Assignment Unicorn by Edward S. Aarons Read Free Book Online Page B

forget
the—ah—subsidy?”
    “No, I will not forget. Don’t worry about it, Colonel. I
will keep my word. The funds will be replaced.”
    “What do you suppose was the main objective of the attack on
Donaldson’s plantation? The safe? Seventy thousand dollars is a lot of money.
You can adjust your books so its replacement will be explained?”
    “You worry too much, Colonel.”
    Colonel Ko said, “And Donaldson’s daughter-the girl you
placed in the Willem Van Huyden Hotel—”
    “Your people are very good, Colonel.”
    “She could tell you nothing?”
    “Nothing.” Durell paused. “I would like her to have exit
papers from Palingpon prepared immediately.”
    “You will take her with you?”
    “I just want her to be free to leave, that’s all.”
    “Of course. In two weeks, when the money—”
    “Tomorrow,” Durell said.
    Colonel Ko thought about it, then nodded. He turned away as
the sergeant of the firing squad came up and saluted. The soldiers were
ordered into a ragged line in the shade of the sapodilla tree. The prisoner
hung limply from the stake in the center of the courtyard, in a bright shaft of
sunlight that pierced the leafy foliage above.
    Nothing about the man indicated that he knew where he was or
what was about to happen.
     
    12
    DURELL TOOK an Air India flight to Bombay, via
Singapore, and found tickets for a westward Pan Am connection on to Rome. At
the Palingpon Airport that morning, Maggie Donaldson joined him. Her long hair
was still skinned back into its tight, schoolmarmish bun at the nape of her neck. He was again surprised at her height.
    She squinted into the hot sun and did not smile.
    “Hi,” she said.
    “A coincidence?”
    “No, I found out which plane you were taking.”
    “You want to come with me part of the way?”
    “All the way, Sam.”
    “You should go home,” Durell said.
    “I don’t have any home. Just an old aunt in New Haven. All I
have is the money Daddy left me. I’m a rich young woman.” She spoke flatly
as if it didn’t really mean anything to her. “I went to the bank today and they
advanced me enough to keep me going until the lawyers clear everything up.”
    Durell said, “What about the old aunt in Connecticut?”
    “We’re not that close, Sam. My bad habits rather turned her
off.” Then after a pause she added, “I really have no home, no friends. Except
maybe you.”
    “I’m going to Rome,” Durell said.
    “Fine. Me, too.”
    “I’ll be quite busy.”
    “I’ll keep myself occupied visiting the ruins.”
    “I don’t want you with me in Rome. You’d be safer back in
New Haven demonstrating to your aunt how easy it is for a girl of strong
character to kick the habit.”
    “Nuts. I’m sticking with you.”
     
    13
    IT WAS raining in Rome.
    Durell lay on the bed in the Hotel Vittoria and read a book
in Mandarin Chinese he had picked up in a stall near the Piazza Navonna. It was
a collection of poetry written by the sixteenth-century Shantung poet Tan
Ch’ien. The poems were pretty little pieces dedicated to nature. He could say
he read it to keep up his linguistic skills, but in fact he found solace
reading Tan Ch’ien’s poems.
    “Sam?”
    It was warm in the room, and he and Maggie lay naked under
the sheets in the comfortable bed. There were small ornamental balconies below
each of the three tall windows, and through the curtains he could see the old
Roman wall that marked the boundaries of the Borghese Gardens.
    “Sam?”
    “I’m reading.”
    “Where did you learn to make love?”
    “Everywhere.”
    “Oh, wow.”
    She was silent a moment.
    “Sam?”
    “Yes, Maggie.”
    “Isn’t this nice?”
    “Yes.”
    “I mean the rain.”
    “Yes, the rain is very nice.”
    “And Rome.”
    “Yes.”
    “What’s so wonderful about that damn book, Sam?”
    “It’s very difficult to read. Either there are mistakes in
the calligraphy or the poet was bombed out of his skull. For instance, in this
passage Tan Ch’ien says