Hawaii Five-O - 2 - Terror in the Sun

by Michael Avallone

  ASSASSINS,

  INCORPORATED!

  THE ENGISHMAN: with his small, deadly and silent automatic.

  THE ITALIAN: with his neck-sized loop of finest Toledo steel.

  THE RUSSIAN: who can make a bomb out of a car, or a fountain pen.

  THE FRENCHMAN: with his treasured collection of surgical knives.

  THE GERMAN: his only weapon, a handful of tasteless, lethal pellets.

  THE UNDERTAKER: the man without a country. The deadliest assassin of all, whose hands can crush a coin—or a man—like a flower.

  THE TARGET: Hawaii Five-O Inspector Steve McGarrett, who has his own hands full protecting a Very Important Person and his Very Willing Daughter.

  IT WAS EVERY ASSASSIN FOR HIMSELF—

  Six of the world’s deadliest professional killers, each with his own technique and special tools.

  Five of them assassins with orders to work separately on a single assignment: Kill McGarrett!

  The sixth with an even more difficult assignment: Kill the man McGarrett is protecting!

  Hawaii Five-O

  —top-secret task force of undercover police on the world’s most exotic and dangerous beat—1600 miles of sun, sand and sudden death!

  Jack Lord and James McArthur star as Steve McGarrett and his side-kick Danny Williams on the exciting new CBS series, Hawaii Five-O

  Copyright © 1969 by Columbia Broadcasting System, Inc.

  All rights reserved

  SIGNET TRADEMARK REG. U.S. PAT. OFF. AND FOREIGN COUNTRIES

  REGISTERED TRADEMARK MARCA REGISTRADA

  HECHO EN CHICAGO, U.S.A.

  SIGNET BOOKS are published by

  The New American Library, Inc.,

  1301 Avenue of the Americas,

  New York, New York 10019

  First Printing, September, 1969

  PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  TERROR IN THE SUN

  AGAIN—FOR TOURISTS ONLY

  Hawaii is a land of enchantment and mystery, its people reflecting every nationality and origin. Visitors from East and West include tourists, fortune hunters, diplomats, businessmen, soldiers, students, socialites, gamblers and inevitably, criminals, ranging from petty thieves to asssassins.

  The fiftieth state (it entered the Union August 21, 1959) is composed of eight principal islands. Only five of these offer any interest to the average visitor. These are Hawaii, Maui, Oahu, Kauai and Molokai.

  Of the five, Oahu is by far the most omnipotent and absorbing, for Honolulu is there, as is almost three quarters of the entire population of the Hawaiian Islands. Oahu is the central point of all things Hawaiian. Ships and planes from the mainland touch there. Oahu is the hub of Hawaii which is why the Japanese elected to attack Pearl Harbor in 1941.

  To maintain law and order in this island complex of 1600 miles, a special kind of police force is needed, over and above the formal units of enforcement. That force is Hawaii Five-O, a highly mobile investigative organization ever alert to move into action when cases demand secrecy, discretion and special training.

  Hawaii Five-O is stationed on the island of Oahu, in the modern city of Honolulu, in stylish offices within the hallowed walls of legendary, historic Iolani Palace where island kings once sat and ruled the North Pacific cosmos.

  Oahu is so important to any scheme of Hawaii that all the other islands in the watery chain are referred to as the “neighbor islands.” It takes an eighty-mile circle-tour by automobile to see Oahu with its mountains, palm forests, native villages, sugar and pineapple plantations. And volcanoes.

  For the men and officers of Hawaii Five-O, it is the most exotic, most beautiful, most deadly “beat” in the civilized world. Bar none.

  Steve McGarrett is the head of Hawaii Five-O.

  His assistants are Danny Williams, Chin Ho Kelly and Kono. His secretary is a girl named May.

  Four people on the side of the angels.

  On the side of Hawaii.

  The state motto is: Ua Mau ke Ea o ka Aina i ka Pono.

  It means, “The life of the island is perpetuated in righteousness.”

  1. SIX KILLERS—NO WAITING

  “How shall we kill the man McGarrett?”

  The sudden question was low, evenly delivered, with barely a rise of inflection or a permit to argue the point. The speaker was a tall, thin cadaverous man of amazingly undernourished proportions. A funereal aspect that not even an Italian silk suit of brilliant gray hues, oxford shoes of shining black and white and a thick blue tie with orange stripes, could triumph over. A neon sign on a human scarecrow.

  His listeners, five men in all, lounged and sat, filling the sumptuous furnishings of the second largest hotel suite in the up-to-date confines of the Kahala Hilton. Bright oaken paneling, beige drapes and wall-to-wall carpeting of the richest, deepest maroon hues, lent the suite the general impact of great wealth, great comfort—and great plans.

  None of the tall thin man’s audience saw fit to render an immediate answer to the loaded question. It could have been a rhetorical query yet each man present in the room knew it was not. The single simple fact that Benjamin Bygraves had ordered their presence in Honolulu—no, demanded it, was sufficient reason for all. In truth, when a grown man’s chosen profession is that of assassin-for-hire, what better man was there to listen to than Benjamin Bygraves? He wasn’t known as The Undertaker for nothing. A steady wake of corpses had littered the trail he had left behind him since Delhi in India when he had killed a Hindu’s unfaithful wife by drowning her in the Ganges. That had been as far back as ’46 but Benjamin Bygraves had left India with a fortune in rupees and a reputation that only loomed larger as a world in upheaval staggered on toward the twenty-first century. The Cold War, Fascist Spain, Korea, Castro-Cuba and Red China had led to a death toll beyond actual count. And recording. Nobody knew how many men, women and children Benjamin Bygraves had murdered all in the name of money. And the finer things in life. He had no political convictions, no active faiths, which is perhaps why he was the perfect assassin.

  Bellini of Italy stirred in his chair. A dainty, almost elfin man with all of the characteristic swarthiness and bravado of his origins. But his face was oddly angelic and many women would have found him so easy to talk to. Now, a thin white Turkish cigarette poked from his full, sensuous mouth. When he spoke, his voice was musical and high.

  “All right, Undertaker. McGarrett.” Bellini’s fine nostrils flared. “You’ve done so many jobs yourself, all of a sudden you need a mob like this? Give, man. Don’t hide anything. I appreciate the plane fare from Rome but I don’t need Hawaiian sunlight. You have to tell some more. You guys go along with me on that?” He craned his darkly handsome head to take in the other five men in the room. Most of them coughed or moved restlessly. A round of drinks had preceded Benjamin Bygraves’ suddenly startling opening question.

  “Yes,” murmured Tornier of the Paris underworld. “I too wonder about that. I should like to hear more.” He was as off cliché as Bellini was. He was broad, angular, with the face of a peasant for all of his Mod suit and turtleneck shirt. His face was lumpy, with brows that met in a sharp eternal V. His hands were ridged with calloused knuckles and red, gristly hair. You would have thought him more at home at the throttle of a French locomotive rather than with the knives, daggers, and slim shining instruments of murder which constituted his real-life expertise.

  Benjamin Bygraves, following Bellini’s demand of his audience, looked at Mark Tillingham. The Briton, lean and weathered in justly jaunty Carnaby Street clothes, passed a slim pale hand across his brow and tilted his head. He managed a wry smile, something that made his totally hairless face and head see
m as ruddy as a music hall song and dance man.

  “Smashing, Bellini. Hear, hear. You do owe us some explanation, Bygraves. Target, conditions, payment. The lot.”

  “Jawohl,” Von Litz of Berlin rumbled throatily, slugging down his blend of papaya juice and vodka. “Why this need for all five of us? Six, if we include you, my dear Bygraves.” His Teutonic skull glistened. Twinkling eyes, broad brow, close-cropped gray hair on a head that had known many helmets as a professional soldier. “One might think you had rounded us all up, here in Hawaii, to turn us over to the authorities. CIA, Interpol—who knows? A fait accompli?”

  Bygraves, lantern-jawed face inscrutable, rested his eyes on the last of Bellini’s responders. Dorkin of the U.S.S.R. Here again, which is perhaps why these assassins had known so much success, Igor Dorkin was none of the things you would expect of a Russian assassin. He was very American looking. Bland, unwrinkled, sandy-haired, with regular pleasant features and a smile that invited confidences. Dorkin looked about as Joe College as they make them. He was the youngest man in the room but already, at thirty-five, he had racked up an astounding total of kills. Seventeen, definite, two probables and one possible. His virtuosity lay with the fact that he could make a homemade bomb out of very nearly anything he could find in the common kitchen.

  Dorkin shrugged, at ease, placid and thoroughly amiable. Yet his blue eyes were riveted on the face of the man they all knew as Benjamin Bygraves. Very little in life disturbed Igor Dorkin.

  “I’m willing to wait to hear what The Undertaker has to say. He’s major league all the way. We know they can’t come any bigger. Relax, Bellini. This must be a pretty big pot for a big six like us to be rung in on the deal.”

  Bellini took the measure of that and swung back to Bygraves.

  “All right,” his musical voice said softly. “Open up. If it’s a closed game now, let’s begin. No Dealer’s Choice, Undertaker. Make it millions or better. It’s that or you can have my arrivederci right now.”

  Quickly, a growing chorus of approval broke around the fashionable suite. Bygraves barely nodded, his eyes slitted and unreadable, as he rested his angular lanky figure against one corner of the large table set in the background of the room. The wide windows behind him, flanked by the beige drapes, glowingly advertised Hawaii’s liquid sunshine, golden orange flooding the glass. Jet planes in flight boomed high above the Kahala Hilton, great aeronautical shadows racing across the surrounding sands of Waikiki Beach. The daily flights of Boeing 707’s, DC-8’s and Astrojets had become as commonplace in the skies above Oahu as the Nene, the picturesque goose which dominated so much of the island’s acreage and which cackled and bobbed its way into being recognized as the state bird of Hawaii. Bygraves waited for the propelled fury of the jets to subside. Once more, he regarded the room at large. His tall nearly ludicrous figure might have been funny were it not for the reputation that went with it. That and the nearly uncanny deadly calm of the man.

  “I shall do most of the talking from this point on,” he resumed in his flat even voice. “There isn’t any time for harangues or personal reminiscences. Nor is there room for argument. I will talk and you will listen. You may interrupt only to ask questions that deal directly with the target and the conditions of the assignment. For assignment it is. For myself, I would like to get off this sunburned island tonight. I have never cared for the fragrance of flowers. Since the local Chamber of Commerce and the tourist people insist on welcoming all newcomers with the traditional lei looped about their unsuspecting throats, I have been unable to rid my nostrils of the scent of roses and lilies and all the rest of it. I assure you we are not here to smell the pretty flowers.”

  Bellini smiled tightly, Tornier refused to grin, Mark Tillingham tittered, Von Litz grunted and Igor Dorkin chuckled softly. Benjamin Bygraves resumed. He might have been addressing a student body on the rules and regulations pertaining to No Smoking in the school building proper.

  “McGarrett of Five-O is the target. He is to be liquidated without delay. The proposal reached me in Paris. The peace talks had made my presence there salutary. It seemed a ripe ground for interested contractors. Nothing came forth, however, until a coded message from Saigon and an offer of one million dollars, payable on a bank in Switzerland, sent me here. The message also relayed to me the importance of removing a certain party from this life, while also suggesting that I bring you additional experts onto the scene. It will be fractional arithmetic, of course, but the six of us should each come out of this with something in the neighborhood of one hundred and sixty-seven thousand dollars. Each of us will be given a key to a safety deposit box in Switzerland that contains that amount of money. I have those keys now but needless to say I cannot dole them out until we have succeeded in our assignment. Any questions thus far?”

  Bellini looked at the end of his dangerously-shortened Turkish cigarette. “Who’s going to argue a price like that? Best I ever did was fifty thousand for a retired oilman in—” He broke off, grinning slyly. “You’re right. No Memory Lane stuff. Okay. Who’s this McGarrett?”

  Benjamin Bygraves’ expression altered ever so subtly. An almost zealot’s glow came into his eyes.

  “Most of you are continentally orientated like myself. I have been investigating Mr. McGarrett’s dossier while I waited for you to come. This is a man for whom we should have the greatest respect—and, let me add, handle accordingly. He is the head of Hawaii Five-O, a special police force with carte blanche on this island, thanks to McGarrett’s penchant for always being able to talk things over with the Governor of this state. His record to date is nothing short of incredible. He is a grim man who does not smile too often and is equally at home with the ideal that crime is a sin, a mortal abomination which he has devoted his life to removing. I will give each of you his picture, physical description, tastes, proclivities, quirks—all that you’ll ever need. But let me say also—and I cannot overstate the case—do not think of this man as the garden variety police official out to pile up a good track record or one who is out for glory and medals. He is a machine of efficiency. The record speaks for him. He gets things done and he and this Governor have already managed to sandbag quite a few ambitious undertakings in this backyard of theirs. Do I make myself clear? If he had thought of a life of crime, I firmly believe he would have made a name for himself. Perhaps, the rival and yet even the superior of mine. I am afraid of McGarrett.”

  Von Litz snorted. “He’s only a man. Flesh, blood and bones. He will bleed and break and come apart as anyone else will.”

  Mark Tillingham frowned, studying Bygraves. “Hold on a bit. Dear Mr. Bygraves—I detect in all this—a joker somewhere. Something you said a while back. You mentioned a certain party—” Tillingham looked almost self-consciously around the room at the gathering. “This is a bit thick, you know. Six of us. Experts. Don’t you see? As good as the Undertaker says this McGarrett blighter is, why six of us to stop one more policeman? A local fellow, too. I should think—” and here another crooked smile crossed the Briton’s face as his eyes swung back to Benjamin Bygraves “—that removing McGarrett is necessary diversion tactics for the main attraction. Bygraves has to put the bump on somebody else, obviously, and he doesn’t want McGarrett fouling up the lawn party. Meanwhile, all five of us will be keeping McGarrett busy dodging whatever we throw at him. If he lives long enough to dodge, that is.”

  “Sonofabitch,” Bellini said in a soft curse. “I think you just might have hit it on the nose, Limey.”

  Tillingham shrugged. “Let’s hear from Bygraves.”

  “What does it matter?” Von Litz rumbled. “Has it ever mattered? We do the job, we take the money. I don’t care what the reasons are.”

  Igor Dorkin nodded. “Ditto for me. So we’ll take care of McGarrett. No questions asked. However, I am curious. I don’t like to resemble the ostrich too much. My rear end is important to me. I wouldn’t want any backwash to catch up with me when I clear out of here. Talk, Undertaker. Who are you going to
hit?”

  “Yes,” Tornier agreed. “It would do no harm for us to know. Will you tell us or are you sworn to secrecy?”

  Incredibly, another jet thundered overhead, high above the clouds. Benjamin Bygraves folded his arms. His gaunt face and bony brow were unfurrowed. He almost smiled. But it was an illusion.

  The same sort of fanciful impression left by a stark skull leering from a peg in an anatomy class.

  “Yes, Tillingham,” Bygraves intoned levelly. “You’ve caught the point. I have someone else to take care of. I can’t afford to miss my target. I can’t afford to have McGarrett in my way. Since the target is right here in Honolulu, right here in this hotel, I am stalking the prey right under McGarrett’s efficient nose. Why five men to take care of one? I’ll tell you that too. The man is surrounded by three highly skilled police officers who are as familiar to him as the fingers of his hands. I shall give you their pictures too. There is his younger partner. Named Danny Williams. And two Hawaiian born detectives named Kono and Chin Ho Kelly. But more of them later. Do you understand now the purpose in all this? For a million dollars and the good opinion of our nameless employer in Saigon, the success of this venture will have to become our raison d’être, as it were. Should we miss McGarrett and the target I must account for, we may as well all pack up our bags and leave the profession forever. To quote an ancient appropriate maxim: what have you done for me lately?”

  Silence filled the room. Bygraves knew the assassins breed. He let them think, let them ponder, let them carefully digest any and all reservations they might have. The Undertaker waited a full two minutes then briskly called a roll.

  “Bellini?”

  “I’m in.” The Italian had reached for a second cigarette.

  “Tillingham?”

  “Roger.”

  “Tornier?”

  “Yes. Certainly.”