The Alternative Detective (Hob Draconian)

by Robert Sheckley

  “Yes, so you did. But that doesn’t count. I was trying to get in touch with you, as a matter of fact.”

  “Were you? What for?”

  “Hob, I need some help. I’m willing to pay for it, too.”

  “What’s the trouble?”

  Alex’s story began some years back. He had left Europe, just as I had, returned to the States and began looking for work. He had passed his bar exam in Washington, D.C., some years before. Now, with the help of one of his uncles, he went to work for the Selwyn Corporation, a group of fund-raisers. This was in 1985. By 1986 Alex found himself in the middle of an interesting situation, raising money for the Contras, and for the secret Iran initiative that the White House was promulgating during those years. Although “Spitz” Chanell was the one who would get into the news for his fund-raising activities, Selwyn and others were also active.

  This was also the time when Alex met Rachel. She was one of the secretaries working for Selwyn. She and Alex began to go out together. Within a month they had moved into a little Georgetown apartment. Alex went on working for Selwyn.

  Over the next months, Alex couldn’t help but notice that a lot of money was being raised for various initiatives concerning the Contras and Iran. But as much as came in, little of it ever seemed to get to the combatants. It was a curious situation. Everything was being done in terms of patriotism, but some people seemed to be making a lot of money out of it.

  Then came 1987 and suddenly Iran and the Contras were in the news. They were linked, Iran-Contra, also known as Irangate. Casey went in for his brain operation and never returned to full health, dying soon after. Colonel Oliver North was fired. Admiral Poindexter, his superior, was in trouble. A lot of people were going to be in trouble before this one was finished.

  Alex could see that his days in this job were numbered. In fact, the days of Selwyn, Ltd., were also numbered.

  It was then in those final days that Alex saw the handwriting on the wall. It took a little time for it to sink in that his superiors had been engaged in something that, no matter how it looked when they began, looked illegal as hell now.

  The net of the investigations was thrown wide, and a lot of little fish were being pulled in. Politics being what it was, you could be sure that a lot more little fish were going to get jail sentences than the big fish. And Alex was not in a good spot. Because, however innocently, he was involved.

  Selwyn had learned of his Swiss account and had taken advantage of it from time to time, as a transfer point for contributions for the Contras, or for whoever was getting them. There was no profit in this for Alex, but it looked like he was going to get into plenty of trouble.

  He discussed it with Rachel. She had learned, along the secretarial grapevine, that investigators from the Special Prosecutor’s office were going to start checking into his dealings with Selwyn.

  “It wasn’t so much that I couldn’t prove my innocence,” Alex said. “I could, though it would have taken time and money. The main thing was, I’d have had to stay in Washington while the thing dragged on. I couldn’t do that. You know me, Hob.”

  I nodded. I couldn’t have stood for that, myself; not if there were any other way out. “So what did you do?”

  “I figured it was time to pack up and get going. In fact, it looked almost too late. Rachel had heard that there was a subpoena out for me. I left that same evening. Rachel stayed behind to take care of final details, get rid of the apartment, put stuff into storage, all that sort of thing. And then she was supposed to meet me in Paris.”

  “That part of it I know,” I said. “But then you disappeared. Or so Rachel said.”

  “Yes, I did, didn’t I?” Alex said, an amused smile on his face. “Or I seemed to, at any rate. As far as Rachel was concerned, I had disappeared. That, of course, was when she hired you.”

  I nodded. “What actually happened?”

  “I ducked out of sight for a while,” Alex said. “It seemed a good idea at the time. I’d heard something about Rachel which disturbed me.”

  “What was that?”

  “It seemed she was talking to one of the special investigators. A guy named Romagna. Maybe you’ve seen him around?“

  I nodded. “He’s around. But why would Rachel do that?”

  Alex gave me a long, somber look. “You’ve seen her Damascene routine?”

  “Yeah, when she came into my office the first time.”

  “She does weird things sometimes, Rachel. She’s a Mormon, you know. They raise some strange ones. You never know when she’s going to get an idea that she has to do something. She’s probably OK; maybe I was just paranoid, but I thought I’d better get out to Europe.”

  “What about Romagna?”

  “I don’t know if he has a warrant for me or not. But he’s hanging in a little too tight for my peace of mind. I thought I’d stay out of things for a while and see what was up.”

  “Have you seen enough now?”

  “Yes, I think so. My mind’s made up now. I’m ready for the next step.”

  “And what will that be?”

  “That’s the part I need your help for,” Alex said.

  “No,” I said.

  “Hob, just listen to me.”

  Same old Alex. And I was listening to him. Same old Hob.

  10

  LA BAULE

  45

  Please do not ask me to explain how Alex got me from a taverna in the center of Paris eating moules and drinking wine to the passenger side of a rented Citroën speeding through the dark Paris countryside with the glow of the city behind us and the Atlantic coast ahead. I must have been crazy. Alex has that effect on me. There’s no buddy like a good old buddy. And, like some other men who have had multiple wives and replaceable families, don’t ask which means more to me, family or friends.

  And I felt more than a little guilty, because here I was, flying through the night with Alex, like we had done so many times before, and I was laughing at his jokes like I used to do, and we were both a little drunk and the countryside was dark, vast, empty, mysterious, and we the only humans as far as the eye could see, Alex and me under the stars of Mother Night. So I’m sentimental; shoot me.

  At least I was able to convince myself, not without reason, that I was actually doing my job, following Alex to wherever it was he was going, so that I could report to Rachel, my employer (who might be in cahoots with Romagna) Alex’s whereabouts. Of course, I’d also tell Alex exactly what I was going to do, so he could take his precautions, but what the hell, there’s nothing in my client’s agreement that says I have to do in an old buddy.

  Alex had said he’d explain, and I allowed him to pull me out of the security of the taverna near the Panthéon with its long wooden benches full of French college students, its pitchers of beer, cheerful, sweaty, shirtsleeved waiters, the plates of mussel shells—blue-black, nacre.

  At least I could give myself the illusion I was still doing it for Rachel, my employer, flying out into the night like this with Alex in order to learn his whereabouts, after which I would report to Rachel and she, perhaps, would report to Romagna. Only I would previously have told Alex I was going to tell her.

  Well, maybe I didn’t know what in hell I thought. His rented Citroën convertible had a blown muffler and I couldn’t even hear myself think, much less talk with Alex about what was going on. He’d probably kicked a hole in the muffler himself in order not to have to talk to me. Nobody tells me anything. But even for me, enough is enough.

  “Alex,” I said.

  “What is it, buddy?”

  “Stop the car somewhere, OK?”

  “What’s up?”

  “We need to talk.”

  He looked at me. I looked back at him. He understood.

  “OK, buddy,” he said, “as a matter of fact, there’s a nice little restaurant not far from here, right close to Angers. We need a break.”

  He was doing what I’d asked, but he was giving nothing away. I’d always admired Alex. W
hich didn’t necessarily mean I’d do what he wanted.

  I remembered only later that Alex had a positive affinity for the world’s worst eating places. I wish I’d thought of that and eaten some more mussels in Paris before we turned into the parking lot of the dark little inn on the N23 just south of Le Mans.

  It was one of those thatch-roof affairs that always should be viewed with suspicion, and it turned out to be an overpriced bad eatery, something rare in France, but trust Alex to find the exception.

  All right, I’m exaggerating; maybe it wasn’t that bad, but I had suddenly remembered that I hadn’t had a decent meal since I’d come to Paris and to be frank, I was feeling more than a little churlish about it. Wouldn’t you?

  It may seem like an odd place to begin complaining, in the middle of a mad dash to the French seacoast, to La Baule, to be precise, located a few miles past the not-very-famous port (except to Second World War German-submarine buffs) of St-Nazaire. But there it is; I complain when I please. And even though I had agreed to help Alex, due apparently to some blind impulse powered by déjà vu, I was now having second thoughts, to say nothing of third and fourth thoughts, and indeed all thoughts up to and beyond the transfinite series.

  Over cups of dismal coffee, but with an acceptable cognac to accompany them, I asked Alex to explain just what the hell he was doing now and why he found it necessary to have me along.

  “It’s very simple,” Alex said. “I’ve got to disappear.”

  “You already did that, remember?”

  “That time was just playing around. This time’s for good.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Hob, they’ve got me boxed. The people I work for. I finally got the angle. They’re going to put it on me.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “The whole Iran-Contra missing funds business.”

  “How can they do that?”

  “They’re going to claim that I scammed them, diverted key funds to my own account. I should never have let them use my account. I thought I was so smart. Anyhow, I’m going to step out of the world for a few years, give it all a chance to settle down.”

  “Step out? Where? How?”

  “The old identity trick.”

  “A new passport?”

  “A total set of papers. An entire personality I can step into. These people I’m going to meet can arrange it.”

  “Is that where we’re going? To meet some forgers?”

  “It’s safe,” Alex said, “but I’m a little nervous about them all the same. That’s why I need you to back me up.”

  “Why bother dealing with these guys at all? If you really need a forger, I’ll find you one in Paris.”

  “These guys produce first-class documentation. And they have just what I need. It’ll go all right. Especially when they see I’m not alone.”

  I fell silent and couldn’t help but think, cynically, that if Alex were relying on me for when the shooting started, he didn’t know how alone he was. I don’t know what he thought private detectives do, but a lot of us get along nicely without guns, boring as that may sound.

  “You mean you’re not armed?”

  “Certainly not. What do you take me for? Some sort of a thug?”

  Alex shook his head and took something out of his pocket and tapped my knee with it. It was solid and metallic. The thing, not my knee.

  “What are you doing?” I asked with some irritation.

  “Take it,” Alex said. “Put it in your pocket.”

  I reached under the table. He put a large, slightly oily automatic into my hand.

  “Now just a minute,” I said.

  “Hob, you won’t have to actually use it.”

  “Damn right I won’t have to use it. I’m not taking it. Here, take it back.”

  I reached with it under the table.

  “Hob,” he pleaded, “please don’t make a scene.”

  “Damn it,” I said, “take back the piece.”

  “Hob, listen—”

  “No, you listen; take back the goddamned piece.”

  “I’m trying to tell you I’ll pay you two thousand dollars just to keep the gun in your pocket.”

  “Two thousand dollars?” I said.

  “That’s what I said.”

  “But not to use it?”

  “Just to hold on to it and show it, if necessary.”

  “Two thousand dollars?” I asked.

  He nodded.

  “It’s easy to say,” I told him.

  “Hold out your hand under the table,” he said.

  “Just a minute,” I said. “I have to put this thing away.” I managed to stuff the bulky automatic into a jacket pocket, where it made an unsightly bulge and probably left an indelible stain. Then I reached under the table again.

  “Check this out,” Alex said, and put something in my hand.

  It was an envelope.

  The envelope was filled with something.

  About half an inch of something.

  I peeked. Lovely thousand franc French notes. I riffled them. They’d probably come to two thousand dollars American close enough. I put them into my pocket.

  “Let me explain the ground rules,” I said. “First of all, I’m not going to shoot anyone. I don’t know what you’ve read about private detectives, but we don’t do that.”

  “Don’t worry,” Alex said. “The gun’s just for show.”

  “Isn’t it loaded?”

  “Of course.”

  “Why, if it’s just for show?”

  “It’s not possible to bluff properly with an unloaded gun. Come on, Hob, let’s get out of here.”

  We paid up and piled out into Alex’s Citroën. Then we were off down the dark road, proceeding at speed through low, flat country with high hedges on either side.

  “What’s our next stop?” I asked.

  “Angers.”

  We were in the heart of nothing, and we were on our way to nowhere. The auspices were terrible. But I did have an unanticipated two thousand dollars.

  THE HIT

  46

  We went through Angers around midnight. The streets were without sidewalks, the buildings lining the streets shoulder to shoulder. High, narrow buildings with steep eaves. A tangle of stone streets like the petrified entrails of a medieval monster. Europe is our past, we must go back from time to time to exhume it psychically, penetrate the layers that lead to our guts. Grays and browns, and sometimes a glint of starlight.

  But then, just a few hundred yards within the sleeping city, we saw the right-hand turn marked Nantes-Rennes-Laval. We took it through the suburbs and followed it through small towns near the banks of the Loire: St-Georges-sur-Loire, Varades, Ancenis, coming at last to Nantes. There was no time to stop and sample the frogs’ legs, a speciality of the region. We continued watching the signs for Vannes and Rennes. We followed them onto a dual carriage road, through a lot of construction, emerging at last on the N165. We continued through open countryside for fifteen miles, then, just before Savenay, turned onto N171. Soon we were rolling through the dark industrial heart of St-Nazaire, and past it to the little town of La Baule, just a few miles past St-Nazaire.

  It was going on 4:00 a.m. We followed a road along the coast, passed through La Baule itself, a huddle of Breton houses, and came to a group of docks situated just beyond the mouth of the Loire, but sheltered from the open Atlantic by a curving headland to the north.

  Alex parked the car close to the docks. He turned to me. “Do you know how to use that gun?”

  I took it out of my pocket and examined it by Alex’s small penlight. It was a Browning .45 calibre automatic. I couldn’t quite remember how the safeties worked. As I’ve mentioned, firearms are not my thing and I manage most of the time to do well enough without them. Alex watched me fumble for a moment or two then took it out of my hand.

  “Like this,” he said, extracting the clip and ejecting the round in the chamber. He showed me how to put the clip b
ack in, jack a cartridge into the barrel, and how to operate the safeties. Finally, he handed it back to me, the hammer set on half cock.

  “All the safeties are off except the half cock,” he said. “To shoot, just thumb the hammer down. Then point, aim and squeeze. Nothing to it.”

  “Since I’m not going to shoot anyone,” I said, “I really don’t have to know all that stuff.”

  “Hob, as a private detective you are a disaster. Look, I’m paying you two thousand dollars just to look dangerous. Or at least competent. The least you can do in return is pay attention when I show you how the thing works.”

  “All right,” I said grudgingly. I took the automatic again and went through the moves. After all, since I was in the detective business, you could never tell when this sort of thing might come in useful.

  “Ready?” Alex said after a few minutes.

  “Sure, I’m ready,” I told him. To be perfectly frank, I was feeling less than unmitigated enthusiasm. But the two thousand dollars in French notes did a lot for my motivation. Also, I had always liked Alex and this was a chance to help him out.

  We left the car and walked along the dockside. About twenty yards down, Alex identified the rendezvous: a pier belonging to Dupont et Fils, Shippers. The high iron gate had been left unlocked, so we were able to go through it and around the main building to the wharves on the other side.

  We walked until we came to a long pier extending out into the water. There was a bright light at the end of it, and Alex indicated that this was the place where the exchange was to take place.

  “Hob,” he said, “I want you to stay back here. Just make sure no one else comes out onto the pier.”

  “What do I do if they try anyhow?”

  “Just tell them to go away.”

  I didn’t like it, but what was there to do? I found a tall iron diesel barrel to crouch behind. Alex drew a small revolver out of his pocket, a .32, I suppose, checked the chambers, looked at me, said, “Wish me luck, old buddy,” and started down the pier.

  Even before Alex walked out on the dock, I could hear the low throbbing of a boat’s engine in the harbor, closing on the pier. As he walked to the end, I could make out the boat’s shape, a darker mass against the medium gray darkness of the sky and water. The shadow of the boat crept up to the pier without lights. I could see Alex standing at the end, in silhouette.