The Handle

by Donald E. Westlake

  “We go out there every night.”

  “You know what I mean, Grofield.”

  Grofield was suddenly bored. He shook his head. “Parker's doing some of the groundwork,” he said. “I don't know where he is because it doesn't matter where he is. When he's got things set he'll get in touch with me, and a few days after that we'll do the job.”

  “Why did Parker lose our men?”

  “No, no, it's the other way around. You want to know why your men lost Parker.”

  “Parker deliberately shook them.”

  “Maybe for fun, the same as me this afternoon. I shook two of them, and I could have got rid of the third one too.”

  The third one was one of the two Feds standing over by the door. He cleared his throat and said, “Don't be so sure of yourself, you.”

  Grofield smiled at Hopalong Cassidy. “Shall we have a dry run? Use all the men you want, in one hour I'll be clear. Little side bet to add spice?”

  Hopalong shook his head. “I don't understand you people” he said. “You don't make sense. You do this, you do that, but nothing happens.”

  “We're subjects of the red queen,” Grofield told him, knowing he wouldn't get it and not giving a damn.

  Hopalong waved a hand as though he were tired of Grofield, disgusted with Grofield, uninterested in Grofield. “Go on,” he said. “Go on about your business.”

  “Bless you.” Grofield, smiling, got to his feet. To the two at the door he said, “Come along, chums. We have unfinished business in a lady's apartment.”

  2

  Baron Wolfgang Friedrich Kastelbern von Altstein lay on his back on a maroon carpet and raised his bare right leg perpendicular to the floor. He lowered it again and raised the left leg. Then the right leg. Then the left leg. Across the way, Steuber sat morose in a red-upholstered Victorian chair, his watch in one hand and an exercise book in the other. He counted aloud as Baron — he called himself, these days, Wolfgang Baron — raised each leg, and when he reached thirty Baron rolled over on his face and started doing push-ups.

  Steuber looked at his watch. “Forty-five seconds ahead,” he said.

  Baron grunted and kept on with the push-ups.

  He was fifty-seven years old now, but no one would guess he was much over forty. He kept himself in good physical and mental shape at all times. Doing push-ups now, dressed in white T-shirt and black bathing trunks, he looked the picture of health, a man with thirty or forty years of life left in him.

  His life had started, in Kiel, Germany, just a few years before the First World War. His father, the fourth Baron, was at that time a major in the German army, a Prussian career officer like his own father and his father's father. By the time the war had nearly run its course he was a general, and then just a few months later he was a civilian. By 1920, bewildered by a world that seemed to have no use for any of his barbaric arts, he was dead in his own bed and his son Wolfgang had inherited his title, his old uniforms, and his debts.

  Baron grew up in a Germany of chaos. He was too young to be part of the Freikorps, battling the undeclared war on the Polish frontier in the early twenties, but he turned eighteen and graduated from the gymnasium just in time to be swept into the maw of National Socialism, the new movement that was already being called by the slang word Nazi. He was living in Danzig then, with an uncle on his mother's side, and every Sunday he could be found in the big park wearing his brown uniform, singing the marching songs, and listening to the speeches.

  The SA was a good place for a young man in the late twenties. Comradeship, good drinking parties, singing and marching, carousing, truck rides in the country, now and then a good brawl with the Poles or with some other political bunch. Baron was pleased to be in the SA, and the SA was just as pleased to have him; some day he might prove useful, what with his hereditary army connections. The army at that time had not yet been brought within the Nazi sphere.

  After Hitler's takeover and the capitulation of the army, it was suggested to Baron that he leave the SA and accept an army commission, but he was still youthful at heart and preferred to stay with the crowd he knew. It was only with the murder of Roehm and the near-downfall of the SA organization completely that he decided to move on, and then it was not to the army that he went but to the SS. The army had killed his father by becoming all-important to him and then deserting him. The army would have no such chance with the son.

  The war, when it arrived, matured Baron and taught him things about himself he'd never guessed were there. He was already in his thirties, but still acted like a college kid on a spree, until the war came along.

  The first thing he learned about himself was that he was afraid to die. Men could fight for the Fatherland anywhere in the world they wanted, but they'd fight without Baron. It wasn't patriotism that had stirred him at the rallies all these years but merely pageantry, and it wasn't the Fatherland that had lifted his heart but merely the Fatherland's beer.

  The second thing he learned about himself was that he was a natural opportunist, with innate skill and native balance. In a world gone mad, self-interest approaches the level of a sacrament, so it was with a will that Baron launched himself into his new-found vocation: Looking Out for Number One. (He had a little joke in those days, used only when among his closest and dearest friends. “I hate to be chauvinistic, but…” and then finish the sentence with something viciously anti-Nazi or anti-Hitler or anti-Germany or possibly just pro-Baron.)

  His activities during the war were varied, lucrative, and extremely safe. He entered France well behind the combat troops — three months behind — and became one of the overseers in the plunder of French art treasures, most of which was shipped to Germany but some of which Baron siphoned away for his own use at another time when the world should roll over once again. Later he was an administrative part of the famous scheme to flood Great Britain with bogus pound notes, and a few cartons of the counterfeits very quietly disappeared to a cache that only Baron knew.

  Although almost everything he engaged in during the Second World War was a crime, none of it — he was always a careful man — came under the heading of war crime, so the name Wolfgang von Altstein appeared on no one's list of most-wanted Germans. The war's end found him in Munich, in hastily assembled civilian clothing and armed with the false set of identity papers he'd had made up two years before for just such an emergency. On these identity papers the name Wolfgang Baron first appeared. The papers claimed Baron had been a language teacher at a school in Berlin — he did speak English, French, and Spanish, all fluently — and that his sole connection with the Nazi Party or any German military organization was his membership in the Volkssturm, the home guard of the old, the very young, and the lame, assembled from the remnants of German maledom toward the end of the war.

  With the coming of peace, Baron traded his black uniform for the black market, exchanging watches and cameras for coffee and gasoline and cigarettes. This interim activity kept him going and earned him some pleasant profit until 1948, when it was possible for him to move abroad and begin converting various of his acquisitions to cash.

  He lived in France for the next eight years, slowly selling off the art works he'd commandeered during the war, and it was his expectation to live the rest of his life in France, well off and well out of trouble.

  But then the roof fell in. The biggest Nazis had long since been taken care of, and the lesser Nazis were almost all either dead or captured. Smaller and smaller fish were added to the lists of wanted men, simply because the lists gave so many men in so many countries a source of livelihood, and in the late fifties the name of Baron Wolfgang Friedrich Kastelbern von Altstein made the grade. Charge: war crimes. Specifics: the looting of France. Some enlisted men, truckdrivers and such, had ratted on him.

  He found out in time to get out from under, but not in time to liquidate all his assets. He landed in Spain still a wealthy man, but with his wealth cut just about in half and with his opportunities for accumulating more money drastic
ally diminished. He lived for several years in Spain, living on his capital, and when he was approached by the Russians for potential espionage work he was more than willing to take their money. Unfortunately the deal fell through before he made a pfennig; the truth was, he didn't know anything the Russians could use and he didn't know any way to find out anything the Russians could use. Espionage had never been a part of his world.

  Still, this contact with the Russians proved fruitful a couple of years later, when he decided to move on, establish himself in a country more productive of opportunities for money-making than Spain, and made the mistake of first choosing the United States.

  He never did find out how they'd gotten onto him. He had established himself in New Orleans, being part owner of various night clubs and motels, and suddenly he was in the middle of a covey of Federal agents. He ran like a hare, and if it hadn't been for the reserve fund he had prudently salted away in a Swiss bank he would have left the United States penniless.

  As it was, he was far from rich. He took immediate refuge in Cuba, the one place in the western hemisphere he was sure American policemen could not enter in search of him, and established his identity by mentioning the names of the two Russians with whom he had had dealings in Madrid a few years before. He claimed now to have contacts within the United States, and promised to create an espionage apparatus for the Russians if he was given their cooperation. No money, he assured them, not until and unless he delivered. All he asked was their nonfinancial support in his establishing himself. If thereafter he failed to produce anything worthwhile, the Russians would not have lost a thing.

  They agreed, as a speculative venture. Baron had known for twenty years of the nameless nationless unwanted island off the Texas coast; there had been foolish talk at one point during the war about establishing a fueling base for U-boats there. He arranged for Cuba to claim the island — it was nearly nine hundred miles from Cuba, but the Azores were over two thousand miles from Portugal and the world is full of similar precedents, so no serious objections were raised, except in the United States House of Representatives, which fulminated about “takeovers” but which couldn't do a damn thing about it — and he himself named the place Cockaigne, an ironic reference to the land of idleness and luxury in the old legends. It was easy to convince the Russian intelligence officers that a gambling island off the American coast was a good base for espionage, and if the results of the espionage were slow in coming it was still true that Baron had cost the Russians nothing but a little wasted anticipation.

  Now he had the island and the casino, and life was pleasant. He had no espionage apparatus, and no intention to establish one, and because he knew how often and how rapidly the world turned over and the politicians and intelligence officers were reshuffled and redealt, he wasn't particularly worried. He could stall the Russians until new alignments should make their current hopes for him obsolescent.

  And now, as ever, the most important thing was to keep himself alive, and healthy, and financially secure, and as safe as possible from his enemies. For this he had the island and the casino and the exercises and Steuber.

  Steuber had been with him since 1939, in Berlin. At that time, at the beginning, he had been Baron's chauffeur. In the years since he had been Baron's butler, valet, bodyguard, go-between, whipping boy, and confidant. He was Baron's army, Baron's family, Baron's circle of friends. In ways that neither of them clearly understood, Steuber was Baron's world and equally so was Baron the world for Steuber.

  “Forty,” said Steuber now, and peered at the stopwatch. “Twenty-five seconds ahead.”

  Baron rested a few seconds on the floor after his fortieth push-up, then hoisted himself to his feet and started running in place. Steuber counted each time Baron's right foot touched the floor. Baron ran with fists clenched, head up, eyes staring straight ahead. Running, he looked like a fanatic.

  At first neither of them heard the knocking at the door, but when Baron did notice it he turned his head and glared in that direction, because the staff knew he was not to be disturbed while exercising. But the knocking wouldn't stop, so Baron took over the counting himself, without losing the pace of the running, and nodded to Steuber to go see to the door.

  Steuber got to his feet, carefully set watch and book on the chair, and walked across the room — it was part-office, part-living room, part-library — to open the door. Baron reached one hundred and began at once to do sailor jumps. Steuber was talking in the doorway with one of the staff members from downstairs. Baron did ten sailor jumps and started running again, and Steuber left the room, closing the door behind him.

  That was very unusual. Running, Baron frowned, trying to understand it. It must be important or Steuber would not have interrupted their routine this way. But if it were immediately dangerous Steuber would not have gone away without telling Baron about it. In any case, there was nothing to do but go on exercising.

  It was a few minutes before Steuber came back, and when he did Baron was still running in place. Baron gasped, as he ran, “Almost done!” and Steuber hurried across the room to pick up the watch.”

  “One hundred!” cried Baron, coming down hard on his right leg. He stopped.

  Steuber calculated, frowning massively at the watch. The watch looked small in Steuber's heavy gray hand. Finally, he said, “One minute, twelve seconds ahead.”

  “Good. What was that?”

  “Man you better see,” Steuber said. “You can tell better than me if he's telling the truth.”

  Baron said, “Oh?” He walked across the room, stripping off his T-shirt. “What does he say?”

  “Says some people are going to rob this place.”

  Baron stopped in the doorway. Beyond him was the gleaming tile of a bathroom. He looked back at Steuber. “What do you think?”

  “I can't tell those types. Maybe it's the truth, maybe not.”

  “Where is he?”

  “Dining room.”

  “All right.” Baron nodded and went into the bathroom and shut the door. He stripped off the bathing trucks, took a fast shower, and went out the other door wrapped in a white terrycloth towel. Steuber had laid fresh clothing out on the bed. Baron dressed, lit a cigarette, studied himself in the mirror. He was pleased. He went out to the other room and Steuber opened the farther door for him.

  On the way down the stairs Baron said, “What is this man's name?”

  “Heenan, he says.”

  “Heenan.” Baron smiled and shook his head. “I dislike the Irish,” he said. “A sloppy dirty people. My only prejudice.”

  He pushed open the door and went into the casino. It was barely three in the afternoon, so the casino was nearly empty.

  The few customers looked up with surprise when Baron walked apparently out of the wall, because the door was invisible on the casino side. Steuber's bright idea, done as a surprise for Baron, his own little addition to the plans. Baron had tried to look pleased when Steuber first showed it to him, complete and invisible, but these occasional reminders of Steuber's thickheadedness were something of a trial. It had never occured to him that the casino might be full of customers sometime when Baron wanted to go up or downstairs. When Baron, as gently as possible, pointed it out to him, Steuber was chagrined, going around looking hangdog till Baron told him it was all right, it was actually a good gimmick, giving the customers an extra taste of the spice of adventure they were really coming to Cockaigne in search of.

  In the dining room the Irishman was tucked away in an inconspicuous corner with two stickmen from the casino flanking him at the table. At Baron's arrival and gesture they went away. Baron sat down across from the Irishman and Steuber sat at Baron's right.

  Baron said, “What's this stupid story?”

  The Irishman looked aggrieved. That's what the breed did best, looked shifty and aggrieved. “It's no stupid story,” he said. He was heavy-set and very pale of skin, with very black hair. “It's the truth,” he said.

  “Some people are going
to rob this island.” Baron put contempt and scorn and total disbelief into his voice.

  But now the Irishman looked truculent, the other expression his sort found habitual. “You don't want to believe me,” he said, “the hell with you.”

  Steuber lightly slapped his face. “Don't talk like that,” he said.

  The Irishman put his hand to his face, where the white skin was turning red in a design like fingers. His eyes widened and he said, “I didn't come here for trouble, I don't want trouble.”

  Baron said, “How do you know these people are going to rob the island?”

  “They wanted me to go in with them, run the boat.”

  “But of course you were too honest for such a thing.”

  “I would of done it,” the Irishman said truculently. “Only I wasn't good enough for them.”

  “They changed their minds about you?” Baron could see how it was possible, given this man.

  “Somebody tried to kill me,” the Irishman said. “I went on home and somebody tried to kill me, and I don't go for that.”

  “So you want revenge.”

  “It ought to be worth something to you, knowing about it in advance.”

  Baron smiled. “You want money?”

  “You don't need charity,” the Irishman told him.

  Steuber raised his heavy hand and held it where the Irishman could see it. “You watch your mouth,” he said.

  Baron said, “It's all right, he doesn't know any better. Who are these people who plan to rob me?”

  “There's a guy named Parker, and one named Grofield, and one named Salsa. They'll get somebody else to run the boat, I don't know who.”

  “It's just four of them?

  “That all that's doing the job. They got some kind of syndicate money behind them.”

  “Karns?” Baron raised his eyebrows. “Is that moron Karns behind this?”

  It would make sense. Karns and the organization he represented were unhappy about Baron's existence independent of them. He was aware of that, had been for some time, but he had never considered — what did it call itself? The Outfit, yes — he had never considered the Outfit a serious threat.