The Memory Trap Read Online Free Page A

Italian escort, whose shiny crumpled suit had shouted ‘Policeman’ in confirmation of those recent passenger-suspicions. ‘Good flight?’
    ‘What are all those soldiers doing?’ Audley pointed past Mitchell.
    ‘Don’t worry. They’re not your reception committee.’ Mitchell waved an acknowledgement to shiny suit, who was hovering beside the rearmost car. ‘There’s some sort of anti-terrorist scare in progress … although they’re calling it “an exercise”, like the SURE one you must have seen at Heathrow.’ He re-directed the wave to the front car. ‘So everyone’s being screened and searched.’ Now he opened the passenger door. ‘Everyone except us, that is … Get in, David, there’s a good fellow … No, we’re cleared to go out by the back entrance, with these special branch types for protection.’
    Audley regarded the small battered Fiat with distaste.
    ‘Yes … well, I’m sorry about the transport.’ Mitchell grinned ruefully at him. ‘Only, I wanted to drive you, so we could talk. And this was all they could find at short notice. But … it is unobtrusive. And I have put the seat back as far as it’ll go, anyway.’
    ‘What about my bags?’ Mitchell’s rather strained cheerfulness was almost as irritating as the Fiat. ‘And where’s Elizabeth?’
    ‘Elizabeth is chatting up the local cops and the Guardia di Finanza .’ Mitchell circled the car. ‘She’ll be meeting us along the coast. And your bags are being held at the airport. Don’t worry.’
    So that was the last of his luggage, thought Audley. But, although he couldn’t see what the Italian customs service had to do with Peter Richardson, it was perhaps as well that Elizabeth was elsewhere, because there certainly wasn’t room for her in the back of this car. ‘I’m not worrying. Just tell me about Peter Richardson.’
    The car started with a jerk which banged his knees against the dashboard.
    ‘Damn! Sorry!’ Mitchell struggled with the gear-box. ‘This isn’t exactly what I’ve been used to—it drives in Italian … or maybe Neapolitan—ah!’
    Mitchell’s pride and joy at home was a second-hand Porsche, which he had got cheaply for cash after the stock market crash, Audley remembered. Tell me about Peter Richardson, Mitchell.’
    ‘Major Richardson—?’ Mitchell flogged the car to catch up with the unmarked police vehicle ahead. ‘I thought you were the expert on the elusive Major, David?’
    Audley’s heart sank. So far from being an expert, he still thought of Peter Richardson as Captain , not Major . But, of course, that last promotion had been Fred Clinton’s work at the time of the fellow’s departure, as a sop to their mutual feelings of still more-or-less friendly regret. But that wasn’t what mattered so much as the adjective Mitchell had added. ‘What d’you mean “elusive”? Haven’t you found him?’
    The Fiat juddered to a halt, within inches of the leading car which had stopped at what was now a heavily defended exit, complete with a brace of light tanks.
    ‘Yes … well … “yes-and-no” is the answer to that, David.’ Mitchell peered through the dirty windscreen, watching the Italian special branch arguing with the Italian army. ‘Or, rather, “no-and-yes”, more accurately.’
    Audley felt his temper begin to slip, but then checked it. Of all his colleagues, apart from Jack Butler himself, he knew Paul Mitchell best. So now he could recognize the tell-tale signs under that accustomed casualness, for all that the man’s eyes were concealed behind sunglasses. And the 30-millimetre cannon which was more or less pointing at them at this minute no more accounted for those whitened knuckles on the hands of the steering-wheel than did the little car’s gearbox account for that bruising start.
    ‘Uh-huh?’ If Paul Mitchell was frightened, then perhaps Jack Butler was right—and perhaps he ought to be properly frightened too. But fear was in itself a debilitating influence,