The Python Project by Victor Canning

Author:Victor Canning [Canning, Victor]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-10-04T14:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 8

Saraband Two

I was not present at the take-over discussions. I was taken away to a little room at the front of the house where, if it hadn’t been for the bulk of A.T. standing guard outside, I could have had a good view of the sandy drive. In the room with me was a fourth man, whose face was vaguely familiar.

He sat by the door on the edge of a hard chair, a fidgety, nervous little man who looked as though he were waiting his turn to go into the dentist. One thin, almost feminine, hand held a big Colt Service revolver which he kept directed at me. I only hoped that the safety was on. He kept flicking his eyes at me and running the edge of his tongue between his thin lips. One of his socks had been put on inside out. I guessed that he was the talkative type. Conversation would be a way of easing his nervousness. Let him sweat, I decided. I’d got myself into this by trying to do good to those who didn’t deserve it, which confirmed that there was a basic flaw in the Christian ethic. I lit a cigarette and considered the Duchêne angle. It didn’t need much considering. When you look back over events from some crisis point a lot of things become clear. Being wise after the event comes easy. Duchêne had wanted to muscle in on the Dawson kidnapping. And he had let me do all the leg-work for him. That annoyed me. At least, it rated a fee. I had a feeling that I would never get one. But more important, how, I asked myself, had Duchêne or Paulet ever come to know that Dawson had been kidnapped? How had they ever come to know that Freeman was involved? I could think of two or three answers to that, but I decided to reserve judgment until I knew whether they—like Pelegrina and Freeman—were just working for their private interests or, as I suspected, representing a far from private interest.

I smoked another cigarette, and studied the one picture on the wall of the room. It showed a group of Roman matrons in and around a wide marble bath, being toileted by half a dozen handmaidens. They were having a jolly time splashing water at one another. The artist must have been Victorian because their poses were so arranged that there were no pudenda in the slightest bit exposed. Not that it would have cheered me up if there had been.

My guard coughed dryly and put his left hand around his right wrist to help support the big Colt.

I took pity on him.

‘I’ve seen you before, haven’t I?’

The thin face broke into a happy smile to show very bad teeth. ‘On the plane from Tripoli to Malta. I got off with you.’

I remembered then. He’d looked like a worried cotton-length salesman, fiddling around with his order book all through the flight, just across the aisle from me, and never once looking at me.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.