This United State

by Colin Forbes

  'Bernhard is the greatest printer in the whole world,' boomed Ronstadt. 'He gives you a date and the work is finished by that date.'

  'Everything is ready now, Ronstadt,' Yorcke confirmed. 'I have even printed a greater quantity. It is running on the machines now. For that, of course, I expect a bigger fee.'

  As he spoke he advanced very close to Ronstadt. The spiked bar was raised to his chest level as though about to strike. He stared hard at Ronstadt, who answered quickly, trying not to look at the nearness of the spike.

  'You'll get a big extra fee. And I won't pay you in what you've produced.'

  'Don't do that,' purred Yorcke. 'Life can be short.'

  'It was a joke, Ronstadt assured him hastily. 'Can we start loading the trucks?'

  'One truck is already loaded. The driver is waiting to leave.'

  'Tell him to get moving, please.'

  His men were exploring different rooms as Yorcke went to an old-fashioned phone attached to the wall. He used a turn-handle to ring the bell in the garage.

  'Dave, take the truck to its destination. Yes, now.'

  Newman, with a holdall he had borrowed from Marler, was starting his tour of the house. He grabbed a grenade from the holdall, hurled it with great force through an illuminated window. Glass cracked as the missile landed somewhere inside. It detonated. The window shattered, scattering glass all over the snow outside. Newman had already moved on, hurled another grenade. He continued throwing the grenades almost non-stop as he ran.

  Below the wide ramp Tweed was crouched against the wall, Walther in his hand. He suddenly heard the sound of a powerful engine starting. Looking up, he saw the huge door of the garage elevating swiftly, automatically. A large white Mercedes truck roared out, sped down the ramp. He aimed his gun, fired. A useless shot. The driver inside his cab was way past him, had swung the vehicle round at the bottom, accelerated, headed for the track and thundered down it. Nield was by his side.

  'We've lost it. I fired but hit nothing. Where could it be going?'

  'Tell you in a minute …'

  He watched the truck rushing along the track. In no time at all it reached the road, swung left, heading back the way they had come. Then it was gone.

  'Freiburg for starters would be my guess,' said Tweed. 'There may be a way of stopping it later.'

  Newman dashed past them. He was running round the house, hurling more grenades from the holdall slung over his shoulder. He aimed one well clear of Kent, crouched by the front wall at the top of the steps. There was a fresh detonation. More glass sprayed the outside, none of it coming near Tweed and Nield. He didn't stop running.

  Half a minute earlier, the door at the top of the steps at the side of the house where Paula waited, was thrown open. Three thugs rushed out, down the steps, firing at random. Paula elevated her machine-pistol. She fired one long burst, lowering the weapon. The thugs on the steps tumbled over each other, fell in a heap, very still. She was reloading, expecting more, when Newman rushed round the corner, took in the situation at a glance.

  'Great work. Don't go inside!'

  He ran on. Paula waited. No one else emerged. She laid her machine-pistol on the ground. It would be difficult to manipulate inside the confines of the house. Holding her Walther gripped in both hands, she walked to the foot of the steps. Slowly she began to climb them, threading her way between the strewn corpses. Then she disappeared inside.

  At the rear of the house Marler waited well back at the edge of the trees, holding his Armalite. Butler was standing nearby, crouched low behind some wild shrubbery.

  'Keep your eyes on that door, Marler called out. 'They're doing that.'

  When the assault came it was in an unexpected way — and from an unexpected direction. Without warning —they had heard, had seen, no sign of activity - a hail of smoke bombs arrived from inside the shattered windows. Marler and Butler were lost in a dense, choking fog.

  The door opened quietly. Ronstadt led the way out, followed by Leo Madison, Chuck Venacki and Vernon Kolkowski. They had guns in their hands but they did not fire them. Instead they ran for Ronstadt's Audi, now parked in front and facing the track. Ronstadt opened the driver's door quietly, sat behind the wheel as he was joined by Chuck at his side with Madison and Vernon in the back. He started the engine, accelerated.

  Marler, coughing, emerged from the smoke. He saw Newman appear round the side of the house. Ronstadt drove the car straight at him. Newman jumped clear just in time. Then the car had gone, vanishing down 'the gulley.

  Newman clambered to his feet, realized he had sprained his ankle. He stared at the flat-topped rock where Paula had been sitting. He looked quickly up at the open door at the top of the steps, beyond the piled bodies.

  'Marler!' he shouted. 'Paula's gone inside. Up those steps. For God's sake go after her.'

  'On my way.'

  When Paula reached the open doorway she paused, listened, then peered inside. She was looking up and down a lighted corridor. Deserted. She frowned. She could hear a strange noise. Clatter... clatter... clatter...

  It went on and on and was coming from an open door further down the corridor to her right. As she walked down the corridor the noise became louder and louder. A slab-like door was open, pushed back against the wall. As she came closer she saw it was made of solid steel. She peered round it and suppressed a gasp of surprise. She was looking down into a vast basement which must run under the entire house.

  She understood the noise now. The basement was occupied by an array of machines working like mad. Illumination came from fluorescent tubes suspended from the ceiling. Beyond the door a flight of concrete steps led down into the basement, with a metal rail on one side. She scanned the area as far as she could. No sign of anyone. Step by step she began to descend the flight. The noise of the clattering machines was hellish, trapped inside the basement.

  Walking down stealthily, she caught glimpses of the battery of machines. At one end large reels of paper were being fed in. They became perfectly flat sheets as the first machine carried them along. Then they passed under a series of huge revolving rollers. They emerged, still flat, but now printed with what, at first, she thought were outsize postage stamps. A moment later she realized they were banknotes, row upon row of them. They continued their journey until they reached a series of very large metal plates which jumped up and down, slicing them.

  She had almost reached the bottom step when she slipped on some spilt oil. Her legs collapsed under her as she grabbed for the rail. The hand was still holding the Walther and she bruised herself, dropping the gun. Picking herself up, she flexed her hands and legs. No damage - she always fell limply. But where was the Walther?

  The light was bright enough for her to see clearly but there was no sign of the weapon. It must have slid under one of the machines. She swore. Shaking her head to clear her mind, she began walking towards where the printing process started. Near the end was a concrete platform, elevated about a foot high. She assumed it was an observation platform so a printer could check to make sure everything was functioning properly.

  Suddenly she sensed a presence behind her. She swung round and let out a gasp of fear. The most hideous man she had ever seen was close to her. A gnome with a hunchback, his evil face twisted in a leer of anticipation of a pleasure to come. In his right hand, raised high, he held a ferocious-looking black spike.

  'I am Bernhard Yorcke,' he called out above the noise of the machinery. 'The greatest printer in the world. You have come to sabotage my beautiful work.'

  'I think your work is the most beautiful I've ever seen,' she said quickly.

  'No, you don't. You have been sent to destroy it. So I will destroy you.'

  'You're a genius,' she babbled.

  'I am the greatest genius of them all,' he said, coming closer.

  'That's why I came here. To see your wonderful work.'

  'You lie,' he snarled. 'You came to destroy. Instead, I am going to destroy you.'

  She knew he was
going to drive the dreadful spike into her face. As she backed away her right hand was feeling desperately inside her shoulder bag. Her fall had pushed it behind her back. She missed the special pocket sewn in which held her Browning. Her hand plunged deep, felt a canister of hair spray. He was very close to her as she brought out the spray, aimed it, her own eyes dosed, ejected the spray.

  'You foul whore.'

  She opened her eyes, then realized the spray had only hit his left eye. His right eye stared into hers as he lifted the spike higher to jab it forward. Backing away from him she had come up against the wall. There was nowhere to go, to escape.

  Marler came bounding down the steps like a rocket, Armalite in his right hand. He hadn't been able to shoot from the top for fear of hitting Paula. He saw the oil on the step which had brought down Paula, leapt over it.

  'You ugly deformed little bastard!' he shouted.

  The insult had the effect he had prayed for. Yorcke, about to jab the spike forward, turned round. Marler used the barrel of his Armalite like a club,, smashing it across Yorcke's forehead. Yorcke staggered back, still clutching the spike. He felt his legs press against the concrete platform. With incredible agility he jumped up on to the platform to give himself extra height. He was waving the spike when the Armalite hammered into him again, catching him across the hooked nose.

  He lost his balance, fell backwards on to the moving machine. Sprawled on the paper, he was carried along to the rollers. They had a safety device, jumping up when something large hit them. The large object was Yorcke's head. The roller came crashing down and Marler turned Paula away so she couldn't see. Yorcke let out a ghastly scream, heard clearly above the noise of the machinery. His shoulders reached the roller which jumped up again, then down. There was no further scream and the rest of his body swept under as the immensely heavy roller crashed down again. The paper was stained with a spreading pool of blood. Marler spoke quickly.

  'Don't look.'

  He heard someone call down from the top of the steps. Newman stood there with Tweed. Newman, followed by Tweed, hobbled down the steps, stopped when Marler warned him about the oil. Marler, his arm round Paula, guided her to Newman.

  'Take her to the car. Stay with her.'

  'You've hurt your foot,' Paula observed. 'I'll tend to it in the car. I've got a first-aid kit. Let's go. Take your time.'

  Tweed stared at the printed sheets still proceeding along the battery of machines. Then he looked at Marler.

  'British twenty-pound notes, ten-pound notes and fivers. It was Lenin who said, "If you want to destroy a 'country debauch the currency." Something like that. It's quite fiendish. The Americans were going to flood Britain with forged banknotes. We'd lose all faith in the pound. Then the Americans would persuade the population to switch to dollars. Then they would have taken us over.'

  He looked up. At the top of the staircase Kent, Butler and Nield were gazing down. He shouted up to them.

  'The three of you move as a unit. Check every room in this house. Make sure no one else is here. If it's all clear come back and tell me. But be careful.'

  'I imagine you'd like all this to be wiped out?' Marler suggested.

  'As soon as possible. Trouble is, the ceiling's concrete.'

  'I think not.'

  Marler climbed a ladder perched against a wall. Reaching up, he tapped at the ceiling. Looking down he shook his head.

  'Not concrete at all. Some kind of polystyrene - to match the concrete floor. Above it will be wood flooring. And wood burns. I need to go back to my car for extra supplies. Don't go round the end of this battery of machines. Something very unpleasant will be there.'

  When Marler had gone Tweed started to walk to the end of the conveyor belt of machines. He had a Walther in his right hand. Seeing what the last machine had spewed out onto the floor he skirted the remains of Bernhard Yorcke. His stomach churned. He walked on, past large packed bales piled to the ceiling, reaching a very wide door which was open. Beyond the door steps led up to a lighted area. He found himself inside the huge garage with the automatic door at the front still open.

  It was freezing cold. He saw a switch on the wall, pressed it. The automatic door lowered swiftly. More fluorescent tubes lit the interior of the garage and three more white Mercedes trucks stood parked, replicas of the truck he had seen driven away. He looked inside the open backs. Empty. He went back down the steps into the machine room.

  Inside a drawer he found a collection of knives. Selecting one, he bent down to rip open one of several bales on the floor. He stared at its contents — stack after stack of British twenty-pound notes, each neatly held together with an elastic band. He heard footsteps running down the steps from the house. Kent was in the forefront with Nield and Butler behind him.

  'Come and look at this,' Tweed called out. 'But when you reach the end look at the wall.'

  'All's clear,' Nield reported. 'No one else in the house.'

  'Oh, my God...' gasped Kent. 'What is it?'

  He had overlooked Tweed's advice. Now he was staring at what had seeped out of the last machine onto the floor.

  'Don't ask,' Tweed snapped. 'I told you not to look. Instead, come and look at this.'

  Kent came round the corner, bent down. He extracted a stack of the banknotes, took off the elastic band. His expression was grim.

  'More forgeries. I don't need to use my eyeglass. They are very good, but once you know what to look for you can see at once they're fakes.'

  'So once the knowledge spread like wildfire every bank teller, every shopkeeper, every shopper in Britain would know they were holding useless money?'

  'That's how it would work,' Kent agreed. 'Then panic.'

  Picking up the knife Tweed had used, he ripped open another bale. This one was brimful of stacks of fivers. He opened a stack, glanced quickly at several banknotes, shook his head.

  'Again, at first glance they're the real thing, but they're not.'

  Kent ripped open several more bales. He found stacks of ten-pound notes, fifty-pound notes. Tweed then led him up the steps into the garage. He pointed at one of the trucks.

  'How much of the faked currency do you reckon that could contain?'

  'Millions and millions,' Kent replied. 'It's a big truck. It would contain enough — if distributed — to start a run on the pound.'

  'Worse than I thought. Much worse. One loaded truck got away.'

  They returned to the machine room as Marler appeared, lugging a very heavy holdall. He dumped it on the floor, well clear of the spreading reddish pool. He glanced round the huge basement.

  'I imagine you'd like me to lose this lot?'

  'Yes. And the whole house. Can it be done?'

  'Without difficulty. I've got thermite bombs which will turn the place into an inferno. Plus high explosive — just to make a professional job of it. If you've finished here, I suggest you leave me to it. Everyone returns to the Audis, then drive down to the end of the gulley. I'd appreciate it if you'd wait for me to arrive.'

  'How does it work?'

  'With this.' Marler took a small black object smaller than a matchbox from his pocket. It had a shallow depression on one side.

  'I press that,' he explained, 'and the world blows up. It works rather like the gizmo you press when you drive home, pause at the end of your drive, press your gizmo. Hey Presto! The garage door lifts automatically. Based on a radio signal with a code. Same thing here. I've laced the rooms in the house with thermite and high-explosive bombs. All have a signal receiver. The whole shooting match goes up when I press this gizmo '

  'Put it away in your pocket,' Kent suggested. 'We don't want an accident.'

  'Then clear off now and leave me to it,' Marler repeated.

  With their two Audis parked beyond the bottom of the gulley, they waited. They had a clear view of the strange house perched on its bluff. Also they were close to the road running alongside the lake. They seemed to wait for ever but, by Tweed's watch, it was only five minutes later when they
heard two dull explosions.

  'It's started,' said Paula. 'Oh, Lord, where's Marler?' 'Hasn't started yet,' Tweed assured her. 'And here comes Marler like a rocket.'

  When he reached the two cars Marler was out of breath. He stood still for a moment. Then he took the small black object he had shown them from his pocket. He looked at Tweed.

  'Ready for the fireworks?'

  'We are.'

  Marler pressed the device. They all stared fixedly at the weird house. They had left all the lights on. Paula could make out the broken windows. There was a simultaneous roar blasting out across the forest - accompanied by a searing sheet of fire. At first flames shot out of the windows, then the house began to come apart. The garage elevated. A truck rocketed into the air, on fire. It shot forward in an arc, descended into the lake. Flames fizzled, the truck sank. Within seconds there was an even more deafening roar. The house came apart. The front section elevated, was lifted bodily forward like the removal of a stage façade. It fell forward, dived off the bluff, landed in the lake. For a moment it floated, burning, a bizarre sight. Then it sank below the surface with a sinister sizzle. It created a small tidal wave which rushed forward, hit a long beach, sent up high a cloud of spray which settled.

  'Those are banknotes,' shouted Paula.

  She snatched up the binoculars she had focused on the house before Marler arrived. Above the crumbling side and rear walls of the house was a snowstorm. In her lenses she could see she was right. They were banknotes. Then a sheet of flame soared up, consumed the snowstorm. A strange large object was carried forward by the shockwave. She caught it in her binoculars. It was a huge section of a printing machine with a slab of concrete attached to its base. It dropped into the lake with a tremendous splash, sank instantly without trace. The flames, which had become an inferno had reached the nearest trees, setting them on fire.

  'The forest is burning,' cried out Paula..

  'Won't get far - not when they're saturated with snow,' Tweed remarked.

  Slowly the wall of flames became less ferocious, suddenly no more than a series of flickers. They could see now that the house had vanished, reduced to a pile of ashes. The crackle of the flames had been loud as the wood burned but now there was a deathly silence. It was as though the Psycho-like house had never existed.