Gavin Lyall - Midnight Plus One

I tossed a hundred-franc note on the counter.'C'est de la part du Général, avec ses remerciements.'

He looked blank at me, and hungry at the note. I smiled reassuringly, but it wasn't the smile which convinced him.

I nodded at the telephone on the end of the bar and asked:'Vous permettez…?'

He smiled and bowed.'Monsieur…'

I dialled the Victoria's number and asked for General Fay – good and loud. I was sure he must have a private line as well, but any man whose work is collecting and selling information could never refuse any phone call.

The proprietor glanced at me and I held a finger alongside my nose and he did the same, both of us sharing a big secret and neither of us having the faintest idea of what it was.

The old voice whispered tinnily down the wire: 'Must be losing me grip. Occurred to me after you'd gone that I could have sold you the information that Maganhard was in the coop.'

'Well, I've just done you a good turn, too. I tipped the chap here a hundred francs.'

'Far too much. Don't expect me to refund it. D'you want to know what I found out?'

'Go on.'

'How much?'

'Put it on the bill. There'll be more yet.'

'All right. There's been no official request to arrest Maganhard. So they did it offtheir own bat. So we may be able to-'

'I'll do it. I want you to ring the duty inspector in ten minutes: say you've heard he's nicked Maganhard and you want to confirm it. Then let slip you know the French haven't asked for it. Say you've heard rumours they're dropping charges. Just get him worried. By the way – who's the duty inspector likely to be?'

'Camberet or Lucan. It's all on the bill, Cane. What are you going to do?'

Take a long shot. Oh – and I've sent a couple of people up to see you. Look after them until I get back, will you?'

'Damn you, Cane, I'm living in a hotel, not running one.'

'One of them's pretty.'

There was a crackle on the line that might have been his aged chuckle. 'All right, Cane. In ten minutes from' – he paused, obviously looking at his watch – 'now.'

'Now,' I said, and looked at my own watch. I hadn't meant it to be as precise as this, but at least it gave me a timetable.

I rang off and ran.

Four minutes later I was telling the police sergeant that my problem was extremely important, highly confidential, remarkably delicate, and exceptionally urgent. That made it normal; he'd have thrown me out as a practical joker if I hadn't said something like that.

Which still left me with the problem of getting in to see Inspector Lucan – he was the one holding the fort, I'd learned – inside four minutes. I'd need the last two for softening him up before the General rang.

But at least I knew that if Lucan was busy, it could only be on the Maganhard problem. It was Montreux's slack time: mid-way between the ski tourists and the summer tourists, with no traffic troubles and, since there were no tourists to give them cover, none of the con men and jewel thieves who work the hotels in season.

The sergeant sighed, picked up the phone, and asked me my name.

I said:'Robert griflet. SûretéNationale.'

Lucan was a thin, neat man with a dark moustache, dark hair greased flat, and bright, beady eyes. He was naturally a brisk, suspicious man, but trying hard to be what he thought a Montreux inspector should be: slow, courteous, and inscrutable.

I liked his phoney character best. If he got brisk and suspicious about Robert griflet, I wasn't likely to have any choice about how I spent the next seven years.

I dealt him my to-whom-it-may-concern letter and followed it up, horse, foot and guns. I wanted him on the defensive, in the hope he'd forget to ask for mycarte d'identité. The photograph of griflet was pretty old and didn't look much like him now – but it looked a damn sight less like me.

I understood he'd arrested Maganhard? Splendid. Could he find a couple of charges to hold him on, while my bosses at the Sûretémade up their minds to ask for extradition? I was sure they would – eventually, anyway. Well, probably.

He frowned suspiciously at me, but went hastily back to looking inscrutable. Then he asked about the rape charge. Surely- I shook my head with what I hoped was a look of weary despair. We'd been trying to find the woman who'd laid the charge, and she seemed to have skipped. Which led one to suspect thatperhaps… and one couldn't be too careful when arresting multi-millionaires, could one?

He smiled, but only with his teeth. He knew all about being careful with multi-millionaires – any Montreux cop would. And he'd probably been getting the same song-and-dance from Maganhard for the past half hour.

He asked me what I expected him to do?

I sneaked a glance at my watch: if the General was on time, I had about fifty seconds left. I explained that I just wanted Maganhard kept on ice for a couple of days. Dream up a holding charge. What about illegal entry into Switzerland? – I could bet Maganhard didn't have an entry stamp on his passport.

He reminded me, coldly, that no court in Europe would take that as proof: too many frontier posts didn't bother to stamp passports at all. And legally, Maganhard was a Swiss resident, which complicated matters.

I got a bit huffy. Well, let him dream up his own charges. Hell, he'd done the arresting, not me. I presumed he hadsome reason for that- The phone rang.

He looked at it, then me, then picked it up and said:'Lucan,' Then:'Ah, bonjour, mon Général…'

I turned away in my seat and pretended I was pretending not to listen.

At first, Lucan didn't say much more thannon, a cautiousoui, and C'est possible. Then he asked who had said that Maganhard had been arrested?

I gave up my pretence and hissed that he mustn't tell anybody that he'd got Maganhard – that Maganhard's lawyers must never know – that we'd both be ruined…

He flicked a hand to keep me quiet, but perhaps he went a little pale. He ended up saying rather stiffly that he couldn't say anything official I hoped the General had ended up saying that he was going to start spreading the news as from now.

I demanded an explanation, and got a brief run-down on the General's history, status, and prestige. I shrugged it off: obviously, he must go and arrest the General, as well. That should keep things quiet.

He laughed in my face.

I let Robert Griflet lose his temper and played my fifth ace: he, Lucan, would do as I said or I, Griflet, would bring down the wrath of the Republic of France on his head and squash him like a bed-bug. Montreux cops had better learn to jump when areal policeman from across the frontier said so, or By God…

It was the one thing the real Griflet would never have done; Swiss officials blow up automatically at any hint of their big neighbours saying Or Else. Three minutes after they threw me out, they threw Maganhard after me. Whether it was mostly because Lucan was scared that he'd made an expensive mistake, or mostly to annoy me, I never asked and haven't bothered to guess.

I tailed Maganhard for a quarter of a mile to make sure nobody else did, then caught him up, and told him to head for room 510 – andnow part his damn hair differently. He did it without arguing. I took the taxi behind him.

We ended up back in room 510.

Harvey and Miss Jarman were already there, tucking into the champagne, and with coats off in that heat. The General was still in his fireside chair. Morgan raised his eyebrows at me as he let us in, but left it at that.

Harvey stood up. 'Christ, how did you do it?'

'I just said Please.'

'Well, I'm damned.' Then he suddenly looked at the champagne glass in his hand.

But I wasn't worried – yet. For him, champagne would be about as strong as British beer. Still, it wasn't a bad thing for him to remember that getting Maganhard back meant we were still in action.