The Golden Gate

by Alistair MacLean

  ‘Nobody.’

  ‘You’ll live a little longer, Tony. Provided you don’t eat that damned food of yours.’ He turned to O’Hare. ‘Well, that leaves only you and the fragile Miss Wednesday.’

  ‘You insinuating that either of us might have been carrying secret instructions from your alleged poisoners?’ There was more contempt than incredulity in O’Hare’s tone.

  ‘Yes. Let’s have Miss Wednesday here.’

  O’Hare said: ‘Leave her alone.’

  ‘You said – who do you think is in charge here?’

  ‘Where a patient of mine is concerned, I am. If you want her here, you’ll have to carry her. She’s asleep in the ambulance, under heavy sedation. Can’t you take my word?’

  ‘No. Kowalski, go check. You know, a couple of stiff fingers in the abdomen.’

  Kowalski returned within ten seconds. ‘Out like a light.’

  Branson looked at O’Hare. ‘How very convenient. Maybe you didn’t want her subjected to interrogation?’

  ‘You’re a lousy psychologist, Branson. Miss Wednesday is not, as you know, cast in the heroic mould. Can you imagine anyone entrusting her with any vital information?’ Branson made no reply. ‘Apart from that, the only good thing that’s ever been said about you is that you never molest women.’

  ‘How do you know that?’

  ‘Chief of Police Hendrix told me. He seems to know a lot about you.’

  ‘You confirm that, Hendrix?’

  Hendrix was curt. ‘Why shouldn’t I?’

  Branson said: ‘So that leaves only you, Doctor.’

  ‘As a prime suspect? You’re losing your grip.’ He nodded at Hansen’s sheet-covered form on a stretcher. ‘I don’t want to sound sanctimonious but as a doctor my job is to save lives, not take them away. I have no wish to be struck off the Medical Register. Besides, I haven’t left the ambulance since before the food wagon arrived. I couldn’t very well be there identifying your damned food trays and be in the ambulance at the same time.’

  Branson said: ‘Kowalski?’

  ‘I can vouch for that, Mr Branson.’

  ‘But you were talking to people after you returned and before the food wagon arrived.’

  Kowalski said: ‘He did. To quite a few people. So did Miss Wednesday.’

  ‘We can forget her. The good doctor here.’

  ‘A fair number of people.’

  ‘Anyone in particular? I mean long earnest chats, that sort of thing?’

  ‘Yes.’ Kowalski appeared to be extremely observant or have an uncomfortably good memory or both. ‘Three. Two with Miss Wednesday –’

  ‘Forget the lady. She’d plenty of time to talk to him in the ambulance to and from hospital. Who else?’

  ‘Revson. A long talk.’

  ‘Overhear anything?’

  ‘No. Thirty yards away and downwind.’

  ‘Anything pass between them?’

  ‘No.’ Kowalski was definite.

  Branson said to O’Hare: ‘What did you talk about?’

  ‘Medical privilege.’

  ‘You mean mind my own damned business?’

  O’Hare said nothing. Branson looked at Revson.

  ‘No medical privileges,’ Revson said. ‘Cabbages and kings. I’ve talked to at least thirty people, including your own men, since we arrived. Why single this out as a special case?’

  ‘I was hoping you could tell me.’

  ‘There’s nothing to tell.’

  ‘You’re pretty cool, aren’t you?’

  ‘A clear conscience. You should try it some time.’

  ‘And, Mr Branson.’ Kowalski again. ‘Revson also had a long talk with General Cartland.’

  ‘Oh. More cabbages and kings, General?’

  ‘No. We were discussing the possibilities of ridding this bridge of some of its more undesirable elements.’

  ‘Coming from you, I can well believe it. A fruitful talk?’

  Cartland looked at him in icy silence.

  Branson looked thoughtfully at Van Effen. ‘I have a feeling, just a feeling, mind you, that we have an infiltrator in our midst.’

  Van Effen gazed at him with his impassive moonface and said nothing.

  Branson went on: ‘I think that would rule out the doctor. Apart from the fact that we’ve checked out on his credentials, I have the odd instinct that there is a trained agent loose on this bridge. That again would rule out O’Hare, who’s just here by happenstance anyway. You share my instinct?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Who?’

  Van Effen didn’t hesitate. ‘Revson.’

  Branson beckoned Chrysler. ‘Revson here claims to be an accredited correspondent of The Times of London. How long would it take you to check that out?’

  ‘Using the Presidential telecommunications?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Minutes.’

  Revson said: ‘I suppose I’m supposed to show a degree of high indignation, but I won’t bother. Why me? Why assume it’s any of the news media members? Why not one of your own men?’

  ‘Because I hand-picked them personally.’

  ‘Just the same way that Napoleon did his marshals. And look how many of them turned against him in the end. How you can expect loyalty from a bunch of cut-throats like this, however hand-picked, is beyond me.’

  ‘You’ll do for the moment,’ Van Effen said comfortably. He touched Branson’s arm and pointed to the west. ‘We may not have all that much time.’

  ‘You’re right.’ Dark, heavy, ominous clouds were rolling in from the Pacific, although still some miles distant. ‘The audiences wouldn’t like it at all if they were to see their President and Vice-President, not to mention their oil friends, sitting here getting soaked in a thunderstorm. Ask Johnson to organize the cameras and the seating.’ He waited thoughtfully until Van Effen had done this then took him across to where Revson was standing alone. He said to Van Effen: ‘Revson tells me that you have already searched his camera.’

  ‘Yes. But I didn’t take it to pieces.’

  ‘Maybe you should.’

  ‘And maybe you shouldn’t.’ For once, Revson let anger show. ‘Do you know that it takes a man five years’ training to learn just how to assemble one of those cameras? I’d rather you kept the damned thing for the duration of our stay here than have it ruined.’

  ‘Call his bluff and have it stripped,’ Branson said.

  ‘I agree.’ Van Effen said to Revson, almost soothingly, ‘We’ll have Chrysler do it. He’s as close to a mechanical genius as anyone I know. It will be intact.’ To Branson he said: ‘I’ve also searched his carry-all, the upholstery of his seat, below the seat and the rack above. Clean.’

  ‘Search him.’

  ‘Search me?’ More than a trace of truculence remained in Revson’s face. ‘I’ve already been searched.’

  ‘For weapons only’

  If there had been a grain of rice on Revson’s person, including inside the coat lining, Van Effen wouldn’t have missed it. Apart from keys, coins and an inoffensive little knife, all he came up with were papers.

  ‘The usual,’ Van Effen said. ‘Driving licence, social security, credit cards, press cards –’

  ‘Press cards,’ Branson said. ‘Any of them identify him with the London Times!’ ‘There’s this.’ Van Effen handed the card across to Branson. ‘Looks pretty kosher to me.’

  ‘If he is who or what we think he might be, he wouldn’t be likely to hire the worst forger in town.’ He handed the card back, a slight frown on his face. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Yes.’ Van Effen opened a long envelope. ‘Airline ticket. For Hong Kong.’

  ‘It wouldn’t be dated for tomorrow?’

  ‘It is. How did you know?’

  ‘He told me so himself. What do you think?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ For a moment, as Van Effen idly fingered Revson’s felt pens both he and Branson were only a heart’s beat from death. But Van Effen, his mind on something else, reclipped t
hem and opened Revson’s passport. He flipped rapidly through the pages. ‘Certainly gets around. Lots of South-East Asia passports, last about two years ago. Near East immigration stamps galore. Not many European or London stamps, but that signifies nothing. They are an idle bunch across there and British and most European – Western European – passport officers only stamp your passports if they feel in need of the exercise. How does it all sound to you?’

  ‘Ties in with his own claims, what he told me himself. You?’

  ‘If he’s a bad one, I would call this an excessive cover-up. Why not Milwaukee? Or even San Francisco?’

  Branson said: ‘You a San Franciscan?’

  ‘By adoption.’

  Van Effen said: ‘Who’d spend a dozen years travelling the world just to establish a background, an alibi like this?’

  Chrysler came up. Branson looked at him in slight surprise. ‘Through already?’

  ‘The President has a hot line to London. I hope you don’t mind. Revson’s clean. He’s a fully accredited correspondent of the London Times.’

  Revson said to Chrysler: ‘Branson wants you to take my camera to pieces. There’s a time-bomb or a radio inside it. Watch you don’t blow yourself up. After that, you’d better make damn sure you put it all together again.’

  Chrysler received Branson’s nod, smiled, took the camera and left. Revson said: ‘Will that be all? Or do you want to unscrew my false heels?’

  Branson wasn’t amused. ‘I’m still not satisfied. How am I to know that Kylenski here is not in cahoots with the poisoners? How am I to know that he was not instructed to find only a dozen poisoned plates so as to kill our suspicions? There should have been seventeen tampered trays. There should – there must be someone on the bridge capable of identifying them. I want you, Revson, to sample one of the trays that Kylenski has declared safe.’

  ‘You want me – you want to kill me off with botulinus on the off-chance that Kylenski has made a mistake? I’m damned if I will. I’m no human guinea-pig.’

  Then we’ll try some of them out on the President and his oil friends here. Royal guinea-pigs, if you will. This should make medical history. If they resist, we’ll force-feed them.’

  Revson was about to make the obvious point that they could force-feed him equally well but immediately changed his mind. Cartland had not yet had the opportunity to inform those in the Presidential coach as to how the infected trays could be identified: O’Hare apart, he was the only one who could. Revson turned his palms upwards. ‘God knows what you’re after but I trust the two doctors here. If they say there are so many uncontaminated trays, then I believe them. So you can have your plebeian guinea-pig.’

  Branson looked at him closely. ‘Why have you changed your mind?’

  Revson said conversationally: ‘You know, Branson, you’re endlessly over-suspicious. From the expression of your lieutenant, Van Effen there, I would say that he agrees with me.’ No harm could come, Revson thought, from sowing the odd seed of dissension. ‘Some people might even interpret it as a sign of weakness, of uncertainty. I’m agreeing because I don’t care so much for you. A chink in everybody’s armour. I’m beginning to believe that your belief in your own infallibility may rest on rather shaky ground. Besides, plebs are expendable: Presidents and kings are not.’

  Branson smiled his confident smile and turned to Tony. ‘Lay out ten of the uncontaminated plates on the counter.’ Tony did so. ‘Now, Revson, which one would you care to sample?’

  ‘You’re slipping, Branson. You’ve still the lingering suspicion that I might be able to identify the poisoned trays. Suppose you choose for me?’ Branson nodded and pointed at one of the trays. Revson moved forward, lifted the indicated tray and sniffed it slowly and cautiously. The surreptitious movements of his fingertips found no traces of tiny indentations on the underside of the plastic lugs. This tray was clean. He took a spoon, dug into the centre of what looked like a browned-over cottage pie, and sampled the meat. He grimaced, chewed, swallowed, then repeated the process. He laid down the tray in disgust.

  Branson said: ‘Not to your liking?’

  ‘If I were in a restaurant I’d send this back to the kitchen. Better, I’d take it there and empty it over the chef’s head – not that the person who made this could ever be called a chef.’

  ‘Contaminated, you’d think?’

  ‘No. Just plain bloody lousy’

  ‘Perhaps you’d care to sample another one?’

  ‘No, I would not. Besides, you said, just one sample.’

  Branson said persuasively: ‘Come on. Be cooperative.’

  Revson scowled but co-operated. This tray, too, was clean. He went through the same performance and had no sooner done so when Branson handed him a third tray.

  This one had indentations on the underside of the lugs.

  Revson broke the skin, sniffed suspidously, tasted a little and at once spat it out. ‘I don’t know whether this is contaminated or not, but it tastes and smells even lousier than the other two. If that’s possible.’ He pushed the tray under Kylenski’s nose, who sniffed it and passed it across to his colleague.

  Branson said: ‘Well?’

  Kylenski was hesitant. ‘Could be. A marginal, a borderline case. It would require lab. testing.’ He looked thoughtfully at Revson. ‘Do you smoke?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Drink?’

  ‘Birthdays and funerals only.’

  Kylenski said: ‘That could account for it. Some non-smokers and non-drinkers can have an extraordinarily acute sense of taste and smell. Revson is obviously one of those.’

  Without consulting anyone, Revson examined another six trays. He pushed them all away and turned to Branson. ‘My opinion, for what it’s worth?’ Branson nodded. ‘Most – not all, but most – of those trays are off. With some, you’ve almost got to imagine it. Others stink. I think the whole damn lot is contaminated. In varying degrees.’

  Branson looked at Kylenski. ‘Possible?’

  Kylenski looked uncomfortable. ‘It happens. Botulinus can vary widely in its degree of concentration. Only last year there was a double family outing in New England. Ten in all. Among other things, they had sandwiches. Again the botulinus bug. Five died, two were slightly ill, three unaffected. But the sandwiches were all spread with the same meat paste.’

  Branson and Van Effen walked apart. Van Effen said: ‘Enough?’

  ‘You mean you see no point in going ahead with this?’

  ‘You stand to lose credibility, Mr Branson.’

  ‘I agree. I’m not happy about it, but I agree. Trouble is, we’ve really, basically, only got Revson’s word for it.’

  ‘But he’s identified twenty – in all – contaminated trays: three more than was necessary.’

  ‘Who says so? Revson?’

  ‘After all the proofs, you still don’t trust him?’

  ‘He’s too cool, too relaxed. He’s obviously highly trained, highly competent – and I’m damned sure that it’s not in photography’

  ‘He could be in that, too.’

  ‘I wouldn’t doubt it.’

  ‘So you’re still going to treat this as a case of deliberate poisoning?’

  ‘Where our vast viewing public is concerned? Who’s to gainsay me? There’s only one mike and it’s in my hand.’

  Van Effen looked towards the south tower. ‘Food wagon number two on its way’

  Branson had the TV cameras, the honoured guests, the newspapermen and still cameramen in position in very short order indeed. The black thunderous clouds from the west were steadily marching in on them. Among those seated, the only difference in composition was that Hansen’s seat had been taken over by the Vice-President. The cameras were turning and Branson, seated next to the President, was talking into the microphone.

  He said: ‘I am calling upon all viewers in America and throughout the world to be witnesses to a particularly heinous crime that has been committed upon this bridge just over an hour ago, a crime that I trust
will persuade you that not all criminals are those who stand without the law. I would ask you to look at this food wagon which, as you can see, has its counter covered with food trays. Harmless, if not particularly appetizing food trays, you would think, such as any major airline would serve up to its passengers. But are they really harmless?’ He turned to the man on his other side and the camera was now back on them. ‘This is Dr Kylenski, a leading forensic expert on the West Coast. A specialist in poisons. Are those trays really harmless, Dr Kylenski?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You’ll have to speak up, Doctor.’

  ‘No. They are not harmless. Some are contaminated.’

  ‘How many?’

  ‘Half. Maybe more. I have no laboratory resources to hand.’

  ‘Contaminated. That means infected. What are they infected with, Doctor?’

  ‘A virus. Botulinus. A major source of severe food poisoning.’

  ‘How severe? Can it be deadly?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Frequently?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Normally it occurs naturally – spoiled food, things like that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But a culture of it can be manufactured synthetically or artificially in a laboratory’

  ‘That’s putting it very loosely’

  ‘We’re talking primarily to laymen.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And it could be injected synthetically into already prepared but otherwise harmless food?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Yes or no?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Thank you, Dr Kylenski. That will be all.’

  Revson, still without his camera, was standing by the ambulance with O’Hare. ‘For a person who’s never been inside a courtroom, Branson seems to have mastered the prosecuting counsel bit pretty well.’

  ‘It’s all this TV.’

  Branson said: ‘I put it to all of you who are watching that the authorities – military, police, FBI, Government or whoever – have made a deliberate attempt to murder or at least incapacitate those of us who have taken over the Presidential entourage and this bridge. There must be someone on this bridge who knew how to identify poisoned trays and see that they fell into the right hands – that is, the hands of my colleagues and myself. The attempt, fortunately, failed, but there has been one casualty whom I shall mention later.