Second Wind Part 24

"Seriously, " she said, having healthily dispatched the tuna, "what's hurting you? " "Onset of broken heart? " She shook her head, smiling. "I saw the papers yesterday, with your grandmother. It's amazin you and your friend Kris survived at all. " (, , , I said I'd probably cracked a rib or two, which could be a bit frustrating in the active love department, for a couple of days.

"Think in terms of a week or two, " Miss van Els instructed.

"Or a month or two. " She smiled with composure. "The first rule of disengagement is to take your time at the beginning. " "How about lunch tomorrow, then? " "All right, " she said.

ALTHOUGH I WOULDN't do my act before the cameras until well after six o'clock, I was always at work in plenty of time before two, when the twice-daily conference on world atmospheric conditions took place.

One had to consider as a whole the jacket of air swirling round the spinning planet and to foresee if possible how far the low pressure systems in hot areas might deepen further still, to give rise to gales.

I had always found it extraordinary that people turned their backs on physics as a subject at school and university, even if public opinion was at last gradually changing. Physics was the study of the hugely powerful invisible forces that ruled the way we lived. Physics was gravity, magnetism, electricity, heat, sound, air pressure, radioactivity and especially radio, the mysI terious forces that clearly existed, whose effects were commonplace, whose powers were unlimited, and which could not be seen. Every day I dealt with them as friends.

No one at work made much comment on Kris's or my Sat.u.r.day escapade, as our colleagues seemed to have exhausted their "welcome backs" after Odin. Their matter-of-fact approach suited me fine, though perhaps I would have preferred a more concerned response to inquiries into the fate of a missing dipstick further north. When I telephoned for news, I got nowhere, as it wasn't my dipstick, I was told. When Kris telephoned, at my prompting, he still got nowhere, as nothing could be discussed unless he made the journey to talk to them in person.

"Get Luton to ask, " I suggested, but Luton received only a suggestion that Kris himself should be more closely questioned.

"What does that mean? " Kris demanded.

I said,

"It means they haven't found a dipstick at their end.

It means they think you didn't screw your dipstick in tight and they are trying to say it was your fault the oil came out. " Kris scowled, but when I went to Kensington on Tuesday morning to pretend to be engaged on a textbook, John Rupert took the leaking oil to be a bona-fide attempt to put Kris and myself underground.

"I fly my own plane,

"John Rupert said. "I've been a weekend pilot for twenty years, and I wouldn't like to try to land blind. A year ago, oil on the windshield killed four people who crashed into English cliffs on their way back from France.

Their dipstick was found on the ground where they'd topped up their oil before setting off for home. It was in all the papers. " "Poor sods, " I said. "I remember it. " "No one,

"John Rupert observed with conviction, "could have expected you both to be back at work unharmed. " The door opened quietly for the advent of Ghost. He shook hands with stretched sinews and finished off the single ginger cracker overlooked by John Rupert himself.

"News? " Ghost suggested laconically, quietly crunching.

"Thoughts? " "Apart from attempted murder by oil,

"John Rupert said.

"Because you both lived, " Ghost said dryly, "no one will consider it an attempt... " He broke off and asked me straightly, "Could it have been by any means an accident? " "Only if it was random mischief by a stranger, which is,

I.

believe, what the local investigators think. " "But you don't? " "No. " "And is that why you've come back to us? " I blinked. "I expect so, " I said.

Ghost smiled, a fearsome facial expression threatening the wicked with decades in limbo.

I said, "I don't know exactly who whisked out the dipstick, but I've brought you a list of possibles. " They read them. "All from Newmarket, " Ghost commented. "All except this last one, Robin Darcy. " "I don't think it was him, " I said.

"Why not? " "He shook hands with both of us. Separately, that is. " "You're old-fashioned, " Ghost said. "Shakespeare was bang up to date. One can smile and smile and be a villain. " "I don't want it to be Darcy, " I said.

"Ah, " Ghost sounded satisfied. "Gut feelings... those I believe in. " John Rupert studied the list. "Tell us about these people, " he said. "What about Caspar Harvey? And Belladonna, his daughter? " I was surprised at how much I'd learned about each of them and it took me a good hour to roam round the perimeter of quivery Oliver Quigley (old and new perceptions) and George Loricroft, a bully who believed himself ent.i.tled to dominate his semi-bimbo wife, who was much brighter than her husband realized or allowed for and who half-understood too much but not quite enough, and was therefore a danger to herself, though she didn't know it.

"I don't think the dipstick was Glenda's doing, " I explained, drawing breath. "I don't think she wanted Kris and me dead.

She wanted us to be alive, to be weathermen, and to check on her suspicions. " I explained about the snow and ice discrepancies in Loricroft's actual and professed journeys.

Ghost listened intently. John Rupert said merely,

"Expand. " "Well... " I collected a few thoughts. "When I came to you... sought you out... I knew the names of three of the Traders, and I didn't tell you them because... " "Because, " Ghost said disapprovingly, as I hesitated, "you sentimentally wanted to save them from prosecution, as they hadn't killed you when they had the opportunity. Correct? " "I guess so. " "And? " "And that was fact, but what I can tell you now is inference and supposition. " "Glad to have them,

"John Rupert said with mock formality.

"Fire away. " "You may ridicule... " "Leave that to us. " "The Unified Traders... " I said slowly. "Well, these Unified Traders, it seems to me, are more amateur than professional. That's to say, they're dishonorable enough in intent, but not slick or hard enough in performance. For instance, leaving their folder of essential information lying about for so long was plain stupid, so was engaging Kris to collect it. On the surface it seemed a reasonable quid pro quo, as Kris would have done more or less anything in exchange for a chance to fly through a hurricane. " John Rupert nodded.

I said, "Caspar Harvey and Robin Darcy are very longtime colleagues, and apart from Harvey's barley and Darcy's turf farm, they are both used to handling things in small packets.

Harvey sells birdseed and Darcy sells vacuum-packed exotic mushrooms. Darcy set up a small mushroom operation on Trox Island, but I was told, seconthand, by full-scale mushroom growers, that the Trox operation was too small to succeed. In the end it was used, as I told you before, to frighten away the whole population of the island. But it was their ability to think small that started them off, I reckon, on arranging the introduction of buyers to sellers of tiny amounts of radioactive materials. " John Rupert said, "I suppose if you put enough small packets together you get a haystack. " "Or a bomb, " said Ghost.

"Or enough of a bomb, " I said mildly, "to raise the bargaining power of that amount. But I don't think the Traders actually handle the uranium or plutonium themselves. It's very dangerous stuff. But they do have small-scale know-how. " I stopped, but both men wanted more.

"I think, " I said, "and frankly I'm guessing, that Darcy recruited Caspar Harvey as a Trader, and Harvey drew in Oliver Quigley and George Loricroft... and for a while the middlemen operation ran smoothly and imnnensely profitably with the three Traders across the Atlantic, each of the group of six acting on the old musketeers' principle of All for one and one Ghost, his eyes shrewdly narrowed, asked,

"Why did the original Traders need more recruits? Why didn't Darcy and Harvey keep the proceeds to themselves? " "I think... " I found all my thoughts coming out as speculations. "... I think Harvey found Loricroft had a gift for sniffing out the truffles. George Loricroft kas traveled all over Europe--and especially throughout Germany--telling his wife lies about the local weather to explain why he hadn't been where he was supposed to have been, and always treating her as an idiot, and in fact it's possible that all those places he lied about were trading posts. They were nearly all in Germany, and as Loricroft is internationally known as a racehorse trainer, there is nowhere in the world more suitable or less conspicuous for him to trade and exchange information than on racetracks. " I looked down at my shoes, dodging their undoubted incredulity, but I'd gone too far to withdraw.

"I told you I could remember only Hippostat as a word in the heading of one of the letters, but I know another--it came to me when I wasn't concentrating... it just drifted back from my subconscious memory. " Ghost said impatiently,

"What is it? " "Well... " I looked up, "it's Rennbahn. It's Baden-Baden Rennbahn. " John Rupert smiled vividly. "And do you know what Rennbahn means? " "Racetrack, " I said. "I've looked it up. Baden-Baden Racetrack. It was written in German script in a letter in another language that I didn't know. " "We have German dictionaries downstairs, and every other sort of dictionary you care to mention, " John Rupert said.

"Would you remember any more if you... er... browsed?

" I said doubtfully,

"I don't know. " "We can try. " "Meanwhile, " Ghost said, "tell us about the other two Traders in Florida, Robin Darcy's colleagues. " "They're in the Cayman Islands, not Florida, " I explained, and described Michael and Amy Ford. "And they may be in the game because of idealism or political motives... I simply can't tell, but they also may be the original Traders. In any case, they are, I'd say, the richest of the whole group. " "Why do you think so? " Ghost wanted to know.

"I stayed in their house... and Amy's airplane, that we ditched in the hurricane, that plane was a perfect beauty. They said Amy had sold it to Darcy. " "But you doubt it?

"John Rupert asked.

"Well... I do, yes. But that's only an impression.

None of them seemed to be terribly upset by losing it. I don't know about insurance. None of them mentioned it. " There was a pause. John Rupert then said, "Is that the lot? " and prepared to rise, and I said with diffidence, "One more thing... " "Yes? " He relaxed in his chair, attention unending.

I picked at my fingers. "Well... it's only that the Unified Trading Company doesn't have a boss. They don't have a hierarchy.

" "Are you sure?

"John Rupert inquired doubtfully. "Every organization I've ever dealt with has had a hierarchy. " "I'm sure, " I nodded. "In an ordinary company, the lower members report upwards, and then receive their instructions from above. But in the Unified Trading Company they each act on their own ideas and report afterwards what they've done.

They act first and tell the others after. As a result they duplicate some things and omit others entirely, and they get in a muddle. " Both John Rupert and Ghost were shovwing more and more doubt.