Nobody was supposed to know I was in Madrid, and I tried to make sure nobody did. I wasn’t expecting attention, but it didn’t hurt to be careful. I was meeting Hawk in less than an hour and couldn’t take the chance of leading anyone to him.
After dinner I walked back to the Hotel Nacional instead of taking a taxi. I looked over my should der a couple of times but couldn’t spot anyone suspicious. At the hotel I asked the desk clerk if there had been any inquiries for me, as a double check for safety. The clerk’s reply was negative, so I took an elevator to the fifth floor and went to my room.
I was just about to insert the key into the lock when I noticed that somebody was already inside.
I had left a fine coating of powder on the knob of the door before I went out, and that powder had been disturbed by the grasp of a hand. There were probably prints on the knob somewhere, but in my job I rarely have time for following that line of identification. Things move too fast for detective work.
Looking up and down the corridor, I saw that I was alone. I drew the 9mm Luger, the gun I called Wilhelmina, from its holster, and started to try the door. I stopped and glanced at the overhead corridor light just a few feet away. There was a straight chair beside a table not far from the light. I got the chair, put it underneath the fixture, and climbed onto it. I reached up, removed a couple of < screws, the protective glass, and the bulb. The corridor was plunged into darkness.
Back at the door, I turned the knob slowly. As I suspected, the door was unlocked. I twisted carefully so that there would be no noise. Wilhemina was snugged in my right hand as I shoved the door open a few inches.
It was black inside. I listened for a moment and heard nothing. I opened the door a few more inches, then slipped quickly into the room.
There was still no evidence that anybody was in the place. No movement, no sound. My eyes slowly adjusted to the darkness, and I could make out black hulks of furniture and a dim light from a curtained window. I eased the door shut behind me.
It was possible that a maid had come into the room during my absence. Or that there had been an intruder, but he had looked around and left. Still, I couldn’t take any of that for granted.
I had a small suite, and I was now in the sitting room. There was a bedroom and a bath at either end. I moved to the bathroom first, the Luger poised in front of me. If anybody was still here, he would kill to protect his identity.
There was no one in the bath. That left only the bedroom. I went cautiously across the sitting room to the bedroom door. On the way there, I stopped again. The room was in perfect order, except for one thing. The Madrid newspaper I had left on the small sofa had been moved. Only about six inches, but it had been moved.
I went on to the partially open bedroom door. If there was someone still here, this was where he had to be. When I got to the door, I reached carefully inside with my left hand, snapped on the bedroom light and slammed the door open all the way.
The bed was slightly mussed, but there was no-body on it. Then I heard a sound from the corner to my right.
I whirled in a lightning movement, my finger tightening on the trigger of the Luger. I stopped the squeeze just in time. My jaw dropped open slightly as I focused on the girl sitting in the overstuffed chair.
Her eyes opened slowly and, when she saw the gun, they popped wide. She was very awake now. I set my jaw hard.
“You just damn near got yourself killed,” I said. I lowered the luger and looked around the rest of the room to make sure she was alone. She was.
“I hope you’re not angry with me, Senor Price,” the girl said. “The bellboy, he…” her voice trailed off.
I almost laughed with relief. The enterprising bellboy of the Hotel Nacional seemed to have decided tired, lonely Bob Price, the alias I was wearing, could use company tonight. I would be properly grateful in the morning for his thoughtful surprise. I wondered how he got away with it in puritanical Spain.
I turned to the girl. There was genuine fear on her face and her eyes watched the gun warily. I bolstered the automatic, moving closer to her and softening my voice.
“Look. I’m sorry, I’m just not interested. You’ll have to leave.”
She was a good looking little piece, and I could have become very interested, given half a chance. But it was late, and David Hawk was expecting me. He had flown to Madrid especially to brief me on my next assignment.
A long leg dangled from under her coat as the girl reclined in the chair, and she swung it slowly. She knew all the moves, and I’d bet she’d be great in bed.
I smiled in spite of myself. “What’s your name?”
“Maria,” she said.
I reached down, pulled her to her feet, and she came just to my shoulder. “You’re a very pretty girl, Maria, but as I said before, I’ll have to look you up some other time.” I gave her a gentle shove towards the door.
But she wasn’t having it. She moved to the center of the room and, as I watched, unbelted the coat and opened it wide, revealing a beautiful, naked body.
“Are you sure you’re not interested?” She smiled.
I watched as she walked toward me. Every curve was sleek, every inch of flesh was smooth, taut, and supple. It made a man hungry. My mouth went slightly dry when she reached me, still holding the coat wide open. Then she dropped it to the floor and pressed herself against me.
I swallowed hard as she entwined her arms around my neck. I touched her waist and wished I hadn’t. Just the touch set a fire in me. I knew I had to end this idiotic game, but my body wouldn’t cooperate. While I hesitated, she placed her mouth on mine.
The taste of her was delicious. With more will power than I thought I had, I pushed her away, reached down, and grabbed at her coat while I could still think straight. I draped the coat on her and she reluctantly pushed her arms through the sleeves. I tied it at the waist.
“Now get out of here,” I said huskily.
She looked up at me with one last appeal. “Are you sure?”
“Jesus,” I mumbled. “Of course I’m not sure. Just go.”
She smiled, knowing she had gotten to me. “All right, Mr. Price. Don’t forget me when you are in Madrid again. You promised.”
“I won’t forget, Maria,” I said.
She turned and left the suite.
I sat down heavily on the bed, loosening my tie. I tried to keep myself from thinking of how Maria would have looked on the bed. Damn Hawk, damn AXE, damn me. I needed a cold shower.
I undressed quickly and moved across the main room of the suite to the bath. When I got in there, «I saw that the door of the medicine chest was open slightly. I was sure I’d closed it before I left earlier. And it was difficult to imagine why Maria would have nosed around in there.
I opened the chest door cautiously. Apparently there was no booby trap. Then I saw the note taped to the inside of the door. There was a message scrawled on it I didn’t think Maria had written it because the scrawl was very masculine:
Get out of Madrid. If you don’t, you will die.
Something tightened inside my gut. Obviously, I’d had two visitors that evening.
TWO
I was about fifteen minutes late for my appointment with Hawk, and he had chewed three dead cigars down to stubs while he paced the floor waiting for me.
“I’m glad you could make it,” he said sardonically after he admitted me to the rather squalid hotel room.
I suppressed a small grin. Hawk was in one of his moods. “Good to see you again, sir,” I told him, “Sorry about the delay. I had a small problem.”
“The Russians?” he asked.
“I’m not sure.” I told him about the message scrawled on the note.
He grunted. “I know Madrid is not the safest place for you at the moment, but it was convenient for both of us right now, and I had to speak with you quickly.”
He turned and moved to a small, rickety table on which were spread several official-looking papers. He sat down and shuffled the papers absently while I slumped onto a straight chair near him.
“I think you’ve heard me refer to an American defector named Damon Zeno,” Hawk began.
“A research microbiologist,” I said. “You figured he was doing some work for the Russians a while back.”
“That’s right,” Hawk said quietly. “But now he’s on the Chinese payroll. They set up a research lab for him in Morocco, and he’s been doing work on a tropical bug called bilharzia. Are you up on your tropical diseases?”
“It’s a flatworm,” I said. “A parasite that eats away at a man from inside. You pick it up in water, as I recall. Has Dr. Z done something to this bug?”
Hawk stared at the remains of his cigar. “Zeno took the bug apart to see what made it tick. And he found out. Our informant tells us that he’s developed a mutation of the normal flatworm, an almost indestructable strain of bilharzia. He calls it the Omega Mutation. Since Omega is the last letter in the Greek alphabet, we figure Zeno took the designation from his own last name.
“At any rate, if what we’ve learned is correct, the Omega Mutation is particularly virulent, and it multiplies at an almost unbelievable rate. It resists all known drugs, antidotes, and water purifiers currently in use.”
I uttered a low whistle. “And you think Zeno means to use this bug against the U.S.?”
“He’s admitted as much. America is to be the proving ground for any effective biological weapon he’s developed. A handful of enemy agents could easily infect our lakes and streams. Even after we learned of the bug’s presence, we could do little about it. Within days — not months or weeks— within days of contamination, most of us would have contracted the disease. In another few days, we’d be dead.”
“I guess I go visit Zeno in Morocco,” I said.
Hawk fiddled with the cigar again. “Yes. We believe the L5 man who runs the operation, by the name of Li Yuen, has personal ties with a couple of Moroccan generals who still have aspirations for a leftist coup. He may have made a deal with them; we don’t know yet. In fact, we don’t even know exactly where the lab is located.”
I shook my head. There was no advantage to being AXE’s Number One man except for the pay, and a man had to be a fool to do what I did for any amount of money. “I suppose time is of the essence?”
“As usual. We think Zeno is just about ready to make a final report to Peking. When he does, he will undoubtedly send the results of his experiments along with it. I’ve made reservations for you on a flight to Tangier tomorrow morning. You’ll meet Delacroix, our informant there. If you can bring Zeno back to us, do so. If not….” Hawk paused. “Kill him.”
I grimaced. “I’m glad you haven’t set my goals too high.”
“I promise you a good rest when this one is over, Nick,” Hawk said, moving his thin-lipped month into a small grin. Sitting there across the table from me, he looked more like a Connecticut farmer than a powerful intelligence chief.
“I may get a longer one than I want,” I said, returning the grin.
THREE
Iberia Airlines flight 541 arrived in Tangier late the next morning. As soon as I stepped off the plane, I noticed that it was warmer than in Madrid. The air terminal was a fairly modern one, and the uniformed Moroccan girls at the desks were friendly. There was a reservation booth for hotels, and I arranged for a room at the Velasquez Palace, in the French Quarter.
On the balmy ride into town, along a tree-lined but dusty road, I reflected on the note I had found in my room. Did the Russians leave it to let me know they were on AXE’s trail? Or was it a message from the Chicoms? Maybe, the Chinese L5 had gotten wind of AXE’s renewed interest in the Omega experiments, and an agent was trying to frighten us off until Zeno got his report to Peking.
The Velasquez Palace sat on a hill overlooking the harbor and Straits of Gibraltar and the med-ina section of Tangier, with its crammed-together ancient buildings and narrow streets. Tangier was a sparkling white-washed city set against the greenery of the hills behind it and the cobalt blue of the Straits. It had been a center of trade for over a thousand years, the meeting place of European and Asian commerce where Berbers and Bedouins mixed with merchants from every corner of the world. Smuggling and shady deals had flourished in the narrow streets of the medina and casbah until new laws were passed just after the Second World War.
When I called Delacroix from my hotel room, a young woman answered. The voice was filled with emotion as soon as I asked for André Delacroix.
“This is his real estate agent?” she asked, using the identification code that Delacroix had been given.
“Yes, that’s right,” I said.
There was a short pause. “My uncle has met with an accident. Perhaps we can meet to discuss the matters you wanted to take up with him.”
That was one of the problems with this kind of work. No matter how carefully you planned, an unknown factor was always being thrown at you. I hesitated before I spoke.
“Mr. Delacroix is unable to see me?” I asked.
Her voice was trembling slightly. “Quite un-able.” She spoke with a French accent.
“All right. Where would you like to meet to discuss the matter?”
Another slight pause. “Meet me at the Cafe Tingis, in the medina. I will be wearing a green dress. Can you be there by noon?”
“Yes, noon,” I said.
And then the phone was dead.
As I left my European-style hotel, a boy in a beige djellaba and a brown fez tried to sell me a taxi tour, which I declined. I walked along the Rue Velasquez to the Boulevard Pasteur and made a right to the Place de France. A couple of blocks later I entered the medina through an ancient archway.
As soon as you step into the medina you sense the chaos. The narrow streets are crowded with robed Moroccans. It is all winding streets and overhanging balconies and dark doorways leading to shops that sell brass and leather goods of all kinds of exotic things. As I moved along toward the Little Socco, oriental music assailed my ears from a shop somehwere, and strange but fascinating odors reached my nostrils. Veiled women wearing gray kaftans stood and spoke together in hushed whispers, and two American hippies stood in front of a dilapidated hotel, arguing with the proprietor about the cost of the room.
The Cafe Tingis sat at the end of the Little Socco. It was a large place inside, but nobody ever sat there except Moroccans. Outside on the sidewalk were tables with a wrought-iron railing in front of them to separate the patrons from the masses of humanity.
I found Delacroix’s niece seated at a table next to the railing. She had long straight, flaming red hair and wore a green dress that showed plenty of long white thigh. But she seemed completely un-aware of how beautiful she looked. Her face was tense with worry and fear.
“Gabrielle Delacroix?” I asked.
“Yes,” she answered, relief starting to show on her face. “And you are the Mr. Carter that my uncle was supposed to meet?”
“That’s right.”
When the waiter came, Gabrielle ordered a Moroccan mint tea, and I ordered a coffee. After he was gone, she turned large green eyes on me.
“My uncle is — dead,” she said.
I had guessed as much from the way she talked on the phone. But hearing her say it gave me a small empty feeling in my chest. I did not speak for a moment.
“They killed him,” she said, tears forming in her eyes.
Hearing the grief in her voice I stopped feeling sorry for myself and tried to comfort her. Placing my hand on hers, I said, “I’m sorry.”
“We were quite close,” she told me, dabbing at her eyes with a small lace handkerchief. “He came to see me regularly after my father died and I was all alone.”
“When did it happen?” I asked.
“A couple of days ago. He was buried earlier this morning. The police think the killer was a burglar.”
“Did you tell them otherwise?”
“No. I decided to do nothing until you tried to contact him. He told me about AXE and a little about the Omega project”
“You’ve done the right thing,” I told her.
She tried a smile.
“How did it — happen?” I asked.
She looked past me into the square toward the Cafe Fuentes and the Boissons Scheherazade. “They found him alone at my apartment. They shot him, Mr. Carter. Over and over.” She looked down at the small table between us. “Je ne comprends pas.”
“Don’t try to understand,” I said. “You’re not dealing with rational men.”
The waiter came with our drinks, and I gave him some dirhams. Gabrielle said “Mr. Carter” again, and I asked her to call me Nick.
“I don’t know how they found him, Nick. He seldom left the apartment.”
“They have ways. Have you noticed anyone hanging around your place since your uncle’s death?”
She made a little grimace. “I was sure somebody was following me when I went to police headquarters. But it’s probably my imagination.”
“I hope so,” I murmured. “Look, Gabrielle, did André tell you anything specific about the place where he worked?”
“He mentioned some names. Damon Zeno. Li Yuen. I have never seen him in such a state. He was afraid but not for himself. This Omega thing they are working on there, I think that’s what frightened him.”
“I can well imagine,” I said. I sipped the thick coffee, and it was terrible. “Gabrielle, did your uncle ever mention anything about the location of the lab to you?”
She shook her head. “He flew here from Zagora, but that is not where the facility is located. It is near a small village down closer to the Algerian border. He did not mention its name to me. I suspect he did not want me to know anything that could be dangerous.”
“A smart man, your uncle.” I stared out across the square to the Bazar Rif, trying to recall the names of villages along the border in that area. A caramel-faced Moroccan wearing a knit cap passed, pushing a handcart of luggage and followed by a sweating, red-faced tourist. “Is there anybody else around here that André might have confided in?”
She thought a moment. “There is Georges Pierrot.”
“Who is he?”
“A colleague of my uncle, a Belgian like us. They were school friends in Brussels. Uncle André visited him just days before his death, after he had made his escape from the research facility. It was about the same time that he spoke to Colin Pryor.”
Colin Pryor was the man from DI5, formerly MIS, that Delacroix had contacted in Tangier to get to AXE. But AXE knew everything that Pryor knew, and that did not include the location of the facility.
“Does Pierrot live here in Tangier?” I asked.
“Not far away, in a mountain town called Tetuãn. You can get there by bus or taxi.”
I rubbed my chin thoughtfully. If Delacroix had gone to see Pierrot in the short time he was in this area, he might have told him pertinent things. “I’ll have to go see Pierrot.”
Gabrielle reached over and put her hand on mine. “I’m very grateful that you are here.”
I smiled. “Until this is over, Gabrielle, I want you to be extremely careful Call me if you see anything suspicious.”
“I will, Nick.”
“Do you work in Tangier?”
“Yes, at the Boutique Parisienne, on Boulevard Mohammed V.”
“Well, go to work every day as you normally would, and try not to think about your uncle. It’s the best thing for you and if anybody is watching you, it may lead them to believe that you are not suspicious about your uncle’s death. I’ll contact you after I’ve spoken with Pierrot.”
“I will be looking forward to it,” Gabrielle said.
She was not the only one who would anticipate the next meeting with pleasure.
That afternoon I walked down to the bus station and found out that it took over twice as long to get to Tetuãn by bus as by taxi, but I decided to go at least one way by bus because it would be less conspicuous. I was told to arrive at the station early the following morning to catch the Tetuãn bus at 6:30. The tickets could not be purchased in advance.
That evening I placed a call to Colin Pryor, the DI5 agent. There was no answer, even though the operator let the phone ring a number of times. I remembered that there was a recently established drop site in the newer part of town, and around mid-evening I walked over there and checked it, out. There was no message.
I didn’t like it. Delacroix dead, Pryor not available — I was beginning to smell a rat. And then, as is too frequently the case, something happened to confirm my suspicions. I was making my way back to the hotel, walking along a dark street with almost no pedestrian traffic. It was an area of new construction where shops were going into renovated buildings. Not ten seconds after I had passed a dark alleyway, I heard a sound behind me. I ducked low as I spun on my heel, and a silenced shot thumped in the blackness.
The slug from the gun dug into the brick of the building near my head and zinged off into the night. Just as I drew Wilhelmina, I saw the shadowy figure move quickly into the alleyway.
I ran back to the alley and peered down its black length. The man was not in sight. The alley was a short one and opened onto an interior court.
I started into it but stopped short. It was a kind of parking lot for several buildings. At the moment it was full of heavy equipment, including a big crane with a demolition ball on the end of a long cable. The crane looked American-made.
A wall of one building to my left had been partially torn down, and there was a lot of rubble around. The shadowy figure was nowhere in sight. But I felt he was there somewhere, hiding in the rubble or equipment, just waiting for a second, better opportunity to get me.
Everything was deadly quiet. My eyes swept over the black hulks of heavy machinery as I moved past them, but I saw no human shape. It was possible that my assailant had gone into the rubble of the damaged building. I went slowly toward the demolished wall, watching my footing carefully.
Suddenly I heard the engine break the silence with its rumbling roar. I whirled around quickly, at first unable to tell which piece of equipment the sound was coming from. Then I saw the boom of the crane move and the enormous iron ball raise slowly off the ground. Blinded by the crane’s headlights, I squinted at the cab of the machine and could just barely make out a dark figure in there.
It was a clever idea. The crane stood between me and the alley exit, and I was trapped in a corner of the building complex with no place to hide. I moved along a back wall, holding the Luger ready.
I aimed toward the cab of the crane, but the ball was between the cab and me and was swinging toward me. It came with surprising swiftness and seemed as big as the crane itself when it arrived. It was between two and three feet in diameter and had the speed of a small locomotive. I dived headlong into the rubble, and the ball swung past my head and crashed into a wall behind me. Glass shattered and stone and brick crumbled as the metal ball demolished a section of the wall. Then the boom of the crane was pulling the ball back for another try.
The ball had missed me by inches. I reholstered Wilhelmina and clambered out of the rubble, spit-ting dust and swearing to myself. I had to get around that damned crane somehow, or I would be smashed like a bug on a windshield.
I ran to my left, toward the corner away from the crane. The big ball swung after me again, and the operator’s timing was almost perfect. I saw the black, round mass rushing toward me like a giant meteor. I threw myself to the ground again but felt the massive sphere graze my back as I went down. It crashed loudly on the wall behind me, rending and tearing metal, brick, and mortar. A couple of windows popped open in the building at the right of the court, and I heard a loud exclamation in Arabic. Apparently there were people still living in that building, despite the demolition on the far side of the court.
The man in the crane ignored the shouts. The engine thudded purposefully on, and the ball swung back to strike out a third time. I struggled to my feet and continued toward the far wall. Again the ball came, black and silent, and this time I stumbled over a piece of broken concrete just as I was about to make my attempt to avoid the round hulk. I was thrown off balance for just a split second before I could dive away from the ball, and when it came I had not quite gotten out of its way. It grazed my shoulder as it went past, throwing me violently to the ground, as if I were a cardboard doll. I hit the rubble hard and was dazed for a moment. I heard the crane operating again, and when I looked up, the ball was poised about ten feet above my chest.
Then it dropped.
The thought of being mashed on that broken pavement by that descending spherical terror galvanized me into action. As the ball plummeted out of the night at me, I made a frenzied roll to my left. There was an ear-splitting crash beside my head as the ball hit and debris rained around me, but the ball had missed.
The man in the crane apparently could not see that he had not hit me because he descended cautiously from the cab as the dust cleared. I grabbed a hunk of broken wood and lay very still as he approached. The engine was still throbbing behind him. He had raised the ball up about six feet, and it hung in mid-air. More windows had been opened in the building and there was the sound of many excited voices.
My assailant was standing over me. I swung the piece of wood at his knees. It connected solidly with his kneecaps, and he yelled aloud and slumped to the ground. He was a big, ugly Moroccan. Covered with dust and dirt, I leaped up and onto him. He met my attack, and we rolled on the ground to a spot under the big metal ball. I saw the ball slip down six inches, and I swallowed hard. He had not quite gotten the pulley apparatus into gear before he left the cab of the crane.
I rolled quickly out from under the ball, the other man with me, hitting at my face with a big heavy fist. Then he was on top of me and had a good hold on my neck. His viselike grip closed, and he was cutting off my wind. He had more energy left than I, and his hands felt like steel bands around my throat.
I had to get him off or suffocate. I jabbed stiff fingers into a kidney, and his grip loosened some. With a violent movement, I managed to jam a knee into his groin. The grip on me was lost, and I sucked in a big lungful of air as I shoved the Moroccan off.
I grabbed at my stiletto, which I called Hugo, but was never able to bring it into play. Just as the big man hit the ground the ball jerked again and fell on him.
There was a dull crunch as the ball hit his chest. The dust cleared quickly, and I saw that he had been cut almost in half, his body mashed by the ball.
I struggled to ray feet and heard someone say something about the police.
Yes, there would be police. And they would find me there if I did not move fast. I sheathed Hugo and, with one last look at the dead man, left the scene.
FOUR
“André Delacroix? Yes, of course I knew him. We were close friends. Please step into the library with me, Mr. Carter.”
I followed Georges Pierrot into a comfortable, small room of his Moorish-style home. The room was all books and ornate carpet and wall maps of various areas of Africa. Pierrot had carved out quite a niche for himself in Morocco. He was a chemical engineer for a private industrial firm in Tetu&n.
“May I offer you a drink?” Pierrot asked.
“I’ll take a glass of brandy if you have any.”
“Of course,” he said. He went to a built-in bar on one wall, opened carved doors, and withdrew two bottles. Georges Pierrot was a small man in his mid-fifties with the look of a French university professor. His face was triangular with a goatee on the end of it, and he wore spectacles that kept slipping down on his nose. His dark hair was streaked with gray.
Pierrot handed me a glass of brandy and kept a Pernod for himself. “Were you also a friend of André?”
Since Pierrot was close to Delacroix, I answered, with at least some of the truth: “I’m the help he was looking for.”
His eyes studied me more carefully. “Ah, I see.” He looked down at the floor. “Poor André. All be wanted was to do good. He was a very dedicated man.” Pierrot spoke with a heavy French accent.
We had seated ourselves on a soft leather sofa. I sipped at the brandy and let it warm my insides. “Did André discuss the facility with you?” I asked.
He shrugged thin shoulders. “He had to talk to somebody. There is his niece, of course, a lovely girl, but he seemed to feel the need to confide in another man. He was here less than a week ago, and he was very upset.”
“About the experiments at the lab?”
“Yes, he was quite despondent about them. And, of course, he barely escaped from there with his life. They knew he was suspicious of what was going on, so when he tried to leave one night, they followed him with guards and dogs. They shot at him in the darkness, but he got away — only to have them find him in Tangier.” Pierrot shook his head slowly.
“What else did he tell you when he came here?” I asked.
Pierrot looked up at me tiredly. “Not a great deal. Probably nothing you do not already know. That the Chinese were working on a terrible biological weapon and that they had moved the laboratory to this country recently to conclude their experiments. He admitted to me that he was working with the Americans to keep a watch on the project. I am sorry if it was wrong of him to speak so openly, but as I said, he felt the need to talk to somebody.”
“Yes, of course.” It was one of the troubles with depending on amateurs.
“Did he mention the location of the laboratory to you?” I probed on.
Pierrot paused a moment. “He did not speak of the exact location, Monsieur Carter. But he mentioned that the facility was close to a village down near the Algerian border. Let me think.”
He pressed his fingers to the bridge of his nose, pushing the spectacles down farther, and closed his eyes in concentration. “It was — the one south of Tamegroute — it begins with an ‘M.’ Mhamid. Yes, Mhamid, that is the village he mentioned.”
I made a mental note. “And that’s down near the border?”
“Yes, on the other side of the Atlas Mountains, in dry, arid country. There is almost no civilization there, monsieur. It is the edge of the desert.”
“A well-chosen spot,” I mused. “Did André describe the personnel of the facility to you?”
“Only briefly. He told me of an American scien-tist”
“Zeno,” I said.
“Yes, that is the name. And, of course, the Chinese who is the administrator of the facility. Li Yuen, I believe he said the name was.”
I sipped some more brandy. “Did André talk of Li Yuen’s personal ties to Moroccan generals?”
Pierrot’s face lit up. “Yes, he did.” He looked around the room conspiratorially as if there might be someone lurking behind the draperies. “There are two names André spoke of, men he saw at the facility, conferring with Li Yuen.”
“Who are they?”
“I remember both names because they were in the news here fairly recently. You will remember the uprising of the generals? The coup was put down by King Hassan in a bloody reprisal. The two military men that André saw were among the ones accused at first, but later they were cleared. Many believe that they were the real leaders of the coup and that they are even now waiting their chance to make another attempt to overthrow the Moroccan government and establish a leftist regime. They are General Djenina and General Abdallah,” Pierrot said. “It is believed that Djenina is the leader.”
“So Djenina promised protection to the laboratory for a limited period,” I guessed aloud, “in return for financial backing from the Chinese for a second and more efficient coup.”
I still had to have a better description of the location of the facility. I could not go down to the border and roam around in the desert for a week trying to find the lab. By then it might be too late.
General Djenina knew where it was located. And if he was like most army men, he had a written record of it hidden away somewhere.
“Where is this Djenina now?” I asked.
Pierrot shrugged. “He commands an imperial army in this area and has his headquarters in Fez. But I have no idea where he makes his home. It would undoubtedly be near Fez.”
“And it’s his home where he would keep anything important, away from official eyes,” I said. I set the brandy glass down and stood up. “Well, I want to thank you for your cooperation, Monsieur Pierrot.”
Pierrot rose to see me to the door. “If you are going to Ibn Djenina,” he said, “you had best take care. He is a ruthless, dangerous man who wants to be dictator of this country.”
I extended my hand to the Belgian, and he took it. “I promise to be careful,” I said.
As soon as I got back to Tangier, I went to the Velasquez Palace to clean up and make another call to Colin Pryor. When I entered my room, I stopped short.
The place was a mess. My one piece of luggage was open, and the contents were strewn all over the floor. The bedding was in shreds and the drawers of the chest had been pulled out and flung across the room. It seemed someone wanted to know how much information I had at this point and thought my belongings might tell him. But the action was also a terror tactic, a show of muscle. When I went into the bathroom, I found another note, in the same scrawl as in Madrid, this time taped to the glass of the mirror over the washbowl. It said:
You’ve been warned. The girl is next. Read tomorrow’s newspapers to her.
I didn’t understand the last part. I stuck the note into my pocket, went to the phone and called Pryor. This time I got him. His accent was distinctly British.
“Good to hear from you, chappie,” he said when I had identified myself to him in code.
“Same here. I’m seeing the sights. How about taking them in with me tonight? We could meet around 11:00.”
“Sounds good. I have to stop to see a friend first, but I can meet you after that.”
“Right. See you later.”
I hung up after we’d arranged to meet at a small sidewalk restaurant on Mohammed V, a site used previously by both DI5 and AXE. Then I called Gabrielle Delacroix and was relieved to find that she was all right. I asked her to join me for dinner at Detroit Restaurant, in the casbah, at eight and she agreed.
My last call was to Avis Rent-A-Car, to see whether they would be open for a while. They said they would. I took a taxi and rented a Fiat 124 convertible. The car had five forward gears as standard equipment and was just right for driving in the streets of Tangier. I drove up the hill to the casbah, through the narrow winding streets of the medina, and met Gabrielle at Detroit. The restaurant was perched atop an ancient fortress building that had been a sultan’s palace. Three walls of the dining area were glass and gave an incredible view of the Straits of Gibralter. I found Gabrielle at a window table. She was white-faced and looked very different from the way she had sounded on the phone.
I sat down at the low round table and studied her. “Is everything all right?” I asked.
“I turned on the car radio on the way here,” she said in a monotone.
“Go on.”
“There was a brief news item from Tetuãn.”
My stomach tightened automatically. “What was it, Gabrielle?”
The green eyes looked up at me. “Georges Pierrot is dead.”
I stared at her, trying to grasp what she had said. It seemed impossible. I had left him just hours ago. “How?”
“The police found him hanging from a short rope in his garage. They are calling it suicide.”
“I’ll be damned.”
“I am very scared, Nick.”
Now I knew what the note had meant. I was just about to speak when the waiter came along, so I stopped and gave him our orders. Neither of us was very hungry, but I ordered two pots of Moroccan couscous with a light wine. When the waiter left, I took the note from my pocket.
“I think you ought to see this, Gabrielle,” I said, handing the paper to her. “I found it in my hotel room.”
Her eyes skipped across the message, and as they did so, a glaze of raw fear came into her eyes. She looked back at me.
“They are going to kill me too,” she said hollowly.
“Not if I have anything to say about it,” I assured her. “Look, I’m really sorry that you and Pierrot had to get mixed up in this. But that all happened before I got here. Now that they know about you, the only thing we can do is take special care that you don’t get hurt. You may have to move out of your apartment for a while until this blows over. I’ll register you in a hotel this evening.”
She had gotten control of herself now, and there was no more hysteria in her eyes. “My uncle fought these men because he knew they must be fought,” she said slowly. “I will not run away.”
“There’s no need for you to do any more than you’ve done already,” I told her. “I’m leaving Tangier soon to find the research lab. You’ll be alone, and the only thing you have to do is stay out of sight for a while.”
“Where is the facility?” she asked.
“I don’t know yet, but I think I know somebody who can tell me.”
We finished the meal in silence, left the restaurant, and got into my rented car. We drove through the ancient archway to the casbah, over the rough cobblestones, back down through the medina toward the French Quarter. But before we got out of the medina, we found trouble. I had been followed.
It was on a narrow, dark street, away from the shops and people. We were almost at the Old City gates when it happened. A boy came up the street from the opposite direction pulling an empty handcart, the kind used for luggage by the hotel porters. There was plenty of room for us to pass, but suddenly he veered the cart sidewise in front of us, blocking the street. Then he ran into the shadows.
I jammed on the brakes and jumped from the car to yell after the boy. In the next instant a shot barked out in the night from a nearby balcony. The slug ripped into the roof of the car beside my left arm and spent itself somewhere inside. I heard Gabrielle give a sharp little yell of fright.
I ducked to one knee, going for the Luger as my eyes sought the blackness of the balcony. I saw a shadow move. A second shot rang out and tore at the sleeve of my jacket, smashing window glass in the car beside me. I returned fire with the Luger but did not hit anything.
“Get down!” I yelled at Gabrielle.
Just as she obeyed, a shot exploded in the night from the opposite side of the street. The slug ripped through the windshield of the Fiat and missed Gabrielle’s head by inches. If she had been sitting upright, it would have killed her.
I fired back toward the sound of the shot, then swung back behind the open door of the car. I heard a voice shout loudly in Arabic, calling to someone behind us. They had laid a trap for us and had us boxed in.
“Keep down!” I yelled to the girl again. I climbed back into the driver’s seat just as another shot was fired from the balcony and shattered the glass of the driver’s window.
I crouched low on the seat, holding onto the Luger all the while, and started the car. Another shot came from the opposite side of the street, and I could see that the gunman was in a doorway. But Gabrielle was between us. I ripped the gears as I shifted into reverse, and with both of us ducked down low in the front seat, I roared backwards down the narrow street.
The figures came out of the deep shadows and fired openly at us as we moved away. Two more shots shattered the windshield as I tried to keep the car from running into a building. I reached out the vent window with the Luger and returned fire. I saw the man who had jumped from the balcony to the street go down holding his right leg.
“Look out, Nick!” Gabrielle yelled.
I turned and saw a man in the middle of the street, aiming a gun at my head through the rear window. I ducked lower as he fired and the slug shattered both the rear window and the windshield.
Then I stepped hard on the accelerator. The sports car jumped backward. The gunman tried to get out of its way, but I followed him. The car hit him with a thump, and I saw him fly over the left side of the Fiat and hit the pavement against the side of a building. We reached a small intersection, and I backed into it, then slipped the Fiat into first and shot away toward the bright lights of the French Quarter. We drove onto Rue de la Liberty, the Fiat limping on a flat tire, its glass spider-webbed with cracks and holes. I pulled over to the curb and looked at Gabrielle to see if she was all right.
“I see you came through it,” I said, giving her a reassuring grin.
I thought she would be scared speechless, considering her reaction earlier to the killing of Pierrot, but she was looking at me clear-eyed and calm.
She reached over and placed a gentle kiss on my lips. “That’s for saving my life.”
I said nothing. I got out of the battered car and went around and helped her out. Curious passersby were already pausing to look at the Fiat, and I guessed the police would be in the area very soon. I took Gabrielle’s arm and rushed her around a corner and onto the Rue Amerique du Sud. In the shadow of a sapling, I stopped and pulled her close to me.
“This is for being a good sport about everything,” I said. Then I kissed her. She responded completely, pressing her body close against me and exploring my mouth with her tongue. When it was over, she just stood there looking up at me, her breath coming shallow. “That was very nice, Nick.”
“Yes,” I said. Then I took her hand. “Come on, we have to find you a place to stay tonight.”
FIVE
We walked a complicated route through the French Quarter, and when I was sure we were not being followed, I settled Gabrielle into a small hotel called the Mamora, not far from the Velasquez Palace. Then I kept my appointment with Colin Pryor.
The cafe we met at was not heavily visited by tourists, although located on the Boulevard Mohammed V. There was a single row of tables jammed up against the outside of the building to avoid the heavy evening pedestrian traffic. Colin Pryor was already there when I arrived.
I joined Pryor with just a mutual nod of our heads. We had met previously, in Johannesburg, but he looked heavier and out of shape now. He was a squarish Briton who might have been a champion soccer player.
“Good to see you again, Carter,” he said after we had ordered tea from a harried waiter.
I patched the crowd before us in their djellabas and fezzes and veils. “How are they treating you?” I asked.
“They keep me hopping, old boy. And the pay’s the same.”
“Same here.”
It was a perfect place for a meeting. The noise from the crowd drowned out our voices to anybody but each other, and since complete strangers sat at tables together because of a lack of chairs, there was no good reason for an observer to conclude that we knew each other.
I spent the first ten minutes telling Pryor how I almost got killed a couple of times in a couple of hours. He already knew about Delacroix and Pierrot. There was little he could add to my own meager store of information.
“What do you know about the Moroccan general staff?” I asked next.
“Not a great deal. What do the generals have to do with the Omega project?”
“Maybe very little. But Delacroix thought there might be a tie-in.”
“The army leaders are hiding under their desks at present, hoping the king doesn’t decide to bring charges against them. He believes there are still traitors in the army who plan to overthrow him.”
“Has he given Djenina a clean slate?”
Pryor shrugged. “Ostensibly. Djenina was at the state reception where the previous coup attempt was made. A bloody affair. Djenina killed several of his colleagues and helped prevent the coup, they Bay.”
I mused “Before or after he saw how badly it was going for them?”