Rhinoceros (4 page)

'The local assistant chief constable swears it's suicide,'
whispered Tweed, bending alongside the pathologist.

'Suicide, my hat. Just a first impression,' Saafeld warned. 'Don't like the way the fingers are holding the weapon. And
if he was standing, back to the wall, he'd have toppled
sideways when the bullet hit - not slithered down the
wall. But it's early days.'

'Can I call you in the morning - this morning?'

'Try eight o'clock. I work through the night, as you
know. I don't promise anything . . .'

Tweed borrowed Paula's flashlight. She followed him as he walked the full length of the tunnel. The floor was
useless for give-away footprints. Emerging under the arch
at the far end, he paused, took a deep breath. In the moonlight the view was entrancing. A wide stretch of
grass, then a spired church, a gem. He swept the flashlight
along a road immediately beyond the arch. Vague tracks
of probably a dozen cars. Old houses stretched away to his
left and right.

'He could have been brought here by car, tricked into
entering the tunnel. It's as quiet as the grave.'

They retraced their journey through the eerie tunnel.
Reg had taken his pictures, was putting the camera inside
a case.

'Reg,' Saafeld called out. 'Bring the stretcher. We'll get
him out now. It will be the devil of a job maneuvering
him round and up those steps.' Tweed offered help. 'No,
thanks - this is a two-man exercise . . .'

Tweed and Paula reached the small square to find Bogle waiting, standing by a car with an unpleasant sneer on his pinched face.

'I'm off. To write my report. A very full report covering
all aspects of your intrusion.'

He jumped into the front passenger seat, snapped at
the driver. The car took off, its tail lights receding swiftly.
Tweed turned to speak to Sergeant Pole.

'You've been in this area a long time?'

'All my born days, sir.'

'Are there any important people round here? Maybe
rich?'

'There's Lord Barford. Family's been here for generations.'

'Any more recent arrivals?'

'Well . . .' Pole considered carefully. 'There's a Mr
Rondel, a foreigner. Arrived about two years ago. Very
wealthy, I'd say. Travels abroad a lot. Had a big man
sion built inside an old abandoned quarry up on the
Downs. Place went up in no time. Imported German
workers.'

'Can you describe this Rondel?'

'Only saw him once. Drove a red Bugatti along this
street as though it was Le Mans. Only caught a glimpse of him. Blond hair, youngish. Has a helipad by the mansion.
Arrives there by chopper.'

'Any idea where he flies to?'

'Girl who lives here worked as a stewardess once at Heathrow. Told me she'd seen him boarding a Gulfstream.
Think that's what she called it. Private jet. Big job.'

'Any chance of our driving to his place from here?
Now?'

'You could.' Pole sounded doubtful. 'When you meet
the A27 after leaving Alfriston you turn left. If you're not careful you'll miss the turning to Eagle's Nest - that's what
Rondel calls his palatial place. A short way along you come
to a turning off left - just before you reach another one
signposted Byway.'

'I remember that turning,' Paula interjected.

'One hell of a road . . . pardon me,' he said to Paula.
'Unmade, it twists and turns up over the Downs. Get to
the top and the road levels out, then starts to go down.
That's where Rondel's place is, way back to your left.
Right inside the quarry.' He frowned as a car's headlights appeared, driving into the village, the lights on full beam.
They flashed twice, then were doused. The car stopped,
Bob Newman jumped out.

'Monica called me just as we'd finished dinner,' Newman
explained as he drove along the A27 with Tweed beside
him.

Behind them Paula was driving Tweed's car, thinking
she should have been in front to guide them. Would Tweed
spot the turn-off?

'Called me on my mobile,' Newman continued. I'd met Mark Wendover at Heathrow, parked him at the Ritz, took him for dinner to Santorini's.'

'Tell me later, we're coming to the turn-off. There are
things you should know . . .'

Tweed talked non-stop, providing Newman with all the
data about Lisa at Lord Barford's mansion, his arrival in
Alfriston, what he had found there.

As he was talking, Newman's skill as a driver was tested
to the limit as the track they had turned on to kept
switching back and forth on itself in a series of bends.

Left, then right again, then left. All the time they were ascending rapidly, along a potholed track where many cavities had not been filled in.

Behind them Paula too drove with ease and skill, revel
ling in the warmth inside her car. Using a gloved hand, she
cleared a hole in the steamed-up glass of her side window.
The view she looked down on was staggering.

From the base of the Downs flatlands of frost-covered
fields stretched away endlessly to the north.
Then she saw a caterpillar of lights crawling westward, realized it was a
local train which had to be returning to its depot. She felt the whole of England was spreading out before her.

Tweed was telling Newman he had found Lisa an
extraordinary personality. He described her, emphasized
her intelligence, voiced his puzzlement as to what her real
role was and why she was so anxious to meet him again.

'Nearing the summit,' Newman warned. 'Didn't you tell me Pole said that the road levelled out, started to go down
and Rondel's house was on the left?'

'He did,' Tweed confirmed.

They crested the rise suddenly. Newman slowed down
and behind them Paula, gazing through her windscreen, almost gasped. On the other side of the Downs a vast panorama came into view. To east and west were vast slopes of rolling hills. A distance away to the south the sea, caught in the moonlight, glittered like an immense
lake of mercury sweeping into the Channel. The road
began to drop. They pulled up. Newman freewheeled
a few more yards, stopped. He left the engine purring
to keep the interior warm, jumped out after Tweed and joined Paula, who had already left her car.

'There it is,' said Newman. 'Weird-looking. Expen
sive.'

'Look at the name,' said Paula.

A large aluminium plate was engraved with the name
in front of a high wire fence.
Eagle's Nest.
Two high wire
gates barred the entrance to the curving drive beyond. At the far end of the drive it turned towards a very large white
house built of stone. The architecture was surreal, like a collection of white blocks or cubes perched at different levels on top of each other. To one side rose a tall round tower. The entire edifice was located deep inside an old quarry, its steep sides overhanging the house.

'Look!' Paula called out. 'There's something emerging
from the round tower.'

'I've seen it,' Tweed replied.

Somewhere behind them was the muffled sound of a
machine. Paula glanced back - just in time to see the
crouched figure of a rider on a motorcycle. The machine
was steadily negotiating its way up a steep path which,
she guessed, led to the top of the Down overlooking
the house.

'That's Harry Butler,' Newman reassured her. 'He
insisted on guarding my rear all the way from London . . .'

He stopped speaking as a slim mast, like a submarine's
periscope, its top a tangle of wired dishes, continued elevating until it was about twenty feet above the rim of
the Down. Paula nudged Tweed.

'Someone's coming along the drive at a rate of knots. Looks like an old woman carrying a rifle.'

The hurrying figure appeared with astonishing speed
on the far side of the closed gates. She stopped, her
weapon, actually a shotgun, aimed at them. Her voice
was harsh.

'Who are you? Private property. Why are you here?'

'Which question would you like me to answer first?'
Tweed enquired mildly.

She was wearing an old heavy 'dark coat. It almost
reached her ankles and Paula wondered how she'd moved
so fast in such a garment. She was hawk-nosed, bony-
faced, in her sixties, a menacing figure.

'Stop pointing that thing at us,' Newman ordered.
'Shotguns can go off almost by themselves.
Want to spend
the rest of your life in prison for murder?'

'Can't frighten me,' she snarled, but she swivelled the
gun to a port position and it fired harmlessly into the air.

'See what I mean,' Newman shouted at her. 'Who
are you?'

'Mrs Grimwood. The . . . 'ousekeeper
...
if you must know.'

The shot had echoed a long distance in the cold night air,
would have been heard inside the strange house. Tweed was ignoring the verbal confrontation, his eyes glued to
the tall mast. Seconds after the shotgun went off the mast
began to withdraw swiftly. It disappeared inside the tower, was gone.

'Private property,' Airs Grimwood yelled.

It was becoming like the repetition of an old gramo
phone when the needle had got stuck. Tweed shrugged,
wondering why Paula had slipped behind him earlier. The
old crone opened up a fresh barrage.

'That girl with you - 'as a camera. I want the film.'

'No, I haven't,' Paula lied. 'Can't you recognize a pair
of binoculars? Get your eyesight tested.'
Silly old cow,
she
added to herself as Tweed went back towards the cars.

They stood staring at the sea for a few minutes. Now
it was like a sheet of crystal, flat, motionless. Paula heard the muffled sound of Harry Butler's machine return slowly
down the path from the Down.

'I've got a suggestion,' Newman said as he joined them.
'Harry's had a long tiring ride. I could squeeze his small
motorcycle in my hatchback, let him drive your car, Tweed
— then the three of us could drive back together and
talk.'

'Good idea,' Tweed agreed. 'Get your photo?' he asked
Paula.

'Photos. Half-hidden in the shadow beyond the house I
saw a helipad - with a chopper on it. I got that as well as the
mast. They certainly want to keep that thing - whatever it
is - secret
...'