Running Blind / The Freedom Trap

Author:Desmond Bagley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction
Publisher: HarperCollins

II

I lunched at the Cock in Fleet Street and then set out to look up the address Mackintosh had given me. Of course I walked in the wrong direction—London is the devil of a place to get around in if you don’t know it. I didn’t want to take a taxi because I always play things very cautiously, perhaps even too cautiously. But that’s why I’m a success.

Anyway, I found myself walking up a street called Ludgate Hill before I found I’d gone wrong and, in making my way into Holborn, I passed the Central Criminal Court. I knew it was the Central Criminal Court, because it says so and that surprised me because I always thought it was called the Old Bailey. I recognized it because of the golden figure of Justice on the roof. Even a South African would recognize that—we see Edgar Lustgarten movies, too.

It was all very interesting but I wasn’t there as a tourist so I passed up the opportunity of going inside to see if there was a case going on. Instead I pressed on to Leather Lane behind Gamage’s and found a street market with people selling all kinds of junk from barrows. I didn’t much like the look of that—it’s difficult to get away fast in a thick crowd. I’d have to make damned sure there was no hue and cry, which meant slugging the postman pretty hard. I began to feel sorry for him.

Before checking on the address I cruised around the vicinity, identifying all the possible exits from the area. To my surprise I found that Hatton Garden runs parallel with Leather Lane and I knew that the diamond merchants hung out there. On second thoughts it wasn’t too surprising; the diamond boys wouldn’t want their accommodation address to be too far from the ultimate destination. I looked at the stolid, blank buildings and wondered in which of them were the strongrooms Mackintosh had described.

I spent half an hour pacing out those streets and noting the various types of shop. Shops are very useful to duck into when you want to get off the streets quickly. I decided that Gamage’s might be a good place to get lost in and spent another quarter-hour familiarizing myself with the place. That wouldn’t be enough but at this stage it wasn’t a good thing to decide definitely on firm plans. That’s the trouble with a lot of people who slip up on jobs like this; they make detailed plans too early in the game, imagining they’re Master Minds, and the whole operation gets hardening of the arteries and becomes stiff and inflexible.

I went back to Leather Lane and found the address Mackintosh had given me. It was on the second floor, so I went up to the third in the creaking lift and walked down one flight of stairs. The Betsy-Lou Dress Manufacturing Co, Ltd, was open for business but I didn’t trouble to introduce myself. Instead I checked the approaches and found

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