The Intriguers

xxxi.

He started by slapping me, which was childish. His smooth, handsome, politician's face was kind of white-pink with rage and fear; and his eyes actually seemed to bulge slightly from their sockets. He looked like a good candidate for a coronary, but I knew I'd never be so lucky. It was my job. I'd flubbed it once but I'd have to take care of it eventually.

The trick was staying alive long enough to do it. There was, at the moment, no possibility of help from Martha, bound and guarded. I saw the lady senator standing in the doorway aft, taking in the scene in the crowded cabin. I realized that she was my best bet. She hadn't got where she was by being stupid.

Leonard gave me another peevish whack across the cheek, like an irritable mother disciplining an infuriating child.

"How many?" he demanded in a choked voice. "How many cold-blooded assassinations-" I laughed in his face. "Says the man who sent an agent clear to Mexico to shoot me in the back with a scoped-up 7mm rifle! Don't talk to me about cold-blooded assassinations, Leonard! Who started it? How many of our people did you actually manage to have murdered, trying clumsily to wipe us out?" I laughed again. "What the hell made you think you could play the killing game with us, little man? We're pros, not political dilettantes. You never had a chance, any more than if you tried racing on the same track with the Unser brothers, or playing golf with Palmer and Trevino."

I couldn't tell whether or not my arrogant speech impressed the gray-haired woman in the doorway; but it stung Leonard to fury, which was almost as good. After all, who wants an ally who flips his lid in a crisis? He came at me with both hands, this time knocking me back against the cushions of the lounge.

"How many?"

I shook my head to clear it. "I don't know how many," I said. "It doesn't matter. You can be sure there were enough. Since last night, when you were playing hide-and-seek in this mangrove labyrinth, you haven't got an organization any more. All you've got is a bunch of scared civil servants waiting for lightning to strike them out of a blue sky. A runaway truck. A bullet out of nowhere. A little synthetic heart failure or plague in the morning milk. They know, little man, they know. They know that the one who takes your orders from now on, dies. Try it. Pick up your pretty blue phone. Have your radioman connect you. To anybody-of the ones still alive, I mean. See if the person you reach will snap to attention at the sound of your voice, or laugh at you. Or curse you for a bungling, ambitious incompetent who got a lot of his friends and associates killed. Go ahead. Try it!"

It was a bluff, of course. Actually, I suspected, Mac had been very careful not to let the night's operations take on the aspects of a nationwide bloodbath. The dead had, I figured, all been agency people, of one undercover agency or another in Leonard's shaky empire. Well, agents are always getting themselves killed, and the machinery stands forever ready to hush it up so as not to attract attention. It would take time before those in the know added up a freeway crash here and a drowning there and, realizing that they'd happened on the same night, came up with something resembling the right answer, which by that time would be ancient history.

Nevertheless, it sounded good, I thought; and a worried look on the face of the man guarding Martha confirmed my opinion. He looked like a man beginning to wonder if he'd bet more than he could afford on the wrong nag. I hoped Mrs. Love was having similar thoughts; but her face was harder to read.

"Well?" I said, when Leonard didn't move. "Aren't you going to call the roll of your trusty henchmen? Try the fellow running your show in Phoenix, Arizona, for instance. What was his name, now? Bainbridge, Joseph W. Bainbridge. Give him a ring. I doubt he'll answer, but don't take my word for it. Or the woman in Chicago-" He swung a fist at my head, and connected glancingly, and stepped back nursing his bruised hand. "Jernegan!" he gasped.

"Yes, Chief."

"Take him into the pilot house and work him over!"

"Yes, sir!"

It was the woman who stopped it last, as I'd hoped she would. By that time, they were all gathered in the pilothouse watching the show; and the young boatman, a tougher specimen than either of the two who'd been guarding Martha and me, was obliging with a performance that made up in enthusiasm for what it lacked in skill. I was playing right up to him, of course. If I do say so myself, I'm pretty good at letting myself be knocked down in the way that hurts the least.

I've had lots of practice in absorbing that kind of punishment. You'd be surprised at the faith people have in the power of fists. As far as I'm concerned, beating a man up is a good way to get yourself killed-for every dozen or so you manage to intimidate that way, there'll always be one who just gets mad and comes back with a gun. I started getting a little mad myself as the ordeal went on; and I was sustaining myself by thinking of all the fun I'd have carrying out my instructions regarding Herbert Leonard, when Mrs. Love finally stepped forward impatiently.

"Stop it!" she snapped. "Herbert, you're wasting time. Ca!! off your boy."

"We have to have the information. If it bothers you to watch-"

"My dear man, I've seen blood before. I was raised on a farm, and when it was time for a chicken dinner, I was the girl who was handed the hatchet. This wouldn't bother me a bit if you were getting somewhere, but you aren't. I think you'd better let somebody else interrogate the man while he can still talk."

"What makes you think you-"

"What makes me think an elderly female can succeed where you strong young males have failed? My dear man, it's a matter of psychology. May I have a knife, please?"

"Mrs. Love-"

"A knife, Mr. Leonard. If you please! Thank you."

Lying on the floor, pretending to be in very bad shape – which didn't take hell of a lot of acting-I waited for her to approach, wondering if I'd misjudged her. If so, I was in serious trouble; but her footsteps went the other way, to the little group by the electronics department consisting of the radio operator, Martha, and her guard.

I heard Mrs. Love's voice. "Turn around, girl. Hold out your wrists. That's right. There you are. Now clean up your friend so I can see his expression when I talk with him. Young man, you with the gun, lend her your handkerchief and fetch her a pan of water from the kitchen. If you please!"

Then Martha was kneeling beside me, dabbing at my face. She was making the commiserating noises to be expected under the circumstance, but I was listening to Mrs. Love arguing with Leonard.

"You've tried your way, Herbert," she was saying. "Now let me try mine… All right, girl. He's presentable enough. Help him up… Mr. Helm, you're not unconscious. Don't try to fool an old woman. Over there on the settee. Good. Now go back where you were, girl, and behave yourself, or you'll find yourself tied up again so fast it will make your head swim… Mr. Helm?"

I wasn't unconscious, of course, but things were a trifle hazy. I looked up at the motherly figure in the printed dress, with the neatly waved blue-gray hair, and said, "Yes, ma'am."

"We've been trying to get the answers to a few questions-"

"No, ma'am," I said.

She frowned quickly. "What do you mean?"

"He's been trying," I said. "You haven't been trying."

She studied me for a moment. "Are you saying you'll talk to me, Mr. Helm? Why to me and not to him?"

"Why should I waste time talking to a dead man?" I asked. "I was kidding him along before you got here, telling him he'd be allowed to live, but it isn't true. I can't tell him anything that'll save him, and wouldn't if I could. Anyway, I can't let him go to his death thinking he can beat information out of a trained, experienced agent. He's got enough misconceptions about this racket already. There are methods, sure, but they don't involve fists."

Leonard, standing at the head of the ladder leading down and aft, with Jernegan and my former escort, Bostrom, beside him, stirred indignantly.

Mrs. Love snapped, "Be quiet, Herbert. You've had your turn. Mr. Helm?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Am I a dead woman?"

"Nobody's after you that I know of, Mrs. Love."

"Why Mr. Leonard and not me?"

"You're not one of us, ma'am. What you do isn't our concern. But he is, or he's trying to be, and he's sold out. He's tried to use his country's undercover services for private political purposes-"

"My purposes, Mr. Helm."

"Sure, but there are always ambitious politicians who'd like to use us," I said. "Their ambitions-your ambitions – have nothing to do with us. We're not responsible for keeping the whole world honest. What does concern us is us. Any time an agent sells out, or allows his knowledge or skill or training to be employed for private purposes, that's a black mark against the whole profession. At least I figure that's how my chief feels about it. He's spent most of his life at this business, and he has very strong opinions about the place of agencies like ours in a democratic society-strong enough for him to pass the death sentence on any agent who abuses his privileged position as Leonard has done and led a lot of others to do."

The woman was silent for a little. When she spoke again, it was on a totally different subject. "Why do you call me 'ma'am'?"

"Perhaps you remind me of a teacher I once had, Mrs. Love."

"Probably a tough old biddy," she said. "Well, we're wasting time. Let's get to the questions Mr. Leonard was asking you. How many?"

"I don't know."

Her eyes narrowed. "I can have that energetic young man turned loose on you again."

"I don't know, ma'am," I repeated. "That's the truth. All I know is that I was responsible for a list of ten names, and I have no reason to believe they weren't taken care of by the people I assigned to them."

"Tell us the names."

"Leonard already has them."

Mrs. Love turned quickly. "Is that true, Herbert?"

The white-haired man hesitated. "Well, yes, they fed me some kind of a list through the girl, there. I didn't really believe it, of course-"

"Why not?"

"Who could conceive that a supposedly civilized man like Arthur Borden would plan a deliberate massacre-"

"Your men have been shooting at his, I understand. What's so inconceivable about his shooting at yours? What steps did you take when you received this information?"

"I… I warned the individuals in question and arranged for protection where it seemed to be required. However, we were given the wrong date. We were led to believe that the attempt, if it was made at all, would be made on the seventeenth of the month, two days from now."

Mrs. Love regarded him coldly. She said, "But you did know, and your agents were warned, and they died anyway? I'd hardly call that an attempt, Herbert. I'd call it a successful execution of a carefully laid plan."

"We don't know that all the people listed-" She sniffed impatiently. "Don't quibble. You've checked on five of your key men, and all five are dead, if we figure that Mr. Dunn in Los Angeles isn't very likely to be returning from his yacht trip." She sighed. "It's really too bad. I had faith in you, Herbert. I counted on you. I was warned that your track record in this field wasn't impressive, but you talked a very good fight. You convinced me. Obviously, I was mistaken."

"Mrs. Love-" She ignored him, turning back to me. "If you had to guess, Mr. Helm, how many other groups like yours would you say your chief had operating around the country?"

I hesitated, then I shrugged, winced, and said, "Hell, it doesn't matter now. It's all over except sweeping up the pieces and dumping them into the trash can. If I had to guess, ma'am, I'd say none."

She frowned dubiously. "Then you think the total body count is only ten, assuming that all your agents performed successfully."

Getting smart, I refrained from shaking my head. "No, I didn't say that. You asked how many groups there were like mine. I think there was only one group like mine, operating independently. The list I was given pretty well covered the country, with the exception of a limited but important area on the East Coast. I noticed the gap when I received my instructions; and Leonard's man who died of botulism in Washington, DC was not on my list. 1 think that man and quite a few others-I have no way of estimating how many-were taken care of by agents working directly under my chief. I think Mac handled the critical East Coast area himself, leaving the hinterlands to me and my group. I figure that's why he had Leonard decoyed out of Washington, so he could have time to clean house without interference."

"I see." Mrs. Love was still frowning thoughtfully. "That would make, perhaps, twenty or thirty human beings violently dead in one night. Do you feel no remorse, Mr. Helm?"

"Do you, Mrs. Love?" I asked boldly. "You're the one who set the machinery of violence in motion. What did you expect when you started using men with guns, that nobody would ever shoot back?"

She sighed. "Well, I must say, I find it a little shocking. If I'd thought there was any chance our little scheme would meet such direct and brutal resistance, I probably wouldn't… Well, the question is academic now, isn't it?" She was silent for a moment, looking down at me; then she said, "Give my regards to the man you call Mac, if you ever see him again. You realize, of course, that I can't do anything for you here. The situation is out of my control."

As she said it, she let her eyes touch, for an instant, the girl in the corner who had been bound and was now unbound.

"Yes, ma'am," I said.

She turned on her heel. "I'll want your pilot to take me back to civilization right away, Herbert. Oh, and under the circumstances, I think I would like another man along, armed. How about the young man beside him? I don't altogether trust Mr. Helm's assurances; they were just a little too glib."

As she started down the stairs, or ladder, with Jernegan and Bostrom in tow, she glanced back casually, and I saw one eye close in what could have been construed as a wink. She was making certain that I was aware that, having first untied my accomplice, she was now reducing the odds against me by as many men as she could plausibly take with her. She wanted to be sure this was credited to her account. A tough, smart, old biddy.

"Don't bother to see me to the boat, Herbert," she said. "Just get on with your fun and games."

There were still too many men in the room, but two of them-Martha's guard and the radio operator-were basically non-combatant types, I hoped. At least they weren't, I hoped, the kind to die loyally for lost causes. I also h9ped that Martha was ready and not hampered by too many peaceful inhibitions after watching the terrible, brutal beating I'd received. I also hoped the gadget I'd given her would work after being soaked in swamp water. That was, 1 realized, a lot of hoping.

Leonard waited until the runabout had pulled away and the sound of its motor had faded in the distance. I got up as he came for me. He stared at me hard for a moment, his hands closing into fists, and I thought we were going to have the sock-and-slap routine some more. Then he wheeled abruptly.

"Give me that!" he snapped, snatching the revolver from the hand of Martha's nameless guard.

"But, sir-" Leonard ignored the protest, if that's what it was. He came back towards me, deliberately, his knuckles white with the tension of gripping the pistol. it was no way to hold a gun for accuracy, but at that range he could hardly miss. There was a convincing look of ferocity on his handsome face. Even pussycats get mad.

I circled warily past the houseboat's big steering wheel towards the electronics section, aware of movement behind me as the spectators scrambled instinctively out of the line of fire. Leonard raised the pistol and took aim. I stopped, facing him.

"Twice!" he breathed. "Twice I had it all in my hands, all I ever wanted, and you, always you, took it away from me, Helm! Well, you're not going to live to gloat about it-"

"Martha, now!" I shouted, throwing myself to the floor. He was an amateur to the last. He looked quickly towards the girl instead of doing his shooting first and his sightseeing afterwards. There was a sharp crack behind me, like the report of a firearm. An intense white light filled the pilothouse, brighter than the sunshine through the big windows. The light seemed to envelop Herbert Leonard's face, and his hands as well, as he tried to claw away the fiery, incandescent thing that had struck him. He screamed and fell to the floor, rolling back and forth in agony.

Nobody moved except the thrashing man on the pilothouse floor and I. I hitched myself over to pick up, with my bound hands, the gun he'd dropped. I struggled to my feet, moved to stand over him and, by twisting and craning, managed to aim accurately enough to put a bullet into the back of his head and stop the noise. After a little while the flare burned itself out.

I looked at the two men. Martha's guard raised his hands in a gesture of submission. The black radio operator spread his wide, with a little shrug, indicating that his field was electronics, not violence. Martha looked at me blindly for a moment. Then she threw the little flare gun away from her, turned, snatched the door open, and stumbled to the houseboat's rail, very sick.

It took me a while, unassisted, to cut my hands free with Herbert Leonard's pocket knife, find the signaling device again, reload it, and go out on deck to fire another flare straight up into the blue Florida sky.