Brian Freemantle - The Predators

‘I got two paedophile films and a lot of stills,’ announced McCulloch.

Ritchie didn’t turn, too intent on the photographs he was taking. ‘And this original coal cellar has been converted into a cell with a metal-grilled door…’ He turned. ‘But Mary Beth isn’t in it.’

That morning’s gathering was the last at which the identity of the informer remained unknown. There had been a brief, preliminary meeting at the American embassy at which Claudine had argued that neither Poncellet nor Smet – and certainly none of that day’s clerks – would know she was twisting her assessment of the previous evening’s telephone conversation. The others also agreed not to question the unexpected result of the overnight forensic and number check on the mobile telephone unless Poncellet drew attention to it.

At police headquarters, Smet again asked for the actual conversation to be played, following it from the prepared transcript, coming up to Claudine enquiringly the moment it finished.

‘She’s panicking,’ responded Claudine easily. ‘Dumping the telephone as she did clearly indicates that. And she’s frightened of me, personally. The whole conversation is directed against me, not the ambassador. And she hasn’t got a clue how to arrange a ransom.’

‘I didn’t think you believed there was ever any serious intention of getting a ransom?’ pressed Smet.

‘What I doubted was her intention of giving Mary back,’ corrected Claudine. ‘To have got away, undetected, with a ransom would have been her ultimate victory. She won’t get that now. She’ll abandon the ransom idea.’

‘If she doesn’t go ahead with the ransom there’s no reason to maintain contact, is there?’ said Poncellet.

Claudine wished the policeman hadn’t asked the question, although there was an opening to continue the goading. ‘It was always the most worrying possibility. I never imagined she would collapse so quickly or so easily.’

‘You don’t know that she has,’ persisted Poncellet.

‘I do,’ said Claudine. She was uncomfortable, offering wrong assessments. More immaturity, she recognized. It wasn’t a wrong assessment. It was an absolutely correct procedure to achieve a very necessary objective. The doubt was whether she would succeed in doing so.

‘Was there anything in the scientific examination of the telephone?’ asked Smet.

Blake said: ‘Nothing. It was stolen in Ghent seven days ago.’

‘A blank there, then?’ said Poncellet.

For a further five hours that single remark focused the suspicion upon the police chief, in front of whom were set out the findings – including the one obvious but seemingly unnoticed inconsistency – of the mobile telephone company, who had cooperated fully from the first moment of their being contacted, once the number had been identified.

‘Nothing that I can see to help us along,’ said Harding, setting a fresh snare for the policeman who immediately appeared to fall into it by saying nothing.

‘So everything revolves around another telephone call?’ said Smet.

‘Which she’ll be too frightened to make,’ declared Claudine.

*

There was nothing from the surveillance when they got back to the embassy. Although the hope of a possible discovery within six hours had been unrealistic, the disappointment was nevertheless intense.

‘I’ve changed the entire strategy,’ Claudine explained to the doubtful Burt Harrison. ‘Directly challenged her with being scared: behaving like someone mentally unstable. She won’t be able to stop herself from responding.’

‘I couldn’t do your job,’ said the diplomat.

I know you couldn’t, thought Claudine. Aloud she said: ‘Most times I don’t enjoy doing it myself.’ Had that morning been another confidence-building public performance? She certainly hadn’t thought so until now. And with no professional reason for him to attend, Hugo Rosetti hadn’t been there to witness it. He hadn’t come down for breakfast before she’d left the hotel, either.

It was four thirty before the courier hurried in with Jean Smet’s two tapes and a selection of the stills to be copied. Both were hard core paedophilia pornography.

Harrison became visibly distressed halfway through the first film and openly protested at the need to watch the second in its entirety. ‘Why?’ he demanded.

‘To see if Mary Beth is featured,’ said Blake bluntly.

The man objected again when Volker rewound both to replay them simultaneously. The German ignored him, exclaiming in satisfied triumph when he freeze-framed both at the meaningless strip of letters and figures that preceded both performances.

‘What?’ demanded Claudine expectantly.

‘They’re identical.’ Volker traced his finger along each matching set of symbols. ‘It’s cryptography: encoding data against unauthorized entry. In this case it’ll be the details of the distributors. It’s the newest and safest way for paedophiles to hide: the current anti-hacking firewall.’

‘Where’s this going to take us?’ asked Harding.

‘To who they are and where they operate from. To all the pornography they’ve got on offer, to see if Mary is among those already featured…’ Volker hesitated, nodding in renewed satisfaction. ‘And hopefully to their subscriber list to see who else in Belgium, particularly in Brussels, is on it as well as Jean Smet.’

The illegal burglaries had been totally justified, decided Henri Sanglier. And all except that of Smet’s house could remain undisclosed. So he was in no career-obstructing personal danger. In fact, as the acknowledged head of the investigating force, there would at the end of the case be a great deal of public recognition. He said: ‘We’ve done extremely well. I’m very pleased.’

Briskly, actually moving towards the door, Harrison said: ‘We could have Mary back by tonight! I’ll tell the ambassador.’

‘You won’t!’ snapped Blake. ‘This is the beginning, not the end. And that could still be a long way off.’

At first, when they left the house, Felicite held tightly to Mary’s hand, but it was difficult for the girl to throw the bread to the screeching gulls hovering against the warm wind so Felicite let her go. The gulls swarmed very close and Mary screamed and laughed, although nervously, finally hurling the remainder of the broken-up loaf in one shower, to send the birds from her. The sun was silvering the water and after so long in the basement Mary still had her eyes screwed up against the brightness: already there was some faint colour coming back to her cheeks.

‘Isn’t this nice?’ said Felicite. She was completely recovered, quite calm: content even. Certainly much better than she had been after talking to Smet. Then she’d been so furious she hadn’t even been able to think properly, her mind jumping from one half-thought to another, nothing in its proper order. It was now; as it always was. Everything worked out, all the uncertainties resolved. There was a lot to do, despite all that she’d already done since the previous day, but there was no longer any hurry.

‘Can I collect shells and things?’ asked Mary, as the disappointed gulls at last left them alone.

‘Don’t go too far ahead.’ There was nowhere Mary could go but Felicite was watchful. Two barges were passing each other in the centre channel of the Schelde but Felicite wasn’t worried. Both were too far away to see any crew so she and Mary would be just as distant: tiny unrecognizable figures.

‘I like my new things. And the u.p.’s,’ said Mary. She was glad she could throw the old, stained pair away. And that the pain in her tummy had gone and there weren’t any more blood spots. She wasn’t sure the woman was telling the truth about her becoming a big girl. The woman told lies.