The Wrecking Crew

Chapter Twelve

I had time enough-and illumination enough from the Volvo's headlights-to get a good look at him as he approached. He wasn't very big, and he had a dapper, Continental air. He was wearing a Homburg hat, required headgear for the European businessman, and his suit was dark and conservatively cut, even by local standards. There was a glint of light from a pin in his rich, glossy, flowing tie. He was wearing pearl-gray gloves. You could probably have seen your face in the mirror surface of his shoes, had the light been a little better. Having separated his sword-cane into two parts, he discarded the half he had no further use for, and come for me with the business section.

"Murderer!" he hissed. "Fцrbannade mцrdare!"

I wasn't with him at all, having no idea who he was or what was eating him, but a needle-pointed sword speaks a language all its own, and I ducked his first lunge and got the Solingen knife from my pocket. I flicked it open one-handed without taking my eyes from him. You grasp the blade and the weight of the handle carries it open when you snap your wrist a certain way-a show-off trick mostly, but convenient when you want to leave one hand free for attack or defense.

I had the situation figured now. His sticker was, as they often are, a three-cornered, fluted blade with no cutting edge whatever. All I had to worry about was the point. Just tease him into overreaching himself a little on the next lunge, dodge, grab the sword as he tried to recover, step inside, and use the knife, edge up, to open him up like a zipper bag from crotch to breastbone…

I was a little mad, in other words. I don't like being scared, almost wrecked, and nearly skewered like a marshmallow on a toasting stick. I wasn't thinking clearly; I wasn't remembering my orders. This could be another test, like the phony beating I'd run into in Stockholm: it was fairly essential for me to remain unperforated, but I couldn't be too quick or clever at it, or too drastic. Under no circumstances take action, Mac had written. The instructions could be said to apply only to Caselius, but I had a hunch, if there was trouble in Washington, that any other dead bodies wouldn't be greatly appreciated. And for all I knew, this irate little fashion plate with his bodkin was Caselius, improbable though it might seem.

The homicidal impulse passed before any harm was done. I evaded the next lunge, all right, but my grab was deliberately clumsy, and the sword slipped through my hand. Unfortunately, the damn thing wasn't quite as dull as I'd thought. Near the point, all three edges had been honed- for better penetration, I suppose-and I got a couple of sliced fingers before I could let go.

It hurt, and I found it a little hard to remember, dodging around on the gravel with that point coming at me, just who I was supposed to be and which act I was supposed to be putting on. Well, I wasn't Matt, the innocent photographer, that was for sure. Whoever my assailant might be, he wouldn't be trying to kill me-or test me, if that was his goal-if he thought so. And I obviously wasn't Matthew, the respectable husband of Elizabeth Helm and the father of three little Helms; that part of my life was over for good, or would be as soon as the decree was final. And I wasn't Mac's boy Eric, the cold and efficient stalker of men; it wasn't time to pull that joker out of the deck, since I hadn't even identified my quarry yet, and was forbidden to act even if I had.

That left me only the character of Secret Agent Helm, the fist-fighting hero who absorbed punishment like a sponge, the defender of democracy whose attractive female associates got beat up and shot right under his nose-a slightly wised-up operative now, packing a silly little knife instead of trusting entirely to his feeble fists. Well, it was time that he showed some kind of skill with some kind of a weapon, since he wouldn't have been sent out on a job if he was completely useless. I wasn't very fond of this guy, he was pretty much a moron, but I did have a certain interest in keeping him alive.

"Mцrdare!" the little man panted. "Dirty killer. Pig!"

If it was an act, he was putting his heart into it. He was getting warmed up now, and he'd fenced in his time, but edged and pointed tools have always been my specialty. Ever since I was a kid with a wooden sword and a shield made out of Dad's old tobacco cans, I've had a fondness for the shining blades. A gun, after all, is good for nothing but killing. With a knife, as the oldtimers used to say, when you've nothing more interesting to do, you can always whittle.

I wiped my cut left hand on my pants, and switched the knife over, in time to knock aside his sword as it came at me again. At the same instant I ducked and picked up the weapon he'd discarded, perhaps thinking it no weapon at all, perhaps wanting to see if I had sense enough and skill enough to use it. But I had no choice; I couldn't keep him off forever with less than four inches of steel. I scooped it up: about thirty inches of strong and slender cane, tipped with a nice brass ferrule. Now I had the cane in my right hand and the knife in my left. It was the old Italian sword-and-dagger routine. They could also do mean things with a cloak, blinding an opponent or entangling his blade, but I didn't have a cloak handy.

"All right, Buster," I panted. "I don't know what's got you so burned up, but if you want to fence, let's fence! I used to be pretty good at this in college."

He came in again fast, and I took his blade on the cane, deflected it neatly, and lunged in my turn, driving the shiny brass ferrule straight at his eyes. He saved himself only by a frantic last-minute parry. It had been a long time, and I no longer remembered quarte from tierce, but my wrist hadn't forgotten nearly as much as my mind.

His part of the sword-cane was somewhat longer than mine, and sharper, but I also had the knife, and obviously he'd never played that game before. It's not considered respectable in contemporary salles des armes. I had the reach on him by several inches, enough to compensate for the difference in weapons, and the brass-tipped cane was plenty sharp enough to destroy a man's eye or throat.

It was a weird scene, I suppose, on that deserted road up near the frozen top of the world, but I was too busy to appreciate it fully. We'd dance from the dull red glow of the Ford's taillights into the bright white glare of the headlights of the Volvo, each trying to keep the more intense ifiumination in the other's eyes.

We got better as we went along. The little man had a strong wrist and he was fast on his feet; he'd obviously been a good йpйe-and-foil man in his day, although like me he was rusty now. Sword against sword he might well have taken me. But he was fighting the handicap of the knife and his own anger, real or pretended. Time and again the short Solingen blade would break up a classic attack pattern that had never been designed for use against a two-weapon defense. And time and again he'd drive in furiously when he should have taken it easy and figured me out. He kept trying for the heart when he should have gone for an exposed wrist or arm.

His tie was flapping loose now; his hat was gone and his shoes were dusty. His face was shiny and sweating; so was mine, no doubt. He came in again, and as I parried I realized that he was tiring: his point was far out of line. There's an old trick whereby you can, theoretically, disarm a man if he'll stand still for it. I don't suppose it was ever used in actual combat, any more than any of the old Western gunmen ever used such fancy stunts as the highwayman's roll or the border shift. You don't generally do juggling tricks when your life's at stake.

But still, it was a theoretical possibility, and he was right in position for it, and I had to do something with him that wasn't lethal. I made a sharp counter-clockwise circle with the cane-I've forgotten the technical name of the maneuver-catching that wide point and spinning it around, twisting the weapon in his grasp..

An alert swordsman, in good condition, would simply have come smoothly around my blade, or cane, and continued his attack; but the little man's reflexes were slowing, his wrist was tired, and the sudden wrench caught him by surprise, took the sword away from him, and sent it flying across the road. He stood there for a moment, disarmed and vulnerable, and I couldn't decide what the hell to do with him. I guess I was a bit tired, too.

When I moved, it was too late. He gave a kind of sob and ran after his weapon. He beat me to it and picked it up and came at me again, but he wasn't fencing any more. He had the sword in both hands and he was wielding it like a club, beating at my head and shoulders. He was crying with frustration and anger as he whacked away, trying to chop me down like a tree.

It was all I could do to defend myself against the crazy attack. I could kill him, all right-he was wide open, with his arms above his head like that, and one straight-armed lunge would have driven the brass-tipped cane through the cartilages of his throat-but I wasn't supposed to kill anybody. Under no circumstances. This is an order. This is an order. Suddenly I had too many weapons. My hands were full; I had to get rid of something if I was going to take him alive, although this seemed to have most of the pleasant aspects of getting a living, spitting bobcat out of a tree.

I parried a two-handed cut with the sword that would have laid my scalp open even if the weapon didn't have a real edge on it. I threw my arms about the little man, dropped everything and, clutching him desperately-if he got free now, he could run me through in an instant-I gave him the knee just as hard and dirty as I could. When he doubled up, I clubbed him on the back of the head, not with the edge of the hand to break his neck, but just with the heel of my fist, like a hammer, to drive him down into the road. He went down, and curled up like a baby, hugging himself where it hurt.

Breathing hard, I retrieved my knife. I picked up the sword, and the cane sheath, and fitted them back together. It was a beautiful job of workmanship: you couldn't see the joint at all. I picked up the Homburg hat and dusted it off, and carried it back to the little guy, who was still lying there. My left hand ached, and I didn't feel a bit sorry for him, although I had to admit, in all honesty, that he'd put on a damn good show. Whether it was genuine or phony remained to be determined. I bent over to hear what he was moaning. I caught a name, and leaned closer.

"Sara," he was whimpering. "I did my best, Sara. I am sorry." Then he looked up at me. "I am ready," he said more clearly. "If I were just a little bigger… But I am ready now. Kill me, murderer, as you did hen"