In a Lady’s Service

by Tom Ardies

  “Did what, for God’s sake?” Noli demanded impatiently. “You’re not making any sense.”

  Oh, it made sense, all right, Buchanan decided. They believed him guilty—suspected him of doubling back and doing the job after their departure—but they knew better than to go to the police. If they did that, they’d get involved personally, perhaps come under suspicion as accessories, the entanglement he himself feared. The alternative was to track him down personally. And why?

  Well, the answer to that was even simpler, wasn’t it? They believed him successful in his torture of Doña Otelia. They believed him in possession of the salve’s elusive formula. So their object, of course, was to get the secret out of him at gunpoint, and then turn him over to the law.

  They could hand him up on a platter without risking their own necks. An anonymous call from the airport just before boarding flights to the other side of the world. Buenos días. Es la policía? Would you like the name of the slavering monster responsible for that beastly slaughter in Santa Luisa?

  Buchanan reeled at the scope and complexity of the damnable scenario he had conjured up to earn him the noose. How could he ever extract himself?

  Run and he was caught. Instinctively, he knew that. He’d never make the border. And yet …

  Boldly, he decided on the most daring solution, fraught though it was with impossible dangers, perhaps even death. Instead of turning tail, he would seek out—yes, dammit, seek out—the leader of the enemy camp.

  “I must find her,” he announced, steeling himself.

  Noli was as bewildered as ever. “Who?”

  “Marina,” Buchanan answered with a sardonic smile. Who else? Wasn’t it just like her to find him guilty without benefit of trial? Wasn’t it just like her to lead the lynch mob?

  “That’s madness,” Noli protested. He hastily dug into his pocket to pay the bill. “Haven’t you had enough trouble already? Must you go looking for more?”

  Unfortunately, yes, Buchanan thought, weaving his way through the tightly spaced tables. Marina had to be found and convinced of his innocence. She had stayed away from the police so far—her instinct for survival was as strong as his own—but that was no guarantee of her continued silence.

  He was unhappily aware of her mean temper and its short fuse. Frustrated, she would act as always, wouldn’t she? Impulsively … blindly … stupidly …

  “Wait!” Noli called, but Buchanan ignored him, plunging across the street. There wasn’t time for explanations. Every second lost brought him closer to the gallows.

  Marina, meanwhile, was impatiently waiting for him, parked across from the Geneve in a rented car, an older, plain black Plymouth no one would think to look at twice. Nor would she herself draw a second glance from passersby. Her fragile beauty was hidden by an ugly wig of crinkly, short-cropped hair, huge dark glasses blotted out half her face, and a loose silk scarf was piled up to cover the rest.

  Even in this disguise, her heart pounded against her ribs, fearful that at any moment the law’s heavy hand would reach out to grab her. Every nerve in her body insisted that she flee for her life. But how in good conscience could she abandon poor Buchanan?

  For his dirty trick, switching the salves, leaving bullshit behind, the sniveling sneak deserved to be licked to within an inch of his life, no doubt of that. But to be charged with a murder of which he was innocent? To spend the rest of his days rotting in a Mexican jail? To smoke a last cigarette in front of a firing squad?

  No. She couldn’t leave him to that fate. Not and live with herself. She had duped him into this awful mess—and it was her moral duty to extricate him. Irresistibly, her eye was drawn to the folded newspaper on the seat beside her, where all was a blur except the last sentence in the story.

  … police are trying to locate a number of tourists who visited the village on the weekend.

  Anywhere else but Mexico, the police would have them all rounded up by now, Marina thought, shivering. Gonzales and the Presidente would have provided detailed descriptions. The first place to check for tourists was the major hotels.

  Yet, obviously, the Mexico City police hadn’t even started work on the case, or else had assigned it to the worst kind of bumbler. Her anxious telephone calls had twice confirmed Buchanan’s release without charge.

  Had they any reason for suspicion, the police would still have him on the grill, demonstrating their usual tact. If you wish to keep your teeth, answer our questions, por favor. Who were your accomplices in Santa Luisa? Which one of them did the deed?

  Marina shivered again. Which one? Which two, rather, and the finger of guilt pointed directly at the Glasses, more cruel and desperate than she could scarcely imagine. Do what evil they might, Doña Otelia had taken her secret to the grave, and it was a measure of their desperation, their insatiable greed, that they had boldly returned to the Geneve to grab Buchanan.

  That was something she wouldn’t have had the stomach for. Having done what they did, she’d never have set foot in the Geneve again, no matter WHAT. Rather than stalk Buchanan to his lair, she’d have waited, as she was waiting now, wearing a hastily assembled disguise, fear gnawing at her insides.

  Adele and Herbert. Who would have ever thought? And the worst of it, they weren’t the kind to give up now, were they? No. Like herself, they’d be concealed close by, ready to snatch Buchanan as he came along, and would she be able to reach him first?

  If he came along. The police claimed he had been released hours ago and yet where was he? Upon being freed, had he read the newspaper, too, and was he now hotfooting it out of the country, fearful of being falsely accused?

  Marina felt the panic building in her. How long could she afford to wait for the idiot? Where was the blundering … ?

  As if in answer to her demand, Buchanan suddenly appeared at the other end of the block, dodging through the crowd, hurrying as fast as he could. He had a determined look on his face. A man with a mission.

  Now what was the fool up to? Marina wondered, starting her car. She would wait until he was almost in front of the Geneve. Then she would swoop into the no-parking zone and whisk him away.

  However, before she could find a break in the traffic, Buchanan was already past the hotel, questioning the drivers at the taxi stand. As she watched, trapped, he found the cab he wanted, leaping in as it pulled away, tires squealing.

  Marina caught only a glimpse but it was enough. That was her driver, the one she had taken from the Geneve, staked out police headquarters with, and then—after learning of the murder—returned with to the María Isabel. Buchanan was questioning him. He was nodding emphatically.

  Well, this was a break, wasn’t it? For some reason, Buchanan wanted to see her just as badly as she wanted him, and he had the good sense to know how to track her down. Perhaps he wasn’t such a fool after all.

  But wait! A nondescript Chevrolet had just slipped in behind—and at its wheel was the tough police captain who had braced Buchanan so badly the previous Friday.

  Oh, no, Marina moaned. The thing was a setup. No wonder the police had been so quick to release Buchanan. They were using him as bait—in the hope of tracking her—and the nincompoop was taking them straight to her hotel.

  Marina paled at the looming disaster. Though she had registered under a false name, her description was all the captain really needed, and once he was inside her room all was lost. Rather than risk them on this rescue foray, she had left all her travel documents behind, and most of her funds as well. She was trapped.

  Oh, that stupid, stupid Buchanan. He was leading the police to her very doorstep. My God—he was leading everybody there.

  Marina sat stunned as cars moved in from every which way, slipping into place one after another, a whole parade taking form. The tough captain in his nondescript Chevy. Adele and Herbert in a pink-striped Rent-a-Jeep. A mysterious dark figure in a luxurious LTD Town Car.

  This couldn’t be happening. Please, God. Not everybody.

  Fighting back the pan
ic, Marina tried to concentrate, to think. She couldn’t outrace Buchanan’s taxi in the Zona Rosa’s crazy traffic. His head start guaranteed that he’d beat her to the hotel. The only answer was to stop him before he got there. But how?

  After a while she calmed herself and got out of her car and went into a nearby shop.

  The dispatcher’s voice crackled over the radio just as Buchanan’s taxi deftly merged with the swift flow of traffic on the Paseo de la Reforma. “Fourteen? Do you have a male passenger picked up at the Geneve?”

  “Sí,” Ramón replied before Buchanan had time to stop him.

  “We’ve an urgent message for him,” the dispatcher said. “His mother is very sick …”

  “I haven’t got a mother,” Buchanan interrupted.

  “… and he’s supposed to go home immediately.”

  “I haven’t got a home, either,” Buchanan said impatiently. The María Isabel was just a block ahead.

  “You’ve got the wrong taxi,” Ramón radioed back.

  “No, it’s your number, Fourteen,” the dispatcher insisted. “My caller is anxious to intercept. Says condition is dangerous … wants to help …”

  There was a break in transmission because of static and then the rest of the message. “You’re supposed to take it slowly. North on Insurgentes. Middle lane.”

  Buchanan was suddenly alert. That message could be for him after all. Dangerous condition … intercept … help …

  “Did the caller give a name?” he asked warily.

  Ramón repeated his question but the dispatcher’s answer was lost in static. When he came on again, it was with a call to another cab, giving instructions for a pickup.

  “Well?” Ramón asked. Buchanan had to make his decision now. Did they trun into the María Isabel—or go on by?

  “Keep going,” Buchanan said, opting for time to think.

  Ramón shrugged and drove past the hotel. He made a U-turn in the traffic circle around El Angelito, the golden winged figure honoring the heroes of Mexico’s Independence, and headed back on Reforma toward Insurgentes. “I thought you didn’t have a mother?”

  “I forgot,” Buchanan said curtly, still wondering what to do. “Try the dispatcher again, will you? Did the caller leave a name?”

  Ramón relayed the message and got a static-riddled reply that sounded vaguely negative.

  “Man or woman?” Buchanan asked.

  Static again hampered the dispatcher’s transmission but one word did come through loud and clear. Señorita.

  So, Buchanan thought. Marina, obviously. Who else? He began seriously to wonder. Had he been too quick in deciding Marina and the Glasses had not killed Doña Otelia? His only basis for that deduction was flimsy to say the least. If implicated, they’d be hiding, out of the country, not chasing him—that is what he had originally thought.

  But, if one probed deeper, if one put his feelings aside and accepted the premise of their guilt, why shouldn’t they be chasing him? He, after all, knew all about them, more than anyone else. He alone could convict them …

  My God. That was it. What a fool he had been to think otherwise. Marina and the Glasses wanted him dead and buried. They were desperately trying to snuff out his life.

  Yes, yes, that was it, and it was plain enough what was happening now. Marina, the little fiend, had been lying in wait for him outside the Geneve, hoping to get away a clear shot as he entered, but instead he had foiled her, jumping into the cab.

  She had no hope of catching him—who could keep up with an experienced cabbie in this homicidal rush?—so she had devised a clever ruse. Drive slowly along Insurgentes, indeed! If he did, she would suddenly appear alongside, her gun aimed at his head, and blooie!—it would be all over.

  “Turn back,” Buchanan ordered. He’d fool the twisted bloodthirsty bitch. Let her go chasing up and down Insurgentes. That would give him time to prepare his own surprise.

  Ramón regarded him unsurely. “Back?”

  “To the María Isabel.”

  “But what about your mother?”

  “She’ll keep,” Buchanan assured him.

  Ramón nodded and made a U-turn in the traffic circle at Niza. Caramba! He had met some hard characters in his time. But how did you like this cold sonofabitch?

  Mendoza maintained his position several cars behind. Did Buchanan think he could lose him by traveling in circles? How very amusing.

  Farther back, Adele and Herbert also hung in there grimly, not to be fooled, not to be frightened off. Cops or no they had to get that salve.

  Farther back still, the dark figure in the Town Car, Harry was wondering, was he doing this right?

  Buchanan had his campaign planned by the time Ramón pulled up in front of the María Isabel. “You know what is meant by the runaround?”

  “Sí. The runaround.”

  “Okay, then,” Buchanan said. “The señorita who wants to meet me on Insurgentes?—give it to her.”

  “If you say so,” Ramón agreed, too shaken to object. The man had a heart of steel. A devil.

  Mendoza parked down the block in the no-parking zone in front of the U. S. Embassy. He flashed his badge to the policeman on duty and hurried to catch up. This was going to be simpler than he thought.

  Adele and Herbert parked around the corner of the hotel and ran back just in time to spot Mendoza stalking Buchanan. This was going to be tough.

  Harry, stalled in traffic, watched them go into the hotel, one after the other. Buchanan, Mendoza, Adele, Herbert. This was going to be goddam impossible.

  The María Isabel, normally staid and dignified, was virtually a mob scene, the lobby so crowded Buchanan could hardly move. The bulletin board’s list of eventos told him why. 1750 Hours. Press Conference. U. S. Secretary of State.

  Why here? he wondered, and then he remembered that the U. S. Embassy was next door, which made it very convenient for Henry. The predictable crowd scenes probably had a bearing on Marina’s choice of hostelry when she moved from the Geneve. The María Isabel would be like this for the whole Tlaltelolco Conference. A good place to get lost.

  Buchanan extricated himself and took refuge beside a pile of press equipment that had been unceremoniously dumped in the middle of the lobby. By the looks of it, the place was full, every room taken. If Marina had registered under a phony name—as he was positive she had done—the clerks might be hard put to provide a room number just from her description.

  In this turmoil, as a matter of fact, they probably wouldn’t even try to help. He’d get a fast brush-off unless he introduced an element of urgency. Something drastic. Like her mother dying.

  No, he decided immediately. He wasn’t going to be a copycat. Surely he could come up with something better …

  The answer was staring him in the face. A press camera perched atop a case of sound equipment. He looked about and could see no sign of a guard. Would it hurt if he borrowed the thing for a while?

  Surreptitiously, he helped himself, bullying his way through the crowd to the registration desk, and banging it down with a press photographer’s vulgar brashness. “Baroness von Beriot’s suite, please,” he asked loudly.

  An overworked clerk turned from sorting mail. “Von Beriot? I don’t think we …”

  Behind, prudently stalking, Mendoza eased up against a pillar, his ears perked. Von who?

  “Oh, goddam,” Buchanan said, starting to go through his pockets. “That woman and her aliases. She’s always …” He snapped his fingers. “Prudence Pennyfeather. Have you got her under that name?”

  “No.”

  Adele and Herbert sneaked up on the other side of the pillar. Pru who?

  “Well, you’ve got her registered under some name, dammit,” Buchanan said, pretending anger. He looked at his watch. “I’m already starting to lose the light.”

  “The light … ?”

  “For my photographs,” Buchanan began, and then changed his tone. “Look. Never mind. If you don’t want your hotel in the background, that’s fi
ne by me, my friend. Let me speak to the manager.”

  The clerk smiled weakly. “Perhaps if you could describe the lady?”

  “Strange you don’t know her,” Buchanan complained. “Pictures in the paper all the time. The big magazines. TV.” He resumed his false search, found a piece of paper, swore at it, crumpled it up. “One of those skinny fashion models, long blond hair, large blue eyes, a very generous mouth.”

  None of that registered on the clerk.

  “The neck of a giraffe,” Buchanan went on. “No, a swan, I suppose. There’s a swoop to it. European, of course. Speaks with an accent. Trouble with her w’s. You’re velcome.”

  The clerk looked blanker than ever.

  “That’s it, then,” Buchanan said, defeated. “Oh, no. I almost forgot.” He pointed to his chin. “There’s a mole here.”

  “Why didn’t you say so?” the clerk demanded. “El lunar! The beauty spot!” He flashed a broad smile and then it quickly faltered. “You say she’s a model?”

  “Yes. Why?”

  “She’s so thin. She has no …”

  “All the better to see your hotel,” Buchanan assured him. “The number?”

  “Ten-oh-six. But I don’t think she’s in.”

  “She’s in,” Buchanan said. “We’ve an appointment. I’ll call.” He turned to go. “Thank you.”

  “Your camera,” the clerk reminded him.

  Buchanan came back to get it. “Silly of me. Thank you again.”

  “De nada.”

  A few steps and he was back once more. “By the way. Just so I’ll know. What alias is she using?”

  “Honig.”

  Harry strained to hear from behind a newspaper. Hon who?

  Buchanan repeated his thanks and returned the press camera to the mound of equipment in the middle of the lobby. In exchange, he took two large boxes, piled one atop the other, and circled back to watch the desk.

  Soon the clerk he had dealt with was poring over a map presented him by a couple of hapless tourists. Buchanan hefted up the boxes so that his face was hidden behind them. He approached the desk groping blindly. “Ten-oh-six, por favor.”