Forever and a Death

by Donald E. Westlake

  Diedrich turned blazing eyes on Bennett. “He hires you scum, he can hire thousands of you scum, and it doesn’t matter. You can kill me in this room, you’re going to kill me in this room and we both know it, but it doesn’t matter. Curtis is going to pay. He is going to pay.”

  Bennett stared at the man on the floor. What could he possibly do with this news? Mr. Curtis wants the answers to two questions, and I just gave him the answer to the first, but now what about the other? Can I give him that answer, ever?

  “Mr. Curtis, this man, this organization behind this man, they’ve been after you for years now, they’ve been plaguing you for years now, because they blame you for a horrible crime you don’t know anything about, that I did, that I hid from you, not from them, I’m the cause of your troubles, Mr. Curtis, there’s the answer to your question, and can I have that job now, that we talked about?”

  Now, for the first time, Bennett did allow the door to the future to slide fully open, allowed himself to look through. And for the first time, he saw that, in that future, there was no Jerry Diedrich.

  15

  Jerry felt the difference. In the air in the room. Through all of this, through the terror, and the pain, and the helpless rage, there had always been some faint hint, some touch of the possibility of belief, that he would live through this, that something would happen, some rescue, or that this man actually would believe he was safe in dumping Jerry somewhere, alive, after he’d finished with his questions.

  But not anymore. Some chill had entered the room, the chill of death. Jerry didn’t know why, or exactly at what point it had come in, but it was here now, and all at once his situation was a million times worse. Before, there’d been, however unrealistically, a sliver of hope. Now, it was gone.

  Could he get it back? Could he return to wherever they’d been before, no matter how dreadful that had been? He looked at the hooded eyes of the other man, his slightly puffy and unhealthy cheeks, his blunt-fingered hands, the shambling strength of his body, and even though the man was the same brute he’d been before, there was also something new in him now, something implacable and unreachable.

  Oh, could he get back to the way it was before? Feeling his throat close up again with pain and terror, he croaked, “Why do you do his work? Why do you do his dirty work?”

  The man shook his head. He seemed to think about what to answer, or whether to answer at all. Then he sighed, and it was as though he felt he owed Jerry something, some return for murdering him; which scared Jerry even more.

  “You’re wrong, you know,” the man said. “You got hold of the wrong idea. You know about the blind men and the elephant?”

  This was a surprise. Was it hope again, a return to human contact? Jerry said, “Each blind man thinks it’s a different animal. They touch different parts, the trunk, the tusks, the leg.”

  “You got hold of a part, and you got it wrong,” the man said, “and that’s the story, that’s your whole story right there.” He chuckled a little, and his meaty shoulders moved. “You’re a lesson in the dangers of prejudice, that’s what you are.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Of course you don’t. Richard Curtis is a rich man, and he goes his own way, and he don’t give a damn about you, so all you can see is he must be an evil sort of person.”

  “He is.”

  “He doesn’t know a thing about Daniel Foster, you know,” the man said.

  Jerry looked at him. Some sort of wound seemed to open up in his heart, something hollowing and mean. He said, he whispered, “What do you know about it?”

  “I was drinking, you see,” the man said. “Not justifying myself, excusing myself, you understand that. It’s just I was a drinking man in those days, and it made me careless sometimes.”

  Barely daring to breathe, feeling that new emptiness in his heart, Jerry whispered, “You were there?”

  “I swear to you, on my manhood,” the man said, “I had no idea he was still in that tunnel. I didn’t know all those planks and such were in there. Boyo, I was fired. I been out of work ever since, and only because what I did to the turbines. Do you think, if Richard Curtis knew I flung a man down that shaft, he’d take my side?”

  Jerry could only stare at him, helpless, knowing he was hearing the truth, and knowing the truth was worse than anything he’d ever imagined.

  The man said, “I’ve been a guilty fellow and a beaten fellow for a long time. My marriage broke up, I was blackballed everywhere. Not looking for sympathy, you know what I’m saying, but I’ve been punished. Oh, you can believe that. You wanted somebody punished for what happened to your friend, well, you got your wish.”

  “If Curtis didn’t…” Jerry began, but then didn’t know what it was he even wanted to ask.

  The man nodded at him. “Curtis knew you were there,” he said. “For a long time, Mr. Curtis, he’s known you were out there, a thorn in his side. A mosquito, but a bad mosquito. You know, he didn’t say to me to kill you, that isn’t the sort of man we’re talking about here. He said to me, Colin, find out who’s the traitor in my camp, and for the love of God, Colin, find out what this fellow Diedrich has against me.”

  “Oh, Jesus,” Jerry said. He couldn’t look at the man anymore.

  “Well, so I’ve done the job,” the man said. “Haven’t I, Jerry Diedrich?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m a willing worker, you know, I’m deserving of trust. I’m deserving of a second chance. Don’t you think so?”

  “You’ll get your second chance,” Jerry said, not trying to hide the bitterness he felt.

  “Well, but there’s the rub,” the man told him. “I’ve given Mr. Curtis the information on this fellow Hennessy, so he’s pleased with me for that. But can I answer his other question? Can I tell him why it is you’ve been hounding him all this while?”

  Jerry looked at him, and now he understood why the temperature in the room had changed. He whispered, “I’ll never tell anybody, I swear.”

  “Now, why would I trust you?” the man asked him. “What sort of relationship have we had, you and I, that I would trust you? You’ve already told your lover friend there, haven’t you? The German boy.”

  “No! I never told anyone!”

  “You? A bigmouth like you?” The man seemed almost amused by him. “And the girl with you,” he said, “You couldn’t resist telling her, could you, for a sympathetic smile?”

  “Honest to God, no, I never told— I never told anybody, I never will tell anybody!”

  “Oh, I know that,” the man said.

  “Please. Please. I swear to you, I’ll never say a word, you can trust me, not a word to anybody, I’ll never bother Curtis again. I’ll—”

  “I know all that,” the man said, and stood. “I know all that, because you’re going to keep your mouth shut.” He went down on one knee beside Jerry. “You know the saying,” he said. “When you want somebody to shut up and keep shut up, what is it you say?”

  He waited, but Jerry didn’t answer. Finally, almost gently, the man gave the answer himself: “Put a sock in it.”

  16

  Mark Hennessy.

  Being driven to the office Tuesday morning, Curtis couldn’t get over how obvious it had been all along. Someone named Mark was passing along to Diedrich and Planetwatch information about Richard Curtis’s affairs. And there was Mark Hennessy, all along, right there in his main office.

  Was that why it had never occurred to him that this Mark might be that Mark? There were dozens, perhaps hundreds, of his employees named or nicknamed Mark, and his suspicions had always leaped over the nearest Mark to any and all of those out there, and now he thought the reason was that this was the nearest Mark. A young man who’d worked for Curtis for eight or nine years, who had always been capable and intelligent and willing and self-effacing. One wouldn’t even think of this Mark as a traitor.

  But he was. And now the question became, what to do about it.

  The simple and obvious
remedy would be to merely fire him, without a reference, telling the little turncoat why, and then to hire someone else in his place. Or, more likely, choose someone already in the firm to be moved up a step. That would be the simple and obvious way, but when Curtis thought back to all the trouble Planetwatch had caused him in the last several years, all made possible by this one little sneak inside his own company, it made him too angry for a mere firing to satisfy. No, there had to be more to it than that, when it came to Mark Hennessy, something that would give more satisfaction. And Curtis thought he might know just what would do the trick.

  He wondered how Bennett had smoked Hennessy out. Not that he doubted the truth of it, not for a second, but he was just curious to know how Bennett had done it. The man had certainly come through, exactly as Curtis had hoped. There might even be a place for him, somewhere, in the organization, later on; time would tell. And it would be a fine further boost for Bennett’s prospects if he could also find out what Jerry Diedrich’s goddam problem was.

  The office was quieter today. The Kanowit architects had gone, with ledgers full of notes, and would return in a month, with revised sets of plans. (In a month, all this other would be behind him. In a month, he would be himself again.)

  So the office was quieter today, mostly because it was winding down in preparation for the boss’s departure. To Manila, most of them thought, all except the absolutely reliable Margaret. And to Manila Mark thought, too, fortunately.

  Curtis told Margaret to buzz him in, and when the fellow arrived Curtis struggled to hide his disgust. “Good morning, Mark,” he said, and managed his usual easy smile.

  “Morning, sir.” Mark seemed as open and boyish as ever, as guileless and as transparent.

  But of course Mark had never been open and transparent, had he?

  Well, Curtis could be a dissembler, too, when he needed to be. Offering his false smile to the false Mark, he said, “You know I’m off to Manila tomorrow.”

  “Yes, sir, of course,” Mark said.

  “You’re one of the few people I can trust, Mark,” Curtis said.

  “Well, thank you, sir,” Mark said, looking both pleased and surprised. “I appreciate that.”

  “I can trust you, can’t I?” Curtis asked, and was immediately afraid he’d gone too far.

  But Mark’s smile redoubled, as he said, “Of course you can, sir! I hope you can always trust me.”

  “I’m sure I can.” Curtis patted the rotten fellow’s arm. “So I’m going to tell you something that no one else in the office knows, except Margaret.”

  Mark looked alert. “Sir?”

  “I’m not actually going to Manila.”

  Even more alert. “No, sir?”

  “I’m in the middle of something— Mark, if my competition found out, or those goddam tree-huggers…”

  “Oh, I understand,” Mark said.

  “Where I’m going,” Curtis told him, “and you really must keep this under your hat—”

  “Absolutely, sir.”

  “Is Sydney.”

  Mark was obviously startled. “Sydney?”

  “I’m actually taking a flight to Sydney, tomorrow,” Curtis told him, “and the reason I’m telling you, I’ll want you to come along.”

  “Sir! I’d be delighted.”

  “I need somebody I can count on, while I’m there.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Our flight leaves at eleven in the morning,” Curtis said. “Margaret will help you with any paperwork you need, and a car will pick you up and bring you to Changi in the morning. See her, and then take the rest of the day off, to pack and get yourself ready.”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.” Mark extended his hand, which Curtis reluctantly took. “Mr. Curtis,” he said, “I do understand the faith you’re showing in me, and I assure you I’ll do my level best to live up to it.”

  And be phoning Diedrich the second you get home, Curtis thought, to give him the news. And good luck to you both. “See you at Changi,” he said.

  Once the little rat was out of the office, the next order of business was Bennett. Curtis called the Race Course Court Hotel, where Bennett was registered under his own name, and left a message for him to phone Richard, no number given. Then he waited, wondering where Bennett was at the moment. Finding out the truth about Jerry Diedrich, maybe. That would be good.

  17

  Bennett woke late, feeling languorous. It was a delicious feeling of physical contentment. He stretched and turned in the hotel bed, feeling the good sheets, the fluffy pillow, the light blanket, and the pleasant cool dryness of air-conditioned air. He felt like a man who’d just finished a long and complicated job and could now think of it as a job well done.

  Of course, in truth, the job wasn’t done, not yet. Diedrich would certainly have talked about Daniel Foster with his German friend, the tall blond fellow, and with the girl. So long as they were in Singapore, so long as they existed, they were a danger to Colin Bennett, because the circumstance just might arise in which they could tell that story to Richard Curtis, and Curtis would have to believe it.

  What about Mark Hennessy? He certainly must know the story, too, and he was physically closer to Curtis, he could blab it at any time. But would Curtis be likely to believe Hennessy now, to believe anything Hennessy might say? Hennessy could easily already know the story of Bennett’s downfall—most people in the company had heard about his destruction of the turbines— and Curtis would simply think Hennessy was making up the rest, to get even with the man who’d exposed him.

  No, it was the other two who were the problem, Luther Rickendorf and Kim Baldur. They were the ones who had to be gotten rid of, before Bennett could report to Richard Curtis on the demise of Jerry Diedrich.

  Bennett had decided, at last, that the way to handle the Diedrich matter with Curtis was to tell him a modified version of the truth. That he’d captured the fellow, and brought him home, and trussed him up, and forced him to reveal the name of the spy in RC Structural. But then, he would say, it turned out he hadn’t been a very efficient interrogator, he hadn’t realized exactly how much pressure he was putting on Diedrich, and the fellow had died before he could describe his grievance against Curtis.

  Yes, that ought to do it. It wasn’t a murder, it was an accidental death, done in Richard Curtis’s service. Curtis hadn’t asked for it, but he could only be pleased by the result. No more Jerry Diedrich to pester him, ever and ever. Who cares what his grievance was. It died with him.

  Last night, when he’d finished talking with Diedrich, Bennett had gone out to a nearby Chinese noodle shop for dinner, a place where they knew him by sight. Then he’d gone to a kung fu movie in the neighborhood, and after that, when he got home, Diedrich was dead. In the darkness of night, it hadn’t been too difficult to carry the body back down the stairs to his Honda and stuff it under the hatchback, the same as he’d brought him here, though this time not breathing. (He’d reclaimed his sock, and now it had definitely gone into the garbage.)

  It was a long drive he’d then taken, over to the Central Expressway to get out of central Singapore, then west on the Ayer Rajah Expressway all the way to the end, and on out Jalan Ahmad Ibrahim past the Jurong Bird Park to the Jurong Industrial Estate, the new area reclaimed from swamp and filled with manufacturing and housing.

  Down in here, at night, there were quiet dark streets leading south to the water’s edge and the Straits of Jurong. Here is where Bennett stripped Diedrich of all identification, finally removed the lengths of duct tape from his wrists and ankles, and rolled him into the water. He would float or sink or whatever he might do, and eventually be discovered and would most likely be a natural death.

  True, there wouldn’t be water in his lungs, so he wouldn’t be thought to have drowned. But he could have fallen into the water and hit his face against something and died that way. In any event, what was there to link this body to Colin Bennett? Nothing.

  The other two would be more complicated. Lying in bed
, in no hurry to rise, he thought about ways to kill them, and then smiled at his own thoughts. He’d never deliberately considered killing anybody before, and hadn’t originally intended (so far as he knew) to kill Diedrich, but now that it had been done, something new had opened up inside Bennett, because now he saw what a solution this was. How easy, and how permanent. The solution to so many problems.

  Well, he should get to it, shouldn’t he? They’d be missing Diedrich, they might have already reported his disappearance to the police. Before they made too many waves, before they did too much talking to too many people, he should stop them. The good new permanent way.

  Bennett rose and dressed. The hotel had no restaurant, but they put out a simple breakfast buffet in a corner of the lobby every morning. Bennett went down there to have coffee and a pair of pastries, then crossed to the desk, not expecting any messages, but just to be certain, so long as he was here.

  “Yes, Mr. Bennett, one message, it came in this morning.”

  Call Richard. Bennett’s pulse jumped, he squeezed the slip of paper tight. He felt like a dog who’s been called by his master, but it wasn’t a bad feeling, a humiliating feeling, it was good, it was positive, it meant he was wanted and useful and productive again.

  What should he do first? Call Richard, or take care of the other two? He was tense with the pressure to take care of the other two, not even knowing where they were, if they were in the hotel, who they might be talking to. But how could he not respond to this call, from Richard?

  He hurried back to his room, and made the call, and was immediately put through to Curtis, who said, “Colin, I’m going to want you to take a trip.”

  Bennett hardly heard that; his own news was so pressing. He said, “Sir, you don’t have to worry about that fellow anymore.”

  There was a brief startled silence, and then: “Oh?”

  “He’s gone, sir,” Bennett said. “He won’t be back.”

  “You’ll have to tell me all about it,” Curtis said. “Later. What I want you to do, Colin—”