"Look, I don't want to take too much of your valuable time."

fforbes-Ffitch appreciated that. "Right. Got another appointment at seventeen thirty hours."

"Roger. Then let's get to it." Jonathan made his case quickly. f-F was obviously committed to gaining credit by persuading Jonathan to undertake the lecture series in Sweden. In fact, he had rather overstated Jonathan's willingness to Sir Wilfred. OK. Jonathan would do the lectures if in return f-F would use his influence as a trustee of the National Gallery to persuade them to display the Marini Horse publicly the day before it was auctioned off.

"Oh, I don't know, Jonathan. A privately owned object in the Nat? Never been done before. Has all the characteristics of a publicity trick. I just don't know if they'll go along with it."

"Oh, I was hoping your influence would be sufficient to swing it." Jonathan's instinct for the jugular proved correct.

"I may be able to, Jonathan. Certainly give it a bash."

"You might mention in your argument that half the art reviewers in England will be mentioning in their papers that the piece will be on display at the Gallery. Your fellow trustees wouldn't want to disappoint the taxpaying public, to say nothing of making fools of the critics, none of whom are too friendly with what they describe as the reactionary practices of that elite group."

"How on earth could the newspapers be saying such a thing?"

Jonathan lifted his palms in an exaggerated shrug. "Who knows where they get their wild ideas?"

fforbes-Ffitch looked long and very slyly at Jonathan. "This is your doing, isn't it?" he accused, shaking a finger.

"You see right through me, don't you? No use trying to con a con."

fforbes-Ffitch nodded conspiratorially. "All right, Jonathan. I think I can assure you that the other trustees will listen to reason. But not without a battle. And in return, you owe me one lecture tour. I know you'll love Stockholm."

True to club routine, the drinks arrived just as they had risen to leave.

Maggie sat on the edge of an oaken bench beside the hearth, unmindful of the glass of port beside her. The focus of her soft unblinking attention was the languets of flame that flickered deep within the log fire, but the attitude of her body and her half-closed eyes indicated that she was looking through the fire into something else. Daydreams, perhaps.

Leaning against a bookcase in the Vicar's study, Jonathan watched the play of light in her fine autumnal hair. The unlit side of her face was toward him, and her profile was modeled by an undulating band of firelight along the forehead and nose. Subtle shifts of color from the flames were amplified in her hair, now accenting the amber, now the copper.

A gust in the stormy night drafted through the chimney, flaring the embers with a bassoon moan, and breaking her fragile concentration. She blinked and inhaled like someone awakening, then she turned and greeted him with a slight smile.

"Boyoboy, it's sure raining cats and dogs," Yank said from across the room where he had been nursing a funk and dealing heavy blows to the Vicar's port supply. He had been set off his feed earlier that evening while they were dining at the Olde Worlde Inn. They had been served lamb couscous, and someone had jokingly mentioned that they owed the feast to governmental indecision. The Feeding Station had been preparing a victim to be found dead in Algiers, but there had been a change in plans. Yank had blanched and left the room. Until this banal meteorological observation, he had been uniquely silent, and the forced energy in his voice indicated that he was not completely over the crisis of disgust.

"Sorry to keep you waiting." The Vicar entered with a drawn and preoccupied air. His gray face and the lifeless hang of his jowls and wattle over his ingrown celluloid dog collar attested to days of tension and strain, as did the intensification of his nervous wink. "At least I see you have found the port. Good." He lowered himself heavily into his reading chair beside the fire. As a passing gust of wind stiffened the tongues of flame and sucked them up the fire step, Jonathan recognized the ironically Dickensian quality of their little grouping.

"Let me say at the outset that I am not very pleased with you, Dr. Hemlock," the Vicar said, winking.

"Oh?"

"No. Not pleased. You have not kept in regular contact with us as you were instructed to do. Indeed, were it not for Miss Coyne's report of this afternoon, we shouldn't even have known that you had gained entree into The Cloisters."

"I've been busy."

"No doubt. You have also been disobedient. But I shall not dwell on your insubordination."

"That's wonderful of you."

The Vicar stared at Jonathan with heavy reproof. Then he winked. "The situation is grave. Much graver than I could have guessed. As you will recall, we were puzzled over the fact that Maximilian Strange did not seem to be making use of the damaging film for blackmail. Doubts concerning his ultimate motive for collecting the filthy evidence have plagued us almost as much as have the films themselves. And the Loo organization overseas has concentrated all its energies on solving the enigma. Bits and pieces of information have been collected, and they fit together to make a frightening picture. Not to put too fine a point on it, the situation is this: England is for sale." He paused dramatically to allow the significance of this to sink in. "In point of fact, effective control of the British government is to be auctioned off. The power holding those recriminating films will be able to bleed us dry-trade concessions, NATO secrets, North Sea oil-all this will go to the highest bidder."

Jonathan found himself wondering whether it was the fact of the sale or the democratic nature of the bidding that pained him the more deeply.

"At this very moment," the Vicar continued, "representatives of every major power are congregating in London; gold transfers are being arranged in Switzerland; and secret talks are being conducted in embassies. Not excluding your own embassy, Dr. Hemlock," he added with stern emphasis.

"Who knows? You may enjoy working for Yurasis Dragon when CII takes you over."

"Don't be flip, Hemlock!" He winked angrily. "I promise you that long before such a thing is realized, you will be in the dock facing irrefutable charges of murder. Is that clear?"

"Get off my ass, padre."

"Sir?" He winked three times in rapid succession.

"Your threats are empty. You say the entire Loo organization has been working on this?"

"They have."

"Do they know when the sale is to take place?"

"No, not precisely."

"Do they know where?"

"No, they don't."

"Do they know where the films are now?"

"No!"

"I know all three. So get off my ass, and stop making empty threats."

Maggie smiled into her glass, as the Vicar brought his indignation under professional control. He rose heavily and crossed to his desk, where he shuffled some papers around pointlessly, making thinking time. "Dr. Hemlock, you represent everything I detest in the aggressive American personality."

Jonathan checked his watch.

The Vicar's hands closed into fists. Then they relaxed slowly, and he turned back. "But... I have learned in my business to admire efficiency, whatever its source. So!" He pressed his eyes closed and took a deep breath. "I assume you have worked out a way to intercept the films and deliver them to me?"

"I have."

"You realize, of course, that you must accomplish this quite on your own. I won't have the police in on this, or the Secret Service. No one must have the slightest hint of the awkward predicament our leaders have gotten themselves into."

"You've made that abundantly clear."

"Good. Good. Now tell me-where are the films?"