The Anvil (21 page)

The doors slid back and he was about to step inside when he was suddenly joined by two men, one on either side of him. They appeared to have materialised out of nowhere. Rives was startled and blurted out something about not realising that there had been other people working on the floor. Neither man replied but all three got into the elevator. Rives pressed the button for the basement garage and his companions seemed content with that.

Rives was afraid. The two men did not look like any members of staff he’d seen before in the building. The taller of the two had a distinctively yellow complexion, almost jaundiced, he thought, while the other was short, squat and fair with a squarish head that seemed to grow directly out of his shoulders. Both men stared into the middle distance as the elevator descended.

The doors opened and the smell of petrol and car wax heralded their arrival in the garage. Rives was just beginning to think that he had been worrying about nothing when he felt his elbows being gripped and he was steered quickly towards a black, Mercedes estate car. He protested and started to struggle but the short man held up a pistol to his head and motioned with the barrel towards the car.

The yellow man drove while the other sat with Rives in the back, holding the gun on him but still not saying anything, making Rives feel like the Invisible Man. All his questions about who his captors were and where the hell they were going were ignored by two men who did not even bother to look at him. Outside in the street he could see people smiling and talking. They didn’t even know he was there.

The Mercedes drew to a halt outside a building in the fashionable district of Sacconex and Rives was told to get out by the driver who came round to open the door. He was prodded along by the gun and directed down a flight of stone steps to a side door. The yellow man opened the door and all three entered to find a man obviously waiting for them. He was younger than Rives, well groomed and well dressed. He might have been an executive in Sales or Marketing.

‘Ah, M. Rives,’ the man smiled. ‘Sit down please.’

‘What is going on?’ Rives demanded. ‘I protest! This is outrageous! I can only assume that there has been some sort of ridiculous mistake.’

‘No mistake M. Rives,’ said the man evenly. ‘Why did you request access to the X14 file?’

Rives’ insides turned to water as he realised what must have happened. The X14 file had a security monitor on it. When he’d been asked to enter his personal details, it had not been for purposes of granting him access. It had been to identify the person making the request! The man questioning him no longer looked like a sales executive. His eyes were devoid of emotion and promised nothing but bad news unless he talk his way out of the mess he had got himself into.

Rives claimed that it was his job to monitor the company’s profits in European countries. By chance he had come across a discrepancy in the company’s assets versus investments in one of them. The computer had told him that something called X14 was responsible. He had thought it his duty to investigate further so he had simply asked for the file on X14.

There was a silence in the room that threatened Rives’ nerves. He watched as the man in front of him tapped his pen slowly end over end on the arm of his chair.

‘So you had never heard of X14 before today?’ asked the man.

‘No,’ answered Rives.

‘Then how do you explain this,’ said the man, removing two pieces of paper from his inside pocket and handing them to Rives who accepted them like a writ. He knew what they were before he looked at them. The crumpled nature of the paper said that they had been taken from his waste-paper basket. They were his notes from two days ago when he had found the connection between Von Jonek and X14. Rives said nothing and looked at the floor.

‘I’m waiting,’ said the man.

‘All right,’ conceded Rives. ‘I was trying to find Dr Von Jonek.’

There was another agonisingly long pause before the man said, ‘Why?’

‘Because someone asked me to.’

‘Who?’

‘A friend.’

‘Name?’

‘Schmidt, Karl Schmidt. He and Von Jonek were students together a long time ago. He’d heard that Von Jonek was working for the company and asked for my help in tracing him.’

‘Then why didn’t you say this at the beginning?’ said the man with an air of benevolence that Rives found disarming.

‘I didn’t want to lose my job,’ said Rives. ‘I enjoy my work.’

The yellow skinned man came from behind Rives and stood at the shoulder of Rives’ interrogator, who looked up at him and said, ‘What do you think Rudi?’

‘I think he’s lying in his teeth,’ said yellow skin.

The seated man rested his elbows on the arms of his chair and brought his fingertips together thoughtfully before saying slowly, ‘Then perhaps we should do something about his teeth?’

Rives started to shake with fear as he anticipated the pain to come. He felt himself being gripped from behind by the squat man and cringed away from yellow skin who was coming towards him. He closed his eyes against the expected blow but felt himself being manipulated into a headlock. He opened his eyes to see that yellow skin was holding a pair of electrical pliers in his hand.

Rives’ mouth was forced open and, at the third attempt, yellow skin managed to lock the pliers on to Rives’ right incisor and lever it horizontal to the gum.

Rives had never known such pain. He screamed and started to shake uncontrollably as the taste of blood filled his mouth

‘At the risk of repeating myself M. Rives,’ said the man calmly. ‘Why did you request access to the X14 file?’

With a desperate courage which Rives had never even suspected that he possessed he maintained that his story had been true.

‘Well Rudi, what do you think now?’

‘I think he’s lying to his fingertips,’ said yellow skin with plain meaning.

Rives’ tormentor did not have to say anything this time. He simply watched the horror register on Rives’ face.

Rives’ courage gave out. He told his torturers everything they wanted to know.

This time the man seemed satisfied. He looked to the squat man and nodded. The man screwed a silencer on to the end of his pistol.

Rives’ body was loaded into the back of the Mercedes and the three men set off to visit Eva Stahl.

Rives had told them about the man named Keith Nielsen who used to work with Eva at Lehman Steiner but had not been able to tell them what hotel he was staying at. No problem. Eva Stahl would tell them.

By nine thirty in the evening MacLean was convinced that this was going to be another day with no word from Eva. Frustration was building up inside him so he decided just had to get out for a while He had just left the hotel when Eva called. She left a message with the desk that he should phone as soon as he returned. MacLean came back just after ten and made the call from the desk.

‘Wonderful news,’ said Eva. ‘Jean-Paul has traced X14. He knows where Von Jonek is!’

‘Where?’

‘Come on over and we’ll tell you all about it.’

‘When?’

As soon as you like. He should be home at any moment now … actually he’s a bit late as it is.’

‘I’m on my way,’ said MacLean. It sounded like a celebration might be in order later. He checked that he had enough money in his pocket and also that he was carrying his passport. This was routine and the result of another of Doyle’s rules. When you’re in the field, stay mobile and solvent. MacLean tossed his key on to the desk at Reception and ran down the steps outside to hail a cab.

A black Mercedes was leaving the rue St Martin as MacLean’s cab turned into it. MacLean paid it scant attention; he was looking for Rives’ white Citroen as a sign of his return. He didn’t see it. Still tingling with anticipation he reached Eva’s apartment and rang the doorbell: there was no reply. He rang again and this time the continuing silence spawned a hellish flashback to what he’d found at Vernay’s flat in Edinburgh. Fear gripped at his stomach as he rang again with still no response. He put his ear to the door and thought that he could heard a sound. He listened again and heard a distinct moan coming from inside.

He put his shoulder to the door and entered to find Eva lying on the floor in a pool of blood. She had been badly beaten. He cradled her head in his arms and began wiping the blood away gently with a handkerchief. Eva opened her eyes and tried to speak. ‘Told them your hotel … didn’t tell them you were … Sean MacLean…’

The effort was causing her agony but she was determined to continue. ‘Jean-Paul is dead …’

MacLean swallowed; he could see that Eva herself was close to death. The blood in her mouth was coming from her lungs, probably punctured by broken ribs. There was no point in breaking off to call an ambulance; it was more appropriate that she should spend her last few living moments in the arms of a friend. He kissed her gently on the forehead and she responded with the merest shadow of a smile.

‘I’m so sorry,’ whispered MacLean but it seemed desperately inadequate.

Eva tried to speak again. ‘Your little girl,’ she murmured. ‘May Haas … X14 … May Haas.’

‘Who is May Haas, Eva?’ MacLean asked.

May Haas is … ‘ Eva tried to take a breath but failed. Her head fell to one side.

MacLean laid her gently down on the floor and closed his eyes for a moment. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he whispered.

MacLean stood up and tried to think rationally. The opposition must be on their way to his hotel. In fact, they would probably be there by now. What would they do when they found out he wasn’t there? The answer seemed clear enough. They would wait for his return. They would have no reason to suspect that he’d been on his way to Eva’s apartment. They would be waiting for an unsuspecting Keith Nielsen to return from wherever.

MacLean saw two options. He could go straight to the airport and, with a bit of luck, be out of the country by the time the opposition got fed up waiting at the hotel. Or he could go back to the hotel and even up the score for Jean-Paul and Eva. The element of surprise would be on his side because the hunted were under the mistaken impression that they were the hunters.

The warning voices of Doyle and Leavey whispered to him. ‘If you let it get personal, you can start digging your own grave.’ Was that what he was doing? Was he thinking purely of personal revenge or was there some advantage to be gained from going to war with Eva’s killers? The objective: he had to remember the objective. He was here to get Cytogerm for Carrie.

MacLean poured himself a glass of cold water in the kitchen and gulped it down. He’d come so close to finding out where Von Jonek and Cytogerm were but it had all gone horribly wrong and all he was left with was a name, May Haas. She was the only link he had to go on and he would have to find her on his own. On the other hand the opposition knew that a man named Nielsen was interested in the X14 project. They did not know that Nielsen was really Sean MacLean but to all intents and purposes, it would now be as dangerous to travel under the name Nielsen as it had MacLean.

It didn’t look good but that part of the opposition who knew about Nielsen were currently sitting outside his hotel. They would have gone directly there after leaving Eva’s apartment so there was a chance they hadn’t yet reported back to their employers. If he could get to them first, Keith Nielsen’s identity would be safe and he could continue using the name while he searched for May Haas. It seemed like a good reason to go to war.

He searched the flat for anything that might be useful in the coming conflict. He couldn’t hope to find a gun, which was what he really needed, but kitchen knives were better than nothing. He selected two and started a little pile to which he added scissors, a screwdriver, pepper, matches, a candle and a tube of superglue. A cupboard under the sink yielded two butane gas cylinders for a camping stove and some plastic tubing from a home winemaking kit. A torch and some clothes pegs completed the inventory. He packed the lot into a plastic bag and left the apartment, closing the door quietly behind him. He hailed a cab to take him to a hotel which stood about half a kilometre from his own. Making a show of entering the hotel for the driver’s benefit, he turned as soon as the man had driven off and started out on foot for his own hotel. He used the shadows intelligently, flitting in and out of doorways, circling, criss-crossing and approaching in turn from both sides to see what he could see. He did not know how many men he was looking for and he didn’t know whether they would be waiting for him inside the hotel or outside.

MacLean’s attention came to rest on a black Mercedes estate car. It was parked in a narrow lane opposite the hotel in the perfect position to observe comings and goings. He could see two men sitting in the front of the car but his view of the back was obscured. He would have to circle round behind the car to see if there were more in the back. He back-tracked and entered the lane from the far end, moving swiftly and quietly from doorway to doorway until he could see that the Mercedes, which was parked with its nearside wheels up on the pavement, held three men. There was a third man sitting in the middle of the back seat. All three were watching the hotel entrance. Two were smoking.