Operation Manhunt

by Christopher Nicole

  “Man, you’d be pressing your luck,” Strohm said. “Harman’s still in there.”

  “Well, here’s what we do,” Jonathan said. “You take Byrne’s rifle, Captain, and go with Mrs. Malthus for her husband. No violence, if we can avoid it, please. Tom, you take Benny to the car, get it started and onto the drive, so we can leave in a hurry. I’ll get Gerry.” Before they could argue, he ran up the stairs, cautiously opened the cellar door. The big house was uncannily silent. He tiptoed along by the stairs, climbed them to the gallery, holding his breath every time one of the old pieces of wood creaked beneath his weight. He crossed the gallery, tried Geraldine’s door; it was locked. But the door to the adjoining bathroom was open. He turned the handle, stepped inside, gazed at Brian O’Connor, just entering the bathroom from the bedroom side.

  “The game’s up, Doctor,” Jonathan said, with all the confidence he could muster.

  O’Connor hesitated, looking past Jonathan as if trying to calculate just what might be happening downstairs, then stepped back and slammed the door. Jonathan hurled himself across the bathroom, but the door was locked. He rammed his shoulder against it, and again, felt the ancient wood cracking beneath his weight. The third attempt sent it swinging open, and he burst into the bedroom.

  Brian O’Connor faced him from the window. The psychiatrist had draped his daughter across his shoulder, and had one leg already through the window. “Stop right there, Mr. Anders,” he said. His right hand held the snub-nosed revolver.

  Jonathan checked, stepped back into the darkness, and the bullet sang through the doorway to shatter the tiles above the bath. He gave a cry to coincide with the noise, and O’Connor began descending the fire escape, Geraldine still across his shoulders.

  Jonathan ran to the window, looked out. The doctor reached the ground as Benny and Crater came around the corner of the house.

  “Throw down your gun, Dr. O’Connor.” Jonathan started down the ladder. “You can’t get away now.”

  “Damn you, Anders,” O’Connor shouted, and fired. Jonathan flattened against the ladder, heard the bullet clang against the iron just above his head. But when O’Connor fired again, there was only a click. The doctor abandoned all idea of making the garage and turned for the shelter of the trees.

  “Stop!” Jonathan yelled. “Leave Gerry, Dr. O’Connor. She has no part in this.”

  O’Connor plunged into the fringe of trees surrounding the house. Jonathan ran behind him, two nights without sleep and forty-eight hours of almost unending physical effort tugging at his muscles, so that he felt as if he were wading through glue. He reached the first of the trees, hesitated, listening, his perception obscured by the hammering of his heart.

  Feet pounded behind him, and Benny and Crater joined him. “Where’d he go?” Crater asked.

  “I wish I knew.”

  “But to take the girl …” Benny said.

  “He’s lost his head,” Jonathan said “I think maybe the strain has proved just a little too much for him.”

  “We’ll fan out,” Crater decided. “Go forward on a broad front. The river isn’t far. That’ll stop him.”

  Jonathan nodded, advanced into the trees. For a few moments he heard the rustling of his two companions, then the night was silent, the forest alternately dark and suddenly illuminated by shafts of moonlight. He could hear the river now, much closer than he had thought, and then he was on the bank, checked by the sight of two forms lying on the ground immediately in front of him. Behind him a branch snapped.

  “Good morning to you, Mr. Anders,” said Conrad Brown.

  CHAPTER 10

  Jonathan stared at the two bodies. “They’re not dead?”

  “Of course not, Mr. Anders. Had I fired, I would have alerted you. Besides, my mission has nothing to do with killing innocent young girls. No, no. The doctor was careless enough to stand with his back to where I was concealed while he made up his mind to cross the river.”

  Jonathan turned his head. Brown stood in the shadow of a tree, but the rifle glinted in his hands. “So it was O’Connor you were after, all the time.”

  “Certainly,” Brown said. “Once my employers received his offer to return General Pobrenski to us, and were told that we could reply to him care of the General Post Office in Bridgetown, Barbados, it became a relatively simple matter. I happened to be in Haiti at the time, and so I was instructed to fly down to Barbados. There, of course, I learned that the good doctor was attempting to be very smart, and had given instructions for any cables arriving for him to be forwarded to the General Post Office in Kingstown.”

  “Which is how you knew to follow him there,” Jonathan said.

  “The doctor, unfortunately for himself, regarded himself as a very clever man, whereas he was nothing more than a not-very-talented amateur who happened to have been quite remarkably lucky over a considerable period of time. We would have found him anyway, because of that photograph he so carelessly allowed to be published in a travel magazine. Now tell me how you knew to trace him to St. Vincent, Mr. Anders.”

  “I’m afraid I followed you.”

  “How stupid of me. But how delightfully simple of you. I have a feeling that you might well go far in this business of ours, were you to receive the chance. I am assuming you work for the British?”

  “I told you, I’m writing a book on volcanoes.”

  “Oh, come now, Mr. Anders. That in itself would have given you away. Oh, yes, you work for Whitehall, all right. Even without your assistant making such a terrible mess in my bedroom yesterday morning, I would have deduced that. A very untidy young man, that Mr. Crater, although I do agree that it was equally thoughtless of me to make inquiries through him in the first place. The espionage network in this part of the world seems to be somewhat confused.”

  “And you work for the Russians?”

  Brown smiled. “Who knows, Mr. Anders. Who knows. I work for the people with whom Dr. O’Connor, in his ignorance, was attempting to deal. Ah, General Pobrenski, how good to see you.”

  Benny came out of the forest, checked. “I do not understand. What has happened to the doctor? And who is this gentleman?”

  “This is Conrad Brown,” Jonathan said. “I may have mentioned him to you before, Benny. I think he has just knocked the doctor out.”

  “I watched you leave the house,” Brown said. “There were three of you, and I am quite sure the other one is quite close. In fact, that must be him I hear crashing about over there.” He raised his voice. “Come out, please, Mr. Crater. I have your friends covered.”

  Crater emerged from the bushes, looking rather crestfallen. “I’m sorry, Jonathan. I was trying to sneak up on him.”

  “Better men than you have failed in attempting that, Mr. Crater. Killing is my business.”

  Crater dropped to his knees beside Geraldine. “Is she all right? If you’ve harmed her, I’ll.…”

  “I would say she is drugged,” Brown said. “How well she is depends on the drug used, but I have not laid a finger on her. Now, Mr. Anders, and you, General Pobrenski, will you join Mr. Crater, on your knees, with your backs to me?”

  “General Pobrenski?” Benny cried. “I’m Benny, the steward from off the Sidewinder.”

  Brown smiled. “You answer the description I was given, General, which is good enough for me.”

  “And you mean to kill us all?” Jonathan asked.

  “Unfortunately, Mr. Anders, I have no choice now. Dr. O’Connor is my specific target. The general is under a sentence of death, in any event, and my superiors can see no point in undertaking the dangerous business of transporting him all the way back to Warsaw. You and Mr. Crater have seen and heard and deduced far too much, as my term of duty in the West Indies is not yet over. But I repeat, I shall not harm the girl, as she apparently knows nothing about me. If she has a strong heart, she should suffer no lasting ill effects from the shock she will undoubtedly receive when she wakes up. Now kneel. It will be dawn in a little while.”

 
; Benny hesitated. “I’m sorry about this, Mr. Anders. But I told you that you were making a mistake, coming after me in the first place. I figure I was just born unlucky.”

  Jonathan considered the distance between himself and Brown. But it was a hopeless proposition against a trained assassin. He sighed, turned away, checked as there came a fresh rustling from the bushes.

  “Quiet!” Brown snapped. “I do believe the stout lady has come looking for you.”

  “Go away, Phyllis,” Benny shouted. “Run!”

  “That was silly of you, General,” Brown said, and sighted the rifle. The branches crackled and Aristotle shot out of the undergrowth, straight as an arrow and traveling like an express train, between Brown’s legs. Brown fired as he lost his balance, fell against a tree. Jonathan propelled himself across the open space. Crater was also on his feet and pounding forward. Brown brought the gun down, fired again. But they were on him now, Jonathan ripping the rifle from his hands, Crater swinging massive right- and left-handed blows, releasing all the pent-up anxiety of the past few days.

  Jonathan pulled the gun clear, stepped away. He did not think the photographer would need any help, once Brown had only his muscles to rely on. He turned to Benny, who held Aristotle in his arms. “Isn’t it remarkable,” Benny said. “The poor little chap only wanted a bit of comfort.”

  CHAPTER 11

  The jet touched down, rose, settled, taxied toward the terminal building, engines screaming in reverse. Jonathan unfastened his safety belt, peered through the window. “I’ll bet that rain’s cold.”

  “It’ll be colder than in Dominica,” Headly agreed. “But I’d bet it’s nothing like as cold as the reception you’re going to get.”

  Jonathan straightened his tie. The aircraft stopped, and he scooped his overnight bag from the rack. “Well, here goes nothing.”

  The stewardess smiled at him. “I hope you’ve had a pleasant trip, sir.”

  “The trip was marvelous,” Jonathan agreed. He went up the ramp, Headly at his heels, joined the queue for Passport Control. One of the uniformed officials detached himself from the desk.

  “Mr. Anders? Mr. Headly? Will you come with me, please?”

  “Oh, he’s furious, all right,” Headly muttered. “When he starts bending rules, look out.”

  The other passengers glared at the apparently privileged pair as they followed the customs officer down the corridor and through a door, found themselves in a small, comfortable little room, overlooking the runways. Craufurd stood at the window, watching an air bus land.

  “I have brought the gentlemen you asked for, Mr. Craufurd,” said the customs officer.

  “Thank you.” Craufurd picked up his bowler hat and his umbrella. “Shall we go? My car is waiting.”

  “I haven’t got my luggage yet,” Jonathan said.

  “My dear boy, I’m sure they’ll keep it for you.”

  “But what’s the rush?” Headly asked. “Or are we taking Jonathan directly to the Tower?”

  “My word, what a scintillating wit you have, Charles.” Craufurd led them out of the building, got into the waiting Bentley, settled himself comfortably and lit a cigar. “Perhaps you would be good enough to explain what went wrong this time?”

  The car moved away from the curb; the chauffeur obviously knew where he was going.

  “Well, Mr. Craufurd,” Jonathan said, “it’s rather a long story.”

  “Then be brief. I am reasonably acquainted with what occurred up to the time the man Brown was disarmed. It is your behavior after that time that most concerns me. Your orders were to deliver General Pobrenski to me in London, personally. Why did you not do so?”

  “Well, you see, we were lumbered with a fair number of criminals. Of course, Harman, Byrne and Stanley were quite willing to surrender once they realized that O’Connor was finished, but we still felt we had to get in touch with Superintendent Courtney. It occurred to me that if both Benny and I had disappeared by the time he got to the house, he might very well want us back. The plane didn’t leave for another two hours, you see, and even then only went as far as Barbados. We would have had to wait another couple of hours for a flight to England, which would have given the Dominica police lots of time to get on the telephone to Bridgetown.”

  “So he sent the general on by himself,” Headly said. “And stayed to explain things to the police. Which seems eminently sensible to me.”

  “Oh, quite,” Craufurd said. “It is his lack of success in that direction I find upsetting. You wound up in jail along with everybody else.”

  “Well, there was some confusion, you see, Mr. Craufurd. Superintendent Courtney wasn’t quite sure who to believe, at first.”

  “But he eventually came round to your side, once I had dispatched Mr. Headly to your rescue.” Craufurd tapped ash, while the Bentley hummed along the motorway. “However, if I have told you once, I have told you a thousand times, it is no part of our business to become involved either with the police or the newspapers. This whole affair has attracted far more publicity than it should have. Now tell me, what about those, er, criminals with whom you were associating?”

  “They’re in custody,” Jonathan said. “Charged with a variety of things, from attempted murder to illegal possession of firearms.”

  “O’Connor?”

  “His situation is a bit more complicated. It seems the State Department has been interested in the doctor’s activities for some time. They’ve sent a man down to Roseau, and the chances are he’ll find himself back in the States before too long. Quite a few of his clients wanted to go to the U.S., you see, so one of the sidelines of his organization was forging passports and visas and arranging illegal entry.”

  “I see. And what about Miss O’Connor, and that Crater person?”

  “Miss O’Connor suffered no ill effects from the drug her father gave her,” Headly said. “And her mother flew down to Dominica to collect her. Crater has returned to Barbados.” He smiled. “I understand Miss O’Connor and her mother have decided to stay in Barbados.”

  “You always were an incurable romantic, Charles,” Craufurd observed. “Obviously the girl is remaining in the West Indies because she will have to appear in court as a witness. Mr. and Mrs. Malthus?”

  “Well, Malthus is in hospital,” Jonathan said. “He’ll have to appear in court as well, of course, and I should think he’s going to spend the next few years in jail. But Phyllis is staying in Dominica. She’s buying the doctor’s house, and is turning it into a dog’s home. Apparently Aristotle likes the climate.”

  “That leaves only the captain.”

  “I must make it quite clear that I wouldn’t have gotten anywhere without his help.”

  “Oh, quite, and presumably he will be a valuable witness for the Crown. As will you, Jonathan. The Dominica authorities are insisting that you be flown back to give evidence as to the, er, mutiny, and the events arising out of it, which is how they propose to treat the case. So you will be able to see your friend Strohm again. I’m happy to say, however, that they’ve gone along with our request to accept a written statement from General Pobrenski, as we have impressed upon them that nowhere except in this country and under our care can the general be considered safe from another attempt on his life. They have also agreed to hand over the man Brown to us, in due course, for interrogation as an enemy agent.”

  “Then for the life of me, Harold, I can’t see what you’re grumbling about,” Headly said. “I think, in the circumstances, young Jon performed wonders.”

  “Yes,” Craufurd said sadly. “Ah, we have arrived.”

  The Bentley had turned off the motorway and was driving down one of the many narrow, leafy lanes which make Surrey such an attractive county. Now the big car swung hard left through a narrow gateway, and pulled up in front of a cottage, secluded from its neighbors by a stand of trees.

  Craufurd got out and rang the bell. The door was opened by a young man who wore horn-rimmed spectacles. “May we come in, Nigel?”
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  “You only just caught us, Mr. Craufurd.”

  “Jonathan!” Benny came down the stairs, shook hands. “It is very good to see you again. And how is the captain? And Mr. Crater?”

  “They send you their best regards.”

  “That is very nice of them. Why, good morning, Mr. Craufurd.” He smiled at Jonathan. “Just as you promised, you know, Jonathan, Mr. Craufurd is being very good to me. He’s given me this house, and that charming boy Nigel to look after me, and the use of a car, and all the money I need. I think you British are behaving quite splendidly. I’m just going for a spin, now. I do enjoy driving.”

  “I was wondering if you’d had a chance to read any of those books I gave you, General? Or perhaps studied the maps? Looked at the films?”

  Benny smiled. “General? Always general. My dear Mr. Craufurd, I’m Benny Smith, the steward, remember? Come on, Nigel.”

  “Every time I come here I feel like a stiff drink,” Craufurd said. “Do you have any idea, Jonathan, how much that crook is costing the Government?”

  “Now, Harold,” Headly said. “I’m a witness to the fact that you pointed to a photograph in a magazine and told Jonathan to bring him back. Regardless.”

  “Quite so,” Craufurd said. “Quite so.” He placed his bowler hat on the floor, stepped on it, and walked out the door.

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