- 13 -

“What time is it?”

My eyes wouldn’t focus and my head was bursting, but when the door to our little room creaked open and the overhead light went on, that was the only question my lips could frame. A lot depended on the answer.

“Just after midnight ,” said Pudd’n’s voice. His broad and amiable face was better to wake up to than Dixie ’s vicious leer. “Eyes open now. Zan’s talked to Scouse, an’ she needs a few words with you.”

He may have looked friendly, but the gun in his great hand told a different story. Ameera and I sat up wearily. I blinked and squinted at the unshaded light, a single forty-watt bulb in the multisocket bracket.

“Couldn’t it wait until morning? We need to get some sleep.”

“We want to finish this before morning,” said Zan. She was standing in the doorway, just behind Pudd’n, and despite the hour she looked fresh and alert. She had changed from blouse and skirt to a clinging purple robe that hugged her figure and showed off her clear olive complexion, and her eyes and lips were freshly made up. She moved forward to stand in front of Pudd’n, always slightly to the side so that we were covered by the gun.

I touched Ameera on her arm. She sat up on the bed and swung her bare feet lightly to the floor.

“Please. I must go to the lavatory. Now.”

Zan and Pudd’n looked at each other. “Take her,” said Zan after a moment.

“What, me?” protested Pudd’n. “She’s a woman, you oughter do it.”

Zan shook her head. “I have to talk to Salkind — Scouse’s orders. You can leave me the gun, if you’re worried about him getting awkward.”

“An’ what about me? You know we’re not supposed to be unarmed.”

Zan looked from Pudd’n’s great frame to Ameera’s five-foot nothing, and gave a slow and lovely smile. “Pudd’n, if she beats you up I’ll look after the wounds myself.”

Pudd’n was not amused. He handed the gun to Zan, stepped forward, and took Ameera by the hand. “Come on, Missie. Let’s get you taken care of an’ back here. Hey, Zan, Dixie ought to bring her back. You know I’ve got to get stuff ready for Scouse. I’ll be up all night as it is.”

Zan frowned. “I suppose so. Tell him to bring food for these two when he comes.”

“Yeah.” Pudd’n grinned at me. “He’ll love doin’ that. Don’t worry, I’ll keep an eye on him an’ make sure he doesn’t try an’ poison yer.”

Zan waited until he was out of the room and the door had been closed before she spoke.

“I think I have a surprise for you. Scouse believes your story.”

“It’s not a story.”

“He believes that Leo Foss is dead, that you are his brother, and that you truly do not know where the Belur Package was left. Why would you come back here, he argues, unless you were trying to find the Belur Package?”

“Full marks for Scouse. So far he’s spot on.”

Zan nodded thoughtfully and leaned forward. “But he knows there must be more. First, you know that the package exists.”

“Damn it, your bunch told me that, back in London .”

She ignored the interruption. “Obviously, you also know the value of the package. And in order for you to come here, you must have received information about where to come. Leo must have told you that. Perhaps at the time of the helicopter crash? That detail is less important. Scouse wants to offer you a deal. We will pool the information, yours and ours, and look for the package together. You will share in the profits from its sale.”

“What makes you think that I have more information?” This conversation was not going the way that I had planned. Instead of convincing Zan to break with the gang, I was being recruited myself.

“When you left England , you disappeared for two weeks. You could have been travelling around India , but Scouse is convinced that you actually went to Leo’s house, the one we have never been able to locate.”

I felt a surge of satisfaction. At least one of my brother’s plans had worked out as he intended. His hideaway was still hidden.

“You’re making an awful lot of assumptions.”

“Scouse is an awfully intelligent man. Somewhere in that house there will be the evidence to show what your brother did with the Belur Package. He is convinced of that. You realize that the chips are worth hundreds of millions, and that we can hold a secret auction for them once we have them? So which is it to be — prompt cooperation, or agony for you and the girl until you agree to take us to the house?” She licked at her full lips and shivered a little as she spoke.

“Not much of a choice, is it?” I tried to sound calm. “But I’ll have to think about it for an hour or two.”

“No.” She shook her head firmly, as cool as though we were discussing the choice of dishes for a lunch menu. “You will decide at once. You were left here alone long enough to think about this situation. Decide now.”

She slapped her hand firmly on her thigh, and as she did so Ameera reappeared in the doorway with Dixie scowling behind her. He had no gun, but his knife blade was poised a couple of inches from her kidneys.

I sighed, and stood up slowly. Ameera and I could have used another few minutes alone, but that would be denied to us.

“All right. I know when I’m beaten. We’ll cooperate with you. But let’s do it upstairs, away from this damned room, and you can give us some food. We’re starving down here.”

I moved forward, slowly enough so that Dixie wouldn’t get the wrong idea, and stood in the middle of the room a step away from Ameera. Dixie and Zan moved to cover my back, knife and gun both ready for use.

“When can I start walking?” I asked, and as I spoke I lowered my hands a few inches towards my pockets.

“Stop that,” barked Dixie . “Get them hands up above your head, where we can see what you’re doin’ with ’em.”

“Oh, take it easy.” I looked over my shoulder at him. My pulse was up about a hundred and fifty, but some detached corner of my intellect controlled my actions and made them smooth and precise. “You know we’re not armed. What do you think we’re going to do, fly away?”

As I spoke I followed his orders and raised my arms high over my head. The light fixture was directly above me.

Now or never! Don’t stop to think about consequences. As my right hand went up I slid the short length of bedspring out of my sleeve and thrust it up hard into one of the empty light sockets in the ceiling bracket.

There was a sputter of hot sparks onto the back of my neck, and a tingling shock through the cloth that protected my hand. Then all the lights went out.

I had used the last moment before darkness came to fix my attention on Ameera’s position. As Dixie swore behind me, I grabbed her hand in mine and squeezed it hard. We had agreed that neither one of us would speak unless we were absolutely forced to. She turned and we began to run back along the corridor, as I allowed myself to be drawn in whatever direction she chose.

There was a flash as the gun went off behind us, and a shrill scream of fear from Dixie — I could see his point of view, he wasn’t holding the pistol. Then Ameera hissed “Stairs,” at me, and we were staggering up the long flight as fast as we could go. We had removed our shoes before Zan and Pudd’n arrived, so our run made little noise. One of my big fears was that Pudd’n would be waiting for us on the ground floor.

A turn, a mad dash scraping along the wall of a corridor, and then we were moving down another staircase. Another one of my fears was ready to be tested — it seemed certain to me that Belur’s lab would be on its own circuit, even if everything else in the house came through a single fuse. We might have to face the danger of a lighted corridor.

We came safely past that area. All the lab lights must have been turned off.

The dusty glass panel in the front door gave me my first sense of position. As Ameera ran towards it and halted, gasping and shivering two feet from the threshold, I squeezed her hand again.