The Golden Circle

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The Golden Circle Page 2

by Lee Falk


  "Who was Pieters?"

  "He works in the jewelry district of Manhattan. And he happened to share my feeling about airplanes," said the stocky policeman. "I suppose you didn't know any of that either."

  "No, but it fits in," said the Phantom. "Then they must have taken jewels from him."

  "Exactly right. A packet of gems worth over $200,000," Colma said. "Pieters was a smart man, able to take care of himself. Besides which he was armed. I'd really like to know how he let you walk in and get the drop on him"

  "I imagine the blonde was the one who got through his defenses," observed the Phantom. On the window next to him the rain was slamming hard. "She has a very innocent exterior."

  "You're sticking to this yarn about a bunch of dames?"

  "Because it's the truth."

  Grunting, Lt. Colma reached up to push the serv-

  ice buzzer. "Okay, Walker. We'll talk to the stewardess for this car. I'll ask her if she saw your lady friends, or if she happens to be a jewel thief herself. Then we'll get back to reality."

  "Have there been other robberies like this one?"

  "This is the first one on a train in a long time." Colma was doodling in the notebook margin, but his eyes were on the big man opposite him. "We're fairly sure down on Center Street there's at least one big jewel theft ring operating in and around New York City at the moment. These boys don't balk at killing. This job tonight could be their work." He sighed out smoke. "But you already know all this, Walker. Don't your

  The Phantom said, "You ought to be searching the train for those women."

  "Train hasn't stopped anywhere since Pieters was killed," answered the squat lieutenant. "Nobody's going anywhere the train isn't."

  There was a knock on the door. Then a lean black man, wearing a crisp white jacket, looked in. "Yes, sir? What can I do for you?"

  "Where's the girl who acts as stewardess in this car?" Colma asked.

  The porter checked his watch. "Oh, she went off duty two hours back. These days, sir, we don't have round the clock...."

  "You sure the girl hasn't been here within the last hour?" asked the policeman.

  "Yes, I am, sir. I made up Miss Toshiko's bed myself well over an hour ago."

  The Phantom sat up. "The stewardess is Japanese?"

  "Oh, yes, sir."

  "And she's the only one?

  "We only have one girl now, sir. These days. . . ."

  "Okay, thanks," said Colma. "That will do it for now."

  "The girl I saw was a redhead." The Phantom started to say something more, then stopped. He'd noticed an object on the rug glistening in the light from the corridor. When the porter was gone, he said, "Look at this, lieutenant."

  "Costume jewelry," snorted Colma. "Not what I'm after."

  "The girl who was here tonight was wearing this."

  The lieutenant made a dismissing gesture at the golden arrow pin. "Walker, I've been as amiable as I intend to be. Your story, to put it mildly, stinks. You heard what the porter had to...." He stopped talking to cough. 1 really ought to quit smoking." He coughed a few more times and wiped his nose. "Okay, now are you going to tell me about what happened to Pieters?"

  The Phantom had been studying the golden arrow. It was fashioned from an odd sort of gold. He closed his fingers over the emblem. "All right, lieutenant," he said. "Here's what actually happened. I went into Pieters' room, clutched up his pillow like this. . . ." The Phantom grabbed the pillow from the seat beside him and hurled it straight at the police lieutenant.

  Colma's cigarette went spinning toward the metal ceiling, sending off sparks. "Heyl"

  The Phantom reached out, gave the stocky man one careful chop on the side of the neck. He spun on his heel, diving for the door.

  After expelling a groan, Colma fell over unconscious.

  The Phantom knew he couldn't convince the New York cop he was innocent. It wouldn't do to be arrested and grilled. The only alternative was to get away, now.

  The fat pink conductor was still out there in the corridor, pacing with waddling steps. "Is everything okay?"

  "Yes, of course, Lt. Colma wants me to bring Miss Toshiko to him." Before the conductor could say anything further, the Phantom hurried away. When he was between cars, he said to himself,

  "Now to get Devil."

  CHAPTER THREE

  Lt. Colma's chin was keeping time with the rhythm of the train wheels. He came gradually awake, found his chin digging into the blue-gray compartment seat. "Ugh," he said, yawning and sucking in air.

  After rubbing at the side of his neck, he elbowed himself upright. "That guy's a pro, whoever he is."

  The wobbly police lieutenant stood. He took a few uncertain steps. His hand happened to brush at a pocket of his rumpled overcoat "Huh, that's funny." Walker hadn't bothered to remove the .38 revolver from Colma's pocket. "Why didn't he take that with him?" Still a little unsteady on his feet, Colma pushed out into the corridor.

  "How's the investigation coming, lieutenant?" asked the huge cherub-faced conductor.

  "Just great What you might call jim-dandy."

  "Now there's an expression I haven't...."

  "Which way did that guy go?"

  "You mean Mr. Walker?"

  "Him, yeah."

  "Why, that way," replied the fat conductor, pointing. "He said you'd told him to go fetch our stewardess."

  "I didn't" said Colma. "What else can he do in that direction?" "Any number of things." The enormous man lifted it corner of his blue vest and scratched his stomach, thoughtfully. "He might have gone to see his dog."

  Huh, he's traveling with a dog?"

  "Yes, it's in the baggage car, four coaches forward, lieutenant," said the conductor. "Quite a large animal. You might almost say...."

  Lt. Colma was already walking fast, not listening to the fat man.

  In the next car, another sleeper, he encountered the porter. "Seen that Walker guy?"

  "Why yes, sir."

  "Where was he going?"

  "He didn't say, sir."

  The stocky lieutenant hurried on, breaking into a trot.

  He went through the coach cars more slowly, glancing rapidly at all the seated passengers. The lights were dimmed, many of the people were sleeping or frying to.

  Colma came to the baggage car finally and found

  the door locked. Standing in the swaying pass way between cars, splashed by gusts of wet wind, he crouched and studied the lock. It looked as though

  t had been recently tampered with. Squeezing one hand into a fist, the lieutenant pounded on the door. "Open up in there," he ordered. "Come on, come on. This is the police."

  No answer came.

  The night train thundered on, clattering and rocking through the storm.

  The lieutenant hit the door again, his fist slamming against the ocean-blue safety glass. "You're not going anyplace, Walker! If you're in there, open up!"

  From inside the baggage car came the sound of Glass shattering.

  Drawing his .32, Colma fired at the door lock.

  Then he put his shoulder to the door and shoved hard.

  The door swung inward.

  There were no lights on in the musty-smelling car. Colma threw himself to one side, so that the faint light coming through the open door would not silhouette him.

  To his right a crate of pigeons were making soft gurgling cooing sounds. A cat had awakened in a wire-sided traveling case and was wailing with great sadness.

  Standing in the shadows among stacked trunks, Lt. Colma felt the rain-laden wind on his cheek. He narrowed his eyes and made out that one of the baggage car windows had been smashed out.

  Carefully he went over. The few fragments of glass which had fallen inside crunched underfoot. The lieutenant peered out. Rain slapped him in the face. "Huh, what the hell," he said. "Don't tell me he jumped."

  After he found the light switch, the lieutenant made a rapid tour of the car. There was no one hiding there. And no sign of any big dog.

&n
bsp; "Could both of them have jumped?" Colma leaned back against something. He realized it was a crated coffin and moved.

  Then he noticed the clothes. Walker's tan overcoat and the rest of what he'd been wearing were in a pile on the car floor. "Is he out there naked as a jaybird?" The stock policeman quickly went through the discarded clothes. He found nothing, no scrap of paper, not even a label or laundry mark.

  When he finished he shook a new cigarette out of his pack. "Still two left. That's not bad. Maybe I can cut down to half a pack a day pretty soon." As he lit the cigarette his eyes fell again on the crate which held the coffin.

  Colma crossed to it, felt at the nails. "Sealed up tight." he observed. "But I wonder. Maybe Walker smashed that window, then ducked inside one of these big trunks or crates. Better check it out."

  A half hour later the stocky lieutenant wiped his forehead, lit his final cigarette, and admitted to himself "Nope, they must have jumped."

  The Phantom had gone rolling and tumbling down the muddy hillside. He was in excellent shape and he notonly knew how to jump but also how to land.

  beneath the civilian outfit he'd donned for his sojourn among relatively civilized men he wore the skintight uniform of the Phantom. He had stripped to thet in the train in order to give himself unencumbered mobility for the leap to freedom.

  "A little muddy," he remarked, standing up. "But no great harm done."

  Devil, his gray mountain wolf, had leaped along with him. Surefooted, the great animal came padding up to him now, nuzzling his master's side.

  "Good boy," the Phantom told him. He scanned the rainy dark. The last lights of the Manhattan bound train were tiny blurred dots far off. "So much for Lt. Colma of the New York City Robbery Division."

  In the distance he heard the swish of highway traffic. "Don't think we want to head that way, Devil. Although we want to get out of this storm for a while. No need for the good lieutenant to know where we landed. Let's head up that hill over there and find ourselves a less traveled road."

  As the masked man began trudging through the field the wolf fell in at his side.

  In his hand the Phantom still held the golden arrow pin the blonde girl had lost in his compartment. "We could simply forget about this business tonight,

  Devil," he said. "Hop a jet and get back to Bangalla and the Deep Woods."

  The Phantom tossed the pin once, caught it. "But there's been a murder done. We're going to find our lethal pair of lady friends."

  The wolf gave a low growl.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  the community of Thornburg is approximately 152 miles from New York. It has a population of just under 11,000; a small town which the railroad tracks rut almost exactly' in half. Because Thornburg is a small town, patrolman Wally Reisberson of the municipal police patrols alone in his three-year-old sedan.

  He was cruising along West Street at 3:00 A.M., listening to an all-night talk show on the transistor radio he kept sitting next to him on the seat. Thorn- burg was usually quiet at this hour and his police radio receiver emitted only static. On his transistor a woman with a nasal voice was telling the host about her first-hand experiences with extrasensory perception.

  Patrolman Reisberson slowed at the intersection of West and Mandell streets. The rain was really coming down. There were instants between the flicks of the wipers when he couldn't see out the windshield at all.

  . . not more than three months later the very exact thing actually did happen to me. Well, not the precise same . . ." the ESP woman was saying.

  Reisberson saw a wolf.

  He hit the brake a bit too hard, causing his patrol car to skate a few feet sideways and hit the curb.

  Parking where he landed, Reisberson took his flashlight from the seat, turned down the transistor and unsnapped his holster flap. The city council of Thorn- burg hadn't approved the new budget this year, so there weren't enough police raincoats to go around. Reisberson wore a nonregulation transparent vinyl poncho.

  Pulling the garment over his head, he slid cautiously out the car.

  The rainwater was billowing along the gutter, sputtering and splashing, carrying away a day's litter.

  Reisberson was certain he'd seen a large gray wolf turn down the alley between Orlando's Quick-Pizza and the West Street Haberdashery. There hadn't been any reports about wolves running away from the zoo or a circus. It was odd.

  Waiting at the mouth of the alley, Reisberson shined his big flash in. Garbage cans, soft-drink cartons, cigarette butts. No wolf.

  Reisberson had the habit of rubbing his tongue over his prominent upper front teeth when he was thinking. He did that now.

  Shaking his head, he started down the alley. Maybe The wolf was hungry and had been drawn to Orlando's kitchen.

  As the patrolman passed the back door of the haberdashery he noticed it was a good half inch open. How many times had they told Eisman to put in a burglar alarm system? He'd always said he put his faith in the municipal police and their night patrols.

  Reisberson stood, holding his breath, out in the hard rain. Gingerly he reached out to push at the door. It swung a foot open before it made a high- pitched squeeking sound. Something moved inside the darkened clothing store.

  Hopping through the opening into the black room

  beyond, Reisberson sprayed the room with light as he drew his police special.

  Later when he repeated his story to his superiors this was the part where their faces took on strange expressions. Nonetheless, Reisberson swore he saw a large powerfully built man in some kind of tight-fitting costume and mask go jogging out the front door. Close at the masked man's heels was the gray wolf.

  "Halt or I'll fire!" warned patrolman Reisberson.

  'they didn't halt. In a few seconds they were gone In the rainy darkness outside.

  Heisberson bounded through the racks and counters of menswear. He went sideways out the front door, shouting, "Stop, come back! This is the law!"

  The street was empty. The rain hit hard on the pavement. The street lamps glowed a distant moonlight white.

  "Lets see what they took."

  When he shined his flashlight beam on the cash register, Reisberson said, "I'll be darned." Seventy-five dollars in crisp bills was stuck to the face of the ornate old register with a piece of tape.

  Reisberson eyed the fresh money, decided he'd better leave it alone. He trudged out to his patrol car to report in. Nothing like this had ever happened to him in the six and a half years he'd been a cop.

  The roof leaked. Rain dripped down from the flaked ceiling of the shadowy living room, splashing into the half-dozen puddles on the bare wood floor. The rain, still falling hard and heavy, drummed on the shingled roof of the boarded-up farm house. The weathered planks nailed over the windows and doors groaned and creaked in the wind. An old weathercock up on the roof spun, gratingly, in the gusts.

  Stretched out on the stones before the big cold fireplace was Devil. The gray wolfs jaw rested on one forepaw and his eyes were closed. There was a tenseness about him, a readiness even in repose.

  The Phantom stood by one of the blind windows. He had changed into the slacks, shirt, and sport coat he'd unconventionally purchased in Thornburg. He'd removed the cowl of his costume. A pair of dark glasses rested atop the raincoat folded on a dry stretch of floor nearby.

  "Well stay here until the storm lets up, which it should do by morning. We're still about a hundred and fifty miles from Manhattan," he said. He looked down once more at the golden arrow pin in his hand. "That's where the answers to this puzzle are, in New York City."

  Turning, he began to roam about the abandoned living room, facing a zigzag course between splotches of damp. '1 wish I'd been able to talk Lt. Colma into searching the train for those three women. Could they have gotten off the train somehow? Pretty tough trick for a woman to try, jumping from a moving train." He laughed a short laugh. "Still, if they can kill a man they can probably do most anything."

  The Phantom held the pin up bet
ween thumb and forefinger. "Since I couldn't follow my blonde friend to her hideout, I'll use this to lead me to her."

  He settled into a dry corner of the room. Folding his arms he said, "A couple hours sleep will help."

  Exactly three hours later, as the thin light of daw was fighting through the drizzle, the Phantom awok Moments later he and Devil were on the road again.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Lt. Colma sat in his swivel chair with a plastic cup of coffee in one hand and his fifth cigarette of the morning in the other. About three feet above his dark head at the spot where a little thin sunlight was shining on the wall, the smoke from the cigarette mixed with the steam from the hot coffee. The stocky robbery division detective watched the single misty column go spiraling up toward the dingy ceiling. After a few moments, he looked again at the top of his buttered desk. "Huh," he said.

 

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