Backup Men (14 page)

“This came to you in the night, I assume.”

“Around two.”

“As a diversionary measure,” I said, “it has a touch of genius.”

“It’s half good and it gives us half a chance,” he said, “which is about one hundred percent better than we had before.”

“What’s going to the airport? In the armored car, I mean.”

“The ring.”

“The good one, of course.”

“Amanda says that it’s insured for five hundred thousand.”

“And where does the ring go once it gets to the airport?”

“To a jeweler in San Francisco. He’ll clean it and send it back.”

“But our nemeses, Mr. Kragstein and Mr. Gitner, will think that this is just a ruse—that we’re really inside the armored truck.”

“That’s it.”

“And while they’re following or pursuing the armored truck, we’ll be heading somewhere else.”

“Newark,” Padillo said.

“Ah, Newark.”

“Then to Denver.”

“Of course.”

“And from Denver guess where.”

“If I said San Francisco, I’d be wrong so I’ll say Los Angeles.”

“You’re right.”

“Where we rent a car and drive to San Francisco, sneaking in the back door so to speak. Whose armored truck is it, Brink’s?”

“It’s the other outfit,” he said, “the one with the red ones.”

“I’ve never ordered an armored truck,” I said, “probably because I felt that they’d be picky about having me as a customer. Did they give you any static?”

“I doubt that they’d give me the time. But then my Dun and Bradstreet rating doesn’t glow in the dark the way Amanda’s does.”

“She ordered it,” I said.

Padillo nodded.

“I can’t think of any disadvantages in being rich,” I said.

Padillo looked around the room. “Only one,” he said.

“What?”

“Worrying that someday you might be poor.”

After the game broke up and Amanda and I paid the king and Scales the $31.58 that we owed them, she excused herself, and the older of the two men who had waited on us the night before served lunch in the same room where we had played bridge.

Lunch was a shrimp cocktail with a sauce whose recipe I would have paid $100 for, thick rare roast beef sandwiches, and a Mexican beer that I’d never tried before but liked very much. The king said he didn’t drink beer, so he was brought a Coca-Cola.

During lunch Padillo told the king and Scales about the armored truck. They exchanged glances and after the king caught Scales’s almost imperceptible nod, he beamed and complimented Padillo on his deviation.

“I think you mean deviousness, your Majesty,” Scales murmured, looking a little embarrassed. The king beamed happily and said yes, that’s what he had meant all along. “It will also give me the opportunity to see more of your great country than I had thought possible,” he said, making it sound as though he felt that Padillo and I ranked not too far below the President and considerably above the Secretary of State.

Just before the coffee was served, the king got another one of those almost invisible nods from Scales. He rose, smoothing his bald head again, and begged to be excused, mentioning that it was time for his afternoon meditations.

When he was gone, Scales leaned across the table toward us in a confidential if not conspiratorial manner, said “uh” a couple of times, and then asked, “I had no wish to alarm his Majesty, of course, but are you quite convinced that this is our safest route to San Francisco?”

“There aren’t any safe routes,” Padillo said. “But this is the best I can come up with unless you change your mind about bringing in either the local cops or the Secret Service. I’d recommend both.”

Scales frowned, shook his head twice, and said, “Impossible,” in a tone that clearly implied that further discussion would be unwelcome.

It didn’t bother Padillo. “Why?” he said.

Scales pulled at the end of his long, skinny nose, looking first at Padillo and then at me, as if trying to decide whether we could be trusted with some more royal secrets. “I haven’t brought this up before because you might think it a bit ridiculous,” he said.

“Try us,” Padillo said.

“His Majesty—this is not critical, mind you—but his Majesty has a theory that amounts almost to an obsession.”

“About what?”

“Your Secret Service. He blames them, you know.”

“For what?”

“For the death of President Kennedy. Also his brother’s. His Majesty is convinced that it was a gigantic conspiracy and that the Secret Service was in the thick of it.”

“That’s not only dumb, it’s ridiculous,” Padillo said.

“The Secret Service wasn’t even assigned to Robert Kennedy,” I said.

“His Majesty’s point exactly,” Scales said. “‘Why not?’ he asks. Mind you, he’s read virtually everything that has been written on the subject and he is totally convinced of this conspiracy theory. It’s become an obsession with him and that’s why he’s so adamant about refusing Secret Service protection. He is positive that they can be suborned.”

A look of tired disgust crept over Padillo’s face. “All right,” he said. “The Secret Service is on the take. What about the local police?”

Scales ran a finger around the inside of his collar, straining his neck this way and that. His pale face grew a trifle pink. “Doctor King,” he murmured. “And Dallas.”

“The local cops are crooked, too,” Padillo said, nodding his head slightly and biting his lower lip to keep from either laughing or screaming.

“Of this, his Majesty is convinced.”

“What about the Gothars?” Padillo said. “What about McCorkle and me?”

“The Gothars had impeccable credentials, but just to make certain I had them doublechecked—at no small expense, I might add.”

“Who recommended me?” Padillo said. “As I understand it, the Gothars had to make me part of their package.”

“That is entirely correct,” Scales said. “You have an admirer who once was in British Intelligence, Mr. Padillo. I leant heavily upon him for advice. He recommended the Gothars as well as you.”

“What’s his name?”

“He prefers to remain anonymous and I respect his wishes.”

“You should have spent some of that money checking out Kragstein and Gitner,” Padillo said. “Then you might have frightened Kassim into agreeing to Secret Service protection.”

“His Majesty is well aware of their reputation,” Scales said, a little stiffly. “That’s why your services were engaged.”

“Because I’m supposed to be better than Gitner?”

Scales smiled for the first time in what must have been a long while. “Not better, Mr. Padillo,” he said. “But more honest. Decidedly more honest.”

I was back in the room that contained the bar at three thirty that afternoon. After Scales left us, Padillo and I had talked in a desultory manner for twenty minutes or so and then he had gone in search of Amanda Clarkmann to thank her for her hospitality or to say good-bye or to accept her offer of marriage. I never did find out which.

I did find another bottle of the Mexican beer and took it back to my room and sipped it while I read a new novel that a lot of critics had liked about a youngster from the Midwest who was trying to make up his mind whether to go to Canada or Vietnam. When he chose Canada, I gave a small cheer, put the book down, and headed for the room that contained the bar. Padillo and Amanda Clarkmann came in a few minutes later and since both of them seemed to be glowing more than usual I assumed that they had spent a pleasant enough afternoon together, probably in bed.

The king and Scales joined us and then William, the major domo, wheeled in some coffee along with the information that Amanda was wanted on the phone. She used the one near the bar and when she rejoined us she said, “That was the armored truck company. They’re going to be fifteen minutes early. I told William to notify the security people downstairs.”

Padillo looked at his watch. “We have time for one cup, I think.”

Amanda Clarkmann poured and served the coffee and offered around a plate of nice little sandwiches, but no one took any except the king, who took four.

Afterward we walked down the wide hall with the chandeliers, the black and white marble floor, and the Louis Quatorze furniture. Amanda Clarkmann carried a small gray velvet box that I assumed contained the ring. I wouldn’t have minded a look at a ring that was insured for half a million dollars, but I couldn’t bring myself to ask.

At three forty-five we were all standing in the foyer that faced the elevators. Padillo was next to Amanda. I was between the king and Scales. There was a soft bong from a bell as the elevator reached the nineteenth floor and the doors opened and two men in gray uniforms with drawn guns stepped out into the foyer.

It had gone just like Padillo had planned it. The only thing wrong was that one of the men with a drawn gun and a gray uniform was Amos Gitner.

15

PADILLO was the one to take out first and Gitner knew it. He fired once, then twice, and there was a shrill scream, but Padillo was already halfway across the room in a low flat racing dive. He landed on his left shoulder, went into a roll, and when he came up his automatic was in his right hand. The other man in the gray uniform had stepped out into the foyer, blocking Gitner temporarily. For less than a second the man seemed to debate whether to shoot the king or Padillo. He chose Padillo, but I threw my attaché case at him with a hard underhand throw. The attaché case hit his right hand just as he fired. Padillo shot him twice in the chest and he stumbled back against Gitner.

I spun toward the king and Scales. The king was already turned and racing down the black and white marbled hall. He ran fast, much faster than he’d run on the rooftop. Scales was right behind him.

I turned back, clawing my revolver from my coat pocket in what must have been the slowest draw in Christendom. Padillo again fired twice as he moved, this time scuttling sideways. He shot the man he’d shot before, hitting him again in the chest, killing him probably. Gitner had his left arm around the man’s waist now, holding him up, using him for a shield as he backed into the elevator where I could see the bodies of its two operators sprawled on the floor.

Gitner had to punch the elevator button with his right hand, the one that held his revolver. Then he fired once, twice, three times—spacing his shots, not trying to hit anything, just making sure that no one rushed the elevator until the doors closed. As they closed, Padillo jumped for the button, and mashed it, trying to make the doors reopen. He was either too late or the controls didn’t work that way. Gitner was gone and Amanda Clarkmann lay dead against the wall below a quite good watercolor that showed a street scene of Paris in the Spring.

She had screamed only once, probably when Gitner’s first bullet had struck her shoulder. The second one had gone into her throat and had made a mess of it. Padillo walked slowly across the room and looked down at her. I couldn’t see the expression on his face. I didn’t really want to.

When he turned he looked at me, almost curiously, and said, “He used a Magnum. A .357 Magnum. Did you notice that?” He didn’t wait for an answer. Instead, he turned and walked down the marbled hall, his automatic dangling and forgotten in his right hand. I followed.

Once more in the room that contained the bar, Padillo picked up one of the phones and dialed ten numbers. He waited nearly a minute until someone said hello and then he said, “This is Padillo, Burmser. Amos Gitner just shot and killed Amanda Clarkmann in her New York apartment. I’m leaving for San Francisco with the king. Fix it.” Then he hung up.

I had gone around the bar and poured two double Scotches. I handed him one and he drank it down slowly, not taking the glass from his lips until it was empty.

William burst into the room, his usually imperturbable face contorted into fear and horror and, I suppose, even rage. He stopped short when he saw the automatic in Padillo’s right hand which he was still holding and had held, even when he’d dialed the phone.

Padillo looked at him. “Mrs. Clarkmann has been killed,” he said in an almost toneless voice.

“I—I—I” William stopped to gulp down some air.

“Don’t say anything,” Padillo said. “Just listen. The police will be here shortly. But before they arrive, there’ll be some men here from the Government. The Federal Government. They’ll tell you what to do and what to say. Do you understand?”

It took him four tries to get it out, but finally William said, “Yes, sir.”

“Now you need to do three things. Are you listening?”

“Yes, sir,” William said, some calmer now, but not much.

“Get me the keys to Mrs. Clarkmann’s Oldsmobile. That’s one. Two, find Mr. Kassim and Mr. Scales and tell them to meet me here. Three, cover up Mrs. Clarkmann. Use a blanket.”

This time William only nodded before he hurried away, but his face had lost some of its tortured look. He seemed almost glad that there was someone around to tell him what to do.

Padillo turned back toward me and then looked down at his hands which were holding the empty glass and the automatic. He handed the glass to me and stuck the gun back in the waistband of his trousers.