Exocet - Jack Higgins [53]
It was enough. Bernard said, 'You know who Donner is?'
'That's right. I also know he's promised to provide several Exocet missiles to Argentine agents in this country within the next few days. Where's he getting them from?'
Bernard said, 'He hasn't told me. In fact, to the best of my knowledge, he hasn't told anybody.' Villiers raised the gun as if to take deliberate aim and Bernard said hastily, 'No, listen to me.'
'All right, but you'd better make it good.'
'There's a place off the Brittany coast called Ile de Roc where they test Exocets. The nearest port is St Martin. Donner has taken a house near there. I think his intention must be to hijack one of the Aerospatiale trucks as it passes through to St Martin carrying Exocets for shipment to the island.'
His face was haggard, beaded with sweat; he was obviously telling the truth as he knew it. Villiers nodded calmly and said to Jackson. 'Okay, Harvey. Go and wait for me in the car.'
Jackson didn't argue. He went out, closing the door, his footsteps descended the wooden steps. There was silence.
Villiers put the Smith & Wesson on the desk, lit a cigarette and stood up, hands in the pockets of his raincoat.
'You don't like the English very much, do you? Why would that be?'
Bernard said, 'You ran in 1940 and left us to the Boche. They shot my father, burned our village. My mother ...' He shrugged, the despair of years on his shoulders.
Villiers turned and walked to the other end of the office, and examined the notice board. Bernard looked nervously across at the Smith & Wesson on the other side of the desk.
'My father was in SOE during the war,' Villiers said. 'The French section. Dropped into France by parachute three times to work with the Resistance. Finally, he was betrayed, arrested and hauled off to Gestapo Headquarters in the Rue des Saussaies in Paris. A good address for a bad place. He was interrogated for three days with such brutality that, to this day, his right foot is badly crippled.'
He turned, hands still in the pockets of the raincoat and found Bernard sitting, but now clutching the Smith & Wesson.
'Oh, but you must let me finish, Professor. I've saved the best to last. His torturer was a Frenchman in the pay of the Gestapo. One of those fascists you find everywhere.'
Bernard cried something unintelligible and fired. Villiers was already dropping to one knee, his hand emerging from the front of the raincoat holding a Walther PPK. He shot Bernard in the centre of the forehead and the Frenchman was hurled backwards, still seated in the chair.
Villiers retrieved the Smith & Wesson, switched off the light and went out. He descended the stairs, crossed to the judas gate and stepped into the night. Car lights turned on further up the street and the Citroen slid into the kerb, Jackson at the wheel. Villiers got into the passenger seat.
'Did you give him a chance?' Jackson asked.
'Of course.'
'I can imagine. Why not just shoot the poor sod in the first place and get it over with? Why pretend? Did it make you feel better? Every man deserves a chance to draw, just like a fucking western?'
'Just drive, Sergeant Major.' Villiers said and lit another cigarette.
'Deepest apologies,' Jackson told him. 'I trust the major will forgive me. I was forgetting he was a moralist.'
He moved into gear and drove away.
* * *
Donner ordered another bottle of champagne. 'You're not drinking,' he said to Montera, and tried to fill his glass.
Montera put his hand in the way. 'No thanks. Champagne doesn't agree with me.'
'Nonsense,' Donner said. 'A man who is tired of champagne is tired of life; wouldn't you agree, Mademoiselle Legrand?'
'Actually, a nonsensical proposition. No substance to it at all,' she said.
He laughed. 'That, I like. A woman who says what she thinks. Just comes right out with it. Now Wanda here, she never says what she thinks. What she tells you is what she believes you'd like to hear, isn't that so, Wanda?'
The girl's humiliation was plain. Her hands were