Gavin Lyall - Midnight Plus One

I felt sleepy, despite the jolting and creaking of the car, but I wasn't sure I ought to be asleep. I tried to convince myself that the last thing the General would do was set up a gun-fight for when we were still inhis car withhis driver. I convinced myself, all right, but by then I wasn't sleepy any more.

Just before Bern, Harvey woke up. He did it slowly, like a man climbing out of mud, or out of an hour's sleep when what he needs is another six. He lit a cigarette, still moving slowly, and coughed several times. Then he asked: 'Where are we?'

'Bern.'

'How far now?'

'About four and a half hours.'

'Jesus.' He wiped a hand over his face and then looked at the hand. I tried not to look as well, but I was as interested as he was – and for the same reason. The fingers were quivering.

I waited, but he didn't say anything. We sailed majestically through the middle of Bern, sprang past the national Parliament, across the river, and out along the Thunstrasse. We got a lot of interested looks from the citizenry, and a couple of cops gave us half-official salutes. They knew the car, all right.

We ran out of the city and the road surface turned rough again. The Rolls gave out a faint squeaking and creaking of wood rubbing on wood. It was an oddly reassuring noise, perhaps like being in a cabin of an old tea-clipper under full canvas.

I turned and peered into the shadow of the back seat. 'You say you haven't heard of this man Calieron?'

Maganhard said: 'Never.'

I nodded. 'He's turning out quite a boy, isn't he? He knows enough to employ the General, to hire a gunman like Bernard, maybe enough to frame you on a rape charge – and he gets hold of Heiliger's shares.'

'To me,' he said, 'that is the most remarkable thing. Max believed in personal possession. He carried everything with him.'

'A big black briefcase,' Miss Jarman said softly. 'Chained to his wrist. And full of bearer shares, bonds, deeds. It must have been worth millions.'

'So?' I looked at her. 'Then why wasn't he carrying it when he crashed?'

She smiled in the gloom. 'Nobody seems to know, Mr Cane.'

Maganhard said suddenly: 'You saidmaybe this Calieron arranged the – the charge against me. Is it not obvious it must be him?'

'Not quite. If he fixed that charge, then he gave himself a system for keeping you away from Caspar meetings: getting you pinched by the cops. He could have put the cops on to you several times in the last two days – but every time he tried to kill you instead. I don't see why. He doesn't need you dead to be able to outvote your partner Fiez. He only needs to stop you coming to the meeting.'

Maganhard said: 'He dare hardly leave me alive if he proposes to try and destroy my company.' And he sounded rather smug about it.

I shook my head. 'I don't buy that. What could you do to him, once he's forced the decision to sell Caspar out? He isn't stealing anything, he's just turning the company into cash. He gets his share – but you get yours. Where's your complaint?' Before he could start telling me, I added: 'I mean legal complaint.'

Miss Jarman said: 'Are you trying to tell us that this Calieron person is not really trying to kill us?'

Harvey chuckled quietly.

'No,' I said. 'But if he was going to the trouble to hire people like Bernard to kill you, I don't see why he needed the French rape charge as well.' Then I got another bright idea. 'Maybe it's all a stunt by Fiez, trying to get control of Caspar. Maybe there's no Calieron, maybe Heiliger's certificatedidgo up in the crash. You've never met Calieron.'

'No, but Monsieur Merlin has. As soon as I heard from Herr Fiez, Merlin flew out to see them.'

'He saw Calieron?'

'Yes.'

'Why the hell didn't he kick Calieron's teeth in and grab the certificate?'

'That is not the waylawyers work, Mr Cane. And you forget – this Calieron may legally own the certificate. He may be Max's legal heir.'

'Yes. I forgot there must besomething legal about all this.'

'And in any event,' he went on smoothly, 'Herr Fiez could not hold a meeting by himself. Under the rules, there must always be two shareholders present.'

I nodded. 'All right. Now we know Fiez is a Good Guy. So why isn't Calieron killing him instead of you? He can outvote either of you as long as the other isn't there – but you're skidding all over Europe and Fiez is sitting in Liechtenstein. I'd've thought it was a lot easier to knock off Fiez instead.'

Maganhard chewed this over. Then he said: 'Also under Caspar's rules, Herr Fiez, as resident director, has a special responsibility. He must be at a company meeting. If he is not, and he is still alive, his vote is taken for granted on the majority side. This, you understand, is to stop him deliberately preventing a meeting by not appearing when only one other shareholder can be present.

'But, of course, I am not bound to appear. So if this Calieron killed Herr Fiez, I could stop the meeting by not arriving.'

I nodded slowly. 'I get it. So as long as he's trying to kill you, he's got to keep Fiez alive.'

But I still didn't see why simply getting Maganhard in jail wouldn't have done just as well.

We rumbled through the covered wooden bridge into Langnau and across the cobbled streets. Beyond that, we were in the picture-postcard country of the Entlebuch valley: dark sweeps of pine forest on the hills, bright apple blossom by the roads, and old church spires that looked like witches' caps.

But to me, most of Switzerland is a picture postcard. Calm, arranged, carefully trimmed… the weather isn't bad, the Rolls is going well, but not much excitement -nobody's shot at us in hours… It's something to do with me, not with Switzerland. Maybe just that this place looked like a postcard when a lot of Europe was like something from a horror film.

I'm too old to grow out of it, Lat perhaps it'll die with me.

Harvey shifted in his seat, rubbed his face again and sneaked another look at his fingers. He just spread them open in front of him – not as obvious as stretching them full out at arms' length the way doctors make you do it, but clear enough if you knew what he was up to. The fingers were shaking like a hula dancer's hips.

He turned his head slowly and looked at me. His face was blank – as blank as his face could ever be. It was still a face that would know hell when it saw it, but it didn't show what it knew now.

Except that I could guess. I said: 'You need a drink.'

He looked at his spread fingers again, with no more emotion than if he was deciding he needed a manicure. Then he said slowly and simply: 'Yes. I'm afraid I need just that.'

I'd been expecting this – but still hoping I wouldn't get it. After getting plastered last night at Pinel, he was back on the old routine: either he took a drink, or his hands shook themselves off his wrists. He'd only managed to delay it so long by the wine he'd drunk at the General's; now even that was wearing off.

The shakes would pass, all right – in about twenty-four hours. I might need him handling a gun inside five.

I sorted the maps in my briefcase and consulted one. 'We should be in Wolhusen in ten minutes. You can get a couple of quick ones there.'

He nodded, but went on staring at his hand. Then he said: 'Or maybe a bottle.'

I didn't like the idea. I wanted him to take on just enough to cure his shakes, but not so much that he slowed his reactions. It was a pretty thin line… I was crazy: it wasn't a line at all, only a matter of time. Once he started drinking, he wouldn't stop until he'd dissolved. That's what alcoholism's about.

But an alcoholic who's worrying about where the next one's coming from won't have time to worry about anything else. A bottle would reassure him, and all I could do was hope any trouble came before his co-ordination had washed away.