"Trevor, Elleston as Hall, Adam - Quiller 03 - The Striker Portfolio 1.1" - читать интересную книгу автора (Hall Adam)

I had to blank my mind consciously before I could get to sleep because I was still narked with Ferris for not telling me anything. Lovett would have to make up for that in the morning.

'He can't be!'

She laughed at first, like some people do, but her eyes were beginning to go bright and she went on staring at me with the laugh still on her face.

It seemed genuine.

I said: 'He threw himself out of a window on the fourth floor. Last night, about eleven o'clock.'

It was genuine all right. I got to her before she could hit her head on anything. She didn't go right under. When I helped her into the chair she stayed there without moving, like a dress thrown across it, but her eyes opened and she began staring again and I said:

'Have you got any brandy ?'

After a minute she asked me: 'How do you know?'

They told me at the hotel. I was going to talk to him this morning and that's what they said happened.'

There wasn't anything but beer and a dreg or two of vodka in the bottom of a bottle so I gave her that, but she didn't drink it. Her colour was coming back and she sounded almost normal when she spoke again.

'So that was Bill.'

She wasn't dismissing him. She just didn't feel like consoling herself with the usual deceptions: but there must be a mistake, I was only talking to him yesterday, so forth. She was the kind of woman who would appeal to Lovett. His wife would have approved.

'It's the official version,' I said, 'anyway.'

'So you know him well.'

'He wasn't the type.'

'No. What's this?'

'Drink it.'

'What do you think I am?'

It was a small room with a bunk bed and there were two dressing-gowns behind the door. I didn't know who the other girl was. They'd given me this one's name at the hotel. She was on the translating staff for the conference. I'd asked them who came to see him most at the Carlsberg and she'd been the only woman on the list and I thought she'd probably know him better than the others.

Ferris hadn't actually told me to start enquiring. It was the only thing to do.

He'd sounded upset. 'Well, they were on to it bloody early.'

'Did they see us coming through?'

'No. They don't know us.'

I listened to his breathing on the line. He was trying to think what to do now. He'd have to tell me a bit more, because Lovett couldn't.

'They must have got on to him a few days ago. You can't rig that kind of thing at short notice.' I could hear him sweating it out. 'That Striker you saw.'