Sub-Zero

by Robert W. Walker

  “Do you mean to say that Atgeld killed Gordy? And that deed has nothing to do with our killer?”

  “He won’t admit it, yet,” said Kennelly, taking a chair, “but he will. I’ve read him his rights. He’s under arrest.”

  “The reactor downstairs,” said Tim, thoughtfully.

  “Atgeld’s baby?”

  Kennelly nodded several times. “He was saving a bundle on maintenance and power costs, and at no loss to the company that would show in the books he kept. He manufactured bills from all the power companies. The reactor’s cost had been regained in a matter of months.”

  “How long has it been in operation?”

  “We’ve determined at least seven years,” said Kennelly. “Quite some hoax,” commented Walsh.

  “Quite some story,” said Gary.

  “And he killed Gordy,” said Tim. “Why?”

  At that moment Atgeld seemed to explode with pent up rage. He became red in the face. With his arm, he knocked over everything from his desk. He had to be restrained from running out of the room.

  “Grab him, Tim.” Kennelly shouted. “Gary! Help!”

  There was a scuffle at the door. Gary and Tim brought the thin man to his knees, and he seemed to give up. His secretary, seeing the scuffle through the half opened door, ran to him and pushed the others away, shouting, “Leave him alone! Leave him be.”

  Atgeld in turn pushed her away. She began crying hysterically and left. It seemed obvious to Tim that her concern was more than matronly, and much more than a secretary’s loyalty.

  “Should you let her leave?” asked Tim, pointing through the door at the departing woman.

  “I’ve spoken with her, Tim. She was very helpful, enviably helpful, actually. It seems she wanted to get back at Mr. Big here herself. He made one too many promises to

  her that he didn’t keep, if you know what I mean.” Kennelly motioned them to place Atgeld back into his chair. “As I’ve told you, Theodore, you don’t have to say a word to us. But you don’t wish to be uncooperative, do you?”

  Atgeld shook his head to indicate no.

  “Why don’t you tell Tim, here, why you killed Gordy?” Atgeld shivered repeatedly. “I didn’t want to do it. I really didn’t do it. Not really.”

  “That’s rather lame as an explanation, Mr. Atgeld.” Kennelly breathed out cigar smoke into his face, and leaned over his desk now.

  Atgeld stared up at him. He had the look of an eleven year old boy caught in a theft. Tim knew he could never be a policeman, to have to force information out of people, to have to be the tough. He admired Kennelly on the one hand, for his Charlie Chan deductive powers, but disliked his harshness.

  “Well then,” said Herb Kennelly, retreating from the desk and strutting about the office again, “I’ll tell you what happened. Gordy was hitting you up for money.”

  “No!”

  “He needed more money than you or Fieldcrest thought a good, honest, retired cop ought to make doing all your dirty work around here.”

  “That’s just not true!” Atgeld denied.

  “He wasn’t supposed to know about your sneak-thievery on the inside, or your gizmo downstairs. You didn’t hire him for his brains. You thought he was just the right, big lug you needed when he came through the door.”

  “It’s lies, I tell you!” protested Atgeld.

  “You’d seen his service. Nothing spectacular, just an honest, hard working street cop who never wanted to be anything else, and who never made anything else in the department, and was now on a crummy pension that hardly supported him. But Gordy fooled you. He fooled me too. He got wise and went into the bad old blackmailing business, because he found some pretty shifty things going on right here. He threatened to take the story to someone like Tim here.”

  Atgeld shriveled under the barrage of facts cascading over him now, but Kennelly didn’t lighten up. “You paid him off, but it wasn’t enough. He told you about his expenses and you got sick of hearing about them. You got tired of his always being there, blood-letting, a thorn in your fat-cat side, the only problem with your fool-proof scheme.”

  Atgeld shook his head through the entire account. “It wasn’t that way at all. Tried to reason with him, yes. He wouldn’t take the money! Offered him more money than he’d ever seen in his life, his whole career as a policeman. He turned me down. He gave me an ultimatum! Imagine it. He gave me an ultimatum! Just like that, he said, ‘Get rid of the reactor and reconvert the old systems.’ He gave me four weeks, or else he’d reveal the story. Didn’t kill him, though. The wall killed him. The damn wall came crashing in. Was damn near buried myself-hit by flying debris.”

  “What really happened down there?” pressed Kennelly.

  “I tell you, he was struck on the temple, here I think. He was knocked over by the sudden crashing of the wall, I swear. The snow and ice flew in. I was stunned. Didn’t know what to do. I thought he was dead, and I panicked...ran.”

  “Then you left him for dead,” said Kennelly. “We’ll have to see what the coroner’s report says.”

  “Mr. Atgeld,” began Tim. “If you didn’t program that reactor to shut down air in the building, and make a death trap of every Environment machine in the place, then who did?”

  “I do all the programming. On no occasion has anyone ever been allowed to put anything but my programs into it. They’re all routine programs. I can’t imagine anything but a malfunction somewhere in the lines. It couldn’t have been the program.”

  Kennelly pulled out the computer chip from his pocket. “Did you program this?”

  Atgeld studied it for some time. He was calmer now. Having talked out everything seemed to be a great relief to him. “This is one of my chips, but it’s been tampered with.”

  “By whom?”

  “I don’t know. No one else working with the reactor knows the slightest thing about programming.”

  “Who else works with it?”

  “There are two others. But they’re just operators, no more knowledge of the actual programming than a keypuncher would have.”

  “What are their names?”

  Atgeld swallowed hard before he answered. “One comes on each night. The other is on call during the day.”

  “On call?” asked Tim.

  “I don’t need them every hour, every minute. It’s only part of their jobs, the smallest part, really,” he answered Tim, still avoiding names. “Dual-role hiring,” he continued. “You’ve heard of it.”

  “Like hiring Gordy as head of maintenance as well as security. You didn’t need any maintenance for a maintenance-free system, but you had to have it on the old books. Gordy was again perfect for your hiring practices because he knew next to nothing about maintenance. He’d have difficulty putting a bolt lock on a door. But you gave him the job, not knowing the man very well. You gave him a job to do, and he took that very seriously. Because everything was done by the reactor, all he had to do was see that his small crew clean the men’s room off and on. It’s little wonder it took him so long to stumble onto that thing down there, to look it up in the blueprints, and find out what it was.”Kennelly leaned over the desk, and puffed at his cigar like an enraged bear. He shook his head, becoming self-conscious. Then he said, “Gordy was an old man, and an old friend.”

  After a moment of silence, Tim asked, “You don’t think Atgeld here tried to kill Wertman, do ya?”

  “We’ve got a likelier suspect in custody already, Tim,” said Walsh.

  “Who? When?”

  “Last night,” said Gary. “He tried to kill Wertman just before his news show.”

  “Caught in the act, as they say,” said Herb Kennelly.

  “One of the oldest geezers I’ve ever come across. Worked with Wertman for years. Just went berserk. Seems there was some jealousy. The old man used to hold Wertman’s telecast job, years ago. Ben Nevis is his name.”

  29

  “Nevis? Old Ben Nevis? No way, just now way, man!”

  Tim cried out
in Atgeld’s office. “That’s insane, ridiculous.

  The old man could hardly have gotten around to all the places the killer is supposed to have been, He wouldn’t harm a fly, anyway!”

  “You’re sure of that, are you?” Kennelly rebuked him. “Yes, quite sure.”

  “He did pretty well on Walsh last night,” said Gary Hornell with a boyish grin.

  Walsh frowned and turned his head. Tim hadn’t been able to see the dark bruise under George Walsh’s left eye before now.

  “What happened? Where is Nevis? I want to talk to him,” said Tim, “You know he’s a brilliant man. He’s got some possible answers to the ice age condition our world is in. I was going to see him today.”

  “He asked for you,” said Kennelly. “Won’t talk to anyone else. We still don’t know why he wanted Wertman dead. Have to assume it was good, old fashioned jealousy. I have an idea the old man knew Joraski too. They might have been on the same binge together. Maybe J oraski was burned at some time or another by Wertman. He seems to have very few friends.”

  “The list,” answered Tim. “What list?”

  “Atgeld has a funny little list that might prove interesting,” said Tim. “Has to do with another scam he was conducting here. Renting rooms. Seems he was an affectionate landlord to the needy. Maybe Joraski was one of them.”

  “We’ve gone over the personnel files, Tim,” said Walsh. “There’s no record of Joraski as having been employed here.”

  . “Where’s this list, Atgeld?” asked Kennelly.

  “I keep it in the vault.”

  “Good. We’ll have a look at it while Tim has his talk with Dr. Nevis,” replied Kennelly. Looking at Tim, he said, “The old man’s in the vault for safe keeping.”

  Tim ignored the pun. “Take me to him.”

  “You’re forgetting the names of the two programmers,” said Gary.

  “Oh, no we’re not,” answered Kennelly. “Are we, Tim?”

  Tim looked again into Kennelly’s half-smiling face and his semi-cool eyes of brown. “No, we’ve pretty well figured out who they are, haven’t we, Chief?”

  Kennelly nodded.

  They took Atgeld to the vault and locked him up there too. The list was found where Atgeld said it would be. When Tim saw Ben Nevis, his heart went out to the old man. He had been cut over the right eye. A large, white bandage showed spots of blood. A small cot had been set up in the vault. Nevis was still in his white smock. He had difficulty trying to get up and greet Tim. Tim shouted at him, saying, “Please, stay where you are. Don’t move.”

  Nevis ignored Tim and got to his feet. Tim helped him to a small, empty table and chair at the center of the room. All around the tiny room, the walls were lined with shelves. Stacked on the shelves were books, ledgers, cashier’s forms, and lock boxes. One wall was lined with safety-deposit type drawers and file cabinets.

  Atgeld was placed on the cot. Tim and Nevis exchanged a few pleasantries. Then the old man said, “I only regret that I didn’t kill him, Tim.”

  “Why? Why Ben?”

  “You programmed the reactor downstairs to kill Wertman, didn’t you, old man?” badgered Kennelly.

  Nevis stared at Kennelly. He shook his head. “I only do what Mr. Atgeld tells me; I don’t like that thing. I wouldn’t touch it at all if I didn’t have to. I only put in the program he wants, when he wants.”

  “How did you get down there without breaking your neck?” Tim asked.

  “There’s a way, an accessible way, Tim,” he said simply.

  “He’s telling the truth,” Tim said. “He didn’t program the computer to kill Wertman.”

  “That was the part that puzzled me, too,” said Kennelly. “But he had access and he had motive enough, and he’s certainty smart enough to have changed Atgeld’s program. Atgeld wouldn’t have used it in that manner, not to kill Wertman. It risked the discovery of the reactor. Nevis here, unconsciously wanted the reactor found, and quite demonstrably wanted Wertman killed.”

  “But what about the other programmer?” asked Gary.

  “Couldn’t he have done it? Maybe it was Joraski. Maybe he’s on this ‘Necessary Personnel’ list.”

  Gary held the list in his hand. He read off some of the names. Tim flinched a little when he heard Mabel Wellington Corey read. “Joraski won’t be there,” said Tim with finality. “The names are all changed, to protect the guilty.

  We have to persuade Mr. Atgeld there to supply us with the real names. Of course, it might save time if he just told us who the other programmer was.”

  Atgeld raised his head. His hair was in strands, wet with perspiration. He lowered his head in his hands again and looked as though he might begin crying like a baby. “I love her,” he said simply.

  “Here it is! Joraski! It’s paper thin, brief but here it is.” Tim stood up and left Nevis at the table. He went to Gary who stared unbelievingly at the name Joraski. Kennelly leaned over his shoulder and said, “I’ll be switched.”

  “It’s not Emil, though,” said Gary.

  “No, it’s Emily,” said Tim. “Emily Joraski.”

  “But it is Joraski. I mean, he used a woman’s name, right?” asked Gary.

  “He was the other programmer?” asked Walsh.

  “He couldn’t have been,” said Kennelly, finally. “My boys did a thorough job on him and he’s been living in Leningrad.”

  “Who did you think it was then, Kennelly?”

  “His secretary, Margaret Tyler.” He pointed to Atgeld. “That’s what I thought you’d say,” answered Tim. “And you believed the old man, and not she, would have it in for Wertman. You let her off Scott free.”

  “She can’t get far,” answered Kennelly.

  Atgeld suddenly came alive, shouting, “That’s right! It was her. Margaret did it, and you let her go, like a fool! She did it.”

  “Oh, shit!” moaned Kennelly.

  “It wasn’t Margaret either!” shouted Tim at the same instant.

  “It was her!” insisted Atgeld. “She was the other programmer. The only one left who knew of the reactor. I hired her just like old Nevis. She was destitute. She made promises to me, the same as him.”

  “You’re too insistent, Theodore,” said Kennelly.

  Atgeld stood up from the cot and shouted, “It’s the truth! She’s getting away with it!”

  Kennelly lost his temper, and with the ease of a cook flipping over a pancake, he yanked Atgeld’s legs out from under him. Atgeld hit the stone floor with a thud and was immediately silent. He’d been knocked unconscious.

  “Oh, great, Chief,” moaned Tim.

  George Walsh instinctively went to Atgeld and examined the damage that was done.

  “He can tell us a whole shitload of facts now,” continued Tim in exasperation.

  “I don’t know why I did that. I don’t know what came over me,” said Herb Kennelly, dropping his cigar. “I guess this place is getting to me, and him-his snot-nosed whining.”

  Kennelly pointed to Atgeld’s prostrate form. Walsh looked up at the others. “He’ll be all right, I think. He won’t be talking for awhile.”

  Tim turned his attention to Ben Nevis, going back to the chair beside him. “Do you know who the other programmer was, Ben?”

  Ben shook his head to indicate no. “I wish I did.”

  I t was said in a tone of desire, as though Nevis admired the killer’s intentions. Tim scratched his head and looked at Kennelly.

  “Look,” began Kennelly, standing over Nevis and coming around the table to face him. “You could be facing life-the rest of your life, that is-in prison. No computers to play around with, no meteorology work, nothing.”

  The remarks didn’t faze the old man. “I did what I had to do. What any man would do. Emil was my friend and he killed him. Emil was half dead already, a broken man. His mind was no longer his own. His Russian brothers had seen to that. He came here to find me. He was looking for his daughter. She was here, somewhere in the city, and he thought I could he
lp him. He called me no less than twenty-nine times before he found the courage to get on an airplane and fly here. The Russian government had taken him off their list of ‘dangerous’ sorts years before. He’d spent some time in a Siberian work force. He’d been stripped of his dignity. The only thing that remained for him was to find his daughter.”

  “His daughter?” asked Tim. “What was her name, Emily?”

  “That is right,” replied Nevis. “From the look of things, Emil was closer than he dreamed to finding her.”