Alistair MacLean - Puppet on a Chain

I didn't need a street guide to find my way out of Huyler. The harbour lay to the west, so the terminus of the causeway road must lie to the east. I made my way along a few narrow winding lanes, in no mood to be affected by the quaint old-world charm that drew so many tens of thousands of tourists to the village each summer, and came to a small arched bridge that spanned a narrow canal. The first three people I'd seen in the village so far, three Huyler matrons dressed in their traditional flowing costumes, passed me by as I crossed the bridge. They glanced at me incuriously, then as indifferently looked away again as if it were the most natural thing in the world to meet in the streets of Huyler in the early morning a man who had obviously been recently immersed in the sea.

A few yards beyond the canal lay a surprisingly large car park — at the moment it held only a couple of cars and half a dozen bicycles, none of which had padlock or chain or any other securing device. Theft, apparently, was no problem on the island of Huyler, a fact which I found hardly surprising: when the honest citizens of Huyler went in for crime they went in for it in an altogether bigger way. The car park was devoid of human life nor had I expected to find an attendant at that hour. Feeling guiltier about it than about any other action I had performed since arriving at Schiphol Airport, I selected the most roadworthy of the bicycles, trundled it up to the locked gate, lifted it over, followed myself, and pedalled on my way. There were no cries of 'Stop thief!' or anything of the kind.

It was years since I'd been on a bicycle, and though I was in no fit state to recapture that first fine careless rapture I got the hang of it again quickly enough, and while I hardly enjoyed the trip it was at least better than walking and had the effect of getting some of my red corpuscles on the move again.

I parked the bicycle in the tiny village square where I'd left the police taxi — it was still there — and looked thoughtfully first at the telephone-box, then at my watch: I decided it was still too early, so I unlocked the car and drove off.

Half a mile along the Amsterdam road I came to an old Dutch barn standing well apart from its farm-house. I stopped the car on the road in such a position that the barn came between it and anyone who might chance to look out from the farm-house. I unlocked the boot, took out the brown paper parcel, made for the barn, found it unlocked, went inside and changed into a completely dry set of clothing. It didn't have the effect of transforming me into a new man, I still found it impossible to stop shivering, but at least I wasn't sunk in the depths of that clammily ice-cold misery that I'd been in for hours past.

I went on my way again. After only another half-mile I came to a roadside building about the size of a small bungalow whose sign defiantly claimed that it was a motel. Motel or not, it was open, and I wanted no more. The plump proprietress asked if I wanted breakfast, but I indicated that I had other and more urgent needs. They have in Holland the charming practice of filling your glass of jonge Genever right to the very brim and the proprietress watched in astonishment and considerable apprehension as my shaking hands tried to convey the liquid to my mouth. I didn't lose more than half of it in spillage, but I could see she was considering calling either police or medical aid to cope with an alcoholic with the DT's or a drug addict who had lost his hypodermic, whichever the case might be, but she was a brave woman and supplied me with my second jonge Genever on demand. This time I didn't lose more than a quarter of it, and third time round not only did I spill hardly a drop but I could distinctly feel the rest of my layabout red corpuscles picking up their legs and giving themselves a brisk workout. With the fourth jonge Genever my hand was steady as a rock.

I borrowed an electric razor, then had a gargantuan breakfast of eggs and meat and ham and cheeses, about four different kinds of bread and half a gallon, as near as dammit, of coffee. The food was superb. Fledgling motel it might have been, but it was going places. I asked to use the phone.

I got through to the Hotel Touring in seconds, which was a great deal less time than it took for the desk to get any reply from Maggie's and Belinda's room. Finally, a very sleepy-voiced Maggie said: 'Hullo. Who is it?' I could just see her standing there, stretching and yawning.

'Out on the tiles last night, eh?' I said severely.

'What?' She still wasn't with me.

'Sound asleep in the middle of the day.' It was coming up for eight a.m. 'Nothing but a couple of mini-skirted layabouts.'

'Is it — is it you!'

'Who else but the lord and master?' The jonge Genevers were beginning to make their delayed effect felt.

'Belinda! He's back!' A pause. 'Lord and master, he says.'

'I'm so glad!' Belinda's voice. 'I'm so glad. We — '

'You're not half as glad as I am. You can get back to your bed. Try to beat the milkman to it tomorrow morning.'

'We didn't leave our room.' She sounded very subdued. 'We talked and worried and hardly slept a wink and we thought — '

'I'm sorry. Maggie? Get dressed. Forget about the foam baths and breakfast. Get — '

'No breakfast? I'll bet you had breakfast.' Belinda was having a bad influence on this girl.

'I had.'

'And stayed the night in a luxury hotel?'

'Rank hath its privileges. Get a taxi, drop it on the outskirts of the town, phone for a local taxi and come out towards Huyler.'

'Where they make the puppets?'

'That's it. You'll meet me coming south in a yellow and red taxi.' I gave her the registration number. 'Have your driver stop. Be as fast as you can.'

I hung up, paid up and went on my way. I was glad I was alive. Glad to be alive. It had been the sort of night that didn't look like having any morning, but here I was and I was glad. The girls were glad. I was warm and dry and fed, the jonge Genever was happily chasing the red corpuscles in a game of merry-go-round, all the coloured threads were weaving themselves into a beautiful pattern and by day's end it would be over. I had never felt so good before. I was never to feel so good again.

Nearing the suburbs I was flagged down by a yellow taxi. I stopped and crossed the road just as Maggie got out. She was dressed in a navy skirt and jacket and white blouse and if she'd spent a sleepless night she certainly showed no signs of it. She looked beautiful, but then she always looked that way: there was something special about her that morning.

'Well, well, well,' she said. 'What a healthy-looking ghost. May I kiss you?'

'Certainly not,' I said with dignity. 'Relationships between employer and employed are — '

'Do be quiet, Paul.' She kissed me without permission. 'What do you want me to do?'

'Go out to Huyler. Plenty of places down by the harbour where you can get breakfast. There's a place I want you to keep under fairly close but not constant surveillance.' I described the window-barred building and its location. 'Just try to see who goes in and out of that building and what goes on there. And remember, you're a tourist. Stay in company or as close as you can to company all the time. Belinda's still in her room?'

'Yes.' Maggie smiled. 'Belinda took a phone call while I was dressing. Good news, I think.'

'Who does Belinda know in Amsterdam?' I said sharply. 'Who called?'

'Astrid Lemay.'

'What in God's name are you talking about? Astrid's skipped the country. I've got proof.'

'Sure she skipped it.' Maggie was enjoying herself. 'She skipped it because you'd given her a very important job to do and she couldn't do it because she was being followed everywhere she went. So she skipped out, got off at Paris, got a refund on her Athens ticket and skipped straight back in again. She and George are staying in a place outside Amsterdam with friends she can trust. She says to tell you she followed that lead you gave her. She says to tell you she's been out to the Kasteel Linden and that — '