Scarlet Imperial (17 page)

She said, “Say what you have to say.”

He studied her face. It was as if she held the key. She was surprised at his question. “How well do you know Towner Clay?”

She was rigid. He couldn’t have followed her from the Ritz to delve into Gavin’s implication. He wouldn’t have left Feather abruptly, as he must have left her, only for this.

She answered him to get past this deviation, to advance to his real purpose. She answered him truthfully, “Better than I know anyone in this world.” She knew no one else; Towner was her only friend, her one link with the living.

He didn’t take his eyes from her. “He sent you to me.”

“Yes.” It could be admitted now.

“Do you know why?”

“Yes.”

He waited but she didn’t say any more. He said it. “To steal the Scarlet Imperial.”

It was an ugly allegation, but she didn’t flinch from it. “Yes.”

“Do you know why?”

“Yes.”

She didn’t understand all of it yet. He had empowered Brewer to find the Imp, to turn it over to him. It wasn’t to save the price he must pay for delivery. Money didn’t matter to Towner; he had too much of it.

There could be only one reason, the one she had decided upon before, because Towner did not believe that Bry, once the Imp was in hand, meant to turn it over to him. Because somewhere his information had slipped. Neither Bry nor Towner knew that the other had for ultimate goal the return of the Imp to Feroun Dekertian. Someone had juggled truth to each man, someone who didn’t mean for Dekertian to have the Imp. Someone … Gavin Keane. She said slowly, “Yes, I know why.”

“And you were willing to steal it for him?”

“Yes.”

He hadn’t believed it of her, even when Gavin must have convinced him of it, because Gavin required someone to divert suspicion from himself. He didn’t want to believe it now of her, his eyes hurt her.

She needn’t keep silent longer; she could explain to Bry. He and Gavin were separate; it had been proven today. It was as she had believed in the beginning; Bry was the innocent bystander.

She said, “Yes, I was willing to steal to get the Scarlet Imperial. Towner and I have been after it for a long time.”

He drew away from her. She cried out, “It isn’t what you think.” Bry must understand; she mustn’t remain branded a thief in his eyes. He must be made to understand. She began haltingly, “When I was a little girl I lived in Manchukuo. I think I was born there. I think my family were Americans. I don’t know. I don’t even know my real name. I had to forget it for so long.” She’d never told anyone all of it, not even Towner, not even Thad. “I saw them killed. Because they were white foreigners. The monkey people, the invaders, thought I was dead too. I pretended I was dead. Until finally they went away.” She shook her head. “I don’t know how many days.”

He hesitated. “You couldn’t have been very old.” He understood.

“I was probably about six,” she said.

“But … what did you do?”

She said simply, “I wandered. With other refugees. I spoke Chinese, probably better than English. I was young enough to have been more with my amah than my mother. At any rate, I remember the amah better. I don’t remember anything of my mother except the way she looked when the guns tore her open.”

He breathed, “God!” Angrily.

But she had no real memory of it now; it was only something she could never forget. “I wandered up and down the countryside. I passed for Chinese. My hair and eyes are dark, and living outdoors darkens skin like mine. I must have been about twelve years old when I reached Shanghai. I went to work as a kitchen maid. I’d always been hungry. That way I’d get more to eat. I figured that out myself.” She was still proud of it. And proud that she’d never attached herself long to any one group. She’d lived alone, like a cat; alone in her own tight box. No one, not even the kindest, had ever been able to find her, to lay one finger touch on her inner spirit. She had no possessions, animate or inanimate, of which she could be deprived. She’d been a tough little roadside beggar before she graduated to the streets of Shanghai. She cared for no one, and no thing.

Until Thad came. She took a breath.

“Later I figured I’d get more to eat and more money if I worked in a cafe.” And more freedom. “I was trained by then. I even worked in the best hotels.” Never too long in one place. Wily as a shadow. And as elusive.

Until Thad came. “I passed everywhere as Chinese, perhaps Eurasian.” Thad who had known her without need of explanation. “And then—” She didn’t want to talk about Thad. She said, “You wonder why I’m telling you all this.”

“No.” He put his hand on hers. It was a gesture of kindness, nothing more.

She began again. “There was a boy, one of your American flyers…. The Flying Tigers.” His hand stirred, moved away. “He—we were in love. He was coming back. We were going to be married. He didn’t come back.” There was no anguish now, only pity for the girl who had dreamed of escaping the degradation of her life; who had waited, believing. “A long time after, I found out. A man who’d known him brought me word. He was dead.” Her voice was quiet. “He’d died in prison. For stealing the Scarlet Imperial.”

Remembered fury devastated her. “I tried to kill the man who told me that. I knew it was a lie. I tried to kill him and to kill myself.” She wrought control in herself. “Towner Clay saved me.”

Bry said, “I see.”

He thought he did; he couldn’t because he’d never known the dregs of living, the escape blocked. He’d never known the miracle of a vague, disinterested man who appeared as saviour.

“I was sick for months. He took care of me. He got me out of the East before it was too late. When I was well again, I helped him.”

“Towner was in the diplomatic service,” Bry said.

“Not after the war was over.” The inner excitement lighted her again. “He was seeking treasures that had been stolen by war thieves, by looters. I helped him find them. To return to their owners when we could locate those persons. We couldn’t always. When I knew what he was doing, I told him about the Scarlet Imperial. Thad had died but the Imperial had never been found.” She breathed deeply. “Towner promised to help me find it. To return it to Iran. It was one of their state treasures.” Her voice quieted. “It couldn’t bring Thad back. But it would clear his name. And if we could find who had actually stolen it, Feroun Dekertian promised to bring the thief to justice.”

“Dekertian promised you that?”

“He promised Towner,” she said. She put her hand on Bry’s arm, to lift his attention from the gravel on the path. “I didn’t know Towner was your client. I don’t know why he sent me to get the Imp from you. Unless he was afraid it would be stolen from you by someone else.” She was matter of fact. “He knew I could cope better with that sort of thing.” Because she was used to trickery. She rubbed her forehead. “I don’t know why Towner didn’t speak to me today.”

Bry said, “I know why.”

Her eyes questioned him.

“Because Jones of the F.B.I. told him you were in league with Gavin, to steal the Imperial.”

She should have realized the reason after Jones’ accusation in the office. She admitted aloud, “I should have known.” And because he believed Jones, Towner thought her to be involved in the murders. She was bitter. “They’re convinced of it now. Gavin took me with him. He held a gun on me. I got away from him at his hotel. He couldn’t kill me there.”

“Kill you?” Bry’s eyes opened wide.

“You don’t know him very well, do you? He killed Hester. Maybe Pincek.” Anyone in his way.

Bry took her hand again. “Liza, Dekertian is on his way here from Washington. Will you give him the Imperial? When he arrives?”

She nodded.

His hand tightened on hers. “You still have it?”

“Yes.” She said, “If I can stay safe that long, I will give it to M’sieur Dekertian.”

He considered it soberly. “You can’t go to your place. Or Towner’s. They’re obvious.” He suggested, “I could give you the key to my apartment. No one would think of looking for you there.”

He was right. There had been nothing but office between Bry and her.

She hesitated. “Gavin—”

His face set. “Gavin won’t be coming there. I’ll see that he doesn’t. You go to my apartment. I’ll bring Dekertian and we’ll go for the Imp.”

She hesitated further. “I want Towner there when I turn over the Imp.”

“I’ll get in touch with him. You lay low. You don’t want Jones turning up.”

She didn’t. She decided. “Very well. Give me the key.” It should be safe. She had lost all doubt of Brewer now. He wanted only to return the Imperial. “We won’t leave the Park together. I’ll go the south entrance.”

He removed the key from his ring, put it in her hand, repeated his address. On Fifty-ninth street, East. “Be careful. Don’t open the door to anyone. I have a spare key. I’ll be there as quickly as possible.”

She turned to go but she couldn’t yet. Not until she asked the question. “Did Gavin Keane steal the Scarlet Imperial from Iran?”

He didn’t hesitate. “No, Gavin did not steal the Imperial from Iran.”

The apartment on Fifty-ninth was small and peaceful. The asthmatic elevator man hadn’t questioned her statement: she was Mr. Brewer’s secretary. She liked Bry’s taste, books and records and a well-stocked bachelor ice box. She hadn’t eaten since, breakfast; she helped herself.

There was no sophistication, no luxury, only comfort here. Except for Feather’s photographed beauty disdaining sweetly from the studio piano. Eliza dumped her on her sticky-sweet face before settling herself in the chair with her sandwich and milk. And the morning paper. A conservative paper that gave Joseph Pincek’s death as little attention as it warranted. Renfro Hester was on an inside page; the address where he had been found, rather than his identity, made him that newsworthy.

Her respite was interrupted by the tinkling of a bell. Bry had said to let no one in; she didn’t move. The bell repeated; it was telephone but not the one in this room. She located the house phone in the kitchen. She hesitated before answering but she answered, muffling her voice with the palm of her hand over the mouthpiece.

The voice was mild, the cadence inflected. “Feroun Dekertian, speaking. May I speak with Bryan Brewer, if you please.”

She dropped her hand, spoke hurriedly. “Come right up, Mr. Dekertian.”

She waited by the front door, her hand clenched over the knob. When the knock sounded, she opened it a split, not enough that it couldn’t be shoved tight if the wrong man stood outside.

“Mr. Brewer?”

She accepted him in her first quick glimpse. He was a fragile man, neat, with black lozenge eyes in his brown face. His black hair was untouched by gray but he wasn’t young.

She said, “Come in, Mr. Dekertian. I am Miss Williams, Mr. Brewer’s secretary.”

He entered but he was as wary as she. She closed the door quickly after him and his eyes skittled to the sound.

“Won’t you sit down?”

“Mr. Brewer is here?” His speech was precise as the small stripe in his dark suit. As the dark hat and case he carried.

“He was to meet you.” She gestured to a chair.

He didn’t move. “He was not at the airport.”

She explained, “He must have been delayed.” She had held him too long in the Park. Saturday afternoon in traffic. “He’ll come here if he doesn’t find you. He promised to return as quickly as possible.”

He sat down then neatly on the edge of the chair, propped his pinseal brief case between his polished black shoes. His feet were small as a woman’s. His eyes were on her, unblinking. Her own were unblinking on him. Two lizards watching each other. Waiting for the other to communicate.

Her curiosity of him was less controlled than his of her. She spoke, “You have come for the Scarlet Imperial.”

He inclined his head solemnly. “Yes. I have been waiting for word from Bryan Brewer that it is here. Today I have that word.”

The rush of questions blocked her throat. This was Dekertian, the man who had arrested Thad, who had condemned him to prison. Where he had died. Feroun Dekertian, envoy from Iran. Dekertian who had been chief of the police in Teheran before he became a diplomat.

This was the man she had once vowed to kill with her own hands. Until Towner had forced her to know that Dekertian was hot to blame. Dekertian had only been obeying the dictates of his office. The evidence of guilt had all pointed to Thad. Pointed by a crafty hand. Towner had been attached to the American legation in Teheran at that time; he spoke out of first hand knowledge.

There were so many things she wanted to say to this quiet, dark man. She was trying to sort them when the telephone rang. She smiled, “That must be Bry—Mr. Brewer. I’ll tell him you’re waiting.” She lilted, “Hello,” and her face froze in that ludicrous happiness.

“Where’s Bry?” It was Gavin’s voice.

She said nothing.

He crackled, “Hello, hello. Liza? Where’s Bry?”

He knew her voice, even in that one word.

She had to speak. Her words tumbled as if she’d planned, as if she were not speaking out of panic. “He’s waiting for you at the Ritz.” She replaced the phone, cutting him off, whatever he was going to say. Her knuckles were white on the phone. The taste of urgency was in her mouth. “You must come with me, Mr. Dekertian. Now. At once.”

He didn’t move. He wasn’t even curious.

“Please,” she insisted. “Before it’s too late.” Before Gavin came here. He would come when he didn’t find Bry at the Ritz. Perhaps before then. Dekertian must not fall into his hands or into the hands of the other desperate men who were after the Imp. The death of Dekertian would be only another unsolved death. One that would find space on the front page of the morning Times.

She flung her cape about her, gathered her purse and gloves. She had to force Dekertian to accompany her. She demanded, “Do you want the Scarlet Imperial?”

“It is for this I am here.”

“Then come along. I’ll give it to you.”

He lifted his brief case, rose to his small feet. “You have the Imperial?”

“Yes, I have it.” She forced herself to walk, not run, to the door.

“I do not understand this.”

“I haven’t time to explain now. We must get away from here.”