Puppet on a Chain by Alistair MacLean

herself remaining comparatively free from observation.
    I took out my wallet, extracted my previous night's dinner bill, smoothed it out on the table before me and started to make notes on a piece of paper. After a few moments I threw my pen down in disgust, screwed up the paper and flung it into a convenient waste-basket. I started on another sheet of paper and appeared to reach the same unsatisfactory conclusion. I did this several times more, then screwed my eyes shut and rested my head on my hands for almost five minutes, a man, it must have seemed, lost in the deepest concentration. The fact was, that I wasn't in too much of a hurry. Ten minutes, I'd said to Belinda, but if she managed to get out of a bath, get dressed and be across here with Maggie in that time, I knew even less than I thought I did about women.
    For a time I resumed the scribbling, the crumpling and the throwing away and by that time twenty minutes had elapsed. I finished the last of my drink, rose, said good night to the barman and went away. I went as far as the wine plush curtains that screened the bar from the foyer and waited, peering cautiously round the edge of the curtain. The girl in green rose to her feet, crossed to the bar, ordered herself another drink and then casually sat down in the chair I had just vacated, her back to me. She looked around, also casually, to make sure that she was unobserved, then just as casually reached down into the waste-basket and picked up the top sheet of crumpled paper. She smoothed it out on the table before her as I moved soundlessly up to her chair. I could see the side of her face now and I could see that it had gone very still. I could even read the message she had smoothed out on the table. It read: ONLY NOSY YOUNG GIRLS LOOK IN WASTEPAPER BASKETS.
    'All the other papers have the same secret message,' I said. 'Good evening, Miss Lemay.'
    She twisted round and looked up at me. She'd camouflaged herself pretty well to conceal the natural olive blush of her complexion, but all the paint and powder in the world was useless to conceal the blush that spread from her neck all the way up to the forehead.
    'My word,' I said. 'What a charming shade of pink.'
    'I am sorry. I do not speak English.'
    I very gently touched the bruise and said kindly: 'Concussive amnesia. It'll pass. How's the head, Miss Lemay?'
    'I'm sorry, I -- '
    'Do not speak English. You said that. But you understand it well enough, don't you? Especially the written word. My word, for an ageing character like myself it's refreshing to see that the young girls of today can blush so prettily. You do blush prettily, you know.'
    She rose in confusion, twisting and crushing the papers in her hand. On the side of the ungodly she might be -- and who but those on the side of the ungodly would have tried, as no question she had tried, to block my pursuit in the airport -- but I couldn't hold back a twinge of pity. There was something forlorn and defenceless about her. She could have been a consummate actress, but then consummate actresses would have been earning a fortune on the stage or screen. Then, unaccountably, I thought of Belinda. Two in the one day were two too many. I was going soft in the head. I nodded at the papers.
    'You may retain those, if you wish,' I said nastily.
    'Those.' She looked at the papers. 'I don't want to --'
    'Ha! The amnesia is wearing off.'
    'Please, I -- '
    'Your wig's slipped, Miss Lemay.'
    Automatically her hands reached up and touched her hair, then she slowly lowered them to her sides and bit her lip in chagrin. There was something close to desperation in the brown eyes. Again I had the unpleasant sensation of not feeling very proud of myself.
    'Please leave me,' she said, so I stepped to one side to let her pass. For a moment she looked at me and I could have sworn there was a beseeching look in her eyes and her face was puckering slightly almost as if she were about to cry, then she shook her head and hurried away. I