“I think we’re going to be very grateful to you, Lieutenant Wintraub.”
David stood up as they entered.
“Well?”
“It worked. She made two calls. One to a Tandem in Monroe. Mrs. Adelman said he worked here.”
“Paul Tandem? We had to fire him more than five years ago. He was drinking on the job, and he was pitifully drunk the night his son died.”
“Son died?”
“As stubborn and as pigheaded as his father. He had been very sick for days and kept it to himself because he wanted to finish the holiday and make his money. Walked around with a very high fever, walking pneumonia, they called it. He finally collapsed in the dining room. The staff helped him into the kitchen, but he insisted he’d be all right. Refused to leave. They called me and I called Paul, but he didn’t answer at the booth, so I sent a bellhop to find him. He was drunk and shacked up with a chambermaid in the help’s quarters. To make a long story short, by the time we got him and his son to the hospital, and the kid got attention, he was already in serious trouble. He was critical for a while and then he died. It was just too late. Naturally, I had to let Tandem go. It was a very bitter affair. Doesn’t surprise me that he’s in on any plot to do harm to people in the hotel.”
“Well,” Barry said, “that explains their understanding of this place. It’s time to move in on them and clean this all up. We’re heading to room 215. She contacted a party there. They must be the ones.”
“Jesus, be careful. Should I call the local police?”
“In a while. We’ll have to turn them over once we apprehend them. Raise Boggs on the walkie-talkie.”
David leaned over and pressed the talk button on the one on his desk.
“Boggs.”
“I’m here.”
He handed it to Barry.
“Any activity at the room?”
“Nothing.”
“We’re coming up.” He handed the walkie-talkie back to David. “I’ll have Boggs keep Brenda Casewell in her room until we send for the locals. They can book her on an unlicensed weapon’s charge until we have further information here.”
“Okay. It’s only a matter of hours until Chaim Eban arrives.”
“We’d better move fast,” Trustman said.
The music in the lobby continued as the hotel and its guests went on, oblivious to the frantic activity in their midst.
28
Nessim came down a side stairway into the basement. It let him out below the area where the girders were located. He was closer to the laundry. A group of custodial people were unloading the carts of linen and stuffing the material into great washing machines as quickly as they could. It was as if the metallic monsters demanded feeding. He watched them for a moment to be sure he had drawn no special attention to himself and then turned left to walk up the corridor.
It was true that Tandem had many places to hide. He might not even be in the basement and only had said it to throw Nessim off if he did come looking for him. Perhaps he had been in the area of the deep girders and had been watching Nessim when he found his brother. Maybe he sat in the shadows enjoying Nessim’s grief. The thought infuriated him. He felt for his pistol. He’d use it, if he had to. He’d use it, damn it. But he’d rather kill this man with his bare hands, strangle him if he could.
More chambermaids came walking through the corridor. A bellhop followed. All of them looked at Nessim, but he didn’t return the gaze and none stopped to speak to him. It was risky being here, but he had to do it. He had to. He stopped at the first storage room, but before he could walk in, the door swung open. Nessim paused and got into a posture to strike out. An elderly custodian backed out of the room, pulling a cart loaded down with cartons of canned goods. He grunted with the effort to roll the wheels over the little rise in the floor. Nessim relaxed and then went over and pulled the cart to help him.
“Thanks,” he said. “These damn things weigh a helluva lot more ’n people think.”
Nessim nodded and smiled and then continued down the corridor. The old man rolled the cart in the opposite direction. The next door Nessim came to was closed. He looked behind him, and when he was satisfied that it was safe to do so, he went over and turned the knob. The door opened and he stepped into a room housing electrical equipment. It buzzed with ominous warning. There was nothing else in the room and no real place for anyone to hide. He stepped out again. Two men were coming down the hall, carrying a large stage flat between them. He waited for them to pass and then walked on.
He knew that the girder area was just a little ways ahead now, so he slowed his pace and thought. Even if he didn’t get Tandem today, he’d search for him afterward. He’d refuse all other missions and live to hunt the man down. It would only be a matter of time. Perhaps the command would help him, just to speed up his utilization to them. In any case, Tandem could not escape. There was no way he could escape. The conclusion made Nessim feel a bit more relaxed. He came to another door and stopped again. This one was slightly open.
Gazing through the opening, he could see that it was filled with cartons too. From the labels he understood that the cartons contained all sorts of paper supplies. A hotel as big as the New Prospect required so much, he thought. Quite a drain on natural resources. He laughed to himself, thinking what a great deed he was going to do for nature by blowing this monster to bits. He opened the door farther and peered in. There was no one visible, but someone could easily be hiding behind one of the cartons, he thought. Maybe he made a place for himself there. He stepped inside.
Paul Tandem had slept deeply for hours, but his body ached when he awoke. He seriously wondered whether or not he could remain up on the shelf all day and had come to the conclusion that he would detonate the explosives in the middle of the hotel lunch.
In the Catskills, three meals a day was traditional hotel fare. All the guests usually took advantage of it. He was sure he’d get just about every one of them in the dining room then. So he didn’t get the one Israeli, so what? What the hell was one Israeli compared to just about three thousand Jew bastards upstairs? It was after eleven. He’d only have to wait a little more than two hours. He closed his eyes and tried resting again.
Not long afterward, he heard footsteps just outside the storage room door. He opened his eyes and listened closely. It wasn’t a custodian because whoever it was approached very slowly.
He backed himself farther against the wall and watched, nearly holding his breath. Then Nessim appeared. He had really hoped that Nessim wouldn’t come looking for him, that he would simply accept his control and be satisfied. But obviously that wasn’t to be the case.
Then Tandem thought, if Nessim was going to spend the afternoon searching the basement for him, he’d eventually find Yusuf’s body. There’d be no way to avoid conflict then. He had to kill Nessim too. If he could only get at him in this room, away from the activity outside in the basement.
He moved his arms up slowly and pressed his face against the floor of the shelf. Nessim walked farther in, crouched, and began looking behind the big cartons. If he comes over to this side, Tandem thought. If he gets close enough. Nessim crossed the room, expecting Tandem to come out at him any moment. He was poised to ward off blows. When he covered the width and satisfied himself that Tandem wasn’t hiding behind anything, he stopped and straightened up. He was just under the shelf. Tandem inched toward the edge of it. When he steps out, he thought. When he steps out.
Another disappointment, Nessim thought. I probably won’t find him. This is his home ground. He knows it too well to permit himself to be discovered. I’ll have to smoke him out another way.
He shook his head and stepped forward to walk out of the room. At that moment, Tandem, hovering above him and waiting, scooped down with his hands clenched and caught Nessim just under the chin. Tandem’s intention was to literally hang him to death on his arms. He
pulled upward with all his might.
The blow to his Adam’s apple stunned Nessim. Tandem had come at him from nowhere. Nessim hadn’t even considered the shelves in the room, and now he might die because of that error. He raised his hands and tugged downward, but Tandem, on his knees now, had much better leverage. Both men, aware of the danger if they attracted attention to this struggle, were caught up in a nearly comical silent effort, permitting themselves only grunts as they strained against each other.
Nessim’s feet began to leave the ground. He felt the blood rushing to the top of his head. His heartbeat quickened, and the feel of it in his chest cavity, pounding out emergency oxygen and blood to all parts of his body, frightened him. All his life systems were on red; every part of him was screaming warnings. Sirens sounded in his ears. Tandem’s grip closed even tighter. Nessim’s attempts at breaking the hold were futile.
In a moment, the strategy came to him. Instead of pressing down against Tandem’s force, he should somehow go with it and then slip free. He released his grip on Tandem’s wrists and reached up for the shelf, dangling dangerously near death for an instant. The move caught Tandem by surprise and he hesitated a second. Nessim pulled himself upward, toward the shelf, faster and harder than Tandem had expected. The effect was a total release from Tandem’s grasp. When Nessim had that, he let go of the shelf and fell backward to the floor, just under the shelf, free of Tandem’s death clasp.
Tandem knew his best advantage lay in quick reaction. Nessim must not have the time to recuperate. The moment Nessim broke free and fell to the floor, Tandem jumped off the shelf. When he landed, he kicked the door of the storage room closed. This had to be a private fight to the death or the victor would get none of the spoils.
Nessim had time for one quick breath. Tandem spun and drove his left foot at him, aiming squarely for Nessim’s face. He missed, and Nessim caught his foot with his hands and prevented Tandem’s return. He twisted the foot hard and Tandem fell. Nessim was up and drove his own foot into Tandem’s abdomen. He caught him well near the groin, and Tandem brought his legs up in pain. Nessim went behind him quickly and took out his knife. He flipped out the blade and grasped Tandem by the hair, pulling his head back. Tandem reached up to rip away Nessim’s arm, but Nessim did not go for his throat.
He drove the knife into the corner of Tandem’s left eye and with a flick of his wrist, sent the eyeball splattering against the nearby wall. Tandem’s scream was the scream of a wild animal caged and crushed to death. Nessim drove the knife into his mouth, pressing the blade through Tandem’s tongue and pinning the organ like a piece of meat on a skewer. It ended his scream quickly. He began to choke on his own blood.
Then Nessim carefully wrapped his forearm around Tandem’s throat, catching him expertly under the Adam’s apple, and tugged upward. It was only a matter of moments. Tandem’s body jerked about in spasms like a fish onshore. Then he stopped and fell limp. Nessim dropped him and stepped back. He kicked him over on his back, so the blood wouldn’t drip out of his mouth. He stared at him and struggled to catch his breath.
His first thought was to wait and be sure that no one had heard the fight or Tandem’s aborted scream. The silence outside cheered him. He wiped his face with his handkerchief and knelt down to search for the transmitter. All he found was the battery. He looked over the floor, but it wasn’t there. Then he thought of the shelf. When he boosted himself up and looked, he found the device resting there safely. Tandem had the forethought to leave it so it would not be damaged in the fight.
Good for him, Nessim thought.
He hopped down again and considered the body. He couldn’t drag it out of the room now, and he could never put it back up on that shelf. Hiding it behind one of the big cartons would have to do. He made a space and dragged it deeper into the room and then placed a couple of the large cartons in front of it. Before he left the body, Nessim reached down and pulled his knife out of Tandem’s mouth. He wiped the blood on Tandem’s shirt. Then he looked for the splattered eye. He found it and kicked it back behind some cartons.
After that he broke open a carton of toilet tissue and used some to wipe up the blood. When he was sure he had done the best he could in clearing away traces of the fight, he straightened out his own clothes and opened the door slowly. He peered out first and then stepped into the empty corridor. With the transmitter and its battery once again safely in his possession, he had to go back and reactivate the switches. Then, finally, he would be able to leave this damnable basement, perhaps for good.
As he walked back toward the girders, he smiled to himself, thinking of the good news he could bring to his dead brother.
“No one’s gone in or out of the room,” Boggs said. Barry nodded. He opened his jacket. Trustman stepped out to the left. They waited for a couple coming down the hall to go into the elevator. Trustman peered out the hall window.
“Ah, a fire escape,” he said, but Barry wasn’t listening.
“This could be hairy,” Barry said. Boggs nodded and stepped even farther back. He swallowed hard and watched as Barry knocked. There was nothing. He knocked harder. They heard a woman’s voice. Apparently, she was up against the door.
“Nessim?”
Barry’s eyes widened, and Trustman smiled with satisfaction.
“Hotel security, ma’am. We’d like to speak to you.”
“Who?”
“Hotel security.” There was a pause and a long silence. “Ma’am?” He knocked again. Then he beckoned to Boggs. “Use your key.”
Reluctantly, Boggs approached the door and inserted his master key in the lock. Barry indicated that he would turn it and did so. When the door opened, both Trustman and he drew their pistols, crouched, and entered—Barry to the right, Trustman to the left. Clea was sitting on the bed. They searched the room quickly and determined no one else was there.
“What do you want?” she said.
“Why didn’t you open up?” Barry asked. Boggs appeared in the doorway.
“I don’t know you.”
“Where is your husband?” Trustman asked quickly.
“Downstairs. He went downstairs.”
“Where?”
“Shopping. To do some shopping. Who are you?”
“We’re hotel security,” Boggs said. He took out his identification and showed it to her. She looked at it a moment and then looked away.
“Where is your husband?” Trustman demanded again. Barry stepped in between, pulling up the chair from the dresser. He sat down.
“We’re looking for a man named Paul Tandem,” Barry said slowly. Clea looked up at him, her eyes wide with fear. “Can you help us?”
“I … I don’t know him.”
“You know Nessim, though, don’t you?” Trustman said.
“We know who you are,” Barry said, still speaking softly. “There’s no sense pretending anymore. We have the Casewell woman too.”
“Casewell woman?”
“She called you only a short while ago and asked for Nessim. It’s all over,” Barry said.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“NOW YOU LISTEN!” Trustman shouted, waving the gun in his hand. Barry stood up and took him by the arm.
“Just a minute,” he said. He steered Trustman back outside the room. Boggs remained inside. “You’re not going to get anything out of her by shouting and threatening. Can’t you see she’s half scared to death? I know this type. Let me handle it calmly.”
“There’s no time to be calm. Do you know the time? Give me ten minutes alone in there with her and I’ll …”
“Are you crazy? Where the hell do you think you are? You’re in the Catskills, in a hotel. It isn’t the Sinai Desert. Just relax and let me work on her. Or else go back downstairs and wait,” Barry said sternly. Trustman didn’t respond. They went back inside.
“Clea. We know y
our name’s Clea and we know you’re with two men, Nessim and Yusuf.” She didn’t look up. “If you keep quiet and let things go on this way, it’ll only be terrible for them. We have men all over the building now.” He waited. She was still silent. “Will you tell us where Tandem is?”
“I don’t know where he is.”
“But you know him?”
She nodded slowly.
“Is he in the hotel somewhere?”
“I don’t know.”
“We know why you are all here. It’s useless now, Clea. The best thing for everyone would be to bring it all to a halt, before it gets too involved.” He spoke so softly and so reasonably that Clea was put off balance. She looked at him. He was a calm man, even gentle despite his size. She thought of her father.
“I know very little,” she said, shaking her head.
“Is Nessim really downstairs?”
“Well, he’s not here,” Trustman said with impatience. “That’s obvious.” Barry gave him a look.
“Start searching the room,” Barry ordered. “Boggs, you’d better stay out in the hall. Let us know if anyone approaches.”
Trustman began opening suitcases and drawers, treating everything roughly. He threw clothes about and scattered shoes across the floor. He stopped when he opened Nessim’s special suitcase. There were wires and batteries and some extra switches and detonators within.
“Look here,” he said. Barry walked over and observed. “Explosives.” Barry whistled and turned back to Clea. She had her hands folded in her lap. Her body was tight, and she stared at the floor.
“They planted a bomb somewhere, is that it?” he asked her. “In Chaim Eban’s rooms? If it goes off, it’ll only kill innocent people because we’ve changed his suite. Do you want to be responsible for the deaths of innocent people?”
“There are no longer any innocent people,” she said, recalling Nessim’s words. She couldn’t betray him—disapprove of what he was doing, yes, but betray him, never.
“Then you won’t help us?”
The Terrorist's Holiday Page 22
