The Cairo Code (16 page)

Halder made to protest, but Schellenberg said, “Forget it, Jack, you're wasting your time. It's Himmler's personal instruction, and the two Gestapo men outside have orders to ensure you don't go anywhere without my permission.” He stood. “And now you'd better get some sleep. You've a busy day tomorrow.” He crossed to the door, opened it, looked out at the pouring rain. “Thank God the weather's stopped the bombers.” He shivered, pulled up his collar, and looked back, a curious expression on his face. “Do you still have feelings for the woman, Jack?”

“What's it to you?”

Schellenberg shrugged. “I'm simply curious.”

“Drop it. That was all in the past.”

“I take it Canaris told you about Himmler's threat?”

“He told me.”

“Old Heinrich means what he says. Unpleasant, I know, but there you have it. So I wouldn't even think about failing, Jack, or putting anything less than a hundred percent into this. Life wouldn't be worth living, as they say, for either you or your son.” Schellenberg gave a wicked grin as he turned back towards the door. “But rest assured, the boy will be well looked after until your safe return.”

Weaver tilted his head and tried to sit still as the female doctor stitched his neck. He was in a cubicle in the Anglo-American hospital. A nurse had given him a shot of morphine, and all he felt was a warm feeling of elation. The pain would come later, when the drug wore off.

The doctor finished another stitch, smiled, and said, “A wonderful thing, morphine. Makes you forget all your troubles. That's a pretty nasty gash. You're lucky you're still alive.” She was British, very attractive, and had sensitive blue eyes. “So, tell me, what happened?”

“Someone cut me with a knife.”

“That much is obvious.”

The incident was an intelligence matter and not something Weaver wanted to discuss, no matter how attractive the doctor. “Are we almost done?”

“One more to go.” She pierced the flesh again, finishing the last suture. She tied the stitch, cut the thread with scissors, then put a protective dressing on Weaver's neck and wrapped a bandage around it.

“Will I be OK?”

“You'll be fine, apart from a nasty scar when the wound heals. But you're a bit shaken and you'll have to rest up for a week or two. Stick to liquids for a few days, soup and some glucose mixed with water, otherwise swallowing's going to hurt. I'll give you some morphine pills to help keep the pain at bay. Meantime, try not to move your neck too much, otherwise the stitches might be disturbed.”

“Do I really have to rest up?”

“Lieutenant Colonel Weaver, you've lost quite a bit of blood and the cut's deep. A quarter-inch deeper and you'd probably be in the morgue. So it's straight home to bed.”

The door opened and Helen Kane came in. She looked concerned. “How is he, Doctor?”

“He'll live.” She handed Weaver a bottle of pills. “Take two whenever the pain gets too bad. They'll make you a little slow and light-headed, but that's a small price to pay. Try to be more careful in future.”

She smiled playfully and went out with the nurse. Helen Kane said, “How are you feeling, sir?”

“Lousy.”

“Well, there's one good thing.”

“What?”

“I think the doctor liked you. She made a lot of eye contact.”

Weaver was tempted to smile back, but resisted. He touched the bandage around his neck. It felt tight. He could barely move his head and he felt groggy. He hardly remembered being taken to the hospital—everything that had happened after the Arab had slashed him was a blur. He slid off the bed and reached for his jacket. Helen Kane put out a hand to support him. “Don't you think you'd better rest for a while?”

“Time for that later. What's happening about the Arab, Helen?”

“Lieutenant Colonel Sanson wants to see you. He's waiting down the hall.”

•  •  •

Sanson was in one of the waiting rooms when Weaver and Helen Kane entered, the windows open, a ceiling fan whirring away. When he saw Weaver's bandaged neck and the dried blood caked into his shirt and tunic, he looked mildly sympathetic. “That looks pretty bad. Do you feel up to talking?”

“Sure.”

Sanson said politely, “If you don't mind waiting out in the car, Helen.”

“Yes, sir.”

When Helen Kane left, Sanson lit a cigarette and watched her stroll into the gardens outside. “She seems to have a keen interest in your well-being, Weaver. Is there something going on between you two?”

“As one equally ranked officer to another, and if you don't mind me saying so, I really don't think that's any of your business.”

Sanson reddened. He seemed to take the rebuff personally, his expression icy as he nodded towards a bench. “Take a seat.”

They sat near one of the windows. Out on the sun-washed lawns, nurses strolled with their charges, limbless and seriously wounded men on crutches and in wheelchairs, recovering from the fighting in Italy. Looking at the injured patients, then back at Sanson's scarred face and patched eye, Weaver felt grateful that he had only suffered a knife laceration. The last time he'd been wounded was in Algeria, when he'd sustained a shrapnel injury to his thigh from an enemy mortar blast. It had been a close call, because he'd lost a lot of blood and his unit was under heavy machine-gun fire at the time. He couldn't move, but one of his fellow officers had heroically risked his life, crawling forward under withering fire and helping to get him back safely behind American lines. Had he not been rescued, Weaver would certainly have died, but after six weeks enduring the boredom of recovery in a hospital bed in Algiers, he had been almost glad to return to active duty.

“You had a lucky escape,” Sanson said sharply. “My sergeant wasn't so fortunate. He died ten minutes ago in a ward down the hall.”

“I'm really sorry to hear that.”

“So was I. He was a bloody good soldier by any standards.” Sanson was angry. “And I'll tell you something else, Weaver. Something that
is
my business. Had you kept a vigilant watch with the gun and waited until I returned before poking your nose around the flat, my sergeant might still be alive.”

Weaver said grimly, “Maybe you're right. But from the look on the Arab's face, he meant to kill anyone who got in his way. I meant it when I said I was sorry about the sergeant's death. But it could just as easily have been me.”

Sanson took out a notebook, all business, and replied curtly, “Forget it, Weaver. Right now I'm not in the mood for arguing. You'd better tell me exactly what happened after I left the flat.”

Weaver told him and Sanson jotted down details. “If our friend is worth his salt, he's probably got another safe house, but we'll have to check the hotels, pensions, and lodging houses to see if anything turns up. It's probably pointless keeping a watch on the flat—he'll never go back there again. I've also given details of the incident to every police station in Cairo, and we're questioning the other tenants and trying to get in touch with the landlord to see if he can tell us anything about the identity of this fellow.”

“Did you search the flat?”

“Top to bottom. We found nothing, apart from a radio battery hidden under the stove. But it wouldn't stop him from transmitting. A car battery would probably do just as well. I'll try to find out if there's been any unidentified radio traffic out of Cairo recently, and ask Signals to keep a close monitor on the airwaves from now on. By the way, the camera we found is a type that's ideal for photographing documents, and uses a miniature roll of film. With that and the radio, you can bet he's up to serious business. Have you any experience of enemy spies, Weaver?”

Internal security in Egypt was the responsibility of the British; they had the most experience, and the U.S took a backseat. “I guess not.”

“You might say catching them is a personal crusade of mine.” Sanson pointed to his face, the patched eye and scarred jaw, an edge of bitterness in his voice. “No doubt you've wondered about this. It was a gift from a chap named Raoul Hosiny, who worked for the Germans. I tracked him down to a house in Alexandria eighteen months ago, while he was sending a radio transmission to one of Rommel's bases. He was another good one with a knife, was Raoul. So good, he left me blind in one eye and looking on the bright side, permanently.”

“He escaped?”

“Not for long. I tracked him down again and shot the blighter dead.” Sanson dropped his cigarette on the floor, ground it out with his boot. “Catching Italian spies was always easy—you located the most beautiful women in town and looked under their beds. And being sensible fellows, the Italians nearly always gave up without a struggle. But the Germans are something else entirely. They have the most ruthless and professional agents you'll ever meet. Hardly surprising when you consider some of them are trained by the Gestapo and SD.”

“And what about the Arab?”

“Oh, he's a spy, no doubt about it. The question is, what's he up to? And what did Evir do for him that he paid for with his life?”

“You really think he might have breached security at the residency?”

Sanson stood, towering above Weaver, his tone still icy. “We'd better check and try and find out, hadn't we? But if you want an honest opinion, I'll give you one. I was a policeman for ten years, and my nose is twitching on this one. We both know your president and our prime minister are due to arrive next week for a top-secret conference. Our intelligence reports suggest that the Germans have been trying desperately to get details. Why should be pretty obvious. I'd say that's reason enough for both of us to be concerned, wouldn't you?”

•  •  •

The Gezira Sporting and Racing Club was the most prestigious in Cairo, situated on Gezira Island, a small luxury oasis in the middle of the Nile, set in fourteen acres of magnificent gardens, with tennis courts, three polo pitches, swimming pools, restaurants, and several bars. The membership was mostly diplomats, wealthy Europeans, and Allied officers, and there was a waiting list for new members as long as the club's racecourse.

The members' bar was still busy with civilians and off-duty officers when Weaver arrived just after lunch. He ordered a Scotch and soda, took a sip, but found it an effort to swallow. He had showered and changed into civilian clothes, a light linen suit and an open-necked shirt. Wearing a uniform shirt and tie was impossible with the bandage, and now that the anesthetic was beginning to wear off his neck felt painfully sore.

He saw General George Clayton enter the bar, his uniform immaculately pressed as always, the polished brass stars shining on his epaulettes. The U.S. military attaché was a no-nonsense intelligence officer with a tough reputation. “Hello, Harry. You look like you've had a rough morning.”

“I think you could say that, sir.”

Behind Clayton came the American ambassador wearing sweaty tennis whites and carrying a racket and towel. Alexander Kirk was a tall, handsome man with a flamboyant manner, his friendly blue eyes hiding a wily streak.

“Mr. Ambassador, sir. Sorry for interrupting your game.”

“Lieutenant Colonel Weaver. Good to see you again.”

Weaver shook hands, and Clayton nodded towards the empty tables on the veranda. “Why don't we take a walk, where we can have some privacy.”

The ambassador and general strolled outside and sat in the cane chairs at one of the tables, and Weaver joined them. A couple of
ghiassa
—Nile boats with huge sweeping lateen sails—drifted gracefully along the river. Beyond the palm and oleander trees there was an uninterrupted view out to the Giza pyramids twelve miles away, where Weaver knew the American and British army engineers were putting the finishing touches to the special compound being constructed for the top-level conference.

Clayton lit a cigar and dismissed the waiter who approached the table. “So what's this about some Arab trying to cut your throat?”

Weaver explained, and when he finished there was a long silence, until the ambassador said, “You're telling us Lieutenant Colonel Sanson thinks this burglar managed to crack my safe
without
my staff's knowledge? That seems pretty incredible.”

“He believes it's possible, sir.”

“The residency has tight security,” Clayton remarked. “You know that, Harry.”

“And there's been nothing missing from the safe,” the ambassador offered.

“Maybe I'd better tell you what we found, sir.”

Clayton stopped chewing on his cigar. “Maybe you'd better.”

Weaver looked at the ambassador. “There were some faint scratch marks near the latch on the French windows that lead to your study, which could have been made with a knife. And several indentations in the soil under a clump of trees across the lawn. Lieutenant Colonel Sanson thinks they could have been footprints. We're still checking for fingerprints, but it's too early to say.”

The ambassador stirred uncomfortably in his chair. “And what do
you
think, Lieutenant Colonel Weaver?”

“The fact is, the burglar was murdered, for whatever reasons. And the Arab had a radio, and was obviously prepared to kill me to retrieve it. Which means the radio's vital—so it's likely he's in contact with the Germans. He also had a camera. Maybe nothing was taken from the safe, but any documents kept there could have been photographed. Can you recall your schedule for last week, sir?”

“Monday, I visited the British embassy for a private meeting and was back around five-thirty. Tuesday, I was at home. Wednesday, I attended a gala function at the Turkish ambassador's residence. I left at eight and returned at midnight. On Thursday, I remained at the residency, working late in my study, catching up on some paperwork. Friday, the same.”