by Nick Carter
Forgive the interruption. A phone call from the Chief of Police. No class today; I am on call as a consultant.
Von Kluge was found dead in bed this morning. At first glance it looked like natural death. On investigation he was found to have been deliberately smothered.
I must go.
In haste,
Your friend, Hakim Sadek.
Hawk let the letter fall onto the table top and lit his cold cigar with great deliberation. He chewed it, puffed, leaned back and puffed again. At last, he spoke.
“You want me to assume that there is something more here than a criminal group at work in Egypt. Very well, I will dispense with a discussion of all such possibilities and make your assumption. And that is that this affair has international implications and might fall into the province of AXE. Am I right?”
Nick nodded. “It’s the nature —”
“Of the operations, of course,” Hawk cut in irritably. “Eyes, noses, cheekbones, hair. The eyes particularly, I’m sure you want me to notice. I have noticed. And the murder of the surgeon, presumably after he had finished his work. But immediately afterwards? Possibly not. No — after he was seen talking. Perhaps overheard. Oh, you’ve got me interested, no doubt about it. But we must know more — a great deal more — before I can take action.” He squinted thoughtfully and puffed again. “D5’s in Iraq,” he said finally. “He can make the hop to Cairo and do a little digging. That satisfy you?”
Nick smiled faintly. “You know it doesn’t. But it’s better than nothing. Only I don’t think he’s the one to make contact with Hakim. He’s not quite Hakim’s type.”
Hawk billowed smoke and squinted through it.
“And you are, I suppose? What do you want, Carter — to solve the blackout question, play host to Sichikova and fly to Egypt at the same time? I don’t recall that we’ve given you the title of Superman. You’re under orders. Mine. And you have been given your assignment.”
“Yes, sir,” said Nick, and scraped his chair away.
Hawk waved him back. “Sit down, Nick, sit down. Foul coffee always puts me in a foul mood. D5 can check, but there’s still something you can do. You trust this Hakim implicitly?”
“Unreservedly,” Nick said, straddling the chair.
“Then cable him. Use the regular public channels. Tell him that a good friend of yours will be in Cairo within the next day or two and will contact him to hear the latest news. Phrase it any way you like, but make it clear that you want all details that he is able to uncover and that your friend will pass them on to you. I’ll get the orders through to D5 myself and have him scramble Hakim’s report direct to me. How’s his doubletalk?
Hakim’s? He’s an expert.” Nick grinned, remembering. “So expert that sometimes I can barely make him out. But he catches on.”
“Fine. Then let him know, in your own best-guarded language, that we want him to find out — if remotely possible — when von Kluge finished his operations. The exact time and manner of his death. Who the men were or might have been. If eight or nine men have turned up missing recently in Cairo or vicinity. If von Kluge’s medical files are available for inspection. Who it was that might have seen or overheard him talking at that party. And so on. I leave it up to you to make clear to him exactly what we want to know. Now. Let’s get the Sichikova business out of the way.” Hawk pulled a slim file from his bulging briefcase. “Here is a list of the places she has asked to see in addition to the West Valley plant. Perhaps you can get one of your many female friends — AXE-approved, of course — to take her to Bergdorf’s and Macy’s and one or two other places that you might not care too much about. You’ll stay close at hand, naturally. Documents has a suggested itinerary for out-of-town sightseeing. You may use either your own car or one from the pool. Your expense account will be munificent, but I expect you to bring back some change. She will be arriving at Kennedy tomorrow morning at ten via Pan Am, and you will be there to meet her.”
“Pan Am? Not a special Russian flight?”
Hawk shook his head. “Nothing special. She’s traveling a roundabout route for her own pleasure and one of our men will be with her on the flight from London. None of her own. She’s an independent lady, it seems. And she’s traveling under her own name, without any attempt at disguise.”
“I should hope so,” said Nick. “I’d sooner try to disguise the Statue of Liberty than the incomparable Valentina. Who all knows about this trip of hers?”
The corners of Hawk’s mouth turned downward. “Too many people for my liking. Not the press, so far, and I intend to keep it that way. But the story’s gone the rounds of governmental and scientific circles, so it isn’t much of a secret. However. There’s nothing we can do about it. I can only urge you to exercise the utmost care. You’ll have two back-up cover men behind you all the way, Fass and Castellano, but you know as well as I do that their function is tail-spotting and not trouble-shooting. So you’ll be pretty much on your own. Your lady friend flatly refused all our standard security precautions. Still, we have no reason to anticipate trouble. She’s not well known outside of Russia — not on anybody’s wanted list so far as we can tell, and we have checked her thoroughly. So I’m fairly certain that you’ll have no difficulty.”
“Don’t see why I should,” Nick agreed. “I look forward to seeing her again. Now there is one dame I really love!”
“One?” said Hawk, and favored Nick with a smile that was almost fatherly. “One of at least a dozen that I know of. Now suppose you reach for that bottle of Courvoisier and pour us both a healthy tot. I know it’s a little early in the day, but I need something to take away the taste of breakfast. My God, look at the haze over this benighted city . . .”
Nick pulled the Peugeot into the airport parking lot and sniffed the clean, cool air. Valentina had chosen a lovely day for her arrival. No doubt she had ordered the elements to behave. The sky was blue and smog-free, as if doing its utmost to offer her a welcome.
His pass took him to the official greeting area on the border of the tarmac, and there he waited with one eye on his watch and the other roaming around to spot specks in the sky and cover-men behind him.
Like Hakim, he thought suddenly, whose eyes really did go in opposite directions and could drink in two totally different scenes at once.
He had sent off his cable to Hakim the Hideous, as Hakim liked to call himself, within an hour after leaving Hawk the day before. D5, by now, would be on his way to Egypt. And Valentina the fabulous would be landing in New York within the next ten minutes. Too bad Carter couldn’t be in two places at once. Still, Valentina was worth waiting for.
Nick’s eyes went on roving. A Constellation landed, then a 707. Two giant jets took off, screaming. Cover-man Fass was standing by near Immigration. Castellano was on the observation deck. Another jet took off. And then a speck grew larger in the sky until it became a streamlined metal giant, landing on the strip before him.
Valentina’s plane.
She still knew him as Tom Slade, the name he had had to use during that affair in Moscow. But even though she did not know his right name she knew a lot about him — that he was AXE’s highest-ranking operative, that he loved women, good food, strong drink; that he could use his mind as well as his fists and his killing weapons; that despite his rank of Killmaster there was warmth and love and laughter in him. And he, in his turn, knew that she had never in her life used a name other than her own; that she was one of the most devastating and spectactular and honest and wonderful women he was ever likely to meet; and that, in spite of her looks, she had a quick, sharp mind that had earned for her the position of Chief Assistant Commissar of Russian Intelligence, second only in rank to top Commissar Dmitri Borisovich Smirnov.
The stairs were in place; the great doors of the craft were open. The first of the new arrivals began to straggle off the plane. Then they came out in two steady streams — people laden with coats, cameras, handbaggage; people with smiles for the stewardesses and glad looks o
n their faces and people who gazed out uncertainly at an unfamiliar world and searched hopefully for welcomers.
So far, no sign of Valentina.
Nick walked toward the plane.
The two steady streams slowed to a trickle and then stopped. Still no Valentina.
He halted near the forward airstair and looked up. The first-class stewardess was still waiting at her post. So there was still someone to come.
Then the face of the pretty airline hostess broke into a smile, and her hand reached out to take the huge hand extended to her.
The magnificent Valentina stood in the doorway, making a brief little farewell speech of thanks. Nick gazed upward, feeling a rush of affection for this most wonderful of women.
Stood in the doorway? No, she commanded it — filled it, dwarfed it, shrank it down to the size of a hatchway in a model plane. Even the giant aircraft seemed to dwindle, so that it’s very vastness seemed to become a mere backdrop for this one woman alone.
When Valentina Sichikova finally began her slow, majestic descent, her eyes swept over the great airfield, taking it in with the casualness of someone glancing over a small suburban back yard.
Nick spread out his arms involuntarily, long before she reached him, and his smile of welcome almost split his face in two.
Her own face blazed with pleasure.
“Tomaska!” she bellowed, halting on the stair. “Greetings! No do not come up to meet me — I think these stairs will support me only, yes? Ho, ho, ho, ho!” Her body shook with massive merriment. “You know why I make Alexei wait and we come out last, my friend? Because I did not want to block the aisles. Ho, ho, ho!” She turned briefly and rumbled over her shoulder. “Alexei, do you have everything, my friend. No, you let me take that heavy bag, Aloysha . . .
Nick gazed upon her lovingly as she conducted a brisk discussion with Alec Greenberg of AXE’s London office. He was barely visible in the background, but he was there, a gnat guarding an elephant.
For Valentina was indeed one of Russia’s biggest women. She was immense: more than six feet tall and quite incredibly broad; wide, fearsome, bulging shoulders and breasts so huge and shapeless it was impossible to tell where her waistline might be or even if she had one. Her ensemble of sacklike blue serge suiting and boat-sized walking shoes suited her to a T — or rather to an O, which she most resembled in repose. But in action she was less like the placid O than a blimp in Russian dress, a tank with heart, a bulldozer with the warmth of a dozen human beings.
She continued her slow descent, and the sturdy stairway shook.
Agent A7 stood behind her, watching her majestic progress and sweeping the field with his keen gaze. Her baggage stood at the top of the stairway beside him. The cautious Alec, Nick noted, was deliberately keeping his hands free until Valentina had navigated her way to solid ground and her new escort.
Nick planted himself foursquare at the foot of the stairs and watched her coming toward him.
He heard the piercing bird whistle and the first whining zing of sound at the same time, and a split second later the sudden sharp clink of metal against metal.
With one bound he was up the stairway to the mid-point and shielding Valentina’s gargantuan bulk with his own tall muscular leanness — just in time to sec her rear back like a startled horse and clap a vast hand to her pudding of a neck.
Whip-crack sounds split through the air somewhere behind Nick as Valentina tottered toward him like a punctured barrage balloon.
CHAPTER THREE
The Vanishing Nine
Al! Get the girl inside!” Nick roared, and even as he shouted he was twisting his body around and grabbing at two enormous arms so that they were wrapped around his neck. Mosquito sounds zoomed past him and ended in metallic thumps. One of them skimmed past his outer thigh.
He heaved mightily, like a midget Atlas trying to rid himself of a world on his back. For a moment nothing happened and he felt an almost overwhelming sense of foolishness.
“Upsadaisy, Valya,” he grunted, his body bent almost double under her impossible weight, his muscles straining. Then he heaved again — with an abrupt and twisting motion that flipped the vast body over the rail and down onto the tarmac beside the stair. He followed it in one vaulting leap and hauled the fallen blimp behind the cover of a nearby baggage truck, hearing the crisp barking of Alec’s return fire and the thud of bullets into metal. Seconds later he was on his feet again with his Luger out, dodging past the truck and wondering why the shots that had started so high to his left had seemed for a while to be coming from lowdown on his right.
He was clear of the baggage truck now and out of Alec’s line of fire. His eyes scanned the buildings and the field.
Suddenly the firing stopped and people started screaming.
There was some sort of commotion on the observation deck. Nick caught a glimpse of Castellano bending over something. Then Castellano bent down low and out of sight. But the screaming was not coming from that part of the observation deck. It was coming from his right, both from roof height and ground level. And it was not really screaming, most of it — it was shouting, and the shouters were pointing at something he could not see.
Two assassins! Of course. He should have realized it at once. One on high and one below, and Castellano had taken care of one.
Where in hell was the other?
He edged past a fuel truck toward the shouting and he saw what everybody was shouting about in the same instant that Alec called out — “More to the right, Nick! Beyond that old Icleandic crate.”
A man was crawling under the belly of the Icelandic plane, his head and gun darting about in all directions so that he was covering not only his objective but the little knot of people behind him. They were technicians, Nick noted, with a couple of officials among them, and none of them was armed.
The man was planning his maneuvers well. If Alec fired he would either hit the plane, which would be useless and potentially dangerous, or he ran a very strong risk of slamming a shot into that knot of people. The fuel truck, too, made shooting difficult. So Alec was biding his time. And the man kept on crawling inexorably toward the baggage truck that shielded Valentina.
Nick cursed himself briefly for not having shoved her upward into the plane but he had had good reason at the time and anyway it was no use cursing. He dropped down low and started crawling, himself, in a quick zigzag that took him toward the tail of the Icelandic crate. Alec loosed off a couple of cover shots that bit the dirt low in front of the gunman; he missed by feet but he served his purpose, and Nick took swift advantage to duck behind the tail.
He could see the man firing back in Alec’s direction and then swinging back to look for Nick and not finding him; he could see the airport cops breaking up the knot of people and shoveling them inside the building; and he could see the cautiously moving figure that he knew was Marty Fass snakebellying along past the nose of the plane and closing in on the killer.
So now they had him. Once in the open he would be caught in a triangle and he would not have a hope in hell.
Nick dropped behind cover and settled himself into firing position. The thing was almost over, and then all they would have to do would be to find out who and why and what, and try to explain it to an outraged Russian Government —
What happened then was the kind of thing that happens when a well-meaning amateur interferes.
The killer emerged from beneath the belly of the plane . . . and a mechanic in work overalls appeared suddenly from beneath a wing and slithered rapidly after him, brawny arms outstretched to grab the fellow and wrest the gun from him.
Only it did not happen quite the way the young mechanic had planned. The killer was a pro. A brilliant pro.
He turned with the controlled speed of a wildcat and triggered off two incredibly swift shots — not at the mechanic but at Marty Fass. And got him. Marty dropped like a sack of potatoes and lay, twitching slightly, on the tarmac, and by the time he had dropped, the assassin had kneed th
e mechanic’s groin and twisted his arm in a savage hammerlock that made the young man squeal with pain.
Nick could hear the killer’s sibilant whisper.
“One move I don’t tell you to make, and you’re dead. You understand? Now walk ahead. Walk nice.”
The young man walked, his body twisted by the hammerlock and his face distorted with frustration and pain. The killer’s gun was jammed hard against his back and its message was unmistakable. And just in case there was anyone among the watchers who did not get the picture, the gunman’s body movements made it ominously obvious. His head darted out at all angles, like a striking snake’s, and his upper body swiveled in lithe, quick motions, so that his position was changing constantly — literally from split second to split second — in relation to all the people who stood or crouched nearby and watched him. And with each swift, darting turn he swung the young mechanic tightly around to cover himself, so that his helpless human shield would be sure to take the brunt of any fire. Any fire; because that gun rammed tight against the innocent back meant You shoot me and I shoot him and I don’t give awho dies!
The killer quickened his pace. He was almost running now, ramming and swiveling and dodging his way across the tarmac toward Valentina.
Nobody fired.
Nick let his held-in breath out slowly. His stripped-down Luger followed the scuttling figures like a magnet. If a brave and foolish young man had to die in place of Valentina, then die he must. There really was no choice.
And Nick had already waited long enough for an opening that might never come.
He raised the barrel a fraction of an inch and his narrowed eyes bored into his duel target. Like Siamese twins, he thought as his finger tightened gently over the trigger. Drop one; kill both. But maybe not. It was a chance he had to take.
Then even as his finger squeezed, he froze.
