Murder Round the Clock

by Hugh Pentecost

  He stood aside, and Chambrun walked into the neat little living room, so perfectly cared for by Serafina.

  "What has happened to Serafina, Luigi?" Chambrun asked. "I know something has happened to her, or you would have called in."

  "Oh, my God, Mr. Chambrun!"

  "Tell me, Luigi. I'm your friend. I want to help you if I can."

  The old Italian turned away, and his body convulsed with sobs. "You cannot help! There is no way to help me."

  "Tell me what has happened, Luigi!"

  "The terrorists have her!"

  "What terrorists? What are you talking about?"

  "The enemies of General Hassan," Luigi said. "They have taken her to be a hostage."

  "Stop blubbering, and tell me! How can I help you if I don't know what has happened?"

  Luigi turned back. "I must help them commit a murder, or they will kill Serafina."

  "How on earth are you supposed to help them commit a murder?"

  Luigi was silent.

  "You must tell me," Chambrun said. "I am your friend. I am Serafina's friend. You know that."

  "I have been warned not to go to the police, not to go to the FBI, not to go to you."

  "You haven't come to me, I have come to you," Chambrun said.

  "They will know you are here, Mr. Chambrun. They are watching. They will think I've sent for you to help me. They may already have—have dealt with Serafina. You couldn't know, but your coming here may have cost her her life!"

  I can imagine how that jolted Chambrun, but I doubt he showed it in any way.

  "If you had to commit a murder to save her, why are you sitting here doing nothing?" he asked Luigi.

  "I couldn't! I couldn't move! I was unable, like a man who has suffered a stroke. But it must be tomorrow morning or— or else. They have been in touch with me again. I—I have a last chance."

  "To kill General Hassan?"

  "To make certain he dies."

  "How?"

  "If I tell you, and you prevent it—"

  "I promise you, Luigi, I will do nothing to risk Serafina's life. How are you supposed to make certain the general dies?"

  Luigi turned away, his face working. "They cannot get to the general directly," he said. "There are his bodyguards, there are Jerry Dodd's men, there are FBI agents in the hotel. He is thoroughly protected from all ordinary violence. But I—I take him his food and drink."

  "Poison?" Chambrun asked.

  Luigi nodded.

  "Impossible," Chambrun said. "He has his own trusted chef. The chef is watched, in all stages of his preparations, by an FBI agent."

  "They know that," Luigi said. "There is one weak link in all of the protection they've set up, Mr. Chambrun. I take the food wagon up from the kitchens, on the service elevator, to the rear door of the general's suite. I am not watched because you selected me, I am to be trusted. Tomorrow morning, when I take up the breakfast wagon on the service elevator, I will be intercepted somewhere between the kitchens and the twenty-first floor. Someone will poison the food, and I will go on with it—and serve it."

  "And if you sound an alarm?"

  "For God's sake, Mr. Chambrun, they have Serafina! If a dozen generals have to die, I would save her first. Before you came, I made up my mind. I will go through with it. Now you will try to stop me!"

  I can visualize Chambrun taking a flat Egyptian cigarette from his silver case, his eyes narrowed against the smoke as he lit it.

  "I will not try to stop you, Luigi," he said. "You will do exactly what the assassins have ordered you to do. What I do—well, that is something else again."

  "It is a very neat dilemma," Chambrun said. He was sitting behind the carved Florentine desk in his plush office on the Beaumont's second floor. Jerry Dodd and Betsy Ruysdale and I were with him, the three people I think he trusts implicitly. "We prevent Luigi from delivering a poisoned breakfast to the general, and Serafina dies. We don't prevent him, and the general dies."

  "You haven't any choice," Jerry Dodd said. He is a dark, wiry little man, intense, expert at his security job. "You have to protect the general."

  "I have to protect Serafina," Chambrun said. "She is my friend's wife. I've promised him not to endanger her."

  "You have to make a choice, Pierre," Miss Ruysdale said.

  Chambrun smiled at Miss Ruysdale, a sly, almost mischievous smile. "I know, and I have made a choice," he said. "I plan to save them both."

  "You have no idea where Serafina Cantora is being held," Jerry Dodd objected. "You have no way to find her."

  "So I will have to find a way, won't I?" Chambrun replied.

  "Do I notify my people and the FBI that we are expecting trouble?"

  Chambrun's smile vanished. "You don't mention any of this to a single living soul," he said.

  "You're playing some kind of fancy game with human lives," Jerry said. He always has the guts to stand up to Chambrun.

  "Only a fancy game can save them both," Chambrun said. "What I want from you, Jerry, is to tighten your protection of the general, don't let anyone become complacent. But I don't want you to change the routine by a hair—no sudden surveillance of the service elevator, no watchful eye on Luigi. What I have told you is as sacred and secret as if you were priests in the confessional."

  "Just don't blame me if we mess up on the general in some way," Jerry said. "Is that all, boss?"

  "That's all," Chambrun said. "The zero hour isn't until tomorrow's breakfast."

  Jerry took off, obviously not convinced that Chambrun was making sense. There was, however, no doubt he would carry out his orders to the letter. When the day comes that we can't follow The Man blindly, our world will have collapsed.

  "You have appointments," Betsy Ruysdale reminded Chambrun when Jerry was gone.

  "I'll keep them," Chambrun said. "Remember, Ruysdale"— he never calls her by her first name, just "Ruysdale"— "nothing is to change. All routines as usual—until tomorrow's breakfast."

  Ruysdale nodded and took off for her private office.

  "What can I do to be useful?" I asked Chambrun.

  He sat very still for a moment, staring down at a blank pad on his desk top. Then he looked up at me. "If I muff this, Mark, there won't be much flavor to living."

  I didn't say anything.

  "The general's breakfast is served at eight-thirty," he said. "I want vou here with me at eight o'clock."

  "Right."

  "I may need you very urgently then, Mark. Meanwhile, today, don't let the press and media people develop any kind of special or sudden interest in the general. Invent something, if necessary, to keep them looking somewhere else. The Queen of England may be coming to stay with us; Greta Garbo is planning a party to announce her return to the screen. Anything to keep them looking away from the general."

  "Count on it."

  "You think I'm out of my mind, Mark?"

  "No, but I don't know what's going on in it—in your mind."

  "It's quite simple," he said. "I hope to save two lives."

  If it had been anyone but Chambrun, I might have protested, loud and long. No individual has the right to play games with life and death. The general, forewarned, could be

  kept perfectly safe. He was surrounded by an army of trained people. Serafina Cantora was an unfortunate victim of fanatical evil. All hostages are such victims. Someone playing games with the situation was running intolerable risks.

  But not Chambrun. If any man could assess the odds for success and against failure, that man was Chambrun. He had lived and succeeded all his life by taking calculated risks.

  I have to tell you that I went through the next hours—the rest of that morning, the afternoon, and a long evening— under a kind of tension I wouldn't have believed. The Beaumont seemed to operate with its usual Swiss-watch efficiency, but for me violence seemed to be waiting around every corner. We all live with violence, but for me, that day, it was pinpointed, focused on the Beaumont.

  The big trouble was expected
tomorrow morning, but somehow I expected it might erupt long before that. I had an ear to the ground. I knew when the general left for the UN about ten in the morning. I knew when he returned about six in the afternoon. I knew when the changing of the guard took place, when a new group of FBI agents took over, when Jerry Dodd's crew changed.

  The general lived through the day without incident. The newspaper and other media people had shown no interest in him. I was exhausted when I went to my apartment on the second floor and fell into bed, alerting the switchboard to call me at six-thirty in the morning. I wouldn't have believed it possible, but I slept as though I'd been slugged.

  I must have jumped three feet clear of the bed when the phone rang. It was only the operator telling me it was time to get moving. The sun was streaming through my windows. This was the day when one of two people was scheduled to die, and both of them might.

  Chambrun was already in his office when I got there at a quarter to eight, fifteen minutes ahead of the time I'd been ordered to report. He was wearing a light gray tropical worsted suit with a little white flower in the buttonhole. He looked as if he'd slept like a baby; he was refreshed, ready for anything. I knew from my shaving mirror that I looked as if I'd been on an all-night binge.

  "We are sharing the breakfast hour with the general," Chambrun informed me.

  With murder scheduled for eight-thirty, I told myself.

  We went to the twenty-first floor, and Chambrun rang the bell to the general's suite. The door was promptly opened by one of the dark-faced bodyguards.

  We were led into the luxurious living room where General Hassan was already at work at his desk. He got up from his chair to greet us, a handsome man with the brilliant smile of a professional public figure, a neatly trimmed beard and mustache, and dark eyes, bright with pleasure.

  "It is a delight to see you, Mr. Chambrun," he said.

  The general wasn't alone. The guard who had admitted us stood by the door to the vestibule. Another was at the opening of the corridor that led to the bedrooms. A third, I guessed, was at the rear of the suite waiting for Luigi Cantora to arrive with the breakfast wagon.

  "It's rather early in the day, general, but there seemed to be no other time to fit myself into your busy schedule," Chambrun said. "Have you met Mark Haskell, our public relations director?"

  The general's handshake was firm and friendly. "Like everything else in this establishment, Mr. Chambrun, the machinery turns soundlessly. Mr. Haskell has kept me well protected from the press. Please sit down. You will share coffee with me when it comes. It should be here any moment. And now, what can I do for you, Mr. Chambrun?"

  "I just wanted to make certain everything is as you wish it to be," Chambrun said. "That you are satisfied with the routines, that the service is satisfactory."

  "My own people in my own palace could not be more perfect," the general said. "Ah, here is Luigi with the breakfast."

  Luigi Cantora looked like a man about to face a firing squad

  as he wheeled in the breakfast wagon, followed by a guard. When Luigi saw Chambrun, his eyes bulged like marbles.

  "We missed you yesterday, Luigi," the general said.

  "My—my wife was ill, sir," Luigi muttered.

  "I trust she is feeling much better today," the general said.

  "Thank you, sir."

  Luigi wheeled the breakfast wagon into place in front of the general. Luigi's hands were obviously shaking as he shifted some of the silver-covered plates and moved the silver coffee pot into position. I felt the inside of my mouth go painfully dry. Almost certainly, from Luigi's panicked appearance, death was lurking there for the general.

  The general was evidently in high good humor.

  "I think you will find extra coffee cups in the pantry, Luigi,;' he said. "Please fetch two for Mr. Chambrun and Mr. Haskell."

  Luigi seemed frozen where he stood.

  "Luigi—" Chambrun said, very quietly.

  The coffee! It had to be the coffee! The old waiter made a despairing sound, turned, and stumbled out of the room. The general filled the one coffee cup on the wagon with a flourish, picked up the cup, and held it out toward Chambrun.

  "For you, my friend," he said.

  Chambrun's face looked carved out of stone. He didn't move in his chair. One of the guards took a quick step forward, apparently to pass the cup. He stumbled as he reached the breakfast wagon, reached out to prevent himself from falling, sent the coffee cup flying, spilling most of the contents on the front of Chambrun's immaculate summer suit. The guard's other hand overturned the coffee pot on the wagon.

  Both Chambrun and the general were suddenly standing.

  "How could you be so clumsy, Abdul?" the general said sharply.

  The guard muttered something apologetic in a language I didn't understand. He was blotting at Chambrun's stained suit with a napkin. Then he turned to the breakfast wagon to

  work on the coffee spill there. I glanced past him and saw Luigi in the entrance to the pantry, clinging to the door jamb like a man whose legs had turned to gelatin. Chambrun spoke quietly to the old waiter.

  "Help clean up the mess, Luigi, and bring General Hassan a fresh cloth and napkins—and a fresh pot of coffee," Chambrun said.

  Luigi nodded and began puttering, almost aimlessly.

  "I'm deeply sorry for Abdul's awkwardness, Mr. Chambrun," the general said. "I trust you will wait for fresh coffee."

  "I'm afraid not, General," Chambrun said. "I have a rather busy schedule this morning, and I'll have to change into a more presentable suit of clothes."

  "Another time," the general suggested.

  "It will be a pleasure, General."

  Out in the hall I grabbed Chambrun's arm. "That was no accident," I said. "You'd forewarned them!"

  He gave me an odd, cold look. "I agree with you, Mark. It was not an accident. But I assure you, I've talked to no one about this but Luigi, you, Jerry Dodd, and Ruysdale."

  'Then why—"

  "If I had taken a swallow of that coffee and dropped dead on the spot," Chambrun said, "it would have closed off the only avenue they have for getting at the general. As it is, tomorrow is another day."

  "And you won't be there for breakfast tomorrow."

  "If I have to be," Chambrun said, "it's 'Goodbye, Serafina."

  It was pretty hard to concentrate on the routines of the day. Chambrun, I knew, would never tell me anything but the truth. He hadn't warned the general or his guards about a planned assassination by poison. That meant there was treachery within the ranks of the general's close and personal protectors—specifically, the man called Abdul. One rotten apple in the barrel. If the plan to use Luigi, forced to cooperate out of fear for his wife, was to be tried again it would have to be delayed until tomorrow's breakfast.

  The general would have his lunch at the UN, and who could know where he might dine. Our unexpected presence this morning had aborted the plan, but Abdul—he must have thought very cleverly—had saved them a second chance. Serafina Cantora was still a hostage, and the terrified Luigi would continue to cooperate. Abdul and his co-conspirators must have felt certain of that. We, on our side, had a day and a night, but what could we do with that time?

  A little after ten o'clock that morning I was in my office, down the hall from Chambrun's, when I got a call from The Man.

  "I need your help, Mark," he said.

  "Anything you say."

  "Meet me at the elevator. We're going places."

  Two or three minutes later we met. He was wearing his rakish hat and carrying his blackthorn walking stick. Apparently we were going somewhere outside the hotel.

  Chambrun pressed the down button, and we descended to the garage in the basement of the hotel. He didn't explain anything until we reached his own private Mercedes, which was waiting for us with Jerry Dodd at the wheel. Chambrun got in up front with Jerry. He turned to me in the back seat as the car started up the ramp.

  "I figured Abdul would have to report to his pa
ls," he said. "So I alerted Jerry. Abdul wouldn't, I thought, make an outside call through the hotel switchboard. The general's guards change when he leaves the hotel for the UN."

  "The boss was right," Jerry said, as he maneuvered the car out into the city traffic. "The first place Abdul went when he was relieved was to a pay phone in the lobby. I was on his heels. I could see him dial a number. He spoke, excited, in a language I couldn't understand. But I checked with a chum at the phone company and got an address for the number he'd called. About ten blocks away on the Upper East Side."

  "That's where we're going/' Chambrun said.

  "To do what?" I asked.

  "Not to whistle 'Dixie'!" Jerry said.

  Our target turned out to be a dilapidated brownstone not far from the river. Jerry parked the Mercedes about a block from the house he indicated.

  "Let me case the joint." he said, and took off.

  We waited for what seemed an interminable length of time. Then Chambrun sat up straight. On the front steps of the house down the block we saw Jerry. He'd removed his suit coat, and he was, of all things, industriously sweeping the front steps of the house.

  We left the car and walked briskly down the block to the house. The front door stood open behind the sweeping Jerry.

  'The janitor was a sucker for a ten spot," he said. "Foreigners have rented the rear apartment on the first floor." He grinned at Chambrun. "I have the passkey"

  We went into the dark hallway and down the corridor to the rear. Jerry signaled us for silence. He slipped a key noiselessly into the lock, again indicating we should stay behind him. He turned the key and was instantly three steps into the room beyond.

  'A leak in the bathroom," we heard him say. "I thought you guys were out."

  Chambrun pushed forward, I right behind him. Two dark-skinned men faced us, startled by our sudden appearance.

  "Chambrun!" one of them said. They knew The Man by sight. They had probably scouted the Beaumont thoroughly before they'd put their murder scheme into action.

  "I assume Mrs. Cantora is in the back bedroom," Chambrun said, coldly. "Will you be good enough to bring her out here. Mark?"

  I must have looked like a sleepwalker as I started for the far door. One of the terrorists recovered and took a quick step to block the way There was a gun pointed straight at my chest.