Deathwish World

by Mack Reynolds

  “Peter Windsor demands that we ally with the Graf. In a subservient position, without doubt.”

  Captain Bois said, still cautiously, “And what did you tell him?”

  “I threw him out, of course—Fraser, that is. But now I’m alone here with Sergeant Sengor. I think we’d better move some of the lads into the hotel, just to be sure. One doesn’t know what that murderous Fraser’s orders might be.”

  The thin man shook his head. “Sorry, Boris. You’re not big enough to go up against the Graf. He tolerated small organizations such as ours in the past, while recruiting our best men. But now contracts are too few and far between for him to allow competition. He’s amalgamating every mercenary group still outside the ranks of Mercenaries, Incorporated.”

  “Traitor!”

  The other shook his head again and his tone was apologetic. “I talked it over with Flaubert. We’ve both had offers from Windsor to go on the Graf’s full-time retainer, with promotions. I’m afraid we’re taking the offers, Boris. I suggest that you make your own peace with him. He’d probably promote you to brigadier.”

  “Brigadier, you ass! He hasn’t had a brigade-sized contract since ’80.”

  The other’s face was rueful, even as it faded from the screen.

  Boris Rivas was livid. He came to his feet again, went back to the liquor, and repeated his performance of a few minutes before. He said to the impassive black, “Get a drink, Sergeant,” and returned to the desk.

  Sengor went over to the bottles, poured himself a small gin, and returned with it to his place against the wall, near the door.

  Rivas flicked on the phone screen again and dialed. When the face appeared, it was that of a coarse, middle-aged man who looked as though he was half drunk. In fact, even as he sat there before the screen, he lifted a glass to his lips.

  Rivas snapped, “What’s the matter with you?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Well, confound it, get over here with any of the men you have in that bistro with you. We’re having a fracas with the Graf and his pigs.”

  “I know. The word is all about town.”

  The colonel stared at him. “Spread by whom?”

  “By Bois and Flaubert, among others. They said that you’re washed up, Boris. They’re signing with Brandenburg.”

  “And what do you think, Henri?” the colonel snarled in a high rage.

  The other took another drink. “I’ve stopped thinking. I can’t afford it. Peter Windsor hasn’t approached me. If he doesn’t by the weekend, I’ll offer him my services. If he doesn’t want them, it looks as though I’m retired.”

  The face faded and Rivas slumped back in his chair for a long moment. Finally, he got up and poured himself another drink, a smaller one this time. Carrying the glass with him, he went over to one of the curtained windows. He said to the black, “Turn off those lights.”

  The sergeant brushed his hand over the switch at the side of the door. Rivas stood to one side of the window and pushed back the curtain a few inches. Across the street, he could make out a figure standing in a doorway. He let the curtain back and for a moment leaned against the wall, breathing deeply. He knocked the drink back and threw the glass across the room, shattering it against the far wall. His hand went beneath his coat to emerge with a small Gyrojet, a silencer attachment on its muzzle.

  “Come on, Sergeant,” he muttered. “It’s you and me now. We’ll go to ground and start recruiting for our counterattack. That scum Brandenburg doesn’t know what fighting men are. He hires lads to do his dirty work; hasn’t been in action himself for decades. I just wonder how impregnable that Wolfschloss of his really is.”

  The sergeant opened the door, peered up and down the dark corridor, then let the colonel precede him. They hurried down the stairway, the colonel pressing the light button, as had Nat Fraser, at each landing. And at each landing they shot glances up and down the hotel corridor. The lobby was empty.

  “This way,” Rivas snapped. “Out the back. To the alley.”

  They went behind the desk and utilized the same door that the concierge had disappeared through on Nat Fraser’s orders. They went down a dark, narrow corridor to the portal leading out into the alley. The colonel, gun in right hand, cautiously opened it and peered through.

  The alley was dark, very black, and led to the left. It had no lights at all. One end led out onto the street; the other was a cul-de-sac blocked by a high brick wall. On each side, the walls were blank and tall. The only light came from the street, fifty feet away. The door through which they emerged was at pavement level. The alley was cobblestoned, going back to the days of Napoleon the Little. As they emerged into it, two figures entered from the street, cautiously, half crouched.

  “Damn!” the colonel snarled. “We can’t afford a shootout here. The flics would lay it at my door. Back, back the other way!”

  But then he slowly, as though with great care, leaned forward and went down onto his knees. He coughed softly, then leaned forward again and put his hands on the cobblestones in front of him. The Gyrojet pistol clanged to the paving. He slowly bowed his head, as though staring in fascination at the cobbles before him. There was a splashing sound. His arms and legs seemed to give way at the same time and he fell forward into the puddle of his own aortic blood.

  Nat Fraser and Frank Pinell came up, tucking their guns back into holsters beneath their coats. They stared down at the body. A four-inch combat knife handle protruded upward from the body of Boris Rivas. The Australian looked up at the sergeant and nodded. “Be with you in a meejum minute, Sengor.”

  He turned and led Frank, who had been staring at the fallen man in dread fascination, twenty feet down the alley.

  Nat said, his voice unruffled and unhurried, “You do a bunk back to the hotel and get your things. I’ll stay here with the wog and do the necessary. Your orders are to go to Vaduz, in Liechtenstein, and to the Wolfschloss—that’s the Graf’s stronghold. You’re to contact Peter Windsor there. I won’t be seeing you again, cobber, not this time.” He stuck his right hand out. “It was bonzer getting to know you, Frank.”

  Frank Pinell ignored the hand and looked into the other’s face coldly. He said, his voice even, “I won’t shake hands with you, Fraser. You’re no friend of mine. You and Panikkar had it all worked out to set me up for that Mahdi job. Anybody with a brain in his head could see that it was a one-way trip. I don’t know what happened, or why, but at the last minute this Peter Windsor, or somebody else on the Graf’s staff, diverted me to this instead. I played along with you for a while, Fraser, just to see what the hell was going on, but I never would have taken that Mahdi job. It was suicide.”

  The big Australian nodded. He took off the bush hat, reset the brim, then returned it to his head. “What you say’s the dinkum oil, cobber. Sorry. It was out of my mucking hands. I have to take whatever orders they give me. You see, they’ve got a lock on me.”

  He turned and went back in the direction of the sergeant, who had the body of Boris Rivas under the arms and was hauling it back into the dark hallway of the hotel.

  Frank took the rocket shuttle from Paris to Zurich, then a vacuum tube to Buchs, on the Liechtenstein border. The vacuum tube line crossed the tiny principality on its way to Vienna but didn’t stop in Liechtenstein. There was evidently no shuttleport, nor even an airport. Frank began to get the idea of just how small and remote this country was when he had to take a surface bus to complete his journey.

  There had been no customs inspection at the border; that was taken care of in Vaduz itself. He didn’t spot any police but the bus station had an official look about it and there were several men lounging about clad like those stationed at Colonel Ram Panikkar’s fortress-like estate in Tangier—berets, commando-type uniforms, and paratrooper boots. They carried Gyrojet carbines as naturally as though they had been born with them in hand. None of them paid any particular attention to Frank, who was the sole passenger debarking at Vaduz.

  There was a desk
with a sign reading Customs and Immigration and, carrying his own two bags, he made his way to it. The young man there, dressed in civilian garb rather than a uniform, looked up at Frank’s approach.

  He frowned slightly and said in English, after taking in the newcomer’s appearance, “I’m afraid you have made a mistake, sir. Liechtenstein is not a tourist country. There is nothing particular here to attract visitors. If you hurry, you can return to the bus, which makes its next stop in Feldkirch, in Austria. You can take the vacuum tube from there to Innsbruck or…”

  Frank said, “Thanks for the wholehearted welcome, but I’m here to see Mr. Peter Windsor at the, uh, Wolfschloss, whatever that is.”

  The other’s voice became more brisk. “I see. May I see your identification?”

  Frank brought forth his International Credit Card, which had been given him by Colonel Panikkar in Tangier. He had wondered at the time if it was a forgery, but evidently not. He had drawn on it for credit when traveling without any difficulty. He wondered how many pseudodollar credits he had to his account.

  An International Credit Card, as always, doubled as a passport. The customs man glanced at it and then put it in a slot. In moments, a voice from the desk screen spoke in German. The official nodded and handed it back to Frank. He must have pressed a button with either hand or foot, since one of the uniformed men came up.

  The customs man said, “Escort Mr. Pinell to the Wolfschloss. He is to see Mr. Windsor at the donjon.”

  “Right,” the other said, and took Frank in. He lifted one of the two pieces of luggage and said, “This way.”

  Frank followed him out to a small parking area and to one of the several jeeps there. They put the bags in the back and climbed into the front.

  The other looked as though he was probably American and spoke like it as well. He must have been roughly Frank’s own age but had a toughness about him somewhat reminiscent of Nat Fraser.

  As he started up, he said, “First trip here?”

  “That’s right,” Frank said.

  “Bore you shitless unless you’re quartered up in the schloss. Not bad up there.”

  “What’s a schloss?”

  “Castle.”

  Frank said, “American?”

  His guide hesitated momentarily before saying, “Canadian.”

  “I guess that makes you an American these days. Been here long?”

  The other looked over at him briefly, then turned his attention back to the road without answering. It would seem that questions weren’t good form locally, though the Canadian had asked the first one.

  It was an excellent road. They had passed out of Vaduz in moments. Frank said, “I work for the Graf, too. At least, I think I do.”

  That didn’t seem to lower any barriers. They went on.

  Frank looked up shortly and said, “For Christ’s sake.”

  The driver grinned. “Looks like something out of a fairy story the first time you see it, eh?”

  Frank had never seen a castle before, save in historical Tri-Di shows. He had no idea that they could be this large. The Wolfschloss was built atop a small mountain. Even the lower foundations were a thousand feet above the valley floor. It brought to mind an action-filled movie revival of the last century, depicting the good guys storming the Alcazar in Segovia. They had used catapults, small primitive cannon, battering rams, and finally, scaling ladders. It had been on the gruesome side, with the defenders pouring melted lead and boiling oil down on the attacking forces. The good guys had finally taken the castle by storm, but Frank had wondered ever since what sort of soldier would be idiot enough to be first man up one of those scaling ladders.

  He had never expected a castle to be as large as the looming Wolfschloss. He wondered if it had ever been captured in the old days. He didn’t see how it could have been, before the advent of heavy artillery.

  Along the road, since they had left Vaduz, they had passed guard houses and on two occasions concrete pillboxes, heavy automatic weapons projecting from their slots, but they had been stopped only once, and then, briefly. The guards were obviously acquainted with his guide.

  Now they pulled up before an ultramodern building with two heavy steel cables extending from its interior up to the schloss. There were ten or twenty other vehicles in the parking area.

  They got out, each carrying a bag, and headed for the entry. There were two guards there, armed with the usual Gyrojet automatic carbines, stationed to each side of the metal door, and one who, by his shoulder tabs, was obviously an officer with a sidearm in a quick-draw holster.

  When the two approached, the guide gave an easygoing salute to the officer and it was returned just as offhandedly. The guide said to Frank, “Your identification?”

  Frank handed it to the officer, who looked at it briefly, handed it back, and said, “Go on in, Mr. Pinell. You’re expected. Welcome to the Wolfschloss.”

  The metal door slid to one side, into the thickness of the wall, then slid silently shut behind them. They were in a moderately large room, steel of walls, ceiling, and even the floor, which was, however, carpeted. Six armed men studied the newcomer.

  One of the seated officers held out his hand without words and Frank handed over his International Credit Card again.

  There was a faint buzzing sound, and the officer looked at him coldly. Two of the guards hurried over. The other two covered Frank, less than casually now.

  The officer said, “You’re carrying a shooter.”

  “That’s right,” Frank told him.

  The two guards frisked him quickly and came up with his stubby Gyrojet with its attached silencer. It was put on the desk of the examining officer.

  That worthy said dangerously, “You mean you’ve got the gall to try and get in to see Mr. Windsor armed?”

  “For Christ’s sake,” Frank said, mildly impatient. “It was issued to me by Nat Fraser, in Tangier. Nobody told me where to hand it in.”

  The officer looked at him for a long moment, then down at the gun. “It’s one of our models,” he muttered. He flicked on a desk screen and spoke into it in German.

  The officer finally looked at Frank’s guide and said, “Take him up, Colin.”

  While this was going on, two of the other guards had taken Frank’s luggage, opened both bags, and gone through them. Frank got the feeling that they were being electronically scanned at the same time.

  His guide, Colin, said, “This way, Mr. Pinell.”

  They went through another metal door and into what turned out to be the cable house proper. It looked like the waiting room of a small shuttleport. There were unupholstered benches and chairs, and a small bar at which a pretty young blonde, in a feminine version of the ever-present commando uniform, presided. There were two more guards at their ease here, and three civilian-dressed, bored-looking men, all carrying very ordinary-looking attaché cases.

  The ceiling was only partially roofed and the double cables, which were attached by heavy links of chain to the floor, extended through the opening. In only moments, a cable car came sliding into the room and descended into the slot built for it into the floor. One of the guards went forward and unlocked its door. Two passengers emerged, one a tall, well-dressed black carrying a very large briefcase, the other an efficient-looking, middle-aged woman who looked Spanish or Italian. They headed for a door other than the one Frank and Colin had utilized.

  The three other men, one an Oriental, entered the cable car. Frank and his guide got in, too. The car was rectangular, with rounded comers and modest windows. By the looks of them, none of the windows could be opened, and Frank suspected that the glass was bulletproof. As Frank took a seat, the guard outside locked the door and they took off with a slight lurch, climbing at a sharp angle though the swaying gondola remained horizontal.

  Frank stared out a window in fascination. Beneath them were scrubby, hardy trees and massive, jagged boulders, occasionally with wiry grass. From time to time he could spot a zigzag trail ascending the hill. I
t looked as though it hadn’t been used for years and, from time to time, there were indications that it had once been wider—perhaps a narrow road. In the distance were spectacular snow-topped Alps.

  He looked over at Colin and said, scowling puzzlement, “You mean that this cable car is the only access to the, uh, schloss? Surely it can’t be supplied from a gondola?”

  “Of course not,” the other grunted. The guide was slumped back in his seat, not bothering to look out. He had obviously made the trip many a time.

  In ten minutes, the cable car swung into an aperture again and settled on its skids into another slot. Frank could see, through the windows, only a small portion of huge castle wall, partially brick, partially massive stone, before they passed into the interior.

  A guard unlocked the door and all issued forth. The three other passengers hustled off. They left the waiting room of the terminal by one door, and Colin led Frank through another.

  The steel room into which Frank was ushered was similar to that below, but not identical. For one thing, there were ports in one of the walls which evidently overlooked the cable car ascent. Before each of them was mounted heavy weapons of a design Frank had never seen before, even in films. There were six guards on duty here and, once again, two officers. Their shoulder tabs looked more impressive than those the two below had worn.

  He went through much the same procedure as before: he was electronically searched, and his credit card was checked out, then handed back to him. “Righto, corporal,” the bored officer said. “You’re cleared for the donjon.”

  “Yes, sir,” Colin said, saluting in the offhand manner that seemed to apply to these professionals.

  This part of the castle had been reconstructed recently. On the other side of the metal door through which they exited was a modern, though militarily barren corridor, which couldn’t possibly have dated back to medieval times. It extended only fifty feet or so before they were confronted by another heavy portal, which automatically opened for them onto a vista which made Frank gasp.