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  “How could I get off the hook Frank?” Grindley said trying to search out what might be in the other’s  mind.

  Labied stood up. “Come with me,” he said stepping over Merouze’s body and going into the room where they had found Cross. Grindley didn’t want to go in there again. Labied’s voice came from inside. “Get your ass in here Jonathan. I’m not fooling around. If I’m going to risk my neck for you, then you’d damned well better be here to give me a hand.” Grindley started to protest. “Shut your fucking mouth and get in here.” Grindley gingerly stepped across Merouze and joined his friend.

  He watched Labied un-stick one of the bonds from the Gulliver book and fold it carefully until it was no more than an a few inches across. Labied took a small penknife from his pocket and moved over to Cross’s body. “Help me move him on to his back,” he told Grindley who knew better than to argue. The two men manhandled the corpse until Labied was able to get at a jacket pocket. He pulled out the pocket and used his penknife to slit the stitches that held the material together. He pushed the folded bond through the slit until it fell into the lining of Cross’s jacket.

  It wasn’t over. Labied cautiously opened the door to the corridor and peered out. The coast was clear. By the lifts he found a service room, inside was a big laundry cart, the type that staff used for soiled linen. It was empty. He wheeled it back into the room. It took them longer than it should have to get Cross’s body into the cart. Grindley was not as useful as he might have been. Labied stripped the sheets off all the beds in the suite and covered the body as best he could. It was time to go. Once more checking the corridor they wheeled the cart out and left it where Labied had found it. To Grindley it seemed an age before they were down the stairs and out into the street. When they had put a few blocks between them and the hotel, Labied made a call.

  They found a taxi and headed back into New Delhi. It was late; there was no chance of getting a flight out that night. Labied checked them into the Marriott. He made an excuse about lost luggage and they were quickly shown to a comfortable room.

  Grindley was all out but Labied was full of energy. “I called our duty team,” he told his companion. They should get Cross’s body away before the local police find Merouze and his pal.”

  Grindley shook his head. “I don’t understand what’s going on Frank,” he said hopelessly.

  Labied gave him a pitying look. “It’s simple. Our boys will pick up Cross. We both report things exactly as they happened except we leave out the bit about planting the bond. They’ll go through Cross’s stuff with a fine toothed comb and of course find what we want them to. It will be assumed that Cross was involved in some way. You’ll be off the hook. I told you, it’s simple.”

  Grindley still looked confused. “But what about Cross’s people? I mean his family. We’ve ruined an innocent man’s memory, his reputation.” It occurred to Labied that Grindley was making a career of his miserable act.

  “Not a bit of it. Of course it will be noted that Cross may have been a crook or even a double. They’ll look like hawks at all his contacts and everyone and everything he worked with but they won’t find anything because there isn’t anything to find. There won’t be a word to his family or to anyone outside the highest levels in the department. The people at Delhi station who find the evidence will be sworn to secrecy and more than likely Cross will get an award at a ceremony to which his family will be invited. The pension due to his next of kin, if any, will be paid in full.” Labied smiled at Grindley who had swapped his miserable face for his incredulous look. “You look all in,” Labied went on, “Get your head down for a few hours and be ready to roll by seven. I‘ve a few loose ends to tie up before then.” He went out of the door.

  Grindley was left alone to ponder the incredible events of the day. Before he slept he put a call through to his lady in England. If her husband answered he would put down the phone but it was her voice that greeted him at the end of the line. Tired as he was, they spoke for an hour.

  Inspector Ram Chand slammed his hand down on his desk. It made both Grindley and the sergeant jump. “Why do you persist with this rubbish about oil companies and petty claims?” The inspector shouted at him across the room. He tried to rise but the sergeant pushed him back into his chair. “Up to now we have behaved like gentlemen with a lot more courtesy than you have shown our distinguished Egyptian guests.” Poor Grindley was once again confused. “For God’s sake Mr Wickham, or whatever your real name is, don’t treat us like fools. We know all about your little games at the Azad last night. Even now my men are combing the area for your accomplice.”

  “I have told you my name is Jonathan Wickham. I am on assignment for Neural Oil. I am a British citizen and I demand that I be allowed to make contact with the British consul.” Grindley tried to sound outraged.

  “You can demand nothing,” Ram Chand flung back at him. “We are only a small station here but when they come and take you to Delhi Central you will find they have very persuasive methods.” He took a different tack, his voice softened. “Be reasonable Mr Wickham. Consider this the start of the plea bargaining process. I have signed statements from the hotel desk clerk, three maids and the doorman who all saw you in the hotel last night. The taxi driver who drove you to the Marriott has also come forward. Mr Khan and Mr Wazir are both shot dead. We have the gun, an illegal weapon by the way – maximum penalty for that alone is twenty years - that we took from your pocket. Your victim’s hotel room was covered in your prints and, piece-de-resistance, I have a valuable child’s book, valuable I might add to the tune of almost two million US dollars, that we found in your hotel room. You are a dead man Mr Wickham, a dead man. In fact we need nothing from you except the names and current whereabouts of the other persons involved. All of which will be forthcoming in due course I have no doubt.”

  The inspector fished into his pocket and pulled out a scrap of paper. “And, while you are filling us in on your nefarious deeds, you might like to enlighten us as to the significance of this.” He read from the scrap. “Have you seen the Brough – he pronounced it ‘brow’ - engine at the railway museum? The Quatab Minar at sunset is more my sort of thing. And last but not least. You must see locomotive RB-forty-nine, it’s quite a sight. Perhaps you could let us all in on the code Mr Wickham.”

  Grindley recognised the piece of paper on which he had written the phrases Cross had given him. Like a bloody fool he had forgotten to destroy it. His head dropped on to his chest.

  The inspector was enjoying his moment of triumph. “The only thing that might save you from hanging is revealing the location of the drugs. Tomorrow I will organise a thorough search of the Railway Museum but tomorrow will be too late for you my friend.”

  They’d obviously got hold of the wrong end of the stick but putting them right by telling him he was a British agent on a secret mission was hardly likely to have them clapping in the aisles and sending him away with hugs and kisses. Grindley remained silent. “Take him back to his cell,” the inspector told the sergeant in disgust.

  Grindley squatted in the corner of his tiny and unimaginably filthy cell. This time he was truly fucked. He could see no way out. The inspector and two sergeants had come to his room at the Marriott, almost it seemed, before his head had touched the pillow although in fact it had been six in the morning. They had asked him nothing except his name and then had summarily bundled him out of the hotel and into a police Jeep, much to the amusement of the tourists in the lobby. There had been a cursory identification session when they had brought him to this police station in what seemed like the wilds. The inspector had filled half a side of paper with a few details and they had flung him into a cell. A few hours later he had been pulled out to face the brief interrogation he had just experienced. Now he was back in the hole and about to be collected and taken, he had no doubt, to bigger and better things. Somehow or other it had gone spectacularly wrong. At any moment he expected to hear the sound of Frank Labied being thrown into the cell next to his.

  As if on cue there was an enormous commotion somewhere in the building. A few moments later a door opened and he fancied he heard a number of policemen bring in another prisoner. There