“The wound and surrounding tissue exhibit signs of severe infection. I’d say our man was wounded by that Israeli chap during the actual kidnapping. His comrades tried to keep him alive, but apparently they finally gave up and put him out of his misery with a neat bullet in the back of the head. He probably suffered terribly. I suppose there is some justice in the world after all.”

SIO crouched next to the body and examined the lower leg of the corpse, then began searching the corpse itself for evidence. The coat pockets were empty, as were the front pockets of his trousers, but in the back right pocket he found a single sheet of paper, folded in quarters and flattened by many days of pressure. The SIO unfolded it carefully and read it by the beam of his flashlight.

“Draw me up a list of supplies one would need to treat a bullet wound in the field—things that can be purchased over the counter at an ordinary chemist’s shop. And put a very wide cordon around this scene. If your theory about this chap is correct, this beach is going to be invaded soon by several hundred men from the Anti-Terrorist Branch, MI5, the FBI, and the CIA.”

“Done.”

The SIO turned and walked quickly out of the trees. Two minutes later he was behind the wheel of his car, speaking by radio to the duty officer in the Operations and Communications Center. “It looks like the body might be linked to the missing American woman,” he said. “Get the chief constable on the phone immediately and bring him into the picture.”

“Anything else, sir?”

“I found a receipt in his pocket for the Portsmouth–to–Le Havre ferry. If this chap is really one of the terrorists, it could mean that the American girl is now in France.”…

The series of events that occurred next unfolded with precision and remarkable swiftness. The Operations and Communications Center immediately located the Norfolk chief constable, who was dining with friends and family in Norwich, and told him of the discovery. The chief constable stepped away from the table and quietly relayed the information to his superiors at the Home Office, who in turn informed the COBRA committee and the Police Nationale of France. Fifteen minutes after the SIO’s initial dispatch from the beach, news of the discoveries reached the American team at Grosvenor Square. A secure cable was sent priority status from the embassy to all federal agencies involved in the search for Elizabeth Halton, including the CIA.