Assignment — Stella Marni

by Edward S. Aarons

  "Do you, Sam?" McFee asked quietly.

  Durell said: "I have nothing to discuss with Blossom."

  McFee said: "Just because you don't get along with Mr. Blossom..."

  "He's the wrong man for this case," Durell said flatly. "I told him so this afternoon. He might as well be working for the other side, for all the good he accomplishes. He uses terror and hate to get these frightened people to talk. But nothing he can threaten them with can equal the blackmail that induces these people to go back home to death and imprisonment. They need sympathy and understanding, not more threats. They need intelligent help. Blossom gives them bigotry and a kick in the teeth. He doesn't belong in this."

  Blossom's face was pale. "I can afford to overlook your remarks. Just answer the question. Was Stella Marni at that studio tonight?"

  Durell said nothing.

  McFee spoke in a voice like iron. "Sam, your silence implies that you are withholding information the law needs. This isn't our baby. Senator Hubert called tonight to make that clear, and so did some of the Joint Chiefs. I've conferred with the Attorney General. It's not our business. Whatever you may think of Blossom has no bearing here. You are to co-operate with him by giving him whatever you know and then come back to Washington with me."

  "Is that an order?"

  "Yes."

  "Sorry," Durell said.

  A faint rustle went around the conference table. Tom Markey looked dismayed. McFee's face was inscrutable, his gray eyes resting on Durell's angry face. Blossom made a small sound of satisfaction.

  "So far, Durell, your meddling has got one of our key witnesses, Frank Greenwald, killed. And our primary target, Stella Marni, is missing. We had her covered like a blanket, but thanks to your interference, we've lost surveillance since eight o'clock this evening. She knows what we must know in order to break up this thing; she knows names, dates, and places. And finally, your meddling has put one of your own men in a dying condition right here in this hospital. Yet you have nothing to say?"

  "Not to you," Durell said.

  "Then make your report to me," McFee snapped.

  "No." Durell stood up. "Not here and not now."

  "Do you know where this girl is?"

  "I can find her."

  "Did she kill Frank Greenwald?"

  "I don't think so."

  "But you are not sure?"

  "I can't prove she is innocent, if that's what you mean. But I know this: I know she is frightened because her father is missing and she's afraid to talk to Blossom because Blossom doesn't give a damn about these political refugees and he hasn't made any real effort to find Albert Marni. He's in love with Stella Marni and she won't have anything to do with him. Because of that, Blossom hates her and is out to smash her."

  Blossom lurched to his feet, his face paper-white. A cord of muscle stood out in his throat, and a pulse beat raggedly in his temple. He started toward Durell and Tom Markey jumped up and said something in a hurried undertone, shooting a glance at Durell, and pushed at Blossom's chest to force the FBI man down.

  "Those are all lies," Blossom whispered. His breathing was ragged. "Every one of them."

  "Do you deny trying to force your attentions on Stella Marni?"

  "Yes. Do you believe her word against mine?"

  "Do you deny that you haven't made any real effort to find her father?"

  "I've got men on it"

  "Turning up anything?"

  "That's our business. We're not ready to discuss the case at the moment"

  McFee stood up. For the first time since Durell had come to know him, he showed anger through his usual objective calm. The anger was directed at Durell. "Sam, this is too much. I don't understand what's eating you. Mr. Blossom has been with the FBI for much longer than you have been with us. His record is spotless. His percentage of case convictions stands higher than that of any other man in his district. There has never been the slightest criticism of his methods or his personal habits. Your remarks are too serious to be dismissed lightly." McFee swung to Blossom. "I apologize for Durell. Do you have any objections if I take him with me back to Washington?"

  Blossom looked down at his hands, flat on the table, and shook his head. "We want the information he possesses. He is a material witness to the murder tonight He's also made serious charges against me, impugning my integrity in this case. I want that cleared up. An apology from you, General, is hardly enough."

  Tom Markey cleared his throat. "I think, gentlemen, we have all gone overboard with our tempers. I have known Sam Durell for many years. I realize he is upset because his friend is seriously injured, perhaps dying. I'm sure he will give us everything he can to help settle the matter when he has had time to think it over."

  "Don't apologize for me, Tom," Durell said. His anger, he knew, was now suicidal. He knew that the best thing to do was to shut up, keep quiet, let it all ride for now. But he couldn't help himself. He had the greatest respect for the FBI and the unselfish men who devoted their lives to internal security. He knew that Blossom was one exception in thousands. He knew that, in a way, Stella Marni had confused his thinking as much as she had twisted Blossom's perspective in the case. There was no reason why he should believe Stella against Blossom. Yet he did. He could not help himself. Every ounce of rational thinking and training urged him to co-operate, to apologize, to work with these men and do what he could, to turn in Stella Marni and go back to Washington with McFee and forget it. But it was impossible. He knew the dangers of a wild crusade for vengeance, but this went beyond a desire to satisfy himself personally about Art, if Art should die.

  It was the girl.

  He could see her, sense her, and feel her, and hear again the desperation in her words, whispering to him. There was a feeling in him of something left undone, of something still to be explored and settled between himself and Stella Marni. It had been something beyond her despair and terror and beauty, something he could not explain. How can you explain what makes you walk by a hundred women and suddenly feel yourself come alive at a single meeting of the eye, at the glimpse of a proud face, a knowledge of the way one walked, alive with pulses singing and a feeling of being incomplete suddenly, unless you could be with this particular one, this one out of all the hundreds?

  He felt as if Stella Marni had somehow possessed him.

  And knowing this, he suddenly felt less bitter toward Blossom.

  The conference went on for twenty more minutes. Durell tried to be more amenable. But what he had learned from Stella and the few leads he intended to follow he kept to himself. The tensions at the board table relaxed slightly, and Dickinson McFee's quiet manner contributed to it as much as Durell's change of attitude. Blossom was not in the least satisfied; neither was Tom Markey, his second in command. There was a telephone call from Senator Hubert at the end of all the talk, and Blossom listened and replied perfunctorily while McFee seemed to be thinking of something else, and then Blossom pushed the phone away and stood up.

  "That's all for now, gentlemen. Durell, you're to go back to Washington with the General and stay out of it. Understood?"

  Durell nodded.

  "Well need a statement from you, of course," Blossom was cool and businesslike now. "That will be enough, for the present, provided you don't meddle in this any further."

  McFee stood up. "I'll take Durell with me."

  They left the hospital building a few minutes later. It had stopped raining, and the East Side streets looked washed and clean in the early-morning hours. Durell lit a cigarette gratefully and they walked a little way in silence. The wind was cold. There wasn't much traffic. A few cabs cruised by, but McFee made no effort to hail one.

  "Well, Sam," McFee said. "You pulled out all the stops on that one."

  "I suppose I did."

  "Are you right about Blossom?"

  "I'm willing to bet on it."

  "I respect your judgment as a gambler, Cajun. As a matter of fact, I talked in Washington about Blossom — pretty touchy, conside
ring he's in another department and I could be considered impertinent — and I also discussed him with Tom Markey. Markey is intensely loyal to Blossom, but both sources are disturbed. Blossom hasn't been himself. Not since he met Stella Marni. All at once, according to Markey, Blossom changed. He's kept most of the data in this case to himself: even Markey is in the dark about a lot of it. Blossom knows his business. His past record puts him pretty high in his department. But even the best of us has a weak spot, an Achilles' heel, Sam. In Blossom's case, it might be his years of confirmed bachelorhood suddenly meeting up with an irrational infatuation for the Marni girl. Anyway, Markey is completely at a loss over the sudden change he sees in Blossom."

  Durell dragged silently at his cigarette.

  "Still," McFee went on, "this isn't officially our baby. You went at it the wrong way, Sam. even though I was going to send you up here to look into it, in any case. We've got the word from State. It may be a matter for the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee, but these political refugees aren't merely a domestic problem. Every man or woman who returns to his homeland is a propaganda victory for the other side. State is alarmed about the growing numbers of those turning away from us. Something has to be done about it. Of course, all this is off the record."

  Durell nodded.

  "We know it isn't simply love of homeland that makes these people return. Up until recently, it's been the usual business of anonymous letters asking them to come home and mentioning relatives and friends in such a way that there is left no doubt that refusal means death and torture for those still behind the Iron Curtain. So they go home. But it's never been on such a wholesale scale as it is lately."

  Durell was impatient to check at his hotel for Stella Marni. "Blossom said something about a ring operating right here in New York."

  "Yes," McFee said thinly. "I've seen his reports. He did excellent work until he went haywire over the Marni woman. There's an organized ring operating in town that uses underworld, gangster methods beyond anything we ever ran into before. Blossom knows a lot more about it than he's put into his reports, I suspect. This ring is made up of Americans, Sam. They do it for money, I'm ashamed to say. They use these unfortunate people as merchandise in order to make a dishonest buck. I hate it and I hate them and I want them smashed."

  "You ordered me off the case," Durell said.

  "Officially, yes. But Art Greenwald is badly hurt. I like to take care of my own, and you feel the same way. I don't have to question that. I'd like some satisfaction for what happened to Art, the same as you."

  Durell stopped walking and flicked his cigarette into the street. His face was hard. "Let's not have any double talk between us, General. What do you want me to do?"

  "Officially, you are being reprimanded and sent back to work in your office in K Section. The thing is forgotten and done with as far as we are concerned. Sidonie Osbourne will cover for you in Washington. So will I, up to a point You're being reprimanded for insubordination and failure to obey discipline." McFee sighed. He looked small and gray and tired. "It never ends, does it? This world we live in..." He paused. "How far did you get with Stella Marni? Was she at that studio?"

  "Yes," Durell said. "And I made a beginning."

  "Know where she is now?"

  "Yes."

  "Going to see her soon?"

  "As soon as you walk in the other direction, General."

  "Then I won't delay you. I'll send Tony Isotti up to help, if you want him. He's just back from Budapest. Do you want him?"

  Durell nodded. "All right."

  "Up here, you're on your own, Sam. There will be a hell of a flap if it gets out that you have State's private blessing on this thing. We've known about Blossom's attitude for some time. Sour apple, as you would say. It happens. But if anything goes wrong for you, it's your throat. Any objections?" No."

  The small gray man whistled for a cab, and one promptly appeared for him. It never failed. "Good luck then. Sam. Don't communicate with me. I don't want to know anything about this mess until it's cleaned up. If you get into trouble, it's your neck."

  "Will you see Rosalie Greenwald for me?" Durell asked.

  "Of course. Good-by, Sam."

  McFee got into the waiting cab. Durell lit another cigarette and watched the taxi vanish around the corner, beading toward Queens and La Guardia Airport. The street was empty, but he turned his head sharply and considered the shadows behind him. He felt very much alone. It was not an unusual feeling, but he never liked it, and it had never happened quite like this before. The empty street felt alien and dangerous.

  He walked two blocks before he found another cab. He was not followed. No one was behind him. As he rode uptown, he gave the driver some devious directions and then checked behind him again. Still nothing. Yet he had the feeling that there were eyes upon him.

  He had told Stella Marni to wait in his room and that he would be along within an hour. But more than four hours had passed, and uneasiness possessed him. Perhaps he had been too trusting. Perhaps the girl had tricked him and made as big a fool of him as she had of Harry Blossom.

  He rode up in the elevator to his floor and waited impatiently for the operator to take the car down, and then examined the hushed, dim hallway. There was nothing to see. Nobody was in sight.

  He rapped twice on his door and spoke his name.

  There was no answer.

  "Stella?"

  He tried the door. It wasn't locked. Even before he pushed it open and walked in to snap on the light, he knew what to expect.

  Stella Marni was not there.

  Chapter Six

  He stood in the center of his hotel room, frowning. He had come up from Washington with only a small suitcase, and he had left the leather bag on the luggage rack. It was now on the bed, thrown open, his few belongings scattered with a reckless and contemptuous hand. Nothing else in the impersonally furnished room had been disturbed. He started to light a cigarette, then paused, aware of a dim trace of Stella Marni's perfume. So she had been here. It was hot in the room, and the steam radiator hissed, and he was perspiring.

  His position was precarious if Stella Marni had crossed him. He had staked too much on her trust in him, and on the information he had hoped to glean from her.

  He picked up the phone and called the room clerk and asked if there had been any messages left for him. There were none. The clerk had not seen Stella Marni. But then the clerk's voice changed. There had been a visitor for Mr. Durell, from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. A Mr. Blossom, who had gone up to wait in Durell's room.

  "What time was that?" Durell asked.

  "Just twenty minutes ago, sir. Isn't he there now?"

  Durell hung up.

  Stella had been here; he was more conscious than ever of her perfume. And Harry Blossom had hurried straight here from the conference, while he had talked with General McFee. Was Blossom looking for him? Or for Stella? Blossom couldn't have known for certain that Stella was hiding here, but it might have been a lucky, vindictive guess. Blossom would enjoy pinning a charge like hiding a material witness to a murder — or a murder suspect — on him.

  Stella and Blossom had been here in this room. And both were gone. Where? Durell drew his thumbnail across his narrow black mustache. He felt caught between two fires. He had taken a long chance in trusting that the girl would keep her promise to him. and he had lost that chance. But it might not have been Stella Marni's fault. Blossom could have ordered her away with him.

  He looked at his bag on the bed and his scattered clothes, and annoyance worked in him. pushing him back to the telephone again. He called the number of the FBI district office downtown and when he was connected he asked for Blossom. Special Agent Blossom had not checked in. He asked for Tom Markey next, and a moment later the slow, sober voice of the bald and middle-aged man replied.

  "That you. Sara?"

  "Yes." Durell's eyes were dark, without expression, as if he were sitting at a round green poker table in a game not between
friends. "I've been trying to reach Blossom. I think I've got something for him and I'd like to see him. Top priority, Tom."

  "Don't steam me. Sam. I saw how you two rubbed each other. Am I stupid? I know you too well to think you've had a change of heart. So what's the pitch?"

  "No pitch. I just want to see him."

  "To swap more insults? Listen, Cajun, you stay away from Blossom. He can be dangerous. He's as good in his own way as you are in yours. I don't want to see you two tangling with each other. Why don't you go back to Washington with McFee?"

  Durell smiled into the phone with the corners of his mouth. His eyes were still without expression. "Level with me, Tom. What's the matter with Blossom? I know his record as well as he knows mine. It's a damned fine one. But he gets a queer light in him when he talks about Stella Marni."

  "Ah. hell. Forget it."

  "Is he gone on her?"

  "I guess so," Markey admitted reluctantly. There's nothing at all wrong with Harry Blossom, nothing. He's got a thing on with this girl, is all. I jerked him about it, at first, but with him it isn't a laughing matter. He's got a wire loose about her, but hell straighten out. Especially if you don't needle him too much about her and don't tangle with him right now."