The Intimidators (23 page)

It was a beautiful evening coming up, almost flat calm now, but I couldn’t really appreciate it, busy holding my station astern. I was careful to stay precisely in the flat central portion of the cruiser’s wake. For one thing, it was bouncy off the sides, and for another, Brent soon began taking us through some pretty thin water. Every so often our big stem waves would break like surf on shoals no more than ankle deep, just off our course....

The island far ahead seemed to be just another strip of sand upon which a couple of hunks of driftwood had stranded during some past storm. I’ll* admit that I was too preoccupied with my nautical duties to realize what I was seeing until the larger boat ahead suddenly squatted, losing speed. I hauled back on my throttles and let the outboard glide alongside. Brent leaned over the flying-bridge railing.

“There’s the enemy line of battle,” he said, pointing ahead. Way over there, beyond the islet, lay the fifty-footer I’d seen before, its silhouette reflected in the calm water. Brent said, “Okay, it’s all yours, Eric. Run straight west a quarter-mile. There’s a channel leading south; take it. When you’re exactly opposite them, head in slowly. Use the power tilts; raise the props to just below the surface. Don’t go in too far. There’s no need. It’s all solid bottom, good wading. Just don’t step on any stingrays.”

“Thanks,” I said. “I wasn’t really planning to go wading, but thanks a lot.”

As I’ve said, the Florida Keys are really a wonderful place once you get away from them in a boat. We were lying in still, clear water over a clean sandy bottom; and all around was a fairyland of islands and islets, apparently uninhabited except by birds. The sky in the west promised a glorious sunset shortly.

Morgan said, “I’ll kill him. I’ll kill the murdering sonofabitch. Renee....”

His voice trailed off. He wasn’t looking at me. He didn’t seem to be looking at anything in particular. Even my motion to grasp the throttles and ease them forward didn’t cause his vacant stare to shift noticeably. We moved ahead almost without sound, the motors ticking over slowly. I stood up so I could read the water the way I’d been taught by a fishing guide. You navigate by the color down there. Dark blue is deep water, light blue-green is shallow, and white means you get out and push.

I found the darker channel leading north Brent had told me to look for, and changed course to follow it. Behind me, the rakish
Red Baron
lay motionless on the mirror-like surface. Over to the west was the big, white sportfisherman. I could see a figure up in the tall tuna-tower, and a glint of glass from binoculars watching me. I wondered if Manderfield himself was up there; or if perhaps he didn’t like such high, precarious perches. I’m not very fond of them myself.

Morgan said, “A man is not a machine discipline shit. The black man was only following orders get the white goddamn bastard fuck your lousy Russky discipline....”

Renee Schneider had described him as a thug, but Renee had been lying for effect. Paul Martin Manderfield had called him an expendable muscleman, but Manderfield had been engaged in horsetrading of sorts. It occurred to me that I didn’t know what kind of a man this vengeful Morgan was. I didn’t even know if Morgan was his first name, his last, or a code name. I remembered something I’d said to Ramsay Pendleton, about leaving people behind to die. Well, Pendleton had got behind and now Morgan was going to be left.

I said, “Cut it out, friend. I’m not going to turn my back on you, and you can’t take me one-handed anyway, so let’s dispense with the delirious act, shall we?”

After a moment, Morgan drew a long breath and grinned briefly. “Well, it was worth a try. What happens now?”

“You get your feet wet,” I said. “Satisfy my curiosity. Why the long hair?”

“Menace,” he said. “It scares people to think of a professional hitman with long, girlish hair. Try it some time.” After a moment, he said, “I wasn’t expecting that lousy gaff. You took me by surprise. I’m not that easy. You know that.”

It was a relief, in a way. Now I knew. Whatever his feeling for Renee Schneider had been, he was just another tough one, full of pride, concerned lest I downrate him because he hadn’t put up a very good fight.

“Sure,” I said. “Sure, I know that.”

The little islet drew abeam. The chunks of stranded driftwood on the sand had become two human beings, standing, one dressed in white, the other in khaki. Even though Manderfield had said she’d be there, I was very glad to see Harriet; I was going to need her badly before this night was over. I threw the levers into neutral and, looking astern, hit the tilt switches and watched the big motors tip up until the propellors were barely submerged. I engaged the gears once more and made the turn toward the key. The steering was harder with the mills angled like that. The water got paler and shallower ahead.

“That’s far enough. We can make it. Don’t get my motors full of sand.”

That was Harriet’s voice. I cut the power and watched the two of them wade toward me. Harriet’s companion seemed to be wearing rather elaborate white satin pajamas of some kind, designed more for a boudoir than a beach, let alone a wading party. Preserving the fragile, fancy garment didn’t seem to concern her much, perhaps because—as I could see when she got closer—it had been wet before and was pretty well decorated with mud and sand. She was a nicely shaped lady with a face that was close to beautiful in a pert, girlish way; and short, dark hair.

As Harriet reached the boat and grasped the gunwale, I put my sneakered foot on her fingers, not hard. “What the hell are you trying to pull, sweetheart?” I asked.

She looked up at me and laughed. “You asked for a female Phipps, didn’t you? Well, you’ve got one. What are you complaining about? All you wanted was a token to show we knew the right place, wasn’t it?”

I studied her smiling face for a moment, and grinned. She’d put one over on me, and that was fine. It got me off the hook. Now I wouldn’t have to feel badly about putting one over on her.

“Sure,” I said, removing my foot. “Welcome aboard, Captain Robinson. Give Mrs. Phipps a hand, will you, while I keep an eye on our male guest, here.... Okay, Morgan. Over you go.”

A moment later we were backing cautiously out of the shallows with Harriet at the controls, leaving Morgan standing in knee-deep water. Presently, he turned and started wading slowly toward the island. There was no place else for him to go.

I stood in the cockpit of the express cruiser looking through the binoculars I’d borrowed from Brent; standard, big, seagoing 7x50s. Harriet’s open boat was now towing astern, squatting a little as
Red Baron
picked up speed. Beyond it, Little Grass Key was getting smaller in the distance. Back there, an outboard dinghy with one man on board was just receiving a second passenger. I watched the small boat turn and head toward the big white fishing vessel waiting in deeper water.

“What are you looking at?”

It was the voice of Mrs. Wellington Phipps, the dark-haired mother of Haseltine’s beautiful blonde Loretta. I turned. She didn’t look like anybody’s mother. She looked like an attractive kid who’d been playing on the beach, with her grubby satin pajamas and short, tousled hair. I was quite sure, now, that I’d never seen any movie in which she’d played. I’d have remembered her.

It occurred to me that I’d arranged things very badly. If I’d been truly smart, I’d have worked out a plan that would let me be marooned on a desert island with Mrs. Phipps, instead of giving the experience to Harriet, who probably hadn’t appreciated it. Of course, I hadn’t known this particular lady would be present, but never mind that.

Aside from the fact that she had a husband, assuming that he was still alive, there was only one thing about her that bothered me slightly: a funny little constraint she’d shown upon greeting Haseltine, that had been returned in kind. Well, prospective sons-in-law often had mixed feelings about prospective mothers-in-law, and vice versa.

I said, speaking loudly, as she had, to make my voice carry over the thunder of the diesels: “I wanted to see if they’d shoot him there or wait until they got him offshore where they could dispose of him directly without witnesses.”

Her eyes widened. “Shoot him? Are you joking?”

I shook my head. “That’s a dead man, Mrs. Phipps. He may have a couple of hours to live if they decide to wait until dark, but no more.”

“But if he was valuable enough that they agreed to this exchange to get him back—”

I said, “They wanted him back so they could shoot him, that’s all. For one thing, in our hands, alive, he might eventually have been persuaded to talk about things he shouldn’t. For another, there’s a disciplinary problem involved. But actually, they didn’t want him back very badly. He’s really just a piece in a very complicated chess game, Mrs. Phipps. We all are.”

“But you turned him over to them, knowing he’d be killed?”

I was disappointed in her. It was the same old illogical, automatic-humanitarian reflex. You must never allow anybody to die, even though keeping that one individual alive may cost a dozen other lives.

I said, “I had a choice. A bunch of innocent people somewhere along the coast of Cuba, or one professional killer with very recent blood on his hands. If you think I chose wrong, let me know. I can have them turn this boat around and maybe intercept that dinghy before it gets back to the mother ship. Say the word, Mrs. Phipps.” There was a little silence. When she didn’t speak, I said, “Excuse me, I’d better get these glasses up to our navigator before he runs us aground without them....”

When I climbed back down the mahogany ladder to the cockpit, she’d gone inside the cabin. I slid back the door to join her, and stopped inside, and whistled softly.

“Exactly,” said Amanda Phipps. “A forty-knot love-nest complete with bed and bar. Help yourself to a drink, I guess it’s on the house, and I do mean house. Did you ever see such a floating bordello?”

The cabin was done in red leather and gold, with carpet to the ankles. I waded through the deep nylon to the red-leather-covered bar, wet down some ice with whiskey since that was what was handy, and joined the lady on the curving leather settee that half-surrounded a low cocktail table—black marble, no less. On the credit side, I had to admit that the sound insulation was good. In here the big motors made only a distant rumble and vibration. We could talk without raising our voices.

“I’m sorry,” Amanda said. “What I said out there was stupid. Forgive me.”

“It takes a little getting used to,” I said. “It’s a different world, with a different set of values. Pretty soon, we hope, we’ll have you back in your own tidy universe where each and every human life is priceless.” I drank from my glass and changed the subject: “Actually, this glamor-barge won’t do forty knots with a full load of fuel. Bill is very disappointed. He’s going to sue the guy from whom he chartered her. Thirty-six was the best he could get, bringing her down from Key Largo.”

“I bet he will sue, too,” Amanda said. “Nobody takes advantage of Big Bill Haseltine. But nobody.”

I glanced at her. “What’s the trouble between you two, or shouldn’t I ask?”

“Does it matter? It’s my daughter he’s courting, not me.” Her voice was stiff and formal. Then she smiled abruptly. It was a wonderful smile; and the fact that she’d undoubtedly perfected it in front of a mirror years ago, and used it professionally in front of the cameras, didn’t make it a bit less breathtaking. It made you forget she was a woman with a grown daughter, not to mention, once again, the husband. I found myself wondering if it was really necessary to rescue Mr. Wellington Phipps. She said, “I’m sorry again, Mr. Helm. I didn’t mean to be stuffy. I can’t tell you what the trouble is. It’s Bill’s business. Ask him.”

“Sure, and get my nose punched,” I said. “I’ve got enough Haseltine trouble now, thanks, without asking the guy embarrassing questions about matters that are none of my business. Or are they?”

“They aren’t.” Amanda hesitated, and said, “You don’t have to keep me company, you know. I mean, I appreciate the gesture, but shouldn’t you be up there—” she gestured toward the flying bridge overhead, “—making with the sextants and parallel rulers and stuff? Hattie says you’re the man in charge of everything, a very important and violent person.”

I said, “The lady to whom you refer is a prejudiced source of information. As for my climbing up to that seagoing electronics lab—you never in your life saw so many screens and switches and dials on one lousy little yacht—the three of them are having the time of their lives navigating up a storm, checking all the complicated playthings before it gets dark. If I stay clear away, they may never discover that I don’t know what the hell it’s all about. You’ll keep my secret, won’t you, Mrs. Phipps?”

She laughed softly. “I know what you mean. After all the time I’ve spent on Buster’s boats—that’s my husband, you know—I still have a hard time remembering which is port. It
is
left, isn’t it?”

“Uhuh, and the other side is called starboard, I think. At least that’s what somebody told me once, I forget who.” I noticed that she was absently pulling some damp satin away from her knee, as if she found it uncomfortable. I said, “If you’re cold, maybe we can find you some dry clothes. I don’t know what’s on board this luxury liner, but I can take a look—”

“Oh, no, you don’t!” she said quickly.

“What’s the matter?”

She gave me that heart-stopping smile again. “Well, maybe you’ve heard I was in the movies once,” she said. “Jungle epics were my forte. I was the queen of the shipwreck sagas. As soon as the wind-machines revved up and the hurricane started howling, they’d call for Amanda Mayne. I got dunked in every phony ocean in Hollywood, and some real ones—being marooned, today, was old stuff to me. And do you know, Mr. Helm, every goddamn time I crawled ashore on that same old South Seas island in my sexily tattered dress, looking, if I may say so, rather fetching, along would come the lousy hero and, quick as a wink, produce somebody’s big, dirty old pants for me to climb into. I tell you, I evolved some fancy theories about the sex lives of those Hollywood producers and directors. Obviously, they were all queer for women in oversized male clothing, the grubbier the better. Don’t you start doing it. I’m perfectly happy in my own beatup pajamas, thanks—although I’ll admit that the next time I’m kidnaped I’ll give some consideration to sleeping in my jeans.”