Read Online Romanov Succession by Brian Garfield - Free Book Online

gambit.”
    It was only a voice on a telephone. He’d tried to get more: “Where does he live? What’s his routine? What’s he like?”
    But the employer refused to be drawn. “You’ve got all you need to go on. You’re supposed to kill him, not marry him—what difference does all that make?”
    So he’d botched the first one because he’d had no way of anticipating the speed and agility with which the target was capable of reacting. He’d paced the target toward the underground garage until the moment came when no one else was abroad in the blacked-out street. Then he’d quickened his pace and drawn the gun but the target heard all of that and without even looking behind him he’d dived between two parked lorries and that was that: the assassin ran forward and snapped a running shot but he knew he’d missed and then the target was out of sight in the heavy shadows and you couldn’t go running through the streets of London brandishing a 7.62 Luger with a big perforated silencer screwed to the barrel.
    â€œHe’s faster than the telegraph,” he’d reported back. “You didn’t tell me that.”
    â€œWell you know it now.”
    It was nearly a month before the employer called back. “You’d better not blow it this time. It’s an RAF airfield in Kent—Biggin Hill, do you know it?”
    â€œI can find it.”
    â€œThey’re flying him from Scotland. Some sort of conference with three or four Russian exiles. It’s set up for a hotel in Maidstone but we want him taken out before the meeting—so it’s got to be the airfield or the road. It’s the A20.”
    â€œI know the road. What kind of car will he be in?”
    â€œIt’s a Bentley saloon, grey, two or three years old.”
    â€œNumber plate?”
    â€œAngel Kevin six three three.”
    â€œChauffeur?”
    â€œYes, of course.”
    â€œThen that’s two of them. The price is higher.”
    â€œThe price is the same, after your last fiasco.”
    He didn’t fight the point too hard; only a token face-saving riposte: “I’d have had him last time if you hadn’t been so jealous with information.”
    â€œNever mind. It’s July fourteen. The meeting in Maidstone’s set for eight in the evening. You’ll have to work back from there to get his ETA at Biggin Hill.”
    â€œThere’s another way. Where does the Bentley live?”
    â€œIt belongs to one of the White Russians. He lives in London but he’ll be staying at the hotel in Maidstone. The name’s Ivanov. He’s got a detached house in Highgate. Shepherd’s Hill, Number Forty-three. They’ll be going down to Maidstone sometime on the fourteenth.”
    â€œBastille Day,” the assassin remarked, and cradled the phone.
    On the fourteenth he’d parked on the verge with the nose of his Morris pointed out toward the main road; got out of the car with a brush and a jar of black watercolor ink. His license plate number was IPF 311; he closed the characters to make it read TBE 814. Then he screwed a new silencer onto the Luger and put on a white jacket, a pair of clear-glass spectacles and a white trilby hat. Any witnesses would remember only the disguise, and there would be at least one witness: if they weren’t going to pay for the chauffeur he wasn’t going to give them the chauffeur.
    He had to wait more than an hour. Several cars and military vehicles came out of the service road and he kept watch in the driving mirror until the Bentley’s big square snout appeared.
    He put the first bullet into the front tire because he wanted to prevent the target escaping. Then he had a clear shot at Devenko and no way to miss it because they hadn’t spotted the source of the trouble yet. He squeezed the trigger with firm gentle pressure and the Luger recoiled, mildly as it always did; the bullet