Eighth Card Stud

by Nick Carter

  "You watched them?"

  She nodded, then said, "That looks good. Why don't you fix me a drink, too? I can use one to calm my nerves."

  Mentally, I flipped through pages indelibly etched in my mind. She drank vodka martinis, but not during the day. I fixed her a vodka collins. Her eyebrows arched slightly at the sight of the drink.

  "You are very thorough yourself."

  "It comes from living with such a beautiful wife for three years, six months, and two days," I said, gently forcing her back into the roles we both would have to play in public.

  "Rich wouldn't know that," she said, shaking her head. "He had a terrible time recalling exact dates. He failed a history course twice in college because he couldn't remember what days the class met, much less all the required dates of battles, treaties, and revolutions. He even mixed up his own birthday one year."

  "Thanks," I said. "Ill remember to forget dates now. There's so much that can't get into a person's files. I need you. The entire country needs you."

  Marta started to say something but was interrupted by the ringing of the doorbell. I cast a quick glance in the direction of the plain wood portal, setting my drink down next to the sofa out of sight. Men just out of the burn and trauma unit weren't allowed liquor, even mild stuff like Kahlua.

  "Dr. Sutter," said Marta loudly, opening the door only a crack, "how nice of you to stop by. But could you come back later? Richard just got here and we want to…"

  I approved of the way she handled Harold Sutter. Her voice contained just the right amounts of irritation, apology, and cajoling. She must have been more than just a desk jockey for the DIA. I'd have to ask since that information hadn't been supplied to me. The powers that be didn't think I had a "need to know."

  "I'll just stay a moment, my dear." A gray-haired, short, slightly paunchy man pushed his way past her. "I talked to the doctor at the hospital, and he said Richard could have a visitor or two, as long as he didn't tire himself unduly."

  "Harold," I said, hoping my voice sounded weak enough. "So good of you to see this burned relic. How're things at the lab?" I figured this was safe ground. I hadn't had time to go over Sutter's dossier thoroughly enough to know what else to say.

  He chuckled drily, smiling like some overweight elf. "I see even the fire's not enough to keep you away from your work. I just wanted to tell you that we have everything under control. Ed and I have taken over the programming for the big test. Anne is a great help, too. She knows a lot more than some of those kids with brand new Ph.D.'s that we've been getting lately. You just rest and you'll be back out on site before you know it."

  The man licked his lips, and I saw he was consumed with the need to know the extent of my burns. I couldn't tell if suspicion lurked behind those rheumy eyes or not.

  "Glad to hear everyone's handling my job so well," I said, wishing I had more information about him. This lack is what happens when an assignment comes up too suddenly. "Want a drink?" I asked him.

  I tensed at his reaction. If I'd offered a man dying of thirst a glass of cool water, the expression couldn't have been one of greater desperation. He raced to the bar, poured a stiff slug of bourbon into a glass, and downed it without even making a face. I'd seen men drink like that before. Harold Sutter, in addition to being the director of Project Eighth Card, was an alcoholic. Perhaps my dawning suspicions transmitted themselves to him. He stiffened as I watched.

  "Well, Richard, this is a remarkable recovery you've made. I just wish the doctors would have let me visit you sooner. Not like them to keep all visitors away."

  "Please, Dr. Sutter, Richard is tiring fast. This is the first day they haven't stuck an IV in his arm. And the bandages…" Marta allowed her voice to trail off, as if in concern for her injured husband. I barely took notice of her performance now. My full attention focused on Harold Sutter.

  The man suspected me. I could feel it.

  "You're so right, my dear. I'll be seeing you, soon I hope, Richard. Without the bandages." He left, the door securely clicking shut behind him.

  "What did I say wrong?" I demanded the instant Marta sat down on the sofa beside me. "He knew almost instantly that I was neither injured nor Richard Burlison."

  "He suspects," she said. "That was a big mistake offering him a drink. Rich has disapproved of Sutter's drinking ever since he went to work at the lab. Several times at parties. Rich has even embarrassed Sutter about it. Rich would never have offered him a drink of anything stronger than water."

  "Christ," I muttered, "a man like that drinking like a fish. Who'd have thought it?"

  "The pressure's greater at the top of the heap," Marta said bitterly. "Or don't you react to pressure? Are you one of those cold-blooded types who gets off on the pressure?"

  "I'm just a guy doing a job," I replied, irritated at her in spite of myself. Something about her got to me, and there was nothing I could do about it. "And right now, these bandages make my job stifling. Help me off with them, will you?"

  The touch of cool fingers was balm for my nonexistent wounds.

  * * *

  "You're a good cook. That wasn't in your dossier, either. "The meal had been superb. Marta was far from being a cordon bleu, but I was starved and the food had been ample. The way her face lit up with the compliment made it all the more worthwhile. The longer I talked with her, the more I came to see how much of a strain she was under.

  "You're being polite. That's something Rich never was. He was always brutally truthful." She sighed, remembering.

  "How long had he and Sutter known each other?"

  "Can't say. Rich mentioned something once about how brilliant a chemist Sutter was. Inventions all over the place, patents, papers, all the things that make a company sit up and take notice. I think the government paid a premium getting Sutter to head up Eighth Card."

  "How'd a chemist come to run a laser physics project?"

  She smiled, this time in real amusement.

  "You're with the government. Don't you know? Bureaucrats love putting square pegs in round holes. Sutter's adequate for his job, I suppose, but he really doesn't fit in. He would be better off in his own lab without the pressure of administration on his shoulders."

  I thought about that. Stress made men do strange things, but seldom did it turn them into Russian spies. There had to be more to it than that. Sutter reputedly wasn't any great shakes at administrative chores; his secretary took care of the details. He lacked the smooth manner and glad-handing ability to be a good politician. That caused me to wonder about his motives in coming by to see Burlison — to see me.

  Did he suspect something before he came? My act, because of that damned lack of knowledge, couldn't be perfect, though it would be good enough to fool anyone not looking for minute slipups. If Sutter was the man I wanted, he already knew Burlison was dead. The autopsy had shown the cause of death to be a fractured skull. That had come before the fire consumed the bunker — and the already dead body. Only the murderer would know Burlison couldn't be sitting in the front room of his home enjoying the quiet company of his wife.

  Sutter.

  The name and picture of the man turned over and over in my head. Things didn't click. He didn't seem the type, but then they never did. The one thing I've learned in all the years of close scrapes and double-dealing is that spies never look like the spies in the movies. The fake ones are all handsome and suave like Richard Burton or Michael Caine. Real-life ones could look like a short, pudgy, approaching old-age Dr. Harold Sutter.

  "I'm going out tonight," I told Marta. "If anyone calls asking about me, tell them I've taken a sedative and nothing short of Armageddon will wake me."

  I began stripping off the bandages wrapping my face. It felt good to breathe again. The long, white strips came off easily in my hands. A quick check verified Hugo in his spring-loaded sheath along my right forearm and Wilhelmina in her shoulder holster. Everything was in order. I was ready to check out Sutter.

  Marta stopped me, throwing her arm
s around my neck. Surprised at her reaction, I asked, "What's wrong?"

  "Nothing," she said, biting her lower lip. "This is the first time I've had a good look at you without all the bandages."

  "And?"

  "And you look so much like Rich! Damn them, damn them all! Why did they have to pick someone who looks so much like him?"

  "I'm the best," I said without any false modesty. "And I'll find the people responsible for his death."

  For a long minute, we stood there seeking out clues in each other's eyes. I saw tears forming at the corners of Marta's eyes and gently wiped her cheeks when the overflow threatened to streak her carefully brushed-on makeup.

  "I believe you. Give 'em hell!"

  "Right."

  I disengaged myself from her arms and silently left through the back door. The chill desert air startled me. When the sun went down, even in the summer, it got cold fast. I looked to the towering mountains rimming the eastern part of town and realized the high altitude had something to do with the quickly lowering temperatures, too. A gentle breeze whipped across my face and refreshed me. Wearing those bandages had become more of a trial than I'd bargained for. But it was part of my job.

  Cautiously, I made my way to the back fence and slipped over it. Down the street a dog barked, but other than this there was no sign that anything in the area lived. I quickly walked to a nondescript, slightly battered green Ford parked two blocks away. I'd have to tell Hawk I preferred something a little fancier. If I had to look like a mountain of white gauze all day long, there wasn't anything wrong in being able to drive at least a Porsche by night. I got into the Ford and keyed it to life. The powerful roar of a well-tuned engine told me that there was more than enough power lurking under the hood to appease my racing instincts. I sighed. Hawk thought of everything.

  The way the car handled on corners hinted at considerable structural changes, too. Feeling better, I drove faster than I should have across town to the posh suburb where Sutter lived. His house was held against the mountain by some mysterious glue. The style of architecture reminded me of tacky California modern. The creeping blight from that state had permeated even a quaint town like Albuquerque. I had barely selected my site for the all-night vigil when I saw Sutter leave the house and get into his car. He lurched out of the driveway and roared toward town. I followed at a discreet distance, making sure he wouldn't know he had acquired a tail.

  I hardly expected a man of Sutter's social position and wealth to end up in a bar at the edge of the Martinez-town barrio. Chicanos lounged with careless ease against the fenders of the cars and pickups in the dusty parking lot, laughing and crudely joking with one another in Spanish. Sutter had gone into the side door of the bar, indicating he was a regular customer here.

  Parking my Ford, I casually walked around the block. Two high, barred windows in the back of the bar shone with light from within. Guessing the side door might lead back to a room having one of those windows, I silently melted into shadow and soon perched high atop a teetering crate. Wiping off the grime from one of the panes with my sleeve, I managed to get a good view of the dingy room.

  Several men sat around a familiar green felt-covered table, cards, chips, and drinks in front of them. Sutter already had a wild-eyed expression, hardly the poker face the game required. It didn't take him long to lose several hundred dollars. From my vantage point, I saw a dozen ways the gathered men could cheat Sutter. A broken mirror behind the scientist showed every card in his hand. The dealer held the cards in such a way that I guessed the entire deck had been shaved — he could deal out only the cards he desired. Sutter didn't notice that, much less the even more subtle devices being used to clean him out.

  But the men didn't really need any of those gimmicks. Sutter lost his money through terrible playing. For a scientist, he had no conception of statistics.

  I couldn't hear what happened in the room, but it was fairly obvious. Sutter was broke, demanded credit, and was refused. One of the men, a burly Chicano, shoved Sutter against the wall and pulled a knife, threatening the overweight chemist. Sutter paled and began to babble incoherently. I debated intervening and decided against it. In the split second it took me to make that decision, Sutter eluded the man and bolted from the room like a frightened rabbit.

  I heard his car roar to life. Cursing under my breath, I jumped off the boxes and ran to my own car. It was too bad there weren't judges with stopwatches. I would have set a new land speed record.

  But luck was with me for a change. Sutter's taillights rounded the corner just as I came even with the bar. Expert driving on my part soon put Sutter in plain view again. This time he went onto the freeway and opened up his car. It came as a relief for me to follow. The wind whipping through the open window revitalized me. The chase was on. What would come of it I couldn't guess. The very uncertainty honed my body to a razor's edge of readiness.

  When Sutter left the city limits, my heart began to beat faster. I felt something big was at hand. The scientist finally pulled off onto a deserted lane leading into the mountains and drove some distance away from the main highway until he came to a looming mansion of a house. No light shone from any of the windows, but this didn't stop him from getting out and entering the house.

  Parking some distance past the house, I skirted the edge of the weed-overrun lawn and found the window to the room where Sutter paced nervously. No lights had been turned on, but I recognized his pudgy profile in the gloom.

  "God, am I glad you came!" he suddenly exclaimed.

  Another figure came into the room, shrouded in darkness. I wished I had a Starlight scope with me.

  "Here, take it," said the dark figure, thrusting out an envelope.

  The whiteness of the paper contrasted almost painfully with the grays and blacks of the room.

  "Thank you. God, you don't know what this means to me. You know I couldn't get by without it. I…"

  "Never mind. Your gambling debts should be taken care of with that money. But…"

  But I never heard the rest of the man's words. A heavy hand shoved me against the wall of the house. The sound of my body smashing into the hardness echoed through the still night like a gunshot. I didn't stay rigid. I slumped and this saved my life. Where my head had been a fraction of a second earlier now protruded the sharp, wickedly shining blade of a hatchet.

  Reaching for Wilhelmina gained me nothing. My assailant kicked out viciously, his foot hitting me in the ribs. Colored lights flared in my head. The pain made me wonder if a rib hadn't broken. I continued slumping bonelessly, as if mortally wounded.

  On the way down, I tensed my forearm muscles enough to send Hugo rushing into my grip. When the man advanced for the kill, I was ready. The sharp tip of the stiletto found flesh, ripped through it, and sent a geyser of blood fountaining out over my hand.

  "Ungh," was all my attacker grunted. Nothing more. It was as if pain meant nothing to him. I found it hard to fight from the sitting position I found myself in so I rolled away, barely avoiding another kick aimed at my head.

  Coming to my feet, knees bent, knife held in front of me in the classic fighting position, I found myself menacing only thin air. The man had gone, leaving behind only the hatchet embedded in the wall of the house. A tiny rustle from the back porch drew my attention. I saw the man escaping. Pursuing, I shifted Hugo to my left hand. I wanted to make sure I had my right hand free to grip and clutch and fend off further attacks. Having slashed the man once using the knife in my right hand, I might surprise him with a left-handed thrust.

  Maybe.

  The door leading into the house stood ajar. I kicked it wide open, listening to the echoes of my violent act die away inside the empty house. Advancing more cautiously, I strained for the smallest of sounds, the scuffle of shoeleather on a board, the brush of a shirt against the rough plaster walls, a harsh panting from exertion.

  He was good. I had no warning at all when he leaped over the stair railing and landed on my shoulders with both feet. His wei
ght carried me to the floor. The wind whistled from my lungs and, in a daze, I thought I was done for. A heavy fist crashed into the side of my head, numbing me further. Some hidden reserve came into action to aid me. My left hand drove forward, and again I heard the wordless cry of pain. Wildly now, I slashed and hacked. There could be no finesse in this fight. I had to regain my senses and to do that I had to stay alive.

  I stayed alive.

  One of Hugo's thrusts caught the man in the groin. Doubled up, he waddled grotesquely away from me. I kicked out, my foot landing behind his knee. He crumpled to the floor like a ball of used Kleenex.

  I kicked him again to get him flat on his back.

  "Who was Sutter meeting?" I demanded.

  A gurgling noise came from the man's lips. Bubbles of dark blood spotted his chin, and he gestured for me to come closer to listen to his last words.

  It was almost the last word I ever heard.

  "Sucker!" he cried, his hand snaking forth. The blade of his knife slashed through the fabric of my shirt and caught skin. A minor wound, but only quick reflexes saved me from having the knife sheathed fully between my ribs. Again I acted instinctively. Hugo drank deeply from the man's carotid arteries.

  This time the blood coming from the pinched lips was real, not merely smeared by deft fingers. He died in less than a minute, unable to give me the information I so desperately needed.

  I stood and stared at the body. I knew before I searched the corpse that there would be no identification. He had been a pro and a good one. Still, even a small clue was better than none. To the best of my knowledge, I had never seen him before.

  He had been about twenty-five, of medium height and build, with long, greasy hair hanging down around his shoulders. And, as I had already guessed, there wasn't any ID on him. His clothing was rough and cheap, easily purchased at any discount store in the area. The shoes could have been picked up at an Army surplus store.