"Nothing important," I said, "except about me. She blew my cover the minute I stepped ashore."
He said, "Hell, it wouldn't have hurt you. Caselius needed an American photographer badly, too badly to quibble about whether the guy packed a gun in his camera case. Anyway, he'd have seen through your corny disguise soon enough.
This way Sara got the credit for unmasking you."
"Swell," I said. "It did her a lot of good. And I don't recall anybody's consulting me."
He said impatiently, "I was pretty sure Caselius would go ahead and use you anyway. Well, he did, didn't he? He's the kind who'd actually be tickled at the thought of having an American agent do his photographing for him. He'd just take the precaution of running a few simple tests to see what kind of a guy he had to deal with, first having his boys knock you around a bit and then checking you out himself with cold steel. You assayed fairly high on stupidity, I understand. You even let him know you were pretty good with a knife, so he knew what to watch out for. He's a conceited little guy. It would give him a big kick to use and outsmart a man who'd been sent to kill him. I counted on that."
"I see."
Wellington grimaced. "What did you lose? We had to let Lundgren pass on some genuine information, didn't we? If he'd spotted you on his own, and she'd said nothing about you, he'd have wanted to know why. We wanted her to keep her standing with the little man, so that we could use her to slip him a false lead later, if things broke that way. Afterward, she'd have been quietly shipped back to the States and eased out of the service-nobody wants the publicity of a trial, in a case like that.
"She wasn't a bad chick, you know, jUst a little stuck-up, too good for us crude American boys. It was good for a laugh, if yo~ir sense of humor ran that way, when a real smoothie came along and played her for a sucker. It would have been punishment enough for her to be tossed out on her ear and have to spend the rest of her life remembering what a sap the little man had made of her. But you couldn't leave it at that, could you? You had to be judge, jury, and executioner. You spotted the double-cross and lowered the boom, just like that."
I said, startled, "Hell, I didn't kill her!"
He shrugged, unimpressed. "She went into the park to meet you. You came out, she didn't. You're the big dangerous man, aren't'you? Whether you killed her or just stood back and let them kill her doesn't much signify, does it? She was with you. You're the smart, tough bastard, sent out to fix things after all the rest of us poor fumbling dopes have failed. Are you going to tell me you couldn't have saved her if you'd wanted to, Superman?"
I started to speak and stopped. He was convinced. Nothing I could say was going to unconvince him. Maybe there had been a little more between him and Sara Lundgren than he'd indicated, to make him feel so strongly-or maybe he'd just have liked there to be. And after all, what he said was quite true. I'd gone to meet a woman in the park and left her there dead. It wasn't anything I could be proud of. It wasn't worth an argument. Anyway, we'd talked enough about Sara. There was another woman I was more interested in.
"Taylor?" he said when I asked. "Yes, sure she was working for me. Hell, you saw us together one night, didn't you?" I didn't say anything. I was still trying to rearrange my thinking around all this new information. He went on after a moment, "You made quite an impression on her. I guess you must be hell with women. She kept pleading with me to let her tell you what we were doing. That's why she insisted on meeting me outside here, to make her pitch again, although it was risky as hell. I told her to keep her mouth shut, but obviously she decided she knew best and went against my orders."
"What do you mean?"
He said scornfully, "Oh, come off it! She must have told you what was going on. Otherwise, how could you have known enough to cut the ground right out from under us with this lousy film trick?"
I said, "She didn't tell me anything."
He shook his head, dismissing this as not even worth comment. "Let me tell you, something, Helm," he said. "You may think you're going to hog Caselius and the credit for yourself, now that you've run us off the track, but you're forgetting one thing, aren't you, a little matter of orders? Sara tied a muzzle on you with that letter she wrote to Washington, didn't she? Caselius put her up to it, of course, but I didn't mind a bit. I'd asked for more time to trap him legally, co-operating with the local authorities, who didn't much like the idea of having a well-known foreign spy taking cover under a Swedish identity and Swedish citizenship. Washington wouldn't listen, until Sara wrote, as the resident agent on the spot, protesting the barbaric notion of sending a trained assassin into a friendly country, etc., etc. Then they got scared and decided to call you off and give me my chance. I was instructed-get this, Helm
– I was instructed to make use of your specialized talents only if, in my considered judgment, it was absolutely necessary for the success of our mission." He grinned wolfishly. "Guess what my considered judgment is, fella. You'll grow roots like a tree, waiting for action orders from me. We'll get Caselius some way, in spite of you and without you."
"We?" I said. "You and Lou Taylor?"
His expression changed slightly. "No, I was speaking editorially, I guess. As far as Taylor's concerned, I don't figure her chances are very good. But I couldn't very well stop her, under the circumstances."
"What do you mean?" I asked sharply.
"You heard Grankvist. She went off with Caselius, when they were released. I tried to talk her out of it, but she felt she had to do it, and you can see why."
"You can, maybe," I said. "Brief me."
He hesitated. Then he said, "Well, the whole scheme was pretty much her idea. She contacted our people in Berlin secretly, and they passed her on to me in Stockholm; I'd been assigned there to check up on Lundgren and take over her duties. My cover was good-Lundgren was still carrying the ball for us, as far as the other side knew- so Taylor and I just played it straight: the American businessman paying court to the pretty American widow. As far as Caselius knew, I was just another old friend of Hal's whose connections might come in handy. Of course, he knows better now. That's another strike against her, wherever she is. Anyway, whether or not he believes she double-crossed him, he knows she can't be of any more use to him, and he's not a little man to burden himself with excess baggage."
I said, "You're just a ray of sunshine, aren't you? If you can figure that out, so could she. And still she went with him?"
He shrugged. "Like I say, she felt she had to… She told us the whole thing, of course, starting with that damn gaudy article her husband wrote. It was pretty much a gag, you know. There was hardly a word of truth in it. Mister Taylor had just stumbled across the name somewhere. He'd picked up a lot of stray dope about intelligence and counter-inteffigence in his work. When a magazine offered him a nice fat check for a sensational article on the subject, he stuck his tongue in his cheek and started beating on his typewriter. Title: CASELIUS, THE Mi~ NoBODY KNOWS. Text: full of terrific facts that just didn't happen to be so. He didn't really consider it cheating, according to his wife. He just thought it was a hell of a good joke on everybody. He was that kind; he liked fooling people."
I said, "If all that's true, why was he killed?"
Wellington laughed, and walked' back to the big chair and sat down. He waved his stinking cigar at me. "Look at it from Caselius' standpoint, fella. That little man's no dope. Dozens of bright operatives on our side have been trying to trap him for years. They haven't succeeded, true, but gradually they've drawn a ring around him, if you know what I mean. They've driven him from one cover to the next; now he's compromised this Swedish disguise that I figure he was more or less keeping as a last resort. And then he reads this crap about himself: Caselius, the great hulking espionage genius with a Cossack beard and a laugh that shakes the Kremlin walls. His organization's described in detail, all wrong-"
"Lundgren seemed to think he had that fairly correct."
"Sara said what Caselius wanted her to say. When these proud, independent
females fall for a guy, they really fall. The article was way off the beam in practically every respect, take it from me. Caselius couldn't have asked for a more perfect red herring. All he had to do was call attention to the piece somehow, make it seem genuine.
"He's a great boy for direct action: he simply lured the author into an ambush and had him shot to pieces. That made it look as if Mister Taylor had really got hold of something, some genuine information, important enough that Caselius had to have him killed because he knew too much to live. So Hal Taylor became a martyr, and his crazy magazine piece became-in some circles, at least-the authoritative reference work on Caselius, the bearded giant, while Caselius himself went happily on his way, laughing up his sleeve, planning his next operation while he sold silly dresses to silly women in silly dress shops all over Europe-a cute little Swedish citizen not much more than five feet tall."
Wellington grimaced. "He's really a cocky little bastard. He even gave us a clue. Did you know that Caselius is simply a latinized version of Carisson? When a Carlsson comes into money and wants to get fancy, he calls himself Caselius in this country, just like at home a Smith might get notions to call himself Smythe."
It was getting pretty thick in the room from that cigar. I glanced toward the window, and changed my mind. I didn't figure there was much danger any more, if there ever had been. By now Lou would have let Caselius know he couldn't spare me quite yet. However, timing and communications are tricky in such matters, and there was no sense in taking unnecessary chances for a little fresh air.
Wellington was waiting for me to ask a question. I fed him his line. "I still don't quite see how Lou Taylor got into the act."
Wellington said, "Well, there was just one hitch in Caselius' plans, fella. It seems that the machine gunner at that road block wasn't quite as hot with his weapon as Caselius himself seems to be. When they got to the car, it was a shambles of course, blood all over the place, but underneath her husband's body Mrs. Taylor was still very much alive.
"And when they started hauling the body off her, they found that it wasn't quite dead, either. It was pretty badly shot up, but some guys are tough. Hal Taylor stubbornly insisted on keeping right on living. He's still over there, despite the urn of ashes and the neat little gravestone with his name on it, somewhere in France. Caselius is a thoughtful guy. He has somebody take a picture now and then for him to show to Mrs. Taylor, so she can see how her husband's coming along. Somehow, Hal Taylor's progress toward recovery seems to depend largely upon how well his wife does what Caselius asks her to. Does that clear things up for you, fella?" After a moment, he said, "I've got a couple of the pictures. Here."
He took them from his pocket. They were dog-eared snapshots, apparently taken with a cheap box camera with a flash attachment, fairly lousy in quality. One showed a bandaged man in a white hospital bed, nice and clean, with a starched nurse standing by, smiling prettily. The other showed the same man in the same bed, but the bed hadn't been made for a while and the dressings hadn't been changed and no other attention had been paid to the patient, who was alone and obviously incapable of looking after himself. The flat flash lighting had washed out gradation and detail; nevertheless, it wasn't what you'd call a pretty picture.
I gave the prints back. "If that's the best work Caselius can get done over there," I said, "it's no wonder he had to import a photographer from America."
Wellington said, "One's the kind of picture Taylor gets when she's co-operating nicely. If she balks, she starts getting the other kind. It worked for a while. She went along with Caselius, using her American citizenship and her husband's old contacts and sources for the little man's benefit. Then I guess she sat down and took stock of the situation and decided there was no future in it; and that maybe if she could nail Caselius for us we could do something about getting Hal Taylor back for her. So she came to us with her plan, which you've just finished shooting to hell. Now she's out there somewhere trying to persuade Caselius that she had nothing to do with it, that I fooled her as much as I did him, so he won't take it out on her husband, wherever he's lying helpless."
"You don't know where they went?" I asked.
He shook his head. "I wanted Grankvist to have them followed, but he wasn't sticking his neck out any further on my sayso. He'd had it, as far as I was concerned."
"You could have followed them yourself," I said. "Instead of coming over here and making with the fists."
He said, "Don't tell me what I could have done, fella. Have you got a drink around here somewhere? All this talking makes me dry."
I said, "You seem to know your way around my suitcase. Find it."
I went to the dresser and got my little plastic cup and my jar of powdered coffee and took them behind the bathroom curtain. I let the water run, waiting for it to turn hot, testing it from time to time with my finger. I thought of Lou Taylor in her tight black pants. I thought of Lou Taylor in her rusty skirt and swзater. I thought of Lou Taylor in her nice black dress, and stopped that line of thought. I heard the big guy in the other room take a couple of swigs out of my plastic flask. Well, the alcohol should kill any germs he might leave, but I still thought I'd wash it off later.
"God, you keep it stuffy in here," I heard him say.
I called back, "If you wouldn't smoke those ropes…" Then I stopped. He was moving to the window. I could have warned him, I suppose, but he was old enough to vote. He'd been in this business as long as I had. I didn't owe him a thing except a sore jaw and a couple of bruised ribs. To hell with him. I heard the window open. The shot came almost instantly. I walked into the room. There wasn't any hurry. The guy had either missed or he hadn't.
'When I came in, Wellington was standing at the open window, his back to me, his hands to his face. I've said they don't have screens, haven't I? There was nothing to stop him when he pitched forward. The last I saw of him was the soles of his shoes. They looked tremendous. He was a big man, all right. It seemed quite a while before he hit the ground, two stories below.
Chapter Twenty-five
As IIE'I) SAID himself, some guys are tough. When we got to him-Grankvist had left some men on the premises, and being downstairs, they beat me to it-he was breathing and gave promise of continuing to do so for a reasonable length of time, barring further accidents. He was even, after a few minutes, conscious and cursing. The doctor who arrived shortly diagnosed a broken arm, a broken collarbone, an undetermined number of broken ribs, and a neat furrow along the bone above the left eye, caused by a bullet. There seemed to be no serious damage to skull or eye. They took him away to the hospital.
I went back to my room and shaved. I was almost dressed when Grankvist arrived. I let him in, and finished tying my tie, watching him go to the window, look around, and discover for himself where the bullet had buried itself in the wall after glancing off Wellington's cranium.
He said, "You were in there, according to the report I have." He jerked his head toward the curtain.
I nodded. "I didn't shoot him."
"Obviously," Grankvist said. "As a matter of fact, we already have the would-be assassins. Their lorry-truck, I think you call it in America-broke down thirty kilometers east of town. The rifle was still in it. They were caught fleeing into the woods. We haven't yet determined which of the two fired the shot, but it's not a matter of great importance, except perhaps to the court that will try the case." He glanced at me. "You wouldn't want to hazard a guess as to why Herr Wellington should be shot?"
"No," I said, "but he's an hombre who'd naturally have lots of enemies-I mean, of course, because of his business."
Grankvist nodded thoughtfully, and glanced at the window again. "It was still quite dark, was it not? And the light of the room was behind him, and you are both tall men, although he is heavier. And it is your hotel room, not his."
I looked shocked. "Why, son, nobody'd shoot at me!"
"Maybe not," Grankvist said, "but I find it strange how you attract violence and death, Herr Helm. There was a l
ady in Stockholm, was there not? Had we not thought it essential to our plans that you should be free to proceed to Kiruna with your cameras, you would have been questioned quite thoroughly about that murder, I assure you, although there was some evidence to indicate that you were not responsible. The Stockholm police would like a statement, upon your return. Then there was the man found dead in your hired car, outside this very hotel. Now this unfortunate incident. Somehow I do not think Herr Wellington has been quite frank with me in the matter of your identity. I received a distinct impression of-shall we say?-professional jealousy."
I said without expression, "Naturally, I don't know what you're talking about, Herr Grankvist."
"Naturally," he said. "But please keep in mind, Herr Helm, that we Swedes feel very strongly about violence. We do not even allow our children to watch your American cowboy films. It is our belief that even known criminals and spies are entitled to a fair trial. To simply shoot them down, except in cases of dire necessity, is a travesty of law enforcement. I hope I make myself quite clear." He turned toward the door, and paused. "What is this?"
He'd picked up my flask from the top of my suitcase, where Wellington 'had left it. "Just a flask with whisky," I said. "It's not illegal, I hope."
"Oh, no," he said. "I was just interested. They make so many interesting things of plastic these days."
As soon as he'd gone I went to the suitcase. I didn't have to look very far; I found it stuck down among my clean, rolled socks, cold and hard to the touch: my little five-shot Smith and Wesson, still fully loaded. I frowned at it for a moment. Grankvist had been cryptic, to say the least. I didn't really know whether he was returning the gun for my protection-after what had happened to Wellington- and warning me sternly not to misuse it, or whether that fancy speech of his had been double-talk to cover up the fact that he was turning me loose with a loaded revolver and his blessing. It's always a little hard to interpret these characters who deal in abstract concepts like law and justice.
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