'I'm afraid so. Looks as though he was the leader of an organized gang." 'It doesn't make sense. Not Sean." 'Your son has built up quite a reputation." 'He was a little wild at one time,' Shasa admitted, 'but he is settling down to his articles now, working hard. And why would he want to get involved in something like that? I mean, he doesn't need the money." 'Articled clerks are not paid a great fortune." 'I give him an allowance,' Shasa shook his head again. 'No, I don't believe it. What would he know about house-breaking?" 'Oh, no - he doesn't do it himself. He sets up the job and Rufus and his henchman do the dirty work." 'Sets it up - what do you mean by that?" 'As a son of yours he is welcome in any home in the city, that is right, isn't it?" 'I suppose so." Shasa was cautious.
'According to little Rufus, your son studies each prospective victim's home, decides on what valuables there are and pinpoints where they are kept - strong rooms, hidden drawers, wall safes and that sort of thing. Then he begins an affair with one of the family, the mother or a daughter, and uses his opportunities to let his accomplice into the home while he is entertaining the lady of his choice upstairs." Shasa stared at him wordlessly.
'By all accounts it works very well, and in more than one case the theft was not even reported to us - the ladies involved were more concerned with their reputations and their husband's wrath than with the loss of their jewellery." 'Marge Weston?" Shasa asked. 'She was one of the ladies?" 'According to our information - yes, she was." Shasa whispered, 'The little bastard." He was appalled, and totally convinced. It all fitted too neatly not to be true. Marge and Sean, his son and one of his mistresses, it was just not to be tolerated. 'This time he has gone too far." 'Yes,' Louis agreed. 'Too far by a mile. Even as a first offender, he will probably get five or six years." All Shasa's attention snapped back to him. The shock to Shasa's pride and sense of propriety was such that he had not even begun to consider the legal implications, but now his righteous rage was snuffed out at the suggestion of his eldest son standing in the dock and being sentenced to long-term imprisonment.
'Have you prepared a docket yet?" he asked. 'Is there a warrant out?" 'Not yet." Louis was speaking as carefully. 'We were only given this information a few hours ago." He crossed to his desk and picked up the blue interrogation folder.
'What can I do?" Shasa asked quietly. 'Is there anything we can do 'I've done all I can,' Louis answered. 'I've done too much alread, I could never justify holding up this information, nor could I justii informing you of an investigation in progress. I've already stretche my neck way out, Shasa. We go back a long way, and I'll never forget the work you did on White Sword - that's the only reason took the chance --' he paused to take a deep breath, and Shas sensing there was more to come, remained silent. 'There is nothin else I can do. Nothing else anyone can do at this level." " ' He place peculiar emphasis on the last three words, and then he added seem ir/gly incongruously, 'I'm retiring next month, there'll be someore else in this office after that." 'How long do I have?" Shasa asked, and he did not have to elabor.
ate. They understood each other.
'I can sit on this file for another few hours, until five o'clock today, and then the investigation will have to go ahead." Shasa stood up. 'You are a good friend." 'I'll walk you down,' Louis said, and they were alone in the lift before they spoke again. It had taken Shasa that long to master his perturbation.
'I hadn't thought about White Sword for years,' he changed the subject easily. 'Not until today. All that seems so far away and long ago, even though it was my own g and father.
r 'I've never forgotten it,' Louis Nel said softly. 'The man was a murderer. If he had succeeded, if you hadn't prevented it, all of us in land would be a lot worse off than we are today." th!sI wonder what happened to White Sword - who he was and where he is now? Perhaps he is long dead, perhaps--' 'I don't think so - there is something that makes me doubt it. A few years ago I wanted to go over the White Sword file--' The lift stopped at the ground floor and Louis broke off. He remained silent as they crossed the lobby and went out into the sunlight. On the front steps of the headquarters building, they faced each other.
'Yes?" Shasa asked. 'The file, the White Sword file?" 'There is no file,' Louis said softly.
'I don't understand." 'No file,' Louis repeated. 'Not in police records or the Justice Department or the central records. Officially, White Sword never existed." Shasa stared at him. 'There must be a file - I mean, we worked on it, you and I. It was this thick --' Shasa held his thumb and forefinger apart. 'It can't have dsappeared!" 'You can take my word for it. It has." Louis held out his hand.
'Five o'clock,' he said gently. 'No later, but I will be in my office all day right up to five, if anyone wanted to telephone me there." Shasa took his hand. 'I will never forget this." He glanced at his wristwatch as he turned away. It was a few minutes before noon, and most fortuitously he had a lunch date with Manfred De La Rey.
He headed back up Parliament Lane, and the noon-day gun fired just as he went in through the main doors. Everybody in the main lobby, including the ushers, instinctively checked their watches at the distant clap of cannon shot.
Shasa turned towards the members' dining-room, but he was far too early. Except for the white-uniformed waiters, it was deserted. In the members' bar he ordered a pink gin and waited impatiently, glancing every few seconds at his watch, but his appointment with Manfred was for twelve-thirty and it was no good going to search for him. He could be anywhere in the huge rambling building, so Shasa employed the time in cherishing and fanning his anger.
'The bastard!" he thought. 'I've allowed him to fool me all these years. All the signs were there, but I refused to accept them. He's dirty rotten, right to the core --' and then his indignation went off in , a new direction. 'Marge Weston is old enough to be his mother, how many of my other women has he been boffing? Is nothing sacred to the little devil?" Manfred De La Rey was a few minutes early. He came to the members' bar smiling and nodding and shaking hands, playing the genial politician, so that it took him a few minutes to cross the room.
Shasa could barely contain his impatience, but he didn't want anyone to suspect his agitation.
Manfred asked for a beer. Shasa had never seen him take hard spirit, and only after he had taken his first sip did Shasa tell him quietly, 'I'm in trouble - serious trouble." Manfred's easy smile never faltered, he was too shrewd to betray his emotions to a room full of adversaries and potential rivals, but his eyes went cold and pale as those of a basilisk.
'Not here,' he said, and led Shasa through to the men's room.
They stood shoulder to shoulder at the urinal and Shasa spoke softly but urgently, and when he finished, Manfred stood staring at the white ceramic through for only a few seconds before he roused himself.
'What is the number?" Shasa slipped him a card with Louis Nel's telephone number at CID headquarters.
'I'll have to use the security line from my office. Give me fifteen minutes. I will meet you back at the bar." Manfred zipped his fly closed and strode out of the lavatory.
He was back in the members' bar within ten minutes, by whic time Shasa was entertaining the four other members of the lunct eon party, all of them influential back-benchers. When the finished their drinks, Shasa suggested, 'Shall we go through?" A they moved towards the dining-room Manfred took his upper art in a firm grip, and leaned close to him, smiling as though conveying a pleasantry.
'I've squashed it, but he is to be out of the country within twenty four hours, and I don't want him back. Is that a bargain?" 'I am grateful,' Shasa nodded, and his anger at his son wa: compounded by this obligation that had been forced upon him. I was a debt that he would have to repay, with interest.