Triple Trap

by William H Hallahan

  “I’m fully prepared to proceed,” Chessmann said.

  “When will it be?”

  “Tomorrow night. During the night.”

  “Where shall I send the package?”

  “To my hotel. I will give you the address. Once I receive it, I will complete the operation. I am sure the Washington newspapers will be full of it. Another drug crime.”

  Revin traveled to Zurich for his monthly meeting with Gogol.

  Revin admired Gogol as one admires a tiger, a splendid predator, ideally suited to his times and environment. But although Gogol could kill with no qualms, he was not a Chessmann; he wouldn’t kill for a living. Revin wondered if Brewer could kill without qualms.

  The purpose of his meeting with Gogol in Zurich was to go over the Blue List of Acquisitions issued by the committee each month.

  Gogol became irritated with the length of the list. “That committee will ride a willing horse to death. What do those people think I am, a human railroad? Look at all this nonsense. Have all the other supply lines broken down?”

  Gogol sighed. He was tired, and not eager for this quarrel. “As you know, there’s a customs crackdown all over Europe. They’ve finally awakened—the Germans, the French, the Austrians, the Italians—all of them. They talk of nothing else but the conventional military posture of Russia. After years of selling us billions of dollars in weaponry, now no one wants us to have so much as a nut or a bolt. It’s taxing the resources of the whole Directorate to get matériel through the new customs barriers.”

  Gogol looked sourly at Revin. “You know, Viktor,” he said, “if that committee were a herd of horses, there would be more horses’ asses than horses.” He cast the Blue List aside. “As a condition of existence, every committee on earth should be flogged once a week. How much more difficult they make things.”

  “We will give you some relief soon, I hope,” Revin said.

  “How?”

  “Brewer. We will soon finish him off.”

  “Skip it, Viktor. The time to have killed Brewer is past.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Brewer’s more valuable alive than dead.”

  “That’s absolute nonsense! There’s too much at stake. And Brewer is too dangerous. I don’t approve of contract killing. You know that. But in this instance, it must be done.”

  “How will they do it this time? Maybe the committee is going to stone Brewer to death with marshmallows.”

  “No. I handled the details personally this time. I’m using a highly experienced professional named Chessmann who is going to make it seem a drug-related death.”

  “I see. And when will Chessmann make this drug-related death take place?” Gogol asked.

  “Tonight. Late tonight.”

  “In Washington?” Gogol asked.

  “In Brewer’s car.”

  Gogol folded the Blue List and pushed it into a pocket. “This is the last time I handle a list this long. You tell the committee I simply cannot maintain my effectiveness and at the same time deliver the absurd quantities they are asking for. Tell them that for me, Viktor. Revoir.”

  In a mink-lined trench coat, in a mink fedora with a quail’s plume, in a long white scarf, always like Pan piping the spring, Gogol exited.

  From his car Gogol telephoned for plane reservations: a flight from Zurich to Paris and then a Concorde flight from Paris to Washington.

  He drove directly to the airport and there awaited his flight. Shortly later, he received an overnight bag from the estate chauffeur.

  “Did you break my speed record?” he asked the chauffeur.

  “Never,” the chauffeur said. “The road is snow-covered in the passes again. Have a good trip.”

  Less than an hour later Gogol was airborne to Paris. With great good luck he would arrive in Washington just in time to stop Brewer’s assassination.

  Chapter 31

  Chessmann took a last, careful walk through the furnished apartment he’d leased, murmuring to himself as he went.

  “Brewer has been smuggling heroin into the U.S. for some time. And selling it to Waley. After his last trip, he met with Waley here. Their fingerprints are all over the place, with traces of heroin and some marijuana paraphernalia.” He pointed at the kitchen cabinet with a gloved finger. “They have a strong disagreement over money. Brewer gets nasty and makes threats, and Waley decides to kill him personally.”

  Chessmann went to a briefcase and took out a pistol with a suppressor. He had made a change of plans; Brewer’s apartment posed too many problems; therefore he would kill him in his car. At least, he would stage it so that Skits Waley killed Brewer in his car. From the backseat. One shot through the back of the head.

  “After he kills Brewer in his car, he needs to get off the street quickly. So he brings the weapon back here, planning to get rid of it later.” He walked into the kitchen. “He wipes the prints off it and wraps it in this cloth and puts it in the cabinet under the sink, behind the garbage disposal unit. But, due to haste, he leaves a clear thumbprint on the barrel of the suppressor. A fatal error for him.”

  Chessmann walked back to his briefcase and lifted up the roll of clear tape with Chessmann’s fingerprints on it. “I’ll put the fingerprint on it after I bring the weapon back here.” He turned around and looked at everything. “The keys from the landlord.” He struggled to get his gloved hand into his overcoat pocket and lifted out the two keys the landlord had sent to him by messenger. They were tied together with a piece of green grosgrain ribbon along with a plastic tag that gave the address and apartment number. “These are left at the scene of the crime, in the backseat of Brewer’s car. And this extra set of keys I will use to get back in here to put the weapon under the sink. I throw these keys away and board my flight back to Germany. Now—rehearsal for the murder.” He pushed the weapon into the briefcase, took one final look around the apartment, and went out.

  The parking lot behind the bowling alley in Crystal City was already filling when Chessmann got there. It was just after dark, and he carefully checked the lighting. It was poor, a number of the lamps on the poles were out, yet there was still too much light. Chessmann got a pellet gun from his glove compartment and stepped out of the car. He scanned the parking lot, saw no one, and aimed at one of the lamps. It went out like the wink of an eye. He gazed about and shot out another. And another. Six, all told.

  Then he got into the backseat of his car and examined his costume. Black overcoat, black socks and shoes, black gloves and black ski mask. In his hand he held a swivel-headed mirror on a long wand. He lay on his back and side on the floor of the backseat and pulled the black ski mask over his head. He raised the mirror by the wand and studied the appearance of his body by the poor light of the parking lot. His entire figure was a dark blob, an unreflective black mass that blended with the darkness of the backseat. Perfect. “Camera and action,” he said. He pushed the button on a stopwatch.

  “Brewer shoots pool and comes back to his car and gets in. When the door slams, Waley sits up, aims the gun”—Chessmann slipped the weapon and suppressor from his coat sleeve—“at the back of Brewer’s head, gangland style, and pulls the trigger. Pfft! No sound.” Chessmann raised himself higher. “Brewer slumps forward over the steering wheel. And Waley puts another bullet into the back of his head for insurance. Waley then gets up and out of Brewer’s car, goes over to his own car, and drives off to the apartment where he will conceal the weapon.” Chessmann stepped out of his car. “Twelve seconds.” Chessmann looked about the parking lot. “But Waley has forgotten one thing. Brewer’s keys to the apartment.” Chessmann dropped the keys with the plastic tag on the driver’s seat of his car then sat down on them. “When the police pull Brewer’s body from the car, what do they find but this set of keys—which leads them to the apartment and the gun and Waley’s fingerprints and the other incriminating evidence.” He opened the door to the backseat and got inside. “Once more with feeling.” He laid down, clicked the stopwatch, and
went through the motions again. “Eleven seconds.”

  Chessmann got into the driver’s seat and started the motor. “And now for the finale,” he said, and drove to Brewer’s apartment.

  At the airport Gogol stood by the cab stand. Almost immediately a car drove up and Gogol stepped inside.

  “The pistol is in the glove compartment,” Nevans said as he drove off. “Brewer’s address and a map are in there also. The map has an X where Brewer lives. When you’re finished, park the car back here in parking section A and leave it. I’ll take care of it.”

  “Where’s Brewer?”

  The driver looked at his watch. “In about forty-five minutes he should arrive home. He gets his mail then drives over to a bowling alley in Crystal City where he spends his evenings shooting pool. I think what you are doing borders on madness. Brewer should die. You don’t appreciate how dangerous he is. The last thing you should do is save his life.”

  “Enough,” Gogol said.

  Nevans stopped the car at the edge of the airport parking lot and, without a word, stepped out and walked over to a parked car.

  Gogol walked around to the driver’s side and got in. He drove fast to Washington—to Brewer’s house. If you want to find a mouse, go to a mousetrap. From there he was going to have to improvise. He had one primary advantage. Surprise. The killer was not expecting him to interfere.

  Gogol parked beside a fire hydrant where he had a clear view of Brewer’s building and turned his lights out. The headlights of passing cars illuminated the parked cars ahead of him, and he soon realized that a man was sitting in a car across the street, with his lights out and his motor running. Gogol decided it was Chessmann. A few minutes went by. The bitter cold penetrated the car, and Gogol started his motor to operate the heater. A car went by and stopped in front of Brewer’s building.

  The man who got out was unmistakably Brewer. He stepped into his vestibule, opened his mailbox, then returned to his car. When he drove off, the other driver followed him.

  “Ah-ha,” Gogol said. “The cat and the mouse.” Now he was sure it was Chessmann. He followed them both.

  Brewer drove quickly through the streets and over the bridge to Crystal City and entered a parking lot behind a billiards parlor and bowling alley. It was very dark. Chessmann went slowly by then circled the block and came back. He parked too. Gogol circled the block once more and drove back slowly with his lights out.

  Brewer’s car was empty. Chessmann was standing beside it, scanning the area. Brewer was nowhere to be seen.

  Gogol weighed his chances. It was quite dark. There were no pedestrians. Brewer had walked off somewhere. Gogol opened the glove compartment and pulled out the pistol. There would be no finesse to this. He would drive as close as he could to Chessmann, take aim and shoot. Even if he failed to kill, a serious wound would stop him.

  He checked the chamber of the pistol, screwed on the suppressor barrel, and was about to drive when Chessmann turned and went back to his own car. And there he paused. He scanned the area again, opened his car door, abruptly ducked his head and got inside.

  Gogol began to drive slowly, his car lights out. He rolled down the window as he approached Chessmann’s car. Chessmann had become almost invisible: he wore a black ski mask over his face. Suddenly Chessmann flung his arms violently. In the bad light Gogol saw a pistol and suppressor in Chessmann’s hand. He was trying to aim it behind him, toward the backseat. The gun went off and the back window shattered. Chessmann cried out and pumped another shot backward. His legs were up now and his heels were kicking at the passenger’s front window. Another shot collapsed a back window. Chessmann’s whole body was thrashing and struggling. At last Gogol understood. Brewer was in the backseat of Chessmann’s car with his arm in a stranglehold around Chessmann’s neck. And Chessmann was trying to shoot behind him with his free hand.

  Chessmann struggled furiously and finally kicked out the passenger window. His raised hand kept pulling the trigger, but there were no more bullets. The kicking slowed. Then stopped. Gogol quietly backed his car away and waited. Brewer stepped out of the backseat, entered his own car, and drove away.

  Now Gogol pulled up to Chessmann’s car and looked in. The body lay against the door with one foot stuck out of the broken window. He still wore the black ski mask.

  Gogol looked after the red taillights of Brewer’s car as they moved away. For the first time he felt a chill in his gut. He remembered Revin’s question: “Have you ever seen a ferret go after a rat?”

  “Ego!” Revin cried. “What have you done? Do you have any idea?”

  “I did nothing,” Gogol said. “Brewer took care of it himself.”

  “But you went there to save him,” Revin said. He pulled Gogol by the arm along the walkway outside the Zurich airport. Everytime he spoke, vapor exploded from his mouth.

  “I told you,” Gogol said. “Brewer is valuable now.”

  Revin shook both fists in air. “I will tell you what you have done. Just when your country needs your help most desperately, you have put your own ego first. You know we have to win this issue. We must! We need every advantage. You know how dangerous this Brewer is. We simply cannot let him be a threat any longer.” Revin stopped and turned Gogol to face him.

  “You wanted to save him for your own ego,” he said. “You want to beat the best they have in front of the whole world, rub the committee’s nose in the shit again. What you are doing is grandstanding—gratifying your own ego. A selfish little boy showing off.” He held a finger under Gogol’s nose. “If you fail, you won’t have one voice to speak up for you on the committee. Not even mine!” Revin turned and walked away.

  Gogol shrugged. “I can beat him,” he said.

  Part Six

  Chapter 32

  Brewer was taken by surprise when the call from Chernie came. He was in the middle of his living room, surrounded by the maps he’d hung up, sitting in the midst of countless copies of waybills, freight vouchers, and other documents, carefully piecing together all of the Russian smuggler’s many operations, identifying his habitual procedures, listing his predictable behavior patterns, when his beeper went off.

  “Your cleaner called,” the message center told him. The message couldn’t have come at a worse time. A second snowstorm, stronger than the first, was heading directly for the East Coast. It was just a few minutes after noon. He put on his coat and went down to his car. The new storm had already started, and the stark whiteness of the new snow was already covering the dirty gray mounds of the old.

  He drove past three pay phones before he felt safe. Brewer’s Law Number Three: all phones in Washington are bugged, especially pay phones. He rang Chernie’s Manhattan phone twice then waited five minutes to allow Chernie to get down the street to the pay phone by the all-night pharmacy on Forty-third Street. He dialed that number.

  “I have what you want,” Chernie said. “What you asked for.”

  “Fine.”

  “Special delivery. Personally. Right away.”

  “Of course. Give me a little time to set it up.”

  “I haven’t got a little time,” Chernie said. “It must be right away.”

  “Yes,” Brewer said. “Right away.”

  “Today. It must be today. And it must be you. No substitutes. Your system is riddled. Soviet informants. Don’t trust anyone, Charlie. You come alone.”

  “Stay where you are. I’ll get right back to you.”

  Brewer stood in the freezing phone booth in the middle of Washington in the midst of a growing snowstorm and felt a great elation. “I have what you want.” Chernie knew who X was. But Chernie also sounded desperate. Panicked. Brewer wondered if he could get to the man in time. He dialed another number.

  “This is Brewer,” he said. “You wanted in? You’re in. And I hope you don’t live to regret it.”

  “I’m ready,” Sauer said. “What’s next?”

  “We need at least two more.”

  “How about Court and Maida Cony
ers.”

  “How well do you know Court?”

  “I’ve known him about four years,” Sauer said. “He was with me in Vienna.”

  “Conyers is the lady with the red umbrella?”

  “She’s better than ninety-nine percent of the men in this business.”

  “Get them. I’ll call you back.”

  Brewer needed a helicopter. He dialed another number.

  “Now?” the voice asked. “Today? Brewer, tell me you don’t want it now.”

  “What’s wrong with right now?” Brewer asked.

  “Wrong? Look out of the window, Brewer.”

  “So? You can’t get me a bird?”

  “The bird I can get. The pilot crazy enough to fly it in a snowstorm with high winds—that’s what I can’t get.”

  “Come on. It’s just snow.”

  “Snow? The Midwest is paralyzed. All the airports as far east as Pittsburgh are closed. Dulles expects to be socked in within a few hours. So does JFK in New York. This storm is a lot bigger than the last one. Where do you want to go?”

  “Manhattan. The top of the Pan Am Building.”

  “Brewer, are you crazy? That Pan Am pad’s been closed for years. The FAA closed it because it’s too dangerous. And you want to land on it in a snowstorm. Those winds will slam the bird against the walls of the building.”

  “If that happens, I’ll be very unhappy.”

  “Pick another pad.”

  “East Side in the Forties near the U.N. building.”

  “I don’t think I can put this together today, Brewer. Can it wait twenty-four hours?”

  “We have to move now. My man is halfway out of his skin. He could be in a real jam.”

  “Ho-boy. I’ll have to get back to you.”

  “Make it fast. And don’t fail me.”

  “Brewer, you’re the only guy on earth who could get me to try this. Listen. You have any idea what they’ll do to me and a lot of other people if anything happens to that bird?”

  “You have any idea what will happen if I don’t rescue my man?”