Ark Angel

here who would be only too glad to deal with you if I were to allow it,” Drevin replied mildly. “Perhaps you would do better to keep your mouth shut and listen to what I have to say.”
    He swirled the brandy and took a sip.
    “I have to confess, I’m fascinated by you.” The grey eyes studied Alex closely. “When Magnus told me you were an MI6 agent, I laughed. I simply couldn’t believe it. But when I look back over everything that’s happened, it makes perfect sense. I met Alan Blunt once and thought him a most devious and unpleasant individual. This confirms my impression. Even so, I find it hard to accept that he sent you after me. Is that what happened, Alex? Were you planted from the very start?”
    “He’d been shot,” Payne growled. “I’ve seen copies of his hospital records. That was real enough.”
    “Then perhaps it was no more than an unhappy coincidence. Unhappy, that is, for you. But I’m glad we have this time together. Although I’m afraid that both you and Miss Knight must be dispensed with soon, at least I’ve been given the opportunity to explain myself to you. You see, Alex, I’d like Paul to know about me. I’d like to tell him everything I’m about to tell you. But he’s weak. He’s not ready yet. He might even end up hating me for what I am. But you, I know, will understand.”
    Drevin lowered his nose into the glass and breathed in deeply.
    “I am, as you mentioned just now, a rich man. One of the richest men on the planet. I employ a team of accountants who work for me full-time all the year round, and even they are unsure quite how much I am worth. You have no idea what it’s like, Alex, to be able to have anything you want. I can walk into a shop to buy a suit and decide instead to buy the shop. If I see a new car or ship or plane in a magazine, it can be mine before the end of the day. At the last count I had eleven houses around the world. I can sleep in a different country every day of the week and wake up in yet another little bit of paradise.
    “Of course, as you’ve probably been told, this wealth did not come to me in a way that you might describe as honest. Such terms are of no interest to me. I am a criminal; I freely admit it. I have killed many people personally and countless more have died as a result of my orders. Many of my associates are criminals.
    Why should this trouble me? There’s not a successful businessman alive who has not at some time cheated or lied. We all do it! It’s just a question of degree.
    “I have been hugely successful for the past twenty years, and I fully intend to become richer and more successful in the years to come. However”—Drevin’s face grew dark—“about eighteen months ago I became aware of two small problems, and these have forced me into a particular course of action. They are the reason why you are here now, Alex. They are problems that could all too easily destroy me and which I have spent a great deal of time and money seeking to overcome.”
    “Why are you telling me all this if you’re planning to kill me?” Alex asked.
    “It is because I’m planning to kill you that I can tell you,” Drevin replied. “There will be no danger of you repeating what you hear. But please don’t interrupt again, Alex, or I shall have to ask Magnus to hurt you.”

    He closed his eyes briefly. When he opened them again, he was fully composed.
    “The first problem,” he said, “concerns the State Department of the United States, which decided to investigate some of my financial dealings, particularly those involving the Russian mafiya. Of course, I have been aware right from the start that they were building a ease against me. I have always been a careful man. I avoid written evidence and make sure there are no witnesses who might incriminate me. But even so, it would not be possible to act on the scale that I do without leaving some trace of myself, and I knew that the Americans were squirreling away the bits and pieces, talking to anyone who’d ever met me
    —and that sooner or later they were planning to bring me to court.
    “The obvious solution to this seemed to be to destroy the US State Department and in particular the men and women whose job it had been to meddle in my affairs. It occurred to me that in one respect they were actually being quite helpful. They had gathered all the evidence together: a case of putting all their eggs in one basket! With a single, well-aimed missile, I could kill all