He gaped at me, then ran back down the hall to phone. I waited for him to return and then we entered the elevator. His eyes had gone opaque. I pressed the lobby-floor button and we rode down; I could hear his breathing. The doors slid open and we stepped out into the lobby and Cartlidge wiped the sweat off his face. He gave me a wry inquiring look. “I take it you found your fact.”
“I think so.”
“Want to share it?”
“Not just yet. Not until I’m sure. Let’s get to the conference building.”
We used the side exit. The car was waiting, engine running, driver armed.
I could have told Cartlidge which one was Gregorius but there was a remote chance I was wrong and I didn’t like making a fool of myself.
Caracas is a curiously Scandinavian city—the downtown architecture is modern and sterile; even the hillside slums are colorful and appear clean. The wealth of 20th century oil has shaped the city and there isn’t much about its superficial appearance, other than the Spanish-language neon signs, to suggest it’s a Latin town. Traffic is clotted with big expensive cars and the boulevards are self-consciously elegant. Most of the establishments in the central shopping district are branches of American and European companies: banks, appliances, coutouriers, Cadillac showrooms. It doesn’t look the sort of place where bombs could go off: Terrorism doesn’t suit it. One pictures Gregorius and his kind in the shabby crumbling wretched rancid passageways of Cairo or Beirut. Caracas? No; too hygienic.
As we parked the car the walkie-talkies crackled with static. It was one of Cartlidge’s lads—they’d found the armed device on the hotel’s fire stairs. Any heavy man could have set it off. But by then I was no longer surprised by how indiscriminate Gregorius could be, his chilly indifference to the risk to innocents.
We had twenty minutes before the scheduled arrivals of the ministers. I said, “It’ll be here somewhere. The bomb.”
“Why?”
“It’s the only place he can be sure they’ll turn up on schedule. Are the three suspects still under surveillance? Check them out.”
He hunched over the walkie-talkie while I turned the volume knob of mine down to get rid of the distracting noise and climbed out of the car and had my look around; I bounced the walkie-talkie in my palm absently while I considered the possibilities. The broad steps of the palacio where the conference of OPEC ministers would transpire were roped off and guarded by dark-faced cops in Sam Brownes. On the wide landing that separated the two massive flights of steps was a circular fountain that sprayed gaily; normally people sat on the tile ring that contained it but today the security people had cleared the place. There wasn’t much of a crowd; it wasn’t going to be the kind of spectacle that would draw any public interest. There was no television equipment; a few reporters clustered off to one side with microphones and tape recorders. Routine traffic, both vehicular and pedestrian. That was useful because it meant Gregorius wouldn’t be able to get in close; there would be no crowd to screen him.
Still, it wasn’t too helpful. All it meant was that he would use a remote-control device to trigger the bomb.
Cartlidge lowered the walkie-talkie from his face. “Did you hear?”
“No.” I had difficulty hearing him now as well: the fountain made white noise, the constant gnashing of water, and I moved closer to him while he scowled at my own walkie-talkie. His eyes accused me forlornly. “Would it kill you to use it? All three accounted for. One in his room, one at the hotel pool, one in the dining room having his breakfast.”
I looked up past the rooftops. I could see the upper floors of the Hotel Tamanaco—it sits on high ground on the outskirts—and beyond it the tiny swaying shape of a cable car ascending the lofty mountain. Cotton ball clouds over the peaks. Caracas is cupped in the palm of the mountains; its setting is fabulous. I said to Cartlidge, “He has a thing about stairs, doesn’t he.”
“What?”
“The Hamburg Bahnhof—the bomb was on the platform stairway. The Cairo job, again stairs. This morning, the hotel fire stairs. That’s the thing about stairways—they’re funnels.” I pointed at the flight of stone steps that led up to the portals of the palacio. “The ministers have to climb them to get inside.”
“Stone stairs. How could he hide a bomb there? You can’t get underneath them. Everything’s in plain sight.”
I brooded upon it. He was right. But it had to be: suddenly I realized it had to be—because I was here and the Saudi’s limousine was drawing up at the curb and it meant Gregorius could get both of us with one shot and then I saw the Venezuelan minister walk out of the building and start down the stairs to meet the limousine and it was even more perfect for Gregorius: all three with one explosion. It had to be: right here, right now.
Where was the damned thing? Where?
I had the feeling I needed to find the answer within about seven seconds because it was going to take the Venezuelan minister that long to come this far down the steps while the Saudi was getting out of the limousine; already the Venezuelan was nearly down to the fountain and the Saudi was ducking his berobed head and poking a foot out of the car toward the pavement. The entourage of Arab dignitaries had hurried out of the second limousine and they were forming a double column on the steps for the Saudi to walk through; a police captain drew himself to attention, saluting; coming down the stairs the Venezuelan minister had a wide welcoming smile across his austere handsome face.
They’d picked the limousine at random from a motor pool of six. So it couldn’t be in the car.
It couldn’t be on the steps because the palacio had been guarded inside and out for nearly a week and it had been searched half an hour ago by electronic devices, dogs and human eyes.
It couldn’t be in the fountain either. That had been too obvious. We’d exercised special care in searching the fountain; it had only been switched on ten minutes earlier. In any case you can’t plant a bomb under water because the water absorbs the force of the explosion and all you get is a big bubble and a waterspout.
In other words there was no way for Gregorius to have planted a bomb here. And yet I knew he had done so. I knew where Gregorius was; I knew he had field glasses to his eyes and his finger on the remote-control button that would trigger the bomb by radio signal. When the Saudi met the Venezuelan and they shook hands on the steps not a dozen feet from me Gregorius would set it off.
Six seconds now. The Venezuelan came past the fountain.
The walkie-talkie in my hand crackled with static but I didn’t turn it up. The mind raced at Grand Prix speed. If he didn’t plant the bomb beforehand—and I knew he hadn’t—then there had to be a delivery system.
Five seconds. Gregorius: cold, brutal, neat, ingenious. Then I knew—I was the bomb.
Four seconds and my arm swung back. It has been a long time since I threw a football and I had to pray the instinct was still in the arm and then I was watching the walkie-talkie soar over the Venezuelan’s head and I could only stand and watch while it lofted and descended. It struck the near lip of the fountain and for a moment it looked ready to fall back onto the stairs but then it tipped over the rim and went into the water.
His reaction time would be slowed by distance and the awkwardness of handling binoculars and the unexpectedness of my move. Instinctively he reached for the trigger button but by the time he pressed it the walkie-talkie had gone into the water. The explosion wasn’t loud. Water blistered at the surface and a crack appeared in the surrounding rim; little spouts began to break through the shattered concrete; a great frothy mushroom of water bubbled up over the surface and cascaded down the steps.
Nobody was hurt.
* * *
—
We went into the hotel fast. I was talking to Cartlidge: “I assume the one who’s still upstairs in his room is the blond one with the crew cut.”
“How the hell did you know that?”
“He’s Gregorius. He had to have a vantage point.”
Gregorius was still there in the room because he’d had no reason to believe we’d tumbled to his identity. He was as conceited as I; he was sure he hadn’t made any mistake to give himself away. He was wrong, of course. He’d made only one but it was enough.
Cartlidge’s bomb squad lads were our flying wedge. They kicked the door in and we walked right in on him and he looked at all the guns and decided to sit still.
His window overlooked the palacio and the binoculars were on the sill. I said to Cartlidge, “Have a look for the transmitter. He hasn’t had time to hide it too far away.”
The Blond said, “What is this about?” All injured innocence.
I said, “It’s finished, Gregorius.”
He wasn’t going to admit a thing but I did see the brief flash of rage in his eyes; it was all the confirmation I needed. I gave him my best smile. “You’ll be pleased to talk in time.”
They searched him, handcuffed him, gave the room a toss and didn’t find anything; later that day the transmitter turned up in a cleaning-supplies cupboard down the hall.
To this day Cartlidge still isn’t sure we got the right man because nobody ever told him what happened after we got Gregorius back to the States. Myerson and I know the truth. The computer kids in Debriefing sweated Gregorius for weeks and finally he broke and they’re still analyzing the wealth of information he has supplied. I’d lost interest by that time; my part of it was finished and I knew from the start that I’d got the right man. I don’t make that kind of mistake; it didn’t need confirmation from the shabby hypodermics of Debriefing. As I’d said to Myerson, “The binoculars on the windowsill clinched it, of course. When the Venezuelan and the Saudi shook hands he planned to trigger it—it was the best way to hit all three of us. But I knew it had to be The Blond much earlier. I suppose I might have arrested him first before we went looking for the bomb but I wasn’t absolutely certain.”
“Don’t lie,” Myerson said. “You wanted him to be watching you in his binoculars—you wanted him to know you were the one who defused him. One of these days your brain’s going to slow down a notch or two. Next time maybe it’ll blow up before you throw it in the pond. But all right, since you’re waiting for me to ask—how did you pick the blond one?”
“We knew until recently he’d worn his hair hippie length.”
“So?”
“I saw him at the pool toweling himself dry. I saw him shake his head back the way you do when you want to get the hair back out of your eyes. He had a crew cut. He wouldn’t have made that gesture unless he’d cut his hair so recently that he still had the old habit.”
Myerson said, “It took you twelve hours to figure that out? You are getting old, Charlie.”
“And hungry. Have you got anything to eat around here?”
“No.”
FLIGHT INTO DISASTER
ERLE STANLEY GARDNER
WHEN THINKING ABOUT Erle Stanley Gardner (1889–1970), numbers pop out that would impress even the most blasé. He created the most famous criminal defense attorney in literature, Perry Mason, when he published The Case of the Velvet Claws on March 1, 1933, and went on to produce eighty Mason novels which, in all editions, have sold more than three hundred million copies.
Gardner began his lengthy writing career in the pulps in Breezy Stories in 1921, eventually producing hundreds of short stories, countless articles, more than a hundred novels, and numerous nonfiction books on the law and, as a noted outdoorsman, on travel and environmental issues. At the time of his death, he was the bestselling writer in the history of American literature.
The Perry Mason novels were the ultimate in formulaic genre fiction, with the lawyer taking on the role of detective to prove his client innocent at trial, turning at the end to point a finger at the real culprit, who generally broke down and confessed. The television series based on the character, starring Raymond Burr, was enormously successful for nine years, running from September 21, 1957, to May 22, 1966, and showing in reruns pretty much ever since.
The relentless popularity of the Burr TV series suggested it should be tried again, resulting in the 1973 debut of The New Perry Mason, a series of hour-long programs starring Monte Markham in the title role and Sharon Acker as Della. Generally criticized as lacking the power of the original series, it was short-lived.
During the 1940s and early 1950s, Mason had a successful career on several radio programs, most notably a Monday-through-Friday afternoon serial with John Larkin as the lawyer and Joan Alexander as a cool Della.
The novels had quickly become so popular that, inevitably, Hollywood wasn’t far behind. A half dozen Perry Mason films were made between 1934 and 1937, with Warren William in the first four with different female stars in each, including Mary Astor in the first, The Case of the Howling Dog (1934), Margaret Lindsay in the second, The Case of the Curious Bride (1935), followed by Genevieve Tobin in The Case of the Lucky Legs (1935), and Winifred Shaw in The Case of the Velvet Claws (1936). Ricardo Cortez and June Travis starred in The Case of the Black Cat (1936), then Donald Woods and Ann Dvorak ended the Warner Brothers series with The Case of the Stuttering Bishop (1937).
“Flight into Disaster” was originally published in the May 11, 1952, issue of This Week Magazine.
FLIGHT INTO DISASTER
ERLE STANLEY GARDNER
ONLY ONCE BEFORE had the woman in the club car ever known panic—not merely fear but the real panic which paralyzes the senses.
That had been in the mountains when she had tried to take a short cut to camp. When she realized she was lost there was a sudden overpowering desire to run. What was left of her sanity warned her, but panic made her feel that only by flight could she escape the menace of the unknown. The silent mountains, the somber woods, had suddenly become enemies, leering in hostility. Only by running did she feel she could escape—by running—the very worst thing she could have done.
Now, surrounded by the luxury of a crack transcontinental train, she again experienced that same panic. Once more there was that overpowering desire to run.
Someone had searched her compartment while she had been at dinner. She knew it was a man. He had tried to leave things just as he had found them, but there were little things that a woman would have noticed that the man didn’t even see. Her plaid coat, which had been hung in the little steel closet so that the back was to the door, had been turned so the buttons were toward the door. A little thing, but a significant thing which had been the first to catch her attention, leaving her, for the moment, cold and numb. Now, seated in the club car, she strove to maintain an attitude of outward calm by critically inspecting her hands. Actually she was taking stock of the men who were in the car.
Her problem was complicated by the fact that she was a compactly formed young woman, with smooth lines, clear eyes, a complete quota of curves, and under ordinary circumstances, a latent smile always quivering at the corners of her mouth. It was, therefore, only natural that every male animal in the club car sat up and took notice.
The fat man across the aisle who held a magazine in his pudgy hands was not reading. He sat like a Buddha, motionless, his half-closed, lazy-lidded eyes fixed upon some imaginary horizon far beyond the confines of the car—yet she felt those eyes were taking a surreptitious interest in everything she did. There was something sinister about him, from the big diamond on the middle finger of his right hand to the rather ornate twenty-five-dollar cravat which begged for attention above the bulging expanse of his vest.
Then there was the man in the chair on her right. He hadn’t spoken to her but she knew that he was going to, waiting only for an opportunity to make his remark sound like the casual comment of a fellow passenger.
He was in his late twenties, bronzed by exposure, steely-blue of eye. His mouth held the firmness of a man who has learned to command
first himself and then others. The train lurched. The man’s hand reached for the glass on the little stand between them. He glanced apprehensively at her skirt.
“Sorry,” he said.
“It didn’t spill,” she replied almost automatically.
“I’ll lower the danger point,” he said, raising the glass to his lips. “Going all the way through? I’m getting off at six o’clock in a cold Wyoming morning.”
For a moment her panic-numbed brain failed to appreciate the full significance of his remark, then she experienced a sudden surge of relief. Here, then, was one man whom she could trust. She knew that the man who had searched her baggage hadn’t found what he wanted because she had it with her, neatly folded, fastened to the bottom of her left foot by strong adhesive tape. Therefore the enemy would stay on the train as long as she was on it, waiting, watching, growing more and more desperate, until at last, perhaps in the dead of night, he would…She knew only too well that he would stop at nothing. One murder had already been committed.
But now she had found one person whom she could trust, a man who had no interest in the thing she was hiding, a man who might well be a possible protector.
He seemed mildly surprised at her sudden friendliness.
“I didn’t know this train stopped anywhere at that ungodly hour,” she ventured, smiling.
“A flag stop,” he explained.
Across the aisle the fat man had not moved a muscle, yet she felt absolutely certain that those glittering eyes were concentrating on her and that he was listening as well as watching.
“You live in Wyoming?” she asked.
“I did as a boy. Now I’m going back. I lived and worked on my uncle’s cattle ranch. He died and left it to me. At first I thought I’d sell it. It would bring a small fortune. But now I’m tired of the big cities, I’m going back to live on the ranch.”
The Big Book of Espionage Page 68
