on it.’
He got through immediately. ‘Good morning, Colonel … No, I have not
been attacked, kidnapped, tortured, assassinated or otherwise set upon
… Quite the contrar;. Positively cordial … No, there was a newcomer.
Romero Agnelli’s brother. Genial mafia-type, quite friendly, really,
rejoicing in the name of Leonardo Agnelli . . . Yes, it is rather
splendid, isn’t it, and yes, we’ve made some arrangements. I am engaged
to blow up the royal palace at eight p.m. . . . No, sir, I do not jest.’
He covered the mouthpiece and looked at the two startled, wide-eyed
girls. ‘I think the Colonel’s drink has gone down the wrong way. Yes,
sir, amatol. Triggered by a remote-controlled radio device, details of
which I shall be receiving this evening … Certainly I intend to do it.
They’re depending on me … No, it’s deep in the cellars. There will be
no loss of life … Very well.’
He covered the mouthpiece with one hand and gave his
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empty glass to Julie with the other. ‘I’m to keep a respectful silence
while he communes with himself before telling me what to do. I don’t need
telling and I almost certainly won’t agree with what he suggests.’
‘Blowing up the royal palace.’ She looked at Julie who had just brought
in the jenever bottle. ‘The palace. Blowing it up. He’s mad. You – you’re
a policeman!’
‘A policeman’s lot is a hard one. All things to all men. Yes, I’m
listening!’ There was a long pause. Julie and Annemarie studied his face
covertly but closely, but he gave no indication as to what he was
thinking although he did permit himself the occasional thoughtful
expression as he sipped some more jenever.
‘Yes, I understand. Alternatives. First, you can pull me off altogether
and you have the means to ensure that I do this, so, of course, I would
have to accept that decision. But there’s a difference between pulling
me off a job and putting me back on to it again. Should this prove to be
the first in a series of bomb outrages – and you know better than anyone
that those things almost invariably happen in cycles – then I should have
to refuse to be assigned to the investigation on the grounds that I was
fortunate enough to be given the opportunity to investigate this group’s
activities and you denied me the opportunity … Certainly, sir, you
could ask for my resignation on the grounds of refusing to obey orders.
I would refuse to resign. You’d have to fire me. And then, of course, you
would have to explain to your minister that you fired me because you had
made a mistake, because you had refused to listen to me, because you
wouldn’t give me the chance to stop what may be a new crime wave before
it started, because you had backed your own judgment against mine and you
had been wrong. Throw as many chestnuts as you like into the fire,
Colonel. I refuse to pull them out. And I refuse to resign. Excuse me,
sir.’
Julie had sat beside him on the bedside and had put both hands on his
telephone arm as if trying to pull it away.
‘Stop it, Peter, stop it.’ Despite the fact that van Effen had prudently
covered the mouthpiece, her voice was low, tense, urgent. ‘You can’t talk
to the Colonel like that. Can’t you see
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that you’re putting tile poor man in an impossible situation?’
Van Effen looked at Annemarie. From her compressed lips and slowly shaking
head it was evident that she was of the same opinion as Julie. Van Effen
looked back at his sister and she visibly recoiled from the expression on
his face.
‘Why don’t you hear me out instead of indulging in a repetition of last
night’s unwarranted interference and blundering into things you know
nothin.- about? You think he’s in an impossible situation? Listen to what
I say and judge what kind of position I’m in.’ She slowly removed her hands
and just looked at him, her expression uncomprehending. Van Effen raised
the phone again.
‘Forgive the interruption, Colonel. Julie says that I have no right to talk
to you in this fashion and that I’m putting you in an impossible situation.
Julie, alas, doesn’t know what she’s talking about. Annemarie, who is also
here, agrees with her but she wouldn’t know what she’s talking about
either. In fairness to them I must say that, judging by the way they are
looking at each other, they don’t think I know what I’m talking about
either. You people are only on the periphery: I’m the man in the middle. An
impossible situation, she says. Consider your alternative.
‘I go ahead as planned with Agnelli and company. You, you say, will ensure
my safety. In the first place you are duty-bound – you claim – to notify
the royal household using as justification the many threats that have been
made against the royal family in recent months. You will have the Dam
square invisibly cordoned off by snipers. You will have anti-terrorist
police squads inside die palace itself. It has apparently never occurred to
you that those criminals have their moles and informants pretty thick on
the ground and that the presence of even one extra policeman will be
immediately reported. I have been warned that if any such thing happened
they would know that there could have been only once source, one person,
through whom this information reached the police. And I don’t think – I
know – that the palace security is pitiful and that those spies move freely
within the gates. Lift that telephone to the palace, to
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your anti-terrorist squads, to any other policeman, and you might as well
reach out for pen and paper and write down and sign my death warrant.’ That
was, van Effen was aware, pitching it rather strongly, extradition was the
worst he had to face, even assuming they had penetrated his disguise, which
was uncertain. But now wasn’t the moment for such niceties.
‘Ensure my safety? You’ll ensure my death, van Effen in a better world by
midnight. What’s one detective-lieutenant less just so long as your
pettifogging rules and hidebound rcgulations are concerned? Maybe – no, I’m
sure – that Julie and Annemarie don’t like me very much at the moment but
I think they’ll have the grace to testify at the inquest that I did do my
best to save my own miserable skin.
‘That, of course, is the absolute worst scenario and I’ve no intention of
being part of it. I’ve been thinking during our conversation and I’ve
changed my mind about one thing. You’ve offered me two alternatives. One
leads to being fired, the other to the old pine box. I’m not quite in my
dotage yet and I think it would behove me to find some form of work where
I’ll be faced with threats of neither dismissal nor extinction. If you send
one of your boys round to Julie’s place I’ll let him have my written
resignation. At the same time I’ll give him the tape-recording I had made
in the Hunter’s Horn this morning. I hope that you and your University
friends will be able to make something of it and of the other tape-recorded
telephone messages. Sorry about this, Colonel, but you leave me with no
option: I seem to have run out of alternatives.’ He replaced the telephone
in the bedside cupboard and left the room.
When Julie and Annemarie rejoined him he was sitting relaxed in an
armchair, legs crossed and jenever in hand. For a man who had just made
such a momentous decision he seemed singularly unconcerned.
Julie said: ‘May I say something?’
‘Certainly. Compared to what the Colonel said and what he is no doubt
thinking at this moment your slings and arrows are as nothing.’
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She smiled faintly. ‘I haven’t lost my senses or memory. I
have no intention of being – how did you put it so charmingly
last night – cool, clinical, superior and handing out unwanted
and unsolicited advice. I am sorry for what I said in the
bedroom. I didn’t know you were in so impossible a situation.
But if I go on to say that I also think you’ve put the Colonel in a
fearful fix, you’ll probably say that you appreciate that a
lieutenant’s life i ‘ s as nothing compared to the Colonel’s finer
feelings. Well, I still say I’m sorry, but
Annemarie interrupted. ‘Julie?’
‘Yes?’
‘I wouldn’t bother saying sorry to him again. I don’t for a moment believe
he’s in an impossible situation. Look at him. He’s getting high blood
pressure through trying not to laugh out loud.’ She gave him a considering
glance. ‘You’re not very active. I thought you came through here to write
out your resignation.’
He frowned, looked off into the middle distance, then said: ‘I’ve no