Cargo for the Styx

by Louis Trimble

  The same hand untied the rope holding the gag in my mouth. I pushed it soggily out. I blinked my eyes until I could begin to see.

  And I saw Bonnie Minos. She was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. She held two beautifully damp bottles

  “I had an idea you’d be thirsty. Otho does a pretty goon tie-up job.”

  “I had an idea you’d be thirsty. Otho does a pretty good tie-up job.”

  I showed her just how right she was.

  I handed her my empty beer bottle and climbed down out of the bunk. After a few stomps my legs and feet did what I told them. I said, “Do you mind taking your beer aft? I want to shower off.”

  “Men are so damned modest,” she remarked. She took herself and her beer aft.

  I stripped down and got into my robe. It smelled faintly of Irma just as the bed had. I reached for the telephone. Bonnie had put it back on the shelf. I reminded myself to ask her if she’d called me.

  I dialed Irma’s office number. I got the voice of her secretary, a chubby brunette with a slightly dowdy look. I said, “This is Martin Zane. May I talk to Miss Wilson, please?”

  “Miss Wilson left a message, Mr. Zane.”

  I remembered leaving Irma earlier. I remembered agreeing to meet her at one for lunch. I also remembered agreeing to meet Bonnie at one in my office. My watch said that it was now two o’clock.

  I said, “Okay, let’s have it.”

  The girl’s voice was prim and faintly disapproving. “Miss Wilson asked me to tell you that she was sorry you couldn’t meet her for lunch. She accepted an invitation from Mr. Clift as she has to be there this afternoon to make a final check of the cargo manifest.”

  I said, “If you see her first, tell her I was tied up.”

  I hung up. I dialed another number. I got Jasper Clift on the end of the line. I said, “Is Irma Wilson there? This is Zane.”

  “Miss Wilson? Not yet. I expect her sometime this afternoon.”

  I said, “You didn’t have lunch with her?”

  Clift gave a kind of bark that I decided was a laugh. “Lunch with a dame today? This is the day I sail, Zane. I’m busy.”

  I opened my mouth and closed it again. I took a deep breath. I said, “Okay, thanks.” I hung up. I had begun to sweat all over again. A different kind of sweat this time.

  A shower washed me down a little, but it didn’t make me feel any better. Neither did my fresh clothes. I went into the lounge still struggling into my jacket, my shoelaces flapping.

  Bonnie Minos had her nose in a beer mug, one of my Tyrolean ones. Three empties sat on the floor beside her chair.

  I said, “That’s eleven per cent stuff from Mexico. Better go easy.”

  “I’m used to it,” she said.

  I didn’t have time for more chit chat. I said, “Did you telephone me a little while before you came here?”

  She shook her head. “I went to your office. I waited around a while but you didn’t show up. I started back home. When I passed your moorage I had an idea.”

  I said, “So you stopped to see what you could find?”

  “I couldn’t find anything in the office,” she said. “I thought maybe you kept it here.”

  “Kept what here?”

  “Whatever it is some people seem to want from you.”

  I said, “Are those your goons? Did you sic them onto me to keep me out of your way for a while?”

  “If they were mine, would I have turned you loose, buster?”

  I said, “Maybe they’re Aggie’s boys and you cut me loose to keep him from getting in too deep.”

  “In where too deep?” she demanded. She lifted the beer mug and drained it. “And if they were Aggie’s, I still wouldn’t turn you loose. It isn’t my job to mess up my husband’s business.”

  I said, “What is your job?”

  She hiccupped. I said, “When you cut me free you made some crack about Otho doing a pretty good tie-up job. What makes you think Otho had anything to do with tying me up?”

  She closed one eye and surveyed me with the other. It was slightly glazed. “Who else around here is big enough to do that to you, Zane?”

  I felt as if I was trying to wade through stiff molasses. I said, “We made a date to talk. I’m a little late for it, but let’s talk anyway.”

  She tried to snap her fingers. There was no crack. She frowned and tried again. She shrugged and dropped her hand to her lap. She said, “Speaking of dates, you got a phone call right after I got to your office.”

  I said, “Irma?”

  “A Miss Wilson. Is that Irma?” I nodded. She said, “She wanted to know where you’d got yourself to. I told her I wanted to know the same thing.” She waggled a finger at me. “Your ideas are too big for one man, buster. You can’t date two women at the same hour.”

  I said, “Let’s cut the horseplay. What did Irma say?”

  “You mean, what did she say besides what she called you?”

  I said, “Yes, besides that.”

  “She said ‘good-bye,’ “ Bonnie announced.

  I said, “Look, when those goons left here Vann said they had to hurry up and take care of ‘that dizzy dame.’ Irma’s secretary told me she’d gone to have lunch with Jaspar Clift. He says she did no such thing. He hasn’t seen her.”

  Bonnie murmured dreamily, “Busy boys, aren’t they. This morning it was me they wanted. Now it’s another woman.” She frowned. “They’re fickle.”

  I said, “Why did they want you in the first place?”

  “I didn’t ask them.”

  I said, “Does Aggie really think you’ve been horsing around with me or with Clift? Did he put them on you to scare you?”

  She stared in amazement. “Don’t talk through the side of your head, Zane. Aggie knows how I feel about him. He trusts me.”

  I said, “I could tell him a few items that might change his trust.”

  She got up. “Go ahead and try. I squared him away after you left this morning. Anything you say won’t even get a listen.”

  She had all her bets coppered. She had an explanation—or a dodge—for everything. I retired from the field—on my shield. I said, “How about giving me a lift down to the Temoc? Vann swiped my car.”

  “Do you think Jaspar is holding the fair Irma for ransom?” She smiled sweetly at me, closed one eye, opened it, closed the other, and hiccupped. She said, “Keys in my bag. Help yourself.”

  She put her head against the back of the chair and went to sleep.

  CHAPTER XII

  A WOMAN like Bonnie Minos wasn’t the type to get gowed up on three bottles of lightweight beer. I had the idea that she wanted me to think she was drunk so that I’d leave her alone on my boat. It wasn’t an idea I liked.

  I got behind her and lifted her out of the chair. She was limp but not limp enough. I got her to her feet and started to take the support of my hands away. She straightened up fast.

  “Whatsamatter?”

  I said, “Let’s take a cold shower.”

  She said, “You’re a louse, Zane.” She picked her bag off the floor, glared at me, and started out. I moved along behind. We reached her car. She worked herself into the passenger seat.

  “Honest, Zane, I don’t think I can make it.” She hiccupped again to show me what she meant.

  I slid behind the wheel. She put the key in the ignition, showed me the starter, and gave me a short lecture on the gear shift pattern. I backed the Ferrari around and eased onto Harbor Way. I started up the hill to The Point.

  I whipped up into the driveway and braked to a stop in the garage. Aggie’s Cadillac wasn’t there.

  Bonnie said, “I still don’t like you when you scowl, Zane.”

  I said, “Look, I appreciate your cutting me loose. I don’t appreciate your making a sucker out of me. This is a great game to you. It’s my living and maybe my life to me.”

  I left her in the car and headed on foot down the driveway.

  She didn’t say a word. I half expected her
to chase me in the Ferrari. But I walked the three blocks to The Point shopping center and there was no sign of her. I grabbed a cab and told the driver to run me to Pier 7. No one tagged me.

  The loading of the Temoc was about wound up. Only a small pile of crates sat on the dock, and the loading boom was swinging out to grab them. I spotted Clift on the bridge.

  I didn’t wait for an invitation. I went aboard and climbed up to him. The motor running the boom was making a lot of racket. I yelled, “I’m still looking for Irma Wilson.”

  “I haven’t seen her,” he yelled back.

  “A couple of hoods tried to grab her this morning,” I shouted.

  He looked puzzled. He made a motion and started off the bridge. I followed him down to his cabin. It was quieter here. He said, “What was that you said?” I repeated it. He didn’t like something about my words. I could see the mean look settling around his mouth.

  “Are you climbing my back, Zane?”

  I said, “I’m wondering about your crew.”

  “Prebble?”

  I said, “Come off it, Clift. You’re supposed to have two men besides Prebble. Where are they?”

  “On their way down here,” he said. He walked over to his desk and began fingering some papers on the top. I hadn’t asked for an explanation, but he gave me one anyway.

  “The pair I originally hired couldn’t make it. I had trouble getting replacements. Non-union sailors with good records are hard to come by.”

  I said, “And what did you draw?”

  He stopped fussing with the papers and dug a bottle of bourbon out of his desk. He poured a drink for himself. “Ask me when they get here,” he said. “I called a friend in L.A. and he said he’d have a couple of men down here by this afternoon. That’s all I know about it.”

  I said, “You’re itchy, Clift. For a week you aren’t itchy. All of a sudden you are.”

  He started to swing around on me and stopped. He gulped down half of his drink. He said, “Hell yes, I’m nervous. This cargo is delicate. It’s my first job.”

  I said, “I can think of some other ‘first jobs’ that might make a man nervous. Like the first time he tries to clip an insurance company.”

  Clift set down his glass. He came toward me with those big shoulders swinging. His face was set and ugly. The thin line of his scar stood out hard on the tanned skin of his face.

  “Get out of my hair, Zane. I didn’t ask you aboard. I don’t want you here.”

  I said, “Tell your goons they did a lousy job of tying me up, Clift. Tell them to do better next time.”

  I didn’t wait to watch him. I hiked out and back to Harbor Way. I picked up a cab and had him run me to the office. I wondered if I’d pushed Clift too far. I had myself out on a limb. If he wanted to saw me off short, he could call Ted Winters at Marine Mutual. If he was clean, he should call Ted Winters. But I didn’t have the time to wait around to find out.

  It was a long time since I’d had to be careful about walking through dark alleys. But now some of that caution came back to me. I stood to one side and eased open the office door. Silence and warm air. Nothing else. I was almost disappointed.

  I sat at my desk and reached for the telephone. I tried Irma’s office again. Her secretary hadn’t seen her. No one had called to ask about her. I was back where I’d started.

  I dug a note pad from the desk drawer. I started making notes about Aggie Minos and Jaspar Clift. It was something to do. It wasn’t getting me anyplace. I threw the notes into the wastebasket.

  The telephone rang. I said, “Martin Zane Company,” into the mouthpiece.

  I got back Blimey’s voice without the British accent. He sounded excited or afraid or both.

  He said, “Mr. Zane, there’s a lady here asking for you.” He made a gulping sound. “A Miss Wilson.”

  Relief made the telephone wobble in my hand. I said, “Put her on—and thanks.”

  “I can’t put her on,” he said. “She’s in the storeroom. She acts kind of funny. Sick like. She told me to call you.”

  I said, “I’m on my way. Keep her there.”

  I blessed the elevator because it hadn’t gone away. I let it rattle me down six flights. I trotted across the lobby and climbed into the first cab in line. I said, “Blimey’s Shack on the double.”

  I could see Irma’s red convertible at the curb when we turned onto Harbor Way. A truck was making a U-turn and I told the driver to let me off behind the convertible. I started up the sidewalk past it. I glanced in and saw the keys hanging from the ignition. I stopped and reached over the door to pull them out before some smart punk borrowed it.

  I was pulling the keys out of the lock when the blast let loose. I looked up just in time to see Blimey’s Shack lift itself from the pier. The whole affair seemed to hang in the air for the time it took me to draw a deep breath. Then it disintegrated.

  Army service has its points. For one thing it teaches you to hit the dirt and hit it fast. I was flat on my face and half under the car when the concussion wave rolled over me. I felt it shake the convertible.

  The rains came. A piece of two-by-four drove a jagged end through the windshield. Small chunks of wood drummed down on that part of me sticking out from under the car. Something heavy landed on the hood. I could hear metal cave in. Two tires blew. The sound of litter hitting the grille was like a midwestern hailstorm.

  Sound stopped. Nothing moved, no traffic, no pedestrian. I gave it a count of ten and decided the silence meant the rains had left. I crawled to my feet. I saw the jagged end of a two-by-four that had gone through the windshield. It had buried itself in the front seat.

  In the distance a siren howled. I glanced toward the shack. The freakishness of the explosion had played the usual tricks. The rear wall still stood. So did the grill. Three of the four counter stools were upright, but the counter itself lay on its side. I saw that much before an eddy of wind lifted smoke from somewhere and drifted it over the end of the pier. Then I saw the small tongues of fire.

  I started to run. Loosened pier boards jarred under my feet. Behind me someone shouted. Ahead the flames were feeding themselves on aged wood and grease. All I could see was billowing, ugly smoke.

  A puff of breeze sucked in by the heat cleared the smoke briefly. I was almost to where the doorway had stood. I stopped, squeezing my eyes to see.

  I saw the edge of the tipped-over counter. I saw the stools still upright like crazy, long-stemmed mushrooms. I saw the smoke closing back in again.

  And I saw the hand. It was a small hand, the size of a woman’s hand. It was motionless.

  CHAPTER XIII

  I STOOD BESIDE Lieutenant Nicolo, Homicide, and watched the firemen douse the last of the fire. He said, “You were lucky, Zane.”

  I said, “Hell, it isn’t even safe to want a cup of coffee anymore.”

  He gave me a sideways look. “Did anyone know you wanted that cup of coffee?”

  I could have said “Yes,” and told him about Vann and Otho, about Clarence, about Prebble. I could have, but I didn’t.

  I said, “Not unless someone was reading my mind, Lieutenant.”

  I watched the smoke turning into steam. An hour ago I might have considered letting the police hold up the sailing of the Temoc. But not now. Now I had an idea. I would play a hunch and keep Marine Mutual from having to pay off on delay of shipment of cargo. And I’d keep them from having to pay off on the Temoc at all.

  I couldn’t do any of this with the police hungry to help.

  Nicolo said, “Are you on a case, Zane?”

  I grinned at him. My face felt stiff, but he didn’t seem to notice. I said, “I just wound one up.”

  Nicolo grunted. If he had anything else to say it was lost when Biddle, the city’s arson expert, came up. “Let’s go in and look for that hand you were howling about, Zane.”

  The three of us walked down the pier. Biddle talked about dynamite and explosion patterns. He said, “It was planted under the pier and set of
f with a timing mechanism. We dug pieces of clockwork out of the pilings.”

  I didn’t say anything. We were back where the front door had been. I kept on going, picking my way through debris. The remains of the floor were awash with water. The stench of wetdown wood and of burned grease clogged the air. But the smoke was gone; I could see what there was left to see.

  The hand was still there. It stuck out from the end of the counter. Smoke and fire and water hadn’t made it unrecognizable. From ten feet away it kept looking like a woman’s hand. I clenched my teeth and sloshed toward it. My weight on the shaky floor threw up a small wave. It caught the hand, moving it gently. I took a deep breath.

  I reached the counter. I went around the end and stopped. The cave made by the tipped counter was shadowy, but not so shadowy that I could miss the arm that belonged to the hand. The arm and hand were still together; they weren’t with the rest of the body.

  Nicolo flashed a light into the gloom. The explosion had stripped the body and taken off one arm. It hadn’t done any more damage. The corpse was recognizable. It belonged to Albert Prebble.

  I backed away. Nicolo said, “Not big enough for Blimey?”

  “Some poor devil enjoying a cup of coffee,” I said.

  “Where the hell is Blimey?” Nicolo demanded.

  Biddle said, “It wasn’t the kind of explosion to blast anyone out of sight. If he’d been here, we would have found traces. And this guy is all there is; he must have been here alone.”

  “Maybe he planted the stuff and didn’t get away fast enough,” I said.

  Nicolo said he’d think about that. I decided I’d told enough lies. I turned and sloshed my way out. I stopped on the sidewalk. Harbor Way was quiet with traffic rerouted. I walked back to the office. I sat down and thought about Irma.

  If Biddle was right, she hadn’t been in Blimey’s when the place blew. And neither had Blimey. That could only mean he had called me from somewhere else. That he’d used the story about Irma to sucker me down there. If I hadn’t stopped to take the keys out of her convertible, I’d have been stepping in the door as the dynamite went off.