Matt Helm--The Interlopers

by Donald Hamilton

  “Come on, let’s get out of here,” I said. “I’ve seen a boat leave a dock, haven’t you?”

  I led her away, with my arm around her waist. Corduroy isn’t my favorite material by a long shot—I’m an oldfashioned silk-satin-and-lace man at heart—but somehow she managed to make me very much aware of the woman under the ribbed, velvety cloth.

  “Have you got a stateroom?” I asked.

  “Yes, why?”

  “Because you owe me three nights of bliss, sweetheart.”

  I felt her hesitate, and keep on walking. “That many? You’ve been a busy little man.”

  “Somebody else said that. Is it supposed to be funny?”

  “Did you get the girl?”

  “I had her,” I said, “but I let her go.”

  This time, Libby stopped abruptly and swung to face me. We were on the other side of the ship now, away from the shore, and we had it pretty much to ourselves.

  “You let her go!” Libby’s voice was incredulous. “But why?”

  “Maybe I just didn’t want to seem greedy.” I said. “Or maybe I figured that after three wonderful nights together we’d probably be getting on each other’s nerves anyway.”

  She said stiffly, “I don’t think that’s very amusing!”

  I went on, “Or maybe I just figured I’d left enough dead people around for the cooperative authorities of a friendly foreign nation to dispose of. In that, I seem to have been right. The Canadians aren’t a bit happy with me, I’m told, and neither are the boyscouts I’m supposed to be working with, or for.”

  Libby was studying my face carefully. “Of course, the fact that the child is fairly good looking had nothing to do with your decision.”

  “Child, hell,” I said. “She could wring you out and hang you up to dry.”

  “I didn’t say she wasn’t a tall child, or a strong child, or a smart one. A very smart one, apparently.”

  “Sure,” I said. “But say she twisted me around her little pink finger and made a fool of me, so what? Are you going back on your bargain, Libby? Or changing the rules of the game after the starting whistle? The original deal, as I understood it, was that any dead body would count for points, as long as it had, alive, had something to do with the outfit that murdered your backward lover. Well, these were all members of the same gang, there’s no doubt about it. But now you’re acting as if I had to produce one particular female cadaver to qualify—”

  “Don’t!”

  “Don’t what?” I asked innocently.

  “I… I didn’t realize…” She stopped and her throat worked. “Anyway, don’t talk about it like that. So… so cold-blooded!”

  I had been pushing hard for a reaction. Now that I’d got it, I had to decide whether it was genuine or phony. I made a sound of disgust.

  “I might have expected it!” I said bitterly. “I’ve never yet known a woman to arrange for a killing that she didn’t get squeamish when the job was done and the payoff was due. Very damn convenient, I must say!”

  “Oh, stop it!” she snapped. “I’m not backing out of any deals. I just don’t want to talk about… about the gory details, or hear you talk about them, that’s all!”

  We faced each other for a moment longer, and I still had no clear sign to tell me whether or not she was really the rich bitch on a vengeance kick she’d claimed to be, now a little subdued by the actual fact of homicide. I had to admit to myself, however, that I wasn’t quite as sure she was faking as I’d been when I talked with Mac two days before.

  Abruptly, Libby shrugged, dismissing the subject. “If you know the coordinates of the dining room on this bucket and are willing to guide me there, I’ll let you buy me some breakfast. I thought we’d be under way hours ago, so I came down to the dock without anything to eat. Now I’m starving.”

  “Sure.”

  As we went inside, the big ferry began backing out of its slip; by the time we’d settled at a table in the dining room, it was moving forward and the spruce-clad shores were slipping by the windows at a respectable rate of speed. It was a relief, I found, to be under way. I hadn’t been quite sure that I wouldn’t be yanked off the boat by the Canadian police, perhaps egged on by an offended Smith or two.

  Now I had a contact to make on board today; and then, tomorrow, there was the island town of Sitka coming up, and another pickup. That was as far ahead as I let myself think; the business up north on the mainland could wait. I glanced at my watch.

  “What’s the matter, am I boring you?” Libby asked sharply.

  “Go to hell,” I said. “I’m a working man; I’ve got a schedule to keep. I’m not supposed to be wasting time on stray brunettes.”

  “Oh, that’s right. You’re to contact somebody right here on shipboard, aren’t you?”

  She still had no more notion of security, it seemed, than a gabby parakeet. Furthermore, Mac has a thing about people who use “contact” that way, and it seems to have rubbed off on me. Or maybe I just found her irritating today, on general principles.

  I said sourly, “Wait a minute and I’ll have the head waiter arrange for a P.A. system so you can tell the whole ship all about it.”

  “Don’t be so stuffy. Nobody’s listening to us. Matt?”

  “Call me Grant, just for practice.”

  “All right, Grant.” She wasn’t very fond of me, either, at the moment. “I don’t want to run the subject into the ground, Grant, but aren’t you afraid that little girl you let go is going to louse up the whole mission. If she talks…”

  I said, “Look, you play your hunches and I’ll play mine. My hunch said it was time to stop killing people and turn one loose alive. Maybe I was right and maybe I was wrong, but that’s the way it stands. And at the moment I’m not half as worried about the girl I let go as about the girl I can’t seem to get rid of. Just what are you supposed to be doing here, Libby?”

  She looked surprised. “Last time we talked, you were very anxious to know I’d be around if you needed me.”

  “Sure, and it’s great as far as I’m concerned, but how did you wangle it without arousing suspicion elsewhere?”

  “It’s all right,” she said confidently. “It’s been cleared with everybody who counts, all the way to Moscow. Well, almost. As a matter of fact, you’re looking at a competitor in the Communist-courier business. I’m running a special message up to Anchorage for them. I asked if it would be all right if I arranged to make the ferry ride with you. Permission was granted with an indulgent laugh and a crude joke or two.”

  I said, “Let’s hope they really bought your act, and aren’t just being tricky. Did they mention Stottman at all? Or his partner, an Indian named Pete?”

  “Stottman, yes. They asked if he’d bothered me, and I told them about our little scene in Seattle, and they said to forget it, Stottman and his paranoid suspicions had caused trouble before.”

  “That’s reassuring, if true,” I said.

  “You think they could be setting a trap for me… us?”

  “It’s always a possibility.”

  “They didn’t mention any Indian. What kind of an Indian? An American Indian or an Indian Indian?”

  “American, but don’t ask me what kind. I’m not up on the west coast tribes. He was in the hall outside your room when Stottman came barging back in that night. Didn’t you see him?”

  “No, I wasn’t looking out in the hall. Why is he important?”

  “Because Stottman is dead, and Pete seemed the kind of stubborn guy who could conduct a vendetta that would make a Mafia enforcer look like a schoolboy mildly annoyed because somebody stepped on his toe.” I became aware that Libby was staring at me, and said, “What’s the matter?”

  “So Stottman is dead, too?” She whistled softly. “You really have been a busy little man, haven’t you?”

  I couldn’t see that a response was required. Besides, a waiter was approaching to take our orders. Having eaten in the camper, I settled for coffee. Libby’s big talk about breakfast an
d starvation turned out to be mostly bluff: coffee, juice, and toast was all the nourishment she’d take. It was nice that she was looking after her figure so well, but I couldn’t help remembering another female who, despite some screwy ideas, had been a lot more fun to feed.

  Afterwards we parted company, and I headed down to the car deck to carry out phase one of the day’s contact operation, which consisted of turning the pup loose to run and giving him a little retrieving drill in an open area beyond the cars up forward. As I tossed the training dummy—actually a canvas boat fender—and sent him scampering after it, I was aware of various people stopping to watch, among them a smallish rather good-looking young blond woman with a nicely rounded figure, the effect of which, for me, was pretty well spoiled by the fact that she was wearing one of those ridiculous garments that seem to be nice enough short dresses at first glance, but turn out, when the wearer moves, to have a lot of stuff between the legs, the purpose of which I haven’t got quite clear. I mean, in these days of miniskirts, no woman can really kid herself that men are all that interested in what she’s got to hide. Or can she?

  It was hard to say whether the ultra-modest young lady caught my attention because she watched our little training game more intently than the others, or just because she was the best-looking female who happened to come by. I must admit I can’t trust myself to be totally objective in such matters; besides, I was supposed to be concentrating on the pup.

  I took the dummy from him and tossed it once more and sent him after it. When I glanced toward the stairs again, the girl was gone—but six hours later, when I came into the cocktail lounge right on schedule for phase two, she was sitting at the bar, still in her neat, safe little pale blue romper suit. At close range like this, I noticed the odd thing about her: her hair was very fine and blond, apparently genuine, but her eyes were brown. It was quite a striking effect. You don’t meet many brown-eyed blondes who didn’t get their hair-color from a bottle.

  When I sat down a couple of stools away, she looked my way and said, “I saw you playing with your dog downstairs. Isn’t that a Labrador retriever? He’s a beauty. What’s his name?”

  19

  I’d arranged to meet Libby afterwards and take her to dinner. We’d set our date for six, to leave as much time for the contact as the instructions allowed—if nobody’d appeared by six, I had an alternate time and place set for later. As it turned out, my business was concluded shortly after five, but Libby didn’t make her entrance until six-twenty. After making sure that I was alone with my martini, she sat down beside me at the bar and asked, “How did you make out with the baby-faced blonde in the chastity-dress?”

  “Well, I think I got what I came for,” I said.

  “That’s all you’ll ever get from that one,” Libby said. Then she laughed. “Don’t mind me, darling. There’s something about prissy little blondes that brings out the feline in me. What routine did she have worked out for slipping you the coin? I didn’t stick around to watch the whole show.”

  “She asked me to get her some cigarettes from the machine. I offered to pay for them, of course, but she insisted on giving me the change. I palmed the Canadian quarter she gave me and substituted another I had handy, according to instructions. Any more questions, Nosy?”

  She said, a bit defensively, “You wouldn’t know anything about Grant’s instructions if it wasn’t for me! Don’t I have the right to ask how they worked out?” When I didn’t answer, she sighed. “You really are in a lousy mood, aren’t you? I can see it’s going to be a wonderful voyage. Well, maybe the scenery will be pretty.”

  “Maybe,” I said, “but you won’t get to see much of it unless the fog lifts.”

  “Fog?”

  “When I stepped out on deck for a breath of air a little while back, you could hardly see the water. I hope the captain knows where he’s steering this tub. The Canadians put one of theirs on the rocks in a fog not so long ago.” I heard a voice in the dining room calling for a Mr. Nystrom, and remembered that was me. I said, “If you want a drink, get it quick and bring it along, before the headwaiter gives our table to somebody else.”

  It wasn’t much of a dinner. That is, the food and the service were both satisfactory—a pleasant change from the backwoods hash joints I’d been patronizing along the road—but the conversation left a great deal to be desired. We simply didn’t seem to have much to say to each other. After we’d eaten, we had a couple of brandies in the bar. Then we took a turn around the deck, but it was cold and damp and windy out there and a little unnerving, the ship charging recklessly, or so it seemed, through fog and darkness. We ducked back inside.

  I said, “To hell with Alaska. I liked working in Hawaii better.”

  Libby was patting her windblown hair back into place. She glanced at the watch on her wrist. “It’s a little early,” she said in an expressionless, voice, “but it’s been a long day. Give me fifteen minutes. You, know the stateroom number by this time, I suppose.”

  “I know it.”

  “That’s the advantage of dealing with a real secret agent. He doesn’t have to be told things.” She faced me in the passageway. Her voice remained cool and impersonal. “Fifteen minutes. Don’t keep me waiting, darling.”

  I watched her walk away, a slim, very feminine figure despite the mannish corduroy suit. I checked the time, went down two flights of stairs, squeezed between the cars to the camper, got in and said hello to the pup, and took his collar off, and gave him his dinner. Then I dug the quarter I’d palmed out of the pocket into which I’d dropped it; also my stiff new knife—still so stiff that I had to use the coin to pry it open far enough so my fingers could get a good grip on the blade. It wasn’t really what you’d call an instant-defense weapon yet, I reflected wryly. I used the knife to separate the two halves of the coin…

  That is, I tried to use the knife to separate them, but I could find no crack into which to insert the edge. Well, it was a heavy blade. I got a smaller knife with a finer edge from a drawer, and tried again, without success. Then I got a ten-power magnifier and studied the coin carefully. I tossed it on the table and listened to the sound it made.

  I sat there for a while. The pup, who’d finished eating, came up and licked my hand in a worried way, sensing trouble. I scratched his ears, and buckled the collar back around his neck.

  I said, “Hank, old pal, this is getting strictly ridiculous. Three contacts so far, and only one has gone the way it was supposed to—and some guys were waiting for me with guns when I came back from that one. Well, I’ve got to see a customer about some homicides she ordered and I delivered. Be good.”

  I took the stairs to the deck above, and walked forward to where the super-deluxe staterooms were, the ones whose occupants didn’t have to go down the hall to use the plumbing. I knocked on the door that had the right number on it. Libby’s voice told me to come in. When I entered, she was sitting in front of a mirror, brushing her hair. She didn’t turn her head.

  “You’re late,” she said.

  “Go to hell,” I said. “I waited twenty minutes for you this evening; you can wait three minutes for me.” I looked around. “The trouble with love on shipboard is those damn berths. You have the choice of falling out of the upper or cracking your head in the lower.”

  The cabin wasn’t much bigger than the camper I’d just left, but the ceiling was higher and the arrangements were different. The furnishings consisted mainly of the stacked berths and a built-in dresser with a little stool, upon which Libby sat. She was wearing a scrap of ruffled black lace—a little more than a chemise, a little less than a nightie—just enough to decorate the property without spoiling the view. There was a half-full glass at her elbow. She took a drink from it, and went on brushing her hair, which didn’t seem long enough or tangled enough to require so much attention.

  “Well, take off your shoes or something,” she said, still without looking at me. “Don’t just stand there.”

  I said, “You make everything so r
omantic, sweetheart. There was something said about cash, as an alternative. Under the circumstances, I think the subject is worthy of consideration. What are you offering?”

  The hairbrush stopped moving. Deep in the ship below us, powerful machinery vibrated steadily. After a very long moment of silence Libby said very quietly: “You can’t do that to me, darling. Not now.”

  “Cut it out,” I said. “Let’s skip the clichés. You’re not a nymphomaniac. You’re not hurting for a man; obviously not for this one. You’re not going to go into a frenzy of frustration if nothing happens between us tonight. So let’s talk business. I don’t know the going rate, but I think three grand a head should be about right. That’s nine thousand you owe me. Cash. No checks. You can make the financial arrangements in Anchorage, I’m sure. When we get there. I’ll trust you that far.”

  She swung around on the stool to look at me. “You bastard,” she said softly.

  I shrugged. “That’s between mom and pop, and they’re not here.”

  “What are you trying to prove? Was I rude to you, is that it? Didn’t I receive you properly? Did I hurt your damn little feelings? What did you expect, throbbing love and panting passion?” After a moment, she said, “You didn’t find me repulsive in Seattle, darling.”

  “Maybe that’s because you weren’t repulsive in Seattle.”

  “But I am here?”

  “Let’s just say I’m not in the mood, and you don’t seem to be, either. Anyway, I don’t really like playing dirty games with sex; and the way we’ve been tonight, it’s not worth nine grand of my money. For that I can get a willing woman and have change left over.”

  “Your money!”

  “It’s mine. I earned it. And don’t you forget it.”

  “Get out of here!” she breathed. “Get out of here before I kill you!”

  “Nine grand,” I said. “In Anchorage. Cash.”

  I got out of there, checked my watch again as a matter of habit, and went upstairs to the snack bar and got two cups of black coffee from the vending machine that dispensed all the requisite beverages: coffee without, coffee with, coffee with double, hot chocolate. I carried my purchases below and managed to avoid the pup’s eager greeting long enough to set the cups safely on the dinette table.