The Manx Murders

by William L. DeAndrea

  “We’re twins, Chief. We grew from the same cell. He’s a part of me. I’d know if he weren’t alive.”

  “Mystical nonsense,” Benedetti objected amiably. “The operational question is more to the point. Do you, Mr. Pembroke, care to take the chance that the kidnappers don’t have your brother, and ignore this note?”

  “Of course not. What do you take me for, Benedetti?”

  The old man shrugged. “Some things need to be put on the record, that’s all. I meant no offense.”

  “I’ll pay. Don’t you interfere, Viretsky. I mean to pay this money and get my brother back, and God help you if you try to stop me.” The way he was leaning forward, head thrust out and small fists clenched, made it look as though he wouldn’t mind working off some of his pent-up anxiety on the person of the chief.

  “Wouldn’t dream of it, Mr. Pembroke,” Viretsky said. Ron could detect no trace of sarcasm. “Getting the victim back safe is always the top priority.”

  “What are the instructions?” Benedetti asked. “Where is the money to be left?”

  “Doesn’t say. It’s one of those goddam paper-chase deals. They want Henry Pembroke, or his representative, to drive east on Dropham Road—that’s the one that parallels the front of the estate here—and he’ll be signaled what to do next.”

  Henry Pembroke looked suddenly old. Ron thought he could see purplish lines in the man’s face now, he’d turned so pale. “I ... I don’t see too well at night, now. What if I miss something?”

  “You won’t miss anything, Dad,” Chip told him. “I’ll be with you.”

  “Uh-uh,” Viretsky said. “Too risky. Look what it says here: more than one person in the car; any sign of cops; any sign of a gun; any sign anyone is following you—Clyde Pembroke dies instantly.”

  “Oh, my God,” the victim’s brother moaned.

  “I’ll go alone, then,” Chip said. His voice had wavered on the o of alone. He tried again. “I’ll go alone. I’ll deliver the money.”

  “No,” Ron said. “I’ll do it.”

  Benedetti shook his head. “A brave suggestion, amico, but not an intelligent one. You cannot go.”

  “Why not?”

  “Think.”

  Ron thought about it, saw what the Professor was driving at, and felt like an idiot.

  “I’m sorry, Maestro.”

  “You have still to learn not to let your impulse toward heroism get in your way.”

  Viretsky furrowed his brow “Why the hell can’t he go?”

  “Because Ronald has no idea of what instructions are to be given. If he receives a message that says to go to the abandoned cottage above the old reservoir, or some other esoteric local landmark, how is he to know where the reservoir is? He needed your directions to find this place, if you’ll recall. Ronald has excellent qualities, but he cannot become an expert on local geography in less than a day.”

  Viretsky tried to work his way out of sending Chip. Ron knew he was worried about losing a second Pembroke in search of the first, and Ron didn’t blame him. It was something he’d been thinking about, too.

  But what could be done? Send one of Viretsky’s men? Any sign of a cop, Clyde dies instantly. And this was obviously a snatcher, or group of snatchers, with a lot of local expertise. They might know the cops by sight. They may or may not have been able to recognize the new-look Viretsky, but the chief couldn’t take that chance and he knew it. They didn’t dare put Ron in the car with an expert on local geography because the kidnappers, who seemed to be on top of things, specifically forbade more than one person in the car.

  “How about a radio link?” Chip suggested. Then his face fell. “Nah,” he began.

  Viretsky looked sour. “Yeah. They might give him time limits to get from point to point. If he’s got to radio back the directions he gets, and wait for an answer, he’ll blow it.”

  “I’ll go,” Chip said.

  “Furthermore,” Ron added, “they could easily intercept a radio transmission.”

  “I said, I’ll go.”

  Ron figured Chip, like anybody in this situation, was holding on to his courage by his fingernails. He didn’t need people trying to convince him to drop it. “Wait a minute,” he said. “A cellular phone. It would be hard for them to tap that.”

  “It is possible, however, amico. Remember the embarrassment to the House of Windsor,” Benedetti said.

  “Yeah. The Princess of Wales thing. But the guy who intercepted that phone call had special equipment.”

  “As might the kidnappers.”

  “Besides,” Chip said, “you’re famous. Sort of. Anyway, your picture has been in the paper with Professor Benedetti’s as a famous crime fighter. They might recognize you, too, and get scared. When they see me, they know they have nothing to worry about.”

  “It’ll be dangerous,” Viretsky said.

  “I think I know that,” Chip said. He swallowed.

  “You must take some precautions,” Benedetti told him softly. “I have a few ideas.”

  Twelve

  THE SIGN SAID HARVILLE, EXIT ONLY, 1 MILE.

  Janet said, “Where was Sandy during all this?”

  Ron took his eyes off the road for a second to look at her. Janet wished he wouldn’t do that.

  “Sandy? The receptionist? I tell you a tale of missing birds and brutalized cats and kidnapping and courage, and you want to know about a bubbleheaded and blabbermouthed receptionist with a yen for the telephone?”

  “I’ve got other questions,” Janet said primly. There was a time when an outburst like that from Ron would have upset her for a week, but she’d learned about his sense of humor—and the tense times, the times during which he was most likely to indulge it. “I just like people to be accounted for,” she said. “For that matter, what about Mr. Jackson?”

  “He was attending to his duties. That guy has more duties than an army platoon. Sandy was upstairs more or less locked into a guest room with the telephone removed. Whenever she complained, Chip kept reminding her that she had never punched out from Chip’s Creamery, and was currently earning time and a half, soon to be double time, for lying around on a bed reading magazines. She said she wanted to talk to him about a bill from Northeast Flavors and Fragrances that she couldn’t understand, but he told her it could wait. Probably forever.”

  “What were the precautions the Professor was talking about?”

  “Ah, wouldn’t you like to know?”

  “Yes, I would.”

  “Well, me too. Seems the Professor is getting coy on us, saving the precautions until just before departure time.”

  “Which is?”

  “Nine o’clock sharp. However this turns out, we probably won’t have to stay up too late. Have I told you that I love you and I missed you, and I don’t want to spend four nights in a row away from you anymore?”

  Janet smiled inwardly. Take that, Flo Ackerman. “Not for the last ten minutes or so.”

  “I love you,” Ron said, “and I missed you, and I don’t want to spend four nights in a row away from you anymore. Also, I wish I was doing the goddam errand tonight.”

  “I don’t,” Janet said.

  “That’s all well and good, but I’ve got a hell of a lot better chance to make something worthwhile out of this than Chip does. Although he did show some guts, today. The thing is, he hasn’t—I’m glad you’re here.”

  “You said that.”

  “I mean it professionally, this time. We could use some psychological expertise.”

  “I’m at your service, darling. Professionally and otherwise.”

  Ron’s grin lasted only a second. “Keep a close eye on these people. I haven’t had a chance to talk to the Professor yet, but I got an itchy feeling about this.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The kidnappers are almost too smart. God knows they’re too goddam confident for me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The ransom instructions. They were delivered to the fac
tory, remember? Viretsky ran it down. It was a legitimate Federal Express delivery. It had been picked up from a Federal Express drop box at a mall outside Scranton at five-thirty Friday afternoon—yesterday.

  “So at five-thirty yesterday afternoon, Benedetti, Flo Ackerman—and where the Professor got this stupid idea I’m interested in her is beyond me—”

  “Shhh,” Janet said. “He never said you were interested in her, he said she was interested in you. She’d have to be crazy not to be. Go on.”

  “At five-thirty yesterday afternoon, we were beating our way through silent and odd-smelling woods. The dead cat had yet to be found. The brothers hadn’t confronted each other over it yet. I hadn’t had my bright idea about beefing up security. Clyde hadn’t gotten in his car to head home.”

  Janet nodded. “I see where this is going.”

  “Yeah. The kidnappers are so sure of themselves, they arranged for the delivery of detailed ransom instructions before the snatch ever took place.”

  Thirteen

  FLO ACKERMAN WAS BACK, and she was angry.

  “Why wasn’t I told about this?” she demanded.

  “Because it didn’t have anything to do with you,” Chief Viretsky told her. “And because I didn’t want this news spread all over Washington, D.C., while there’s still a chance of getting the victim back.”

  “I can keep a secret as well as anybody!”

  “Sure you can,” Viretsky said. “Everybody in D.C. can, when they feel like it. Unfortunately, they’ve usually got some reporter they’d rather keep buttered up instead, so they don’t.”

  “You—”

  Viretsky showed her a hand, like a traffic cop. “If you happen to be among the one-tenth of one percent who don’t go running off to the press when they think they can get an edge from it, then I apologize. If.”

  “And it does too have to do with me,” Flo insisted. “I’ve worked for months to bring the two together, to get that device into production. This could ruin everything.”

  Benedetti said, “Excuse me, Miss Ackerman, but could it also not save everything?”

  Flo said, “What?”

  “From your point of view I speak only hypothetically, but please, be, as Huxley advised, humble before the facts.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Peccato. I will try to be clearer. The problem, from your point of view, is that the brothers are estranged, and that Henry was blocking the project out of pure animosity toward Clyde. You were unable to budge them from that position. Now observe. Clyde is missing, and Henry is visibly distraught, even now drawing one million dollars, buon’Iddio, from the bank to pay ransom.

  “If Clyde is returned safely, surely his ordeal and the generosity of his brother will bring them back together in this project that will profit them greatly, and be of great benefit for the human race.”

  Viretsky touched his face with his right hand. He did it twice, trying to adjust the glasses and smooth the mustache he no longer had.

  “Professor,” he demanded, “are you trying to say that she had something to do with this?”

  “All I am trying to do,” Benedetti said, “is to imagine. That is the whole of what I can bring to these endeavors—imagination and humility. I imagine, and check the fruits of my fantasy against the known facts, then imagine again, always—humbly—ready for correction or additional knowledge. Until I have imagined a story confirmed by real observations and events.”

  “But—” the chief began.

  “I am only in my first imaginings, Chief.

  “Still, it may be instructive for me to continue. Look again. What happens if Clyde Pembroke does not return safely? Then Henry becomes the sole authority on what is to happen at the plant. Would he not see the continuance of the project as a tribute to his brother? Would it not be simpler to deal with one brother instead of two?”

  Flo looked at the two men. The chief’s face was coolly appraising; Benedetti’s wore a catlike smile that gave away nothing. Were these two going to charge her with a kidnapping she knew next to nothing about? They seemed ready to charge her with a murder that, for all anybody knew, hadn’t happened and might never happen.

  This was not the way she’d planned things when she picked up the phone early that afternoon, just to check how Gentry’s little security meeting had gone. She’d gotten an obviously frightened Jackson telling her everything was just fine, couldn’t be better, you bet.

  And she started to worry. A lot of her future career was tied up in this. She tried the call again. This time, Jackson, who was obviously getting cues from someone else, kept telling her, no, ma’am, Mr. Henry Pembroke couldn’t come to the phone, and, no, ma’am, everything was just fine, and he was ever so sorry but he had to clear the line for a very important call, and, yes, ma’am, he’d tell Mr. Henry Pembroke she’d called.

  And he’d hung up on her.

  That was the weirdest thing of all. She’d been dealing with Jackson for some time now, and he had to be a contender for the title of Politest Living Human. There was nothing subservient about it—the man was just genuinely nice. For him to hang up the phone without saying goodbye was as good as a scream from someone else. Something was wrong, and they were keeping the news from her.

  What the hell. She’d planned to go back to Harville tomorrow, anyway. She canceled her date (a producer with ABC news—if Flo had anything to do with it, Chief Viretsky would never know how close he’d come), hopped in her car, and drove north and west.

  Well, she’d found out what was wrong. She just hoped they weren’t trying to frame her for it.

  “I ... I think I’d better call my lawyer,” she now told the chief.

  Viretsky looked surprised. “Do you know a Pennsylvania lawyer? You need to make a statement or something?”

  “Chief,” Benedetti interjected, “I believe I have frightened her. I am so sorry, Miss Ackerman. I was only trying to show you why the chief is right to be cautious. Not only with you, but with all of us.”

  “Including you,” Viretsky told the Professor.

  “Of course, you must include me. I have no apparent motive; indeed, I should enjoy breathing clean air as much as Miss Ackerman would enjoy providing me with it. But motives can be hidden. So inquire, by all means.”

  He turned to Flo. “At that, Miss Ackerman, Niccolo Benedetti is not so blind as to see the inconsistency of his own imaginings. For if you were indeed sufficiently calculating to plan the kidnapping or murder of one of the Pembroke brothers to make a million dollars or to speed your career, or both, you would also be able to calculate that Henry Pembroke would have been an infinitely better target.”

  “Why—” Flo’s voice seemed rusty. She cleared her throat and tried again. “Why do you say that?”

  “Because if you—or your confederate ... That is why no one will avoid suspicion in this case—alibis mean nothing. One can buy a good amount of conscience-free help with the promise of considerably less than a million dollars. Where was I? Oh, yes. If you or a confederate of yours wound up killing a kidnapped Henry Pembroke through design or inadvertence, the survivor would be Clyde, who already desires to produce the smoke scrubber.”

  “I still think maybe I need a lawyer.”

  Chief Viretsky got impatient. “No, you don’t. Not only are you not an active suspect, you aren’t even being questioned. The Professor’s questions were all ... what do you call it?”

  “Rhetorical.”

  “Yeah, rhetorical. He didn’t even wait for answers. You’re here now; you drove a couple hundred miles and barged in. You’re welcome to stay until we work this out. Whether you have the run of the place—within reason—or wind up locked in one of the extra rooms is totally up to you, Miss Ackerman. Okay?”

  “That’s not much of a choice, Chief.”

  “It’s the only one I got. No. You could also be brought to the station. I can hold you for forty-eight hours. This thing should be over for better or worse by tonigh
t. Plenty of time for me.”

  Flo looked at him. She had met the chief briefly a time or two during her numerous stays in Harville, and she’d thought him a typical small-town geek. With the grease out of his hair, and the glasses and the mustache gone, he’d be presentable anywhere. But why she thought a change in appearance would bring a change in small-town, power-drunk attitudes, she didn’t know.

  So she was stuck. Be a good girl, or spend the night in jail. She’d be good. Flo didn’t want to admit it, even to herself, but she’d be glad to efface herself for a while. Benedetti had scared the hell out of her.

  Gravel crunched on the driveway.

  “They’re back,” the chief said. “Here’s your chance to see a million dollars in one lump, Miss Ackerman. Unless, of course, you’ve ever been to lunch with a congressman and a lobbyist.” He smiled as he said it, though, and headed for the door.

  Flo tried to think of anything else to do besides follow him. She couldn’t. Before she could get started, though, Professor Benedetti laid a hand on her arm.

  “Miss Ackerman,” he said. “It wouldn’t be prudent to allow your imagination to run free, as I did mine, in the presence of the Pembrokes. There is no need to mention any possibility of failure in tonight’s exchange of prisoner and ransom, eh?”

  She looked at him. “Professor, have I angered you in some way? I’m not in the habit of gratuitously hurting people.”

  “No? Well, I have been known to do it, despite my best intentions. Please forgive me if I hurt your feelings.”

  “You got me pretty upset,” she began. But, she realized, she didn’t want to fight Benedetti. She didn’t even know what kind of ammunition would affect him. She told him it was all forgotten, and moved toward the hallway.

  The chief was just opening the door, but it wasn’t the Pembrokes, father and son. It was Ron Gentry and his wife, Janet.

  Flo needed this like a hole in the head.

  “Oh,” Viretsky said as he opened the door. “It’s you.”

  Janet tried to imagine how the chief had looked “greased up,” as Ron put it. She supposed she could, but she couldn’t imagine why she’d want to. His voice and body language said here was a self-confident man having the confidence tested, and doing his best not to show the strain.