"Excuse me, Mrs. Williams," Henriette's voice said on the intercom, "there's a Detective Hornung here to see you. He says it's urgent."
Elizabeth turned to look up at Rhys, puzzled. They had just returned from Rio to Zurich the evening before, and they had only been in the office a few minutes. Rhys shrugged. "Tell her to send the man in. Let's find out what's so important."
A few moments later the three of them were seated in Elizabeth's office. "What did you want to see me about?" Elizabeth asked.
Max Hornung had no small talk. He said, "Someone is trying to murder you." As he watched the color drain from Elizabeth's face, Max was genuinely distressed, wondering if there might have been a more tactful way he could have phrased it.
Rhys Williams said, "What the hell are you talking about?"
Max continued to address himself to Elizabeth. "There have already been two attempts on your life. There will probably be more."
Elizabeth stammered, "I - you must be mistaken."
"No, ma'am. That elevator crash was meant to kill you."
She stared at him in silence, her dark eyes filled with bewilderment, and some other emotion buried deeper, that Max could not define. "So was the Jeep."
Elizabeth found her voice again. "You're wrong. That was an accident. There was nothing the matter with the Jeep. The police in Sardinia examined it."
"No."
"I saw them," Elizabeth insisted.
"No, ma'am. You saw them examine a Jeep. It wasn't yours."
They were both staring at him now.
Max went on, "Your Jeep was never in that garage. I found it in an auto junkyard at Olbia. The bolt that sealed the master cylinder had been loosened, and the brake fluid had run out. That's why you had no brakes. The left front fender was still bashed in and there were green markings on it from the sap of the trees you ran into. The lab checked it out. It matches."
The nightmare was back. Elizabeth felt it sweep through her, as though the floodgates of her hidden fears had suddenly opened, and she was filled again with the terror of that ride down the mountains.
Rhys was saying, "I don't understand. How could anyone - ?"
Max turned to look at Rhys. "All Jeeps look alike. That's what they were counting on. When she crashed instead of going off the mountain, they had to improvise. They couldn't let anyone examine that Jeep because it had to look like an accident. They had expected it to be at the bottom of the sea. They probably would have finished her off there, but a maintenance crew came along, found her and took her to the hospital. They got hold of another Jeep, smashed it up a little and made the switch before the police came."
Rhys said, "You keep saying 'they.'"
"Whoever was behind it had help."
"Who - who would want to kill me?" Elizabeth asked.
"The same person who killed your father."
She had a sudden feeling of unreality, as if none of this was happening. It was all a nightmare that would go away.
"Your father was murdered," Max went on. "He was set up with a phony guide who killed him. Your father didn't go to Chamonix alone. There was someone with him."
When Elizabeth spoke, her voice was a hollow whisper. "Who?"
Max looked at Rhys and said, "Your husband."
The words echoed in her ears. They seemed to come from far away, fading in and out, and she wondered if she was losing her mind.
"Liz," Rhys said, "I wasn't there with Sam when he was killed."
"You were in Chamonix with him, Mr. Williams," Max insisted.
"That's true." Rhys was talking to Elizabeth now. "I left before Sam went on his climb."
She turned to look at him. "Why didn't you tell me?"
He hesitated a moment, then seemed to make a decision. "It's something I couldn't discuss with anyone. For the past year someone has been sabotaging Roffe and Sons. It was done very cleverly, so that it seemed to be a series of accidents. But I began to see a pattern. I went to Sam with it, and we decided to hire an outside agency to investigate."
Elizabeth knew then what was coming, and she was simultaneously filled with a deep sense of relief and a feeling of guilt. Rhys had known about the report all along. She should have trusted him enough to tell him about it, instead of keeping her fears to herself.
Rhys turned to Max Hornung, "Sam Roffe got a report that confirmed my suspicions. He asked me to go up to Chamonix to discuss it with him. I went. We decided to keep it just between the two of us until we could find out who was responsible for what was happening." When he continued, there was a note of bitterness in his voice. "Obviously, it wasn't kept quiet enough. Sam was killed because someone knew we were getting on to him. The report is missing."
"I had it," Elizabeth said. Rhys looked at her in surprise. "It was with Sam's personal effects." She said to Max, "The report indicates that it was someone on the board of Roffe and Sons, but they all have stock in the company. Why would they want to destroy it?"
Max explained, "They're not trying to destroy it, Mrs. Williams. They're trying to cause enough trouble to make the banks nervous enough to start calling in their loans. They wanted to force your father to sell the stock and go public. Whoever is behind this hasn't gotten what he wanted yet. Your life is still in danger."
"Then you've got to give her police protection," Rhys demanded.
Max blinked and said tonelessly, "I wouldn't worry about that, Mr. Williams. She hasn't been out of our sight since she married you."