The Mountains of Brega
Blade 17
By Jeffrey Lord
Chapter 1
Richard Blade was bored. This condition very seldom killed anybody. It did not very often make people want to die. But it could and did take away much of a man's zest for living. At the moment, it was doing that to Richard Blade.
He turned on the heel of one custom-made shoe and stared out the floor-to-ceiling window of the deluxe flat. The peach-colored velvet draperies were drawn back, and through the heavy glass he could see London spread out below. The flat was forty stories up in one of the newest of London's luxury buildings, so Blade could see a long way. The twinkling lights and spots of color that were neon signs seemed to march endlessly away into the darkness. It was an unusually clear night, but the spectacle did nothing to diminish Blade's boredom.
From behind him came the noises of a cocktail party. Ice cubes clinked in glasses, corks popped, soda-water siphons hissed like snakes. The noises simply made Blade feel more bored. They were so expected, so conventional.
Blade was at the party more out of a sense of duty than anything else. He was there as the guest of a certain young lady who wanted to show him off to her «set.» She had been quite frank about that. She hadn't been quite as frank about why she was showing him off. But Blade had an almost instinctive ability to read another person's intentions toward him. He wouldn't have been alive without it. And what he read in Clarissa was the desire to snare him for a husband.
He was certainly eligible enough. The Richard Blade who moved elegantly through the London social whirl was one of the most eligible bachelors around. Wit, charm, intelligence, and an ample if vague income, he had them all. Though he had left forty behind, his face and body showed no signs that he was much more than thirty. Not a confirmed bachelor, in other words-still young enough for a determined woman to mold into whatever kind of husband might strike her fancy.
The faint reflection from the window glass gave Blade a picture of his face and body. It was a strong face-the face of a warrior rather than a courtier. Blade had been both in his career, in places stranger and more distant than anyone in the room could or would believe even if he chose to tell them.
And the body inside the custom-tailored jacket-that was an athlete's body, six feet one and a little more, carrying two hundred and ten pounds on its large bones. It suggested a former rowing or tennis Blue from Oxford who had kept himself in excellent trim. Blade had been those, among other things.
Now he was almost physically itching with boredom. He looked at his reflection in the window again and noticed a pale face framed in dark hair hovering near his right shoulder. He drained the last of his drink and turned to face the slender woman who had drifted up behind him as he stared out the window.
She must have been at least five feet eight. Her dark brown hair swept up to a point almost on a level with the top of Blade's head, and her wide gray eyes looked almost straight into his. From her grooming and poise, Blade thought at first that she might be a fashion model. But her figure was too full in the hips and bosom, and her legs were too elegantly curved to make her a good object on which to hang current fashions.
She smiled as she sensed his eyes going over her. «You look bored, I think. Yes?» There was a slight trace of a foreign accent in her low voice. Blade tried to place it. Not French; not Italian. German? Vaguely, but not quite. Somewhere farther to the east? Quite possibly. Without any outwardly visible sign, Blade was on the alert.
«Rather,» he drawled. He wanted to sound a little like the stereotyped silly-ass English playboy. A little, but not too much.
The woman smiled again. «My name is Elizabeth.» The b sounded almost like a v. «You are-?»
«Blade. Richard Blade. I'm a friend of Clarissa's.»
«Ah, another one of the men she brings around to show off.»
«You know her?»
«For several years I have known her. She helped me a lot when I first came to England.»
«Where did you come from?» The question slipped out before it occurred to him that it might be untactful. If the woman had come to England from somewhere behind the Iron Curtain, she might not wish to talk about her reasons for doing so.
«I am Czech,» said Elizabeth. «I was in England in 1968 when the Russians marched into my country, and I did not want to go back. Clarissa helped me very much, to find a job and get settled. I owe her a good deal. But I cannot think much of the way she is always showing off her men friends.»
«Like a hunter, showing off trophies?»
Elizabeth laughed. «Yes, exactly.» She looked Blade over from head to foot, the same way he had done her. Then she smiled and said, «'This time I think she has caught a good one.»
Blade couldn't help smiling, even though the flattery was rather transparent. Listening to an attractive woman say things like that to him was always pleasant, even if he suspected she was playing games. And he did suspect Elizabeth. He decided to draw her out a little more.
«Actually, I wouldn't say I've been caught, not really,» he said.
«You and Clarissa are-just good friends, I think the saying goes?»
Blade nodded. He made a mental note that Elizabeth was not a very skilled player, unless her game was something he couldn't even imagine. She was too eager, too fast with her answers. He was not going to have much chance to reveal himself-unless they wound up in bed. That was all right with him. But he was going to keep on the alert, no matter how the evening ended.
Elizabeth threw her head back and smiled warmly at Blade. The motion thrust her full breasts out even farther against the red wool of her dress. Blade didn't need to keep his eyes off those breasts and didn't try. The woman noticed where his eyes were.
To give the impression of being entirely at ease, Blade said, «Would you like another drink?» He pointed at the woman's empty glass.
«I would, but not any more of Clarissa's. I still can't get used to Scotch or mixed drinks. I have a better idea. I have some real Czech brandy in my apartment. Why don't we go over there and try that?»
«Why not, indeed?» said Blade, with a grin. He did his best to make it a mindlessly lecherous grin, but his mind was turning with almost audible clicks. Elizabeth's game of getting him to her apartment was transparently obvious. Why was she playing it, and playing it so crudely? Was it just plain and simple lust for a handsome man, or something more? Richard Blade had been a professional secret agent for far too long to rule out the possibility of something more.
But he would never find out either way if he didn't accept Elizabeth's invitation. He took her hand and squeezed it with a firm but gentle pressure. «I'll make my apologies to Clarissa, and then we can go. Is your apartment far?»
Elizabeth nodded and named an address about four miles away.
«Then we'll take my car. Do you mind riding in an MG?»
«Not at all.» She looked at him again, with obvious invitation in her eyes. «Somehow a sports car-it fits you, what I think you are.»
Blade made his way over to the bar and went through the routine of saying goodbye to Clarissa. He was glad that Elizabeth had agreed to ride with him. One telephone call to the man known as J, one twist of a concealed switch, and the Special Branch of the Metropolitan Police would be tracking him all the way to his destination.
Elizabeth clung tightly to his arm as they rode down in the elevator, flashing increasingly warm smiles at him all the while. In the lobby of the building he excused himself. «I need to make a phone call-tell the office I may be late tomorrow.» He looked at her as he said that, watching for any reaction.