Johnny Goes West

by Desmond Cory

  A BLOATED CORPSE WITH NO FACE AT ALL

  . . .recognized only by his cheap white suit, chalked up as suicide. In that steaming, sweltering Venezuelan jungle village, no one mourned the sudden death of Robert West.

  Not his wife, a pitiful shell consumed by alcohol and drugs . . . not his mistress, still bearing the scars of his hideous beatings and insatiable lust . . . not his partner, a smiling sadist with no feelings in his scrawny body.

  Only the British Government felt the loss. For Robert West had held the key to the deadliest weapon man had ever devised.

  That’s where Johnny Fedora came in— Fedora, the spy with the killer instinct. A tough man in the dirty, dangerous business of espionage.

  Now British Intelligence ordered Johnny into the treacherous Venezuelan jungle. To get information from a man too dead to talk, and help from a woman too dangerous to be left alive . . .

  “Muscular style, explosive action, authentic toughness. . . a true thriller.”

  —Buffalo Evening News

  MEET THE MOST SAVAGELY EXCITING SECRET AGENT SINCE NICK CARTER AND JAMES BOND!

  “Johnny Fedora is cool and ruthlessly efficient!”

  —Personal Book Guide

  “Johnny Fedora, assassin, brings a steely touch to cloak-and-daggering!”

  —Buffalo Evening News

  “Lots of violence and sex . . . good action, fast reading.”

  —Springfield Daily

  JOHNNY FEDORA! NERVELESS, AMORAL, BLASTING INTO ACTION IN A NEW BRITISH ESPIONAGE SERIES!

  Copyright © MCMLVIII by Desmond Cory.

  All rights reserved.

  All the characters and events portrayed in this

  story are fictitious.

  Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 67-13223

  First published in the United States of America

  in 1967 by Walker and Company, a division of

  Publications Development Corporation.

  First Award printing 1968

  AWARD BOOKS are published by

  Universal Publishing and Distributing Corporation

  235 East Forty-fifth Street, New York, N.Y. 10017

  TANDEM BOOKS are published by

  Universal-Tandem Publishing Company Ltd.

  33 Beauchamp Place, London SW3, England

  Manufactured in the United States of America

  Chapter One

  “WHAT this place needs,” said Fedora, ducking.

  The bullet passed some six feet over his head and whacked into the wall behind him, showering his hair with greenish-yellow plaster. “. . . Is a little law and order.” He peered cautiously around the corner of the up-ended table. “An absolute disgrace, I call it.”

  The big fat man in the floppy sombrero raised his heavy revolver and fired again, this time through the window; the bullet would most certainly have smashed the glass to smithereens had there been any glass there for it to break. As it was, it made a most satisfying racket ricochetting off a corrugated-iron roof; and the big man uttered a cry of hoarse delight, not unlike the mating-call of a spoonbill. Then someone who had been creeping up behind him brought a chair forcibly down on top of the sombrero, and the big man sank down to the floor; quite contentedly, as though this were a development he had been anticipating with some degree of pleasure. People began to rise from the unseemly postures into which they had thrown themselves: the owner of the bar emerged from beneath the counter, his hair dripping with the beer that the big man had seen fit to hurl into his face, like Anadomyene rising from the foam with a fresh line in South American vituperations; and Fedora pushed himself upright with a thrust of his springy leg muscles, righting the table as he did so. “Well done, that man,” he said.

  In the corner, a confused tangle of arms and legs and popping eyes began to de-bundle itself in a haphazard sort of way and to resolve itself into its component elements, viz. Sebastian Trout, as virile and sun-tanned as ever, and a middle-aged mining engineer whose name was Hendricks. Since this latter half of the tableau vivant had been nearly winded by the violent impact of Trout’s fourteen-odd stone on his midriff, it was left to Trout himself to make the appropriate commentary on the situation; and this he was not slow to do. He expressed himself with an admirable pungency and terseness, developing his theme to fresh heights when he observed, for the first time, exactly what he had just been compelled to sit in. Fedora blushed prettily.

  “What bad luck,” he said. ‘Just when we were getting used to the way you smelt before.”

  Trout flipped up a chair in one enormous mitt and seated himself rumbustiously upon it, glowering furiously the while at the author of his woes; who still lay on the floor, sleeping peacefully in the shade of his badly-dented hat. “Damned if it’s decent,” he said. “I’m damned if it is.”

  The bar was now resonant with singsong Venezuelan voices, excitedly discussing the curious occurence; the consensus of opinion seemed to be substantially on Trout’s side, but nobody seemed to be especially surprised or, with the possible exception of the owner of the bar, annoyed. There was a general movement towards the counter to replenish upset glasses, and this before long had an alleviating effect on the owner’s spirits; he acknowledged Trout’s wave of the hand with a beaming smile, and sent the ill-kempt urchin at his side—who served him as general waiter and glass-washer but mainly (as was evident) in the Former capacity—across to their table with a loaded bottle. “¿Qu’es lo que pasa?” asked Trout, watching warily as the urchin replaced the metal mugs on the table and refilled them: the urchin shrugged himself from the waist-line up, grinned, shook his head. “Does this sort of thing go on all the time here?”

  “No, no, señor. This is a quiet village, this is. From time to time one drinks a little too much—you know how it is.”

  “Not enough of this blasted stuff is a little too much,” said Trout, who was still feeling ruffled. He picked up his mug and squinted at it vindictively. The owner of the bar, having coped with the brief surge in his business, ducked out from under the counter and scurried across to their table, dismissing the ill-kempt urchin with a gentle swipe behind the ear.

  “We regret the incident, expertise. We regret the incident. We only hope the caballeros were not unduly alarmed.”

  “Look at my trousers,” said Trout, rising to display to the fullest advantage his imposing rear elevation. “It’s not respectable—that’s what it isn’t.”

  The owner clicked his tongue, raised his eyebrows, and turned his hands palm upwards, by these means contriving not to laugh. “These people here are pigs, señor. It has to be said. They are pigs. They have no idea of how to comport themselves. Fortunately, these incidents are rare. Bojollo is a quiet village.” He raised one hand as though to dust Trout’s jacket, then changed his mind. “Of course, it is most regrettable. Most regrettable.”

  “Why don’t you throw that guy out?” said Hendricks, who had now recovered sufficiently to make his first contribution to the conversation. “And take away that gun of his? He’s no more fit to own a gun than a baby is.”

  “Of course. At once. We shall throw him out at once, if the expertise wish it.” The owner looked slightly unhappy, though, at this suggestion; his formidable moustaches took on a downwards droop. “But we cannot take away his gun. That would be a serious offence.”

  “What d’you mean,” said Trout, “an offence?”

  “Why—because that is the local Chief of Police.”

  “I see,” said Trout. “Yes, that makes things difficult.”

  “An excellent fellow, in spite of all, who knows when he has done wrong. That’s not to say that tomorrow I should care to be in the shoes of the fellow who hit him on the head.’ However,” said the owner, dry-washing his hands with notable ex
pertise, “the expertise should not go away with a bad impression of our little pueblo. Bojollo is a quiet village. The people here are very good fellows, though perhaps—as you rightly point out—uncultivated. But that is only to be expected. Here there are none of the amenities of a large town, such as London or N’Yorrrrk or Los Cielos.”

  Neither Trout nor Fedora made any comment on this last observation. In every town and village that they had passed in the last five days, the local inhabitants—to a man-had been aware that the destination of the three foreign caballeros was Los Cielos (pop. 13,000), though by what strange system of bush telegraphy the information was being passed along it would have been hard to fathom. “Ah, well,” said Trout. “To hell with it. Let’s all have another drink before we get out of here. Join us.”

  “Most gracious,” said the owner unctuously. “The drink is to your liking, we trust?”

  “Never tasted anything like it,” said Trout. “What is it?”

  “It is veesky,” said the owner proudly. “I thought it must be something like that.” The mysteriously-concocted veesky glinted palely in the light of the oil lamp as it flowed from the mouth of the tilted bottle; Fedora, who had been sitting quietly with his knees under the table picking pieces of plaster out of his hair, came back to life and reached out for his mug. The liquid within it gave off curious and not-quite-recognisable fumes, vaguely reminiscent of low-grade benzole; Fedora savoured the aroma, then threw back his head and gulped. “Much petrol in these parts?” he hazarded.

  “¿Petroleo? Ah, no. No, señor. Bojollo is a quiet—”

  “Funny,” said Fedora, risking another swig. “I don’t see what else. . . However.”

  The owner glanced back over his shoulder and, satisfied that the ill-kempt urchin was dealing with the wants of other and less important clients, drew up a chair to the table; his manner suggested that he was taking a long-awaited opportunity for a heart-to-heart chat with kindred spirits. “The expertise are no doubt mining experts? Yes? Well, there’s nothing of that sort here. Here we grow bananas. Bojollo is famous the world over for its fine bananas. But Los Cielos—ja es otra cosa. Los Cielos is a rich town.” And the fall of his tone conveyed, as though by magic, the impression of a city steeped in vice and corruption, of a population to whom the sins of Babylon and Gomorrah were the merest commonplaces of everyday existence. “Plenty of money there. And fine women. Oh, very fine women with magnificent breasts. Yes, you’ll see, the expertise will see for themselves. And the Galdos combine, why, that’s one of the biggest concerns in the country. The expertise will of course be working for the Galdos combine?”

  Trout, to whom the question was directly addressed, smiled a secretive little smile and brushed at the corners of.a totally imaginary moustache. “Unfortunately,” he said, “the exact nature of our employment—”

  “Entendido” said the owner hurriedly. “Claro, claro, claro. One appreciates the necessity for. . . And business secrets, of course, must be respected. . . Nevertheless,” and his eyes grew filmy, “and as between men of the world. . . Another lode, eh? More diamonds?”

  “That remains to be seen,” said Trout.

  “Quite. But I remember the last time Sr. Galdos called in a foreign consultant—a Norteamericano, if I remember rightly—that was for the new shaft, the Dona Elvira. . . Of course, that was twelve years back. Still, one draws one’s own conclusions. Inevitably.”

  “Inevitably. But isn’t there another foreign consultant working for Sr. Galdos at the moment?”

  “Please?” The owner surveyed Trout interestedly, his little finger hooked elegantly through the twisted handle of the mug.

  “His name,” said Trout, “I think is West.”

  “West? Ah?” The owner sat rather still for a moment, reflecting; then lifted the mug and drained its contents at a single gulp. “Yes, to be sure. . . Sr. West. . . ” His chair scraped back on the bare floorboards. “The expertise will excuse me. I must get back to my duties.” His fingers rested for a second on the table-top, flicked a fragment of cigar-ash from it surface and then withdrew. “West. . . No, I don’t think I’ve ever heard that name. . . ”

  Shaking his head over-elaborately, he moved away towards the bead curtain that hung in one corner of the room; passed through it, leaving the long strings swaying behind him as though to the pressure of a breeze. But there wasn’t any breeze. Trout watched the curtain until it had steathed itself into immobility once more, then picked up his mug and emptied it, as had the owner, at a gulp. His throat accepted everything short of hydrochloric acid; Fedora and Hendricks, whose gullets were made of less adamantine material, made no attempt to emulate him. They went on sitting there; Hendricks tilting his chair back on to its hind legs, Fedora with his hands poised on the edge of the table as though once again about to throw it sideways and fling himself down behind it. All the same, he was relaxed; altogether relaxed.

  Trout, after a while, made a little growling noise that seemed to come from the depths of his chest. “I suppose we’d better be getting on,” he said.

  Hendricks nodded. Fedora didn’t move. The oil lamp flickered gently in its niche on the plaster-coated wall; at one of the tables on the far side of the room, a small group of tough-looking characters had begun a game of cards. The murmur of their voices was wafted through the smoke-laden air as though it were scent rather than sound; somebody rasped and spat with a noise like tearing canvas, and the boy behind the bar counter began to pick his teeth with a splinter “Let’s go,” said Trout.

  They paid for the drinks and left, stepping over the prostrate’ figure that still lay blissfully sprawled in the doorway; the Chief of Police was now snoring, but gently, entirely to himself. Outside, the main and only street of Bojollo, the quiet village, ran swiftly downhill through dark and shadowy roofs of plaited palm; an occasional lighted window punctuated with a pale glow its path towards infinity. The hard-trampled soil outside the bar entrance gritted slightly underfoot; Fedora was conscious of an unpleasant taste at the back of his mouth like brass, and of the heat drifting down like something tangible from the depths of the night. There was a faint sound somewhere of water trickling. Trout lifted his head and belched musically to the watching stars.

  “Fine women in Los Cielos, the feller said. What are we waiting for?”

  “We won’t get there tonight,” said Hendricks.

  “No. Not even halfway. But we ought to make it by noon tomorrow—barring breakdowns.”

  They walked over to where the Land Rover stood, its wheels already sunk half an inch or more of its own weight into the yielding earth. A cigarette-end glowed beside it, then another; a shrill voice suddenly called out something, and the group of children squatting around the car—nine or ten of them— darted back into the shadows, fleeing before Trout’s advance like frightened little fishes. Trout unlocked the door and scrambled into the driving seat; Fedora sat down beside him and Hendricks, as usual, wriggled his way to the rear. The engine started up with art abrupt, coughing roar that set a dog to barking somewhere in the village; the headlights flicked on? slashing a path of silver down the narrow street and casting into obscurity the vague, dim lights of the crouching houses. Trout revved the engine, once or twice and then let the car roll forward. Clods of loose earth whacked against the mudguards as it gathered speed; the light of the headlamps seemed to vibrate in waves before it, as though distorted by the throbbing of the motor. Fedora pushed a cigarette between his lips and lit it; then sat back in the plastic-upholstered seat, breathing out a thin grey trailer of smoke. His head was aching, though not too much. Not yet.

  “Nobody wants to talk,” he said. “Nobody’s talking at all.”

  Trout confirmed the truth of this observation by driving on for a while in silence. Bojollo and its world-famous banana clumps fell back behind them; the Land Rover mastered the shallow ford at the dip in the road and began to pant its way upwards through the foothills that held the village prisoner at their feet. The road was frankly in
famous, but no worse than the other roads they had been travelling for the past three days. Trout’s concentration, all the same, seemed to be irrevocably fixed on its contours; not until five minutes had passed did he say anything, and even then his remark did not seem to follow upon what Fedora had said. “We’ve got a nice stiff climb ahead,” he grunted. “Los Cielos must be all of a thousand metres above sea level. Won’t be so bloody hot there, that’s one thing.”

  “That’s if it’s where the map says it is.”

  “I’ll tell you,” said Trout, “what we ought to do before we get there.”

  “What?”

  Trout leaned forward to tap at a small metal plate that had been screwed into place above the Land Rover’s dashboard. “Get rid of this,” he said.

  Johnny glanced at it briefly. In itself, it was in-obtrusive; the letters upon it were so small that, had he not known exactly what they spelt, he would have had to lean forward to read it. But of course, he knew perfectly well: it said,

  EMERALD INVESTIGATIONS AND EXPLORATIONS CO. LTD.

  LONDON.

  “That won’t have anything to do with it,” he said.

  “With what?”

  “With nobody talking.”

  “No?”

  “No, how could it have? None of these boys round here can read. And if they could, ..they’d never have heard of E.I.E. in their lives.”

  “Maybe not,” said Trout, twisting the car adroitly round a boulder that lay in the middle of the track. “No, probably not. But it may be different with the Galdos combine. Why take any chances, anyway?”

  Fedora’s assumption, though, had been reasonable enough. Very few people indeed had ever heard of E.I.E.; even in London, where it had its unostentatious headquarters, and much less in the heart of Venezuela. But in another sense, it was well-known; it was known to just those people who were most likely to wish to engage its services. Its headed note-paper gave the names of the Board of Directors . . . Lt.-Col. J. G. Emerald, M.C., D.S.O.; Sebastian Trout, O.B.E.; S. O’N. Fedora. . . but the original idea had been entirely Jimmy Emerald’s, and he deserved such credit for it as the world might be willing to hand out. Whether he also deserved to spend the whole time moving comfortably between New York, London, Rome and Paris—usually in the organisation’s private aeroplane—was occasionally a point of discussion between the two members of the Executive Branch, especially when they found themselves employed on just such an uncomfortable and unrewarding mission as occupied their attention at the present moment. Their only consolation, really, was the obvious fact that they could take over Emerald’s role even less happily then he theirs, whereas the present distribution of forces made for a three-way partnership as perfect as that of knife, fork and spoon. And if the spoon gets to handle most of the sweets, it often finds itself in the soup, as well.