The Way to Dusty Death

by Alistair MacLean

  He moved round to the other side of the house. He didn’t even bother looking at the barred lower windows. He looked upwards and his attention was at once caught and held by a window that was slightly ajar. Not much, perhaps three inches, but still ajar. Harlow looked around the grounds. About twenty yards away were a cluster of garden and potting sheds and a greenhouse. He headed resolutely in their direction.

  Rory, meanwhile, was pacing up and down in the lane outside, continually glancing at the rope in what appeared to be an agony of indecision. Suddenly, he seized the rope and began to climb.

  By the time he had dropped to the ground on the other side, Harlow had a ladder against the lower sill of the window and had reached the level of the window itself. He pulled out his torch and carefully examined both sides of the window. Both sides had what were clearly electrical wires stapled to the framework of the window. Harlow reached inside his bag, produced the wire-cutters, snipped both wires, lifted the sash high and passed inside.

  Within two minutes he had established that there was no one on the upper floor. Canvas bag and unlit torch in his left hand, the silenced pistol in the other, he stealthily descended the stairs towards the hallway. Light streamed from a door that was slightly ajar and the sound of voices from inside, one of them a woman’s, carried very clearly. This room he temporarily ignored. He prowled round the ground floor ensuring that all the rooms were empty. In the kitchen, his torch located a set of steps leading down to the basement. Harlow descended those and played his torch round a concrete-floored, concrete-walled cellar. Four doors led off this cellar. Three of those looked perfectly normal: the fourth had two massive bolts and a heavy key such as one might expect to find in a medieval dungeon. Harlow slid the bolts, turned the key, passed inside, located and pressed a light switch.

  Whatever it was, it was certainly no dungeon. It was a very modern and immaculately equipped laboratory although what precisely it was equipped to do was not immediately apparent. Harlow crossed to a row of aluminium containers, lifted the lid of one, sniffed the white powdery contents, wrinkled his nose in disgust and replaced the lid. As he left he passed by a wall telephone, obviously, from the dial, an external exchange one. He hesitated, shrugged and walked out, leaving the door open and the light on.

  Rory, just at the precise moment when Harlow was mounting the steps from the cellar, was hidden in the deep shadow on the edge of the thicket of trees. From where he stood he could see both the front and the side of the house. His face held a considerable degree of apprehension, an apprehension that suddenly changed to something very close to fear.

  A squat, powerfully built man, clad in dark trousers and a dark roll-neck pullover, had suddenly appeared from behind the back of the house. For a moment the man, the patrolling guard that Harlow hadn’t bargained for, stood stock-still, staring at the ladder propped against the wall. Then he started running towards the front door of the house. As if by magic two items had appeared in his hands – a large key and a very much larger knife.

  Harlow stood in the hallway outside the occupied room, thoughtfully regarding the bar of light streaming from the partially opened door and listening to the sound of voices. He tightened the silencer on his gun, took two quick steps forward then violently smashed the door open with the sole of his right foot: the door all but parted company with its hinges.

  There were five people inside the room. Three of them were curiously alike and might well have been brothers – heavy, well-suited, obviously prosperous men, black-haired and very swarthy. The fourth was a beautiful blonde girl. The fifth was Willi Neubauer. They stared as if mesmerized at Harlow who, with his bruised and battered face and silenced pistol, must have presented a less than friendly appearance.

  Harlow said: ‘The hands high, please.’

  All five lifted their hands.

  ‘Higher. Higher.’

  The five occupants of the room stretched their arms very high indeed.

  ‘What the devil does this mean, Harlow?’ Neubauer’s tone was intended to be harsh and demanding but it burred with the sharp edge of strain. ‘I come calling on friends – ’

  Harlow interrupted in an iron voice. ‘The judge will have more patience with you than I have. Shut up!’

  ‘Look out!’ The almost panic-stricken scream was barely recognizable as Rory’s voice.

  Harlow had the cat-like reflexes that befitted the outstanding Grand Prix driver of his time. He turned and fired in one movement. The dark man, who had been just about to start a vicious downstroke, screamed in agony and stared in disbelief at his shattered hand. Harlow ignored him and had whirled back to face the others even before the dark man’s knife had struck the floor. One of the swarthy men had dropped his right hand and was reaching inside his jacket.

  Harlow said encouragingly: ‘Go on.’

  The swarthy man lifted his right hand very quickly indeed. Harlow stepped prudently to one side and gestured briefly with his gun towards the wounded man.

  ‘Join your friends.’ Moaning in pain, his left hand clutching his bleeding right, the dark man did so. Just then Rory entered the room.

  Harlow said: ‘Thank you, Rory. All sins forgiven. Get the first-aid box from that bag. I told you we might need it.’ He surveyed the company coldly. ‘And I do hope this is the last time we need it.’ He pointed his gun at the blonde girl. ‘Come here, you.’

  She rose from her chair and came slowly forward. Harlow smiled at her, chillingly, but she was either too shocked or stupid to realize what lay behind that smile.

  ‘I believe you have some pretensions towards being a nurse,’ Harlow said, ‘even though the late and un-lamented Luigi might not agree with that. There’s the first-aid box. Fix your friend’s hand.’

  She spat at him. ‘Fix it yourself.’

  Harlow gave no warning. There was a blur of movement and the silencer of the pistol smashed against the blonde’s face. She screamed, staggered and fell to a sitting position, blood welling from gashes on both cheek and mouth.

  ‘Jesus!’ Rory was appalled. ‘Mr Harlow!’

  ‘If it’s any consolation, Rory, this charmer is wanted for premeditated murder.’ He looked at the blonde and what little could be seen of his face was totally devoid of pity. ‘Get to your feet and fix your friend’s hand. Then, if you wish, your own face. Not that I care. The rest of you, face down on the floor, hands behind your back. Rory, see if they have guns. The first man that as much as twitches will be shot through the back of the head.’

  Rory searched them. When he had finished, he looked down almost in awe at the four guns he had placed on the table.

  ‘They all had guns,’ he said.

  ‘What did you expect them to be carrying? Powder puffs? Now, Rory, the twine. You know what to do. As many knots as you like, the twine as tight as possible and the hell with their circulation.’ Rory set about his task with enthusiasm and in very short order had the hands of all six securely bound behind their backs: the dark man now had his hand roughly bandaged.

  Harlow said to Neubauer: ‘Where’s the gate key?’

  Neubauer glared venomously and kept silent. Harlow pocketed his gun, picked up the knife his would-be assailant had dropped and pressed the tip against Neubauer’s throat, just breaking the skin.

  ‘I’m going to count three then I’m going to push this knife clear through to the back of your neck. One. Two.’

  ‘Hall table.’ Neubauer’s face was ashen.

  ‘On your feet, all of you. Down to the cellar.’

  They trooped down to the cellar, all with highly apprehensive expressions on their faces. So apprehensive was the last of the six, one of the three swarthy men, that he made a sudden vicious lunge at Harlow, probably with the intention of knocking him down the steps and then stamping on him, which was a very foolish thing to do, for he had already had eye-witness proof of the quite remarkable speed of Harlow’s reactions. Harlow stepped nimbly to one side, struck him above the ear with the barrel of his pistol and watch
ed him topple then fall halfway down the steps. Harlow caught one of his ankles and dragged him down the lower half of the stairs, the unconscious man’s head bumping from concrete step to concrete step.

  One of the other swarthy men shouted: ‘God’s sake, Harlow, are you mad ? You’ll kill him!’

  Harlow dragged the unconscious man down the last step until his head hit the concrete floor and looked indifferently at the man who had made the protest. ‘So? I’m probably going to have to kill you all anyway.’

  He ushered them into the cellar laboratory and, with Rory’s assistance, dragged the unconscious man in after them.

  Harlow said: ‘Lie down on the floor. Rory, tie their ankles together. Very tightly, please.’ Rory did so, displaying not only enthusiasm for but now positive enjoyment in his work. When he had finished, Harlow said: ‘Go through their pockets. See what identification papers they are carrying. Not Neubauer. We all know who our dear Willi is.’

  Rory returned to Harlow with quite a bundle of identification documents in his hand. He looked uncertainly at the woman on the floor. ‘What about the lady, Mr Harlow?’

  ‘Never confuse that murderous bitch with a lady.’ Harlow looked at her. ‘Where’s your handbag?’

  ‘I haven’t got a handbag.’

  Harlow sighed, crossed to where she lay and knelt beside her. ‘When I’m finished with the other side of your face no man will ever look at you again. Not that you’ll be seeing any men for a long time to come – no court is going to overlook the testimony of four policemen who can identify you and the fingerprints on that glass.’ He looked at her consideringly then lifted his gun. ‘And I don’t suppose the wardresses will care what you look like. Where’s that handbag?’

  ‘In my bedroom.’ The tremble in her voice accurately reflected the fear in her face.

  ‘Where in your bedroom?’

  ‘The wardrobe.’

  Harlow looked at Rory. ‘Rory, if you would be so kind.’

  Rory said uncertainly: ‘How will I know which bedroom?’

  Harlow said patiently: ‘When you come to a bedroom where the dressing-table looks like the toilet counter in a pharmacy, then you’ll have found the right bedroom. And bring down the four guns from the living-room.’

  Rory left. Harlow got to his feet, crossed to the desk where he’d placed the identification documents and began to study those with interest. After about a minute he looked up.

  ‘Well, well, well. Marzio, Marzio and Marzio. Sounds like a firm of well-established solicitors. And all from Corsica. I seem to have heard of the Marzio brothers before. I’m quite certain the police have and will be delighted to have those documents.’ He laid down the papers, pulled six inches of a roll of stand-mounted Scotch tape and affixed it lightly to the edge of the desk. He said: ‘You’ll never guess what that’s for.’

  Rory returned, bearing with him a handbag so large as to be more a valise than a handbag, along with four guns. Harlow opened the bag, examined the contents, which included a passport, then unzipped only a side compartment and pulled out a gun.

  ‘My, my. So Anne-Marie Puccelli carries a fire-arm around with her. No doubt to fend off those would-be nasty attackers bent on robbing her of those cyanide tablets such as she fed to the late Luigi.’ Harlow replaced the gun, then dropped into the bag the other documents and the four guns Rory had brought. He extracted the first-aid box from the bag, took out a very small bottle and poured white tablets into his hand.

  ‘How convenient. Exactly six tablets. One for each. I want to know where Mrs MacAlpine is being held and I’m going to know in less than two minutes. Florence Nightingale there will know what those are.’

  Florence Nightingale had no comment to make. Her face was paper-white and drawn, she appeared to have put on ten years in ten minutes.

  Rory said: ‘What are those things?’

  ‘Sugar-coated cyanide. Quite pleasant to take really. Take about three minutes to melt.’

  ‘Oh, no ! You can’t do that.’ Shock had drained Rory’s face of all its colour. ‘You just can’t. That – that’s murder.’

  ‘You want to see your mother again, don’t you? Besides, it’s not murder, it’s extermination. We’re dealing with animals, not human beings. Look around you. What do you think the end product of this charming old cottage industry is?’ Rory shook his head. He seemed to be completely numbed. ‘Heroin. Think of the hundreds, more likely thousands, of people they’ve killed. I insulted animals by calling them animals. They’re the lowest form of vermin on earth. It would be a pleasure to wipe out all six of them.’

  Among the six bound, prostrate prisoners there was a considerable amount of sweating and lip-licking in evidence. All six were plainly terrified. There was a ruthless implacibility in Harlow that made it all too horrifyingly plain that he was in deadly earnest.

  Harlow knelt on Neubauer’s chest, tablet in one hand, gun, in the other. He struck Neubauer, stiff-fingered, in the solar plexus. Neubauer gasped and Harlow stuck the silencer of his pistol into his opened mouth so preventing him from clenching his teeth. With finger and thumb he held the tablet alongside the silencer.

  Harlow said: ‘Where is Mrs MacAlpine?’ He withdrew the gun. Neubauer was babbling, almost mad with fear.

  ‘Bandol! Bandol! Bandol! In a boat.’

  ‘What type? Where?’

  ‘In the bay. Motor yacht. Forty feet or so. Blue with white top. The Chevalier it’s called.’

  Harlow said to Rory: ‘Bring me that strip of Scotch tape from the side of the table.’ He repeated his two-fingered assault on Neubauer’s solar plexus. Once again the gun was in the mouth. Harlow dropped the tablet in. ‘I don’t believe you.’ He strapped the tape across Neubauer’s mouth. ‘Just to prevent you from spitting that cyanide tablet out.’

  Harlow moved across to the man who had made the vain attempt to pull his gun. Tablet in hand, he sank to his knees. Totally panic-stricken, the man started screaming at Harlow before the latter could speak.

  ‘Are you mad? Are you mad? For God’s sake, it’s true! The Chevalier. Bandol. Blue and white. She’s anchored two hundred metres off-shore.’

  Harlow stared at the man for a long moment, nodded, rose, crossed to the wall phone, lifted the receiver and dialled 17 – Police secours, which can be variously interpreted as police-help or police-emergency. He made contact almost instantly.

  Harlow said: ‘I’m speaking from the Villa Hermitage in the rue Georges Sand. Yes, that’s it. In a basement room you will find a fortune in heroin. In the same room you will find the equipment for the bulk manufacture of heroin. Also in the same room you will find six people responsible for the manufacture and distribution of this heroin. They will offer no resistance – they are securely bound. Three of them are the Marzio brothers. I have taken their identification papers along with those of a wanted murderess called Anne-Marie Puccelli. These will be given to you later tonight.’ There came from the earpiece the sound of a voice talking rapidly, urgently, but Harlow ignored it. He said: ‘I will not repeat myself. I know that every emergency call is tape-recorded, so there’s no point in trying to detain me until you get here.’ He hung up, to find Rory gripping his arm.

  Rory said desperately: ‘You’ve got your information. The three minutes aren’t up. You could still get that tablet from Neubauer’s mouth.’

  ‘Ah, that.’ Harlow put four of the tablets back in the small bottle, held up the fifth, ‘five grains acetylsalicylic acid. Aspirin. That’s why I taped his mouth – I didn’t want him shouting to his pals that all he had been fed was an aspirin – there can’t be an adult human being in the western world who doesn’t know the taste of aspirin. Look at his face – he’s not terrified any more, he’s just hopping mad. Come to that, they all look hopping mad. Ah, well.’ He picked up the girl’s handbag and looked at her. ‘We’ll borrow this temporarily – fifteen, twenty years, whatever the judge cares to give you.’

  They left, bolting and locking the door behind them, too
k the gate key from the hall table, ran through the open front door, down the driveway then unlocked and opened the gates. Harlow pulled Rory into the shadow of a cluster of pine trees.

  Rory said: ‘How long do we stay here?’

  ‘Just till we make sure that the right people get here first.’

  Only seconds later they heard the ululating wails of approaching sirens. Very shortly afterwards, sirens still on and lights flashing, two police cars and a police van came at speed through the gateway and pulled up in a shower of spraying gravel and at least seven policemen ran up the steps and through the open doorway. Despite Harlow’s reassurance that the prisoners had been immobilized, they all considered it necessary to have their guns in their hands.

  Harlow said: ‘The right people got here first.’

  Fifteen minutes later, Harlow was seated in an armchair in Giancarlo’s laboratory. Giancarlo, leafing through a bundle of documents in his hands, heaved a long sigh.

  ‘You do lead an interesting life, John. Here, there, everywhere. You’ve done us a great service tonight. The three men you speak of are indeed the notorious Marzio brothers. Widely supposed to be Sicilians and in the Mafia, but they’re not. As you’ve discovered, they’re Corsicans. Corsicans regard the Sicilian Mafiosa as bungling amateurs. Those three have been at the top of our list for years. Never any evidence – but they won’t get out of this one. Not when they’re found alongside several million francs’ worth of heroin. Well, one good turn deserves another.’ He handed some papers over to Harlow. ‘Jean-Claude has preserved his honour. He broke the code this evening. Interesting reading, no?’

  After about a minute Harlow said: ‘Yes. A list of Tracchia’s and Neubauer’s drop-offs throughout Europe.’

  ‘No less.’

  ‘How long to get through to Dunnet?’