“I need to be sure. That’s why I have to go with you.”
Behind the mask Zack stared at Quinn in disbelief. He gave a grating laugh.
“See that man behind you? One word and he blows you away. Then we take the stones anyway.”
“You could try,” admitted Quinn. “Ever seen one of these?”
He opened his raincoat all the way down, took something that hung free from near his waist and held it up.
Zack studied Quinn and the assembly strapped to his chest over his shirt, and swore softly but violently.
From below his sternum to his waist, Quinn’s front was occupied by the flat wooden box of what had once contained liqueur chocolates. The bonbons were gone, along with the box’s lid. The tray of the box formed a flat container strapped with surgical tape across his chest.
In the center was the velour package of diamonds, framed on each side by a half-pound block of tacky beige substance. Jammed into one of the blocks was a bright-green electrical wire, the other end of which ran to one of the spring-controlled jaws of the wooden clothespin Quinn held aloft in his left hand. It went through a tiny hole bored in the wood, to emerge inside the jaws of the peg.
Also in the chocolate box was a PP3 nine-volt battery, wired to another bright green cord. In one direction the green cord linked both blocks of beige substance to the battery; in the other direction the wire ran to the opposite jaw of the clothespin. The jaws of the pin were held apart by a stub of pencil. Quinn flexed the fingers of his hand; the stub of pencil fell to the floor.
“Phony,” said Zack without conviction. “That’s not real.”
With his right hand Quinn twisted off a blob of the light-brown substance, rolled it into a ball, and tossed it across the floor to Zack. The criminal stooped, picked it up, and sniffed. The odor of marzipan filled his nostrils.
“Semtex,” he said.
“That’s Czech,” said Quinn. “I prefer RDX.”
Zack knew enough to know all explosive gelatins both look and smell like the harmless confection marzipan. There the difference ends. If his man opened fire now they would all die. There was enough plastic explosive in that box to clear the floor of the warehouse clean, lift off the roof, and scatter the diamonds on the other side of the Thames.
“Knew you were a bastard,” said Zack. “What do you want?”
“I pick up the pencil, put it back, climb into the trunk of the car, and you drive me to see the boy. No one followed me. No one will. I can’t recognize you, now or ever. You’re safe enough. When I see the kid alive, I dismantle this and give you the stones. You check them through; when you’re satisfied, you leave. The kid and I stay imprisoned. Twenty-four hours later you make an anonymous phone call. The fuzz comes to release us. It’s clean, it’s simple, and you get away.”
Zack seemed undecided. It was not his plan, but he’d been outmaneuvered and he knew it. He reached into the side pocket of his track suit and pulled out a flat black box.
“Keep your hand up and those jaws open. I’m going to check you out for wiretaps.”
He approached and ran the circuit detector over Quinn’s body from head to foot. Any live electrical circuit, of the kind contained in an emitting direction f
inder or wiretap, would have caused the detector to give out a shrill whoop. The battery in the bomb Quinn wore was dormant. The original briefcase would have triggered the detector.
“All right,” said Zack. He stood back, a yard away. Quinn could smell the man’s sweat. “You’re clean. Put that pencil back, and climb in the trunk.”
Quinn did as he was bid. The last light he saw was before the large rectangular lid of the trunk came down on him. Air holes had already been punched in the floor to accommodate Simon Cormack three weeks earlier. It was stuffy but bearable and, despite his length, large enough, provided he remained crouched in fetal position—which meant he nearly gagged from the smell of almonds.
Though he could not see it, the car swung in a U-turn, and the gunman ran forward and climbed into the backseat. All three men removed their masks and track-suit tops, revealing shirts, ties, and jackets. The track-suit tops went into the back, on top of the Skorpion machine pistol. When they were ready, the car glided out of the warehouse, Zack himself now back behind the wheel, and headed toward their hideaway.
It took an hour and a half to reach the attached garage of the house forty miles out of London. Zack drove always at the proper speed, his companions upright and silent in their seats. For both these men it had been their first time out of the house in three weeks.
When the garage door was closed, all three men pulled on their track suits and masks, and one went into the house to warn the fourth. Only when they were ready did Zack open the trunk of the Volvo. Quinn was stiff, and blinked in the electric light of the garage. He had removed the pencil from the jaws of the clothespin and held it in his teeth.
“All right, all right,” said Zack. “No need for that. We’re going to show you the kid. But when you go through the house you wear this.”
He held up a cowled hood. Quinn nodded. Zack pulled it over Quinn’s head. There was a chance they would try to rush him, but it would take only a fraction of a second to release his grip on the open clothespin. They led him, left hand aloft, through into the house, down a short passage and then some cellar steps. He heard three loud knocks on a door of some kind, then a pause. He heard a door creak open and he was pushed into a room. He stood there alone, hearing the rasp of bolts.
“You can take the hood off,” said Zack’s voice. He was speaking through the peephole in the cellar door. Quinn used his right hand to remove his hood. He was in a bare cellar: concrete floor, concrete walls, perhaps a wine cellar converted to a new purpose. On a steel-frame bed against the far wall sat a lanky figure, his head and shoulders covered by another black hood. There were two knocks on the door. As if on command the figure on the bed tugged off his hood.
Simon Cormack stared in amazement at the tall man near the door, his raincoat half open, holding up a clothespin in his left hand. Quinn looked back at the President’s son.
“Hi there, Simon. You okay, kid?” A voice from home.