'Ab. State secrets.'

'Not at all. Come along. Both of you. It'll save me from having to repeat myself.'

He sat down on Julie's bed, opened a bedside cupboard and extracted a phone. Annemarie said: 'That's a curious-looking instrument.' 'Scrambler phone. Any eavesdropper who is locked into your telephone hears only garbled nonsense. A device at the recipient's end works in reverse and makes the jumble intelligible again. Much used by secret services and the Letter cla.s.s of spy. Very popular with criminals, too. The original connection was to my apartment but I can also call de Graaf on it.'

He got through immediately. 'Good morning, Colonel ... No, I have not been attacked, kidnapped, tortured, a.s.sa.s.sinated or otherwise set upon ... Quite the contrary;. Positively cordial ... No, there was a newcomer. Romero Agnelli's brother. Genial mafia-type, quite friendly, really, rejoicing in the name of Leonardo Agnelli . . . Yes, it is rather splendid, isn't it, and yes, we've made some arrangements. I am engaged to blow up the royal palace at eight p.m. . . . No, sir, I do not jest.' He covered the mouthpiece and looked at the two startled, wide-eyed girls. 'I think the Colonel's drink has gone down the wrong way. Yes, sir, amatol. Triggered by a remote-controlled radio device, details of which I shall be receiving this evening ... Certainly I intend to do it. They're depending on me ... No, it's deep in the cellars. There will be no loss of life ... Very well.'

He covered the mouthpiece with one hand and gave his empty gla.s.s to Julie with the other. 'I'm to keep a respectful silence while he communes with himself before telling me what to do. I don't need telling and I almost certainly won't agree with what he suggests.' 'Blowing up the royal palace.' She looked at Julie who had just brought in the jenever bottle. 'The palace. Blowing it up. He's mad. You - you're a policeman!'

'A policeman's lot is a hard one. All things to all men. Yes, I'm listening!' There was a long pause. Julie and Annemarie studied his face covertly but closely, but he gave no indication as to what he was thinking although he did permit himself the occasional thoughtful expression as he sipped some more jenever.

'Yes, I understand. Alternatives. First, you can pull me off altogether and you have the means to ensure that I do this, so, of course, I would have to accept that decision. But there's a difference between pulling me off a job and putting me back on to it again. Should this prove to be the first in a series of bomb outrages - and you know better than anyone that those things almost invariably happen in cycles - then I should have to refuse to be a.s.signed to the investigation on the grounds that I was fortunate enough to be given the opportunity to investigate this group's activities and you denied me the opportunity ... Certainly, sir, you could ask for my resignation on the grounds of refusing to obey orders. I would refuse to resign. You'd have to fire me. And then, of course, you would have to explain to your minister that you fired me because you had made a mistake, because you had refused to listen to me, because you wouldn't give me the chance to stop what may be a new crime wave before it started, because you had backed your own judgement against mine and you had been wrong. Throw as many chestnuts as you like into the fire, Colonel. I refuse to pull them out. And I refuse to resign. Excuse me, sir.'

Julie had sat beside him on the bedside and had put both hands on his telephone arm as if trying to pull it away.

'Stop it, Peter, stop it.' Despite the fact that van Effen had prudently covered the mouthpiece, her voice was low, tense, urgent. 'You can't talk to the Colonel like that. Can't you see that you're putting tile poor man in an impossible situation?' Van Effen looked at Annemarie. From her compressed lips and slowly shaking head it was evident that she was of the same opinion as Julie. Van Effen looked back at his sister and she visibly recoiled from the expression on his face.

'Why don't you hear me out instead of indulging in a repet.i.tion of last night's unwarranted interference and blundering into things you know nothing about? You think he's in an impossible situation? Listen to what I say and judge what kind of position I'm in.' She slowly removed her hands and just looked at him, her expression uncomprehending. Van Effen raised the phone again.

'Forgive the interruption, Colonel. Julie says that I have no right to talk to you in this fashion and that I'm putting you in an impossible situation. Julie, alas, doesn't know what she's talking about. Annemarie, who is also here, agrees with her but she wouldn't know what she's talking about either. In fairness to them I must say that, judging by the way they are looking at each other, they don't think I know what I'm talking about either. You people are only on the periphery: I'm the man in the middle. An impossible situation, she says. Consider your alternative. 'I go ahead as planned with Agnelli and company. You, you say, will ensure my safety. In the first place you are duty-bound - you claim - to notify the royal household using as justification the many threats that have been made against the royal family in recent months. You will have the Dam square invisibly cordoned off by snipers. You will have anti-terrorist police squads inside die palace itself. It has apparently never occurred to you that those criminals have their moles and informants pretty thick on the ground and that the presence of even one extra policeman will be immediately reported. I have been warned that if any such thing happened they would know that there could have been only once source, one person, through whom this information reached the police. And I don't think - I know - that the palace security is pitiful and that those spies move freely within the gates. Lift that telephone to the palace, to your anti-terrorist squads, to any other policeman, and you might as well reach out for pen and paper and write down and sign my death warrant.' That was, van Effen was aware, pitching it rather strongly, extradition was the worst he had to face, even a.s.suming they had penetrated his disguise, which was uncertain. But now wasn't the moment for such niceties. 'Ensure my safety? You'll ensure my death, van Effen in a better world by midnight. What's one detective-lieutenant less just so long as your pettifogging rules and hidebound regulations are concerned? Maybe - no, I'm sure - that Julie and Annemarie don't like me very much at the moment but I think they'll have the grace to testify at the inquest that I did do my best to save my own miserable skin.

'That, of course, is the absolute worst scenario and I've no intention of being part of it. I've been thinking during our conversation and I've changed my mind about one thing. You've offered me two alternatives. One leads to being fired, the other to the old pine box. I'm not quite in my dotage yet and I think it would behove me to find some form of work where I'll be faced with threats of neither dismissal nor extinction. If you send one of your boys round to Julie's place I'll let him have my written resignation. At the same time I'll give him the tape-recording I had made in the Hunter's Horn this morning. I hope that you and your University friends will be able to make something of it and of the other tape-recorded telephone messages. Sorry about this, Colonel, but you leave me with no option: I seem to have run out of alternatives.' He replaced the telephone in the bedside cupboard and left the room.

When Julie and Annemarie rejoined him he was sitting relaxed in an armchair, legs crossed and jenever in hand. For a man who had just made such a momentous decision he seemed singularly unconcerned. Julie said: 'May I say something?'

'Certainly. Compared to what the Colonel said and what he is no doubt thinking at this moment your slings and arrows are as nothing.'

She smiled faintly. 'I haven't lost my senses or memory. I have no intention of being - how did you put it so charmingly last night - cool, clinical, superior and handing out unwanted and unsolicited advice. I am sorry for what I said in the bedroom. I didn't know you were in so impossible a situation. But if I go on to say that I also think you've put the Colonel in a fearful fix, you'll probably say that you appreciate that a lieutenant's life i ' s as nothing compared to the Colonel's finer feelings. Well, I still say I'm sorry, but

Annemarie interrupted. 'Julie?'

'Yes?'

'I wouldn't bother saying sorry to him again. I don't for a moment believe he's in an impossible situation. Look at him. He's getting high blood pressure through trying not to laugh out loud.' She gave him a considering glance. 'You're not very active. I thought you came through here to write out your resignation.'

He frowned, looked off into the middle distance, then said: 'I've no recollection of saying that.'

'That's because you never had any intention of writing out your resignation.'

'Well, well. We'll make a lady detective of you yet. You're quite right, my dear, I did not. How could I? How could I leave Uncle Arthur alone to cope with the rising wave of crime in Amsterdam? He needs me.' Annemarie said to Julie: 'If I were to say to him, that he is as Machiavellian as he is big-headed, do you think he would fire me? Or just try to reduce me to tears?'

Van Effen sipped his jenever. 'Fortunately, I am above such things. And you must never confuse Machiavelism with diplomacy, big-headedness with intelligence.'

'You're right, Annemarie. I'm sorry I said "sorry".' Julie looked at van Effen with something less than affection. 'And what are you going to do now?'

'Just sit. Waiting.'

'Waiting for what?'

'The phone. The Colonel.'

'The Colonel!'Julie said. 'After what you said to him?'

'After what he said to me, you mean.'

'You're going to have a very long wait.' Annemarie spoke with conviction. 'My dear children - or should I say babes in the wood - you sadly underestimate the Colonel. He is infinitely shrewder than either of you. He knows very well indeed what the score is. He's taking some time to make this call because he's figuring out a way to beat a strategic retreat without loss of dignity, peace with honour, if you will. Now there, if you like, does go a man with a Machiavellian cast of mind - after forty years battling with the underworld one does develop a certain cast of mind. I told the Colonel that he had left me with no place to go. De Graaf, being de Graaf, realised at once what I meant - that he had no place to go. I

Julie said: 'Seeing you're so clever, would you mind 'There's no need to be unpleasant. Look at me. I am treating you with unfailing courtesy- or should I say chivalry-'

'I suppose. What's the Colonel going to say?'

'That's on consideration - or on re-consideration - well, he's going to give me carte blanche. The 8 p.m. a.s.signation is on.' 'It would be nice to see you wrong for once,'Julie said. 'No, I didn't really mean that. I only hope you are wrong.'

For a time no one spoke. The girls kept looking at the telephone on the coffee table by van Effen's side. Van Effen wasn't looking at anything in particular. The phone rang.

Van Effen picked it up. 'Ah! Yes ... I accept that. that maybe I did step out of line. But 1 was provoked.' He winced and held the telephone some distance away from his ear. 'Yes, sir, you were provoked too ... Yes, I thoroughly agree. A very wise decision, if I may say so. . . Of course, you will be kept in the picture, sir ... No, they don't trust me ... Yes, sir, here. Goodbye.'

He hung up and looked at Julie. 'Why aren't you in the kitchen, my girl? Distinctly smell burning. 1 was asked for lunch -' 'Oh, do be quiet. What did lie say?' 'Carte blanche. 8 p.m.'

Julie looked at him , her face still, for what seemed a long time but could only have been a few seconds, then turned and went to the kitchen. Annemarie made a couple of steps towards him, stopped and said: 'Peter.'

'Don't say it. I've already got out of one difficult situation. Don't you and Julie put me in an impossible one.'

'We won't. I promise. You know that we can't help what we feel and you can't blame us for that. But you could blame us if we did start talking about it, so we won't. That's sure.' She smiled. 'Now, isn't that considerate.'

'Very. Do you know, Annemarie, I do believe I'm beginning to like you.' 'Like me?' She gave him a quizzical look. 'So you didn't even like me when you kissed me this morning? Absentmindedness, I suppose. Or do you just go around kissing policewomen as a matter of routine? Something to do with their morale, no doubt.'

'You're the first.'

'And, no doubt, the last. We all make mistakes, whatever I mean by that cryptic remark. Who do-Isn't trust you?'

'Who doesn't - what?'

'Something you said to the Colonel.'

'Ah. My criminal a.s.sociates. We parted at the Hunter's Horn professing mutual trust and faith. Didn't stop them from staking a man out at the Trianon. An irritation. No problem.'

'And after lunch?'

'Stay here a bit. The Colonel is going to call me. That will be after we hear what, if anything, the FFF have been up to at two o'clock. The Colonel is convinced that they will not blow up the Hagestein. Frogmen have found no traces of any underwater charges in position.' Van Effen called his office and asked for the desk sergeant. 'The men on Fred Kla.s.sen and Alfred van Rees. They called in at noon?' He listened briefly. 'So van Rees has lost our man. Chance or on purpose, it doesn't matter. I a.s.sume you have the licence number. All officers on patrol. Not to approach. just locate. Note this number and call me here.'

Lunch was an excellent but hardly festive meal. Julie and Annemarie were determinedly over-bright and over-cheerful and the harsh edges of strain occasionally showed through: if van Effen noticed anything amiss he made no comment: her brother, Julie knew, rarely missed anything.. They had coffee in the living-room. Shortly after two o'clock a young motor-cycle policeman came to collect the Hunter's Horn tape. Julie said: 'I hear that you are awaiting a call from the Colonel. After that?'

'Your bed, my dear, if I may. I don't know when I can expect to sleep tonight or even if I will sleep so I think an hour or two might be of some value. That hour or two, of course, would be helped along by the brandy you have - unaccountably - so far failed to offer me.'

The Colonel's call came when van Effen was halfway through his brandy. It was a brief call and one-sided. Van Effen said yes' several times, 'I see' a couple of times, then told the Colonel goodbye and hung up.

'The FFF blew up the North Holland d.y.k.e at exactly 2 p.m. Extensive flooding, but shallow and no lives lost. Not according to first reports. The Hagestein weir was not touched. As the Colonel says, he expected-this. The frogmen had located no charges and he is convinced that the FFF were unable either to approach the weir or conceal charges. He's further convinced that their blasting techniques are primitive and limited only to simple operations like blowing up d.y.k.es and ca.n.a.l banks.'