The Further Adventures of Batman (43 page)

“Quite right. But Julian Richter is a respectable restauranteur. Customers saw you leave this place in good health and good humor. So far as the police are concerned, The Man is still Mr. Anonymous. There’s nothing to connect me with your rapidly approaching demise.”

“Devil!” Carol cried.

“Shut up!” Richter exploded. “Let’s get this over with.” He turned to one of the gang members. “Fred, roll up their sleeves.”

Fred cautiously unbuttoned Dick’s sleeve, remembering how easily Dick had disarmed him before. His friend, Brad, pressed a gun to Dick’s temple. Then Fred bent over Carol, huddled limply in her chair, and untied her hands. Carol collapsed weakly into Fred’s arms.

There was a knock at the door leading to the restaurant.

“Who is it?” Richter demanded.

“It’s Joe, the waiter.”

“What do you want?” Richter growled. “I’m busy.”

“There’s a package for you. Registered mail. They need your signature.”

“Sign it for me, idiot!”

They heard the waiter conferring with someone. “The guy says the sender requested your personal signature, boss. Or he has to take it back.”

“Very well. One minute.” Turning to Fred, he whispered, “Gag them. Brad, keep them covered.”

Fred tied handkerchiefs around their mouths. Then Richter unlocked the door.

Dick cried out in a muffled voice. Brad jabbed a gun to his back. “Shut up,” he whispered, “or I’ll plug you.”

“Hand it over,” Richter said, reaching for the parcel. The waiter fell forward unexpectedly, and Richter reeled backward. Batman loomed up behind the waiter. A clubbing blow sent Richter crashing into Brad, who dropped his automatic. Dick swooped down, picked it up, and leveled it at Fred.

“All right, drop your gun!” Dick ordered Fred. Before he finished the sentence, Batman had already twisted the gun out of Fred’s hand.

“Raise your hands and face the wall! All of you,” Batman ordered. “You too, Richter.”

Richter meekly obeyed.

They heard footsteps charging down the stairs to the cellar. Policemen appeared in the doorway, their guns drawn.

“I notified the police before barging in,” Batman whispered to Dick.

The police searched and handcuffed the gang. “All right, take them away,” Lieutenant Ross called out.

As the police led them out, Richter managed a defiant smile. “You can’t prove a thing against me. I have witnesses who will swear I haven’t left the restaurant all week. You’ll never make the charges stick.”

“Oh yes they will,” Carol shot back. “With my testimony and Dick’s.”

Richter glared at her, his eyes full of menace.

“And I’ll show the police where the junk is stashed,” Carol added.

Richter’s mouth fell open.

“For once he’s speechless,” Dick said, as a policeman led Richter outside.

“But how did you find this place?” Dick asked Batman.

“I did a little investigating on my own,” Batman answered. “One of our first hunches was that The Man might be a professor adept at hypnosis. A teaching post would be the perfect cover. I looked up an instructor at Gotham U. who remembered a man fitting Carol’s description. He was kicked off the faculty for illicit manufacture of psychedelic drugs. Afterward, Richter changed careers and bought an interest in the Regency, where he performed as hypnotist.”

After the police put the gang in a van, they began a thorough search of the premises. Carol knew of glassine packets of heroin concealed in ceiling pipes. They found other packets in cans buried behind the brick and mortar walls of the cellar.

“This evidence will help put Richter away for life,” Ross said.

“What about the rest of the gang?” Dick asked.

“The ones who abducted Carol will be held for kidnapping and attempted murder. We’ll try to rehabilitate the others, beginning with medical treatment for their addictions. It won’t be easy, but they’re young, and there’s always hope.”

“What about me?” Carol asked.

“I haven’t forgotten you, Carol. You’ll be glad to learn that the department store has dropped its charges against you.”

“That’s great!” Dick said, hugging Carol.

“Your parents are waiting for you at the police station,” Ross added.

“How can I ever thank you?” Carol said, clasping his hands. “And you too, of course, Dick and Batman. I’ll never forget what you did for me.”

“All in a day’s police work,” Ross said.

“All in a day’s investigative reporting,” Dick echoed.

Batman started for the door. “I have to leave now. Anyone want a lift?”

“Going my way?” Dick said, with a wink. “It’s not every day a reporter gets chauffeured by Batman.”

The Pirate of
Millionaires’ Cove

Edward D. Hoch

T
here was a full moon that night, only lightly obscured by mist, as Anton Bartizan strolled on the deck of his converted fishing schooner, the
Dragonfly.
The Fourth of July weekend was always a busy one at Milliton Cove, called Millionaires’ Cove in the society pages of Gotham City’s newspapers because of the large number of fabulous yachts that could usually be found at anchor there. Most had sailed out of the Cove earlier, positioning themselves for the following morning’s big race, but Bartizan had been late, awaiting the arrival of his weekend traveling companion.

Now the sails were full, catching the breeze that drifted across the Cove like gentle fingers. Below deck, an auxiliary engine helped speed them along. Standing there at the railing, he saw the first of the night’s fireworks going off along the opposite shore. He felt in his pocket for the flat box containing the diamond bracelet that was to be the weekend’s surprise, then stepped to the hatchway and called down, “Come up on deck, darling. I have something to show you.”

At almost the same instant there was a blast like a giant firecracker from a nearby vessel. Anton Bartizan looked up, startled, and saw the sky alive with fireflies streaking toward his schooner. He watched, unbelieving, as they punctured his sails, each one producing a tiny tongue of flame. Then he shouted for his two-man crew. “Fire! Fire on the sails!”

Jesse was at the wheel and had already seen the flames breaking out. He ran from the pilothouse as the other crewman, Luis, appeared from below deck carrying a fire extinguisher. But Bartizan was suddenly aware of another vessel moving closer without lights, until its side was almost touching the schooner. Bartizan tried to identify it, but not until the spreading flame from the sails had lit the scene did he make out the skull and crossbones flag fluttering from the mast.

Even when the first of the brawny men had leaped on board, Bartizan thought it must be some sort of tasteless practical joke. He saw their leader, with a bearded chin and a patch over one eye, brandishing a cutlass and looking like someone’s costume-party version of a pirate, and he would have laughed had the flames at his back not felt quite so real.

Then Luis stepped in front of the pirate chief and took the cutlass through his midsection, and Anton Bartizan knew it was far from make-believe. Someone else fired a sort of flintlock pistol and Jesse went down too. The sails were burning out of control now, with bright red fire reflected off the water. To Bartizan it was like the worst of his nightmares.

As other boarders came over the side he remembered his passenger, the lovely young woman below deck who was to have been his companion for the long holiday weekend. He turned and ran for the hatchway with the eye-patched pirate in close pursuit.

She was waiting there for him, seemingly oblivious to the slaughter above deck. “Quick!” he shouted. “Over the side or we’ll all be killed!”

She stood up calmly and smiled at him. “It’s too late for that, dear Anton.”

He turned and saw the pirate behind him, raising his cutlass one more time.

Two days later Gotham City’s police commissioner, tough ex-patrolman James Gordon, sat alone in his office at headquarters, staring distastefully at the headlines in the local papers.
Pirate Ship Strikes Second Yacht at Millionaires’ Cove,
screamed one, while the other—a bit more restrained—announced,
Police Believe Yacht Fire May Be Tied To Recent Sinking.

Anton Bartizan had lived just long enough to babble out a lurid story of attack by a pirate ship, and now the whole thing was in the papers. They’d even managed to connect it with the unexplained sinking of a luxury yacht in the same cove two weeks earlier. The mayor was demanding action, and both their offices had been flooded with phone calls from frightened yachtsmen.

Commissioner Gordon needed help badly.

It was at this moment that the rear door of his office, leading to the private elevator, opened and closed. He heard the whisper of sound and whirled around in his chair.

“Batman!”

“At your service, Commissioner.”

The tall hooded man in blue and gray tights and a blue batcape was a familiar figure to Commissioner Gordon. Batman had come to his aid many times in the past when unspeakable crime menaced Gotham City. The Commissioner immediately felt as though a weight had been lifted from his shoulders. “You’ve read the papers, of course.”

“Is it true,” the Caped Crusader asked, “that a pirate ship has been attacking yachts in Milliton Cove?”

“All too true, Batman. We had a report of it two weeks ago when a young boy reported seeing a pirate ship alongside a yacht named the
Trenchon
. The yacht burned and sank in Milliton Cove that night. No one believed the boy, of course, and we had no other evidence of foul play. But now things are different.”

“Exactly what did Anton Bartizan tell you before he died?” Batman asked.

Commissioner Gordon leaned forward on his desk, peering up at the mysterious caped figure who stood before him. “He said there were fireflies coming at him through the darkness, and then his sails caught fire.”

“Fireflies!”

“Then they were boarded by men dressed as pirates. They slaughtered his two-man crew and he ran below decks to protect a young lady who was there.”

“Was she killed too?” Batman asked.

“We found no trace of her. The crewmen, Jesse and Luis, were both dead and Bartizan was dying when police and firefighters reached the scene. The vessel’s seacock had been opened and it would have sunk like the
Trenchon
if we hadn’t gotten there in time to close it.”

“Any idea of the motive behind these crimes, Commissioner?”

“The same as any pirate’s—money and jewelry. Bartizan, for instance, purchased a diamond bracelet for twenty thousand dollars last week, possibly to give to the lady on the boat. It wasn’t found anywhere. The jeweler supplied this photograph of it.”

“Do you believe she’s involved?” Batman asked, studying the photo.

“It would explain why she wasn’t killed with the others.”

“Pirates sometimes took captives, especially young women.”

“There’s been no missing person report of anyone who could possibly qualify. I think we’ll find she’s one of the gang.”

But Batman wasn’t willing to accept that. “Why would she help steal a diamond bracelet that was going to be hers anyhow?”

“We don’t know that. Bartizan was divorced, but he may have had more than one lady friend. Or perhaps she didn’t know she was getting the gift.”

“What about the first sinking?” Batman asked. “Was there anyone on board?”

“The owner, a local banker named Brewster Hemmings, was alone on board. The seacock was opened in that case too, and until now it was classified as a suicide.”

“Did he have money and jewels on board?”

“It’s very possible. That place isn’t called Millionaires’ Cove for nothing.”

“What line of investigation are you following at this point, Commissioner?”

“We’re stumped, Batman,” he admitted frankly. “Naturally I’m assigning more men to the Cove area, especially around the Yacht Club and marina. All we can hope for is to catch him in the act if he tries again.”

“That might be too late to prevent the loss of more lives,” Batman pointed out.

“Do you have any ideas?”

“Perhaps. I’ll be in touch, Commissioner.”

Without another word Batman wrapped the midnight blue cape around himself and stepped through the door by which he’d entered.