coffee.
" D o you have any evidence on which to base this supposition?"
" T h e aim of the shots."
" D o you have an eyewitness?"
The grating of the cup on the saucer. A pause. The snapping of a cigarette lighter.
"That is a very straightforward question, sir."
" Y e s , Mr Erlich, I have an eyewitness."
"Who saw it all?"
" S o I understand, yes."
" M a y I talk to the eyewitness?"
"Probably - at a suitable time."
" I s tomorrow suitable?"
" I cannot say . . . "
Again, a pause. The smoke curled between them, eddied to Erlich's face. A telephone rang in an outer office. The policeman glanced upwards as if he hoped that the phone would give him an excuse to get rid of this intruder.
"Well, sir, what do you have?"
"What do I have? Put simply, Mr Erlich, I have an intelligence agent of a foreign country going about his activities without informing the local authorities of his work . . . Do you think, Mr Erlich, that if I went to your Embassy to request a detailed briefing concerning the work in my country of Mr Harry Lawrence, Central Intelligence Agency, that I would be shown anything, other than the door . . .?"
" Y o u have the hit car?"
"Burned out, no help."
A welling frustration.
"We're on the same side." The last time he had been in Athens, when the group that called themselves "November 1 7 t h " had hit the Procter & Gamble offices with an anti-tank rocket, he had not been admitted to the presence of this big man. The warhead had not detonated, there had been no casualties. He hadn't been welcome then, wasn't welcome now, but he hadn't pushed his luck as hard when the target had been a corporation and no casualties, as when the target had been an American government servant, dead.
"Are we, Mr Erlich?"
"What do you have?"
"Lawrence and his contact walking in a quiet street. An Opel Rekord, stolen three days earlier in the Piraeus, pulls up 20 yards behind them. One man out, Caucasian, blond short hair. The contact shot. Lawrence blunders into the path of the bullets, is hit . .
"White?"
"Caucasian, Mr Erlich, white."
"IN that it?"
"There was a shout from the car driver."
"What was the shout?"
" The word 'Colt'."
"What?"
" T h e shout was the one word. Please, Mr Erlich, be so kind as to excuse me. The one word shouted was 'Colt'. Only 'Colt'."
He was Colin Olivier Louis Tuck.
Tomorrow would be his 26th birthday, but there would be no cards and no presents.
He sat and stared out over the skyline of the city in the chill of the evening. The first thing he had done when he had come into the apartment had been to turn off the heating system, and then he had opened the window in his bedroom and the window in the sparsely furnished living room. He hated to be boxed up.
What had gone wrong he did not know. He had been met by the Defence Ministry people, who had taken him directly from the aircraft steps, but no one had said a word on the way into the city. There had been no pumped handshakes, no kissed cheeks, no back slapping, so something was wrong. And there was a man at the door, standing as if on guard. A man in a two-piece suit, and a thin cotton shirt and his tie knotted at the second button of the shirt. There was little light in the room but he wore wrap-around dark glasses. Colt had his back to his watcher, but could hear him shiver in the draught. They would say whatever it was they had to say in their own time. There was no hurrying them, that's what he had learned since he had been in Baghdad.
He ran his fingers hard through the cropped growth of his fair, light golden hair. He closed his eyes. He'd wake when they came.
His day had started at 4.30 with the bleeping of his wrist-watch alarm. No breakfast, because he never took breakfast. No coffee.
No food, nothing to drink. He had dressed. He had stripped the weapon, rebuilt it, satisfied himself, and then unloaded and reloaded the magazine. He always checked the mechanism before firing because the Ruger/MAC Mark 1 was now
" D o you have any evidence on which to base this supposition?"
" T h e aim of the shots."
" D o you have an eyewitness?"
The grating of the cup on the saucer. A pause. The snapping of a cigarette lighter.
"That is a very straightforward question, sir."
" Y e s , Mr Erlich, I have an eyewitness."
"Who saw it all?"
" S o I understand, yes."
" M a y I talk to the eyewitness?"
"Probably - at a suitable time."
" I s tomorrow suitable?"
" I cannot say . . . "
Again, a pause. The smoke curled between them, eddied to Erlich's face. A telephone rang in an outer office. The policeman glanced upwards as if he hoped that the phone would give him an excuse to get rid of this intruder.
"Well, sir, what do you have?"
"What do I have? Put simply, Mr Erlich, I have an intelligence agent of a foreign country going about his activities without informing the local authorities of his work . . . Do you think, Mr Erlich, that if I went to your Embassy to request a detailed briefing concerning the work in my country of Mr Harry Lawrence, Central Intelligence Agency, that I would be shown anything, other than the door . . .?"
" Y o u have the hit car?"
"Burned out, no help."
A welling frustration.
"We're on the same side." The last time he had been in Athens, when the group that called themselves "November 1 7 t h " had hit the Procter & Gamble offices with an anti-tank rocket, he had not been admitted to the presence of this big man. The warhead had not detonated, there had been no casualties. He hadn't been welcome then, wasn't welcome now, but he hadn't pushed his luck as hard when the target had been a corporation and no casualties, as when the target had been an American government servant, dead.
"Are we, Mr Erlich?"
"What do you have?"
"Lawrence and his contact walking in a quiet street. An Opel Rekord, stolen three days earlier in the Piraeus, pulls up 20 yards behind them. One man out, Caucasian, blond short hair. The contact shot. Lawrence blunders into the path of the bullets, is hit . .
"White?"
"Caucasian, Mr Erlich, white."
"IN that it?"
"There was a shout from the car driver."
"What was the shout?"
" The word 'Colt'."
"What?"
" T h e shout was the one word. Please, Mr Erlich, be so kind as to excuse me. The one word shouted was 'Colt'. Only 'Colt'."
He was Colin Olivier Louis Tuck.
Tomorrow would be his 26th birthday, but there would be no cards and no presents.
He sat and stared out over the skyline of the city in the chill of the evening. The first thing he had done when he had come into the apartment had been to turn off the heating system, and then he had opened the window in his bedroom and the window in the sparsely furnished living room. He hated to be boxed up.
What had gone wrong he did not know. He had been met by the Defence Ministry people, who had taken him directly from the aircraft steps, but no one had said a word on the way into the city. There had been no pumped handshakes, no kissed cheeks, no back slapping, so something was wrong. And there was a man at the door, standing as if on guard. A man in a two-piece suit, and a thin cotton shirt and his tie knotted at the second button of the shirt. There was little light in the room but he wore wrap-around dark glasses. Colt had his back to his watcher, but could hear him shiver in the draught. They would say whatever it was they had to say in their own time. There was no hurrying them, that's what he had learned since he had been in Baghdad.
He ran his fingers hard through the cropped growth of his fair, light golden hair. He closed his eyes. He'd wake when they came.
His day had started at 4.30 with the bleeping of his wrist-watch alarm. No breakfast, because he never took breakfast. No coffee.
No food, nothing to drink. He had dressed. He had stripped the weapon, rebuilt it, satisfied himself, and then unloaded and reloaded the magazine. He always checked the mechanism before firing because the Ruger/MAC Mark 1 was now
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