She shrugged. ‘What else do I need to know?’
I smiled. ‘No curiosity. Elin?’
‘Oh, I have my curiosity but I keep it under control. If you want me to know anything, you’ll tell me,’ she said tranquilly, then hesitated. ‘I do know one thing about you.’
‘What’s that?’
She turned to face me. ‘I know that you have been hurt, and it happened not long before we met. That is why I keep my questions to myself – I don’t want to bring the hurt back.’
‘You’re very perceptive,’ I said. ‘I didn’t think it showed. Would it surprise you to know I was once a British agent – a spy?’
She regarded me curiously. ‘A spy,’ she said slowly, as though rolling the word about her mouth to taste it. ‘Yes, it surprises me very much. It is not a very honourable occupation – you are not the type.’
‘So someone else told me recently,’ I said sardonically. ‘Nevertheless, it is true.’
She was silent for a while, then she said, ‘You were a spy. Alan, what you were in the past doesn’t matter. I know you as you are now.’
‘Sometimes the past catches up with you,’ I said. ‘It did with me. There’s a man called Slade … ’ I stopped, wondering if I was doing the right thing.
‘Yes?’ she prompted me.
‘He came to see me in Scotland. I’ll tell you about that – about Slade in Scotland.’
II
The shooting was bad that day. Something had disturbed the deer during the night because they had left the valley where my calculations had placed them and had drifted up the steep slopes of Bheinn Fhada. I could see them through the telescopic sight – pale grey-brown shapes grazing among the heather. The way the wind was blowing the only chance I had of getting near them was by sprouting wings and so, since it was the last day of the season, the deer were safe from Stewart for the rest of the summer.
At three in the afternoon I packed up and went home and was scrambling down Sgurr Mor when I saw the car parked outside the cottage and the minuscule figure of a man pacing up and down. The cottage is hard to get to – the rough track from the clachan discourages casual tourists – and so anyone who arrives usually wants to see me very much. The reverse doesn’t always apply; I’m of a retiring nature and I don’t encourage visitors.
So I was very careful as I approached and stopped under cover of the rocks by the burn. I unslung the rifle, checked it again to make sure it was unloaded, and set it to my shoulder. Through the telescopic sight the man sprang plainly to view. He had his back to me but when he turned I saw it was Slade.
I centred the cross-hairs on his large pallid face and gently squeezed the trigger, and the hammer snapped home with a harmless click. I wondered if I would have done the same had there been a bullet up the spout. The world would be a better place without men like Slade. But to load was too deliberate an act, so I put up the gun and walked towards the cottage. I should have loaded the gun.
As I approached he turned and waved. ‘Good afternoon,’ he called, as coolly as though he were a regular and welcome guest.
I stepped up to him. ‘How did you find me?’
He shrugged. ‘It wasn’t too hard. You know my methods.’
I knew them and I didn’t like them. I said, ‘Quit playing Sherlock. What do you want?’
He waved towards the door of the cottage. ‘Aren’t you going to invite me inside?’
‘Knowing you, I’ll bet you’ve searched the place already.’
He held up his hands in mock horror. ‘On my word of honour, I haven’t.’
I nearly laughed in his face because the man had no honour. I turned from him and pushed open the door and he followed me inside, clicking his tongue deprecatingly. ‘Not locked? You’re very trusting.’
‘There’s nothing here worth stealing,’ I said indifferently.
‘Just your life,’ he said, and looked at me sharply.
I let that statement lie and put up the rifle on its rack. Slade looked about him curiously. ‘Primitive – but comfortable,’ he remarked. ‘But I don’t see why you don’t live in the big house.’
‘It happens to be none of your business.’
‘Perhaps,’ he said, and sat down. ‘So you hid yourself in Scotland and didn’t expect to be found. Protective coloration, eh? A Stewart hiding among a lot of Stewarts. You’ve caused us some little difficulty.’
‘Who said I was hiding? I am a Scot, you know.’
He smiled fatly. ‘Of a sort. Just by your paternal grandfather. It’s not long since you were a Swede – and before that you were Finnish. You were Stewartsen then, of course.’
‘Have you travelled five hundred miles just to talk of old times?’ I asked tiredly.
‘You’re looking very fit,’ he said.
‘I can’t say the same for you; you’re out of condition and running to fat,’ I said cruelly.
He chuckled. ‘The fleshpots, dear boy; the fleshpots – all those lunches at the expense of Her Majesty’s Government.’ He waved a pudgy hand. ‘But let’s get down to it, Alan.’
‘To you I’m Mr Stewart,’ I said deliberately.
‘Oh, you don’t like me,’ he said in a hurt voice. ‘But no matter – it makes no difference in the end. I … we … want you to do a job for us. Nothing too difficult, you understand.’
‘You must be out of your mind,’ I said.
‘I know how you must feel, but …’
‘You don’t know a damn thing,’ I said sharply. ‘If you expect me to work for you after what happened then you’re crazier than I thought.’
I was wrong, of course; Slade knew perfectly well how I felt – it was his business to know men and to use them like tools. I waited for him to put on the pressure and, sure enough, it came, but in his usual oblique manner.
‘So let’s talk of old times,’ he said. ‘You must remember Kennikin.’
I remembered – I’d have to have total amnesia to forget Kennikin. A vision of his face swam before me as I had last seen him; eyes like grey pebbles set above high Slavic cheekbones, and the scar ran from his right temple to the corner of his mouth standing out lividly against the suddenly pale skin. He had been angry enough to kill me at that moment.
‘What about Kennikin?’ I said slowly.
‘Just that I hear he’s been looking for you, too. You
