Gilded Nightmare (19 page)

“George Battle will hear about this!” Miller said.

“You can bet your life he will, Mr. Miller,” Chambrun said, and left the room. …

In Sam Culver’s apartment, we waited.

Sam sat at his desk, involved with his second pipe. Every once in a while I could hear him whistle soundlessly between his teeth. I have said that Sam is a man who’s kept in wonderful physical shape for his years. I wouldn’t want to tangle with him, even with a ten-year bulge in age. I wouldn’t want to tangle with him or anyone else, to tell the truth. I take my action excitement out of the late-late movies. I’m like a million other guys around town; after your teens there isn’t one chance in a million you’ll ever have to tangle. You wouldn’t know how. I was too young for the Korean war, too old for Vietnam.

Sam was something else again. He’d had a year’s active duty in World War II and another solid hunk in Korea. He’d know how to fight for keeps, I thought, and it was certain that in Helwig and Masters we were up against two guys who would play it right out to the end of the line. I wondered if Sam was measuring the distance between himself and Masters. I wondered if he was cooking up some scheme; if he’d figured just the right moment to take a long-odds chance. I hoped I’d know how to fall in line if he started something.

The phone on his desk rang.

Helwig was instantly in the bedroom door. “You’ll answer, Mr. Culver,” he said. “You’ll discourage anyone but Charmian who may be calling you. I’ll be on the bedroom extension. Remember—play it your way and Masters and I have nothing to lose. We don’t like being crossed.” He disappeared back into the bedroom.

The phone kept ringing.

Sam, moving like an automaton, reached for the receiver. “Yes?” he said.

I know now that it was Chambrun, and I know now what he said.

“What’s the matter with you, Sam? Hasn’t Mark explained things? I want you down here.”

“Let’s say I don’t feel like it,” Sam said, in a flat voice.

“Perhaps you’ll feel more like it when I tell you that we’ve found Charmian Zetterstrom.”

“Oh,” Sam said, as if it were a matter of no consequence to him.

“Aren’t you at all interested to know what the plan was for murdering you, Sam? Aren’t you at all interested in why the great impersonation—Charmian Two for Charmian One?”

“You have all those answers?” Sam asked.

“I have them, and I want you down here,” Chambrun said.

Helwig was in the room, moving quickly toward Sam at the desk. “I’ll take that phone,” he said. “You and Haskell—over there against the wall.”

I glanced at Masters. He wasn’t fooling now about his aim. His hungry smile had widened into a frozen white gap in his face. Sam and I moved over against the wall of bookcases. Sam’s eyes were cold and bright, but he made no offer to disobey.

Helwig picked up the phone. “Marcus Helwig here, Mr. Chambrun,” he said. “Yes, we have been waiting here in the hope that Charmian would go to Mr. Culver.”

“It’s all over, Helwig,” Chambrun said, on the other end.

I know now there was a good-sized gathering in the great man’s office—Hardy, Jerry Dodd, Miss Ruysdale, who’d managed to get Charmian pinned together and a stiff brandy down her gullet. When Helwig identified himself Chambrun put his hand over the phone’s mouthpiece and said the one word “Helwig.” Hardy started for the door but Chambrun stopped him with a sharp “Wait!”

“The next step is just beginning, Mr. Chambrun,” Helwig said. “I want you to listen quite carefully, because I don’t have time to repeat my instructions twice.”

“You have instructions for me?” Chambrun asked, his voice completely colorless.

“First, I would like to suggest that you don’t assume that by keeping me talking on the phone you have time to get someone up here. If someone knocks on the door or tries to get in some other way I promise you that either Mr. Culver or Mr. Haskell will be instantly dead.”

“I have just stopped Lieutenant Hardy from leaving the room,” Chambrun said. Our pouter pigeon had realized from the instant he heard Helwig’s voice the nature of the next move.

“Second,” Helwig said, “I would like you to put Charmian on the line for just long enough for me to make certain you weren’t fooling Mr. Culver.”

In the downstairs sanctum Chambrun held out the phone to Charmian. She came forward, reluctant, her blue eyes wide with fright.

“Speak to him,” Chambrun said. “He wants to be sure you’re here.”

She took the phone, her hand shaking, but her voice was cool and clear. “I’m here, Marcus,” she said. “I’ve told Mr. Chambrun and the lieutenant the whole story.”

“I believe they taught you to pray in the convent, Charmian,” Helwig said. His voice frightened me as I heard him speak. “I suggest that you start praying now that you never have the misfortune to encounter us again. Be good enough to put Mr. Chambrun back on the line.”

Chambrun took back the phone. The others in his office watched and listened, as frozen as Sam and I were at the other end.

“We have one thing to gain, Mr. Chambrun—our freedom. We have nothing to lose by compounding our crime. So what happens next depends entirely on how much you care about the life spans of Mr. Haskell and Mr. Culver.”

“I’m listening,” Chambrun said.

“You will be good enough,” Helwig said, “to send for a rented limousine. When it is at the door you will call this room and tell us so. Then we will come out with Mr. Haskell and Mr. Culver. I will be walking behind one of them with a gun at his back, and Masters will be behind the other. We will go down in an elevator. We will walk across the lobby and out to the rented car. If there is one move, even a slightly suspicious move, to stop us, Mr. Haskell and Mr. Culver will fall dead in front of your eyes—and as many more as we can manage before the police shoot us down. When we get in the car you will not follow us. If we even imagine we are being followed your two friends will be shot to death where they sit. Is that all quite clear?”

“Quite clear,” Chambrun said.

“You will send for the rented limousine?”

“After I have spoken to Mr. Haskell,” Chambrun said.

“How long will it take to get the car here?”

“Fifteen minutes—after I have spoken to Mr. Haskell.”

“Remember, if there is any attempt to get to us in this apartment, any attempt to stop us on the way out, it’s all over.”

“I’ll remember,” Chambrun said.

“Put on Mr. Haskell.”

“You,” Helwig said to me, and held out the phone.

I took it. “Hi,” I said, sounding like a ten-year-old.

“Mark, I’m sorry. I have no choice,” Chambrun said.

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. “Nice to have known you.”

“In close quarters we might have a better chance,” he said.

“Whatever that means.”

“Tell Sam I’m sorry.”

“Sure.”

“You can inform Helwig I’ll phone for his limousine now.”

“You may ride in the front carriage,” I said, feeling very sorry for myself. That limousine was likely to be our hearse.

The phone clicked off.

“You’ve heard enough to understand the plan,” Helwig said to us. He had a gun now, and it looked as though he knew how to use it. “I want you to disabuse yourselves of the idea that when we leave here and find ourselves in the corridor, in the lobby, that you’ll have a chance to run for it. One quick step away from us and you’ve had it.”

“And we will have had it when you come to the end of your limousine ride,” Sam said.

Helwig didn’t answer. He moved over and sat on the edge of the desk by the phone, waiting for the word that the limousine had arrived. I looked at Sam. His face told me nothing. I found myself thinking about Shelda. I wish I’d thought to give Chambrun a message for her instead of my feeble attempts to crack wise. The silly little bitch, I loved her.

There was a clock on the mantel and I swear to God the second hand was racing like a mad thing. Fifteen minutes had never gone so fast in my whole life. While we waited, Masters had opened the coat closet by the front door and taken out Sam’s raincoat and a topcoat.

And the phone rang.

“Yes,” Helwig said. “Thank you.”

Chambrun had delivered right on the button.

Masters took the raincoat and draped it over his right arm so that the gun in his hand was hidden. He stepped over behind Sam. Helwig imitated with the topcoat, and was behind me. I could feel his gun pressed hard in the middle of my back, which was now wet with sweat.

“Remember, gentlemen, one false move—” Helwig said. He didn’t have to amplify. “Now, march.”

Sam opened the door and he and Masters went out. I felt Helwig’s gun jam into my back and I followed. I thought I was going to faint as I saw a maid coming down the hall toward us. Would they think she was some kind of Chambrun trick? But they smiled and nodded at her and she smiled and nodded back. Oh, baby, if you only knew, I thought.

We reached the elevators and I realized that my legs weren’t going to take me across the lobby when we got there. The elevator door opened. It was a self-service car. Sam and I walked in and the others stood directly behind us. Masters, I think, pressed the down button.

I could feel my stomach coming up into my throat as the car plummeted down. And then it stopped. Someone else was coming aboard at a lower floor.

“One false move—” Helwig whispered.

We were going to look like damn fools, facing to the rear. I wondered if the passenger coming aboard would be someone I knew.

The elevator door didn’t open.

“What’s wrong?” Helwig said, sharply. “Press the down button again.”

Out of the corner of my eye I could see Masters half turn to fumble with the button panel. Nothing happened. The car remained stationary. I turned my head to look at Sam. He was standing rigidly facing the rear wall, a little trickle of sweat running down his cheek. He was whistling tunelessly between his teeth.

Masters swore. “Damn thing doesn’t want to move,” he said.

Helwig’s gun jammed hard into my back. “You know how this thing works, Haskell?”

“I can try,” I said. “There’s an emergency button.”

“Get to it!”

It involved a curious shuffling of positions. Four of us seemed suddenly to crowd the car. I got turned around to face the control panel. Masters maneuvered Sam so that he was also facing front. I pressed the emergency button, but nothing happened. I jammed my finger against the down and up buttons. The car remained motionless.

Helwig was swearing under his breath in German. It sounded colorful.

Then something penetrated. Sam’s little whistle had taken the form of a familiar little tune. I couldn’t place it for a moment, and then suddenly it penetrated—“Dancing in the Dark.”

I was staring at the control panel. Sweat was running down my back in small rivers. I was staring at the switch that said
CAR LIGHTS
. I took a look at Sam. His eyes seemed to be burning into me. He kept whistling that silly tune between his teeth—“Dancing in the Dark.”

I threw the light switch and we were plunged into darkness.

“Sorry,” I heard myself say.

Even as I was saying it, Sam must have exploded. My eardrums were shattered by a gunshot only inches away. Helwig seemed to be propelled violently back and away from me.

“Down, Mark! Down!” Sam was shouting.

I dropped flat on my face, trying to turn. If I was going to get it, I wanted to see it coming. There was nothing to see because the car was pitch-black. I was stepped on, kicked. I was at the bottom of a terrible struggle going on between Sam and the others. Another shot was fired and I could hear the bullet rip through the roof of the car. And then I felt the cold steel of a gun pressed against my cheek. I made a wild swinging gesture to knock it away and it went off.

I was still alive. And I was hanging onto Helwig’s arm for dear life, twisting it with all the strength I had. I heard him cry out in pain.

And then there was a clicking sound and the lights came on. Sam was standing by the panel. He had a gun in his left hand. His right arm hung, crooked and useless, at his side. I could see blood pumping out of a wound near his right elbow. Masters lay, or half sat, in a corner of the car. Part of his face was gone. He looked very dead to me. I was sitting on top of Helwig, still twisting his arm. I saw his gun lying within easy reach. I picked it up and scrambled to my feet.

“Nice going,” Sam said. “I was afraid you didn’t know the tune.”

From far away, as though it came from the other end of a tunnel, I heard Chambrun’s voice shouting at us. “Mark! Sam!”

Sam lifted his head. “It’s all right, Pierre!” he shouted. “Take it away.”

We waited forever—probably ten seconds—and then the car started down. It stopped. The doors opened. Beyond us was the busy lobby, but directly in front of us was a small army—Chambrun, Jerry Dodd, Lieutenant Hardy, and half a dozen cops with guns drawn.

Chambrun’s arms went around me and I grinned at him foolishly.

“My dear fellow,” he said. “It was the only way I could see.” He turned to Sam. “You were dead ducks, Sam, if they ever got you out of the hotel. There was no way to stop them. They meant exactly what they said. I thought if the car was stopped, it would be the one thing they weren’t prepared for. It was a chance—the only chance. I tried to hint to Mark. I told him that in close quarters you might have a better chance.”

I giggled foolishly. “It never occurred to me that meant anything,” I said.

Hardy and his men were in the elevator, attending to a dead man and a prisoner.

“We’d better have Doc Partridge look at that arm of yours,” Chambrun said to Sam. …

A little while later we were in Chambrun’s office—Sam, with his arm in a black-silk sling; Lieutenant Hardy; Miss Ruysdale, plying Chambrun with some fresh Turkish coffee which seemed to make a new man of him; and, huddled in the big armchair by Chambrun’s desk, Charmian Zetterstrom, looking like a twelve-year-old child.

The girl told us her story, most of it in a dull monotone, staring past Chambrun at the paneled wall. Her first memories were of the convent on the Greek mainland. She and her sister Heidi were taken there as babies. The Baron, it seemed, had a fear about children. They were accidents he wanted to forget. The girls never laid eyes on him, although he lived until young Charmian was eighteen years old. The Baroness, the original Charmian Brown, had some feeling for her daughters. She came to see them at the convent perhaps once every month or six weeks. As Charmian grew up she found her mother to be an exciting, glamorous, very wonderful person. There was a special tie between them because it was obvious, even when she was a small child, that young Charmian was going to be a physical double for her mother.