Free Ride a Pale Horse by Helen MacInnes Page B

that. Anyway, I’ve made sure it won’t lie on a desk for some unauthorised eyes to note the Czech censor’s mark. The stamp itself caused a tightening around Fairbairn’s lips for a moment, but he will hear the details tomorrow or the next day, once the top brass decides how we handle them.
    “Well, you took every care,” Karen said. Why blame himself for someone taking the wrong route? She smiled, remembering the envelope safely hidden under a sports shirt. “Did your friend have to hide it your way?” Or perhaps he had carried a useful newspaper.
    “No need.” Bristow’s voice had dropped its worry. “His idea of dressing for summer is a seersucker suit. The jacket hid the envelope nicely.” We’re making good time, he thought, even if I’m keeping to the speed limit. No risk of being stopped by a traffic cop, no more delays.
    Something jolted Karen’s memory. “Was he in that Honda? A brown Honda? It nearly sideswiped me on my way to the café. Who was the driver—is he usually so wild?”
    “Erratic sometimes. But why say ‘usually’—he didn’t do it on purpose, did he?” That wasn’t Shaw’s style. He was eager, yes, but never aggressive.
    She shrugged, didn’t mention that the driver had stared at her; the other man, too, but less obviously. Instead, she said, “They must have arrived too early and parked, and then suddenly noticed the time and came rushing out.”
    “Early?” Bristow fastened on the word. Fairbairn had been on time; no mention of having to wait.
    “They were in that parking space when we pulled off the highway. I noticed the Honda because it was the only car with two people just sitting in it and going nowhere.”
    “I didn’t see—”
    “You were busy navigating,” she reminded him.
    Yes, the approach to the field at the side of the gas station had been full of ruts and
bumps. Bristow looked at her and smiled. If he had needed corroboration that her testimony this afternoon would be accurate enough to be trusted, he had been given a small demonstration. “Acute,” he said. “You really notice.”
    Is he making fun of me? “Not always. It is just that today I’m slightly—well, on edge. That envelope really has a powerful effect. At least,” she added, “I’m rid of it.”
    But I won’t be rid of it, he thought, not for a week—two weeks—three—how many?
    She misjudged his silence. “It wouldn’t matter if your friends did add up two and two and put us together, would it? Or didn’t you want to be seen with me?” she added as a small joke.
    He didn’t share it. “The other way around. I didn’t want you to be connected with me.” Or connected in any way with the delivery of those letters.
    They had left the highway and were now following a narrow road, tree-lined, almost a country lane. Then they passed a gate to enter a curving driveway. Bristow stopped there. Ahead of them, through a screen of bushes, Karen could see a house; not large, but two-storeyed, with a steep slope of roof.
    “Yours?” she asked. And why not drive up to its door?
    “A friend’s. He’s in Spain right now. I have the use of the house on week-ends. So don’t worry. No trespassing charges will be lodged against us. Either we can go inside and have a comfortable chair in a hot room, or we can sit on the grass under a tree. Your choice.”
    “Grass.”
    “Good.”
    He led the way across the lawn, carrying the green bag and the packages. It was a short distance through a screen of trees to a half-acre field with a large maple at the edge of a small pond. On its other side, more trees. “Seclusion complete,” Karen said with approval as she sat down in the maple’s shade.
    “No mosquitoes until five o’clock, no bullfrogs until dark,” he promised her.
    “Birds?”
    “I’ve never seen or heard any around here at this time of day. I guess they’ve had lunch and are now resting. They do that at three-hour intervals, I’ve heard. So what about our lunch?” He