He arranged to meet her in the Holiday Inn’s cocktail bar, but he sat in the busy foyer, pretending to read a newspaper, to see if she was being followed.
She did not see him. She hurried to the elevators, excitement on her face. And McQuade’s heart turned over. He kept his eyes on the entrance. People were coming and going the whole time, but all of them seemed about their normal business.
She was sitting in the corner of the cocktail bar, and beamed as he walked in. He sat in the chair beside her. ‘How’re you?’
Her eyes were moist. ‘All the better for seeing you! I’ve been worried sick.’
He held her hand tight. ‘I love you, Sarah.’
She looked at him, her moist eyes steady. ‘I think I love you too.’ Then she grinned. ‘This is just a fun trip for yours truly of the Christian Science Monitor. Falling in love with sea captains is simply not sensible.’
‘I want to make love to you.’
‘If you’re seeking my acquiescence, my answer is yes, yes, yes. But till then, what’s all this about?’
He still held her warm hand. ‘Can you make your own dresses?’
She was surprised. ‘Of course. Learned it at my mother’s knee.’
‘Could you make a man’s suit?’
She was taken aback.
‘I suppose so. If I had a pattern.’ She added: ‘It wouldn’t be very good.’
‘And if you didn’t have a pattern? But had the man? To measure him up?’
She looked bemused. ‘What’s all this about?’
McQuade opened the plastic bag and pulled out the police book. He opened it at a flagged page. ‘If I supply the brass-work, leather-work, could you make me a uniform like that?’
She stared at the page, then turned to him. ‘Guess I could.’
He was delighted. ‘You’d have to borrow a good sewing machine; or rent one. And the cap? Could you make that?’
She looked at the picture, frowning. ‘Yes. If I had all the materials.’
‘Wonderful! Could you make two uniforms?’
She looked at him. ‘If you tell me what this is about. Who’s the other one for?’
‘Tucker. He’s only an inch taller than me.’
‘And what are you going to do with these uniforms?’ She said solemnly: ‘I’m not going to do this unless I know, Jim.’
‘I’m going to impersonate a policeman.’
‘I’ve figured that much myself. But why?’
McQuade sat back. I’ve made a short-list of suspects, from the print-out of Population Register. The easiest way to confront each man, so I can compare him with a photograph I have, is to knock on the door disguised as a policeman.’
‘And then what?’
‘After I’ve identified him, I go away and make a plan to snatch him.’ He elaborated, to encourage her: ‘And after I’ve finished with him I’ll hand the bastard over to the Israelis. I promise I’ll give you the complete story. It’ll be a scoop.’
She looked at him soberly, thinking.
‘Okay, I’ll do my best. Where do I measure you?’
He wanted to hug her.
He went down to the reception desk and borrowed a tape-measure. They took the elevator up to his room, with a bottle of wine. He locked the door and took her in his arms with a grin all over his face. ‘Thank you.’
She leant back, pelvis against his loins. ‘I want,’ she smiled, ‘to be paid in advance.’
And he crushed her against him and, oh, the glorious feel of her softness, her breasts and her belly and her thighs, and his hand slid down over her soft-hard buttocks and pulled up her skirt, and he slid his hand over her warm-cool thighs and he caught their reflection in the mirror, her long smooth legs and her skirt bunched up, and it was the most erotic and happy-making thing he had seen and he was wildly in love and he toppled her over onto the bed joyfully. ‘I love you, Sarah.’
She held him tight. ‘I love you too,’ she whispered.
And he knew the seriousness of it when he said: ‘Then, when this is over, you can’t possibly go back to Boston, Massachusetts. You’ll have to come and live with me.’
She had half a smile on her lovely mouth and her eyes were glistening. ‘What about my work?’
But McQuade knew loud and clear what he really wanted to say and it was a wonderful feeling to say it. ‘What I mean is, I want to marry you and live with you for ever.’
She looked at him with shining eyes, then she closed them, and a tear squeezed out the corners.
‘I think that takes some thinking about, by both of us.’
Her taxi dropped her off at her apartment block in Hillbrow the next morning. She got into her rented car, and drove slowly through the tricky maze of one-way streets, onto Jan Smuts Highway. She arrived in the prosperous suburb of Parktown North, and parked under the trees outside the house with the high walls. She let herself in and walked through the pretty garden. The living-room door opened and Matt came out angrily. ‘At last!’
‘As the departmental whore I refuse to do short-times.’ She strode past him into the living-room, carrying a plastic bag.
Two young men were at the breakfast table. Matt followed her in and seethed: ‘You’ve been missing since seven o’clock last night! Why didn’t you report?’
‘Because I was in bed. Getting laid.’
‘But why didn’t you advise us where you were meeting him?! So we could tail you?!’
‘Because he came to fetch me, unannounced. I was in his company the whole time.’
‘And where the hell was that?’
‘The Holiday Inn, room four-one-six, but he’s already checked out.’
Matt cried, ‘Jesus Christ! Again! Where’s he gone?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
Matt slapped his head incredulously. ‘You let him go again?! Why didn’t you go with him?’
‘Because he refused to take me.’
Matt held his head in furious exasperation. ‘I don’t believe this …’
‘And because,’ Sarah said angrily, ‘I’m going to be seeing him in a few days’ time when he telephones me.’
‘When he decides to telephone you?’ Matt shouted. ‘Oh, dandy! “Don’t call me, I’ll call you”?’
‘He’ll telephone!’ She pulled the police book out of the plastic bag and slapped it on the table. She opened it at the first flagged page and jabbed her finger at the photograph. ‘He wants two uniforms like that! And’ – she flicked to the pages on the Namibian police – ‘two like that. I’ve promised to make them for him.’ She glared at Matt. ‘I presume that’s not beyond the resources of Mossad?! I’ve got his measurements.’ She thrust a note at him and turned back to the garden. ‘And now, if you’ll excuse me, the whore would like to perform her ablutions!’
Matt grabbed her arm excitedly. ‘He’s going to impersonate a policeman?’
‘How very perspicacious.’
‘To do what exactly?’
‘To gain access to homes of his suspects. To compare them with the photograph Wiesenthal gave him of Heinrich Muller. Then make a plan to snatch him.’
‘So he’s finally admitted to you he’s after Muller!’
‘No, sir,’ Sarah sighed, ‘but we know that from Wiesenthal, don’t we, sir?’
‘No sarcasm! And you really believe he’s going to hand Muller straight over to the Israelis?’
She looked him in the eye. ‘Why not? He’s half-suspected of murder.’
‘Then why doesn’t he want to hand him over to the South African police and clear his name?’
‘Because the Israelis will believe him and clear his name. The South Africans may not.’
‘Bullshit.’ Matt turned away. ‘The South African police know he was in bed with you when the first guy was assaulted. If the cops are after him, it’s because they suspect he’s after somebody big – like Muller. There’s a heavy pro-Nazi element in this country, and in the police. They could be rather worried that our friend McQuade seems hot on the scent of one of them.’
‘And all you care about is that James McQuade leads you to Heinrich Muller before all these Nazis get McQuade and you lose your bloodhound!’
Matt ignored the interruption. ‘And I don’t believe for a moment that Mr McQuade is going to hand Mr Muller over to the Israelis straight away. He wants him for another reason.’
Sarah tried not to stare at him. Her heart sinking. ‘And that is?’
Matt put his fingers together as he paced.
‘He told Wiesenthal a story about a submarine off the coast of South America. Bullshit. That submarine is off the coast of South Africa somewhere. Why? Because McQuade is looking for Muller in South Africa. Why? Because the two fishermen who told him the tale weren’t Spanish at all – they were Namibian natives. Namely these guys who were murdered. QED.’
‘Submarine?’ Sarah’s heart was sinking. Then she said, with a show of indignation, ‘Why wasn’t I told this?’
‘Because you had no need to know.’ He added casually, ‘Why? Has he mentioned a submarine to you?’
Sarah looked away. Her mind trying to race. ‘No.’ She feigned incredulity. ‘So Mr McQuade wants to snatch Mr Muller to find out where that submarine is?’
‘And why, already? Because he thinks there’s a fortune on it.’ Matt looked at her knowingly. ‘Of course, that’s only my guess. But it happens to be Simon Wiesenthal’s guess as well.’
She blinked, then sat down. The young man called Steven said: ‘Can I make a suggestion, sir?’
‘Yes?’ Matt said irritably.
Steven said: ‘I think we’re going about this the wrong way. Using McQuade as our bloodhound. Now he’s disappeared again, and we’re dependent on him contacting Sarah. Supposing he manages to get his uniforms elsewhere? Or if he finds Muller and makes a botch of it? Muller would go underground for ever. Or McQuade may even kill him—’
‘We’ve been through all this! What are you suggesting?’
Steven said respectfully, ‘That we take matters into our own hands now, sir. We have two options. We either find this lesbian and blackmail her into giving us the name and the print-out—’
‘We’ve rejected that option. The girl has already panicked and disappeared on so-called holiday. The whole thing could blow up in our face!’
‘I’m saying we should reconsider that option, sir.’
‘Not yet. Too risky.’
‘Then,’ Steven said, ‘I suggest that we move in on McQuade when he contacts Sarah. Sweat the name out of him, and the whole print-out. And we then impersonate the police and find Muller.’
Sarah said icily, ‘Then you can count me out!’
Matt held a finger out at her. ‘You,’ he said, ‘will do as you are ordered!’
‘Like hell I will!’ she cried. ‘I refuse to be an accomplice to that guy being beaten up! And just remember that you can’t do a damn thing without me because it’s me he’s contacting, me he trusts, me he’s getting the uniforms from! And if I quit you’ll never see him again!’
‘I’ll deal with you later—’
‘You can deal with me right now! And I’m telling you right now that there’s only one condition on which I’m prepared to continue! And that is that we come clean with McQuade! Tell him who we are and persuade him to work with us! Persuade him that it’ll be easier and quicker because we’re the experts and he’s an amateur. And make a solemn deal with him, that he can have the so-called fortune in this submarine – if there is any.’
Matt held his tongue. Because he needed her. He turned elaborately to Steven.
‘We’ve considered your second option of forcing the information out of him and we have rejected it. For the very good reason that it may not work, and we don’t want him to know that Mossad is on his tail. We’ve got things working very well without him knowing, thanks to Sarah. Using strong-arm could blow things up in Mossad’s face, if he created a scandal afterwards. It’s not necessary yet to take those risks.’
‘Yet?’ Sarah said dangerously.
Matt ignored her insubordination and turned to her. ‘As regards your “suggestion” – the same applies. Why reveal that Mossad is on his tail when we’re doing fine through you? It’s very likely that he would reject our offer – Wiesenthal offered him all the help and he backed off. Why? Because he thinks he’ll lose the treasure. And, anyway, it’s highly doubtful that he’d trust us after he finds out that you’ve been screwing him in the line of duty – that your whole relationship is false.’ He shook his head and put an end to the discussion. ‘So, the man must get his uniforms.’ He picked up the police book and said to Steven, ‘Find out the quickest flights to Jerusalem. Then get this book to the Israeli embassy, for their diplomatic bag. With a coded letter saying we want eighteen uniforms made up immediately: nine South African police, nine Namibian. Two pairs of each for Mr McQuade, the rest for us. With fake buttons, badges, Sam Brownes, the works. Enclose the note of McQuade’s measurements and find out what ours are. And we want those uniforms in the next diplomatic bag back here, even if the tailors have to work all night!’