Brian Freemantle - The Predators

The scene-of-crime forensic expert thought there was nothing whatsoever suspicious about how the nail was embedded in the tyre of the original collection car but Norris had wheel, tyre and nail shipped back in the returning military aircraft for detailed scientific examination in Washington DC.

Claudine and Blake were early for the coordinating meeting but Norris, flanked by Harding and Rampling, was already waiting in a hastily contrived incident room created from the largest unit of the normal FBI accommodation. Andre Poncellet was early, too, but from the way he hurried the introductions Norris managed to convey the impression that the perspiring, tightly uniformed Brussels police commissioner had kept them waiting. Neither Harding nor Rampling wore jackets and the CIA resident had his tie pulled loose. Norris sat with both buttons of his jacket fastened: he was facing the window and the light flared off his rimless glasses, making him appear sightless. It was Rampling, a fresh-faced man with an extremely short crewcut, who gestured to the Cona percolator steaming on its hotplate: when Claudine nodded acceptance he poured a cup for her.

A technician with recording apparatus sat by the door. Seeing Blake’s look Norris said: ‘I like keeping tight records. About everything. Anyone got any objection?’

Blake shook his head. Claudine didn’t make any response, intently studying the newly arrived American. Poncellet said: ‘No. Of course not. Very wise.’ He spoke too quickly, too nervously.

‘In answer to your obvious question,’ Norris began, ‘the embassy has heard nothing of or from Mary Beth since she was last seen by two of her classmates walking off, alone, up the rue du Canal. So she’s now been missing for thirty-six hours…’ He paused, looking towards the recording technician, who nodded at the adequate sound level. ‘I’ve satisfied myself that she has not run away of her own accord. The most obvious conclusion is that she has been grabbed and is being held against her will. I fully accept and recognize under whose authority this investigation has to be conducted…’ He stopped again, looking directly at Blake. ‘We greatly appreciate your involvement and want to work extremely closely with you. My government is committing whatever additional support might be necessary. I brought twenty-five men with me from Washington last night, to be part of whatever force you are assembling. Today we need to evolve a strategy-’

‘Won’t that be difficult until we know what we’re investigating?’ Claudine broke in. It could be worse than she’d feared: far worse.

Norris frowned, both at the interruption and because it came from a woman. He needed to know what her function was. ‘I think we should proceed on the assumption that she has been kidnapped.’

‘Why?’ demanded Claudine. ‘Thirty-six hours is a long time without a demand, isn’t it?’

‘Not necessarily, in my experience.’

Harding managed not to show any reaction, although Norris’s reply directly contradicted what he had said on the way in from the airport the previous night.

So Norris was the negotiator, Claudine thought. And clearly the man in charge of the FBI and CIA contingent. ‘She could have been attacked. Be lying injured somewhere. Had an accident and be – or need to be – in a hospital. I don’t see the point of maintaining the silence about her disappearance that I understand has been asked for.’

‘I don’t want to panic whoever’s got her,’ said Norris flatly.

‘We don’t know that anyone has got her,’ protested Claudine. ‘How long do you think we should sit around doing nothing?’

Norris’s face became tinged with pink at the unfamiliarity of being confronted so openly. Before he could speak Poncellet declared with triumphant eagerness: ‘The Brussels police force hasn’t sat around doing nothing. I have assigned squads to the rue du Canal at the precise time she walked along it. Everyone – and I mean everyone – will be stopped and questioned and shown a photograph of the child, in the hope they regularly use the road at that time and might have seen her. In addition there will be road blocks stopping all vehicles for their drivers to be questioned. Checks were started, within an hour of our being told of her disappearance, on every shop, business and private house along the entire length of the road, not just in the direction in which she was seen to walk but also the opposite way.’ He looked proudly around those assembled in the room, saddened at the lack of approval.

‘What’s come out of the premises check?’ demanded Blake.

In his disappointment Poncellet tried condescension. ‘If there had been anything I would have obviously told you.’

Unperturbed, Blake said: ‘How long’s it been going on?’

‘Since the opening of commercial business this morning,’ said Poncellet tightly.

Blake nodded, as if the reply confirmed something. ‘And this afternoon one of the city’s busiest thoroughfares is going to be virtually closed off. By this evening it will have leaked that the daughter of the American ambassador has vanished. It would be better to have a media release, with a photograph, than run the risk of speculation’s getting out of hand and having to be corrected.’

‘I do not consider that’s the right way to operate at this time,’ said Norris.

‘I thought our understanding – the only possible jurisdictional understanding – was that it was how we considered it right to operate,’ said Claudine. So much for diplomatic niceties. They were always bullshit anyway. She’d expected antagonism – come prepared to confront it, which she was doing – but not to be as worried as she was becoming.

Norris grew redder. ‘Kidnappers are frightened once they’ve got a victim. Premature publicity can panic them, as I’ve already tried to make clear. I don’t want…’ He stopped, in apparent awareness of the implications of talking in the first person. ‘It would be a mistake for anyone to be panicked. It’s better for negotiations to be conducted as quietly and as calmly as possible.’

‘Quantico text book,’ identified Claudine.

‘With which I am extremely familiar,’ said Norris, who’d contributed two of the manuals from which it had been created.

‘So am I. I’ve read it,’ said Claudine, who had, as part of her hostage negotiation lectures. Throwing the man’s condescension back at him she said: ‘We don’t yet know we’re investigating a kidnap. We’re looking for a missing child. Missing children are best and most often found through public appeal. And as Europol is the jurisdictional investigatory body into the disappearance of Mary Beth McBride this is the way we consider this investigation should begin. A lot of time has already been wasted: I hope not too much.’

Norris was astonished at the effrontery, and then furious. ‘Have you forgotten who the victim is?’

‘It’s because of who the victim is that we are here,’ Blake reminded him. ‘Lack of contact for thirty-six hours hardly indicates panic. It indicates the very opposite, if she has been snatched.’

Inwardly Harding and Rampling wished they could wave flags or punch the air. Poncellet could hardly believe either the dispute or his good fortune in being safely on the periphery.

Norris was momentarily dumbstruck. Struggling desperately, he said: ‘It’s an official diplomatic request that this situation is not made public for at least another twenty-four hours.’

‘What’s diplomacy got to do with it?’ challenged Claudine. ‘If it is a consideration – and I cannot imagine how it can be – then perhaps it would be better if my colleague and I discussed it personally with the ambassador. We’re not achieving a lot here.’