Touch the Devil

The warehouse was crammed with bales and packing cases of every description. It was dark, but there was a light at the far end and he moved towards it. A man sat at a trestle table beneath a naked bulb. There was a map spread across the table in front of him, a briefcase beside it, and he was making notes in a small, leather-bound diary.

‘Hello, Frank,’ Corder said.

Frank Barry looked up. ‘Ah, there you are, Jack. Sorry to mess you about.’

The voice was good public school English with just a hint of an Ulster inflection here and there. He leaned back in the chair. His blond hair curled crisply, making him look considerably younger than his forty-eight years, and the black Burberry trenchcoat gave him a curiously elegant appearance. A handsome, lean-faced man with one side of his mouth hooked into a slight perpetual half-smile, as if permanently amused by the world and its inhabitants.

‘Something big?’ Corder asked.

‘You could say that. Did you know the British Foreign Secretary was visiting the President at the moment?’

‘Lord Carrington?’ Corder frowned. ‘No, I didn’t know that.’

‘Neither does anyone else. All very hush-hush. The new Tory government trying to cement the entente cordiale which has been more than bruised of late years. Not that it will do any good. Giscard d’Estaing will always put France top of his list, no matter what the situation. Their final meeting in the morning is taking place at a villa at Rigny.’ He stabbed at the map on the table with his finger. ‘Here, about forty miles from Paris.’

‘So?’ Corder said.

‘He leaves at noon by car for Vezelay. There’s an airforce emergency field there from where the RAF will be waiting to whisk him back to good old England, to all intents and purposes as if he’s never been away.’

‘So where’s all this leading?’

‘Here.’ Barry tapped the map again. ‘St Etienne, fifteen miles from Rigny, which consists of a petrol station and a roadside cafe at present closed. A perfect spot.’

‘For what?’

‘To hit the bugger as he passes through. One car, four CRS escorts on motorbikes. No problem that I can see.’

Corder was conscious of the cold now eating deep into his bones. ‘You’re joking. We’d never get away with it. I mean, a thing like this needs preparation, split second timing.’

‘All taken care of,’ Barry said cheerfully. ‘You should know me by now, Jack. I always prefer people who are working for wages. Thorough-going fanatics like yourself – honest Marxists who believe in the cause – you take it all too seriously and that tends to cloud your thinking. You can’t beat the professional touch.’

The Ulster accent was more in evidence now, all part of a deliberate exercise in charm.

‘Who have you got?’ Corder asked.

‘Three hoods from Marseilles on the run from the Union Corse after the wrong kind of underworld killing. One of them has his girl with him. They’ll do anything in return for the right price, four false passports and tickets to the Argentine.’

Corder stared down at the map. ‘So how does it happen?’

‘Simple. As I said, the cafe is closed. That only leaves the proprietor and his wife in the garage. They’ll be taken care of and my men will be in position, dressed as mechanics, from twelve-fifteen, working on a car on the forecourt.’

Corder shook his head. ‘From what I can see, the convoy will be passing at a fairly high speed at that point. Remember what happened at Petit-Clamart when Bastien Thiry and his boys tried to ambush General de Gaulle? Even with machine guns at point-blank range they didn’t do any good because the old man’s car just kept on going. A second is all you get and away.’

‘So what we have to do is stop the car,’ Barry said.

‘Impossible. These days those VIP drivers are trained for just this kind of situation. From what I can see on the map, it’s a straight road giving a good view long before he gets there. Block it with a vehicle or anything else and they’ll simply turn round and get the hell out of there.’ He shook his head. ‘He won’t stop, Frank, that driver, and there’s no way you can make him.’

‘Oh, yes, there is,’ Barry said. ‘Which is where the girl I mentioned comes into the picture. At the appropriate moment, she tries to cross the road from the garage pushing a pram. She stumbles, the pram runs away from her into the road.’

‘You’re crazy,’ Corder said.

‘Am I? It worked for the Red Army Faction a couple of years back when they snatched Schleyer, the head of the German Industries Federation in Cologne.’ Barry smiled. ‘You see, Jack, human nature being what it is, I think that I can positively guarantee that when that driver sees a runaway pram in his path he’ll do only one thing. Swerve to avoid it and come to a dead halt.’

Which was true. Had to be. Corder nodded. ‘Put that way, I suppose you’re right.’

‘I always am, old son.’ He opened the briefcase and took out a hand transceiver. ‘This is for you. There’s a side road on a hill covered by an apple orchard which overlooks the chateau at Rigny nicely. I want you there by eleven o’clock in the morning. You’ll find a Peugeot estate car in the yard outside, keys in the lock. Use that.’

‘Then what?’

‘The moment you see Carrington making preparations to leave, you call in on the transceiver, Channel 42. You say: This is Red calling. The package is about to be delivered. I’ll say: Green here. The package will be collected. Then you get to hell out of there. I want you at St Etienne before Carrington arrives.’

‘Will you be there?’

Barry looked surprised. ‘And where else would I be?’ He smiled. ‘I was a National Service second lieutenant with the Ulster Rifles in Korea in 1950, Jack. You didn’t know that, did you? But I’ll tell you one thing. When my lads went over the top, I was always in front.’

‘With a swagger stick in one hand?’

‘And now you’re thinking of the Somme,’ Barry laughed gently. ‘I killed an awful lot of Maoists out there, Jack, which is ironic, considering my present circumstances.’ He clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Anyway, you’d best be off. A decent night’s sleep and no booze. You’ll need a clear head for what you must do tomorrow.’ He glanced at his watch and laughed. ‘Correction – today.’

Corder weighed the transceiver in his hand, then slipped it into his pocket. ‘I’ll say good-night then.’

His footsteps echoed in the lofty warehouse as he walked to the entrance, opened the judas and stepped out. It was still raining as he moved into the yard at the side of the building. The Peugeot was parked by the main entrance, the key in the lock as Barry had indicated. Corder drove away, his palms sweating, slipping on the wheel, stomach churning.

Kill Carrington, one of the most decent and humane of politicians. My God, what would the bastard come up with next? But no, that question didn’t need an answer, because now Barry was very definitely finished. This was it. What Corder had been waiting for for more than a year.

He found what he was looking for a moment later, a small all-night cafe on the corner of one of the main boulevards into the city. There was a public telephone in a glass booth inside. He ordered coffee, then bought the necessary tokens from the barman and went into the booth, closing the door. His fingers were shaking as he carefully dialled the London code number and then the number following.

The Security Service in Great Britain, more correctly known as Directorate General of the Security Service, DI5, does not officially exist as far as the law is concerned although it does, in fact occupy a large white and red brick building near the Hilton Hotel. It was that establishment which Jack Corder was calling now; more specifically, an office known as Group Four which was manned twenty-four hours a day.

The ’phone was lifted and an anonymous voice said, ‘Say who you are.’

‘Lysander. I must speak with Brigadier Ferguson at once. Priority One. No denial possible.’

‘Your present number?’ He dictated it carefully. The voice said, ‘If security clearance confirmed, you will be called.’

The ’phone went dead. Corder pushed open the booth door and went to the bar. There was a man in a blue suit asleep on a chair in the corner, mouth gaping. Otherwise the place was empty.

The barman pushed the coffee across. ‘You want something to eat? A ham sandwich perhaps?’

‘Why not?’ Corder said. ‘I’m waiting for a call.’

The barman turned to the stove and Corder spooned sugar into his coffee. All calls to DI5 were automatically recorded. At this moment the computer would be matching his voice print on file against the tape of his call. Ferguson would probably be at home in bed. They would ring him, give him the number. Ten minutes in all.

But he was wrong, for it needed no more than five and as he took his first bite into the sandwich, the ’phone rang. He squeezed into the booth, closed the door and picked up the receiver.

‘Lysander here.’

‘Ferguson.’ The voice was plummy, a little over-done, rather like the ageing actor in a second-rate touring company who wants to make sure they can hear him at the back of the theatre. ‘It’s been a long time, Jack. Priority One, I understand.’

‘Frank Barry, sir, out in the open at last.’

Ferguson’s voice sharpened. ‘Now that is interesting.’

‘Lord Carrington, sir. He’s visiting President Giscard d’Estaing at the moment?’

There was a slight pause. Ferguson said, ‘No one’s supposed to know that officially.’

‘Frank Barry does.’

‘Not good, Jack, not good at all. I think you’d better explain.’

Which Corder did, speaking in low urgent tones. Five minutes later, he emerged from the booth and went to the counter.

‘Your sandwich, Monsieur – it has gone cold. You want another?’

‘What an excellent idea,’ Corder said. ‘And I’ll have a cognac while I’m waiting.’

He lit a cigarette and sat back on the bar stool, smiling for the first time that night.

In his flat in Cavendish Square, Brigadier Charles Ferguson stood beside the bed, pulling on his dressing gown as he listened to the tape recording he had just taken of his conversation with Corder. He was a large, kindly-looking man and distinctly overweight with rumpled grey hair and a double chin. There was nothing military about him at all and the half-moon spectacles he put on to consult a small pocket book gave him the air of a minor professor. He was, in fact, as ruthless as Cesare Borgia and totally without scruples when it came to his country’s interest.

There was a tap at the door and his manservant, an ex-Ghurkha naik, peered in, tying the belt of a dressing gown about his waist.

‘Sorry, Kim, work to be done.’ Ferguson said. ‘Lots of tea, bacon and eggs to follow. I won’t be going back to bed.’

The little Ghurkha withdrew and Ferguson went into the sitting room, stirred the fire in the Adam fireplace, poured himself a large brandy, sat down by the telephone and dialled a number in Paris.

The French Security Service, the Service de Documentation Extérieure et de Contre Espionnage, the SDECE, is divided into five sections and many departments. The most interesting is certainly Section Five, most commonly known as the Action Service, the department which more than any other had been responsible for the smashing of the OAS. It was the number of Service Five which Ferguson dialled now.

He said, ‘Ferguson here, DI5. Colonel Guyon, if you please.’ He frowned impatiently. ‘Well, of course he’s at home in bed. So was I. I’ve only rung you to establish credentials. Tell him to call me back on this number.’ He dictated it quickly. ‘Most urgent. Priority One.’

He put down the ’phone and Kim entered with bacon and eggs, bread, butter and marmalade on a silver tray. ‘Delicious,’ Ferguson said, as the little Ghurkha placed a small table before him. ‘Breakfast at two-thirty in the morning. What a capital idea. We should do this more often.’

As he tucked a napkin around his neck the ’phone rang. He picked it up instantly. ‘Ah, Pierre,’ he said in rapid and excellent French. ‘I’ve got something for you. Very nasty indeed. You won’t be pleased, so listen carefully.’

In the warehouse, it was quiet after Jack Corder had left. Barry walked to the entrance and locked the judas gate. He paused to light a cigarette and as he turned, a man emerged from the shadows and perched himself on the edge of the table.

Nikolai Romanov was fifty years of age and for ten of them had been a cultural attaché at the Soviet Embassy in Paris. His dark suit was Savile Row, as was the blue overcoat which fitted him to perfection. He was handsome enough in a slightly decadent way, with a face like Oscar Wilde or Nero himself and a mane of silver hair which made him look more like a distinguished actor than what he was, which was a Colonel in the KGB.

‘I’m not too sure about that one, Frank,’ he said in excellent English.

‘I’m not too sure about anyone,’ Barry said, ‘including you, old son, but for what it’s worth, Jack Corder’s a dedicated Marxist.’

‘Oh dear,’ Romanov said. ‘That’s what I was afraid of.’

‘He tried to join the British Communist Party when he was an undergraduate at Oxford years ago. It was suggested that someone like him could do more good by keeping his mouth shut and joining the Labour Party, which he did. Trade Union Organiser for six years, then he blotted his copybook by losing his cool during a miners’ strike three or four years ago and assaulting a policeman in the picket line with a pickaxe handle. Put him in hospital for six weeks.’

‘And Corder?’

‘Two years in gaol. The Union wouldn’t touch him with a barge pole after that. Deep down inside, those lads are as conservative as Margaret Thatcher when it comes to being British. Jack came over here when he got out and involved himself with an anarchist group well to the left of the French Communist Party which is where I picked him up. Anyway, why should you worry, or has the Disinformation Department of the KGB changed its aims?’

‘No,’ Romanov said. ‘Chaos is still our business, Frank, and we need to create as much as possible in the Western world. Chaos, disorder, fear and uncertainty, which is why we employ people like you.’

‘You haven’t left much out, have you?’ Barry said cheerfully.

Romanov looked down at the map. ‘Is this going to work?’

‘Come on, now, Nikolai,’ Barry said. ‘You don’t really want Carrington shot dead on a French country road, do you? Very counterproductive, just like the IRA shooting the Queen. Too much to lose, so it isn’t worth it.’

Romanov looked bewildered. ‘What game are you playing now?’

‘Oh, you know me,’ Barry said, ‘the game’s the thing,’ and added briskly, ‘I’ll still take the cash, by the way. Chaos, disorder, fear and uncertainty. I’ll do my best to see you get your money’s-worth.’

Romanov hesitated, then took a large manilla envelope from his pocket and pushed it across. Barry dropped it into the briefcase along with the map.

‘Shall we?’

He led the way to the entrance and unlocked the judas gate. A flurry of wind tossed rain into their faces. Romanov shivered and turned up his collar.

‘When I was fourteen years old in nineteen forty-three, I joined a partisan group in the Ukraine. I was with them two years. It was simpler then. We were fighting Nazis. We knew where we were. But now?’

‘A different world,’ Barry said.

‘And one in which you, my friend, don’t even believe in your own country.’

‘Ulster?’ Barry laughed harshly. ‘I gave up on that mess a long time ago. As someone once said, there’s nothing worse than a collection of ignorant people with legitimate grievances. Now let’s get to hell out of here.’

The apples in the orchard on the hill above Rigny should have been picked weeks before, were already over-ripe, and the air was heavy with the smell of them, warm in the unexpected noon-day sun.

Jack Corder lay in the long grass, a pair of Zeiss binoculars beside him, and watched the villa below. It was a pleasant house, built in the eighteenth century from the look of it with a broad flight of steps leading up to the portico over the main entrance.

There were four cars in the courtyard, at least a dozen CRS police waiting beside their motor cycles and uniformed gendarmes at the gate. Nothing too ostentatious. The President was known to imitate General de Gaulle in that respect and hated fuss.

For a while, Corder was a boy again lying in long grass by the River Wharfe, the bridge below him, good Yorkshire sheep scattered across the meadow on the other side. Sixteen years old with a girl beside him whose name he couldn’t even remember, and life had seemed to have an infinite possibility to it. He felt an aching longing to be back, for everything in between to be just a dream, and then the President of France, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, stepped out of the house below, followed by the British Foreign Secretary.

The two men stood in the portico flanked by their aides as Corder focused his binoculars.

‘Jesus,’ he whispered. ‘One man with a decent rifle is all it would take to knock out both of them.’

The President shook the Foreign Secretary’s hand. No formal embrace. That was not his style. Lord Carrington went down the steps and was ushered into the black Citroen.

Corder’s throat was dry. He took the transceiver from his pocket, pressed the channel button and said urgently. ‘This is Red calling. This is Red calling. The package is about to be delivered.’

A second later he heard Barry’s reply, cool, detached. ‘Green here. The package will be collected.’

Carrington’s car was moving towards the entrance followed by four CRS motorcyclists, just as Barry had promised and Corder jumped to his feet, turned and ran through the orchard to where he had left the Peugeot. He had plenty of time to reach the main road before the convoy and the moment he turned on to it, he put his foot down, pushing the Peugeot up to seventy-five.

His palms were sweating again, his throat dry, and he lit a cigarette one-handed. He didn’t know what was going to happen at St Etienne, that was the trouble. Probably CRS riot cops descending in droves, shooting everything that moved which could include him. But he had to turn up; had no other choice, for if he didn’t, Barry, being Barry, would smell an instant rat, call the thing off and disappear into the blue as he had done so many times before.

He was close to St Etienne now, no more than two or three miles to go, when it happened. As he passed a side turning, a CRS motorcyclist emerged and came after him, a sinister figure in crash helmet and goggles and dark, caped coat. He pulled alongside and waved him down and Corder pulled in to the edge of the road. Was this Ferguson’s way of keeping him out of it?

The CRS man pulled in front, got off his heavy BMW machine and pushed it on its stand. He walked towards the Peugeot, a gloved finger hooked into the trigger guard of the MAT49 machine carbine slung across his chest. He stood looking down at Corder, anonymous in the dark goggles, then pushed them up.

‘A slight change of plan, old son.’ Frank Barry grinned. ‘I lead, you follow.’

‘You’ve called it off?’ Corder demanded in astonishment.

Barry looked mildly surprised. ‘Jesus, no, why should I do a thing like that?’

He got back on the BMW and drove away. Corder followed him, totally lost now, not knowing what to do for the best. For a moment Corder fingered the butt of the Walther PPK he carried, not that there was much joy there. He’d never shot anyone in his life. It was unlikely that he could start now.

About a mile outside St Etienne, Barry turned into a narrow country lane and Corder followed, climbing up between high hedgerows past a small farm. There was a grove of trees on the brow of a green hill and Barry waved him down and turned into them. He pushed the BMW up on its stand and Corder joined him.

‘Look, what’s going on, Frank?’

‘Did I ever tell you about my grandmother on my mother’s side, Jack? Whenever she got a terrible headache there’d be a thunder-storm within the hour. Now with me, it’s different. I only get a headache when I smell stinking fish and I’ve got a real blinder at the moment.’

Corder went cold. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Nice view from up here.’ Barry walked through the trees and indicated St Etienne spread neatly below like a child’s model. The garage and forecourt were on one side of the road, the cafe and carpark on the other.

He took some binoculars from the pocket of his raincoat and passed them across. ‘Have a look. I have a feeling it may be a bit more interesting to sit this one out.’

Corder focused the binoculars on the fore-court of the garage. Two of the men, wearing yellow overalls, worked on the engine of a car. The third waiting in the glass office beside the petrol pumps talking to the girl who stood at the door with the pram, wearing a scarlet headscarf, woollen jumper and neat skirt.

‘Any sign of the car?’ Barry demanded.

Corder swung the binoculars to examine the road. ‘No, but there’s a truck coming.’

‘Is there, now? That’s interesting.’

The truck was of the trailer type, an eight-wheeler with high green canvas sides. As it entered the village, it slowed and turned into the carpark. The driver, a tall man in khaki overalls jumped down from the cab and strolled to the cafe door.

Barry took the binoculars from Corder and focused them on the truck. ‘Bouvier Brothers, Long Distant Transport, Paris and Marseilles.’

‘He’ll move on when he finds the cafe’s closed,’ Corder said.

‘Pigs might fly, old son,’ Frank Barry told him, ‘But I doubt it.’

There was a sudden firestorm from inside the truck at that moment, machine gun fire raking the entire forecourt area, shattering the glass of the office, driving the girl back over the pram, cutting down the two gunmen working on the car, riddling its fuel tank, petrol spilling on to the concrete. It was the work of an instant, no more, there was a flicker of flame as petrol ignited and then the tank exploded in a ball of fire, pieces of wreckage flying high in the air. The holocaust was complete and at least twenty CRS riot police in uniform leapt from the rear of the truck and ran across the road.

‘Efficient,’ Barry said calmly. ‘You’ve got to give the buggers that.’

Corder licked dry lips nervously and his left hand went into the pocket of his leather jacket, groping for the butt of the Walther.

‘What could have gone wrong?’

‘One of those bastards from Marseilles must have had a big mouth,’ Barry said. ‘And if word got back to the Union Corse …’ He shrugged, ‘Thieving’s one thing, politics is another. They’d inform without a second’s hesitation.’ He clapped Corder on the shoulder. ‘But we’d better get out of this. Just follow my tail, like you did before. Nobody is likely to stop us when they see me escorting you.’

He pushed the BMW off its stand and rode away. Corder followed. The whole thing was like a bad dream and he could still see, vivid as any image on the cinema screen, the body of the girl, bouncing back across the pram in a hail of machine gun fire. And Barry had expected it. Expected it, and yet he had still let those poor sods go through with it.

He followed the BMW closely, through narrow country lanes, twisting and turning. They met no one and then, a good ten miles on the other side of St Etienne, came to a small garage and cafe at the side of the road. Barry turned in beside the cafe and braked to a halt. As Corder joined him, he was taking a canvas grip from one of the side panniers.

‘I know this place,’ he said. ‘There’s a wash room at the back. I’m going to change. We’ll leave the BMW here and carry on in the Peugeot.’

He went round to the rear before Corder could reply and the young woman in the glass office beside the petrol pumps emerged and approached him. She was perhaps twenty-five with a flat, pleasant face, and wore a man’s tweed jacket that was too large for her.