The Death’s Head Conspiracy

by Nick Carter

  I throttled down, drifted to the dock and threw the bow line to Pilar. She made it fast on a cleat as I jumped out and secured the stern. Then I cradled Rona in my arms and lifted her to the dock where, in the trance-like catatonia of shock, she sat like a zombie.

  “This must be Rona,” Pilar said.

  “Yes. She’s in bad shape. Let’s get a taxi and take her to a hospital.”

  “I can do better than that. While you were gone, I rented a Jeep. It’s parked just over there. You take Rona in back; I’ll drive. I know the way to the hospital.” Then, incongruously, she added, “Your Rona is very pretty.”

  “Pilar,” I said, “I’m glad to see you. You’re a handy gadget to have around. Let’s go.”

  When we were in the Jeep with Pilar tooling expertly through the streets of Willemstad, she said, “What happened on the island.”

  “Gorodin was there with a couple of his goons,” I told her. “He was about to torture Rona to make her talk. What he didn’t know was that she had no answers to give him. She was just an amateur in a game for hard-core pros.”

  “But she did volunteer,” Pilar observed.

  “That’s right, but none of us took the time to tell her the risks involved.”

  Pilars black eyes met mine in the rearview mirror. “Do you care for her, Nick?”

  I stopped to think a moment before I answered. “If you mean am I violins and candles in love with her, the answer is no. I’ve been in this dirty business for so long I don’t know if I could really love anyone in the classic sense. But if you mean do I care what happens to her, sure I do. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have gone bucketing off to Little Dog island to help her. I know that seems a bit too human for me, but I haven’t quite turned into a block of ice.”

  Pilar spoke quietly, keeping her eyes straight ahead. “Nick, tell me something.”

  “Sure.”

  “Do you care what happens to me?”

  I reached up and laid my hand on the warm flesh of her shoulder. “Very much,” I said.

  Pilar sighed, then in a curious tone said, “I hope you will never be sorry.”

  Just then we turned and gunned up the drive of Queen’s Hospital, a sparkling new building of pastel blue. I left a wad of bills with the cashier and was assured by one of the resident physicians that Rona would have the very best of care. Any extra expenses would be paid by the American consul, I told the doc-tor, and then called the consulate to make the arrangements.

  I rejoined Pilar in the Jeep. It was dark, and the sky sparkled with an infinity of stars. I said, “Let’s go rip off some smugglers.”

  I took the wheel of the Jeep; Pilar gave directions. We headed back to the waterfront, and then turned south.

  “There must be other news you have not told me,” Pilar said. “How did you leave Gorodin?”

  “Dead.”

  “And the two who were with him?”

  “Also dead. And a kid named Boris who died because he was too kind and too careless for the game.”

  “So you left four bodies?”

  “Right. But somewhere Anton Zhizov and Knox Wamow are preparing to blow up New York tomorrow. If we don’t get to them first it won’t matter a damn if there’s four bodies found on Little Dog Island or four thousand.”

  Pilar looked pensive. And was silent.

  We drove on into the shabbiest section of the waterfront where the poorest of the local fishermen moored their sorry looking boats in water thick with oil and debris. A couple of miles further on Pilar pointed out a scabrous gray frame building, illuminated in front by a single pale light bulb. It made Vanvoort’s Hideaway seem like Trader Vic’s in comparison.

  “This is where we have to start,” Pilar said. “If you want Torio, you go to Little Liza’s.”

  The sound waves struck us when we were still fifty feet from the door. A full blown riot could not have been louder. Inside, we joined a hundred or so merrymakers who, though not quite rioting, were at least hysterical. Everyone seemed to be in perpetual motion. It was impossible to talk above the din, so everyone shouted. Occasionally a peal of shrill female laughter would cut through the cacophony. Somewhere a juke box was playing, but only the reverberations of the deepest bass notes could be heard.

  Pilar and I picked our way among the frenetic bodies to a simple plank bar set up at the rear of the building. Standing back of this, pouring drinks from unlabeled bottles was a woman roughly the size of Godzilla. And almost as attractive.

  “Little Liza?” I shouted in Pilars ear. It was hardly a wild guess.

  “Little Liza!” she confirmed with a grin.

  Liza wore a cascade of tight curls in a shade of red that couldn’t have been human hair. Somewhere between six and seven feet tall, Liza was all pouches and pockets and odd-shaped lumps of flesh. It was as if an amateur sculptor had hurriedly slapped clay on a framework. Intending to finish the job later, he had rightfully lost faith in his creative ability and had given up.

  When I finally got her attention, Liza lumbered toward me from the other side of the plank bar, the flesh of her various parts all dancing to different rhythms.

  “What’ll it be?” she rumbled in a voice like an empty barrel rolling over cobblestones.

  “I want Torio,” I shouted.

  “Never heard of him,” Little Liza boomed back at me.

  “Gorodin sent me.”

  “Never heard of him either.”

  I pulled out my wallet. I was running low on guilders, so I spread out a number of U.S. bills on the plank bar in front of the huge woman.

  “Andrew Jackson I’ve heard of,” she said. “Torio’s in the back room sleeping one off.” She pointed a finger about the size of a dill pickle.

  With Pilar in tow, I headed for a narrow door at the far end of the bar. The small room behind it was furnished with one chair, one table, and one cot Lying boozed out on the cot, twisted in a tangled grayish blanket that may once have been white, was the squat, baldheaded man I had seen in the smugglers’ launch.

  I closed the door and the noise from beyond it diminished. I checked another door in the opposite wall. It led to the open air behind the building. I crossed to the oblivious smuggler, frisked him and came up with a Colt .38 automatic. Passing this to Pilar, I stuck the barrel of my Luger under his nose and slapped him across the face.

  “Torio!” I yelled.

  He rolled his head, made complaining grunts, then slowly dragged his eyes open. When he saw the gun under his nose, his eyes got very wide.

  “Hey, what is this, a heist?”

  “Get up, Torio,” I growled. “We’re going for a ride.”

  That startled him. He sat up. “Wait a minute,” he pleaded. “I don’t even know you.”

  “It’s not that kind of a ride,” I told him. “Play it straight with me and you’ll have a round trip. Now move it!”

  I gave him a little poke with the gun barrel for emphasis, and Torio sprang from the cot with remarkable agility for a man with a bad hangover. I shoved him out the back door and he marched obediently around to where we had parked the jeep.

  Pilar drove, while I sat in back with Torio and covered him with the Luger.

  “Drive up the road about a hundred yards, then pull off when you find a dark spot,” I told her.

  “Now, Torio,” I said, when we had driven up a dim side road and parked, “I want to know about the suitcases.”

  “Suitcases?” he echoed.

  “My time is short, Torio,” I said, “and so is my temper. In only a minute or two, you will hear bones snapping, and you will see lots of blood. Those bones and that blood will be yours, Torio, so please take this opportunity to volunteer information.”

  In the glow of moonlight, I could see beads of sweat pop up on his scalp and trickle down the smooth sides of his head.

  He nodded rapidly, “Okay, okay. I’m not about to be a hero for a bunch of foreigners. You mean the suitcases I been runnin’ out to the Gaviota, right?”

  “A cle
ver deduction, Torio. I want to know who gave them to you and where you picked them up.”

  “It was a husky, foreign sounding guy I made the deal with six months ago. Big, hairy ape. He never told me his name, and it wasn’t a guy you could ask questions. He always paid me in advance, then he would tell me when there was a suitcase to pick up. I’d head out south of here, a little ways up into the hills, and a helicopter would come in with the suitcase, and I’d take it out to the ship. Believe me, that’s all I know, friend. I even looked in one of them suitcases, and it was empty. Damned queer business, but I don’t get paid to be curious.”

  “How many of the suitcases have you put on the ship?” I asked.

  “Lemme see, we took the last one out three nights ago. That’ll make eight, total.”

  “Can you take us to where the helicopter lands?”

  “Sure, but there’s always a couple of guards there with guns. Them and the pilot, a guy named Ingram, who hangs around there when his whirlybird is in.”

  “It’ll be up to you,” I said, “to see that we get past the guards. Now let’s have the directions.”

  Pilar drove south and turned into a narrow dirt road indicated by Torio. And then we wheeled into open country. It was fortunate that Pilar had rented the four-wheel-drive Jeep, for it was rough going as the road became a trail, the ground rocky, the terrain rising into rolling hills.

  I had the smuggler sitting up in front now, so that when the spotlight hit us he was able to jump up and wave his arms to be recognized before anybody started shooting.

  “It’s me, Torio,” he called.

  A man carrying a rifle advanced slowly, coming to a stop six feet off to the side. “What are you doing here? There’s no pickup tonight”

  “There’s some trouble on the Gaviota,” Torio said. The big man said I should come and tell Ingram.”

  “Who are these other two?” the guard asked suspiciously.

  “They’re—they’re—” Torio began clumsily.

  “We’re with Gorodin,” I cut in. “We have information that must go to Zhizov at once.”

  The names carried weight with the guard. The barrel of his rifle lowered, and he walked closer to the Jeep. “Show me some identification, please, sir,” he said respectfully.

  “Of course,” I said, and fumbled in my pocket for some scrap of paper. I held it so the guard would have to reach in for it. When he did, I grabbed his wrist and yanked him forward. Pilar quickly hand-chopped the man behind the ear, knocking him cold before he had a chance to cry out.

  I put a gag in the guard’s mouth and tied him up with a piece of nylon rope I had found in the boat and appropriated for such an emergency. Swiveling his spotlight, I lit up a small wooden building fifty yards beyond. Just behind it rested a small sturdy helicopter. I killed the light and motioned for Pilar to shut off the Jeep’s motor. Hustling Torio ahead of me, Luger in hand, I climbed out on foot toward the building with the coil of rope and hurried off, Pilar close behind. When we reached the door, I kicked it open and rushed in as I poked the button on the spotlight. Two men sleeping in cots along the far wall sat up abruptly. One was a heavy Slavic type who could have been the brother of the disabled guard at the entrance, the other was a pale skinny man with a big nose and weak chin. He would be Ingram, the pilot, I decided.

  The guard type was sneaking a hand toward his rifle leaning against the wall near the head of his cot.

  “You’ll die trying,” I told him, and the man froze. Ingram sat numbly, rubbing his eyes and blinking.

  Pilar found a light switch and its glaring overhead flooded the single room of the building. Off to our left was a sophisticated short-wave radio set.

  “Torio! You sold us out,” the guard accused.

  “Sure,” the smuggler said, “with a gun at my head, I sell out fast—just like you, pal.”

  “Ingram, you get dressed,” I ordered. “Is the helicopter gassed up?”

  “Yes, to capacity,” he answered nervously.

  The man was shaking with fear. I didn’t want him so frightened that he couldn’t fly, so I said. “Just follow orders, and you won’t get hurt.” That calmed him, and he began pulling on his clothes.

  “Torio, sit in that chair,” I said, and the smuggler hastened to obey. I tossed the coil of rope to the guard and said, “Tie him up. I shouldn’t have to warn you to do a good job.”

  I covered the guard and Torio with my Luger, watching to see that Torio was secured with good, tight knots. Pilar had the smuggler’s .38 in her hand and was keeping an eye on Ingram, but he wasn’t going to cause us any trouble.

  When Torio was tightly bound, I said to the guard, “Now you sit in the chair on the other side of the room.” When he sullenly obeyed, I said to Pilar, “Get the rope and tie that one, too.”

  Pilar handed the Colt to me and walked over to the guard. It was a bad mistake. She had stepped between me and our prisoner. In one swift movement, the man pulled out a knife from somewhere in his clothing and seized Pilar, twisting her around in front of him with her head bent back and his knife blade at her throat.

  “Drop your gun or the woman dies,” he grated.

  Crouched as he was behind the ample body of Pilar, the man offered no target I couldn’t be absolutely sure of missing her and hitting him in a mortal spot. If I moved the gun to take better aim, he would slash her throat. So I hesitated.

  “Goddamn you, I said drop that gun.” he snapped. “Do you think I am bluffing?”

  When I didn’t move, the guard twitched the knife and a red worm of blood crawled down Pilars neck. Still I held the Luger poised.

  “Ingram, take this idiot’s gun away from him,” barked the guard.

  “I-I can’t do it,” the pilot said in a tremulous voice.

  The guard snarled at him, “Be a man for once, you sniveling coward or I’ll—”

  We never found out what the guard might have done to Ingram because in his anger at the pilot, he had turned his head, just long enough for me to bring the Luger into position and shoot him through his exposed left temple. He spun away from Pilar, bounced off the wall and sagged to the floor. The knife clattered harmlessly away.

  Pilar stared at me with a wounded expression. “You’d have let him cut my throat before you gave up your gun, wouldn’t you?” she said.

  “Sure,” I admitted. “Once he had my gun, you and I both would have been as good as dead.”

  She nodded slowly. “Yes, I suppose you’re right Just the same—” She shook her head, “You’re a cool one. You give me the chills.”

  “We’ll warm you up later,” I said quickly and turned to the pilot “Now, Ingram, you’re going to take me to the place where you pick up the suitcases you deliver to Torio.”

  “You mean Zhizov’s hideout?”

  “That’s right. Where is it?”

  “In the mountains on the border between Venezuela and British Guiana. But I could never land there in the dark. It’s difficult enough in the daylight.”

  I checked my watch. “If we take off now, it should be light by the time we get there. And Ingram, if you should happen to fly me in the wrong direction, you’ll be grounded permanently. Six feet under.”

  “I’m neither brave nor stupid,” he answered. “I’ll do exactly as you tell me.”

  “That’s good, Ingram. You may yet live to write mama all the nasty details.”

  Pilar, who had been standing quietly off to the side, spoke now. “Nick, you talk as if you’re going on alone from here.”

  “I am,” I said. “This is the end of the line, and there will probably be some fireworks. A woman could be a handicap.”

  “No,” she said, her feet spread in a determined stance. “We’ve come this far together, and I will not be left behind now. I have been much help to you, have I not?”

  “That’s true, but—”

  “Take me with you, Nick,” she broke in. “I can shoot as well as a man, and two guns will double our chances of success. It means ve
ry much to me, querido”

  For a moment, I was undecided.

  But what Pilar said made sense. She was a seasoned professional, tougher than most men. And she knew that she was expendable, that, if necessary for the sake of the mission, I would sacrifice her.

  “Com© along then,” I said. “Since you won’t be using the Jeep to get back to town, go and pull the distributor cap so it’ll be useless to anyone who might find it helpful.” I couldn’t help adding, “You do know what a distributor cap is?”

  Her full lips curved in a faintly mocking smile. “Yes, querido, I know about distributor caps and many other things you would not believe.”

  I grinned back. “Okay. And you might give our friend out there another tap to keep him asleep for a while.”

  “I will hurry,” she said, and, taking the .38 from me, she scurried off.

  I crossed to the radio, smashed it to the floor repeatedly until the case burst open, then destroyed the guts with the butt of the guard’s rifle. During this crude disassembly, I kept an eye on Ingram, though he was being a very good boy, and was no more threat than a toothless old hound dog on a rope.

  To Torio, I said, “You’ll work loose in a while, then you can walk back to Willemstad. It’s a long hike, but you’ll have time to consider better ways of making a living. Take up plumbing,” I suggested.

  He barely smiled. He didn’t have much of a sense of humor.

  Pilar returned carrying the distributor cap, which she held up for me with a mock curtsey. “The one out there should not wake up before noon tomorrow,” she said. “And then he will have a headache no aspirin will cure.”

  “All right, Ingram,” I said, “let’s get your chopper into the air.” Then the three of us trudged across the rutted, rock-strewn ground to the waiting helicopter.

  Nineteen

  Ingram seemed to take charge of himself when he got behind the controls of the helicopter, and we lifted off into the night sky. We headed to the east and a little south, soon leaving the lights of Curasao behind us. The smaller island of Bonaire slipped away, too, and for awhile we had only the black Caribbean below us and the star-speckled sky above.