Страница 72 из 105
“I am the only one left.”
“You were within the cell?”
“Yes. Why? Does that seem—”
“Never mind.” Hel was convinced now that Asa Stern had been acting in dazed desperation, to introduce this soft college liberal into an action cell. “How large was the cell?”
“We were five. We called ourselves the Munich Five.”
His eyelids drooped again. “How theatrical. Nothing like telegraphing the stunt.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“Five in the cell? Your uncle, you, the two hit in Rome—who was the fifth member? David O. Selznik?”
“I don’t understand what you mean. The fifth man was killed in a café bombing in Jerusalem. He and I were… we were…” Her eyes began to shine with tears.
“I’m sure you were. It’s a variation of the summer vacation romance: one of the fringe benefits of being a committed young revolutionary with all humanity as your personal flock. All right, tell me how far you had got before Asa died.”
Ha
Hel, of course, understood only too well. He had several times had to clean up after these devoted amateurs. He knew that when the storm broke, they either ran or, from equally cowardly impulses, shot up everything in sight.
Ha
“How large a group?”
“Five or six. We were never sure.”
“Had you identified which of them were involved in Munich?”
“No.”
“So you were going to put all five of them under?”
She nodded.
“I see. And your contacts in England? What is their character and what are they going to do for you?”
“They are urban guerrillas working for the freedom of Northern Ireland from English domination.”
“Oh, God.”
“There is a kind of brotherhood among all freedom fighters, you know. Our tactics may be different, but our ultimate goals are the same. We all look forward to a day when—”
“Please,” he interrupted. “Now, what were these IRA’s going to do for you?”
“Well… they were keeping watch on the Septembrists. They were going to house us when we arrived in London. And they were going to furnish us with arms.”
“‘Us’ being you and the two who got hit in Rome?”
“Yes.”
“I see. All right, now tell me what happened in Rome. EEC identifies the stuntmen as Japanese Red Army types acting for the PLO. Is that correct?”
“I don’t know.”
“Weren’t you there?”
“Yes! I was there!” She controlled herself. “But in the confusion… people dying… gunfire all around me…” In her distress, she rose and turned her back on this man she felt was intentionally tormenting her, testing her. She told herself that she mustn’t cry, but tears came nonetheless. “I’m sorry. I was terrified. Stu
“Don’t touch that!”
She jerked her hand away, startled to hear him raise his voice for the first time. A shot of righteous anger surged through her. “I wasn’t going to hurt your toys!”
“They might hurt you.” His voice was quiet and modulated again. “That is a nerve gas tube. If you had turned the bottom half, you would be dead now. And what is more important, so would I.”
She grimaced and retreated from the weapons rack, crossing to the open sliding door leading to the garden, where she leaned against the sill to regain something of her composure.
“Young woman, I intend to help you, if that is possible. I must confess that it may not be possible. Your little amateur organization has made every conceivable mistake, not the least of which was aligning yourselves with IRA dummies. Still, I owe it to your uncle to hear you out. Perhaps I can protect you and get you back to the bourgeois comfort of your home, where you can express your social passions by campaigning against litter in national parks. But if I am to help you at all, I have to know how the stones lie on the board. So I want you to save your passion and theatrics for your memoirs and answer my questions as fully and as succinctly as you can. If you’re not prepared to do that just now, we can chat again later. But it is possible that I may have to move quickly. Typically in patterns like this, after a spoiling raid (and that’s probably what the Rome International number was) time favors the other fellows. Shall we talk now, or shall we go take luncheon?”
Ha
“I don’t doubt that. Now tell me about the Rome hit. Facts and impressions, not emotions.”
She looked down and drew little circles on her ta
“All right. That’s fine. Now tell me this. Were you a target?”
“What?”
“Was anyone shooting specifically at you?”
“I don’t know! How could I know?”
“Were the Japanese using automatic weapons?”
“What?”
“Did they go rat-a-tat, or bang! bang! bang!”
She looked up at him sharply. “I know what an automatic weapon is! We used to practice with them out in the mountains!”
“Rat-a-tat or bang bang?”
“They were machine guns.”
“And did anyone standing close to you go down?”
She thought hard, squeezing her knees to her lips. “No. No one standing close to me.”
“If professionals using automatic weapons didn’t drop anyone near you, then you were not a target. It is possible they didn’t identify you as being with your two friends. Particularly as you left the check-through line some time after them. All right, please turn your mind to the shots that came from the mezzanine and blew away the Japanese hitmen. What can you tell me about them?”
She shook her head. “Nothing. I don’t remember anything. The guns were not automatics.” She looked at Hel obliquely. “They went bang bang.”
He smiled. “That’s the way. Humor and anger are more useful just now than the wetter emotions. Now, the radio report said something about ‘special agents’ being with the Italian police. Can you tell me anything about them?”