Attack at Dead Man's Bay

by Paul Adam

  ‘No, don’t do that,’ he said softly. ‘Let them go. I have people in San Francisco who can take care of them.’

  ‘You have something in mind?’

  ‘Max is an escapologist. He’s performing a very dangerous stunt.’ Clark’s mouth twisted into a menacing smile. His eyes glinted like sunlight on frost. ‘And when you do dangerous things, accidents can happen.’

  TEN

  THE BOEING 747 flew across San Francisco Bay from the northeast, then looped out briefly over the Pacific Ocean. From his window seat in the first-class cabin, Max got his first glimpse of the city. It was a sunny, cloudless day and he had a clear view of the downtown area, the dense urban sprawl broken up by patches of green parkland. He could see that San Francisco was built on a peninsula, like a long thumb, the ocean on one side, the bay on the other. To the north, spanning the entrance to the bay, was the red-orange framework of the Golden Gate Bridge. The plane was low enough for Max to be able to make out the tiny vehicles moving across the bridge. Then the 747 banked and came round in a long curve to approach the airport over the glistening waters of the bay. The wheels touched down and the whole plane juddered as the pilot applied the brakes.

  Max closed his eyes, savouring the moment. Inside the protective shell of the jet he had felt safe for a few hours. He’d spent time planning what he was going to do in the city, but also watched a couple of films, been able to forget about his troubles for a while. But now he was back down to earth he had to face up to reality again. And that meant worries and fears and all the dangers of a new, unfamiliar country.

  There was a crowd of photographers, television camera men and reporters waiting for them outside the arrivals terminal. Max and Consuela posed patiently for some pictures and answered a few questions, then went to the limousine that Herb Feinstein had sent to pick them up. A driver in a black uniform and peaked cap took their luggage and loaded it into the boot. Max had never ridden in a limo before. The interior was luxurious – deep leather seats, air conditioning, a television and a bar with a bottle of champagne on ice for Consuela and a selection of soft drinks for Max. Neither of them touched the drinks. They were both too tense.

  This wasn’t the way they’d planned their trip to San Francisco. Rusty and Zip should have been with them on the flight, but they’d been detained by security men at Heathrow and taken away for questioning. Max hadn’t seen them since. The plane had left without the two bodyguards, making Max feel very vulnerable. Nor was Chris there to protect him. Chris was wanted by the British police, so he’d taken the Eurostar to Paris on a false passport and flown from there to San Francisco the day before Max and Consuela. If everything had gone according to plan, he would be at the hotel waiting for them to arrive. If … Max thought anxiously, praying that nothing had gone wrong.

  They took the freeway north, the eight-lane highway cutting through ugly industrial suburbs, occasionally hugging the shore of the bay, then Max saw skyscrapers on the horizon – tall pillars of glass and concrete rising up the slopes of a hill, their bases hidden by clusters of lower buildings. The traffic began to thicken. The limousine slowed and crawled through a series of lights into the downtown area. Office blocks towered up alongside them, sunshine glinting on their windows. A cable car chugged sluggishly away from a stop up ahead and began to climb a steep hill. The limo followed it, overtaking so that Max could see the passengers hanging precariously from the cable car’s sides.

  A few minutes later, they were at the top of the hill, turning off onto the forecourt of the Fairmont Hotel, an elegant seven-storey stone building with a long row of international flags dangling above the entrance. A uniformed doorman hurried forward to open the door of the limousine, then two bellboys in brown and gold livery and spotless white gloves removed their luggage from the boot and carried it into the hotel. Max felt awkward. He wasn’t used to this kind of treatment; he would have preferred to open the door himself, carry his own suitcase, but that wasn’t how things were done at the Fairmont.

  There was a canopy over the forecourt to protect guests from the weather, then a high, pillared, classical entrance with a red carpet on the steps beneath it. Max and Consuela went through a revolving door into a lobby so opulent that Max stopped dead, staring around with his mouth open in amazement. He’d never seen a hotel foyer like it. There was gold and marble everywhere: polished marble floors, marble pillars supporting the gold-embossed ceiling, rococo gilt-framed mirrors on the walls, gilt armchairs and sofas and chaises longues in the seating areas, everything lit with table and standard lamps that bathed the whole lobby in a soft, golden glow.

  Stretched out in an armchair by the staircase was Chris Moncrieffe. He appeared to be reading a newspaper, but looked up as Max and Consuela came in. His eyes met Max’s for an instant and he gave a discreet nod. Max nodded back, then turned away, pretending he hadn’t seen him. An immense feeling of relief coursed through his body. Chris had made it here safely. Max could stop worrying now.

  He followed Consuela to the reception desk and checked in, then they took the lift up to the seventh floor, the two bellboys accompanying them with their luggage. They had a two-bedroom suite, each bedroom with its own separate bathroom and a spacious sitting room in between. The sitting room was less showy and formal than the lobby downstairs. It had a thick cream carpet, a long sofa and armchairs upholstered in pale blue, and French windows opening onto a small balcony which afforded a spectacular view of the city and bay.

  Max barely had time to explore the room before there was a knock on the door. Consuela checked through the peephole, then snapped back the lock to let Chris in. He smiled at them both, dropped his holdall on the floor and gave Max a high five.

  ‘How’re you doing?’

  ‘We’re OK,’ Max replied.

  Chris hugged Consuela. Max turned away, giving them a moment to themselves. When he looked back, they’d broken apart and Chris was glancing around the suite, pursing his lips appreciatively.

  ‘Not bad,’ he said dryly. ‘You’re becoming quite a celebrity, aren’t you, Max?’ He wandered across the room, checking the balcony, then testing the cushions of the sofa. ‘I’ll bed down here, it feels pretty comfortable.’

  He picked up the room service menu from the coffee table and flicked through it, pulling a face. ‘My God, you seen the prices? It’s a good job someone else is paying for all this.’ He tossed the menu down and looked at Consuela, suddenly serious. ‘Where are Rusty and Zip?’

  ‘They were detained by security at Heathrow,’ Consuela replied. ‘We don’t know what happened to them after that.’

  ‘Convenient,’ Chris said. His tone was light, but there was a flicker of worry in his eyes. ‘You have any trouble on the flight? Or when you arrived?’

  Consuela shook her head. ‘No. How about you?’

  ‘No problems.’

  ‘Are we going to be OK?’ Max asked. ‘Without them, I mean.’

  Chris gave him a reassuring smile. ‘We’ll be just fine. It would have been kind of crowded with five of us in here, anyway.’ He went across to the phone on the desk next to the window. ‘But all the same, I’d like to know they’re all right.’

  He dialled the number of Rusty’s flat in London and let it ring for a long time. No one answered. Then he tried Rusty’s mobile and got his voicemail. He left a message – ‘You know who this is. Give me a call’ – and hung up. ‘It’s been a long twenty-four hours,’ he said, picking up his bag. ‘I think I’ll take a shower.’

  Chris disappeared into one of the bathrooms. Max sat down in an armchair, feeling suddenly tired. He looked at the clock on the sitting-room wall, then checked his watch. They’d left London at two o’clock in the afternoon and endured an eleven-hour flight, then the journey in from the airport. His body clock told him it was nearly two o’clock in the morning, but in San Francisco it was only approaching six p.m.

  ‘Feeling jet lagged?’ Consuela said.

  Max nodded. ‘It’s weird. It feels like th
e middle of the night to me, but it’s broad daylight outside. Should I go to bed?’

  ‘Better to stay up. Try to adjust to the new time and go to bed when it’s dark. Why don’t you take a shower too? It’ll freshen you up, help you get through the next few hours.’

  ‘OK.’

  Max went into his bathroom and had a long shower. Consuela was right – it did wake him up, make him feel better. When he came back out into the sitting room, he picked up the phone and dialled the number of San Francisco General Hospital which he’d brought with him. He asked the main switchboard for the human resources department and a young woman’s voice came on the line. Max had phoned the hospital several times from London, but he didn’t recognize this voice. It was warmer, more pleasant than the others had been. He explained that he was trying to get in touch with a Dr Halstead, whom he believed worked at the hospital.

  ‘Just a moment,’ the young woman said. She put him on hold for a few seconds. ‘I’m sorry, but Dr Halstead doesn’t start his contract with us until next week.’

  ‘I really need to speak to him now,’ Max said. ‘Could you possibly give me a contact number for him?’

  ‘I’m afraid I can’t give out the phone numbers of staff members. It’s hospital policy.’

  Max already knew that – it was what he’d been told every time he’d called – but he wasn’t going to give up.

  ‘Please, this is important,’ he said pleadingly. ‘I’ve come all the way from England to find him.’

  ‘I’m sorry, I can’t give you his number,’ the young woman repeated, but she sounded more hesitant this time.

  ‘Then could you pass on a message to him? Ask him to call me?’

  ‘Well, I’m not sure—’

  ‘Please. I have to speak to him. My name’s Max Cassidy. I’m staying at the Fairmont Hotel.’

  There was a silence on the line. Then the young woman said, ‘OK, I suppose I could do that. Which room are you in?’

  Max gave her the number and thanked her, then hung up. Tracking down Dr Halstead was proving a frustrating task, but it was one that he had to accomplish. The doctor knew where his dad was, Max was sure of that.

  He went to the window and stepped out onto the balcony, looking out over the city. There must have been thousands of buildings in San Francisco, hundreds of thousands of people. If you wanted to lie low for a time, it was a good place to choose. Was his father out there? he wondered. If he was, would he see the press coverage of Max’s stunt off the Golden Gate Bridge and maybe try to make contact? Or was that just wishful thinking on Max’s part? He had flown five thousand miles, yet now he was here, he was beginning to realize he was still a very long way from finding his father.

  At ten o’clock the next morning, the local show-business promoter, Herb Feinstein, met them in the hotel lobby. He was a small, bird-like man in his mid-forties, with a sharp beak of a nose and big black-framed glasses that seemed to cover half his face. His hair was thick and curly, worn long so that it brushed the shoulders of his tan leather jacket; his stick-thin legs were encased in tight blue jeans, and on his feet he sported a pair of white sneakers with purple trim around the lace holes.

  ‘Hi, Max, hi, Consuela. Good to meet you,’ he said warmly, holding out a thin, bony hand. ‘You have a good night? You like your room?’

  ‘Yes, very much, thank you,’ Consuela replied. She introduced Chris, calling him Alan Montgomery and describing him as Max’s security adviser.

  Feinstein looked momentarily nonplussed. ‘Hi, Alan. I wasn’t expecting you. Sheldon didn’t say anything about a security adviser. That’s why I only booked rooms for Max and Consuela.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I made my own arrangements,’ Chris said.

  ‘You did? Well, make sure you bill me for them. I’m taking care of all expenses. Hotels, meals, whatever you like. You’re my guests. OK?’

  Feinstein turned and headed for the exit. ‘My car’s just outside. This is a great hotel,’ he added. ‘You been up the tower block at the back yet? You should, it gives you a terrific view of the city. This is the highest point in San Francisco, you know – Nob Hill. So called because this is where all the nineteenth-century millionaires built their mansions. People like Collis Huntington, Leland Stanford and Mark Hopkins. You heard of any of them? The Robber Barons, they were called. The Fairmont is named after another nob, James Fair – his daughters built the hotel after his death. It was finished in 1906, and two days later it was gutted in the fire that followed the great earthquake. But it was rebuilt using the original white terracotta façade.’

  They came out of the hotel, the promoter still talking about the earthquake and the damage it had done. He pointed across the road to a square imposing building made of dark, reddish stone.

  ‘That was James Flood’s mansion. He was known as the Bonanza King – made a packet from silver mining. The house is now the Pacific Union Club. And beyond it you can see Huntington Park and Grace Cathedral, which is modelled on Notre Dame, in Paris. You should go in there, if you have time. It’s well worth a visit.’

  They climbed into Feinstein’s car, a grey Lexus convertible with the top down. Max tried to get in the back, but the promoter insisted he take the front passenger seat next to him. Max sighed inwardly. He was already beginning to realize that Feinstein – like Sheldon Mackenzie – enjoyed the sound of his own voice.

  ‘Why don’t I show you some of the sights of the city on our way to the bridge?’ he said. ‘You been here before? No? It’s the most attractive city in the whole US. And don’t just take my word for that, look around you. Where else do you get views like this? The Pacific Ocean that way, the bay over there, hills up to the north. An hour’s drive and you’re in the wine country of Napa and Sonoma. An hour after that and you can be skiing in the Sierra Nevada mountains. That’s why people love to live here.’

  Feinstein started up the car and pulled off, maintaining his almost continuous monologue as they toured the city, going up a hill to Haight-Ashbury, which the promoter said was where all the hippies had gathered for the ‘Summer of Love’ back in the 1960s. Max listened politely, though he’d never heard of the Summer of Love, and the 1960s seemed to him as long ago as the Stone Age.

  After that, they drove through a huge stretch of open parkland that Feinstein called Golden Gate Park, the road sweeping in long curves between lawns and gardens and imposing stands of redwood trees.

  ‘This park goes all the way to the ocean,’ the promoter said. The wind was gusting in through the car’s open top, blowing his long hair into his face. ‘There’s everything here. Lakes, a golf course, botanical gardens, a Japanese tea garden, even a paddock full of buffalo. Imagine that, buffalo in the centre of a densely populated city like San Francisco.’

  The road began to descend a gentle hill and Max saw the Pacific Ocean directly in front of them. There were surfers in wet suits out in the breakers, people sunbathing and flying kites on the long beach, but there was almost no one swimming in the sea – it looked too dangerous for bathing.

  Feinstein turned right onto the coast road and headed north. The Golden Gate Bridge came gradually into view, the tops of the towers first, then the rest of the superstructure. Feinstein drove through a short tunnel and they emerged into a car park beside the toll plaza for the bridge.

  ‘We have to leave the car here and do the next bit on foot,’ he explained.

  They got out of the Lexus and walked across the car park. Feinstein pointed to an orange metal container, about the size of a garden shed, that occupied one of the parking bays. ‘That contains all your equipment from London,’ he said. ‘I’ll have it moved up onto the bridge tomorrow.’

  They walked up past the toll plaza and along the footpath next to the freeway, the cars racing past only a couple of feet away. Max could smell exhaust fumes, feel the ground shaking beneath him. The vibrations got worse as they walked further out onto the bridge. So did the roar of the traffic. The footpath was three metres wide and ther
e was a chest-high fence between it and the carriageway, but the vehicles speeding by produced a draught strong enough to buffet Max’s body and ruffle his hair.

  It took them nearly ten minutes to reach the middle of the bridge. Max leaned on the guard rail, looking down at the green, opaque water. It was a long drop.

  ‘It’s quite an engineering feat, isn’t it?’ Feinstein said proudly. ‘It was the biggest in the world when it was built, back in 1937. It’s one point seven miles long, the towers are seven hundred and forty-six feet high and the roadway we’re standing on is two hundred and twenty feet above the water – that’s about seventy metres.’

  Max nodded, though he already knew all those facts. He also knew the water was just over a hundred metres deep, that there was a difference of nearly four metres between high and low water and that the tide rushed in under the bridge at sixty miles an hour. He’d done his research thoroughly before he left London, needing to know exactly what this stunt was going to entail.

  He turned his head, looking along the footpath to a phone on the side of a lamppost. A sign above the phone read: Emergency phone and crisis counselling. There is hope. Make the call. The consequences of jumping from this bridge are fatal and tragic.

  ‘It’s a favourite spot for suicides,’ Feinstein said, seeing where Max was looking. ‘Jump off the side into the water. From this height, it’s like hitting concrete.’

  Max knew that too, though he didn’t want to be reminded of it. He was going to be lowered off here in a wooden crate suspended from a rope. If the rope snapped, he knew he would never survive the fall.

  ‘Let’s go through the timetable again,’ he said. ‘I do the stunt at ten p.m. tomorrow night.’

  ‘That’s right. But two of the northbound lanes will be closed from eight p.m. All shipping traffic under the bridge will also cease at that time. There’ll only be two safety boats down there – one on the east side of the bridge, one on the west, both with teams of divers on board in case anything goes wrong. Not that anything will, of course,’ Feinstein added hurriedly. He gave a reassuring smile. ‘I have complete confidence in you, Max.’