Death of the Falcon

Chapter 14

The tape that held the blood-soaked rolls of toilet paper to my arm also held my stiletto in place. I had to wait for Sherima to locate a pair of scissors in the desk drawer before she could cut away the crimson tissue. More strips of her sheer negligee became bandages for me and, by the time she had staunched the blood bubbling from the bullet crease, there wasn’t much left of what once had been an expensive piece of lingerie.

“You’re really going to be a sensation at dinner tonight,” I said, admiring the small, firm breasts that strained against the soft fabric as she worked on my arm. My hasty explanation about her appointment at the Secretary of State’s home in less than an hour brought, I was glad to see, a typically feminine reaction: “Nick,” she gasped. “I can’t go like this!”

“I’m afraid you’re going to have to do just that. There isn’t time to get back to the Watergate and still have you on the radio by eight o’clock. Now let’s get out of here.”

She hung back, turning to look first at Candy’s body on the bed, then at the Sword sprawled on the floor. “Nick, what about Candy? We can’t leave her like this.”

“I’ll have someone take care of her, Sherima. And Abdul, too. Believe me, though, the most important thing right now is to get you on that radio, talking to—”

“ATTENTION DOWNSTAIRS. THIS HOUSE IS SURROUNDED! COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP! ATTENTION DOWNSTAIRS. THIS HOUSE IS SURROUNDED. COME OUT WITH YOUR HANDS UP.”

The bullhorn echoed itself again, then was silent. Help had arrived. Hawk’s men must have charged the house when they heard the shaving cream bomb go off and, probably, conducted a room by room search on the upper floors before deciding to bring the squawker to the basement door. They most likely got quite a surprise when they opened it and the acrid haze from the extinguished plastic fire rolled out to them.

I stepped to the concrete doorway and called out, “This is Nick Carter,” then identified myself as an executive of the oil company that supposedly employed me. There was a lot I hadn’t explained to Sherima yet, and some of it never would be told her. For the moment, it seemed best to revert to the way she originally knew me.

“I’m down here with… with Miss Liz Chanley. We need help. And an ambulance.”

“STEP THROUGH THE DOORWAY WITH YOUR HANDS UP.”

I obeyed the bullhorned instructions. One of the AXE agents at the top of the steps recognized me and the cellar quickly filled up with Hawk’s men. It took a few valuable minutes to instruct the leader of the team in what had to be done at the house, then I said, “I need a car.”

He handed over his keys and told me where his car was parked. “Do you need someone to drive you?”

“No. We’ll make it.” I turned to Sherima and offered her my arm, saying, “Shall we go, Your Highness?”

Every bit the Queen again, despite wearing a royal gown that was shredded halfway up her thighs and left little to the imagination, she took my arm. “We are pleased to retire now, Mr. Carter.”

“Yes ma’am,” I. said and led her past the bewildered AXE agents who were already working on the Sword. They were trying to bring him back to consciousness before the ambulance arrived that would take him to the little private hospital Hawk had liberally endowed with agency funds so that he was assured a special ward for patients in whom he had an interest. Sherima stopped at the door as she heard him groan again and turned just as his eyes opened and he stared at her.

“Abdul, you’re fired,” she said grandly, then swept out of the hideaway and up the stairs ahead of me.

As the Secretary of State and Hawk appeared from the richly paneled library doorway, I got to my feet. The canopied porter’s chair had been comfortable and I had almost dozed off. The Secretary spoke briefly with the Old Man, then went back into the room where his powerful transmitter was located. Hawk crossed to my side.

“We wanted to give her a couple of minutes of privacy on the radio with him,” he said. “At least as much privacy as there can be, what with monitoring equipment being what it is today.”

“How did it go?” I asked.

It all had been pretty formal, he said, complete with a polite, “How are you?” and, “Is everything all right?”

I wondered just how formal the whole picture would have looked to him if I hadn’t checked the hall closet on our way out of the CIA’s safe house and found Sherima’s mink coat stashed there. The Secretary had offered to help her off with it when we arrived, but Sherima kept it clutched around her, explaining that she had taken a chill en route there and would keep it on a while, then followed the Secretary into the library as the grandfather clock in his entrance hall struck eight times.

During the period that had passed since then, I had told Hawk what occurred in the house on Military Road. He had been on the phone several times, issuing instructions and following up on reports from the various units he had assigned to special tasks after I completed my story. The Secretary had a scrambler line that connected directly with Hawk’s office, and the Old Man’s instructions had been relayed through our communications network over it.

Hawk went to make another call and I slumped back in the big antique wicker chair again. When he returned, I could tell the news was good, because the slight smile by which he expressed extreme pleasure was there.

“The Sword is going to be all right,” Hawk said. “We’re going to get him back on his feet and then ship him off to Shah Hassan as a token of our mutual friendship.”

“What do we get in return?” I asked, suspicious of such generosity on the part of my boss.

“Well, N3, we’ve decided to suggest that it would be nice if the Shah were just to return some of those little presents the boys in the Pentagon have been slipping him when nobody was looking.”

“Will he go along with it?”

“I think so. From what I’ve just overheard in the library, I think the Shah will be giving up his throne soon. That means his brother will be taking over, and I don’t think Hassan wants anyone else to have his finger on the trigger of those playthings. I gather another divorce may be in the offing, too, and—”

He turned at the sound of the library door opening again. Sherima came out, followed by the Secretary of State, who was saying, “Well, my dear, I guess we can go in to dinner, finally. I’ve had the heat turned up in the dining room, so I’m sure you won’t need your coat now.”

As he reached out to take it, 1 started to laugh. Sherima flashed me a smile and winked, then turned so she could slip out of the mink. Embarrassed, Hawk nudged me and said reprimandingly under his breath, “What are you chuckling at, N3? They’ll hear you.”

“It’s a secret, sir. We’ve all got one.”

As the long coat came off Sherima’s shoulders, it was as though the Silver Falcon had shed her wings. As she walked regally toward the candlelit dining room, my secret was exposed. And so were hers.