Line of Succession

by Brian Garfield

  “A great many people hire my boats and my plane. It’s my business.”

  “These had a prisoner.”

  Binaud shrugged and Lime turned to Chad Hill. “He thinks anything we could do to make him talk would be nothing compared to what Sturka and Djelil would do to him if he did talk.”

  “Offer him money,” Chad said in English.

  Binaud understood that; his eyes became crafty.

  Lime said in French, “Two hundred thousand dinar, Binaud. The price of a good airplane.”

  He had the man’s attention at any rate. He added, “You’ve nothing to fear from Djelil—he’s the one who sent us to you. As for Sturka he can’t come out of this alive. You know who his prisoner is.”

  “No. I do not.”

  “You mean they kept his face hidden.”

  Binaud said nothing. Lime sat down on the bunk facing him. They were crowded into the small cabin; Binaud showed his distress. Lime said, “Two hundred and fifty thousand dinar. Call it twenty-five thousand pounds. In gold sovereigns.”

  “I do not see any money in front of me.”

  Lime spoke in English without looking up. “Get it.”

  One of the men left, going up the ladder; the boat swayed when the man stepped onto the pier. Lime said, “We have it with us. There wouldn’t have been time to do it another way. You can understand that.”

  “Can I?”

  “The prisoner is Clifford Fairlie. If you didn’t know that already.”

  No indication of surprise. Binaud sat silent until the agent returned. The leather case was very heavy. They opened it on the deck and two of the agents started counting out the big gold coins, making neat stacks.

  Lime said, “Now what about Sturka?”

  “I know no one by that name.”

  “Call him any name you like then. Don’t you want the money, Binaud?” Lime leaned forward and tapped the man’s knee. “You realize the alternative. We’ll squeeze it all out of you. When it’s finished there won’t be much left of you.”

  “That’s what I don’t understand,” Binaud told him, and met his eyes. “Why don’t you do that anyway? It would save you the money.”

  “We haven’t time. We’ll do it if you force it, but we’d rather do it fast.”

  “How do I know you won’t kill me and take the money back?”

  “You don’t,” Lime said, “but what have you got to lose?”

  The coins were counted out to the sum of twenty-five thousand pounds and the rest went back into the case. Binaud watched every movement until the case was shut; finally he said, “My information probably is not worth that much money you know.”

  “If it helps at all, the money is yours.”

  “And if it doesn’t?”

  “We’ll see.”

  “I didn’t know their names. I didn’t know the man was who you say he was. The prisoner.”

  “Where did you take them?”

  “I didn’t. They had their own pilot.”

  Lime felt a sour taste. “Describe him.”

  “A Negro. Large, heavy, always chewing on something.”

  “When was this arranged?”

  “Ten days ago perhaps.”

  “Who arranged it with you? Djelil?”

  “No. It was a man named Ben Krim.”

  “Benyoussef Ben Krim,” Lime breathed. “Again. What story did he give you?”

  “None, Monsieur. He reserved my airplane for the night of the twelfth. It was to be filled with fuel. He said he would provide his own pilot. I only had to row them out to the plane.”

  “Was Ben Krim with them when they came?”

  “No.”

  “How many were there?”

  “Four,” Binaud said, and frowned. “No, five. The prisoner and four others. One was a woman, one was the Negro. The other two were dressed in burnouses, I did not see their faces.”

  “What condition was the prisoner in?”

  “He appeared unharmed. I recall his face was masked.”

  “Masked?”

  “You know. White tape and plasters.” Binaud made gestures across his eyes and mouth.

  “Did they explain him?”

  “Not really. They said something about the OAS. I thought perhaps he was an OAS they had captured. The Berbers still hold grudges you know.”

  It was very glib and it was probably a lie. But it really didn’t matter. Lime said, “Now I see you have recovered the airplane. How?”

  “I had to go down to a wadi to pick it up. Beyond the mountains.”

  “Where?”

  “Have you a map?”

  Chad Hill provided one from his pocket and they unfolded it on the bunk beside Binaud. Binaud inserted his lower lip between his teeth and leaned over the map. Presently his index finger stabbed a point. “Here.”

  It was south-southeast of Algiers perhaps four hundred miles. Beyond the Atlas Mountains and the Tell—out in the arid plateaus of the bled, on the fringe of the Sahara. Binaud explained, “A friend drove me down.”

  “Now think carefully. How much fuel had been used?”

  “The Catalina? I do not recall.”

  “The tanks weren’t full though.”

  Binaud was thinking hard. “No. There was enough to get me back here—more than enough. If there had been any question I’d have worried and I’d remember that. There’s no petrol at that wadi.”

  “A landing strip?”

  “No. Just the plain. No trouble landing and taking off on it, though.”

  “You came straight back here from the wadi?”

  “Yes of course.”

  “And then I imagine you filled the tanks when you got here.”

  “Yes I did.”

  “How much fuel did she accept?”

  “Ah. I see—yes.” Binaud put his mind on it. “One hundred and forty liters, I believe it was. Yes, I’m quite sure of it.” It was the kind of thing a man like Binaud would remember. He added, “And the distance from the wadi to here was perhaps five hundred and fifty kilometers. But then one has to clear the Atlas Mountains and that takes added fuel. I should say it required forty or fifty liters, the flight home.”

  “Then they put enough miles on her to consume a hundred liters or so,” Lime said. “They had to cross the mountains the same as you. So we’ll figure the same rate of consumption.” He was talking mainly to himself.

  “They probably covered about five hundred miles altogether. Approximately eight hundred kilometers.”

  Some of that mileage would be the distance between Sturka’s lair and the wadi of course. But how much? Ten miles or two hundred?

  More likely it was a fair distance. It left a depressing amount of earth to cover. Draw a half circle around El Djamila with a radius of four hundred and fifty miles or so.… Even if you narrowed it to a wedge with the wadi at the center of its base you had forty or fifty thousand square miles.

  It wasn’t quite a dead end but it was tough. Lime stood up and took Hill aside. “We’ll have to get people into all the villages out there. Find out if they heard that plane go over Wednesday night. Try and find out where it landed.”

  “That’ll take a lot of time.”

  “I know it. But what else is there?”

  “I’ll get on it,” Hill said, and went up the ladder.

  Lime went back to Binaud. There was one more avenue to explore. “You say Ben Krim was not with them Wednesday night.”

  “No.”

  “Have you seen him since then?”

  “No.…” Binaud seemed to hesitate. He hadn’t lied but he had just thought of something.

  Lime waited. Binaud said nothing. Lime sat down opposite him. “What is it?”

  “Rien.”

  “It’s Ben Krim isn’t it. Something about Ben Krim.”

  “Alors.…”

  “Yes?” Suddenly Lime had it. “You’re expecting him to come here, aren’t you.”

  Binaud’s eyes wandered away. Drifted down toward the stacked sov
ereigns. In the end the fatalistic shrug. “Yes.”

  “He’s coming here?”

  “Yes.”

  “When? Tonight?”

  “No, not tonight. He said it was not certain. I was to expect him Tuesday—that’s tomorrow—or Tuesday night.”

  “Exactly where does he ordinarily meet you?”

  “On the pier here.”

  “Not in the bar.”

  “No. He likes privacy, Benyoussef.”

  Lime nodded. “I’m afraid we’ll have to intrude on it.”

  10:15 P.M. EST North African Time Peggy lit a cigarette and gagged on the smoke. These foreign brands must be made out of cow shit. She remembered the head nurse’s furious lectures on the suicidal toxicity of cigarette smoke and the thought made her crush the Gauloise out unsmoked. Then it occurred to her how ridiculous that was and she emitted a little laugh like a hiccup.

  Sturka glanced at her coolly from the far side of the room and Cesar said, “What’s funny?”

  “I had a training nurse who used to lecture us on the evils of smoking. I was thinking about it and I got so upset I put my cigarette out.”

  “That’s funny?”

  “Look we’re all likely to get killed in a matter of days and here I’m worrying about getting cancer when I’m forty-two. You don’t think that’s funny?”

  Cesar picked his way across the rubble-strewn floor and squatted in front of her. The weak illumination of the kerosene lamps made him look jaundiced. There was a generator that provided power to the underground cells but the upper part of the building had been smashed thirty years ago by Italian bombs and nobody had bothered to repair the damage. Evidently some of Sturka’s old comrades in the Algerian liberation movement had fixed up the underground part with electricity and spartan accommodations but they’d never touched the aboveground wreckage. Probably because that would have given them away to the French.

  Cesar said, “Nobody’s going to get killed, Peggy. Everything’s worked fine so far. Why are you so down?”

  “They got Riva’s guys in Washington, didn’t they?” They had shortwave and they had been listening to all the news.

  “They did their job before they died. That’s what matters in the people’s struggle, Peggy. Your life don’ count—it’s that you got to accomplish something before you die. Listen if we all died right now this minute we’d of accomplished something.”

  “I guess.”

  “You don’ sound very convinced. Look this is a hell of a time to get cold feet Peggy.”

  “I haven’t got cold feet. Did anybody say I wanted to back out of this? All I said was I thought it was funny about the cigarettes.” Cesar had her angry now and she picked up the mashed cigarette and smoothed it out and lit it again.

  Sturka broke loose of his thoughtful stance and came striding across to them. “Has the drug had time to work on him?”

  “What time is it?” she asked.

  “Twenty past. You gave him the shot half an hour ago.”

  “It should’ve had time to work.”

  “Then let’s go down.” Sturka beckoned to Alvin.

  Peggy reached for the veil and the Arab robes and by the time she was costumed she saw Cesar and Sturka had engulfed themselves in their rough burnouses. Alvin had put a stick of gum in his mouth and they went down the dim broken stone stairs into the dungeons.

  She put her thumb on the vein in Fairlie’s wrist. He gave her an incurious look; he didn’t even lift his head. His eyes weren’t tracking very well. She said over her shoulder, “Maybe we made the dose a little too big.”

  “We gave him a smaller one last time and it didn’t work,” Cesar said.

  She tapped Fairlie’s cheek. “Can you hear us? Say something.”

  “I hear you.” His voice had a mausoleum tone, like a phonograph record being played at too slow a speed.

  “Sit up. Come on, I’ll help you.” She got her arm under his shoulders and he obeyed, levering himself upright with sluggish concentration. She pushed at his chest and he slumped back against the wall, sitting on the cot sideways with his knees straight, looking like a small boy. His face was bloodless and his eyes were pouched and unrevealing.

  She glanced at the others. Alvin stood guard in the doorway and Sturka was preparing the tape recorder; Cesar sat on the cot beside Fairlie and said in a reasonable tone, “Talk for a while, mister pig. Talk to us. Tell us about all the good people you’ve persecuted. Tell us about the fascist system back home.”

  The hollow eyes settled painfully on Cesar.

  Sturka was clicking controls on the tape recorder. Cesar said, “Can you read, pig?”

  “… Of course I can read.”

  “I mean aloud. Read to us, pig.” Cesar held up the speech they had written for Fairlie.

  Fairlie’s eyes tried to focus on it but his head went back against the wall and his mouth slacked open. “Tired,” he muttered. “Can’t see very well.”

  Too much, Peggy thought. They’d dosed him too much. She turned in anger toward Sturka. “He’s out of it, can’t you see that?”

  “Then bring him around. Give him a shot of adrenaline or something.”

  “I haven’t got any. What do you think I’ve got in that little kit, a whole drugstore?”

  Sturka’s head lifted a little. She couldn’t see his face under the hood but she knew those awful eyes were burning into her. “Lady, your concern for the pig isn’t touching, it’s out of place. You’re forgetting who he is—what he is.”

  She blanched. “He’s no use to us like this. That’s all I’m saying. I let you talk me into it but you can see he can’t handle the dose. We’ll just have to wait for it to wear off.”

  “How long will that be?”

  “I don’t know. It has a cumulative effect—he’s got an awful lot of it in his system. It may take three or four days for the whole thing to wear off. Maybe by morning he’ll be able to talk for you.”

  She knew the trouble; it would cut things awfully fine. But it’s your own stupid fault. You just had to shoot the poor bastard full of stuff because he had the guts to stand up to you.

  Cesar said, “Maybe he’s acting. Maybe he’s a lot wider awake than he looks.” He slapped Fairlie’s cheek and the handsome face rolled limply to the side; Fairlie blinked slowly and painfully.

  “He’s not acting,” Peggy said. “Christ he’s had enough junk poured into him to knock an elephant on his ass. Acting? He hasn’t got any inhibitions left to play games with. Look at him, will you?”

  There were flecks of white saliva in the corners of Fairlie’s slack mouth.

  Sturka switched off the recorder and picked it up. “All right. Morning.”

  They left Fairlie on the cot and went outside and closed the cell door. Peggy said, “I’ll try to get him to eat something later. A lot of coffee might help.”

  “Just don’t bring him too wide-awake. We can’t have him resisting this time.”

  “A few more cc’s of that junk and he’d be dead. He wouldn’t resist at all then. Is that what you want?”

  “Talk to her,” Sturka said mildly to Cesar, and went ahead of them up the stairs.

  “You’re getting to sound like a deviationist,” Cesar said. Alvin squeezed past them to go up the stairs; a blank look at Peggy and he was gone.

  She slumped against the wall and listened with half her attention to Cesar’s voice. She made the proper responses mechanically and it seemed to satisfy Cesar. But under it all she knew they were right about her. She was sliding. She was worried about Fairlie—she was a nurse and Fairlie was her patient.

  Fairlie had been extraordinarily gentle with her. It didn’t make her trust him. But it made him very hard to hate.

  4:45 P.M. EST The Secret Service men were numerous: silently present, indifferent but not inconspicuous. They watched Andrew Bee enter the President’s office.

  Brewster’s face had a gray haggard look. “Thanks for coming over, Andy.” It was meaningless courtesy: you
didn’t ignore a presidential summons. Bee nodded and muttered a “Mr. President” and took the indicated chair.

  Brewster’s head tipped sideways toward the side door. “Winston Dierks just left. We’ve been having a string of conferences here all afternoon. I reckon it’ll go on half the night, so you’ll have to forgive me if what I say to you comes out sounding like a set-piece speech.” The big lined face poked forward; Brewster’s lips pulled back slowly in a smile. “I guess I could have asked for a joint session and talked to everybody at once, but it just ain’t the kind of thing you can do that way.”

  Bee waited patiently. His grief-stung eyes lay against the President’s face; he felt at once reproachful and sympathetic.

  The President glanced at the television set in the corner. Bee didn’t remember having seen a television set in this office since the departure of Lyndon Johnson; it must have been brought in today. The sound was off and the picture was a still shot of a bathroom product. Brewster said, “The seven prisoners will be landing in Geneva in the next hour or so. I thought I’d watch.”

  “It hurts you to have to do that, doesn’t it Mr. President?”

  “If it’ll get Cliff Fairlie back I’m all for it.” The President halved his smile. “It’s what happens if we don’t get him back that I’d like to talk to you about, Andy.”

  Bee nodded without surprise and the President said, “I suppose you’ve been giving it some thought too.”

  “Everybody has. I doubt there’s another subject of conversation anywhere in the country today.”

  “I’d like your views.”

  “Well they’re probably not the same as yours, Mr. President.” Bee grinned a bit. “They rarely are.”

  “I do value your advice, Andy. And I reckon the differences between you and me get to looking pretty small when you compare them with some others.”

  “Like Senator Hollander?”

  “Like Senator Hollander.”

  The President looked unhappy as a soaked cat, Bee thought.

  Brewster was waiting for him to speak. With an effort Bee summoned his thoughts. “Mr. President, I don’t have a great deal to offer right now. I do think we’re between a rock and a hard place. If you think of yourself as any kind of liberal at all, you just don’t have any place left to stand. I’ve watched the troops move in all day. I gather every city in the country’s the same way—like a state of siege. I understand they’re arresting anybody who looks cross-eyed.”