The Way to Dusty Death

by Alistair MacLean

  Giancarlo looked at him almost pityingly. ‘I can reach any place in France inside thirty seconds.’

  There were almost a dozen policemen in the outer office of the police station together with Neubauer and his five felonious companions. Neubauer approached the sergeant at the desk.

  ‘I have been charged. I wish to phone my lawyer. I have the right.’

  ‘You have the right.’ The sergeant nodded to the phone on the desk.

  ‘Communications between lawyer and client are privileged.’ He indicated an adjacent phone booth. ‘I know what that’s for. So that the accused can talk to their lawyers. May I?’

  The sergeant nodded again.

  A phone rang in a rather luxurious flat not half a mile from the police station. Tracchia was reclining at his ease on a couch in the lounge. Beside him was a luscious brunette who evinced a powerful aversion to wearing too many clothes. Tracchia scowled, picked the phone up and said: ‘My dear Willi! I am desolate. I was unavoidably detained – ’

  Neubauer’s voice carried clearly.

  ‘Are you alone?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Then be alone.’

  Tracchia said to the girl: ‘Georgette, my dear, go powder your nose.’ She rose, sulkily, and left the room. Into the phone he said: ‘Clear now.’

  ‘You can thank your lucky stars that you were unavoidably detained otherwise you’d be where I am now – on the way to prison. Now listen.’ Tracchia listened very intently indeed, his normally handsome face ugly in anger as Neubauer gave a brief account of what had happened. He finished by saying: ‘So. Take the Lee Enfield and binoculars. If he gets there first pick him off when he comes ashore – if he survives Pauli’s attentions. If you get there first, go aboard and wait for him. Then lose the gun in the water. Who’s aboard The Chevalier now?’

  ‘Just Pauli. I’ll take Yonnie with me. I may need a lookout or signal-man. And look, Willi, not to worry. You’ll be sprung tomorrow. Associating with criminals is not a crime in itself and there’s not a single shred of evidence against you.’

  ‘How can we be sure? How can you be sure that you yourself are in the clear? I wouldn’t put anything beyond that bastard Harlow. Just get him for me.’

  ‘That, Willi, will be a pleasure.’

  Harlow was on the phone in Giancarlo’s laboratory. He said: ‘So. Simultaneous arrests 5 a.m. tomorrow. There’s going to be an awful lot of unhappy people in Europe by 5.10 a.m. I’m in a bit of a hurry so I’ll leave Giancarlo to give you all the details. Hope to see you later tonight. Meantime, I have an appointment.’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Rory said: ‘Mr Harlow, are you secret service or special agent or something?’

  Harlow glanced at him, then returned his eyes to the road. He was driving quickly but nowhere near his limit: there seemed to be no compelling urgency about the task on hand. He said: ‘I’m an out of work race driver.’

  ‘Come on. Who are you kidding?’

  ‘No one. In your own phraseology, Rory, just giving Mr Dunnet a bit of a hand, like.’

  ‘Doing what, Mr Harlow? I mean, Mr Dunnet doesn’t seem to be doing very much, does he?’

  ‘Mr Dunnet is a coordinator. I suppose I’m what might be called his field man.’

  ‘Yes. But doing what?’

  ‘Investigating other Grand Prix drivers. Keeping an eye on them, rather. And mechanics – anyone connected with racing.’

  ‘I see.’ Rory, clearly, did not see at all. ‘I’m not being rude, Mr Harlow, but why pick you? Why not investigate you?’

  ‘A fair question. Probably because I’ve been so very lucky in the last two years or so that they figured that I was making more money honestly than I possibly could dishonestly.’

  ‘That figures.’ Rory was in a very judicial mood. ‘But why were you investigating?’

  ‘Because something has been smelling and smelling badly on the Grand Prix circuits for over a year now. Cars were losing that seemed a certainty to win. Cars were winning that shouldn’t have had a chance. Cars had mysterious accidents. Cars went off the track where there was no earthly reason why they should have gone off the track. They ran out of petrol when they shouldn’t have run out of petrol. Engines over-heated through a mysterious loss of oil or coolant or both. Drivers fell ill at the most mysterious times – and the most inconvenient times. And as there is so much prestige, pride, power and above all profit in running a highly successful racing car, it was at first thought that a manufacturer or, more likely, a race team owner was trying to corner the market for himself.’

  ‘But he wasn’t?’

  ‘As you so brightly remark, he wasn’t. This became clear when manufacturers and team owners discovered that they were all being victimized. They approached Scotland Yard only to be told that they were powerless to intervene. The Yard called in Interpol. In effect, Mr Dunnet.’

  ‘But how did you get on to people like Tracchia and Neubauer?’

  ‘In the main, illegally. Round the clock telephone switchboard watch, maximum surveillance of all suspects at every Grand Prix meeting and interception of all incoming and out-going mail. We found five drivers and seven or eight mechanics who were stashing away more money than they could have possibly earned. But it was an irregular sort of thing for most of them. It’s impossible to fix every race. But Tracchia and Neubauer were stashing it away after every race. So we figured they were selling something – and there’s only one thing you can sell for the kind of money they were getting.’

  ‘Drugs. Heroin.’

  ‘Indeed.’ He pointed ahead and Rory caught the sign ‘BANDOL’ picked up by the headlights. Harlow slowed, lowered his window, poked his head out and looked up. Bands of cloud were beginning to spread across the sky but there was still much more starlit sky than cloud. Harlow withdrew his head and said: ‘We could have picked a better night for the job. Far too damn bright. They’re bound to have a guard, maybe two, for your mother. Point is, will they be keeping a watch – not only seeing that your mother doesn’t escape but that no one comes aboard? No reason why they should assume that anyone should try to board The Chevalier – I can’t think of any way they can have heard of the misfortune that has happened to Neubauer and his pals. But that’s the way an organization like the Marzio brothers has survived so long – by never taking chances.’

  ‘So we assume there is a guard, Mr Harlow?’

  ‘That is what we assume.’

  Harlow drove into the little town, parked the car in an empty high-walled builder’s yard where it could not possibly be seen from the narrow alleyway outside. They left the car and soon, keeping in deep shadow, were cautiously picking their way along the small waterfront and harbour. They halted and scanned the bay to the east.

  ‘Isn’t that her?’ Although there was no one within earshot, Rory’s voice was a tense whisper. ‘Isn’t that her?’

  ‘The Chevalier for sure.’

  There were at least a dozen yachts and cruisers anchored in the brilliantly moonlit and almost mirror-smooth little bay. The one nearest the shore was a rather splendid motor yacht, nearer fifty feet than forty, and had very definitely a blue hull and white topsides.

  ‘And now?’ Rory said. ‘What do we do now?’ He was shivering, not because of cold or, as had been the case in the Villa Hermitage, of apprehension, but because of sheer excitement. Harlow glanced thoughtfully upwards. The sky was still heavily overcast although there was a bar of cloud moving in the direction of the moon.

  ‘Eat. I’m hungry.’

  ‘Eat? Eat? But-but, I mean – ’ Rory gestured towards the yacht.

  ‘All things in their time. Your mother’s hardly likely to vanish in the next hour. Besides, if we were to – ah – borrow a boat and go out to The Chevalier … I don’t much fancy being picked out in this brilliant moonlight. There are clouds moving across. Let’s bide a wee.’

  ‘Let’s what?’

  ‘An old Scottish phrase. Let’s wait a little while Festina lente.�
�

  Rory looked at him in bafflement. ‘Festina what?’

  ‘You really are an ignorant young layabout.’ Harlow smiled to rob his words of offence. ‘An even older Latin phrase. Make haste slowly.’

  They moved away and brought up at a waterside café which Harlow inspected from the outside. He shook his head and they walked on to a second café, where the same thing happened. The third café they entered. It was three-parts empty. They took seats by a curtained window.

  Rory said: ‘What’s this place got that the others haven’t?’

  Harlow twitched back the curtain. ‘A view.’ Their vantage point commanded an excellent view of The Chevalier.

  ‘I see.’ Rory consulted his menu without enthusiasm. ‘I can’t eat a thing.’

  Harlow said encouragingly: ‘Let’s try a little something.’

  Five minutes later two enormous dishes of bouillabaisse were set before them. Five minutes after that Rory’s dish was completely empty. Harlow smiled at both the empty plate and Rory, then his smile abruptly vanished.

  ‘Rory. Look at me. Don’t look elsewhere. Especially don’t look at the bar. Act and speak naturally. Bloke’s just come in whom I used to know very slightly. A mechanic who left the Coronado team a few weeks after I joined. Your father fired him for theft. He was very friendly with Tracchia and from the fact that he’s in Bandol it’s a million to one that he still is.’

  A small dark man in brown overalls, so lean and scrawny as to be almost wizened, sat at the bar with a full glass of beer before him. He took his first sip of it and as he did so his eyes strayed to the mirror at the back of the bar. He could clearly see Harlow talking earnestly to Rory. He spluttered and half-choked over his beer. He lowered his glass, put coins on the counter and left as unobtrusively as possible.

  Harlow said: ‘ “Yonnie” they used to call him. I don’t know his real name. I think he’s certain we neither saw nor recognized him. If he’s with Tracchia, and he must be, this makes it for sure that Tracchia is already aboard. Either Tracchia’s temporarily relieved him of guard duties so that he could come ashore for a much-needed drink or Tracchia’s sent him away because he doesn’t want any witnesses around when he picks me off when I go out to the boat.’

  Harlow pulled back the curtains and they both looked out. They could see a small outboard-powered dinghy heading directly towards The Chevalier. Rory looked questioningly at Harlow.

  Harlow said: ‘Our Nicolo Tracchia is an impulsive, not to say impetuous lad, which is why he’s not quite the driver he could be. Five minutes from now he’ll be in the shadows somewhere outside waiting to gun me down the moment I step out of here. Run up to the car, Rory. Bring me some of that twine – and adhesive tape. I think we may need it. Meet me about fifty yards along the quay there, at the head of the landing steps.’

  As Harlow signalled the waiter for his bill, Rory left, walking with some degree of restraint. As soon as he had passed through the bead-curtained doorway he broke into a dead run. Arrived at the Ferrari, he opened the boot, stuffed twine and tape into his pockets, closed the boot, hesitated, then opened the driver’s door and pulled out the four automatics from under the seat. He selected the smallest, pushed the other three back into concealment, studied the one he held in his hand, eased the safety catch off, looked guiltily around and stuffed the automatic into an inside pocket. He made his way quickly down to the waterfront.

  Near the top of the landing steps was a double row of barrels, stacked two high. Harlow and Rory stood silently in the shadow, the former with a gun in his hand. They could both see and hear the outboard dinghy approaching. The engine slowed, then cut out: there came the sound of feet mounting the wooden landing steps, then two figures; appeared on the quay, Tracchia and Yonnie: Tracchia was carrying a rifle. Harlow moved out from the shadows.

  ‘Keep quite still,’ he said. ‘Tracchia, that gun on the ground. Hands high and turn your backs to me. I get tired of repeating myself but the first of you to make the slightest suspicious movement will be shot through the back of the head. At four feet I am not likely to miss. Rory, see what your former friend and his friend are carrying.’

  Rory’s search produced two guns.

  ‘Throw them in the water. Come on, you two. Behind those barrels. Face down, hands behind your backs. Rory, attend to our friend Yonnie.’

  With the expertise born of recent and intensive practice Rory had Yonnie trussed like a turkey in less than two minutes.

  Harlow said: ‘You know what the tape is for?’

  Rory knew what the tape was for. He used about a couple of feet of black insulated adhesive tape that effectively ensured Yonnie’s total silence.

  Harlow said: ‘Can he breathe?’

  ‘Just.’

  ‘“Just” is enough. Not that it matters. We’ll leave him here. Maybe someone will find him in the morning. Not that that matters either. Up, Tracchia.’

  ‘But aren’t you – ’

  ‘Mr Tracchia we need. Who’s to say there isn’t another guard aboard? Tracchia here is a specialist in hostages so he’ll know what we want him for.’

  Rory looked up at the sky. ‘That cloud that’s moving towards the moon is taking its time about it.’

  ‘It doesn’t appear to be in any great hurry about it. But we’ll take a chance on it. We have our life assurance with us.’

  The outboard motor dinghy moved across the moonlit water. Traccia was at the controls while Harlow, gun in hand, sat amidships facing him. Rory was in the bows, facing forward. At this point, the blue and white yacht was only a hundred yards away.

  In the wheelhouse of the yacht a tall and powerfully built man had a pair of binoculars to his eyes. His face tightened. He laid down the binoculars, took a gun from a drawer, left the wheelhouse, climbed the ladder there and spreadeagled himself on the cabin roof.

  The dinghy came alongside the water-skiing steps at the stern and Rory made fast. At a gesture from Harlow, Tracchia climbed the ladder first and moved back slowly as Harlow, the gun trained on him, climbed the steps in turn. Rory followed. Harlow made a gesture that Rory should remain where he was, thrust his gun in Tracchia’s back and moved off to search the boat.

  One minute later Harlow, Rory and a blackly scowling Tracchia were in The Chevalier’s brightly lit saloon.

  Harlow said: ‘No one aboard, it seems. I take it that Mrs MacAlpine is behind that locked door below. I want the key, Tracchia.’

  A deep voice said: ‘Stand still. Don’t turn round. Drop that gun.’

  Harlow stood still, didn’t turn round and dropped his gun. The seaman walked into the saloon from the after door.

  Tracchia smiled, almost beatifically. ‘That was well done, Pauli.’

  ‘My pleasure, Signor Tracchia.’ He passed by Rory, gave him a contemptuous shove that sent him reeling into a corner of the settee and moved forward to pick up Harlow’s gun.

  ‘You drop your gun. Now!’ Rory’s voice had a most distinct quaver to it.

  Pauli swung around, an expression of total astonishment on his face. Rory had a gun clutched in two very unsteady hands.

  Pauli smiled broadly. ‘Well, well, well. What a brave little gamecock.’ He brought up his gun.

  Rory’s hands and arms were trembling like an aspen leaf in an autumn gale. He compressed his lips, screwed his eyes shut and pulled the trigger. In that confined space the report of the gun was deafening but even so not loud enough to drown out Pauli’s shout of agony. Pauli stared down in stupefaction as the blood from his shattered right shoulder seeped down between the clutching fingers of his left hand. Tracchia, too, wore a similarly bemused expression, one that changed to one of considerable pain as Harlow’s vicious swinging left hook sank deeply into his stomach. He bent double, Harlow struck him on the back of the neck but Tracchia was tough and durable. Still bent almost double, he staggered through the after door out on to the deck. As he did so, he passed Rory, very pale and looking very faint and clearly through with shooting explo
its for the night. It was as well. Harlow was in such close pursuit that he might well have been the victim of Rory’s extremely wobbly marksmanship.

  Rory looked at the wounded Pauli then at the two guns lying at his feet. Rory rose and pointed his gun at Pauli. He said: ‘Sit down.’

  Pain-wracked though he was, Pauli moved with alacrity to obey. There was no saying where Rory’s next unpredictable shot might lodge itself. As he moved to a corner of the saloon the sound of blows and grunts of pain could be clearly heard from outside. Rory scooped up the two guns and ran through the after door.

  On deck, the fight had clearly reached its climax. Tracchia, his wildly flailing feet clear of the deck and his body arched like a bow, had his back on the guardrail and the upper half of his body over the water. Harlow’s hands were on his throat. Tracchia, in turn, was belabouring Harlow’s already sadly battered and bruised face, but the belabouring was of no avail. Harlow, his face implacable, pushed him farther and farther out. Suddenly changing his tactics, he removed his right hand from Tracchia’s throat, hooked it under his thighs and proceeded to tip him over the guard-rail. When Tracchia spoke, his voice came as a wholly understandable croak.

  ‘I can’t swim! I can’t swim!’

  If Harlow had heard him there was not even the most minuscule change of expression on his face to register that fact. He gave a final convulsive heave, the flailing legs disappeared and Tracchia entered the water with a resounding splash that threw water as high as Harlow’s face. A barred cloud had at last crossed the moon. Harlow gazed down intently into the water for about fifteen seconds, produced his torch and made a complete circuit of the water around the yacht until he arrived back at his starting place. Again, still breathing deeply and quickly, he peered over the side, then turned to Rory. He said: ‘Maybe he was right at that. Maybe he can’t swim.’

  Rory tore off his jacket. ‘I can swim. I’m a very good swimmer, Mr Harlow.’

  Harlow’s iron hand grabbed him by the collar of his shirt. ‘You, Rory, are out of your mind.’

  Rory looked at him for a long moment, nodded, picked up his jacket and put it on again. He said: ‘Vermin?’