Angel's Ransom (7 page)

Holtz stood at the bookcase-bar, idly sliding the panel open and shut. He still held the Walther, but he seemed too
preoccupied with his amusement to pay any attention to the
group of half-dressed people held under guard at the other
end of the salon by Jules
’s
rabbit-faced companion of the
jetty, now armed like Holtz. Freddy, bleary-eyed in a
rumpled dressing-gown, seemed only half awake, unable to
grasp fully what was going on. Valentina looked cool-eyed
and immaculate as ever in a white
negligée
, Laura di Lucca
badly frightened in a swirl of pink lace. Bruno was a scowling, brown-skinned, bare-chested, handsomely muscled
Roman gladiator, wearing only
pajama
trousers.

Holtz continued to ignore the captives until Blake and Marian had joined the group. He looked up then, aiming the
Walther at Blake as if it were a pointer.

‘Now that we are all together, I’ll take your keys, Captain. You carry them on a ring in your right-hand coat pocket.
Throw them to Jules.’

Blake did as he was told. Jules disappeared down the companionway leading to the cabins.

‘I am glad to see that your lesson in cooperation has taken effect.’ Holtz grinned wolfishly. ‘Who else holds ship
’s
keys?’

‘Farr. The steward.’

‘The steward can be ignored, since he is not with us.
Mr
Farr
’s
keys will be taken care of. You are sure there are no
others aboard?’

‘I’m sure.’

Freddy said dully,
‘S
am. What
’s
it all about? Who are these guys?’

The pistol swung toward him, not in threat but to indicate the direction of Holtz
’s
attention. He said, ‘I shall
ask the questions,
Mr
Farr,’ and brought the pistol again
to bear on Blake. ‘It will be bad for everybody, not only yourself, if you lie to me, Captain. Do you understand
me?’

‘I understand you. There are no more keys.’

‘Good.’ The Walther
’s
indicating barrel moved on to Valentina. ‘Who are you? What is your name?’

Valentina
’s
wise honey-
colored
eyes studied the little gunman briefly. What she saw made her answer, without
fright but equally without challenge of his right to ask the
question, ‘Valentina
Walowska
.’

‘Polish?’

‘Yes.’

‘Husband? Family?’

‘I have none.’

‘Protector?’

‘No.’

‘How do you live?’

She shrugged.

‘
S
am,’ Freddy said again, pleadingly. ‘Do something. Throw these hooligans overboard. Call the cops.’

‘The captain has already made the attempt, at some cost to himself. Please be quiet.’ Holtz
’s
menacing pointer moved
on, to Bruno. ‘Who are you?’

With infinite and deliberate insolence, Bruno said, ‘None of your business.’

The pointing pistol held steady,
leveled
at his brown chest. Holtz
’s
expression did not change. Blake was aware
that Marian, standing at his side, had stopped breathing. In
the dead silence, broken only by the faint putter of the
yacht
’s
idling motors, Laura di Lucca said hurriedly,
‘Please. I’ll answer your questions. He
’s
my husband, Bruno
di Lucca. I am Laura di Lucca.’

Holtz made her a small ironic bow.

‘Forgive me,’ he said. ‘I should have recognized the head of the family immediately.’

Bruno
’s
handsome face darkened. He took a quick for-ward step, then froze in the face of the
leveled
pistol. He held the advance for a moment before he slowly, grudgingly
stepped back to his place. There was no fear in his retreat, only an acceptance of superior force.

Holtz said calmly, ‘Roche, if he moves out of his place again, shoot him.’

The rabbit-faced man nodded. Blake suspected that he was too tightly strung to trust his voice. Holtz, on the other
hand, showed none of the tautness of nerves that had marked
his actions in the pilot-house. He seemed wholly at ease.

He pointed the pistol barre
l to indicate that he was speak
ing to Laura di Lucca. ‘Now. You’re American?’

‘By birth. I took my husband
’s
nationality. He
’s
Italian.’ ‘Family?’

‘He has family in Rome. I have only - him.’

‘How do you live? Whose money supports you?’

‘I have a trust fund. My first husband left it to me when he died.’

‘
S
o your second husband could spend it.’

A faint
color
came to Laura di Lucca
’s
cheeks. She said nothing. Holtz made an impatient gesture that dismissed her
and Bruno.

‘Never mind. Your little affairs are of no importance.’ The pointer came to bear on Freddy at last. ‘
Mr
Farr, you look
tired. Please sit down. Over here - at the writing-desk.’

Now it comes
, Blake thought.

Freddy did not move until Roche took him by the arm, swinging him loosely into the chair that Holtz held with
mock consideration. Holtz took a sheet of stationery from a
desk pigeonhole and looked at its letterhead.

‘ “
Aboard the
Angel
”,’ he read. ‘A good beginning.’ He put the paper on the desk in front of Freddy. ‘Add the date,
please. Then write as I tell you.’

Freddy reached obediently, mechanically, for a pen. He wrote like a man in a trance, his eyes half closed. To the
others who watched, there was an indecency in the solicitous
way Holtz took care to speak slowly enough for Freddy
’s
clumsy fingers to follow.

Holtz said, ‘The letter is to Alain Krug,
Banque
Suisse, Geneva. It will read, “Dear Alain. The bearer of this note,
Louis Roche, is my partner in a project to break the bank at
Monte Carlo. Before you start making noises like a banker, I will remind you that it is my own money I am playing with
and that the
house has been shoving Fun-loving Fred around
long enough. Louis has a system that is unbeatable if
enough cash is put into it. That is all you have to know
about it except that I am - I mean you are - putting up the
cash.” New paragraph.’

Holtz paused. Freddy
’s
pen scratched faintly, steadily. The
Angel
, now broached to the wind, had a more pronounced
rock than before. Blake shifted his feet to hold his balance.

He was beginning to feel a new and sobering respect for Holtz. The letter the little man was dictating was the kind of
letter Freddy wrote, even to its typically peremptory refusal
to be questioned. Other things - Holtz
’s
certainty about
Blake
’s
keys, his knowledge that Freddy used the Swiss
banker
’s
first name, the very fact that he knew of the
existence
of the Swiss account - showed careful preparation for
the venture that was revealing its nature as Freddy wrote.
Blake again had the feeling that Holtz was moving through
a well-rehearsed performance in which he would make no
mistakes.

Freddy
’s
pen stopped. He sat with his shoulders hunched, waiting.

Holtz said, ‘The new paragraph. “Please satisfy yourself, as if I didn’t know you will, that Louis is not a crook or a
phony
by double checking his passport, identification
papers, and birthmarks, then cash the
check
I have given
him and start him back this way. If you feel like sending
somebody along with him to see that the money gets here
safely, that is up to you, but keep your nose out of the system
or I will take my business somewhere else.” ’

Freddy
’s
pen scratched and stopped.

Holtz said, ‘Another paragraph. “As you may have seen by the yellow press, one of my
almosts
is trying to grab the
Angel
. I am going to have to disappear with it for a while,
but do not worry about Louis and the money after he gets
here. We have made our own arrangements.” Add “All the
best” and sign it “Freddy”.’

The import of what he was writing had begun to penetrate Freddy
’s
blurred mind before he finished the letter. When Holtz slipped it out from under his hand, to read it
over with care, he said heavily, ‘It
’s
a cute project, but
you’re wasting your time. I haven’t got enough money in
the
Banque
Suisse to keep me warm. Everything I own that
Monte Carlo hasn’t got is in the United States.’

‘You have more than enough money in the
Banque
Suisse for my purposes.’ Holtz did not interrupt his reading. ‘You
have been investigated very carefully,
Mr
Farr. Do not
doubt for a moment that I know what I am doing.’

He folded the note, slipped it in an envelope, and gave the envelope to Roche. Roche took it without concealing his
reluctance to do so.

‘It ought to be in French,’ he grumbled. ‘A man should be able to read what is said about him in a letter he delivers
himself. I could be sticking my head in a trap.’

‘I have read it.’ Holtz paid no particular attention to the complaint. He took another, larger envelope from his pocket.
‘It says what I told you it would say.’

‘I still think it ought to be in French. What happens if the Swiss sausage begins asking questions?’

‘The questions are all answered in advance, and Farr could no more write intelligible French than you can write
Japanese. Everybody knows it but you. Put the letter in your
pocket and stop trying to think for yourself.’

‘I still say
—
’

Roche faltered into silence. He had at last gained Holtz
’s
full attention.

Facing one another, each with a pistol in his hand, the two men were as dissimilar as a rabbit facing a ferret poised
to spring at its throat. There was a chill ferocity about Holtz,
a promise as cruel as that of a pointed gun. He did not speak
or change expression, yet in the few brief seconds during
which he seemed to wait, almost eagerly, for Roche to go on
before Jules came up out of the cabin companionway to
interrupt the tableau, the rabbit-faced man waited visibly.
His relief at Jules
’s
arrival was painfully apparent.

Jules carried an armload of loot: handbags, wallets,
jewelry
, a shotgun.

‘No other guns,’ he reported. ‘Nothing sharp bigger than a razor-blade. The old dame
’s
rocks could be worth
something
, but nobody is carrying much cash. Moneybags’
pockets are emptier than mine.’

‘He lost heavily at the casino last night.’ Holtz was indifferent to Roche again.
‘s
o much the better. It will be in
the newspapers, and he will logically need more dollars. We
will get them for him.’

The envelope he had taken from his pocket contained several pale-blue blank
checks
and a
photostat
of another.
He put one of the blanks and the
photostat
on the desk in
front of Freddy. By accident or design, the muzzle of the
Walther touched the back of Freddy
’s
head as he did so.

‘S
o you may understand that a slip of the pen will serve no purpose,
Mr
Farr, that is the signature which the
Banque
Suisse accepts against your dollar balance with them. I have
been careful to verify it. Make out a
check
to Louis Roche,
under today
’s
date. The amount will be one hundred
thousand dollars.’