Top Assignment

by George Harmon Coxe

  The one-way street was filled with stores and business places. A laundry truck had parked opposite and a whitesuited employee had started across the street with a bundle of towels. Back of the first taxi a bottling company truck had parked double and the driver was already at the kerb lugging a case of soft drinks across the sidewalk close to Muller.

  The girl was ducking her head to enter the cab, and as Palmer’s gaze shifted, the laundry driver spotted him. Beneath the visored cap the face was vaguely familiar, and as he started to push outward he saw the mouth open in some unheard cry, noticed the violent warning shake of the head.

  By then it was too late.

  He was dropping, intent on Henkel’s back but seeing too the sudden movement at his left as the soft-drink man dropped that case of bottles against Muller’s leg knocking him off balance. Before he could recover, the driver stepped close and slugged the big man back of the ear.

  Muller went down. Henkel yanked the gun from his pocket as Palmer hit the kerb, taking the shock on bent knees and staggering erect. He was still five feet from Henkel when the man swung the gun at the driver.

  In that same instant Palmer heard the shot, but instead of the driver, it was Henkel’s body that jerked sideways in front of him. And in that same slow-motion sequence Henkel dropped the gun and sat down on the sidewalk.

  Palmer stood where he was, breathless and shaken by his jump, incredulous now as he saw two sport-shirted men, dressed more like tourists than F.B.I. agents, move out of an adjacent doorway and converge on the taxi. Apparently one of them had shot Henkel, for both held revolvers, and now the bottling-company man was holding a similar gun on Muller.

  The laundry man was already helping Janet Evans from the taxi and now he pushed back his cap and looked at Palmer. Not until then did Larry understand why the driver had tried to warn him not to jump. For this was Tom Hansen, and with recognition the missing parts of the picture began to fall neatly into place as he started toward the girl.

  Hansen explained the coup later in the offices of the local Bureau, and the way he told it made everything sound simple. A call from the Bulletin even before Palmer and Destler took off had alerted him, and he had followed on the next plane, arriving at Miami about 6.30 that morning.

  Before leaving, however, he had talked with the Agent-in-Charge here and briefed him on what to expect. As a result Palmer and Destler were identified upon arrival, the starter and a cab-driver had been given instructions, and once the F.B.I. knew where Palmer was staying, it was simple enough to cover the switchboard and stake out the one-way street.

  Because Hansen had supplied pictures of Henkel and Janet Evans, the local agents knew whom to look for; after that it was just a matter of timing. Once the trio arrived, the trucks and men closed in about the hotel entrance, knowing that Henkel and Muller would be out presently, with or without the girl.

  Even so, the long hours following the departure from the Hotel Walter were confusing and seemingly endless. In the beginning he and Hansen and Janet Evans had found a dress shop that was still open and the two men sat by while the girl bought underwear, stockings, and a tailored green dress which she announced was frightfully inexpensive but on her looked like a million. When she had purchased an oversized but smart-looking straw bag, into which she crammed her soiled things, she announced she was ready.

  After that, Palmer talked to a lot of agents whose names he could not remember, and in a variety of offices, sometimes alone and sometimes in the presence of the girl and her uncle. He was told upon arrival that it would be inadvisable for the Bulletin to break the story at this time. But he did talk long-distance to Kelly, and then Manning, the Agent-in-Charge, talked to him, explaining that the Bureau would need two or three days to check the list of names found on Henkel which apparently covered Communist associates all along the eastern seaboard.

  It was in Manning’s office too that Palmer developed a heart-warming respect for John Destler and realized finally that the little man was a pretty stout fellow for all his mild-mannered ways. For Destler had been well aware of the potential damage the blanks and seal could do in the hands of men like Henkel and Muller. To prevent this happening, he had taken a gamble that could have turned out disastrously, and it was Manning who uncovered the story.

  They were seated around the private office and Manning had been examining the blanks. Something about them caught his attention and he inspected them more closely. Finally he experimented with the texture of the paper and when it tore almost without effort he said:

  ‘What did you do to these?’

  ‘Brushed them with acid’, Destler said, and mentioned a chemical Palmer had never heard of. ‘I’d been experimenting with it.’ He glanced at Palmer. ‘That’s why I spent so much time in my bedroom … It’s on the seal too’, he said to Manning and now the agent opened the seal and held it up to the light.

  ‘Still wet’, he said with quick approval. ‘Thin glass too. What did you do, crush a capsule in it? How long before the metal starts to disintegrate?’

  ‘About twelve hours’, Destler said and grinned. ‘Same with the paper. When they called us just after noon they said they’d contact us before midnight and I had to take the chance. About two o’clock—that would give me two hours’ leeway—I went into the bathroom’—he glanced again at Palmer—‘and painted the sheets. All I had to do was wet them lightly, and they dried in a few minutes.’

  Palmer stared at him in open admiration as he explained the mechanics of how he had palmed a tiny glass capsule of acid when he demonstrated the seal for Henkel; how he had purposely dropped it and then crushed the capsule between the two halves of the seal while his back was turned. When he finished, he glanced at his niece.

  ‘I had to make sure it would be worthless’, he said, as if to make certain she understood.

  That she did was obvious, for though she made no reply, her smile was proud and softly approving.

  Manning spoke into an inter-office communicator and summoned one of his men. When the agent appeared he asked Destler to go with him and repeat the story in detail. To Palmer and the girl he said he would like to have them make more formal statements, and so they separated outside his office, the girl remaining with Manning, Palmer going with a stenographer to an adjacent room, and Destler along the corridor with the other agent.

  That was the last time Palmer saw John Destler, although he did not know it at the time; for it was not until after eight o’clock, when sandwiches and coffee had been brought in, that the little man was missed.

  Palmer and Janet were sitting in an office with the agent who had acted as the bottling-company driver, a goodlooking young man about Palmer’s age named Patterson. Dressed now in a business suit and wearing wide-rimmed glasses, he was eating with them when Manning entered the room and asked where Destler was.

  Patterson just looked at him. ‘I thought he was with you’, he said slowly and watched Manning shake his head. ‘When I finished with him,’ he added, ‘he told me you wanted him to come back and see you. I said all right and he went out. I thought you—’

  ‘How long ago was that?’

  Patterson glanced at his watch. ‘Three quarters of an hour.’

  Manning turned on his heel and Patterson jumped up and followed him from the room. Palmer reached across the corner of the desk they had been using as a table and touched Janet’s hand.

  ‘How about that guy?’

  ‘Uncle John?’ she examined him with a merry glint in her eyes. ‘He’s wonderful.’

  ‘He just walked out. It’s crazy but—I’ll bet you even money he makes it.’

  ‘No bet’, she said, as Manning and Patterson, having searched the other offices, returned.

  Patterson was saying: ‘He checked his bag when we left the hotel’, and Manning said: ‘Try them.’

  Patterson grabbed the telephone and spoke briefly. He waited, spoke again. Finally he hung up and shook his head, his glance sheepish.

  ‘Picked up the
bag about five minutes ago’, he said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  LARRY PALMER CAME back to Logan Airport the following morning, a little surprised that his Miami venture should be over so soon, but complaining not at all because Janet Evans was with him.

  The night before, when the F.B.I. had finished with them, he had assumed that the girl would desire nothing more than an hotel room of her own and a good night’s rest, but to his surprise she announced that she would prefer to take a plane out as soon as they could get space. She had no clothes, she was not particularly tired, and she’d had enough of hotel rooms. He understood why when she told him her story of the trip to Miami.

  Henkel and Muller had driven her to Washington first, where they had spent a night. A plane the following day brought them to Miami and another hotel with adjoining rooms. Here, while the two men made their plans, she had been forced to stay, always with the door open so she could be watched constantly. They had not molested her, but she had been forced to sleep in her clothes; in fact, there had been little else to do during those days but sleep.

  ‘I’d rather go back tonight’, she said. ‘I can sleep tomorrow after I get to Uncle John’s house and am really clean again.’

  But she had slept some on the flight to New York, slumping in her seat in the darkened plane, her head finally coming to rest on Palmer’s shoulder as the sky grew grey and daylight brought them over the city. There had been a wait of an hour and a half in New York, time enough to freshen up and get breakfast, and now, at nine o’clock on this clear bright Friday morning, they walked toward the parking lot and Palmer’s locked car, he with his leather case and she with her tropical-looking straw bag.

  At the Destler house he went in with her to open some windows and see that everything was in order. When they had made a date for dinner that evening, he drove directly to his apartment and went to bed.

  With the shades down and the bedroom partially darkened, Larry Palmer slept until three o’clock that afternoon. He felt groggy and thick-mouthed as he rolled out of bed, but a toothbrush and a shower helped that feeling, and he went into the kitchen to drink some iced fruit juice and make some coffee. With this brewed, he sat around in his pyjamas while he went over the discrepancies he had discovered in his notes.

  He had been allowed to read the statements Henkel and Muller had made the night before and one thing pleased him greatly. From the moment he had lost the list of refugees who had bought false birth certificates in the hope of starting a new life here, he had been worried about what Henkel planned to do with it. The F.B.I. contended that no such list had been found either on Henkel or Muller or in their rooms. Further, Henkel had insisted the list had been destroyed, that his only purpose in getting it, once they knew Leo Flynn was dead, was to make sure no one else knew their names were on it.

  There was one other point on which both men insisted: they had killed neither Ethel Kovalik nor Leo Flynn. According to their story, Henkel had waited outside the Bulletin in the hope that the woman would come to collect the hundred-dollar prize. She had done so and he had followed her to find out where she lived; it was his impression that another man had also followed her, though he would not swear to this. All he knew for sure was that, once he knew where she lived, he had left, returning after dark that night with Muller, only to find her dead on the floor.…

  The shrill of the telephone checked his thoughts here, and when he answered it the voice of Tom Hansen came to him.

  ‘Just wanted you to know that we struck some oil’, the F.B.I. man said. ‘Through Henkel we nailed three of the top guys they were working for. One here and two in New York.’

  ‘Good’, Palmer said.

  ‘There may be others’, Hansen added. ‘We don’t know yet, and there won’t be any story for a while. Just wanted you to know we appreciate your help and co-operation. We’re telling your boss so.’

  Palmer thanked him and hung up, dwelling with some satisfaction on the information until his mind reverted to the problem the call had interrupted. Then, his thoughts once again focused, he silently restated the facts.

  The two thugs insisted that they had not killed Ethel Kovalik, but this did not have to be the truth. Had they been guilty, they certainly would not have added to their woes by admitting it. However, in the light of certain facts now revealed in his notes, he saw that an earlier assumption—that the prowler who had searched his apartment the night of the murder must have been either Henkel or Muller—had been wrong. With this in mind the possibilities were suddenly narrowed and other assumptions were made. Just how he could verify such assumptions was not clear, but he knew he had to try. That was why he finally went to the Bulletin, not to the city room but to the studio two floors below.

  Welsh, the picture chief, was in his office. He listened to Palmer and nodded.

  ‘Sure’, he said. ‘It’s around somewhere.’

  ‘Could I get a couple of enlargements?’

  ‘Sure. Lengel’s around … Lengel!’ he yelled.

  ‘Yo’, said Lengel from some room beyond, and presently he appeared, the hat on the back of his head, jaws punishing his gum, the photographer who had originally taken Ethel Kovalik’s picture.

  ‘Larry wants a couple of enlargements of that picture we ran last week. The one we made from the negative the Kovalik woman left with him. You know, taken in Germany. Showed the dame and her husband. See if you can find it’

  Lengel located the negative without trouble in the printing-room file. He asked what Palmer wanted and then set about making an eleven-by-fourteen enlargement. When it was dry Palmer took it out to the light.

  An examination of the two faces was discouraging because they told him nothing at all; just a German girl and a tall wiry boy with an unfamiliar face and skimpy, diaper-shaped trunks.

  ‘Some outfit, hunh?’ Lengel said, peering over his shoulder. ‘Wear something like that here and they’d run you right off the beach and into the pokey.’

  Palmer was looking at the trunks too and that was how he noticed the whitish slash that extended diagonally across the upper thigh towards the groin. He pointed it out to Lengel.

  ‘Is that a spot on the film? A defect or something?’

  Lengel said he’d look and went back to get the negative. When he had examined it closely he shook his head. ‘That’s no spot, that’s the guy. Could be a scar.’

  ‘Then make me another print’, Palmer said as new hope began to stir inside him. ‘Just the area from, say, the navel to the knee. An eight-by-ten should do.’

  Palmer told his story to Janet Evans across the dinner table, not so much to get an opinion as to see how the theory sounded when spoken aloud. When he finished, the girl’s face was grave, the long-lashed eyes concerned.

  ‘What are you going to do,’ she asked in hushed tones.

  ‘Stay with it, I guess’, Palmer said. ‘The Bulletin’s been paying my salary for over a week, probably with overtime and plenty of expenses, and I still haven’t come up with anything we can use. The obligation is still there, and—’

  ‘Could I go with you?’

  He smiled because the question pleased him so, and shook his head, his gaze proud and affectionate. He said she could ride with him, but that she would have to stay in the car, and that is where he left her when he went to the top-floor apartment he had visited once before.

  This time there was no maid. Isabel Chapman opened the door. As always, her striking grey hair was expertly coiffed, and her still slim body was smartly sheathed in a dark-red gown that matched exactly the colour of her mouth. At the moment her small, regular features registered some surprise, but there was no welcome in her dark eyes.

  ‘Oh, hello’, she said. ‘I’m sorry, but Al’s not in. It may be an hour or so—’

  Palmer cut her off. ‘I came to see you, Mrs. Chapman’, he said.

  ‘Oh?’ She looked him over in an instant of quick inspection and her tone remained brittle. ‘I gather it’s important.’


  ‘Very.’

  ‘Well’—she glanced at a diamond-studded wrist watch—‘if it doesn’t take too long.’

  She stood aside to let him enter the foyer and then went into the living-room. When she had seated herself on the divan she examined him again, a little impatiently it seemed, and waited for him to speak.

  The distant, haughty manner bothered Palmer because he was none too sure of his ground. It also annoyed him somewhat because it put him on the defensive. To counteract the feeling, he sought refuge in words.

  ‘A week or so ago I had a drink with you in the Orchid Room.’

  ‘I remember.’

  ‘You’d been out to dinner.’

  ‘That’s right. At the Concord.’

  ‘Was your husband with you all that time?’

  ‘As a matter of fact, he wasn’t’, she said. ‘Though I don’t quite see why you should be so interested.’ She paused, but when Palmer did not help her out she said: ‘He had to give a customer a demonstration. I remember because I was annoyed. He was sorry, but that was the only time this particular customer was free. We’d had cocktails and he said he didn’t want any appetizer or soup anyway, and for us to go ahead. He said he wouldn’t be long.’

  ‘Was he?’

  ‘Was he what?’

  ‘Gone long.’

  ‘About forty minutes or so, I’d say. Less if anything. I do remember that it was five minutes after eight when he left.’

  Palmer considered the information and mentally checked the times. From the Concord to the Bond Hotel was no more than a block. From there to Martin Street, where Leibmann, the little tailor, had seen a tan Zephyr sedan sometime after eight on that evening, was no more than a three- or four-minute drive.

  ‘Did your husband drive to the Concord in a demonstrator?’ he asked.

  ‘No. We came in my convertible.’

  ‘Could he have walked over to the Bond and borrowed Leo Flynn’s demonstrator?’