Cloak of Darkness

by Helen Macinnes

  Renwick walked over to the painting. It had been centred, logically enough, in a column of grey roses. They were shaded, lifelike except in colour. Leaves sprayed out from their stalks, all carefully shaded, too, but darker than the flowers. One leaf seemed almost black, a deep shadow nestling so innocently among the intertwining foliage. That could be it, he thought, and pulled the picture to swing open on its hinges. The gilded frame with its antique curves no longer distracted the eye. The blackened leaf was definitely a hole. He pointed to it, then closed the picture over the safe. He heard Lorna’s gasp. He chose that vulnerable moment to say, casually, “If you’re heading for Europe, you’d better start packing.”

  “Yes, yes.” She rose, distracted. “I never looked up when I opened that safe.”

  “No one does.” One looked at a safe, not above it.

  She reached for the telephone, told the receptionist, “No calls, no visitors. I’m going to see my doctor—a bad migraine. I’ll be back here tomorrow.” She replaced the receiver, opened a drawer, began pulling out its contents, jamming them into her shoulder bag. “You don’t have to wait. I’ll be out of here in ten minutes.” Like her words, her movements were rapid. She brushed past Renwick, pulled the painting wide, and opened the safe. She reached for a neat stack of dollar bills. “What’s delaying you?” Her tone was brusque. She had recovered.

  “Curiosity. I’d have thought you would have made a beeline for Brimmer’s safe. Or,” he added, “have you already taken that little book with its Plus List?”

  “It’s secure. Beyond anyone’s reach.”

  “Risky. What if he had opened his safe and found it missing?”

  “A small black diary is easy to substitute. Two ninety-five in any stationery store.” She closed the safe, then the picture.

  “But inside”—Renwick persisted if only to hear her confirm his guess—“blank pages? A complete giveaway.”

  “Not so blank.” She was much amused.

  “I see. Brilliant. Names and dates and amounts of money— no relation to the real thing, of course.” How long had she been preparing for this escape? The diary—and that was another detail for an estimate of its size—must have taken several weeks of careful imitation.

  “Of course,” she said mockingly, as she added the dollar bills to a zipped pocket in her handbag. “But good enough for any glance inside.” She began filling a briefcase with a few folders from the filing cabinet, selecting them with care.

  Beyond anyone’s reach... So Brimmer’s Plus List was not anywhere in her apartment but some place far from New York where she could collect it without fear of discovery. Some place, also, where she’d find more money: the dollars from the safe would pay her fare to Europe, would keep her for a week or two. On the run, no one risked leaving a trail with traveller’s cheques or a charge card: it was cash, nicely anonymous cash, all the way.

  She closed the briefcase. “For God’s sake, why don’t you leave? You’ve scared me enough for one morning. What’s keeping you?”

  “A last piece of advice. I would avoid Switzerland. Klingfeld & Sons have offices in Geneva.”

  “Thank you for your concern, but Geneva wouldn’t attract me.” She was condescending, quite certain she had defeated him.

  “Zurich could be safer. I hear it is a good banking town, too.” That ended her assurance. “When you see Al Moore, give him a kind word from me.” He will need it, poor guy.

  “I’ll do that. If I see him.” She opened the door. Her voice sharpened. “Do I go first? Or you?”

  “Ladies always first.” He stood aside.

  “Don’t follow me!”

  Renwick shook his head. But others might, he thought.

  Should he warn her: one last word of advice? The windblown-hair boy must have had time to contact a backup—if he had one. “Lorna—”

  But she had left. Handbag strapped over her shoulder, briefcase in hand, pleated skirt swinging above excellent legs, three-inch heels clacking briskly on the tiled floor, she marched along the corridor, didn’t look back.

  Renwick followed slowly, gave her time to take the elevator before he passed the reception desk. He was still troubled by her last phrase about Al Moore. If I see him. Not when; if. Moore had served his purpose, so now...? The money she intended to screw out of the men on Brimmer’s Plus List would go twice as far if she were alone. Money... she had grown accustomed to its taste. There were two curses in life: money and politics. But no one—except the hermit in his cave—could live without them.

  He stepped into a crowded elevator. No one edged near him; no one paid him any attention. He relaxed. But the sooner he emptied the inside pocket of his jacket, the better. For him as well as for those four pieces of paper.

  10

  By the time Renwick reached the lobby, stepped into a whirl of people eddying around the elevators, Lorna Upwood had vanished. Almost half-past eleven, he noted; he would be on time for his noon appointment with Joe Neill—Park Avenue and the Drake Hotel were only three blocks away. It would be a relief to talk with someone who was honest, straightforward, and with no avarice, either. How much did he make—twenty-five thousand a year? Everything was out of whack: Joe was worth more than any rock-and-roll singer or movie star in terms of the future of this country. But who thought much about the future? Me, me, me, only thought about now now now. Renwick shook off the effects of his talk with Lorna Upwood and concentrated on reaching the entrance to this enormous building. The desk and its uniformed guard were just ahead. And there, too, was the supply-room clerk.

  The man was alone, standing apart from the stream of people, watching. He had seen Renwick. He was either a fool or ill-trained: he wasn’t even trying to melt into the background. At this hour the lobby was far from empty, yet this gas-head couldn’t be missed, with his windblown hair and heavy glasses, posted as he was near the desk. Posted? A warning bell sent off its small alarm inside Renwick’s head.

  Quickly, he side-stepped behind two business-men, ignored a friendly wave and a cheerful “Hi, there!” And where was the fellow’s backup, ready to tail Renwick once identification was made? Renwick didn’t wait to see. He turned on his heel, joined three lawyers arguing about torts on their way to the elevators, and broke into a short sprint to reach a closing door before it shut tight. He got out at the second floor, used the fire-exit staircase to lead him all the way down to a vast underground garage.

  He had just managed it, but barely; no one could have had time to follow. This interest in him was to be expected. Inside his securely buttoned jacket there were four documents for which Mr. Klaus of Klingfeld & Sons would willingly murder. The clerk—and not such an idiot, Renwick admitted wryly— had seen him receive them from Lorna Upwood, had heard talk about illegal transactions and Telex messages in code. But the man hadn’t stayed to hear a discussion about Brimmer’s Plus List or Lorna’s admission that she had taken it. Or, thank God, to hear Renwick leading her into the subject of Switzerland.

  Plenty of problems, he thought as he made his way through row after row of cars—must have been hundreds of them parked here: the building was almost a small city in itself—but the immediate problem was a clean exit from this garage. Far ahead he could see a sloping ramp that led up to a wide mouth gaping into a busy street. He headed toward it. Waste no time, he told himself.

  At the foot of the ramp’s slope, a private ambulance was drawn close to a side wall. Door left open, waiting. But no one guarding it. Renwick halted, stepped instinctively behind a blue Chevrolet. A garage attendant had noted him, came forward at a leisurely pace.

  “I was to meet my wife here,” Renwick told him and forestalled any question. “But I don’t see any sign of her—or her car.”

  “What make?”

  “A Chevy. Blue. Like this one.”

  “Plenty of them around.” The attendant was young, his voice not unfriendly. The glum look on his face was probably normal.

  “An accident?” Renwick nodded toward the ambula
nce.

  “Just an emergency in the lobby upstairs. Some guy had a heart attack. They’ll be bringing him out any minute. They’d better. Can’t have them parked here for long.”

  “Why not in the street?” Renwick was sympathetic.

  “Couldn’t find space.” The attendant shrugged. “So what can you do? Turn away an ambulance?” He stared at the ramp where two men came hurrying down from the street. “What— no heart attack? Perhaps the guy’s dead.” He didn’t seem to find it remarkable that the men wore no white coats, carried no stretcher. Or perhaps it had been explained to him and the other attendants, still engrossed in a heated discussion near the ramp: no stretcher required, the driver would take the ambulance to the building’s entrance, the sick man could be helped to walk that short distance from the lobby.

  Now the driver climbed into his seat, the other man about to enter. He paused—heavily built, round-faced, with a genial look and thick dark hair—and gave a friendly wave to the three garage attendants. “False alarm,” he called as they approached him.

  “Wouldn’t you know?” the young man beside Renwick said in disgust, and left to get his share of the tip now being handed out.

  Yet another figure had appeared, waiting at the head of the ramp until the ambulance would stop and pick him up. He no longer wore glasses, but he hadn’t changed his hairstyle or seersucker jacket. Renwick bent to tie his shoelace, straightened up when the ambulance’s motor merged with the traffic outside.

  So the supply-room clerk had a mini-transceiver among his other little gadgets. When had he called for support? As soon as he saw me enter Lorna Upwood’s office at ten o’clock? Or perhaps five minutes later, when he had started listening in. The ambulance was stolen temporarily, no doubt. It wasn’t intended for Lorna Upwood—they must know her apartment in Beekman Terrace, could pick her up any time. So you’re the candidate, he told himself as he walked toward the street level, leaving behind an argument resumed: who was to blame— owners or baseball players?

  He hailed a taxi, directed it to First Avenue and Sixty-third Street. There, he walked three blocks back to Sixtieth Street, making sure Klaus’s long arm was no longer reaching after him. Another cab took him west to Park Avenue. He left it one street away from the Drake. A small evasion, but he had little time for anything more elaborate. He was already ten minutes late for Joe Neill.

  Neill was making his glass of beer last and beginning to worry. Renwick was always punctual. Then he saw him enter and quietly raised a hand to attract Renwick’s attention to his table against the wall. One signal was all it took. Renwick sat down to face him. The room was dark and cool, the tables half empty at this hour. By one o’clock the place would be packed.

  Traffic heavy?” Neill asked, noticing Renwick’s tight face.

  “Complicated.” Renwick ordered an ice-cold beer, suggested a couple of quick chefs salads, and let Neill make light conversation until they were saved.

  Neill had been waiting for that moment, too. He switched to a lower and more serious tone, asked, “What’s the problem, Bob?”

  “How do you get a healthy man into an ambulance—take him from a crowded lobby with few people noticing one goddamn thing?”

  Neill said, “You know the answer to that.” But his interest had been aroused.

  “Yes,” said Renwick, his voice intense even if it was held low. “A needle in his wrist, or a sting at the back of his neck. Sudden collapse, unable to talk, but possibly still able to walk enough—propped up by a friendly medic and a couple of ambulance attendants who just happened to be there.”

  Neill studied Renwick’s face. “You? They tried it on you?” For once, his usual calm deserted him.

  “They planned it. But I managed to keep a couple of steps ahead of them.”

  “Where did this happen? When?”

  “In a highly respectable building in the smart business centre of Manhattan. One hour ago.”

  Neill recovered. “You should stay in London. You always find trouble when you come over here. I’ve never known whether you go looking for it or whether it meets you.”

  “A little of both, perhaps.”

  “How bad is it this time?”

  “Bad enough, and getting worse.”

  “Need some help?” Neill frowned, wondering how much involvement was necessary. He liked Renwick personally, admired him professionally, but there were limits to what could be done. Rules and regulations were rules and regulations.

  “I think,” said Renwick almost inaudibly, “that we both need each other’s help. If you could prevent three Americans from being assassinated and—”

  “What?”

  “No exaggeration. Actually, there’s a fourth on that death list—me, to be exact. But if you help me reach the other three, I’d be grateful.”

  “My God,” said Neill. A forkful of ham and cheese was poised in midair. “Do they live here?”

  Renwick almost smiled. Regulations, regulations... “Houston, Palo Alto, Washington.”

  Neill nodded, went on eating. After a few minutes he said, “There was an ‘if’ in your last sentence. If we can help you, then what?”

  “I can help you. About another matter. Highly sensitive. But immediate.” For the last half hour Renwick had been trying to decide how much he could tell Neill—he couldn’t hand over Brimmer’s illegal accounts until he had made copies of them for Interintell’s files in London. Tell Neill about them today, promise them for tomorrow? Not altogether satisfactory: evidence was best handed over with the facts. Yet, it was a pretty fair deal. He—and Claudel in Djibouti—had done all the groundwork on Exports Consolidated. “It would give you a head start on the others who’ll be crowding into this case. A scoop, Joe, as our newspaper friends say.” He pushed aside his half-eaten salad, looked around for the waiter. “The cheque is mine. Let’s get the hell out. Some place where we can talk.”

  “My office?” Neill asked tentatively and wondered if Renwick would accept.

  But Renwick did. “Not every day I get an escort from the Bureau,” he said as they came out into the blinding light of the street and signalled for a cab.

  He was back to his old form, thought Neill: finding a small joke in everything. In the Drake Room he had been as serious and intent as Neill had ever seen him. The information that Renwick could give must be a blockbuster. Neill’s interest doubled. He noticed Renwick’s glance at his watch as a taxi drew up. “We haven’t far to go.”

  “Good.” It had been a quick lunch. Now, it was only five past one. Renwick could catch Gilmore in London at the end of his working day, alert him to expect a full report coming later tonight. “I have one phone call to make. I’ll keep it brief,” he said as they got into the cab.

  A tactful hint. Neill grinned. “You can do that from my office. I won’t listen. And I wouldn’t understand a word of it anyway.”

  “I hope not.” Renwick gave an answering smile. It broadened as another idea struck him. “By the way, how’s your copying machine working?”

  “It was fine this morning.” Neill’s amusement grew. Taking over my office?”

  “Just want to leave you with three interesting pages. Saves time—yours and mine.”

  As urgent as that? Neill settled back with his own thoughts.

  Renwick fell silent, too, calculating the tight schedule ahead. His visit to Joe Neill’s office wouldn’t take long. The bare facts about Brimmer, complete with hard evidence, were ready to hand over. Also a full description of the supply-room clerk at Exports Consolidated and of his two accomplices. Also a mention of Klingfeld & Sons, whose agents they were. That was definitely FBI business. But details of Klingfeld and Klaus were unnecessary: they were based in Europe. That was Interintell’s affair. So was Lorna Upwood’s possession of Brimmer’s Plus List, now in a safe-deposit box somewhere in Switzerland. And after his discussion with Neill about the best approach to the other three American names on that death list—what then? Some concentrated work on his report for
London, every scrap of today’s information made crisp and clear and then encoded for transmission this evening. He would send it out by six o’clock, six thirty at latest.

  And after that? Nina... Her safety, now with Klingfeld’s agents in New York, was the biggest problem of all. If they couldn’t get him, they would make a try to kidnap Nina; a hostage to hold and use as blackmail, force him to— He cut off those thoughts. Keep her safe, he told himself, keep her safe.

  ***

  “Let’s skip that movie tonight,” Renwick said as they ended dinner at the little Italian restaurant not far from the house on Sixty-first Street. “Do you mind, Nina? I’m not much in a mood for it.”

  “I didn’t think you’d be.” She looked at him worriedly. He had been working in the top-floor study when she came back from shopping this afternoon, stayed there until after seven o’clock, and since then she had been making most of the conversation. He had listened, yes. Even joked with her over her first day’s adventures in New York. But he had brought some problem to dinner with him—unusual. And instead of lessening, it had increased. Something I’ve done? she wondered, and her own anxiety grew.

  Suddenly, watching her, he seemed to make up his mind. “Back to the house, darling. We’ll put our feet up and talk. And tomorrow we pack.”

  That really startled her. She said nothing, only nodded. But, she thought in dismay, I was just beginning to settle down in New York. There’s so much to see, and I’ll never see it now. And as they left the restaurant, she glanced around the busy avenue—noisy, bustling, filled with a mixture of faces and clothes, everyone out for another evening of fun and pleasure— and repressed a sigh.

  ***

  On the hall table there was a note, written in a large scrawl, waiting for Renwick. “Chet Danford,” he told Nina, who was already half-way up the staircase on her way to the living-room. “He phoned us at eight fifteen. Will call back later.” Renwick frowned, wondering. At eight fifteen, Danford must be phoning from somewhere outside his office. Then Renwick told himself, you’re too much on edge: yesterday you wouldn’t have sensed anything wrong about the placing of that call, felt any emergency. There probably wasn’t.