The High Commissioner. Jon Cleary
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slowing to turn left into Belgrave Square and follow the one-way route round to the Australian High Commissioner’s house on the south side of the square.
As the big limousine turned left into the square Malone, sitting beside Lisa in one of the jump-seats, glanced casually out at the car parked close to the corner. He saw the two men in the front seat of the car turn their faces away, but not before he had caught a glimpse of the man behind the wheel, a fleeting impression like the subliminal images he had once seen tried out on television. His brows puckered, the policeman in him at work. Why should two men, sitting in a parked car late at night, wish to avoid being seen? Then he shook his head and grinned. Leave it to the London bobbies: it was no concern of his.
“Something amusing you?” Lisa asked.
“Just thinking what my old mum would say if she could see me now. She’s Irish, been in Australia for over fifty years, but she’s still back in the bogs. Her idea of luxury transport is still a trap with two ponies.”
“What did she say when she knew you were coming to London?” Sheila Quentin liked this almost naïvely frank man. Too many of the visitors from Canberra brought frankness with them as some sort of primitive weapon designed to bludgeon the crafty, too-superior swindlers of Whitehall. They bored her and irritated her with their rough approach, an approach she knew they worked on from the moment they left Australia, as if determined to prove they were one with the aborigines, an image they were convinced Whitehall held of them. But this new man seemed to use frankness as part of an unwitting charm.
“Told me to buy a bomb and throw it,” said Malone, and confirmed Sheila’s opinion of him. “She still thinks of herself as an auxiliary to the I.R.A.”
The two women laughed, but Quentin sat quietly in the corner of the back seat, his eyes closed. Sheila glanced at him, then put her hand on his. He opened his eyes, blinking a little despite the dimness of the car’s interior, then he smiled wearily.
“Miss something?” he asked.
“Nothing, darling. We’re almost home.”
The Rolls circled the square, then glided into the kerb. The chauffeur, a middle-aged man with the build of a middle-weight wrestler and a voice to match, switched off the engine, got out and came round to open the door. Malone got out first, stopped and looked back along to where the parked car had now switched on its high-beam lights. The Rolls and the people getting out of it stood in a cone of light that threw them into relief against the darkness of the square.
“Hold it a moment,” said Malone, and he would never know what prompted the premonition that something was about to happen. He put a hand against Lisa’s arm to stop her getting out. “Ferguson, get back in and switch on your lights. High beam.”
Ferguson hesitated at being given orders by this newcomer, then he grunted, went back round the car, got in and switched on the headlights. The beam blazed down towards Chesham Place; a taxi coming out of the street honked in furious protest. The two cones of light, from the Rolls and the Zephyr, met in silent assault.
Across the road Traong Tho stood among the thick shrubs, his rifle resting on the heavy wire-netting fence. His eyes had become accustomed to the darkness, and when Pallain had switched on his car’s lights as planned he wondered if they were really necessary. He raised the telescopic sight to his eye and in it saw the chauffeur go round and open the door of the big black car. A tall man in evening dress got out, stopped and looked towards Pallain’s car. Then the chauffeur came back round, got in and switched on the Rolls-Royce’s lights. Truong Tho felt his hands begin to sweat and he blinked his eyes, trying to focus them into the unexpected blaze of light. Something had gone wrong, but he did not have time to consider it. Hazily, like figures behind frosted glass, he saw two women and another man alight. He aimed at the second man and squeezed the trigger.
Malone heard the bullet ping off the top of the Rolls. He yelled at Quentin and the women to duck; then he was running swiftly across the road towards the dark island off the garden. Malone didn’t see the wire fence. Brought up in a city where all the gardens were public, he plunged towards what he thought was a break in the shrubbery; made too trusting by legality, he was brought up short by privacy rights. He hit the fence and bounced back, sprawling on the pavement. He swore, picked himself up and ran towards the eastern curve of the garden. He heard a screech of brakes on the far side of the square; then he came round the curve of the garden. The Zephyr was gathering speed again, disappearing into one of the streets that came in on the north side of the square. He pulled up, knowing the gunman was now in the car and was gone.
He made his way back towards the house, limping a little as he became aware of pain in his shin. He heard the thud-thud of heavy boots and as he crossed the road a uniformed policeman came running up to the entrance of the house. The two women had gone inside, but Quentin and the chauffeur stood beside the car, on the lee side from the garden.
“I heard a shot—” Then the policeman turned with Quentin and Ferguson as Malone limped up to them.
“The bastards got aways. That car down there must have been waiting for him. And spot-lighting us into the bargain.” He felt blood trickling down his chin and he put up his hand to the cut there.
“Did he nick you?” Quentin stepped forward, his face full of concern.
“I ran into some wire. The bloke with the gun was over there among the trees.”
“I’ll phone the Yard, sir.” The policeman made a gesture towards the front door. “May I use your phone?”
Quentin nodded and the policeman went into the house past Sheila and Lisa, who now stood in the doorway. Then Quentin looked at Ferguson. “That will be all for tonight, Tom. And don’t broadcast what has happened. I don’t want this to be in the newspapers. Same time tomorrow morning. Good night.”
Ferguson kneaded the rock-cake of his face, went to say something, thought better of it and touched his cap. “’Night, sir. I’m glad they missed.”
“So am I.” Quentin smiled wryly; he seemed undisturbed by the attempt on his life. “Let’s hope their aim next time – if there is a next time – is just as bad. And don’t forget – not a word to anyone.”
The Rolls eased away and Quentin looked at Malone. “We’d better see to that cut on your face. Oh, and thanks.” He gestured towards the other side of the road; a taxi went by, slowed, thinking he had hailed it, then went on. “You didn’t have to chase that chap—”
“It was instinctive.”
“Reflex action? Never let a murderer get away?” Then he shook his head and passed a hand across his eyes. “Sorry, Malone. I didn’t mean that.”
Malone put up a hand and patted Quentin on the back; then dropped the hand in surprise and embarrassment. The two men stared at each other for a moment, snared by the gift of sympathy and the need for it. Christ Almighty, Malone thought, here I go again, everybody’s friend. Then Quentin nodded in acknowledgment of the gesture, saving Malone further embarrassment by saying nothing, and turned and led the way into the house.
“You’re all right, darling?” Sheila Quentin grasped her husband’s arm. They stood together oblivious of the others in the hall, like lovers meeting after a long separation. Malone saw the anguish on Sheila’s face and felt sick. This woman was going to die when she finally learned what Quentin had done, that she was going to lose him.
Then Lisa came forward. “You’ve been hurt, Mr. Malone!”
The next few minutes was a confusion of Joseph, the butler, being sent for hot water and sticking plaster, of both women ushering Malone into the living-room with such solicitude that he felt he should have at least lost an arm, of Quentin bringing him a Scotch.
“Without Horlicks.” The two men grinned at each other and the women smiled; they could have been a foursome returned from a joyful night out.
Then