By Stealth (10 page)

`What does the letter say?'

`We can talk about that later,' Tweed replied, pocketing the letter. 'It probably means a trip to Belgium soon. And I've little doubt this is what the marauders were looking for.'

`But how on earth did you know where to look?'

Poe's story. It is — briefly — about an important letter which vanishes from a room. They search everywhere and then leave, as I recall — perhaps not too accurately. The main point is the letter was hidden in an obvious place — perched on the mantelpiece inside an envelope. It was so clearly on view no one thought to look there. Hence Andover turning down the page of that story. My guess is the book was on his desk for me to see. Now, before we leave, phone the police anonymously from a call box. We have a grisly task, if we can manage it.'

`Brace yourself, Harry,' Tweed warned in the kitchen as he stopped to raise the lid of the chest freezer.

`Enough to put you off your lunch,' the phlegmatic Butler commented.

`I'm just relieved it's still here,' Tweed responded, staring down at the severed arm preserved in its plastic container filled with ice. 'I don't know how we're going to solve this problem. I'd like to have the limb transported to London for examination by my pet pathologist, Dr Rabin. But we can't just take it there by car like that.'

`Yes, we can,' Butler assured him. 'Not knowing how long we'd be out here, I brought a very large cool bag full of food. It's inside my Ford Cortina. Give me five minutes...'

It was a long speech for Butler. He disappeared and came back quickly, holding an outsize cool bag.

`Should fit in here. May I?'

Paula had perched herself on a stool as far away from the freezer as possible. She wasn't squeamish, but staring at the severed arm with its bloodstained bandage over the elbow wasn't her idea of duty when it wasn't necessary.

Butler had unzipped the long cool bag. Wearing gloves, he lifted the container out and it fitted easily into the bag. He zipped it up, closed the lid of the freezer, looked at Tweed who was scribbling on the back of one of his cards. He handed it to Butler.

`There's the address. Dr Rabin will be expecting you. I'll call him while you're driving back.'

`I'm on my way...'

Paula waited until they were alone. Then she asked the question which had been puzzling her.

`Why a pathologist? And a top one?'

`Because,' Tweed explained, 'although I know very little about medical matters, it seemed to me it would need a very good surgeon to have amputated that arm so neatly. If I can find the bastard who performed that foul act I'll be close to who is behind all this.'

Paula nodded as they prepared to leave. Tweed rarely used strong language: it showed the suppressed rage he was feeling at this brutal act. She didn't look back as they left the ravaged house. Pete Nield appeared out of nowhere, gave a little salute.

`All clear. Not a single car has passed in either direction. Harry is en route to London and I buried the food in a gulley. What's the form now?'

`We need to find out what's happened to Andover. First priority. No point in continuing your vigil here. So we get moving. Back to Passford House for starters...'

The first thing they saw when they arrived back at the hotel car park was Newman's Mercedes parked in splendid isolation. The next thing they saw was Newman standing up from the far side, holding a polishing cloth.

He strolled over, listened while Tweed gave him a resume of what had happened.

Did you find out from Watford if either Burgoyne or Fanshawe own a boat?' he concluded.

`Of course. I was a reporter at one time. I drove friend Walford to a pub, bought him a couple of Scotches. He became quite garrulous. The Brig., as he called him, has a luxury motor yacht based at a place called Buckler's Hard..

`I know that,' Tweed told him.

`Let me go on. Willie Fanshawe has a motor yacht too but his is berthed at Lymington. They all seem to be mad on the sea. Sir Gerald Andover has his own motor yacht, the
Seahorse III
—'

`That's important,' Tweed interjected. 'Based where?'

Lymington. Do let me finish. Andover has left these shores. Walford saw him aboard the
Seahorse III
sailing downriver and into the Solent early this morning. Just after daybreak.'

`Wish we knew where he'd gone,' Tweed said half to himself.

`I do,' Newman went on. 'He informed Walford he was cruising round the Isle of Wight and down to Devon for a few days. Odd thing, Walford said never before had Andover bothered to let him know where he was going. He described Andover as being very secretive about his sailing trips.'

`Which means,' Tweed said grimly, 'that the one place he isn't going to is Devon. Now, he's being ultra- secretive. We have to track him down later.'

`The coastguard?' Newman suggested.

`No good. Andover is clever. My guess is by now he's well out at sea, whatever his ultimate destination is.'

`So it's checkmate,' Paula commented. 'What do we do now? Go back to London?'

`Not yet. I want to scour this part of the world. I feel sure there's something strange happening – on top of what we found at Andover's home.'

Tweed stood staring across the frosted lawn which had a
creme-de-menthe
colour. Even at that hour the temperature was close to zero. Knowing him, the others kept quiet. Tweed's mind was racing, examining what they had uncovered, trying to see, dimly, some sort of pattern.

`I've no idea what's going on,' he admitted eventually. `The alleged kidnapping of Irene is a sinister mystery. And the presence of three old China hands so close together is more than pure chance. Paula said something recently which was significant. The trouble is I can't recall what it was.' He straightened up. 'What we need is even more data—'

`One other thing Walford told me which has just come back,' Newman interjected. 'He wasn't too accurate last night. This morning he told me the three boats which disappeared at the beginning of the year vanished somewhere near the mouth of the Beaulieu River. One of them was Benton. Wasn't that the chap who was a friend of Andover?'

`Yes,' agreed Tweed. 'And what you've just told us links up with the account of the barman at the Ship Inn. We'll take a look at Buckler's Hard and Moor's Landing after an early lunch. Check the map for me, Paula. How close to the Solent is this model village the barman described?'

He paced slowly back and forth while Paula studied the Ordnance Survey map she'd extracted from the Escort. Tweed was disturbed. The whole area seemed so peaceful and yet they'd discovered that severed arm in the house of a broken man.

`Moor's Landing is about a mile from the Solent,' Paula reported.

`So it's close to where those three boats vanished at the mouth of the Beaulieu River. Yes, I think it may well repay a visit …'

With Paula navigating, they took the same route to reach Buckler's Hard they had followed the previous evening. Newman was driving them in the Mercedes with Paula beside him and Tweed alone in the back.

Some distance behind them, on Tweed's instructions, Pete Nield followed them as though they were strangers. They were approaching the entrances to
Prevent
,
Leopard's Leap
, and
The Last Haven
when Tweed spoke for the first time.

`Bob, I want you to slow down now. Crawl at twenty miles an hour.'

`If I must,' Newman protested, 'but the Merc. will be rarin' to go.'

`Why, if I may ask?' queried Paula.

`You just did,' Tweed replied, and lapsed into silence.

As they crawled past the entrances Tweed glanced sideways. Just an empty drive at Andover's place. In the morning he'd called the police anonymously about the break-in. The house was as invisible as before. The wrought-iron gates to
Leopard's Leap
were again open. And once more no sign of life.

Paula stiffened as she saw the pile of bricks and the small concrete mixer on the grass verge. It reminded her of their experience the previous evening when they had almost been killed.

Tweed glanced down the open gravel drive to Fanshawe's Swedish-style house. The net curtains across the windows gave it an even more uninhabited look. He waited a minute before he spoke again.

`Could you pull in at the side of the road? I want a word with Pete and there's no one about..

Nield, driving his Ford Sierra, appeared a few minutes later. Tweed was waiting for him outside the car and gestured for him to stop. Nield jumped out swiftly, leaving his engine running.

`Trouble?'

`Not yet.' Tweed smiled. 'Pete, a mile or two back a lane leads off to the left going back the way we've come. That's where Paula and I had our little encounter with the mobile concrete mixer. It's the only turn-off for miles. I'd like you to go back and drive down that lane to see what — if anything — is happening. I think you studied the map route to Buckler's Hard with Paula. Drive back here as fast as you can later and try to catch us up.'

`All clear. And I'm carrying that route in my head. See you soon...'

Before Tweed had closed the door of the Mercedes Nield had turned round over spare ground and was speeding back. Tweed settled himself again.

`Are both of you armed? I should have checked earlier.'

`I'm carrying my.38 Smith & Wesson Special in a hip holster,' Newman replied as he drove on, accelerating.

`And I have my Browning in my shoulder-bag,' Paula reassured Tweed. 'Pete has a Walther. Are you worried this could be a risky trip? This is the New Forest.'

`And we were nearly murdered yesterday evening …'

7

They had left the Forest — and after that a flat area of barren heath — behind them when the vintage Bentley overtook Newman, travelling like a demon.

Newman was driving down a curving hill at the approaches to the small town of Beaulieu with the river on their left. He was moving at a safe speed when the ancient open touring car, green in colour with running boards and gleaming old-fashioned headlamps, roared past at insane speed.

Behind the wheel of the four-seater crouched the driver clad in an old crash helmet and huge goggles. Paula had only a glimpse but saw his bright scarf was wrapped round the lower half of his face, presumably to muffle him against the cold.

`Crazy so-and-so,' Newman muttered.

`We turn right in a moment,' Paula warned. 'Don't go on into Beaulieu. Oh, my God! Look at the idiot!' `I'm looking,' Newman observed nonchalantly. `And he's going to Bucklers Hard — if he ever makes it

alive...'

`Actually, he's an expert driver, even if a bit of a show-off,' Newman remarked.

To turn up another steep hill leading to Buckler's Hard the driver of the Bentley had to swing through an angle of about a hundred and fifty degrees. He hardly slowed as he spun off the main road and then accelerated up the hill and out of sight.

In the back of the car Tweed was taking no notice of this demonstration of macho driving. He was twisted round, staring through the rear window, then he switched his gaze to the side window as Newman swung round the same tortuous bend.

`There's a chopper floating round behind us,' he told them. 'A private machine with no markings. Odd, that.'

Newman drove on up the steep and winding hill. At the top he manoeuvred them round a series of bends along a lane with hedges on either side. Then they were on the level. The Bentley had disappeared despite the long straight stretch ahead.

`Lord!' Paula commented. 'He must have moved.' `Souped-up engine,' Newman told her.

`That chopper is flying on a course parallel to us now,' Tweed reported from the back.

`You seem very intrigued by it,' Paula replied over her shoulder.

`Give me the map,' Tweed said.

A few minutes later, in lonely open country with fields spreading away, Newman reached a private road leading to Buckler's Hard. He was about to turn down it when Tweed called out again.

`That chopper's landing well ahead of us. From the map I'd say it's coming down somewhere on the west bank — on the land owned by Lord Montagu.'

`Just a chopper,' Newman said as he began turning left.