“GENTLEMAN FOR YOU, MR. CONGREVE,” MAY PURVIS SAID,
coming out into the garden. It was the early morning following Hawke’s near-death experience and Ambrose was sitting outside in the bright sunshine. He had a good picture going. It was a study of the crabapple tree that stood outside his kitchen window. It was not in flower now, but Ambrose was dabbing on scads of pink and white blossoms anyway, clouds of them. His artistic philosophy was simple: Paint things the way they
should
look.
It’s not the truth, but what you believe to be the truth that is important in art. That was his opinion, anyway. Never let the truth get in the way of a good painting. Or a good story, for that matter.
Like his great hero Winston Churchill, Ambrose Congreve used the very delicate art of watercolor not only for self-expression but also as a meditative medium. A release from all his worldly cares. He had slipped into the trance. The Zone. He had not heard the front-door bell.
“Whom shall we say is calling, Mrs. Purvis?” he asked, trying to mask his irritation at the intrusion. His housekeeper had been filling her basket with apples for a cobbler she was making for his pudding. This simple act had inspired his painting.
He was making good progress and any interruption was unwelcome. At any rate, he certainly wasn’t expecting anyone at his door this early on a Sunday morning. It simply wasn’t done. It wasn’t civilized. It wasn’t—
“It would be his lordship, sir. Lord Hawke.”
“Ah! Splendid!” A visit from Alex was another matter. Ambrose had been dying to show off his new digs. “Would you just bring him out here to the garden? See if he wants anything. Tea. Coffee, perhaps.”
“I should certainly expect he wants something, sir. He’s—”
“Eggs. Or, on second thought, lemons.”
“Lemons?”
“He eats lemons.”
“Sir! Lord Hawke is on the telephone!”
“Good lord! Well, why didn’t you say so in the first place?”
Mrs. Purvis shook her head and returned to the kitchen. Ambrose, muttering, went round the far side of the house, through the rose garden, and entered by the exterior door to his study. He grabbed his pipe, plopped down into his worn leather chair, and picked up the receiver.
“Hullo, Alex,” he said into the phone.
“Ambrose. What are you doing for lunch?”
“Painting it.”
“Well, drop that. You need to meet me at Harry’s at one.”
“You sound—stressed.”
“Someone tried to kill me last night. Failed miserably. I’ll fill you in over a plate of Harry’s spaghetti. Meanwhile, Brick Kelly is back in town. He wants to meet with us. Urgently.”
“Us?”
“He specifically asked that you be there. You’ve read the Paris Deuxième case file I gave you?”
“I have.”
“So. Your crystalline logic and supernatural powers of deduction. What do they tell you?”
“Riddled with discrepancies. Pages missing. Erasures. An unsolved murder needs solving. I suppose I could drive the Morgan into town.”
“Brilliant. See you at one.”
“Wait! Who tried to kill you? You can’t let me just hang out to—”
“A tout à l’heure, mon ami,”
Hawke said and rang off.
Harry’s Bar is one of London’s better-kept secrets. It’s a private club and there’s no name on the door, which may account for its lack of notoriety. Congreve was shown by a gentleman in black tie to a quiet table in the rear of the front room. Harry’s walls were washed pale yellow and hung with framed vintage cartoons from
The New Yorker
magazine. Sounded odd, but the effect was cheery and cozy nonetheless. Approaching, he saw Alex and Kelly huddled deep in conversation. He was sure that Kelly had reserved the surrounding tables as well and that, if anyone showed up to be seated nearby, they were armed employees of the United States government.
“Ambrose!” Kelly said, getting to his feet and shaking Congreve’s hand. “Hawkeye and I were just speaking of you.”
The tall, slender man had a quiet, gracious, slightly rumpled manner. There was a lot of steel behind that honeyed Jeffersonian demeanor, Ambrose knew, but Brick Kelly was damned if he’d let it show through.
“Hello, Brick,” Ambrose said, taking the man’s hand. “I’ve just heard on the radio about the French prime minister. Honfleur. Another assassination at the top of the French government. It’s all over the news. Good lord.”
“Yes, it’s all getting very dicey. International consternation of this kind could easily lead to war. Anyway, I’m so glad you could come. We’ll speak of it at lunch. You can be of great help in this matter, Ambrose.”
“Greetings, Constable Congreve,” Hawke said, smiling and shaking his hand. “And, how did you and your beloved Lemony Snicket perform on the highways and byways this morning?”
“Lemony Snicket?”
“Your new automobile.”
“I have dubbed it the Yellow Peril, as you well know, Alex, and it performed splendidly. A magnificent machine. What on earth has happened to your head?”
The maître d’ pulled out the one empty chair and Congreve sat. Hawke was breezily indifferent to the fact that he had a white gauze bandage swaddled round his head. Only Hawke could manage to make the whole affair look faintly piratical. All he needed was an eye patch.
“I was just telling Brick,” Hawke said. “Amazing thing. An acquaintance of mine tried to snuff me last night. Took one to the temple. Superficial, but it knocked me silly. I’ll have a nice scar, according to the doctor who sewed me up. Bloody female came into my house under false pretenses and pulled a gun. Damn near killed me.”
“She missed,” Kelly said by way of explanation to Congreve. “I’m trying to find out why.”
“I hit her first. With a chair. Spoilt her aim, but she nicked me. She conceded the match and left before I could ring the local constabulary.” It wasn’t quite true; he’d thrown her out after taking the gun. And he could not remember whether or not he’d called the police. He’d meant to, he was sufficiently alarmed, but in his woozy state he wasn’t sure he’d gotten round to it. Still, Hawke didn’t want to be seen as softhearted in this particular company.
“You hit a woman with a chair?” Ambrose said.
“Yes, I did. And I’m proud of it,” Hawke said.
“Some old flame of yours? Is she a stalker?” Brick asked.
Hawke said, “She is if she comes back. Right now she’s simply mad as a hatter. By the way, Constable, she’s Chinese. We are both being stalked by Oriental ladies with a view to a kill.”
“Does this thinly veiled coincidence raise a question in your mind, Alex?” Ambrose said, sipping from his water goblet and opening his menu. He was famished.
“Yes,” Hawke said. “Mere coincidence, do you think?”
“I think not. Perhaps they are sisters. Twin sisters.”
“Sisters. There’s a thought. I seem to recall something about—never mind, I’ve lost it.”
“Sisters. Yes. Even twins,” Ambrose said. “Evil twins, one might say. One trying to kill you, the other, me. Be careful, Alex. I have a very bad feeling about all this. We’re all suffering from some kind of China Syndrome, in my opinion.”
“Just the subject young Brick and I were getting round to,” Hawke said. “You’ll be interested to hear what Brick has to say on the subject of our inscrutable Chinese friends.”
“Try me,” Congreve said, “as soon as we’ve ordered a beverage.”
Kelly signaled to one of the hovering waiters and drinks orders were given. No one seemed to be having a cocktail, so Ambrose quietly ordered a Bloody Bull while no one was looking. No celery stick or olives or anything that smacked of booze, he whispered in the waiter’s ear. The whole world might have ceased to drink at luncheon, but that didn’t mean one had to act the sheep and follow the flock. Ambrose Congreve had long decided he would remain steadfast in his habits, albeit quiet about it.
The director made a tent of his fingers, looked at each of them over it with his keen blue eyes, and said, “Let me tell you what’s going on in this little world of ours. We have, I’m very sad to say, a rapidly deteriorating situation. America’s position in this thing is extremely perilous. In short, China, using this new French regime for cover, is about to make a grab for America’s most precious commodity. It could easily push us right to the brink.”
“War?” Congreve said, and Kelly nodded gravely.
“It certainly may come to that, if we’re not very smart about it. It’s a bit complicated, Chief Inspector.”
Hawke said, “Let’s start with France, Brick. In addition to the latest assassination, I heard on the television this morning that France is considering sending troops, lots of them, into Oman. At the express invitation of the sultan. Who, by the way, disappeared from the face of the earth just after the announcement.”
“What?” Ambrose said. “That sounds like an invasion to me.”
“It’s not an invasion when you’re invited in by the host country,” Kelly replied. “But, I don’t buy it. Neither does the president. I think somebody, namely this madman Bonaparte, put a gun to the sultan’s head. I can’t prove it, of course. That’s where you two come in.”
“I think the bloody French have finally lost their minds completely,” Ambrose said. “It’s outrageous!”
Kelly stared at Congreve for a few long moments before he spoke. There was a softness in his eyes that was remarkable.
“We Americans have a long and complicated relationship with France,” Kelly said with his trademark diplomacy, lowering his voice even further. “The secretary of state has likened it to two hundred years of marriage counseling.”
“It hasn’t worked,” Hawke said, sipping his water. “Somebody better call Raoul Felder.”
“Who?” said Ambrose.
“Famous American divorce lawyer,” Hawke said, smiling at Brick.
“First things first, Alex,” Brick said. “Bonaparte has disappeared the sultan. And his family. We need to find him and get the truth out of him. End this charade before France invades. Save them from themselves, if we can.”
“You want me to find out where the sultan is.”
“Exactly. We think Boney has stashed him somewhere. Someplace remote, I imagine. Your job is to find him and get the truth out of him. America has its hands full in the Gulf right now. Iraq, Iran, Syria. We can’t be seen as having any involvement with this. So, you can’t—”
“I’ve been down this road, Brick. I know how it works.”
Kelly nodded and said, “I assume—do you two know about the submarine disaster off Sri Lanka?”
“What happened, Brick?” Hawke asked, suddenly grave.
“It happened last evening. The USS
Jimmy Carter.
One of our
Sea-wolf
class of attack subs. The most heavily armed sub ever built and our premier spy sub. Designed for Naval Special Warfare and as a test platform for some radical new submarine espionage technology. She had the ability to tap undersea cables and eavesdrop on the communications passing through them.”
“And?” Hawke said.
“Down with all hands.”
“Good lord. Accidental?” Congreve said.
“God knows at this point. There were a few garbled transmissions from the sub and then we lost all radio and sonar contact. But right before she disappeared, she was being tracked by an Agosta-B, that new-generation French sub France is trying to peddle to Pakistan.”
“So what happened down there, Brick?” Alex asked.
“Typical cat-and-mouse stuff. Happens all the time. No weapons were fired. And to their credit, the French are actually aiding in the search. It’s possible it was a tragic accident. But, with the mood in Washington right now—it’s tense.”
The drinks arrived and the director stopped talking while the waiter served them. After taking a sip of his cocktail, Congreve resumed the conversation.
“Those poor lads,” he said, raising his glass. “And they’ve all got mothers. I must say that what simply astounds me is the unmitigated chutzpah of these sodding French. Here they are, throwing their weight around like a superpower, taking potshots at Alex here—somebody should smack them good, I say.”
“I’ll volunteer for that assignment,” Hawke said, not smiling.
“You already have, Alex,” Kelly said. “Finding out where the sultan is and getting the truth out of him is a good start.”
Kelly was silent for a moment, looking at both of them and collecting his thoughts. “You’ve nailed the issue. France needs a wake-up call. And fast. But, we can’t smack them, as you say, without putting the whole damned world at risk.”
“Why not?” Congreve asked.
“Very simple, actually. In a word, China.”
“I’ve been thinking about this, Brick,” Hawke said.
“Please,” Brick said, and motioned for him to continue.
“The French abandoned the EU because they were sick and tired of being lumped in with the ‘old Europe.’ They’re psychically tortured by decades of political impotency—so they’re using the Chinese to reassert themselves. Provide some nuclear and economic muscle, you might say. That is pretty much it, at least as I see it.”
Brick nodded. “Exactly. Fifty years of America and the Soviets hogging the limelight has been extremely tough on France’s national ego. But this new relationship with China, it’s more complicated, more—symbiotic than that, Alex. These two feed off of each other. But China is in the driver’s seat. A surging China is using a resurgent France to further the global interests of each.”