Free The Smog by John Creasey Page A

he hated the thought of it. There would be hosts of questions which he couldn’t answer, questions which would come out of half knowledge.
    But at least he would have a few hours at the London headquarters of Z5.
    Â 
    Deep beneath the streets of London, spreading over a considerable area and approached by lifts from sections of the Elite Hotel in Mayfair, the headquarters of Z5 had been made as invulnerable as it was possible to be. There were three floors. On the top one, over a hundred yards beneath the streets, were the administrative offices, on the middle floor the domestic quarters including Palfrey’s regular home, and the Control Room. On the lowest floor were more sleeping accommodation, canteens, some of the more closely guarded records, and some rooms, actually ‘cells’ where prisoners were kept and where, in times of grave emergency, extreme measures had to be taken to make prisoners talk.
    At the moment no one was in these cells.
    Palfrey went down by a one-passenger lift, from the hotel foyer, stepped out within a few yards of his own office, and went inside. Waiting for him and getting some papers out of a filing cabinet close to his wide-topped desk was Joyce Morgan, his secretary and confidant. She was a good looking woman in her early thirties, with a fair complexion, dark hair, dark blue eyes. There was a directness about her expression and the way she looked at people, and an innate honesty, that Palfrey fully appreciated. Today, in this room filled with simulated daylight, she was unfeignedly glad to see him, the love she had for him easy to recognise as she welcomed him back from a situation in which his life had been in danger.
    He put out his hands, gripped hers, and gave her a quick, almost impersonal hug.
    â€œAll safe,” he said. “What kind of a day have you had here?”
    â€œHectic,” she answered. “Have you had enough to eat?”
    â€œI could manage another sandwich and some coffee.”
    â€œGood.” She turned away and pressed a bell in the desk. “Five minutes, will that do?”
    â€œJust right, bless you.”
    She nodded and went out, and he opened a door which led to his bedroom and bathroom, making a sudden decision to have a quick shower. Greatly invigorated, it was only a few minutes later than the time stipulated when he returned to the office. There architects and interior decorators and landscapers had worked a kind of miracle. One wall had become a huge window overlooking a lawn, flower beds, some small trees in full leaf, a table and several chairs. Joyce was in the garden, setting out coffee and cold meats. The garden was her idea, and a remarkable feat, for the lighting was a perfect simulation of daylight.
    â€œIf you’re going to spend half of your life underground, you may as well have it as comfortable as you can,” she had said. Now, at his approach, she turned round, eager to see him.
    â€œWonderful,” he said. “No smog.”
    â€œCan’t you forget smog for half an hour?”
    â€œI can give it second place,” he conceded.
    He saw with satisfaction that the sandwiches and the coffee were exactly as he liked them, arranged with an unobtrusive regard to his small, personal preferences. He was deeply grateful, though no more than that. She knew the awful weight of the burdens he sometimes had to carry; and if he unconsciously traded on the affection she had for him she never, by word or look, allowed him to realise it.
    At last he finished.
    â€œNow,” he said, commandingly.
    Joyce looked at him, judging him fit to receive the full impact of her report. “The situation is not good.”
    â€œHow bad?”
    â€œThere are seventy-one major cities where the carbon monoxide and sulphur oxides content in the air, with nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons, is just below or even just above the danger level to human and to plant life.”
    He stared at her, his mind working