Tiger Milk

by David Garth

  In her room he threw open the doors of her balcony and then, about to leave, paused.

  “The Señorita knows that her passport must be initialed by the military commandant at the last point of departure in Spain?”

  “I know it,” Berkeley said. “But I don’t understand why.”

  “Quién sabe, Señorita? There is so much of confusion these days, so much of regulations. It is but a formality.” He bowed to her. “We live to serve the Señorita Britton,” he said politely, and withdrew.

  The girl pulled off her turban and shook her head to free her thick chestnut hair. Then lounging down in a chair she extended long straight legs out before her and reached in her coat pocket for a small batch of cables clipped together.

  They were all from her father. She had read them several times, but now, again, she studied them reflectively.

  MAN NAMED TRESH HAS VITAL INFORMATION FOR ME. SUGGESTED HE CONVEY IT THROUGH YOU.

  That had been the first one. She had received it shortly before she left Geneva. Three days later she had received the second.

  COULD YOU STOP VALLERON EN ROUTE LISBON. YOU KNOW TRESH IS POLITICIAN WHO LEFT STATES BEFORE INDICTMENT TWO YEARS AGO. IF POSSIBLE SEE WHAT HE WANTS, BUT LET NOTHING PREVENT YOUR DEPARTURE AS PLANNED.

  Her father must have been thinking the matter over because there had been a cable waiting for her in Madrid.

  YOUR MOTHER WORRIED. USE OWN JUDGMENT TRESH SITUATION. PLEASE HURRY HOME.

  Berkeley smiled and stuck the messages back in her pocket. Well, she could not hurry any more than she was. The Clipper did not take off for four days. In the meantime she had better get busy with this strange Mr. Tresh who had turned up ill in Valleron, with a male nurse in attendance.

  She wrote a short note and pressed the bell for the porter.

  The reason for the comparative quiet of the little hotel was well expressed at luncheon. In the dining patio there were scarcely more than a dozen people. They occupied scattered tables in the delightful patio, with its small circular tiled pool and profusion of lowering vines that spilled over the low white walls, and all of them were under the scrutiny of an unobtrusive, graying gentleman who sat before the great window of the solarium and puffed leisurely on a short briar.

  He glanced up as another man entered the solarium and nodded tentatively.

  “Good morning,” said the other and sat down in a wicker chair nearby.

  “Topping.”

  They smoked together in silence. Finally, the unobtrusive little gentleman removed his pipe from his mouth.

  “Did you discover who all those people are down there, Murray?” he asked in a low conversational tone.

  The man, Murray, nodded.

  “The Spanish people are all here for the waters.”

  “I’m interested in the people going to Lisbon.”

  “That threesome down there is Franklin Carver and his children,” said Murray quietly. “He is the European manager of some American business concern. They are leaving tomorrow afternoon for Lisbon.”

  The little man sucked on his pipe and studied the threesome pensively. Carver, the American business executive, was a thickset man with a preoccupied air. His children appeared to be of college age, the girl sleekly blonde and with a pert heart-shaped face, the young man a rather disjointed-looking person in slip over striped jersey and slacks belted with a necktie. The little man’s eyes left them and rested on a young woman and a stout elderly man who was full of French mannerisms.

  “That is Linda Baker, of Philadelphia,” said Murray. “She has been studying at the Paris Conservatory. With her is DesLoge, the piano maestro, who fled to Spain for refuge.”

  The other grunted and once again drew moodily on his dead pipe. Murray’s voice, casual and low as ever, described two other diners in the patio below. “That big young man in tweeds is Philip Courtney, an architect who has been in Europe on a Thomas Fellowship, and the one over at the table in the corner is a Mr. Wilson Gayne, a literary critic who has been over here to see some foreign author living in exile. They are waiting for the Lisbon train, too.”

  The quick eyes of the little man took them both under scrutiny in turn. Courtney was a big chap. With his close-cropped tawny hair and angular height he gave the impression of some former university oarsman. Wilson Gayne was a dumpy elderly man with a cherubic face and thinning hair.

  For a few minutes there was silence in the solarium. Murray mashed out his cigarette and sat back. His chief, the little graying man with the bright quick eyes of a bird, stared down at the luncheon patio absorbed.

  “That’s the lot?” he said.

  “Well, there’s that German officer and his aide from the aviation mission in Madrid,” said Murray. “They dine privately, Mr. Rogge.”

  “I know about them,” said little Mr. Rogge. “They are here for a few days to enjoy themselves.”

  He turned away from the great window. Murray rose and accompanied him as he left the solarium. There was no one in the foyer except one porter dozing on a bench. They mounted the stairs together, exchanging companionable comments on the clay, and strolled clown the corridor to their room. Murray locked the door behind them.

  Mr. Rogge did not say anything for a long time. He locked his hands behind his back and stared speculatively out over the balcony. Finally he turned and rejoined his companion, sitting down and bending toward him to keep his voice low.

  “I have gone after a dangerous man before,” he said in his quiet, confidential way. “But I usually knew who I was after, what he looked like or something about him. Here, I have nothing to work on except the information that he is going to slip out through Lisbon and that a contact may be made with him in Valleron tonight.”

  “You’ll turn up something, Mr. Rogge,” said Murray confidentially. “You always do.”

  “Thanks very much,” said little Mr. Rogge. “But I have a bad feeling about this. If our man was not clever he would not be as dangerous as he has proved. Now take those people down in the luncheon patio—it is, on the face of it, inconceivable that any of them could be the one we seek, and yet,” he shrugged, “it might be.”

  “Perhaps he hasn’t arrived here yet,” suggested Murray. “Perhaps not,” agreed Mr. Rogge. “But our one chance will be to spot the contact, whatever form it takes. Listen to me, Murray,” he said, tapping the other on the knee. “There are times when all the training in the world doesn’t do much good. Take our situation, for example. We may be morally sure that a dangerous man will be at this hotel sometime within the next twenty-four hours. And suppose just one man arrives. We have a right to suspect that man. I will go further—suppose we have the opportunity somehow to delve into his background and his credentials. We still couldn’t be sure.”

  “Jove!” said Murray incredulously. “But why, sir?”

  “Two good reasons. First, because this man’s background and credentials would be solidly established. Secondly, because of imponderables—we might have a right to suspect the one arrival here within a given time, yet who are we to say that our man hasn’t got the wind up and changed his plans?”

  He brought out his beloved pipe and filled it absently from a well-worn leather pouch.

  “‘Dangerous’ is a much overworked word,” he said meditatively. “Various types of persons are considered dangerous when they could be rendered harmless by intelligence and awareness. But, you mark my word, the really dangerous man always hunts with the hunters themselves.”

  Murray cleared his throat.

  “We have a chance, haven’t we?” he said, queerly strained. “I—Mr. Rogge, we, at least, are expecting him.”

  “Oh, yes. We have a chance. And we’ll surely make the best try of our lives.” The graying little man sighed and stowed his pouch away. “But, you know, Murray, I’ve a strange feeling that we may be left along the wayside. We can supply technical trailing, intelligence and physical courage in fair measure, I dare say, but when you’ve had as much experience as I’ve ha
d, you’ll know that the most important thing in any fight, any crisis, any hunt, is the imponderable—the little factor that can’t be weighed beforehand.”

  CHAPTER 3

  El Pajaro Azul had left Valleron to the siesta hour and the little Spanish town slipped into a state of complete repose. The awnings of the wine shops were down against the warm sunshine and the only motion seemed to be the breeze in the leaves of the olive trees along the white motor road.

  In the hotel itself even the solarium with its tiny streamlined bar was deserted. With the aura of lassitude so deeply prevalent all around her, Berkeley Britton was surprised to receive so quick an answer to her note. She answered a knock on her door to find a Spaniard in white surgical coat who identified himself as Mr. Tresh’s attendant.

  His English was not facile, but he gave her to understand that Mr. Tresh wished to see her now.

  Berkeley had been able to recollect that name. Tresh. John Tresh. Yes, of course, there had been a flurry about him in the newspapers a couple of years ago when he had hastily left the States one jump ahead of an indictment for income tax evasion. He had been one of those unheralded but powerful state political-machine bosses.

  She met him in the small upstairs sitting room overlooking a secluded part of the patio. He looked vaguely familiar to her, or perhaps it was his type—a massive, deep-chested man with a definite impression of thickness about him, his physique, his neck, his white hair and frosty brows. He was in a wheel chair and looked freshly shaved and brushed.

  “You are Dick Britton’s daughter?” he said in a deep voice. Dick Britton’s daughter. Berkeley nearly smiled. He sounded as though her father was an intimate friend.

  “Yes, I am,” she said courteously.

  Tresh made a sign to his attendant who went out and closed the door behind him.

  “I have to be sure, lady,” he said. “Can you prove it?”

  The girl gave a surprised little laugh. “Why, I suppose so,” she said, and handed him her passport.

  Tresh studied it, then returned it to her.

  “Thanks, Miss Britton,” he said. “Just one more thing. Does the name Willenden mean anything to you?”

  “Willenden?” she repeated. “That’s the name of a place we owned several years ago. Why?”

  “Passports can be faked,” said John Tresh. “But a spot question like that can’t be answered by just anybody. Excuse it, Miss Britton. I had to feel sure who I was talking to.”

  Then he leaned his heavy white head back against his chair as if that identification had taken a certain amount of carefully husbanded strength. He was not well, that was evident. As he sat back in his chair, propped by a pillow, Berkeley could hear his heavy slow breathing, as though breathing was not an entirely natural process.

  “None of my business,” he said suddenly, “but how does a girl like you happen to be over here?”

  “I’ve been working with the International Red Cross in Geneva for the past six months,” Berkeley said. “Bureau of information, tracing men in prison camps, forwarding mail to them, that kind of thing.” She flirted a hand briefly.

  “Yeah?” said John Tresh. “I admire you, Miss Britton. I admire your father, too. Great lawyer, your father. Say, I begged him to come over. I thought maybe he’d fly over and I could be well enough to meet him in Lisbon. But he wouldn’t—and, well, I’m a sick old war horse, Miss Britton.”

  He gave a deep rumbling laugh. “Funny thing. I retired to come over to Europe and live like a big shot. Get me a villa somewhere and settle down to enjoy life and the swell wines and the rate of exchange. Yeah, well, I’ve been moving around all over creation ever since I got here and now I couldn’t go home if I wanted to. I got to stay quiet, they tell me.”

  Berkeley wondered whether he thought he was fooling anyone. Retired? This big thickish man who had dealt in padded registration lists and bought votes and crooked highway contracts. He had fled rather than face prison.

  “Mr. Tresh,” she said, “my father cabled me—”

  “I know,” he said. “I guess your father doesn’t know what to make of it. He probably hasn’t even thought of me for years. But he did a great thing for me once. He defended that dumb kid of mine against a murder charge.”

  He nodded. “You know, I’ve thought about that a lot of times, Miss Britton. When that hell-raising kid got himself mixed in a shooting scrape I looked around for the best legal talent there was from coast to coast. Oh, I could have gotten a million lawyers, but I wanted the best—the highest class of legal mind. I got turned down in several big law offices. Case looked bad and maybe my name smelled a little to those pillars of the bar association. And there I was with a kid who was innocent, but being railroaded as part of a dirty, rough-and-tumble political trick against me. Nobody could see that in the case. But finally I got to Dick Britton.

  “He acted just like I was Joe Doakes. He looked the case over, decided that the kid was getting a raw deal, and went into action. Hell with who I was or what anybody else thought. This was something he believed the law was made for—justice. And he pulled that dumb kid of mine through after one of the best fights a good lawyer ever made. That was quite some years ago.” It must have been because Berkeley had never heard of it before. Of course, her father had defended so many people.

  “But the payoff came afterwards—when he could have had anything I owned. He nearly laughed me out of his office. I hadn’t meant anything to him from first to last. It was his idea of justice that had made him take the case—and nothing I had or could give him. I never forgot it. I’d kind of like you to tell him that when you see him.”

  “I’ll be glad to,” said Berkeley. “And wasn’t there something else?”

  He wheeled himself up close to the small divan where she was sitting.

  “You never heard of Sam Buckthorne, I guess. He’s running for high public office in my state and I tell you he’s hand and foot with the Nazis.” He banged his fist down on the arm of his chair. “Why, I raised that Buckthorne from a pup. I yanked him out of a hencoop law office and groomed him like a race horse. I taught him everything he knows. Sure, I thought he might run for governor some day. But I never thought he was anything but U.S.A. I don’t know how they got to him—but that guy has to be licked!”

  “Are you offering any proof, Mr. Tresh?”

  “I’m trying to figure if it ties up with this Ivory Tiger thing,” he muttered.

  Berkeley just looked at him. Up until now he had made sense, but now he acted as though his mind was wandering.

  “I beg your pardon,” she said.

  “Look, Miss Britton,” he told her. “I’ve cut some ice over here. Plenty of money and a big political reputation—they thought it was big, anyhow—and I knew a lot about plenty of big shots back home. I got to know all kinds of people. Some of them really are on the inside. That’s how I happened to find a leak. Money did the rest. I’m used to spending money that way. That’s how I heard of the Ivory Tiger. Don’t ask me what it is. I don’t know. But I do know that it’s something they have a lot of faith in and they are sending it to America.”

  “Just a minute,” she said. “I have part of that. Somebody has a lot of faith in an ivory tiger. Who?”

  “The Nazis, Miss Britton.”

  “I see,” said Berkeley, and sat back. So this was his vital information? Nazis, Nazis, Nazis—everywhere you saw a shadow you thought it was a Nazi.

  “Well, what do you think it might be?” she asked reasonably. “A blitzkrieg? A secret death ray? Or, maybe, it really is an ivory tiger.”

  “I wish I knew what it was,” he said slowly. “I thought maybe by now I’d have more of a line on it. Maybe I will yet.”

  “In the meantime,” said Berkeley, “you wish me to tell my father that the Nazis are sending something called the Ivory Tiger to America.”

  She thought even he might see how silly it sounded. But he only seemed more intense.

  “Tell him more,” said John Tresh. �
��Tell him that I think it is the business. Tell him that it scares me to think of what it might be. Tell him, for God’s sake, to believe what I say no matter whether I have proof or not. If a man like your father believes it, the Department of Justice may believe it, too, and be awake for anything that might help to spot it.”

  Berkeley Britton’s eyes rested on the life-worn, massive man propped in the wheel chair. There was nothing more pathetic than somebody like that still trying to play at being important. And for a moment it seemed unreal to her that she had been sitting here listening to him talk about an ivory tiger. This expatriate, unwell and, perhaps, not entirely sober, either had been sold a fake bill of goods or else had developed an overwrought imagination in the swirl of explosive events that had swept around him.

  But, whatever had given him this Ivory Tiger idea, she tried to let him down easily. She smiled at him as she arose.

  “My father will appreciate both your motives and your information, Mr. Tresh,” she said courteously.

  “He’s one man I’d trust with my life,” said Tresh. “And I had to tell him all I know. Can you come to see me tomorrow morning? Maybe I’ll know more by then.”

  She nodded. Tresh clasped his stubby powerful hands and let out a deep tired sigh. “Thanks, Miss Britton. Will you send in that nurse of mine?”

  Out in the corridor she found his attendant sitting in a chair tilted back to the wall. She sent him in to Mr. Tresh and then walked slowly back toward her room.

  * * * *

  Music came with the evening coolness, music and little gleams of light springing up in the low Hat-topped houses on the hillside. A person could stand on a balcony and distinguish snatches of melody from scattered spots out there in the darkness—a lone accordionist somewhere in the village, a soft guitar from the direction of the dining patio, the faint tangy stringed music from the Casino.