A short distance away Palme kept watch. It had all started when Washington had asked Ed Cottel to come out of retirement and do one last job for them — track down the Telescope organisation. He had agreed and then at the last minute, when it was too late to substitute anyone else, had informed his superiors he was combining the Telescope mission with a personal investigation into the Stockholm Syndicate.

"When Harvey Sholto said "What's that?" in front of certain top aides who are next to our President — and they all tried to look as though they didn't know what the hell I was talking about — I knew something was wrong. From that time on I was a marked target on a limited schedule,"

"What does that mean?" Louise asked.

"That I would be allowed to proceed to Europe in the hope that I'd expose Telescope." He gave a lopsided grin.

"Whatever that might be. Once I'd done that, I'd be liquidated — probably by Harvey Sholto himself. Luckily the Sapo chief's men in Sweden spotted the early arrival of Sholto so I took extra precautions to keep underground. Once they realised I was devoting all my energies — using all the network of informants and helpers I built up over twenty years — to crack the Stockholm Syndicate, my limited schedule, as they so nicely phrase it, ran out. They sent out a Nadir signal on me. To be terminated with extreme prejudice."

"Why is Washington so worried?"

"Because most of the President's electoral campaign funds come from precisely those American industrial corporations who are members of the Syndicate." Cottel's voice became briefly vehement. "You know how our President avoids issues likely to embarrass him — he looks the other way, pretends they don't exist."

"I still don't understand it fully, Ed. This Harvey Sholto — how much power has he? What is his official position?"

"No official position at all any longer. More power than anyone else in Washington below the rank of president because of what he knows. Christ, Louise, I've as good as told you — that's the guy who photocopied all Edgar J. Hoover's files! Those files had all the dirt on every influential figure in the country. He's built up dossiers so dangerous, no-one in Washington dare touch him. But what was the use of just scaring people? And then he thought up the idea of the Stockholm Syndicate. He contacted Viktor Rashkin in Stockholm — I suspect they must have met secretly in the Far East earlier."

He broke off as Beaurain reappeared, his former fatigue no longer apparent, and he checked his watch as he came up to the seat. "We'll be out of here in five minutes, maybe less."

"How?" Cottel asked sceptic ally

"By courtesy of Superintendent Marker of Danish police Intelligence. At the moment a fleet of police cars full of armed men is racing to Kastrup. I told him where Sholto has placed his troops it is Sholto, isn't it, Ed? I thought so. Those two pretending to repair a street lamp are in for a shock."

"There'll be shooting?" Cottel queried.

"Not a shot fired would be my guess. Viktor Rashkin is due here aboard a Danair flight from Bonne and they won't want the place swarming with police. I think I can hear police sirens now."

"You can't touch Rashkin," the American warned. The bastard can always claim diplomatic immunity."

"So we wait a few hours and I think Rashkin will solve the problem for us. Yes, you can hear the sirens. Sound to be a hell of a lot of them,"

There was no shooting. Bodel Marker had sent an overwhelming force to Kastrup and none of the men waiting for Beaurain put up resistance. The fact that they carried firearms was more than sufficient reason, for putting them behind bars. Beaurain then explained the final move in detail to Marker, one of the key men responsible for smashing the Syndicate's communications system. He obtained the Dane's full agreement to his plan, not all of which was strictly in accordance with the law. And it was Marker who provided transport in the form of unmarked police cars for Beaurain and his companions to move into the city.

"What was all that about?" Louise asked as they drove away from Kastrup.

Marker had provided them with three cars. In the lead vehicle, a Citroen, Beaurain was driving with Louise beside him while in the rear sat Palme and Anderson, the laconic Sikorsky pilot. The two cars following them, both Audis, contained Max Keller-man and five of Henderson's gunners. Henderson was driving the third car, guarding their rear.

"I will guide you to the arms depot," Palme announced.

"Here in Copenhagen?" queried Louise.

"Over this bridge and turn right," said Palme calmly. "Into the Prinsesse Gade." The three cars pulled into a drab side street and parked. Minutes later Palme had returned with his suitcase and they were on their way again, heading back to the main road.

"Where are we going now Stig has tooled up, as he would say?" Louise enquired.

"To the house on Nyhavn — which is where the whole horrendous series of events is going to end unless I've guessed wrong."

"You wouldn't care to elaborate?" They drove over the Knippels Bro into the heart of Copenhagen.

"The American connection is Harvey Sholto Ed explained about the Edgar Hoover dossiers. With those and his high-level connections Sholto organised the Syndicate membership in the States. He links up with Rashkin, who organises the European end; I suspect that Rashkin has been running a one-man band."

"With the aid of a three-man directorate?"

"Let's see what happens at the house on Nyhavn," Beaurain said.

Ed Cottel, who had stayed behind at Kastrup, watched through a pair of high-powered glasses the arrival of the DC-9 jet Danair Flight SK 262 from Bonne. As he watched passengers filing off the plane he began to worry. He couldn't identify Viktor Rash-kin. Then he had an idea. He hurried to the main exit where cabs waited for fares.