Solo - Jack Higgins [43]
'And you took them on?'
'I was armed, naturally.'
'And you killed them both?'
'Yes. Unfortunately, one of them turned out to be only fifteen.'
'And she found that hard to take?'
'All those Westerns. People expect you to shoot them in the arm or the shoulder or something neat like that, only when it's real, you've only time to do one thing. Shoot to kill. And always twice, to make sure, otherwise he gets one off at you as he goes down.'
'And she was different after that?'
'Not so much the boy. I think it was seeing me do it. Told me she couldn't forget the look on my face. As it happened, she was pregnant anyway, but she never slept with me again after that.'
'I'm sorry.'
'Why should you be? She believes in life, you see. She saw me as some kind of public executioner. She's married to a country parson now. The sort of man who believes in anything and everything, so they do rather well together.'
She said, 'I'm sorry about your daughter.'
'I should have known better,' he said. 'A stupid idea to think I could shock that girl into some kind of response.'
'For the ones like her, it's like a religion,' she said. 'They believe all that cant dished out by people like Sartre. The mystical view of violence as being ennobling. Terrorists are fond of the romantic viewpoint. They claim to be heroes of the revolution, yet disdain the rules of war. They claim to speak for the people and usually speak only for themselves.'
'And the Cretan,' he said. 'What kind of man is he?'
'What do you think?'
He told her of the discussion he and Baker had had on the subject and their eventual conclusion.
She nodded. 'Yes - I can go along with that. The business of a military background is the one point I'd disagree with you on.'
'Why?'
'The Cubans have been offering excellent military training to terrorists from all over the world for many years now and then there are the Russians. These days, they take students from most foreign countries into Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow. The KGB are always on the lookout for promising material.'
'I know,' he said, 'but I think there's more to the Cretan than that. A soldier's instinct for another soldier if you like. What makes a man like him tick, that's what I'd like to know. Not ideology - there's no pattern to his killings that would indicate that.'
'You want the psychologist's viewpoint?'
'Why not?'
'Okay - here goes. Some time ago I got involved in a study of Grand Prix drivers. What came out was that the greater the stress, the better they function. Most of them are only truly alive, truly operating to their full potential, in conditions of maximum danger. The most successful Grand Prix driver is the one who's prepared simply to push any car which gets in his way off the track. His image is one of ultimate masculinity, but he loves engines, cars, the machinery of his trade more than he could love any woman. The race is the perfect challenge, with death as the only alternative. It's a game which always excites, never ceases to satisfy.'
'The constant challenge. One man against...' Morgan frowned. 'Against what?'
'Himself, perhaps. A psychopathic personality, certainly, otherwise he could never take the guilt associated with his killings.'
'And seeking death, is that what you're saying? That he has a death-wish?'
'I shouldn't imagine it would bother him in the slightest. We have tapes of test pilots on the point of death in crashing aeroplanes who, instead of screaming in fear, are still trying to work out aloud what it is that went wrong. He's that kind of man.' She hesitated. 'A man, I should imagine, very like you.'
'Good,' Morgan said. 'That gives me a chance at him then.' He glanced at his watch. 'I must get going. I've an appointment in London this evening.'
As they walked back to the Porsche, she said, 'What will you do now? Isn't this about as far as you can go?'
'No,' he said. 'The gun that was used to shoot Cohen. If I could trace where it came