The Touch of Death (4 page)

She came and sat beside him.

“You look as if you're going to make a night of it, Neil.”

“That's me. Same again,” he said to the bar-keeper.

“Why?”

“Masculine privilege.”

“Rita still hurts?”

He looked at her levelly, and his voice was not amiable.

“As you so rightly say, Pamela, Rita still hurts. You perceive the bare surface of the tortured human soul. I don't wish to discuss Rita. Have a drink.”

“Thank you, Neil.” She ordered a gin-and-it. She really was rather pretty, and had a good figure – the kind of figure one only began to appreciate after a little while. She had rather nice brown eyes, too, and a pleasant voice.

They had dinner together three times in the next week. Pam began to make him feel more human. He was on the point of telling her what had happened, but she might not believe it, and he couldn't bear to be laughed at. There was an eeriness, a sense of mystery, a sense of expectancy – at times it was almost fear.

Pam rang up, ten days after they'd first met at the Bini Club.

“Neil, there's a little restaurant in Soho I'd love to go to, do you think you could make it one day this week? For dinner.
My
dinner!”

“No.”

“Oh,” Pam said, startled. “Why not?”

“
My
dinner.”

“Very well, sir,” she said with a mock quality of demureness, “a Victorian maid I will be, for once. When will it please your masterfulness?”

It was all very trite and light and flippant, but it had a warmth about it, too.

“Tonight.”

“Call for me at seven,” Pam said.

He called for her promptly. They had a drink at the Bini, another at the tiny bar of the Soho restaurant, then dinner in a small room upstairs with three other couples, a perfect meal cooked by a French chef whose sauces were perfection. Everything was exactly right, and Pam was at her brightest. They laughed a lot. Banister wasn't drunk, not even slightly tipsy, but he was in a light-hearted mood.

He discovered that the room was empty. . . .

He kissed her – not for the first time, although more passionately than before. She laughed lightly, jumped up, and then walked
through
the wall.

That was how it looked to Banister. One moment Pam was in the room, walking straight towards the wall; next, she was going through it. Of course, a door which he hadn't noticed before had opened. Laughing, he hurried after her.

He went through the door, but Pam wasn't in the room beyond.

There were three men. One was the little American, the other the giant, the third a man whom Banister had never seen before.

 

 

Banister stopped quite still. The door closed behind him, although he didn't notice it. Another door closed in a corner; he thought fleetingly that Pam had gone through there; and Pam had lured him here.

The American was sitting at a table; grinning. He looked as tough a nut as one would find anywhere. It was something in his manner as well as in his brown, weather-beaten face. His eyes looked like dark-blue enamel.

The giant wasn't smiling, but he looked amiable.

The third man was in the middle. He was in the middle according to size, too. Not particularly handsome, he was impressive looking, and would have been more so but for a rather weak chin. His fair hair curled a little and looked very thin and silky. His eyelids drooped, making him look lazy or perhaps tired. His mouth was well-shaped, and curved a little, as if he saw some obscure joke.

There was nothing sinister about him.

“Hallo,” he said. “Sorry we've been so abrupt – and that isn't the first apology we owe you. Come and sit down, won't you – and try this brandy.”

Banister went forward slowly. There was an empty chair. He sat down. The American said: “He'll do,” quite mysteriously, and the giant smiled faintly. The man in the middle looked pleased.

“My name is Palfrey,” he said. “Dr. Stanislaus Alexander Palfrey.”

Banister realised that all of them were looking at him more closely; there was some tension in the air. It was because of the name – or rather, because of his expected reaction to it. He thought he had heard the name before, but couldn't think where.

“This is Cornelius Bruton,” the man named Palfrey went on, after the tension relaxed.

“Hi, Neil,” the American said.

“And this, Stefan Andromovitch,” Palfrey added with a quick glance at the giant. “Late of Moscow.”

The Russian's hand was offered. Banister took it. As he did so, he remembered the breaking chair legs. The Russian's grip was firm and powerful, but there was nothing to suggest the remarkable strength in the fingers and wrists – except their size.

“And where,” asked Banister dryly, “is Professor Monk-Gilbert or his double?”

Palfrey's lips curved more noticeably in response. Bruton put a match to his cigar, which had gone out. Palfrey sniffed the bouquet of his brandy, without taking his eyes from Banister. Then he said: “Monk-Gilbert died. You stumbled over his body. He was killed by two men who attacked you – and whom we caught some weeks later. They refused to make any statement. We do not know much about them. They are British nationals, but we don't know who employed them, who paid them for their assassins' work. We want to find out.”

He sniffed the bouquet again, casually.

His calm voice, the almost gentle way in which he spoke, made the words more vivid and the picture clearer.

Banister nodded and waited.

“You might have been involved,” Palfrey went on. “It was possible that you were working with them, knew that we were close behind, and picked Monk-Gilbert up and came along, pretending to do a rescue act in order to insinuate yourself into our good graces. He was, after all, coming to Wickham Mews. We don't know why. We thought it might be to see you.”

“It wasn't,” Banister said.

“We know that, now. The man posing as Monk-Gilbert came to see you – and obviously you didn't recognise him. We showed you photographs of other people involved, and were satisfied that you didn't know them. We had to make absolutely sure of that – and also absolutely sure that you weren't involved with the murderers. At the same time, it was necessary for us to test your nerve, to take it to breaking point. We did that by a mixture of terrorism, threat, suspense and general wear-and-tear on the system; we made sure you couldn't rest, and studied your reactions. We started all that, then walked out – to see what you would do. The police took over. They gave a good account of you. Everyone has. Especially Pam. You've been middling tight when with her, but never talked of this. You did everything anyone could do to find out what was behind it, but didn't crack. I say this with diffidence,” Palfrey went on with a deprecating smile. “But you have what it takes. Your nerves are
very
good. You have been watched day and night, and—”

“Don't I know it!”

“You haven't always known it. You got annoyed when you found out, but didn't do anything silly. You must have felt like drinking yourself under the table when Harris turned you down, after a word with Gillick. You didn't. There isn't much about you that we don't know.” Palfrey took a fold of paper from his pocket and handed it to Banister. “You can look at that later. We know you've travelled a great deal and where you've been. We think you've all the qualifications that a job with us would require.”

He paused again, and lifted his glass. It wasn't affectation. He wanted to judge Banister's reaction to that.

“Except possibly one,” Banister said.

“What's that?”

“Willingness to serve. Perhaps I don't like being fooled so much.”

“That's up to you,” Palfrey said easily. “You don't know enough to matter at the moment, if you don't want the job you can say so. Still, your war record and one or two other things suggest that it won't frighten you. You've no ties – no girlfriend or parents. Pam Smith gives you full marks for being the perfect gentleman, by the way, she said that she hardly realised that anyone like you still existed!”

Banister didn't speak.

“Pam works with us without knowing much about us,” Palfrey went on. “See it as three concentric circles. Pam and a few hundred others are in the outer ring. You and perhaps fifty others are on the middle ring – or can be – and we three with a few more are in the centre ring. As for what we are and what we do—” He smiled, still faintly, and began to toy with a few strands of the fair hair. “That's always the difficult thing to explain. One might almost say a kind of international M.I.5.”

He paused and smiled.

He spoke so mildly, deprecatingly, as if apologising for what he was saying. He didn't really surprise Banister. The actual meeting, the definite assertion that these were Secret Service men, had a curious effect on him. It was a kind of paradox – a surprise which in some queer way he had expected. As he looked into the heavy-lidded eyes of the man named Palfrey, he realised that everything had pointed to the Secret Service.

“On a real world basis,” Palfrey emphasised.

He said that so that Banister accepted it; he believed they were Secret Service men working on a world basis.

“Until he blotted his copy-book, Stefan here was the Moscow representative,” Palfrey went on.

Banister felt a greater stirring of excitement as he looked into the face and the calm eyes of the giant.

“Moscow still has a representative with us,” Palfrey said, “and most nations – not all, but most, and that includes all the big ones – have representatives. Headquarters are here in London, but we have agents all over the place.”

Banister felt that this was really some kind of examination or test; much as his first interview with the Russian and the American had been. He had another curious feeling; Palfrey's eyes were not so mild as they seemed. They had a penetrating quality.

A light glowed in his eyes . . .

It faded, and the impression died; he became ordinary again as he went on in an apologetic voice: “Don't get anything wrong, Banister. We aren't attached to UNO or to any Government or any group of Governments, We belong to no
bloc
. Once we joined one side or another, our usefulness would be finished. We aren't employed by Governments or groups of Governments, but most make us a yearly grant to help meet our expenses. If we come across some murky business – plots between countries, for instance, that kind of thing – we get out of it as fast as we can. If Russia sends a dozen men to find out what it can about the American hydrogen-bomb plant, or the Americans slip a few of its nationals into the industrial area beyond the Urals, it's not our affair. We've a different job – a kind of world police force.” He leaned back in his chair. “Sounds shockingly melodramatic, put like that, doesn't it?”

“I see what you mean,” Banister said.

The words came out awkwardly; he felt as if he hadn't used his voice for a long time. In fact, he had said practically nothing since he had come into the room. Palfrey, the others, the whole set-up, had a hypnotic effect; as if he had been warned to keep silent, and knew that it would be folly to say much.

It was unreal; and at the same time, it seemed much more real than his daily life.

“You see,” Palfrey was saying, cuddling the big glass as if it were precious, and raising it so that the bouquet drifted gently up to him, “there are bad men about all the time. As if you didn't know! Governments are not the only people who want to make trouble. The day of armaments rings making wars may be over, but there are things to remember. Power – power through might – is no longer the prerogative of the nation with the biggest population. One man or group of men might discover or develop a weapon as potentially destructive as the atom bomb, even the hydrogen bomb. That's not nonsense, you know.” He looked as if it were most important for Banister to understand that, and glanced at the American. “Is it, Corny?”

“It is not.” The American spoke with quiet emphasis.

“Stefan—” Palfrey began.

The Russian smiled, and said: “There was once a woman who found a way of warping the minds of children – and thought that she might dominate the world by making youths her slaves.”
[1]

As he spoke, it was as definite as if a judge were pronouncing sentence; as if there could not be the slightest doubt about the truth of the statement.

“You see?” Palfrey's voice was boring into Banister's consciousness again. “Let me give you an easy example to follow. Bacteria can be used very simply. Imagine, for instance, a chemist who can produce the cholera germ, or smallpox, any germ you like – perhaps one of an unknown disease against which there is no known protection; and imagine him having a few agents to take these round the world. It could
almost
be done through the post! People can't see germs, after all. They wouldn't make a mark on the whitest piece of cream-laid note-paper. That's an extreme example; the point I'm making is that it wouldn't be difficult to cause a hell of a lot of trouble for the world. A few men, a few fanatics – thwarted Hitlers, perverted patriots, incipient dictators – could cause a great deal of damage. It's our job to dig ‘em out, find out what they're up to. Do you see what I mean?”

Banister's mouth was dry. “Yes.”

“I felt sure you would,” Palfrey said. “Of course, we have to take a few risks – but don't we all? It's hardly on a level with the risks that some of the supersonic pilots take. Risk is relative, anyhow. The importance of life is relative, too—or don't you think so?”

Banister forced himself to speak. “I'd go a long way to save mine, but given—”

He boggled at the word which was on the tip of his tongue.

“I know what you mean,” Palfrey said amiably. “Given the proper cause, you'd throw it away. We think you could do a job for us. You'd be risking your life. In fact, from the time you began, from the time the other people discovered what you were doing, you'd be in the front line. If they decided to kill you, the assassination might come at any time and in any way. Of course, you might get away with it. We'd help where we could. But the risk would remain.”

Palfrey stopped, and this time sipped his brandy. Bruton picked up a small glass of cognac, and drank. The Russian simply stretched out his long legs.

“What do you want me to do?” Banister asked.

 

They had expected his response, yet they were obviously pleased. Neither Palfrey nor Andromovitch the Russian would ever be demonstrative, but Bruton couldn't sit still any longer. He jumped up, slapped Banister across the shoulders, and then began to move about the room. Palfrey and the Russian ignored him.

“Monk-Gilbert went from country to country examining and testing uranium ore from different mines. He needed to study the earth strata near the mines, because he was always searching for an ore of superior quality to most of that now used. Certain grades are more economical, as they have a much greater yield than others. On his last trip, he visited one uranium field in Africa, one in New Zealand, one in Australia, two in Canada and one in Arizona. Six in all.”

Banister nodded.

“In one of these,” Palfrey said, “he found something completely new. Or we think he did. He found an ore which, when refined, causes instantaneous death. It is really rather horrible.”
Rather
horrible! “You might shake hands with a man – an insulated person – who has a smear of this substance on his finger. You would die – just like that.”

Palfrey snapped his fingers.

Banister clenched his teeth.

“In short, he found a substance which has certain radioactive qualities not previously known, in which death is contagious in the way of ordinary illnesses. It is passed on from one to another. One touches the substance, there is a flash, and one dies. It has an effect rather like that of a high-voltage current of electricity. A bright flash comes at the moment of physical contact, although there is no burning; death appears to be from shock. The only outward or visible sign is a small red mark at the point of contact. Monk-Gilbert had one on his hand. A man might be sitting in the corner of a railway carriage, apparently asleep – and actually be dead. A man might be walking along the street, stumble, fall – and be dead. We know the effect of the stuff. We know that a dead man is ‘live' in the sense that anyone once touching him, is killed instantaneously.”