Blow-Down, page 8
An oblong of yellow light gaped suddenly, and Lane was pushed into a bare room. A table and three chairs were the only furniture on the floor of beaten earth. The walls were green with mold. As the door closed behind Lane, another door opened in the opposite wall, and Adolf von Graulitz came in.
Lane could not help remarking the incongruous magnificence of von Graulitz—the elegant insouciance with which his cloak hung from his shoulders; the gleam of medals on the breast of his white serge dinner jacket—in contrast with the primitive interior of the hut and the ill-fitting, nondescript uniforms of the Indians who had brought Lane to the cays. Then, the instant the German’s stiff-necked gaze fell upon Lane, the whole beautiful picture of superb arrogance vanished in a puff of anger and a sputter of gutturals. Von Graulitz’s face turned crimson, his eyes bulged, his precise lips twisted desperately to find invective strong enough. For half a second he was dumb. Then, as his long forefinger thrust rapier-like toward the Indian gunmen, he exploded.
“Dumkopf!” he screamed. “Cabrón! Imbecile! Worm! Ordure! Is this the man you bring me?”
“We followed instructions, Señor,” one of the Indians said humbly. “We followed instructions exactly—”
“Don’t pick on these poor fellows, Graulitz,” Lane said fliply. He was smiling inwardly at the turn the incident had taken, and was preparing to play it for all it was worth. “They did their best. It wasn’t their fault that I walked into their ambush at the wrong moment. Who were you expecting them to waylay outside the Consulate, Graulitz?”
If Graulitz was annoyed with himself for having revealed too much by his petulant exhibition, he did not show it. Without the slightest effort he regained his composure, his superior affability. His smile was almost conciliatory as he waved Lane to a chair.
“Why, it was you I was expecting, Mr. Lane,” he said, “you and no other. Only I was afraid my friends might have been rough with you?”
“Not at all. They were as gentle as cherubs. Of course, I needed no persuasion to make me come. I was, it fact, quite anxious to see you tonight.”
“Indeed! What was it you wished to see me about?”
“You first, my dear Graulitz. Your reasons are more pressing than mine, apparently.”
“Very well.” Adolf von Graulitz slowly sucked in his stomach until his chest developed an overhang like a well-fed dowager’s. “I abhor subterfuge, Lane,” he said. “I come from a blunt race of people and since we are adversaries—”
“Are we adversaries?” Lane asked innocently. “I hadn’t heard.”
“I heard,” said von Graulitz, fixing Lane with a prosecuting-attorney stare, “that after you left Honduras, the local authorities confiscated three fishing smacks which had the misfortune to be fitted with unlicensed radio transmitters; and that five pieces of experimental high-frequency apparatus were seized and destroyed. I thought I would spare you much trouble by telling you that your tactics will not succeed here. You will save time by returning at once to Washington.” The German paused to watch the effect of his harangue on Lane. Lane seemed singularly unimpressed. Von Graulitz drew a deep breath, preparatory to making another, more dramatic peroration. He said, “You see, Lane, I know everything about you. My service of information is one hundred percent efficient. We are a thorough people, we Germans.”
“Fairly thorough,” Lane admitted. “And a little heavy. You’re not very nimble-witted, Graulitz—you and your agent. It took you more than a week to get a report on me. Nine days, to be exact. Your agent didn’t turn in my dossier until day before yesterday, did he?”
Von Graulitz grimaced with one side of his face, as though he were screwing up the muscles of one eye around an imaginary monocle. There was a touch of condescending admiration in his voice as he said:
“You are rather shrewd, Lane—for an American. How did you find this out? Or did you guess?”
“No need of my guessing when you tip your own hand,” Lane said. “You shut down that big power beam of yours night before last—just in case I hadn’t taken enough bearings on it to locate it. You’ve been depending on some two-for-a-nickel spark set for interference. It’s not working very well, Graulitz. It’s hard to keep the edges sharp. Last night you were slopping over to blanket one of your own programs. By the way, it sounded very much as though it might be coming from the cays, Graulitz, and it also sounded very much like a Jacob’s Ladder. Mind if I look around the island, just to see if I was right?”
“What,” said von Graulitz, “is a Jacob’s Ladder?”
“A Jacob’s Ladder is two polished metal rods, with one end of each hooked to the secondary of an induction coil. The two rods are not quite parallel, so that the spark jumping between them climbs progressively toward the open end, then starts over. It makes one hell of a racket on the kilocycles.”
“I am not acquainted with the Jacob’s Ladder—”
“Naturally. I quite understand that Old Testament terminology might be verboten.”
Von Graulitz raised his elbow briskly, a military gesture that brought his wrist watch precisely opposite his eyes.
“You could return to the States by the Bonaca,” he said. “She sails early tomorrow morning.”
“I shall return to the States when I finish my job,” Lane said. “Or shortly thereafter. I may stay around to see how the local authorities get on with their mopping up.”
“You may be surprised to find that the local authorities here are not quite so ready to co-operate as those in Honduras,” von Graulitz said. “In fact, they may refuse completely to co-operate. Have you ever considered the possibility of a—well, a drastic change in the national government here in the near future?”
“I have considered the possibility,” said Lane casually. “And I believe my friends in Washington have also considered the possibility. They can’t be unaware of what happened in Brazil. Which is another reason I am most anxious to remain here until I have you completely checkmated, Graulitz.”
“I shouldn’t delay too long. The climate down here is quite unhealthy.”
“I’m vaccinated against climate,” Lane said. “I don’t expect to leave in a box, either. I’m very careful about what I eat—not like Bossert.”
“Ah, yes, Bossert,” murmured von Graulitz. “Too bad about Bossert.”
“Yes, wasn’t it? Too bad about Stilton, too—or don’t you think so, Graulitz?”
“Stilton? Downright shocking. Who do you suppose killed him?”
“You, probably,” said Lane.
“Ach, dumheit! my dear Lane,” von Graulitz protested. “What makes you say that?”
“I understand you were the last person to see Stilton alive tonight. If he was alive when you left Puerto Musa, how do you know he was killed?”
“News travels fast,” said von Graulitz. “Particularly bad news. There was a telephone call to Liberica—”
“And from Liberica here?”
“I was in Liberica myself when the message came!” snapped von Graulitz.
“Of course! I should have known.” Lane grinned. It was a frank, good-natured grin—frank in its good-natured disbelief. Its very good humor infuriated Adolf von Graulitz. The blood mounted slowly to his face, his scalp, until color showed at the roots of his close-cropped blond hair. But his face remained impassive.
“What’s so damned amusing?” he asked coldly.
Lane did not reply. He continued to grin.
Graulitz deliberately turned his back on Lane, walked with slow, dignified steps to a corner of the hut, snapped back the lock on a heavy chest which reposed on the beaten-earth floor. He came back to the table bearing a small lacquered cabinet the size of a dictionary. He pressed a catch, and a mirrored top sprang open, revealing an array of small crystal decanters and six thimble-sized glasses which sparkled in the lamplight.
“I am paying you a great compliment,” said von Graulitz, setting the pocket-bar on the table. “A soldier honors a worthy enemy even though he must destroy him. I will drink with you, Lane, before I judge you.”
“I am overwhelmed,” said Lane.
Von Graulitz set out two of the liqueur glasses, touched the crystal stopper of one of the miniature decanters, then apparently changed his mind.
“Sit down,” he said.
Lane sat. The German sat down opposite him. Lane felt some small object roll under his foot as he pushed his legs under the table. With the edge of his shoe he kicked it gently to one side, so that he could see what it was. But he did not look for the moment, because von Graulitz demanded his full attention.
“Porfirio! Here!” ordered von Graulitz, with the voice of a man calling his dog.
One of the Indians stepped forward. Von Graulitz snatched Porfirio’s revolver from his holster, broke it, ostentatiously examined the cartridges while his expert thumb pressed against the extractor, then snapped it closed. His long fingers caressed the weapon for an instant before he handed it back.
“You will stand behind me, Porfirio,” he said. “You will keep the pistol aimed at this gentleman—so!” He leaned forward to touch the center of Lane’s forehead. “You will not fire until I give the signal. If your hand trembles, I will beat you to death. This must be done neatly, Porfirio.”
“Sí, Señor.”
“And now, Lane, we will drink. Will you have kirsch, Danziger goldwasser, kümmel, or curaçao?”
“Kirsch,” said Lane.
As von Graulitz poured the drinks, Lane got a look at the object that had rolled under his foot. It was a tiny bottle.
“Heil Hitler,” said von Graulitz solemnly.
“Down the hatch!” said Lane. He was grinning again.
Von Graulitz set down his glass abruptly. “You are laughing?” he demanded with chill annoyance.
“No, I’m merely smiling.”
“You find it comical, perhaps, that a whim of mine could alter your relationship with the universe. You are amused at the prospect of losing all meaning and value in the world—except as food for sharks. You think it is humorous that I have only to lift my little finger and those fine brains of yours will be spattered against the back wall. In one minute, Lane, the sharks would be fighting over your body.”
“They won’t be, though,” Lane said.
“What’s to prevent me from destroying you, Lane?”
“The fact that I’m the wrong man.”
“Wrong man?” Von Graulitz curled the fingers of his right hand tightly about the base of his glass. His left hand moved nervously along the edge of the table.
“Exactly. The wrong man. You forget you were expecting your dim-witted aboriginal pals to bring you somebody else tonight.”
“That’s not true. I assure you it was you I expected.”
“You should play more poker, Graulitz. Before you got a fine Teutonic grip on yourself, your facial muscles told a different story. You’re worried stiff, Graulitz, because you don’t know whether I’m here by accident or design. You don’t know whether your Indian boys blundered, or if I had some understanding with the person you sent them to ambush. You’re afraid I’m thinking one jump ahead of you, and that I might be here as bait for a trap. And you won’t kill me, Graulitz, because you’re not sure I wasn’t followed, that there isn’t a motorboat out there in the night with a submachine gun in the bow and a cockpit full of vindictive friends of the late Mr. Stilton—”
“You’re talking nonsense, Lane.”
“Am I? Then give your signal. Have your man pull the trigger—just to see if the sound of the shot will have any echoes outside.”
Herr von Graulitz glared. His fingers released the glass, and his hand moved across the table slowly, deliberately. Lane could feel his heart beating violently in his throat. He wondered if the man could see the quaking uncertainty he tried to hide behind his jaunty smile as von Graulitz’s right hand closed on the decanter of kirsch. Without taking his eyes from Lane, he refilled the glasses. Some of the cherry spirits spilled on the table.
“Porfirio!” barked von Graulitz, still fixing Lane.
“Sí, Señor.”
“Did a boat follow you out here tonight, Porfirio?”
Porfirio didn’t know. He couldn’t be sure because a rain squall had reduced visibility during most of the trip over. Besides, they had been busy bailing—
“Have him pull the trigger, Graulitz, if you’re ready for the showdown, although”—Lane paused before playing his trump—“if I were you, I think I should find out just how much this woman has talked, before I got hopelessly involved with another murder.”
“Woman? What woman?” Graulitz’s lips tightened disdainfully.
“I’m surprised at you, Graulitz. You know what you Nazis say about women: Kirche, Küche, and Kinder. They like to talk too well, Graulitz, for you to have let one in on an important matter like this. I think, before going any further, I should find out just what the lady in question has been telling in Puerto Musa since Stilton was killed. You’ll find—”
“There has never been a woman in my confidence or in my house!” said von Graulitz calmly.
“No?” Lane stopped, picked up the tiny bottle that lay at his feet, set it in front of Graulitz. “Don’t tell me you use coral fingernail polish yourself, Graulitz. And an American brand, too.”
Von Graulitz tossed off his kirsch at one gulp, rose like an automaton. He stared down at the phial of nail polish but did not touch it. Then he reached back and snatched the revolver from Porfirio’s hands.
For a long moment he stood motionless, his tight lips pale, his hard stare unblinking. There was a sudden flash of lamplight on gun metal as he turned to jam the revolver into the Indian’s holster.
“You will take us back to the mainland, Porfirio,” he ordered. “You will stop half a mile this side of Puerto Musa to land Mr. Lane in the mangroves. He can wade ashore.”
Lane breathed again. He had outbluffed the bluffing German.
Chapter Ten
Old Scandal
The Comandante held the door open while Cecil Holliday came out to join those waiting in the anteroom. Muriel searched his pale, distinguished features for some clue as to the outcome of his inquisition, but found none. Holliday seemed a few degrees closer to sobriety, but it was hard to say how much; it was only in his garrulity that he ever showed he had been drinking. He winked solemnly at Muriel as he resumed his seat between Perry and Alcott.
Ed Bannister arose, but the Comandante waved him back.
“Not yet, Mr. Bannister,” he said. “I’d like to ask Miss Monroe a few more questions first.”
The girl got up and went into the Comandante’s office. The Comandante motioned her to a chair but did not sit down himself. For a moment he seemed to ignore her. Leaning his palms against the edge of his desk, he gave his entire attention to his tame pisote—a small ant-eater which was scampering across the green desk blotter, investigating a pencil with its sharp nose. The Comandante picked up the pencil, prodded the furry little animal playfully with the eraser end until the pisote seized the pencil with its forepaws.
“Well, Miss Monroe?” The Comandante looked up suddenly. “What have you decided?”
“About what, Coronel?”
“About the safe. Half an hour ago you weren’t able to say positively that you had locked the safe before your visit in the office tonight. Has your memory been refreshed by thirty minutes of reflection?”
“At the time, I was pretty sure that I’d locked it,” the girl said. “I still have that impression—although now I know it must have been a false impression. I guess we get careless about habitual movements like that. Anyhow, I’m pretty positive now that I must have left the safe open, or at least unlocked.”
“What makes you certain of that now, Miss Monroe?” The Comandante left the pisote to its own devices, lit a cigarette and came over to look down curiously at the nervous girl.
“Because the money was stolen,” Muriel said.
“And it couldn’t have been stolen by someone who opened the safe for that express purpose?”
“Not by someone who opened the safe by using the combination,” the girl said. “There are only three of us who know the combination. If Mr. Perry or Mr. Alcott wanted to steal the money, they would have been able to do it at their own sweet leisure—and without killing Mr. Stilton.”
“Suppose Mr. Stilton had surprised one of them at the safe?”
“That still wouldn’t have been any reason to kill him. They both had a perfect right to be in the office and to open the safe. They’re both trusted officials of the company. Mr. Stilton couldn’t have seen anything wrong even if he had found either of them with the hundred thousand in his hands.”
The Comandante nodded, squinting through the smoke of his cigarette.
“Now about this man Lane,” he said. “You said he was with you both times you visited the office. Was he with you every minute of the time?”
“Practically,” said the girl uneasily.
“What do you mean by ‘practically’?”
“Well, I sent him out of Mr. Perry’s office while I was working the combination. He was out of my sight for only two or three minutes.”
“It takes only two or three seconds to stab a man to death, Miss Monroe.”
“But Mr. Stilton wasn’t there when we first visited the office!”
“How do you know he wasn’t there?”
“I didn’t see him.”
“You didn’t see him the second time either, Miss Monroe—but he was there, and Lane saw him. How can you be sure Lane didn’t see him the first time?”
“I—I am sure. I can’t explain why, but I am. Call it the old feminine intuition, if you like.”
The Comandante walked around behind his desk and sat down. He was smiling with tolerant cynicism as he placed his burning cigarette on the edge of an ashtray. The pisote immediately attacked the cigarette, ripping the paper with its sharp claws, systematically dissipating the unlighted tobacco, retreating in panic when its pointed nose encountered the glowing end. The Comandante paid no attention to his frantic pet, now doing a war dance about the ash tray, its bushy tail waving excitedly like a pagan totem. He folded his arms and continued to smile at Muriel. He asked finally:
