Read Online The Stockholm Syndicate by Colin Forbes - Free Book Online

meeting must have asked to keep me away. As you can imagine, Voisin would be glad to oblige he's too lazy to take any initiative himself. I don't know. It should have been impossible for the Syndicate to penetrate Brussels police headquarters - but they managed. Those two men were certainly not detectives. What's getting me is how they ensured the reception desk was unmanned."
    "Just before they came in I heard the policeman on duty take a call. When they arrived he had disappeared."
    Beaurain crashed his fist into his palm. "That was Pierre Florin behind the counter when I arrived."
    "Has he been with the force for some time?"
    "Only twenty bloody years. I'll have a few questions to ask him!"
    "That woman is succeeding in rattling you."
    "What's rattling me," he snapped, 'is the penetration this criminal organisation has apparently achieved. We shall have to release Serge Litov immediately - and see where he leads us."
    "You were going to keep him longer," she objected, gripping his arms tightly. "Now they are making you react to their timing."
    "Don't forget what Henderson noticed the night Litov tried to shoot me - the safety catch still on his Luger. With a professional like that! They took the opportunity I gave them in order to exploit it themselves. We are using Litov to find the source of the Syndicate. They're hoping Litov will escape and tell them where we're based. Litov is in the middle and probably knows it. After today's happenings I'm going to speed up the process and release Litov."
    Beaurain broke off as the doorbell rang repeatedly. Louise tensed and let go of his arms. "Who could that be?" she asked quietly.
    "It's the special ring I arranged with Ed Cottel. He said he'd call round."
    "You hope it's Ed," she said, extracting her pistol from her handbag.
    "You're right - from now on we don't make any assumptions. And, by the way, he's here on a double mission - to help track down the Syndicate, which he is convinced exists and also to wipe out Telescope."
    It was indeed Ed Cottel outside and when Beaurain had re-locked the door, the American, who knew Louise Hamilton well, hugged her, nodding his acceptance of a large Scotch.
    "This new Syndicate scares the guts out of me," he said. "I've been talking to Washington - someone I can trust - since that for-ever-and-a-day meeting. The fragments we keep picking up frighten me more each time."
    "Why did you say at the meeting you thought the Kremlin were behind the Syndicate?"
    "Because I can tap a computer."
    Ed Cottel was a slim man in his early fifties. His most outstanding characteristics were his hooked nose, his West Coast accent and his restrained manner reflected in the Brooks Brothers suits he invariably wore. He reminded Beaurain more of an Englishman than an American. He was so independent-minded that the Belgian was surprised Washington had chosen him to come to Europe to collaborate with its security services.
    Tap a computer, Ed? What are you driving at?"
    "It's just about the biggest computer in the world, and it contains records on every person of prominence in politics and industry, including the top Russians. You've heard of Viktor Rashkin?"
    "The Kissinger of the Kremlin - but so much quieter that the international press doesn't know he exists," Beaurain replied.
    "At the moment he is First Secretary at the Russian Embassy in Stockholm." Cottel peered at the bottom of his glass. "First Secretary that's a laugh. Leonid Brezhnev's wonder boy and top trouble-shooter - and trouble-maker - and he's only a First Secretary. It's the usual cover, of course. Moves about a lot, does our Viktor," he said thoughtfully.
    "You said you can tap a computer," Beaurain reminded him. "How does this link up with Rashkin?"
    "At Voisin's comic meeting I mentioned the money transferred from the States to finance Syndicate operations over here. I got a tip while I was in Washington, and I went to the computer and found out about a recent transfer of five million dollars