by Thomas Swan
He looked down from his window to the famous avenue and the landmark arch at Washington Square in Greenwich Village. He had ventured onto the streets to a drugstore, then a liquor store for a fifth of gin. He was surprised the bottle was nearly empty. Tony Waters knew loneliness. It somehow suited him.
The phone rang and he jumped to answer it before it could ring a second time. It would be Edna Braymore. Only she knew where to reach him.
“Tony? It’s Curtis. Are you alive?”
“Of course,” he snapped. “How did you know where to reach me?”
“I told Edna Braymore to give me the number. You’re not the Prince of Wales, for Christ’s sake.”
“She’s under instructions not to give this number to—”
“Bug off, big shot. Have you heard from Jonas?”
“He wants both of us in Como. I’m going on Friday. Kalem will call with your instructions as soon as he’s made the arrangements. You’re not to see or talk with anyone. Is that clear?”
There was silence. “Is that clear?” Tony repeated.
“Yeah. It’s clear.”
Stiehl hung up the phone.
Chapter 19
Alex Tobias assigned Detective Larry Culp to the stakeout at Fifty-fourth and Lexington Avenue. The black, unmarked police car became an oven: only wisps of air kicked up by passing traffic trickled through the open windows. Deats was persistent: “If Waters is still in the city, our only chance is finding him going in or coming out of that building.”
“If you recognize him,” Culp said skeptically.
“I will. Somehow I will.”
Culp was a new breed of police officer. He was perhaps thirty, a state university graduate, and dedicated to law enforcement. He had earned his lieutenant’s bar in June. Tobias had been watching his progress for several years and had the angular, blue-eyed officer assigned to his staff within a week of graduation. Occasionally they closed the windows and turned on the air-conditioning. Then the engine overheated. The relief was momentary.
Deats wrote in his notebook: Wednesday, 24 September. New York blazing hot and no time to be on the trail. Alex Tobias cooperating. Tell Elliot. Good chance Waters here. Officer assigned to me has arrest warrant. Identification is the key. Assume Waters has changed appearance. Will visit Kalem’s offices but expect no better luck than Tobias met with.
A rear door opened and Len Bascom slid onto the backseat and handed a large envelope to Deats. “Here’re the blowups. You won’t need a goddamned magnifying glass.”
A single, medium-sized suitcase was on the bed. It was tan with stout leather flaps, two polished brass locks, and a long, thick handle. It was double-stitched throughout, and with the unmistakable scent of newly tanned leather. He had seen it at Loewes & Kroll, Ltd., one of two indulgences he felt he deserved as he had shifted to the role of Keith Habershon. The second was in the bottom drawer of Jonas Kalem’s desk. He finished packing, then phoned Edna Braymore.
“Are the flights confirmed?”
“Yes. I picked up the tickets this morning.”
“You paid in cash?”
“As you instructed.”
“Put them by the phone on Mr. Kalem’s desk. I’ll pick them up in forty-five minutes. I’ll need money. Three thousand in tens and twenties.”
“It will be in the same envelope.”
“Any calls?”
“Not this morning.”
“If there are, the message is the same. I haven’t been seen for six months.”
“I understand.” Edna Braymore paused, then asked solicitously, “Are you in any danger?” The voice was soft, the coldly efficient tone gone.
“Not at all, Miss Braymore. They’ll tire of chasing and it will all smooth over. Remember, it’s our secret and I’m relying on your help.”
On the street he hailed a taxi and instructed the driver to take him to the intersection of Fifty-fourth and Third Avenue. He paid the fare and handed the driver an extra hundred dollars.
“Circle the block and pull up in front of 284. If I’m not back in fifteen minutes, you made an easy hundred. If I am, you’ve been tipped for a fast ride to LaGuardia.”
The surprised driver folded the bills and slipped them into a shirt pocket. “You’re on, mister. Remember my number: 5603.”
Tony crossed to the north side of Fifty-fourth Street and mingled with the sweating office workers hurrying to or from an air-conditioned haven. His attention was focused on the parked cars lining both curbs, his eyes searching inside the cars for a stake-out crew. He saw the black sedan just as a man opened a back door and got inside. He did not quicken his pace, but fell in with all the others who were returning from lunch. He waited his turn, then pushed through the revolving doors and into the lobby.
Deats opened the envelope and drew out two photographs. The enlargements were heavily grained but sufficiently detailed to reveal a scar running across the back of the right hand. The second enlargement was less clear; a shadow obscured half the face. “Do you remember the face?” Deats asked.
“Not too well,” Bascom replied. “I was in a hell of a hurry.”
“I think I see a mustache.”
“Yeah, I think so,” Bascom acknowledged.
Deats turned his gaze from the photographs to the building entrance. The sidewalks were crowded. A man carrying a tan suitcase turned into the building and disappeared through the revolving door. Deats stared at the spinning panels of glass and steel.
Tony walked to the bank of elevators marked “39–55.” He pressed 39. The thirty-ninth floor was immediately above the two-story-high office Jonas had created for himself. He turned into a hallway off which were the floor’s utility rooms. At the end was a single steel door marked NO ADMITTANCE. He took a key from his wallet, unlocked the door, and stepped into the blackness.
He felt along the wall for a light switch and flipped it on. He was in a narrow corridor. Twenty feet along the wall he pushed open a small door and stepped onto the balcony by which he had left the office several days earlier. He descended the library ladder and stepped quickly to the desk. The envelope was by the phone. He checked the contents and slipped it into his pocket. He opened the bottom drawer to the desk and withdrew a Walther PPKS revolver; his second indulgence. Then he went to the center area of the room and pulled open a drawer in the oversized table. He picked out a folder. Twelve of Giorgio Burri’s drawings were as he had left them. He opened his suitcase and slipped the folder under several layers of shirts. He returned up the ladder, through the corridor, and back to the thirty-ninth floor.
Deats got out onto the sidewalk and peered over the top of the police car toward the entrance and the twirling door. Then he leaped back into the car. “The suitcase! The one carrying it is Waters.”
“Describe him,” Bascom asked.
“Look for a tan suitcase with a wide handle and brass fittings. Whoever’s carrying it has a mustache. Bet on it.”
“Lieutenant, you stay here and get your radio working.” Deats started for the entrance, then returned. “Is there another entrance to that building?”
“Through the shops and the bank. I’ve got the Seventeenth Precinct on the phone. They’re three blocks south on Fifty-first.”
“Tell them what you know and ask for help.”
Tony reached the lobby and paused. His taxi was double-parked in front of the entrance. The black sedan was beyond on the other side of the street. One of the men got out of the car and started to cross the street. Tony edged toward the revolving doors, then damned himself for not planning to leave through the bank offices and out to Lexington Avenue. His taxi was no use to him now; he would have to find one on Lexington Avenue and travel south before turning uptown toward LaGuardia. Don’t take any risks.
He went into the bank.
Deats walked toward the building, through the revolving doors, and into the lobby just as a man carrying a tan suitcase went into the bank. Deats could see into the bank through smoked gray windows that c
aused the lights inside to give off a muted iridescence. He was sure it was Waters. He ran into the bank and saw the man and the suitcase exiting onto Lexington Avenue.
Tony pushed through the crowds and waved to a taxi that had pulled to the corner across the street to discharge a passenger. He turned to see Deats running from the bank. Tony shouted at the driver but was ignored; everyone shouts at New York cabbies. Tony yanked open the door and fell onto the seat. “LaGuardia. And fast!”
“Look, buddy, my off-duty sign is on. I ain’t about to go to LaGuardia in the middle of the day and sit on my dump in this heat.”
“A hundred bloody dollars says you can go someplace and get cool.”
The driver pushed down the flag.
Tony saw Deats running toward the cab. “Go, damn it!” he yelled.
Deats reached for the door handle, his eyes glaring, his screams unheard in the traffic’s roar. His fingers gripped the door handle as the taxi moved forward. The door was locked and he reached with his other hand to pull up on the lock. Tony had pulled out the Walther and smashed the butt end of the gun on Deats’s hand. The intense pain forced Deats to fall against the door, and as the cab gained speed he ricocheted to the street in front of a trailing delivery van. The driver veered left, braking simultaneously. Deats’s head had crashed against the street and he lay limp in the heat-softened asphalt.
“Did you hear that idiot?” the driver yelled over his shoulder. “He near kills himself trying to get a ride. You see all kinds.”
“Keep going, he’s all right. Might teach him a lesson.” Tony turned to see a crowd gather around the fallen superintendent. “How quickly can you get to LaGuardia?”
“This time of day... no traffic . . . thirty minutes if we don’t boil over.”
Deats had seen him clearly. Tony checked the time. It was 1:10. The next shuttle to Boston was at two. Deats would identify him, he was certain of that. New York and federal police would be alerted. They would cover Kennedy or Newark Airport where overseas flights departed. But he was leaving from Boston. How did Jonas Kalem know to arrange that? Minimize risks. His Boston-to-Paris ticket was TWA Flight 810 leaving at 6:40. The shuttle would put him in Logan International at 2:45, and he could be in a room at the airport motel by three. Four hours to kill. He would change clothes. He looked at the expensive Loewe valise and knew he must get a less conspicuous piece of luggage. He stroked his mustache and put the thought out of his head.
“Thirty minutes? See if you can do it in twenty-eight.”
“I saw him run right into the car. He was screaming like a lunatic.” A bystander who had seen Deats dash toward the taxi was trying to get the attention of anyone who would listen. Lieutenant Culp saw the commotion and was the first to kneel over the fallen superintendent. A patrol officer arrived, then another. Culp showed his badge to the first. “Radio for an ambulance. This is a police officer.”
The officer responded. “Four-twelve to headquarters. Need ambulance at five-four and Lex. Repeat, ambulance to five-four and Lex. Police officer injured.”
Deats’s head lay in a pool of blood; three fingers on his right hand were ripped and bleeding. His eyes twitched open, then closed.
“Get these people away,” the lieutenant ordered. The police, now joined by others called from the Seventeenth Precinct, pushed back the throng. The incessant sound of a siren could be heard; then another. A white-coated medic cut through the ring of onlookers as Deats was regaining consciousness. The superintendent tried to rise up but a firm hand urged him back. “Stay put,” the medic said sternly, “let’s see what we’ve got here.”
Deats lay stretched on his back. His body was going into shock, acting as a massive dose of novocaine to dull the pain that would soon grow in his head and broken hand. Deft fingers felt for further damage. A stretcher was set beside him, then almost magically he was levitated onto it. He was carried to the ambulance and, despite the heat, covered with a blanket. He lay still, his eyes searching the eyes of strangers peering down at him. “Lieutenant Culp, is Lieutenant Culp here?”
The medic applied a thick gauze pad to the bleeding scalp. Another hand touched his shoulder.
“I’m here,” the voice answered reassuringly.
“That was Waters,” Deats said hesitantly. “He was in that taxi, I let him slip—”
“No, you tried.”
“He’ll get away—airport . . . London . . .”
The officer tapped Deats’s shoulder reassuringly, then returned to the sedan and raised Alexander Tobias on the phone.
“A hundred damned bucks and the toll’s on me,” the driver laughed and pulled in front of the Air Shuttle Terminal at LaGuardia. “Thirty-four minutes was the best I could do.”
Tony was out of the door before the taxi came to a stop and placed five twenty-dollar bills in an outstretched hand. “Get yourself a cold beer and stay off these bloody hot streets.”
There were no police in sight, only two shirt-sleeved skycaps. He stopped inside the terminal and surveyed the ticket counters and the gangways leading to the departure gates. The two o’clock would depart from Gate 3. The line of passengers moved slowly past an agent. He started for the line as a red-faced police guard entered the terminal from a door marked NO EXIT. He was speaking into a portable phone. Tony spun, slipped the gun into the suitcase, returned to the front of the terminal, and handed it to one of the sky caps. “That goes on the two o’clock to Boston.”
“You can take that right on with you, sir.”
“I’d prefer checking it,” Tony replied, plucking several bills from his wallet. He waited until the suitcase was on the conveyor belt and traveled out of sight.
Back in the terminal he looked for the red-faced guard. He was standing behind the agent at Gate 2, the phone against his ear. A newsstand was between Tony and the gate. He stopped and bought a magazine and immediately opened it. Then, head lowered, he began reading it as if fully engrossed. A digital clock over the door read 1:54. Tony edged toward the agent.
“Goddamn it, I don’t care when the first flight leaves for London. Put a net over every airline that flies there. We can’t get him coming into the airports but surer than hell we can stop him from flying out of it!” Alexander Tobias paced behind his desk. “No, we don’t have the cab’s number! Superintendent Deats nearly lost a hand trying to stop it.” He gave a description based on the little he picked up from Deats and Bascom. Culp thought Waters had been wearing a dark suit and added what he knew about the expensive suitcase with the brass fittings. The detective punched a button on the telephone console. “Get Elliot Heston at Scotland Yard.”
“It’s seven o’clock over there, Chief,” a female voice replied. “He’s probably left for—”
“Get him at home if you have to.” Tobias slammed down the phone. He stared at the squares of plastic, waiting for a light to flash signifying his line was active. He thought of Kennedy Airport, the huge sprawl, the number of airlines connecting New York with Heathrow and Gatwick: Continental, British Air, Virgin, United . . . even Air India. Newark wasn’t as big, but from there a dozen lines flew to Europe.
“Did an alert go to LaGuardia? Why for Christ’s sake not? Do it!” He slipped the phone onto its cradle, his exasperation heightened by the trickles of perspiration sliding down his back.
Tony showed his ticket and walked past the redfaced guard holding the phone tight to his ear.
The whirring of the jet engines crescendoed and the DC-9 rolled away from the terminal onto the taxi strip leading to Runway 1331. At 2:07 clearance for takeoff was radioed.
“Elliot, sorry to get to you so late but we’ve got an alert on Anthony Waters at our airports. Deats nearly had him but he slipped off.” Tobias swiveled his chair and rose. “He’s pretty banged up. He grabbed hold of the door to the taxi Waters was in and got his right hand badly smashed. His head got a good whack, but X-rays are negative.”
“Thank God he’s alive,” Heston said. “Should I come over?”
“You believe Waters is returning to London?”
“We all think so.”
“You don’t know what we’ve turned up. Jonas Kalem was traced to Milan last Friday.”
“Are you suggesting that Waters may be headed—”
“I’m not suggesting anything straightaway, but it’s just as likely he’s headed for Milan as London.”
The Boston shuttle taxied to a stop and the passengers began filing off the plane. Tony reached the ramp, where he stood to the side and scanned the corridor leading into the terminal. There were no uniforms in sight and he proceeded into the terminal and to the baggage-claim area. He stood to the side until the bags began appearing on the carousel. Eventually his Loewe bag tumbled off the conveyor. In it were the drawings and the revolver. He concluded that there was little chance he could tell if the area was under surveillance or not. He gambled and went to his bag, showed his claim check, then went quickly to the airport motel.
“Superintendent? Mr. Deats? It’s Larry.” The lieutenant stood at the side of the bed. “I’ve got good news. You’re a hundred percent except for a couple of fingers and they’ll be okay. How about that?”
Walter Deats had no sensation in his right hand; a local anesthetic had deadened the nerves. But there was an ache in his back and his head throbbed. His eyes opened but all was a blur. He turned toward the voice.
“Lieutenant, the American version of one hundred percent differs vastly from the British. I’m in exquisite pain and I can barely see you.”
