'I want to get a few things straight. What did you come up to talk about with Matt today? Don't worry, I'm not upset about being caught in flagrante deliclo! As I said, Matt and I are old friends. I just want to know what you're cooking up with him?'

He nodded. 'So that you can pa.s.s it all on to Mossad?' He stood in front of her, his hands hanging loosely at his sides. 'Why have you been following me, Jo?' She looked up at him, her face calm, determined. 'I think it's time you started answering some of my questions for a change. You still haven't told me what you spent all your time talking about with Matt?'

'I should ask him yourself- during your next bit of pillow-talk.'

She had taken off her scarf and sat shaking out her hair. 'Oh come on!

-'that's a bit cheap, isn't it?'

He took a step forward until his knees were almost touching her skirt. 'I slapped you around last night, Jo, because I was angry, and because I wanted you to talk. Well, you're going to do some more talking.'

She dropped her lower lip and gave a small laugh, both furtive and cunning.

'And if I don't feel like talking?'

'You didn't come up here just to hold hands. You're a big girl now.' He stood, still almost touching her, flexing the fingers of each hand. This wasn't quite what they'd prepared him for, all those years ago in Darkest Surrey, where -despite the propaganda of popular fiction - girls were still not accepted as part of the British undercover curriculum. The camp at Cobham, after all, had only been a step downmarket from White's Club and the Travellers.

Jo sat looking up at him with sly antic.i.p.ation. She didn't move, didn't speak: and Rawcliff, enervated by exhaustion and the jarring strain of his call to Judith, knew suddenly just how it would be, even before it happened - that there was nothing he could do to prevent it, even if he had wanted to, and that it was irrelevant anyway. Afterwards he had a remote image, in the dying light from the window, of her narrow haunches cleaved into hemispheres of brilliant white against the pale tan of her legs and shoulders, skin dry-cool in the muggy stillness as he closed with her in a skilful pa.s.sionless ritual, its timing perfectly synchronized, undistracted by sentiment, even affection.

He felt no shame, no guilt. Since involving Judith in the operation, he was now beyond such exemplary emotions. When it was over, all he felt was a dead utter tiredness.

He must have slept for only a few minutes. He watched Jo slip gracefully off the bed and move towards the shower cubicle; and he lay and stared out of the window, at the flat roof-tops with their fringe of washing-lines and TV aerials framed against the raw twilight. He heard the water stop, and saw her come back in and start quickly, methodically, hitching up her panties, smoothing her dress, reaching for her watch on the bedside table.

'If you were at the Post Office this evening, you must have seen Jim Ritchie?'

His voice had a thick disembodied sound, as though it came from somewhere outside him, from across the room.

She had put on her shoes and now sat stiffly on the edge of the bed. She might have been a secretary waiting for dictation. 'What did you say about Ritchie?'

He could not read between the dim lines of her profile and realized that he had not even kissed her.

'He was in the Post Office making a local call. Left just as I arrived - got into a big American car outside - the one I told you about last night - that followed me and Matt in from the airfield. Driven by a young man who's staying at the Sun Hall, third floor. Come on, Jo, you're a pro -you're supposed to find out about these things. Who is he? And who was the tall man in rimless gla.s.ses who drove up in the Mini?' She ran her fingers along the edge of the frayed counterpane. 'You expect an awful lot from me. And don't give much in return.' But there was a cynical tone to the words and he did not respond. 'Oh all right, what the h.e.l.l! The young fellow you saw in the car is called Klein. He's got dual American-Israeli nationality.'

'How do you know?'

'You forget that I have contacts with the Israelis. I told last night.' And Klein's another of their agents?'

She shook her head.-'It's not as simple as that.'

'My G.o.d, I hope not!'

'Klein's what's known in the trade as an "information-broker". What you'd call a "double" - or perhaps a "treble", in Klein's case - which is not unusual in this part of the world. He peddles to the Americans and to the Mossad, and occasionally even to the Russians, when they ask for it. He's tolerated because he's useful all round. It's one of the ways Washington - and Moscow - keep tabs on what the Israelis and Arabs are up to. For instance, if one side wants to fly a kite - say, a new initiative involving the PLO, or some other sensitive issue - they'd use Klein as middle-man. He's trusted enough for the other side to believe him. But if they don't like what he tells them - or there's a press leak and a big international row - n.o.body is officially to blame. The ministers and diplomats concerned can honestly claim no knowledge of the business - they'd never dirty their hands dealing with a little s.h.i.t like Klein. That's left to the small-fry - the stringers.'

'Like you? And young Jim Ritchie, so it seems?'

Rawcliff had put on his trousers and took a clean shirt out of his suitcase which lay on the floor still half-unpacked. 'And what about the tall man from the Mini?'

'I don't know who he is. I've never seen him before.'

'Why not ask your friend Ritchie?'

'No. I'm sorry, but it's not in the rules of the game. And unless you know the rules, you just can't hope to understand.'

'I'm doing my best.' He didn't like being patronized by pretty girls who came uninvited into his room while he was taking a shower and provoked him with their neat little naked b.u.ms, then lectured him with a lot of big-talk from the inside-track of the Intelligence racket. Jo was either too ingenious, or too b.l.o.o.d.y crafty. Both ways, he didn't like it.

He stood b.u.t.toning up his sleeveless shirt, letting it hang loose over his trousers. 'So you say it's all a game? Which is what I've always believed about the so-called spy-world.

Neither side has any secrets left any more - none worth guarding, anyway. Most of the technical stuff has usually been published somewhere, if you know where to look. And she really big info, like troop build-ups and rocket-silos, is all monitored by satellite. But the Intelligence people have to do something to justify themselves, so they play around with young amateurs like you and Ritchie, buying and selling the odd t.i.t-bit of hush-hush information, thus making everyone feel important and satisfied. Only people on the outside, likeme, don't feel so satisfied. For a start, who's Ritchie working for?'

'For us, I should think. I mean, the British. Strictly short-term contract - to buy himself insurance, or "good-will", as our authorities prefer to call it. Which in Ritchie's case probably means a guarantee of immunity next time there's a rip-off that he's running over a load of hash in that little plane of his.' She smiled: 'Don't look so surprised! It happens all the time. You don't have to be a big-shot in the art world any more, working for both the Kremlin and the Palace, to get the preferential treatment. Whitehall's much more democratic these days.' She tried to smile again, but was inhibited by the look in Rawcliffs eyes.

'Listen, Jo. This isn't a game, and these aren't t.i.tbits you're buying and selling through Klein. This is a big, serious, nasty operation, and there may be many thousands of lives at stake - mine included. While at least two members of the operation - leaving out Matt for the moment - are busy blowing it to the Israelis, the British, the Americans -even the Russians, if what you say about Klein is true.'

She had again begun sucking the knuckles of her hand, which he took to be a sign of nervousness. .

'You can't just let it hang out like this, Jo. What's Ritchie told Klein?' She said nothing. 'What have you told Klein? You're going to tell me. And you may get more than just a spanking before you do.'

She had taken her hand from her mouth, and said quietly, 'I haven't had anything to do with Klein. I deal direct through my contact in Rome.'

'But you must know what Ritchie's told him? You're a friend of his, for Christ's sake! You're at home in his London pad - and you're both in the same racket.'

'You don't understand. It's one of the first rules that we don't swap info between ourselves.'

'What about Matt? Haven't you talked to him?' He realized it was the first time that he'd thought seriously about Matt, since Jo had arrived, but he certainly wasn't going to start having a sense of remorse on his account.

After all, the American had been a willing accomplice in involving Judith, and Rawcliff felt a sudden irrational hatred of the man.

'Leave Matt out of this,' Jo said.

'Like h.e.l.l I will! Matt's got his own line to the CIA, if he chooses to use it.'

'Matt's neutral. I'm sure he is.'

'No one's neutral - not in this operation. But even if Matt isn't officially on the US payroll, that still leaves you and Ritchie. Now, since you won't level with me about Ritchie, I'll just have to a.s.sume for the moment that you and he know about as much, or as little, about the operation as each other.

Ritchie may be working for the British, but he's also feeding his stuff through Klein. And if Klein is what you say he is, that means that Washington and Whitehall - even Moscow, G.o.d help us! - must all know what you've told the Israelis. But you said last night that all you'd done was keep your friend in Rome up-to-date on the operation?'

'That's right. Honest to G.o.d.' Rawcliff clamped his jaw shut, controlling his temper. He took a deep breath, then said slowly, 'And you've no idea if the Israelis know what the operation is all about?'

'No. They'd never tell me anyway. They just say "thanks, and keep up the good work".'

'If they do know,' said Rawcliff, 'why don'4 they do something about it?

They've got enough friends in Washington to be able to lean on the Cypriots, however much the local big-boys have been paid to keep their noses out of it.

Unless, of course, they don't want to know?'

This time she did smile. 'Clever Mr Rawcliff! And if Jerusalem doesn't know, or doesn't want to know, you can be sure n.o.body else does.'

'All of which seems to suggest an unofficial operation that has everyone's tacit blessing?'

'It rather does, doesn't it?' She stood up. 'Perhaps it's as simple as that.

Or as unsimple.'

'Why have you told me all this, Jo? It's not because you're really that frightened of me, is it? What I'd do to you is nothing to what Peters would think up, if he ever found out.'

'I trust you. You're an innocent outsider, but you're also one of the team - and I've got a pretty good idea that you don't like the way things are going any more than I do. But my hands are tied. I just do what Jerusalem tells me.

You can do as you please - although I'm certain that the last person you'd confide in is Peters. He's just waiting to get even with you - to hang you up by your b.a.l.l.s, and take his time doing it. And don't think you can buy any favours from him, by blowing me and Ritchie, or even Matt. Peters isn't that type. It would be enough for him that you'd even been talking to any of us.'

She had picked up her headscarf from the bed and turned towards the door. 'I suppose I just have to take your word that you were ringing your wife this evening?'

'The Post Office'll have a docket of the number. I was ringing her at work - if you're thinking of checking.'

'I will, don't worry.'

He stood for a long time staring down at the unmade bed. She had left the room so softly that he had not even heard the door close behind her.

Nine.

From Judith Rawcliff's point of view, her husband's telephone call, coming in the middle of that Tuesday afternoon, could not have been more inconvenient or less helpful. She had a stack of world sugar forecasts to finish by tomorrow evening; and he had interrupted her with an urgent demand that managed to be both vague and complex - a task which at best was going to keep her on the telephone for several hours. Nor had his call done the least to rea.s.sure her: indeed, far from resolving the riddle of his disappearance, it had merely deepened the mystery. He had hung up before she had been able to ask him wherehe was in Cyprus, let alone what he was doing there.

He had just said that it was very important: and while he had still given no direct hint that it was anything illegal, even criminal, she decided to do as much groundwork as she could without involving any of her colleagues or superiors in the company. At this stage she did not even enlist the help of her secretary.

She began by making a full list of the main London mapping libraries. Beside the British Library, at the British Museum, and the Royal Geographical Society, the only official Government source available to the public was the Directorate of Overseas Surveys, attached to the Ministry of Overseas Development, whose offices were out in Surbiton. Typically, they closed at 4.30, and the information was disclosed by appointment only. She risked using the company's name to get through to a senior official in the cartographical department, who told her that the only parts of the Middle East to have been recently surveyed was the Yemen Arab Republic - otherwise, non-Communist North Yemen - and large chunks of Sinai, which had been covered by a joint Israeli-Egyptian-oil prospecting team, working together in the 'new spirit of Camp David'.

She made a provisional arrangement to drive out tomorrow during her lunch-break. Her husband had not mentioned the Yemen, telling her to "concentrate on Egypt and the north of Saudi Arabia; but he had also specified the area around the Red Sea, which included both North Yemen and the South, Marxist, Soviet-infiltrated Peoples' Democratic Republic of the Yemen.

She drew a blank at the British Library and at the Royal Geographical Society, although she was able to discover that a firm called 'Hunting Surveys' had made a geodetic survey of Saudi Arabia back in 1970; but they had no report of anyone recently inquiring about the information, or of using any data for computer work.

That left her with the Copyright libraries, all outside London - in Edinburgh, Oxford and Cambridge, and at Aberystwyth. But it was already getting late. And she cursed her delinquent husband and those sugar quotas. She couldn't stay on late at the office, because of collecting Tom from the baby-minder; while her boss, a hyper-active American called Cy Reynolds had demanded those 'futures'

forecasts by six o'clock tomorrow. But, knowing him, he'd then probably forget to use them for another week or ten days. At least she knew her way around Cy; and in spite of everything, her husband had to come first. In the end, he always did.

He had told her that she had, at the very outside, forty-eight hours, but that he would call her again at home tomorrow at eight in the evening.

She now had two deadlines to meet. It was almost five o'clock, and she had made no progress in either direction. She unlocked a drawer of her desk and took out a packet of cigarettes. It was her first for three weeks; but self-denial had its limits. The cigarette made her feel bolder, and slightly sinful. She now decided to try her computer contacts direct.

There was a man at the University of London Computer Centre, called Matlock, who owed her a couple of favours. She caught him just as he was leaving. He had never heard of a Tetra-Lipp Retropilot, but guessed that it might be something to do with missiles, and said he didn't think she'd get much joy out of the Ministry of Defence, even if the thing wasn't still strictly cla.s.sified.

Although Judith had no idea what her husband was playing at, she was shrewdenough to guess that - if only for his wretched sake - she must steer well clear of the military establishment in Whitehall. Even Surbiton might be getting too close.

She read out to Matlock the full details which her husband had given her. He replied that it sounded like a very big specialized job, and that he himself knew of only two computers in the country capable of processing such data at source. One was an ICL 1902 belonging to the Directorate of Military Surveys, which sounded a great deal too official -both for her, and for this job. The other took her back to the old DOS out in Surbiton.

Matlock was apologizing for not being more helpful, when he remembered something, and told her to hang on. She was already on her third cigarette when he came back.

It was a long shot, he said, but he happened to have heard from a colleague that over four months ago - around June, he thought it was - one of the Centre's own computers, a PDF 11/35, had been used for a huge run, transferring already processed source-data on to tape. He couldn't say offhand who had commissioned the job, but he'd heard that the data itself originated from a small private mapping firm that specialized in geodetic surveys, mostly for the big oil companies. He agreed that this might tie in with the Middle East. The name of the firm was AREX Surveys, with offices off the Charing Cross Road.

She thanked him, and he promised that if he heard anything more he'd let her know. When she hung up it was just gone 5.15. She called AREX Surveys., but there was no answer. That would have to wait until tomorrow. And by then, the deadline would be eighteen hours closer.

Tomorrow, Wednesday, looked like being a long day.

Ten.

Rawcliff on that Wednesday morning, woke, dazzled by a spear of sunlight from between the shutters. Outside, the weather was bright and calm, the sky a clear blue. The beginning of a perfect Mediterranean winter's day.

Downstairs he found Ryderbeit and Thurgood engrossed in a game of 'spoof. From their expressions, it was evident dial Ryderbeit was winning handsomely. He was leering and cackling at his opponent; while Thurgood's long pale face was flushed with blotches, and his bulging eyes had a cloudy look. He kept shifting on his chair, his fingers drumming on die table and the nerve tugging at his left eye. Occasionally. he would break off the game to scratch himself vigorously on both arms, and at his shoulders and chest; then would pinch his moustache and say, with bogus hilarity, and in an accent that was a cross between Bertie Wooster and those pre-war BBC commentators - a preposterous drawl, abruptly clipped at the end, 'd.a.m.n well played, Sammy! By Jove, you had me there!'

Rawcliff remembered that back in London Terry Mason had told him, only last week, of how Thurgood sometimes got these 'turns', when he was in the habit of a.s.suming a parady of what Mason had called an 'Oxford accent' -hinting that they usually portended some drastic and unpredictable behaviour on Thurgood's part.

The man totally ignored Rawcliff, as he sat down beside diem. Ryderbeitoffered him a gla.s.s of neat ouzo, but Rawcliff declined. 'We may have to fly soon, Sammy.'

The Rhodesian jabbed a sharp fingernail into Rawcliffs ribs. 'Don't nanny me, soldier. I know how to drink and I know how to fly. I also know how to play spoof. The Flight-Lieutenant here now owes me precisely two thousand, eight hundred and fifty pounds. And he's b.l.o.o.d.y well going to pay me, too!'

'You're a thumping fine fellow!' Thurgood said, wincing and scratching his shoulders and arms.

Rawcliff ordered a double Turkish coffee and yoghurt.

Thurgood had lost another five hundred pounds to Ryderbeit when the phone jangled behind the bar. Taki came out. 'Mr Sammy, sir, telephone!'

While Ryderbeit went to the back of the room, Thurgood began his scratching routine again. Rawcliff asked him what the trouble was.

'Bites, old man. d.a.m.n well bitten all over, I am.' He undid his shirt and pulled it wide open. Rawcliff stared aghast. The whole of the man's torso was covered in a livid network of pustules, strangely reminiscent of a map of the London Underground system, each station represented by a dark swelling, capped with a yellow head, and linked by red weals.

'Christ. Those aren't bites,' Rawcliff said, as Ryderbeit came strolling back.

'Right children! That was Peters. We're off the ground and flying.'

'Just take a look at Thurgood's chest,' said Rawcliff.

Thurgood was holding his shirt proudly open. 'Itches like the billyoh!'

Ryderbeit peered down at him. 'Holy Moses, you better get that seen to, Flight-Lieutenant. And make sure you keep well away from me. It's either scurvy or the bubonic plague!'

'I say, do you really think so, old man?'