Dupree nodded. “Okay. How much will that lot cost?”
“About a thousand pounds. This is how you buy it. Take the Yellow Pages telephone directory, and under Surplus Stores you’ll find over a dozen shops and stockists. Get the jackets, blouses, belts, berets, webbing harnesses, knapsacks, haversacks, and boots at different shops, placing one order at each. Pay cash and take the purchase away with you. Don’t give your real name—not that anyone should ask it—and don’t leave a real address.
“When you have bought the stuff, store it in a normal storage warehouse, have it crated for export, and contact four separate freight agents accustomed to handling export shipments. Pay them to send it in four separate consignments in bond to a shipping freight agent in Marseilles for collection by Mr. Jean-Baptiste Langarotti.”
“Which agent in Marseilles?” asked Dupree.
&n
bsp; “We don’t know yet,” said Shannon. He turned to the Corsican. “Jean, when you have the name of the shipping agent you intend to use for the export of the boats and engines, send the full name and address by mail to London, one copy to me here at the flat, and a second copy to Jan Dupree, Poste Restante, Trafalgar Square Post Office, London. Got it?”
Langarotti noted the address while Shannon translated the instructions for Dupree.
“Janni, go down there in the next few days and get yourself poste restante facilities. Then check in every week or so until Jean’s letter arrives. Then instruct the freight agents to send the crates to the Marseilles agent in a bonded shipment for export by sea from Marseilles onward, in the ownership of Langarotti. Now for the question of money. I just heard the credit came through from Brussels.”
The three Europeans produced slips of paper from their pockets while Shannon took Dupree’s airline ticket stub. From his desk Shannon took four letters, each of them from him to Mr. Goossens at the Kredietbank. Each letter was roughly the same. It required the Kredietbank to transmit a sum of money in United States dollars from Mr. Keith Brown’s account to another account for the credit of Mr. X.
In the blanks Shannon filled in the sum equivalent to the round-trip airfare to and from London, starting at Ostend, Marseilles, Munich, and Cape Town. The letters also bade Mr. Goossens transmit $1250 to each of the named men in the named banks on the day of receipt of the letter, and again on May 5 and again on June 5. Each mercenary dictated to Shannon the name of his bank—most were in Switzerland—and Shannon typed it in.
When he had finished, each man read his own letter and Shannon signed them at his desk, sealed them in separate envelopes, and gave each man his own envelope for mailing.
Last, he gave each £50 in cash to cover the forty-eight-hour stay in London and told them to meet him outside the door of his London bank at eleven the following morning.
When they had gone, he sat down and wrote a long letter to a man in Africa. He rang the writer, who, having checked by phone that it was in order to do so, gave him the African’s mailing address. That evening Shannon mailed his letter, express rate, and dined alone.
Martin Thorpe got his interview with Dr. Steinhofer at the Zwingli Bank just before lunch. Having been previously announced by Sir James Manson, Thorpe received the same red-carpet treatment.
He presented the banker with the six application forms for numbered accounts. Each had been filled out in the required manner and signed. Separate cards carried the required two specimen signatures of the men seeking to open the accounts. They were in the names of Messrs. Adams, Ball, Carter, Davies, Edwards, and Frost.
Attached to each form were two other letters. One was a signed power of attorney, in which Messrs. Adams, Ball, Carter, Davies, Edwards, and Frost separately gave power of attorney to Mr. Martin Thorpe to operate the accounts in their names. The other was a letter signed by Sir James Manson, requesting Dr. Steinhofer to transfer to the accounts of each of his associates the sum of £50,000 from Sir James’s account.
Dr. Steinhofer was neither so gullible nor so new to the business of banking as not to suspect that the fact the names of the six “business associates” began with the first six letters of the alphabet was a remarkable coincidence. But he was quite able to believe that the possible nonexistence of the six nominees was not his business. If a wealthy British businessman chose to get around the tiresome rules of his own Companies Act, that was his own business. Besides, Dr. Steinhofer knew certain things about quite a number of City businessmen that would have created enough Department of Trade inquiries to keep that London ministry occupied for the rest of the century.
There was another good reason why he should stretch out his hand and take the application forms from Thorpe. If the shares of the company Sir James was going to try to buy secretly shot up from their present level to astronomic heights—and Dr. Steinhofer could see no other reason for the operation—there was nothing to prevent the Swiss banker from buying a few of those shares for himself.
“The company we have our eye on is called Bormac Trading Company,” Thorpe told him quietly. He outlined the position of the company, and the fact that old Lady Macallister held 300,000 shares, or 30 percent of the company.
“We have reason to believe attempts may already have been made to persuade this old lady to sell her holding,” he went on. “They appear to have been unsuccessful. We are going to have another try. Even should we fail, we will still go ahead and choose another shell company.”
Dr. Steinhofer listened quietly as he smoked his cigar.
“As you know, Dr. Steinhofer, it would not be possible for one purchaser to buy these shares without declaring his identity. Therefore the four buyers will be Mr. Adams, Mr. Ball, Mr. Carter, and Mr. Davies, who will each acquire seven and a half percent of the company. We would wish you to act on behalf of all four of them.”
Dr. Steinhofer nodded. It was standard practice. “Of course, Mr. Thorpe.”
“I shall attempt to persuade the old lady to sign the share-transfer certificates with the name of the buyer left out. This is simply because some people in England, especially old ladies, find Swiss banks rather—how shall I say?—secretive organizations.”
“I am sure you mean ‘sinister,’” said Dr. Steinhofer smoothly. “I completely understand. Let us leave it like this, then. When you have had an interview with this lady, we will see how best it can be arranged. But tell Sir James to have no fear. The purchase will be by four separate buyers, and the rules of the Companies Act will not be affronted.”
As Sir James Manson had predicted, Thorpe was back in London by nightfall to begin his weekend.
The four mercenaries were waiting on the pavement when Shannon came out of his bank just before twelve. He had in his hand four brown envelopes.
“Marc, here’s yours. There’s five hundred pounds in it. Since you’ll be living at home, your expenses will be the smallest. So within that five hundred you have to buy a truck and rent a lockup garage. There are other items to be bought. You’ll find the list inside the envelope. Trace the man who has the Schmeissers for sale and set up a meeting between me and him. I’ll be in touch with you by phone at your bar in about ten days.”
The giant Belgian nodded and hailed a taxi at the curb to take him to Victoria Station and the boat train back to the Ostend ferry.
“Kurt, this is your envelope. There’s a thousand inside it, because you’ll have to do much more traveling. Find that ship, and inside forty days. Keep in touch by phone and cable, but be very discreet and brief when using either. You can be frank in written letters to my flat. If my mail is on intercept we’re finished anyway.