Solo - Jack Higgins [68]
'You like football?' Morgan asked.
The boy smiled delightedly and pointed at the picture. 'Liverpool - you like?' His English seemed very limited.
'Well, I'd rather spend the afternoon at Cardiff Arms Park myself, but yes, you have to admit that there must be something in the water in Liverpool.'
The boy grinned again, then went to a cupboard, opened it and produced an expensive Polaroid camera. He pointed it at Morgan, there was a flash and then the print was ejected at the front.
Morgan said, 'There's an expensive toy. Who gave you that?'
'Mr Mikali,' Nicky said. 'He nice man.'
Morgan picked up the print and stared down as it automatically developed itself, his face peering darkly out at him, the colours deepening. 'Yes,' he said slowly. 'I suppose he is.'
The photo was ready now. Nicky took it from him and held it up. 'Good?'
'Yes.' Morgan patted him on the head. 'Very good.'
The phone rang. When Mikali answered it, it was Katherine Riley again.
'I'm still in the international departure lounge at Heathrow,' she said. 'There's been a delay.'
'My poor darling.'
'That sounds rather extravagant for you,' she said.
'I feel in an extravagant mood.'
'Anyway, I'll still be on the first hydrofoil in the morning.'
'I'll have Constantine waiting for you. Don't talk to any strange men.'
He hung up as he heard the sound of the engine approaching. He picked up a pair of binoculars, opened the french windows and moved out across the wide terrace. There was still enough light for him to see the launch turn into the bay and move towards the small jetty where Constantine's old wife, Anna, was waiting.
There was a light on the end of the jetty. As the boy tossed the line to his grandmother, Morgan followed him over the rail: Mikali focused the binoculars on him briefly. It was enough.
He returned to the living-room where a pine-log fire burned brightly on the hearth. He poured himself a large Courvoisier and ice, then opened a drawer in the desk, took out a Walther and quickly fitted a silencer to the muzzle.
He pushed the weapon into his belt and went round the room, glass in one hand, opening all the french windows, pushing back and securing the shutters so that the night wind filled the house with the scent of flowers from the garden.
Then he turned off all the lights except a reading lamp on a coffee table by the piano, went and sat down at the Bluthner and started to play.
Fifty or sixty feet up the steep path from the jetty they came to a small, rather primitive cottage. A dog started to bark at Morgan from the porch. The old woman hushed it and she and the boy went in. Constantine continued up the path without a word and Morgan followed him.
The garden was terraced, he was aware of that, fringed with olive trees and there were pots of camellia, gardenia, hibiscus and the warm night air was perfumed with the scent of jasmine.
He could hear the piano now, a strange, haunting piece. For a brief moment, he stopped dead in his tracks. Constantine paused, half-turning, his face showing no emotion, and Morgan started forward again.
They went up the steps to the villa. It was a large, sprawling, one-storeyed building, constructed of local stone with green-painted shutters and a pantile roof. Bougainvillaea grew in profusion everywhere.
There was a double door of iron-bound oak. Constantine opened it without ceremony and led the way in. The inner hall seemed to join two sections of the house together and was in darkness. A faint light showed through a door which stood open at the far end from where the music sounded clearly. Constantine led the way down to it, motioned Morgan inside, put down his holdall and left without a word, closing the front door behind him.
'Come in, Mr Lewis,' Mikali called.
Morgan stepped into the room. It was very long, simply furnished, white-painted walls, a floor of polished brick, the fire burning cheerfully in the hearth and Mikali at the Bluthner