by Brad Latham
Lockwood threw his hands up. “I give up. I should pay more attention to world politics. Maybe you can give me pointers.”
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I don’t want to spoil the evening. There aren’t many men out here for me to go out with to ruin a perfectly good evening with you.”
“It’s okay, really.”
“I went to the Sorbonne in Paris for my Ph.D.,” she said. “I love Europe. I can’t stand what its leaders are getting the whole continent into. This Hitler!” She shivered as if a glass of ice water had been dumped down her back.
Lockwood nodded sympathetically. For a few minutes they ate silently, and gradually peace fell between them. He asked her to dance again, and they turned gaily across the floor in a foxtrot for almost a dozen numbers. Again they drew amused and admiring looks from the small crowd.
For the rest of the evening they engaged in small talk, getting reacquainted all over again. The night was damp and cold when they drove back in the silver Cord, and Lockwood turned the heater up full blast so they could leave the top down. Both found the drive back—the cold, damp night air rushing inches over their bare heads, the brilliance of the stars, the cheery warmth the powerful heater threw off—intoxicating, and by the time he pulled up in front of her house, she was leaning against his shoulder, her head resting comfortably there as she spun the Motorola’s dial from station to station.
Neither moved.
“You going to forgive me my passion for politics?” she asked.
She glanced up toward him. He knew what she was really asking—Are we going out again, or was I too much of a pain in the neck tonight?
He said, “I’m not a Babbitt. That stung. I have things I care about, and I wouldn’t call you names because you weren’t hot for them.”
“I’m sorry. I should watch my temper.” She sighed. “It’s that my mother’s Irish.”
Myra turned her head up and kissed him gently on the lips. He knew from the coolness of the kiss it was no-go tonight, and he felt something inside himself droop in disappointment.
“How’d you like to come over for a home-cooked meal tomorrow night?” she asked. “Won’t be lobster Thermidor—I’m a working girl—but I’ll try to give you a good enough meal to make up for calling you names.”
The wide grin that sprang to his face told the whole story. “Sounds wonderful. I’ll bring the wine.”
“A red.”
“A red,” he agreed, and he leaned down and gave her a kiss that was no warmer than the friendly kiss she’d given him. He thought he was getting her number. Tonight they were friends, but tomorrow night, in the privacy of her house, perhaps he would find that she could express her passion in more than just politics.
She slid across the seat, murmured a goodnight, and disappeared into her house.
Chapter 6
Lockwood spent an hour of the following morning on the phone with Mr. Gray,’ who assigned Steven McPherson, another claims investigator, to handle the office end of the investigation. He felt good about having Steve on his side. Steve knew all the ropes. Lockwood got him to run checks on Dzeloski, Stanley Greer, and Myra Rodman, as well as half a dozen other men who worked in Area C as engineers and mechanics on the project.
“I particularly want to know if any of them have foreign connections. Miss Rodman was in Europe several years getting her doctorate. See if she belonged to any political outfits.”
“Right, Bill.”
“Mr. Gray says he has connections and favors owed to us from maybe a dozen insurance companies in Europe. Run all these names through them.”
“You got it. Cable them?”
“Have to. Speed’s important. These thieves were smooth as silk—not a trace of them out here.”
“An inside scam, huh?”
“Sure feels that way. Look, Steve, don’t send me anything. I’ll call you every day or so, or I’ll call Mr. Gary if you’re out. I can’t trust anybody here.”
As soon as Lockwood arrived at the gate of Northstar, the marine asked him to come directly to Dzeloski’s office.
He interrupted a meeting that looked to have been in progress for some time between Guy Manners, Josef Dzeloski, and a tall, raw-boned Englishman introduced as Nigel Heather-ton, “A lieutenant commander of the RAF, and our liason with the British government.”
“I quite fail to understand why your company hasn’t issued a check for the $75,000, Mr. Lockwood,” Heatherton opened. “Apparently Dr. Dzeloski here cannot get more funds from his congressional committee till he delivers a working model, which is what was stolen the other night and which your company insured against theft.”
Lockwood formed an instant dislike of the aloof, arrogant Heatherton, but he hid his feelings. He knew he needed diplomacy if he was to avoid having a suit slapped against Transatlantic. It was the same story as usual in large claims, just that the stakes were higher.
“Why don’t we all sit down and talk about it?” Lockwood asked mildly. “I don’t see why this English gent is here,” he said to Manners and Dzeloski.
Josef answered, “Work on this project started in Britain four years ago. When the two governments discovered they had several projects in common, it was thought better to pool efforts and share discoveries. We got the bombsight, and they got—another project. Nigel here visits us every other week to see how it’s going, and sends progress reports back to Downing Street.”
“I see,” Lockwood said in a slow, pensive voice. “Is it possible, Mr. Heatherton, that a leak has sprung along the route your reports take?”
“I beg your pardon,” said Heatherton in a voice so arrogant and rude that Lockwood had to restrain an impulse to smash him one. No wonder we had broken away from England.
“Look, Heatherton, I’m not saying you’re leaking secrets. I’m asking if it’s possible your system’s sprung a leak.”
In a tone that declared this part of the conversation was finished, Heatherton said, “Perhaps I shall make inquiries, Mr. Lockwood. And when shall I tell His Majesty’s government your company will deliver the $75,000 that will enable Dr. Dzeloski here to rebuild the new prototype?”
“When I finish my investigation,” Lockwood answered.
Heatherton sighed a gust of impatience. “Just when might this be, Mr. Lockwood?”
With such a snotty tone, Lockwood wondered how the arrogant Englishman ever got cooperation from any human being. He forced himself to answer civilly.
“Certainly not for another few days. Very likely not for a week or two.”
Heatherton’s face gathered the hurt and pain he might feel if he was forced to kick a dog peeing on his pants leg.
“I’m afraid, Guy and Josef, that I shall have to take this up with the ambassador, who—I am sure—will want to speak to Mr. Roosevelt himself. Most of us of His Majesty’s government are certain that the time we have to prepare for an aerial war is limited, and that the Northstar bombsight is essential if we are to put our meager supply of bombs precisely where we most need to place them.”
“I know your hands are tied, Lockwood,” Dzeloski said. He smiled in a friendly fashion. “It won’t bother you if I talk to Mr. Gordon himself, would it?”
“Talk to anybody you want,” Lockwood answered. “It’s his company, and if he wants to pay you, he’s welcome to by me. My job is to make sure there was a theft, to ascertain the value of what was taken, to find out if the beneficiary had a hand in the crime, and to write a report. It’s from that report that my boss, Mr. Gray, makes his recommendation to pay or not. On a claim this size, probably Mr. Gray’ll want Mr. Gordon to review his decision, no matter what it is.”
“Gordon’s the one to speak to, Josef,” Heatherton said, dismissing Lockwood with a sniff and weak wave of his hand. “Obviously Mr. Lockwood’s authority is severely limited.”
Obviously you’re a jerk, Lockwood told himself, but remembering what he was out here for, decided to bury his anger and learn more about Heatherton’s reports and their ro
ute back to England.
“Could I interest you in some lunch, Mr. Heatherton?” Lockwood asked. “Maybe I could cover a few holes in my investigation that would speed up Transatlantic’s issuance of a check.”
Heatherton took the bait. Half an hour later the two of them ordered lunch from the gum-chewing waitress at the Eagle Bar in downtown Patchogue. Besides the bartender, the only other customers in the place were a couple of old-timers at the end of the bar. The Eagle felt tired and settled, as if it, like the old-timers, was satisfied with a slow and easy pace.
Heatherton took a sip of his beer and shuddered. “God, I don’t see how you fellows drink this stuff.”
Lockwood frowned. “What’s the matter with it?”
“Too cold, too much fizzy water in it.” •
Lockwood laughed. Something in him relaxed a little; there was something small about Heatherton, something petty that needn’t excite him. “I’ve heard English beer is flat and warm.”
“What is it you need from me, Mr. Lockwood?” Heatherton asked, clearly wanting to speed his business with Lockwood.
“Look, I’m no more crazy about you than you are about me,” Lockwood said. “I’ve got a job to do. It looks to me, and I’m sure it looks to you, as if whoever lifted this 500-pound hunk of machinery knew precisely what he was doing. I want to find out how that person knew so much about this place, and who inside cooperated with the thief.”
Heatherton seemed to muse over this last statement. “One of the employees could be the thief—could be a traitor.”
“Yeah.”
“And I could be that traitor.”
“I didn’t say that. But maybe your secretary is sloppy with her carbons, or whoever carries the pouch back to England is careless. I don’t know—it’s my job, and Manners’ job, to find out what happened.”
“There’s not much to tell,” Heatherton said. He looked as if he was cooperating, but only under duress. “I arrive here from Washington every second Wednesday, spend the afternoon at Northstar, make notes on what progress and problems Stanley Greer and Myra Rodman have to report, go back to Washington, dictate the report to Miss Pigman, who types it up, and I sign it.”
“And Miss Pigman?”
“Been with the embassy staff for fifteen devoted years, Lockwood.”
“Carbons?”
“Sir?”
“How many carbons does she make?”
Heatherton smiled. “I’m beginning to admire your thoroughness, Lockwood.”
Lockwood gave him a slight smile and nodded. Why did Heatherton work so hard at being disagreeable? He waited for the answer.
“Just one,” Heatherton said finally.
“And the carbon paper?”
“What?”
“Is it possible that she uses fresh carbon paper sometime, and that it finds its way out of the office? The report would be on it clearly.”
“Not Miss Pigman, I’m afraid. She’s penny-thrifty, our Miss Pigman. I don’t think she’s bought new carbon paper in ten years.”
“Do you keep the carbon copies yourself?”
“Yes. I correct them, if necessary, with pen. I seal one in an envelope and deliver it to the ambassador himself, who himself seals it in the Downing Street pouch. The other I seal and put in my lockbox in the embassy safe.”
“How about checking to make sure all your reports are still there?”
“I check them every time I put one in,” the Englishman said. “And before coming today. I’ve been in this business rather a great deal longer than you.”
Lockwood grinned, beginning to like something about the snotty Englishman in spite of his rude manners. For all his aristocratic airs, Heatherton was a professional at his trade.
“How about another frigid beer, Sir Nigel?” Lockwood asked. He hoped to warm up the relationship between them; Heatherton had the sort of mind that might see who had done what at Northstar.
At that moment the waitress brought their lunch.
“Listen, young lady, this is not what I ordered,” Heatherton said in his snottiest voice.
The stringy-haired woman stopped chewing her gum to stare at the strange creature who had addressed her as if she were a peasant on his estate.
“What’s wrong with it—bub?” she asked.
“I ordered this steak rare, and it’s not what the menu said—thick T-bone. This steak’s no thicker than this plate, and it’s burned all the way through.”
The woman gave her gum a couple of clacks while she thought this through. She looked at Lockwood as if to discover if the nut’s keeper planned to restrain him, saving her the effort. Lockwood smiled, gave a light shrug, picked up his knife and fork, and cut into his steak, well satisfied with what she had brought him.
“Look, that’s what we serve, mister,” she said. “I heard you complain about the beer, and I know there’s nothing wrong with it. I seen a million guys eat that steak, and me and Joe don’t get no complaints. I don’t think you like much of anything. You don’t like it, you don’t eat it.”
“Take it back,” Heatherton said. “Cook me one rare, the way I originally ordered it.”
“What do you mean, rare?” she asked, perplexed. “It’s cold that way. Don’t you want it cooked?”
“I’m not hungry. Take it back. I’ll eat elsewhere.”
She frowned and shot a look at the bartender, a look Lockwood interpreted to mean that she was having more trouble than she could handle. Lockwood ate quickly, having a hunch that what he didn’t eat quickly, he might not eat at all.
The bartender—a tall man with a barrel chest and a still larger paunch—loomed over their table.
“Some problem, Patty?” he asked. He put his thick hands on his hips.
“This bozo don’t like the way Marty fried the steak,” she said. “He wants me to take it back, wants another one.”
The bartender looked down at the steak for a few seconds, long enough for Lockwood to get in a couple of bites of steak and one of mashed potato.
“Looks all right to me. What’s wrong with it, mister?” he asked Heatherton.
“Could we not discuss it?” Heatherton asked in a voice that had gone from disdain to something like a high squeal. “I can’t eat this—shoe sole.”
“You ordered it, ace,” the bartender said. “I can’t sell it to nobody else now. We sell lots and lots of them. I take it you’re going to pay for it?”
“I bloody well am not going to pay for something that’s inedible,” Heatherton protested.
The bartender looked at Lockwood to see how formidable an ally Heatherton had. Lockwood gave him the same smile and shrug he had given Patty earlier, as if to say Heatherton was all the bartender’s problem.
“You don’t pay for it, bub, you stay here till the cops come,” the bartender said. His girth seemed to expand. “You foreigners think you can get away with murder, and you got another think coming.”
Heatherton stood up. “I’ll pay for this cold piss you call beer, but I’m damn sure not going to pay for this inedible steak.”
“Patty, call the cops,” the bartender ordered.
As Patty scurried toward the bar, Lockwood slowed down his chewing. If this were dragged out till the cops got here, then he should have enough time to eat in peace.
The bartender and Heatherton glared at each other, neither daring to push any farther. Lockwood heard Patty talking to someone on the phone called Mack, and gathered that she and Joe the bartender were great buddies with the local police.
Lockwood, in a highly conspicuous gesture, took out his wallet and laid two one-dollar bills on the table.
“Great lunch, Joe,” he said mildly and he stood up and sauntered over to a barstool, on which he perched and picked his teeth and waited. At the other end of the bar, Lockwood saw that the two old guys in dirty cardigans had swiveled around to watch. This incident would give the Eagle Bar enough conversation to fill up many a dreary week to come.
Just as Lockwood started in
on his second toothpick, Heatherton broke the impasse by declaring, “Oh, all right, I’ll pay for the bloody—the non-bloody—thing.”
He opened his wallet, pulled out a couple of bills, and flung them to the table. One hit, and the other drifted to the floor.
“Pick it up and put it on the table,” Joe said.
“I’m leaving,” Heatherton answered. “You’ve got your money.”
“Nobody throws what he owes me at my feet,” Joe said. He moved to cut off Heatherton’s advance to the front door.
“Heatherton, you’re a fool,” Lockwood said lazily. “If you’ve got any sense, put the bill on the table and let’s go.”
Through the window they saw the black and white Dodge with the aerial pull up in front. A couple of gangly uniformed cops, hoisting their guns as they moved, got out each side of the car.
Heatherton mashed his lips together in a fury held in. He stooped and picked up the bill and slapped it on the table and stalked out the door. Lockwood followed him with an easy gait, turning as he left to give a lazy wave to Patty and Joe, who glowered at Heatherton’s back.
“Thanks, guys,” Lockwood said. “You did a terrific job.”
He found Heatherton sitting in the passenger seat of his Cord. The Englishman stared straight ahead. Wordless, Lockwood got in, started the car, and drove back to Northstar. And that was the way they rode back to the plant—without a word spoken between them.
Lockwood debated whether to push Heatherton for more information, but decided that he had all he was likely to get for now.
There was something funny about Heatherton, but Lockwood just couldn’t put his finger on it. Surely the Englishman had been in America long enough to know how to get along here. Had the incident at the Eagle Bar been a diversion to keep Lockwood from following the line of questioning he had been on?
By the end of that second day. none of the investigators, including Lockwood, had learned anything, and they had begun to trip over each other’s feet.
By mid-afternoon Area C had been turned back over to Greer and his engineers, who spent the last few hours of the day putting their tools and instruments back in the spots they considered correct. Manners, the T-man, snapped at each man who came in to report the same thing—nothing. By now police and highway patrol in half the United States had an all points bulletin for the Northstar Refrigeration panel truck that had carried the bombsight out of the premises, but it seemed to have vanished after it left the front gate. Every dock on the North and South Shore from Manhattan to Montauk had been gone over foot by foot by Treasury agents or the Coast Guard. Every employee who had been in Area C at any time during the past six months had been questioned, and no one seemed to know anything that helped. Lockwood spent the afternoon with the three agents whom Manners had assigned to start at the bottom of the plant and work their way to the roof to make sure that the bombsight had not been secreted in the building. By 5:00, Lockwood was prepared to swear that the thing was not on the premises.
