Murder Most Merry (43 page)

“St. Ives has worked for some odd people in the past, including terrorists. When I left the store, there were still seven or eight boxes left on his special pile. If I went back there now with a couple of men—”

“Very well,” Hastings said. “But please be discreet, Rand. It’s the day before Christmas.”

It’s not easy to be discreet when seizing a suspected spy in the midst of a crowd of Christmas shoppers. Rand finally decided he wanted one of the free gifts more than he wanted the agents at this point, so he took only Parkinson with him. As they passed through the Oxford Street entrance of Perkins and Simplex, the younger man asked, “Is this case likely to run through the holidays? I was hoping to spend Christmas and Boxing Day with the family.”

“I hope there won’t even be a case,” Rand told him. “Hastings heard Ivan St. Ives was back in the city, working as Father Christmas for the holidays. I confirmed the fact and that’s why we’re here.”

“To steal a child’s gift?”

“Not exactly steal, Parkinson. I have another idea.”

They encountered a woman and child about to leave the store with the familiar square box. “Pardon me. but is that a gift from Father Christmas?” Rand asked her.

“Yes, it is.”

“Then this is your lucky day. As a special holiday treat. Perkins and Simplex is paying every tenth person ten pounds for their gift.” He held up a crisp new bill. “Would you like to exchange yours for a tenner?”

“I sure would!” The woman handed over the opened box and accepted the ten-pound note.

“That was easy,” Parkinson commented when the woman and child were gone. “What next?”

“This might be a bit more difficult,” Rand admitted. They retreated to a men’s room where Rand fastened the festive paper around the gift box once more, resticking the piece of tape that held it together. ‘There, looks as good as new.”

Parkinson got the point. “You’re going to substitute this for one of the special ones.”

“Exactly. And you’re going to help.”

They resumed Rand’s earlier position on the terrace level, where he observed that the previous stack of boxes had dwindled to three. If he was right, they would be gone shortly, too. “How about that man?” Parkinson pointed out. “The one with the little boy.”

“Why him?”

“He doesn’t look that fatherly to me. And the boy seems a bit old to believe in Father Christmas.”

“You’re right.” Rand said a moment later. “He’s getting one of the special boxes. Come on!”

As the man and the boy came down off the ramp and mingled with the crowd. Rand moved in. The man was clutching the box just as the others had when Rand managed to jostle him. The box didn’t come loose, so Rand jostled again with his elbow, this time using his other hand to yank it free. The man, in his twenties with black hair and a vaguely foreign look, muttered something in a language Rand didn’t understand. There was a trace of panic in his face as he bent to retrieve the box. Rand pretended to lose his footing then, and came down on top of the man. The crowd of shoppers parted as they tumbled to the floor.

“Terribly sorry,” Rand muttered, helping the man to his feet.

At the same moment, Parkinson held out the brightly wrapped package. “I believe you dropped this, sir.”

Anyone else might have cursed Rand and made a scene, but this strange man merely grasped the box and hurried away without a word, the small boy trailing along behind. “Good work.” Rand said, brushing off his jacket. “Let’s get this back to the office.”

“Aren’t we going to open it?”

“Not here.”

Thirty minutes later, Rand was carefully unwrapping the gift on Hastings’ desk. Both Parkinson and Hastings were watching apprehensively, as if expecting a snake to spring out like a jack-in-the-box. “My money’s on drugs,” Parkinson said. “What else could it be?”

“Is the box exactly the same as the others?” Hastings asked.

“Just a bit heavier,” Rand decided. “A few ounces.”

But inside there seemed to be nothing but the same plastic tree ornament. Rand removed the tissue paper and stared at the bottom of the box.

“Nothing,” Parkinson said.

“Wait a minute. Something had to make it heavier.” Rand reached in and pried up the bottom piece of cardboard with his fingernails. It was a snugly fitted false bottom. Beneath it was a thin layer of a grey puttylike substance. “Better not touch it,” Hastings cautioned.

“That’s plastique—plastic explosive.”

The man from the bomb squad explained that it was harmless without a detonator of some sort, but they were still relieved when he removed it from the office. “How much damage would that much plastic explosive do?” Rand wanted to know.

“It would make a mess of this room. That’s about all.”

“What about twelve or fifteen times that much?”

“Molded together into one bomb? It could take out a house or a small building.”

They looked at each other glumly. “It’s a pretty bizarre method for distributing explosives,” Parkinson said.

“It has its advantages,” Hastings said. “The bomb is of little use until enough of the explosive is gathered together. If one small box falls into government hands, as this one did, the rest is still safe. No doubt it was delivered to St. Ives only recently, and this served as the perfect method for getting it to his network—certainly better than the mails during the Christmas rush.”

“Then you think it’s to be reassembled into one bomb?” Rand asked.

“Of course. And it’s to be used sometime soon.”

“The IRA? Russians? Arabs?”

Hastings shrugged. “Take your pick. St. Ives has worked for all of them.”

Rand held the box up to the light, studying the bottom. “This may be some writing, some sort of invisible ink that’s beginning to become visible. Get one of the technicians up here to see if we can bring it out.”

Heating the bottom of the box to bring out the message proved an easy task, but the letters that appeared were anything but easy to read: MPPMP MBSHG OEXAS-EWHMR AWPGG GBEBH PMBWE ALGHQ.

“A substitution cipher,” Parkinson decided at once. “We’ll get to work on

it.”

“Forty letters,” Rand observed, “in the usual five-letter groups. There are five Ms, five Ps, and five Gs. Using letter frequencies, one of them could be E. but in such a short message you can’t be sure.”

“GHQ at the end could stand for General Headquarters.” Hastings suggested.

Rand shook his head. “The entire message would be enciphered. Chances are that’s just a coincidence.”

Parkinson took the message off to the deciphering room and Rand confidently predicted he’d have the answer within an hour.

He didn’t.

“It’s tougher than it looks,” Parkinson told them. “There may not be any Es at all.”

“Run it through the computer,” Rand suggested. “Use a program that substitutes various frequently used letters for the most frequently used letters in the message. See if you hit on anything.”

Hastings glanced at the clock. “It’s after six and my niece has invited me for Christmas Eve. Can you manage without me?”

“Of course. Merry Christmas.”

After he’d gone, Rand picked up the phone and told Leila he’d be late. She was living in England now. and he’d planned to spend the holiday with her.

“How late?” she asked.

“These things have been known to last all night.”

“Oh. Jeffrey. On Christmas Eve?”

“I’ll call you later if I can,” Rand promised. “It might not take that long.”

He went down the hall and stood for a time watching the computer experts work on the message. They seemed to be having no better luck than Parkinson’s people. “How long?” he asked one.

“In the worst possible case it could take us until morning to run all the combinations.”

Rand nodded. “I’ll be back.”

They had to know what the message said, but they also had to find Ivan St. Ives. The employment office at Perkins and Simplex would be closed now. His only chance was that pub where Hastings had spoken with Daphne Sollis. The Crown and Piper.

It was on a corner, as London pubs often are, and the night before Christmas didn’t seem to have made much of a dent in the early-evening business. The bar was crowded and all the tables and booths were occupied. Rand let his eyes wander over the faces, seeking out either St. Ives or Daphne, but neither one seemed to be there. He didn’t know either of them well, though he thought he would recognize St. Ives out of his Father Christmas garb. He was less certain about recognizing Daphne Sollis.

“Seen Daphne around?” he asked the bartender as he ordered a pint.

“Daphne Jenkins?”

“Daphne Sollis.”

“Do I know her?”

“She was in here last night, talking to a grey-haired man wearing rimless glasses. He was probably dressed in a plaid topcoat.”

“I don’t— Wait a minute, you must mean Rusty. Does she have red hair?”

“Not the last time I knew her, but these things change.”

“Well, if it’s Rusty she comes in a couple of nights a week, usually alone. Once recently she was with a creepy-looking gent who kept laughing like Father Christmas. I sure wouldn’t want
him
bringing gifts to my kids. He’d scare ‘em half to death.”

“Does she live around here?”

“No idea, mate.” He went off to wait on another customer.

So whatever Daphne had told Hastings about her relationship with Ivan St. Ives, they were hardly enemies. He’d been with her recently in the Crown and Piper, apparently since he took on the job as Father Christmas.

Rand thought it unlikely that Daphne would visit the pub two nights in a row, but on the other hand she might stop by if she was lonely on Christmas Eve. He decided to linger over his pint and see if she appeared. Thirty minutes later he was about to give it up and head for Leila’s flat when he heard the bartender say, “Hey, Rusty! Fellow here’s been askin’ after you.”

Rand turned and saw Daphne Sollis standing not five feet behind him, unwrapping a scarf to reveal a tousled head of red hair. “Daphne!” She looked puzzled for a moment and he identified himself. “Ivan St. Ives introduced us a year or so back. He did some work for me.”

She nodded slowly as it came back to her. “Oh, yes—Mr. Rand. I remember you now. Is this some sort of setup? The other one, Hastings, was here just last night.”

“No setup, but I
would
like to talk with you, away from this noise. How about the lobby of the hotel next door?”

“Well—all right.”

The hotel lobby was much quieter. They sat beneath a large potted palm and no one disturbed them. “What do you want?” she asked. “What did your friend Hastings want last night?”

“It was only happenstance that he met you. though I’ll admit I came to the Crown and Piper looking for you. I need to locate Ivan St. Ives.”

“I told Hastings we’re on the outs.”

“I saw him at Perkins and Simplex earlier today.”

“Then you’ve already located him.”

“No.” Rand explained. “His Christmas job would have ended today. I need to know where he’s living.”

“I said we’re on the outs.”

“You were drinking with him at the Crown and Piper just a week or two

ago.”

She bit her lip and stared off into space. “I don’t know where he’s living. He rang me up and we had a drink for old times’ sake. That’s when he told me about the Christmas job. He talked about getting back together again, but I don’t know. He works for a lot of shady people.”

“Who’s he working for now?”

“Just the store, so far as I know. He said he’d fallen on hard times.”

Rand leaned forward. “It could be worth some money if you located him for us, told us who he’s palling around with.”

She seemed to consider the idea. “I could tell you plenty about who he’s palled around with in the past. It wasn’t just our side, you know.”

“I know.”

But it would have to be after New Year’s. I’m going to visit a girlfriend in Hastings, on the coast. Is your friend Hastings from there?”

“From Leeds, actually.” Rand was frowning. “I need St. Ives now.”

“I’m sorry, I can’t help you. Perhaps the store has his address.”

“I’ll have to ask them.” Rand stood up. “Can I buy you a pint back at the

pub?”

“I’d better skip it now,” she said, glancing at her watch. “I want to get home and change. I’m going to Midnight Mass with some friends.”

“If you’ll jot down your phone number I’d like to ring you up after New Year’s.”

“Fine,” she agreed.

He’d intended to phone Leila after he left Daphne, but back at the Double-C office, Parkinson was in a state of dejection. “We’ve run every possible substitution of the letter E and there’s still nothing. We’re going down the letter-frequency list now, working on T, A, O, and N.”

“Forty characters without a single E. Unusual, certainly.”

“Any luck locating St. Ives?”