The Intimidators (13 page)

“I hope so, sir,” I’d said. “I’m counting on it, in fact.”

Well, he was halfway to Washington by now, if he’d made his connection; and I was here, about to renew my acquaintance with a lady who’d twice almost managed to have me killed. I went into the motel office to register.

“Mr. Helm?” said the pretty brunette girl behind the desk. “Oh, yes, here we are. Matthew L. Helm. You have cabin 26. Just follow the driveway around behind the office and you’ll find it on your right, about halfway down to the marina.”

“I was thinking of doing some fishing,” I said. “A friend of mine recommended a guide here named Robinson. A lady guide, he said.” I laughed. “Anyway, it’ll be a new experience, if she can take me out. How do I get in touch with her?”

The girl said, rather stiffly: “And why shouldn’t a woman be able to locate fish for you as well as a man, Mr. Helm?” Then she laughed quickly. “Ouch, I guess my Women’s Lib is showing. You’ll probably find Cap’n Hattie down on one of her boats, either the open twenty-two-foot
Mako
tied up near the dockmaster’s office—that’s the building like a lighthouse, out on the pier—or the forty-footer she lives on; the first boat in Charter Row, just across from our bar and restaurant. She’s got a sign up: the
Queenfisher
, Captain Harriet Robinson. You can’t miss it.”

I didn’t miss it; but first, after tossing my suitcase into my cabin and turning on the air conditioning because the place was stuffy, I drove down and checked on the dockmaster’s office built like a lighthouse, out of curiosity. It was just that: a tall white tower out on the pier, with a revolving blue beacon on top. Inside was the usual marine-store collection of fishing tackle, charts, boat supplies, sunglasses, guidebooks, and sunburn lotions, plus a tanned gent in a yachting cap who pointed out Cap’n Hattie’s two boats to me.

He said he thought she was on board the cruiser, but I stopped to inspect the empty, smaller vessel first, since I had to walk right by it. It was a good-sized craft for an open boat, about as big as they come, aside from Navy workboats and such. Instead of placing the helmsman and windshield up forward, runabout fashion, it had the arrangement currently popular in boats built for fishing, with the controls located on a console amidships. There were two comfortable pedestal chairs behind the console. The rest was just wide-open cockpit with plenty of walk-around space for casting, or fighting a fish standing up. If you were the lazy type who preferred to battle sitting down, the starboard chair had a rod socket, or gimbal, for the purpose.

Across the stern, forming a bench seat ahead of the motors, were the built-in bait-well and fish-box. There were gaffs, outriggers, a radio antenna, an auxiliary gas tank for extended running, and neatly furled awnings fore and aft that could, presumably, be erected to protect the paying guests from hostile elements, wet or hot. There was also a slender Fiberglas pushpole about fourteen feet long held in clips along one gunwale—a common sight on small fishing boats plying the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico and Florida Bay, where the fish are often stalked silently by poling, but unusual on a craft this big.

On the transom, tilted out of the water, were two large Johnson outboard motors marked a hundred horsepower each. My amateurish estimate was that this amount of power, assuming for the moment that the markings were correct, would put the top speed close to forty knots, which is moving right along on the water, as I’d learned recently in the much smaller vessel of a very similar type which had been assigned to me for my previous job in these parts. I frowned down at the big, tilted motors and exposed propellers, wondering just how far the similarity extended....

I shook my head quickly. Guesswork was a waste of time when the answers to all questions were close at hand. I strolled along the waterfront to where the big charter fishing boats were docked. The first one in line was a shiny white craft with the customary outriggers and flying bridge. The deckhouse, under the flying bridge, had blinds drawn against the sun and seemed to be air-conditioned. The hatch in the cockpit was open for access to the twin engines; and a narrow figure in khakis was prone on the deck, reaching down to work on the machinery below.

I said, “Captain Robinson?”

There was a small space of silence; then a female voice I remembered said: “That’s me. Hand me that wrench, will you, Helm?”

I stepped down into the cockpit and, rather cautiously, placed the only wrench in sight into the slender, grimy hand that reached up for it.

“What’s the problem down there?” I asked.

“What do you care?” asked the familiar voice that brought back memories, not all unpleasant, of a distant time, and a place far north. “You didn’t know much about boats the last time we met. I don’t suppose you know a hell of a lot about motors, either.... Now the screwdriver, please. Thanks. That’s got it.”

She backed herself up and out, and sat on her heels to look up at me. I saw that she hadn’t changed very much. She’d always been a slim, handsome, dark lady with a style all her own, and she still had it, even in well-worn khakis with grease on her hands and a smudge on her cheek.

“Alone?” she said.

“How many does it take?” I asked. “Particularly now that you haven’t got Nick to help you.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Why remind me of that, darling? You’d never have got Nick if you hadn’t been using a goddamn club—”

“And all he had was about fifty pounds extra weight, and you at the wheel doing tricks with that damned schooner to help him while we fought it out. Poor Nick. And poor Renee.... Oh, yes, we traced her, finally, the kid you just sent after me, or had sent after me. Renee Schneider, alias Lacey Matilda Rockwell. Where’s the real Lacey Rockwell, Mrs. Rosten?”

“Don’t call me that,” she said, rising. She looked at me hard. “I don’t know how you do it, Helm,” she said. “You’re not very smart, not really. You’re not very strong; Nick could have broken you in two. You’re not very attractive. And you’re a lousy seaman, if it matters. And still, damn it, you always come out on top.” She shrugged. “Well, to hell with it. Let me wash my hands and—”

“Robin,” I said, as she turned toward the closed and shuttered deckhouse.

“What?”

“Don’t,” I said.

She frowned. “I don’t know what—”

“Whether you’re planning to take a handful of barbiturates, blow your brains out dramatically, or dive out a porthole, don’t do it,” I said. “And don’t try to blow my brains out, either. You’ll never make it. Renee tried, and she was a trained agent, and I’m still here. At blowing out brains, I’m a pro, and you’re just a lousy amateur. At least, before you do anything drastic, wait until you hear what I have to say, please.”

She studied me for another second or two. “My apologies,” she said quietly. “Maybe you are half-smart after all. Okay, darling, I’ll wait. But you’ll never put me in jail. You know that.”

“Nobody’s said a damned thing about jail except you,” I said. “Wash your hands and let me buy you a drink across the road and speak my piece. After that, if you want, you can slit your throat and welcome. I’ve got a nice sharp knife in my pocket. Be my guest.”

The place across the road—actually one of the paved driveways of the extensive resort complex—was a pleasant restaurant with a bar in the shadowy back corner. We picked a table nearby and had the drinks brought to us. She was a bourbon girl, as befitted a former native of Maryland.

“Okay,” she said. “Talk.”

“I’ve got a deal for you,” I said. I’d had time to do some thinking on the flight from Nassau; and I thought I’d figured out a way this wild-goose chase on which I’d been sent to keep Washington happy could be made to show a profit. It involved a lot of guessing and a lot of luck, but then, most operations do.

Captain Harriet Robinson, to give her her local name, sipped her whiskey thoughtfully. “What’s in it for me?” she asked.

“Forgetfulness,” I said. “A total lapse of memory on my part and that of my chief. Robin Rosten’s bones remain buried in the silt at the bottom of Chesapeake Bay. Captain Harriet Robinson carries on with her Florida fishing-boat business undisturbed. That is, of course, assuming she can control her homicidal impulses in the future.”

The tanned woman facing me drew a long breath. “It seemed like a good idea at the time, but now.... How many years has it been, Matt? Too damned long to keep a good hate going. Okay, that’s what I get out of your deal. What do you get?”

“Five things,” I said. “Lacey Rockwell. Wellington Phipps and his daughter Loretta. You can throw in the wife, Amanda, if you’re feeling generous. Sir James Marcus. Baron Henri Paul Lavalle.”

There was a lengthy silence. Cap’n Hattie closed her eyes tightly and opened them again, drawing another lengthy breath. “I’m a fool,” she said. “Of course you have to tease the captured animals a bit. I should have expected it; but I really thought you were serious. I thought you really intended to give me a chance—”

“I do.” After a moment, I said, “You’re not denying that you do know something about Lacey Rockwell, are you?”

“I’m not denying or admitting anything right now, darling.”

I said, “We know the brother, Harlan Rockwell, spent a good deal of time right here at this marina getting his sloop,
Star Trek,
ready for a round-the-world jaunt. He wasn’t really flush, and from time to time he made a little money by helping out on the local charter fishing boats. He worked on your big boat several times when you had a party to take out and your regular mate had tied one on and couldn’t drag himself out of bed. Our information is that you became quite friendly with the boy, gave him advice and help on matters nautical, and maybe slept with him a few times, or maybe not. On this point, our intelligence is a little shaky.”

“Don’t be delicate,” said the lady across the table. “Of course I slept with him, why not? But only once. He was too damned respectful; he made me feel old as the hills. Who the hell goes to bed to be
respected
, for God’s sake?”

I grinned. “I’ll keep that in mind,” I said. “Anyway, at last the boat was ready and Harlan Rockwell shoved off on his great voyage. Weeks passed. Suddenly a little blonde girl with long hair turned up, concerned about her brother, who apparently hadn’t filed a flight plan with her. It seems that communications between Rockwell brother and sister weren’t really as good as I was led to believe in Nassau. They led pretty separate lives; the girl was busy at her job up north; she’d only known Harlan was staying here, from a casual postcard. Then she got another card from Nassau saying the circumnavigation was finally underway, and he’d drop her a line next time he hit terra firma. Followed a long time of nothing. Getting worried at last, and feeling guilty, I suppose, about not having looked after her kid brother more carefully, the girl had taken leave from her job and come down here to see if, before leaving, he might have told somebody the detailed plans he hadn’t confided to her. She was steered to you. The two of you were seen together. Okay?”

“Yes, the girl was here. I talked with her on board my boat. As you say, she was worried about her brother. I told her as much as I knew of his intentions.”

“Which was plenty,” I said. “And at this point, things get kind of complicated. Following the trail of her missing brother, Miss Lacey Rockwell leaves the Florida Keys. Miss Lacey Rockwell appears in Nassau, only it’s not the same Miss Rockwell at all. Well, we know what happened to Female Rockwell Number Two, the imposter. She’s buried in a Nassau cemetery, terminated by a slug from a big old Webley .455 just as she was trying to put a nasty little 9mm projectile into me. The question is, where did Female Rockwell Number One get to, the genuine, original article? Obviously, she was taken out of circulation somehow, so the imitation Rockwell would have a clear field. I’m hoping she’s still alive. If she isn’t, you’re at least an accessory, and we’ll have it that much harder keeping the cops off you, assuming you give us a motive for trying.

There was another silence. At last the woman facing me said: “The girl is alive. I may even be able to get her released. I don’t think she’s been allowed to see or hear enough to make trouble for anybody except Renee Schneider, who talked with her; and Renee, as you say, is dead. But why, darling, are you interested in a fairly boring little blonde who, aside from her brother, can’t seem to think or talk about much of anything except saving the oceans of the world from pollution. I’m not knocking it, but I shouldn’t think it was one of your major interests.”

I laughed. “To be honest, Hattie, aside from a sort of general, kindly humanitarianism. I’m not really concerned about the fate of Lacey Rockwell. However, the fact that your associates couldn’t find the brother and his boat out there in the Atlantic and take him out of circulation, too, doesn’t necessarily mean he’s dead. It’s a big ocean. The kid may still turn up and come looking for his sister. You’re the last person known to have been seen with her. For your own sake, I think it would be a lot smarter if you did get her turned loose, eventually.”

“Eventually?”

I said, “Well, right now I’ll admit Miss Rockwell would be kind of an embarrassment, complaining hysterically to the authorities about her mysterious kidnaping and cruel imprisonment. She might even make some trouble for you if she’s halfway bright. At the moment, I wouldn’t like that. I need you trouble-free. Or, let’s say, the only troubles I want you concerned with are my troubles. So just tell her jailers to keep her well fed and blindfolded until we get the rest of these people taken care of.”

“That’s a pretty callous attitude, isn’t it, Matt?”

“Callous?” I said. “Hell, who’s holding her prisoner, you or I? Who had an innocent young girl kidnaped in the first place, so a substitute could impersonate her in Nassau and commit cold-blooded murder on a fine, upstanding government agent named Matthew Helm? Or was she supposed to decoy me here so you could do the job? Anyway, don’t talk callous to me, Captain Robinson.”

“Well, I’m not actually
holding
—”

“Now you’re quibbling,” I said. “Anyway, as I’ve said, I’m not really worried about Lacey Rockwell except in a vague, sentimental way. I just brought her up so we’d have all the cards on the table. You and I both know that the girl and her brother have nothing to do with the rest of this business. We know that those two kids were just part of an independent, murderous plot dreamed up by you—with the help of some interesting friends—after you saw me here in the Keys and decided your vengeance had waited long enough. The only connection between your endeavor and all these other vanishings is that you may have got your idea, in part, from the Phipps disappearance. So, let’s put Lacey Matilda Rockwell in the hold file for the moment. What we want to concentrate on is two or three Phippses, one Marcus, and one Lavalle. How about it?”