Disorderly Elements by Bob Cook Page B

will lock everything in my office, and I would be grateful if the office remained locked until I return.”
    Owen gave Wyman an inquiring look.
    â€œYou are taking this very seriously, aren’t you? Very well. I see no reason why you can’t lock the office.”
    â€œYes,” Wyman said. “Unlike you and the Minister, I do spy strangers. And when I said I wanted the office locked, I meant that it should be permanently locked. No one should have access to it—not even the secretaries or Mrs Hobbes.”
    â€œI understand,” Owen said curtly. “Is there anything else?”
    â€œNo, thank you,” Wyman said. He got up and walked over to the door. Just before opening it he turned and smiled at Owen.
    â€œWouldn’t it be amusing if I’d made one fatal error of judgment?” he asked.
    â€œAnd what would that be?”
    â€œThe childish assumption that you yourself are above suspicion.”
    He laughed quietly as he left the room.

Chapter Thirteen
    W YMAN FLEW TO ROME on the morning of May 11. He travelled under the assumed name of Edmund Ryle, using a false passport he had acquired when doing field work for the Firm. When its employees have finished their work abroad, the Firm insists on the immediate return of all their bogus documentation. However, Wyman had managed to delay the return of the Ryle passport until it had officially expired. He then applied to have the passport renewed, and upon receipt of the new passport he returned the old one to the Firm. Hence, unknown to his employers, Wyman was able to travel under an assumed name whenever he pleased. Given the nature of Wyman’s trip, and his obvious desire that no one but himself and Owen should know what he was doing, keeping the false passport had turned out to be a good idea.
    The flight from Heathrow Airport to Rome was brief and comfortable. Wyman sat in the first-class compartment of a British Airways TriStar, sipping brandy and smoking duty-free cigars. About halfway through the journey, the pilot pointed out that they were flying directly above the Alps. Wyman looked out and saw nothing but a thick carpet of cloud. He leaned back in his seat and wondered how Owen would react when presented with his expense account for the trip.
    Gradually the weather brightened, and the pilot announced that they would soon be landing at Fiumicino airport. Wyman was reminded to put his watch forward by one hour, and was told that Italian customs would allow him to bring in 300 cigarettes, a bottle of wine and a bottle of spirits. Since all these items were cheaper in Rome than on the plane, Wyman ignored the offer.
    Just under three hours had elapsed when the plane landed. Aeroporto Leonardo da Vinci, better known as Fiumicino, consists of two terminals about 18 miles from Rome, on the Tyrrhenian shore. The airport epitomizes the Italian flair for needless bureaucracy, inefficiency and confusion. As Wyman waited to collect his suitcase, he watched the scattered regiment of airport officials run about shouting, cursing, demanding and receiving entire forests of official documentation, annoying travellers and abusing porters.
    With a skill born of bitter experience, Wyman managed to escape this confused mêlée with relative ease. He walked out of the airport into a warm sunny day and hailed a taxi. Forty minutes later he was in Rome.
    Few cities can be summed up briefly, and Rome defies all concise descriptions. Suffice it to say that Rome is a coffee-coloured city whose exquisite beauty stems from paradox and contradictions. It is both vibrant and sleepy, surging with life twenty-four hours a day, and calmed by indifference to time. It is wildly cosmopolitan and yet typically Italian. It is both tasteful and vulgar, noisy and gentle, elegant and gauche. On a glowing spring day its streets are filled by tourists clutching cameras, fawning shopkeepers who shortchange their customers, plump housewives and their shrill