The Empty Trap

by John D. MacDonald

  He put the balance of his money in a lock box in a Mexico City bank. Then he was ready for the hospital.

  Six weeks later when the last bandages were removed, he was allowed to sit up and look at himself in strong light, in the mirror held by a pretty smiling nurse. Hausmann stood by the foot of the bed.

  Lloyd saw a face he had never seen before. The vivid patch of white hair was still there, but it was muted now by a greyness that had spread over his entire head. The reddish beard, just beginning to grow back, was touched with grey. Under the thin beard he could see the two kinds of scars, the ugly ones made by rock, and the thin neat pink lines drawn by Hausmann’s scalpel. The left cheek was somewhat distorted, but the sick hollow was gone. The jaw was irregular. The great scar on the forehead was miraculously muted. Only the eyes and the shape of the brow were reminiscent of a man he had once known, yet in this stranger’s face, that look of familiarity was slight.

  “You were correct,” he said. “I shall never be handsome.”

  “When the beard is heavier it will be better,” Hausmann said.

  “Then you will look interesting,” the nurse said, smiling.

  “You have done a good job, Dr. Hausmann,” Lloyd said.

  “How do the teeth feel?”

  “Uncomfortable.”

  “You will become accustomed to them. Mine were removed in Hamburg in 1934, with a rifle butt, the few I had left at that time.”

  On the fifth day of August a very tall and very drunken American walked across the bridge from Matamoros into Brownsville, Texas. He wore a white suit and the right hand pocket sagged with the weight of the half empty bottle of rum. He had a ragged straw hat, of the sort that tourists buy, shoved well back on his head. He had a heavy reddish brown beard, and a look of awkward, uncoordinated strength. The petty officials on the Mexican side watched his wavering progress with bored, cynical amusement.

  He argued loudly and profanely with the officials on the American side, complaining how they misused tourists in the dives of Matamoros, and mispronouncing Mexican words. He said that the others, his friends who had driven him over to the town, could damn well stay over there. He was going back to the hotel, by God. They told him he better take one of the cabs parked near the bridge. He had the driver let him out in the center of the city. The driver marveled to himself at how a man so drunk could pull himself together so quickly. Later the driver found the half bottle of rum in the back of the cab. The American must have been very drunk after all to have forgotten his rum.

  The tall American checked into a hotel and, having no luggage, paid in advance. When the room door was locked, he sat in a chair by the windows and looked out at what he could see of the city by night. He had the clothes he wore. He had a little over two hundred Mexican pesos. And, in two money belts, and distributed in various pockets, he had almost exactly thirty thousand dollars.

  7

  Lloyd knew that any successful execution was a complicated thing to arrange. He had long since ceased calling it murder. In this case it was particularly complicated. The entire problem would be simplified if he were willing to sacrifice himself along with his elected victims. Yet, in spite of his hate, in spite of the necessity of this thing, he wished to continue to live, wished to be quite safe after it was over. In that way the details of the execution could be savored again and again.

  Before specific plans could be drawn up, certain major problems required consideration. He would have to acquire a reasonably fool-proof identity. And, in that new identity, he would have to acquire a new set of habits and mannerisms. He had never been fingerprinted, so that was one problem he did not have to consider. With his tallness, and the beard, the visible scars and the patch of dead white hair, he would be easily remembered. That was another factor in the equation.

  In order to get close to Tulsa, Benny and Harry Danton he would have to be at the Hotel Green Oasis. There was enough money so he could go there as a guest. Yet, as a guest, he did not feel he would have as many opportunities as he would as an employee. Obviously, many of the people he had hired, and had worked closely with, would still be there. A new face and new mannerisms might not be enough. He remembered the other hotels under construction at the time he left. There were certain possibilities in that direction.

  He wrote the biography of a man named Robert Rose. He made a chronological account of his life, using his own date of birth. He worked on it a long time, trying to account in logical ways for the failure of Robert Rose to have a social security number, any bonding company record, any union affiliation, and still have hotel experience. For a long time he could not solve this problem. The final solution pleased him. He had been born and educated in the states. His father owned and operated a hotel in Mexico. His father had become a Mexican citizen, but Robert Rose had retained his American citizenship. Robert had worked in the hotel. Recently his father had died and the hotel had been sold. That would account for the money in his possession, and the lack of records. His damaged face could be blamed on Korea. No. That would mean a cross-checking of records by the bonding company. It had been a highway accident in Mexico. And he could use his fluent Mexican Spanish to prove his background.

  He went to Houston. He acquired a used car, a driver’s license, a hunting license, and all other manner of identification he could acquire. He destroyed the last bits of paper that proved he was Lloyd Wescott. He practiced pitching his voice lower, and speaking more slowly. He moved more slowly. He rented a furnished room. He practiced his story until he could tell it calmly and naturally, with just enough detail to make it sound true. By the time he acquired a job in an almost firstrate hotel, as a desk man on the night shift, his money was down to less than twenty-seven thousand. He was taken on trial. He got his social security card. He filled out the blank for the bonding company. He was approved. He did his work well. The manager was pleased with him. In late January, when there was a vacancy, he was given a raise and put on the noon to eight shift. He made no friends. He was competent, uncommunicative. He tried at all times to make his new identity real to himself. His success was only partial. It seemed to him that he had lost any real identity. Lloyd Wescott was dead. The husband of Isabella no longer existed. Sometimes he wondered if he was close to madness, if in the fall he had taken, there had been some traumatic disarrangement.

  He resigned in March.

  On the fifth day of April, Robert Rose opened a large checking account in the Bank of Oasis Springs, and dealt with the same official who had opened an account back in another lifetime for a man named Lloyd Wescott. He opened the account with a check drawn on a Houston bank.

  “Are you a new resident, Mr. Rose?”

  “I’m going to look for work here. Hotel work.”

  “I’m sure you’ll find it without any trouble. Oasis Springs is the new Las Vegas, you know.”

  “I’ve heard that.”

  “The Safari opened last month. It’s an enormous place. Sign again here, please. In three days you can draw checks on the account, Mr. Rose. We appreciate your business.”

  He walked out to the car. There had been no flicker of interest, beyond what one would normally expect. He drove through the town. The twenty-two months had brought many changes. He drove slowly out to the Hotel Green Oasis. The sign had been changed. It was huge, garish and vulgar. The plantings were scraggly and areas of the lawns were parched. He noted that new banks of floodlights had been installed on the grounds. At night the hotel must blaze like a beacon. He drove by it three times before he found the necessary courage.

  The manager was not in. He waited for over an hour in the lobby. The clientele had changed. These people were flashier, and they walked and talked with all the arrogance of the insecure. The house had a shabby look. The lobby carpeting needed replacement. Maintenance seemed practically non-existent. There were few familiar faces among the help. The bell captain was the same, as were two of the cashiers, one of the desk men, one of the elevator operators. He could sense that the
house wasn’t full. And there was a listlessness about the help. It was a slack house and would require months of concentrated work if it were to recover. The salvaging of the reputation would take much longer. Perhaps that could never be redeemed.

  Finally he was told the manager would see him. As he went through he was glad to see that neither Mrs. Boyer nor Betty Larkin, his secretary, were there. It was unlikely they would still be with the hotel. The manager was named Tremaine, and his secretary was a big sultry brunette in too tight a dress. Tremaine was a small man with a continental accent, a small shiny mustache, a slightly wilted flower in his buttonhole, and a manner of great self-importance. Lloyd had seen the type before. They bustled through the third- and fourth-class hotels of Europe and the second-class hotels of America. They were seedy, multi-lingual, arrogant, and as dishonest as their uncertain nerve would permit them to be. They made a servile fuss over nobility of equal seediness, and cockroaches flourished in all of their kitchens.

  Tremaine looked over the credentials of Robert Rose. He asked questions in a cold and haughty manner. “I can’t possibly use you in front, Rose. I’m completely staffed.” He scribbled on a piece of paper. “Take this to a Mr. Haglund. At this time of day you may find him in the kitchens. Tell him to speak to me if he thinks he can use you.”

  Once he was back out in the lobby, he nearly left. This was going to be very risky. He had worked closely with Jack Haglund. Together they had made the food served anywhere in the Hotel Green Oasis exceptional. Haglund had been one of his right hand men. This could be extraordinarily dangerous.

  He found Jack standing at a steam table drinking coffee. The change in the man was shocking. He had put on at least twenty-five pounds, and it was puffy, unhealthy weight. Jack’s fingers were yellowed, and his hand shook as he read the note from Tremaine, crumpled it in his hand. Lloyd suddenly realized Haglund was slightly drunk. His shirt and his nails were not completely clean.

  “Do you know a damn thing about this business?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You know what I’ve got to have? I’ve got to have a coordinator. That’s the word for it. Somebody to keep things straightened away. The damn chefs and the waiters and the buying and the billing.” He thumped his chest. “A personal assistant to me. Man can’t handle everything himself forever. Gets tired. Think you can do it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Haglund peered at him. “We ever work anywhere together, Rose?”

  “I don’t believe so.”

  “If you’re no damn good, I’ll soon find out.”

  Lloyd worked hard for a week. He knew he was being watched. He knew the food staff was suspicious of him. He learned the routine, avoiding the traps. Haglund did practically nothing. The kitchens were dirty, the food indifferently prepared. Dining room service was insolent. Inventory control was sloppy. Many of the good systems he and Haglund had worked out long ago had been altered or dropped. The thieving was highly organized. It was impossible not to learn of it. Every crooked device was being employed. Headwaiters soothed the customers who spotted the errors on their checks. The dining room cashiers split with the waiters. Kitchen staffs had almost unlimited opportunity for pilferage. And Jack Haglund took a percentage of every theft in addition to the kickbacks on his purchasing. Lloyd did not think of improvements. He tried only to make it run smoothly within the framework of theft and indifference.

  At the end of ten days Haglund had him come to his small littered office. He put a bottle of the best bonded bourbon, two glasses and a silver ice bucket on his desk top.

  “Fix yourself one, Robert.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  “The name is Jack.”

  “Then thank you, Jack.”

  Haglund made a drink. “What do you think of the operation?”

  Lloyd shrugged.

  “You know this business. You know the score. What do you think of the operation?”

  “It stinks.”

  “The whole house stinks. It loses money. And nobody gives a damn because the Casino makes enough to take care of the owners. Over here in the house we take care of ourselves. The customers are too tight to give a damn if we poison them or charge them double. There’s no repeat business anyway. What I want to know is this. Will you ride with it?”

  “For how much?”

  “Good question. You’re smart, Robert Rose. And I’ve seen you someplace before, damn it.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Skip that. You got any ideas?”

  Lloyd knew what he meant. Ideas that would improve Haglund’s particular operation. “The bar control is still good, and the check totals on drinks are accurate. You’ve got space out back to set up a service bar for the dining room. Then your waiters would know which tables they could pad for an extra round. And you could go short on the drinks.”

  “We don’t get too much drink trade in the dining room.”

  “It’ll add up to more than you think, Jack.”

  “Maybe I’ll give it a try. What do you want?”

  “Something on the side. Whatever you want to make it. And I want to live in.”

  Jack gave him fifty dollars, five tens. “You’re working out fine, Robert. You’re using your head.”

  “Thank you.”

  “I’ll get you fixed up with a room over in the wing. You can live a little better on the inside.”

  “I know.”

  “It’s easier to line up something.”

  As Lloyd got up to leave, Haglund said foggily, “Just don’t think it was always this way or I was always this way. We had a good house here in the beginning. We had a hell of a good manager. Wescott. You maybe heard of him.”

  “Yes, I have.”

  “I ought to get out of here, I guess. Most of the others left. The good ones. This operation is falling apart.” He looked up, frowning. “But there’s no harm getting it while you can, is there?”

  “No.”

  “So I’m living good. That’s the angle. Live good. Wescott was almost as tall as you are.”

  “I’ve got to get back.”

  “You’re doing a good job.”

  The next day he was given a room with private bath in the wing where staff members lived. He moved his gear in. Haglund made an adjustment in his working hours. From his windows he could see the heavy screen of plantings in front of Harry’s cottage and office. It was on the third day he was in his room, at four in the afternoon, just before he had to go back on duty, that he saw Harry Danton. Two years had made no change in him. He came walking from the cottage with a tall blonde girl. They were obviously arguing. The girl was making angry gestures. She wore a dark red sheath bikini of some shiny material that looked metallic. He saw her wince when Harry took her arm, and saw the anger go out of her. She turned and went back toward the cottage. Harry watched her go, and then walked slowly toward the hotel and was soon out of sight of the window. Lloyd realized his hands had become fists. His nails had made dents in the palms of his hands. His fingers were cramped. He rubbed the tension out of them.

  Two days later Benny and Tulsa came into the kitchens a little after ten at night. Lloyd was sitting at a table checking master copies of menus. They sat fifteen feet away and began talking to one of the chefs. Lloyd gathered from the conversation they had just come back from a trip to New York. Tulsa was as big and powerful as before. He looked slightly heavier, and his hair had receded further. Benny had gained more weight around the middle.

  He heard Tulsa say, “Who’s the beard over there?”

  “New assistant to Haglund.”

  “Has he got a name?”

  “Robert Rose.”

  It seemed normal to look over when he heard his name. “You, with the beard,” Tulsa said. “You ever work in Detroit?”

  “No. Why?”

  “I thought maybe you just worked in Detroit once. How come the spinach?”

  “My beard? I’m scarred up.”

  Tulsa got up and came ov
er and stood looking down at him.

  “You always had the beard?”

  “Since I was twenty-two. Who are you?”

  “I’m Tulsa. I work for Harry. So does Benny over there. Benny, you ever see this joker before?”

  Benny studied him. “Never did.”

  “And who is Harry?” Lloyd asked.

  “Hey, Benny! He wants to know who Harry is.”

  “Harry is Harry Danton who owns the joint,” Benny said.

  Lloyd shrugged and went back to work. Tulsa went back to the table. They talked in a low tone. Lloyd could not hear them. That night, back in his room, he sat in his underwear shorts on the side of the bed. He took the knife Roberto had given him, the knife he had carried out of Mexico strapped to his body. He tested its sharpness again by shaving a small place on the outside of his thigh. He thought of the motel room in Talascatan, of the sounds that had come through the closed door. He remembered the zopilotes and the cairn of stones. He recalled vividly the white smashing explosions of pain and the stink of his own chest.

  He could not sleep that night. The time had come for the specific plans. He made his selection. The first one would be Benny. And Benny Bernholz had a fear of heights. He had wanted Valerez to be first, but he had not seen Valerez and could not ask about him. It was probable that Valerez was still in Mexico. The first step would be to acquire Benny’s confidence and trust. That would not be easy. It would never be given to anyone in full measure. He needed to win that confidence, because death was not enough. There had to be the awareness, the comprehension of the identity of the executioner, and there was a breaking point that had to come before death.