by Brad Latham
“I don’t speak German,” Lockwood said.
The Nazi officer grinned and pulled back the breeching mechanism of the Luger, checked to make sure there was a shell in the clip and let it go.
“Now,” the officer said. “Into the boat.”
The Hook looked down and saw the Luger pointed at his stomach.
He stepped onto the raft.
Then, someone grabbed his arm from behind and forced his hands behind his back. He felt the handcuffs tighten and click on his wrists.
He had no choice now. He had to take the journey to the submarine.
And he had to escape.
Books by Brad Latham
The Hook # 1: THE GILDED CANARY
The Hook #2: SIGHT UNSEEN
Published by
WARNER BOOKS
Copyright
WARNER BOOKS EDITION
Copyright © 1981 by Warner Books, Inc.
All rights reserved.
Warner Books, Inc.,
Hachette Book Group
237 Park Avenue
New York, NY 10017
Visit our website at www.HachetteBookGroup.com.
First eBook Edition: September 2009
ISBN: 978-0-446-56609-4
Contents
Books by Brad Latham
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 1
“What was stolen that was so valuable?” Lockwood asked his boss.
Mr. Gray drummed his pince-nez against the glass surface in a rat-a-tat tattoo. “That’s the problem, Lockwood,” Mr. Gray answered. “Our enterprising president took it on himself to insure an article that’s spelled out in the policy only as ‘the insured product—as developed.’ “
“The—insured product?” Lockwood asked.
“The insured product,” Gray repeated irritated. “Gordon—Mr. Gordon—says he’s not allowed to tell me—me!—chief of claims!—what this so-called product is. Could be a sack of potatoes for all we know.”
Pushing through Gray’s irritation, Lockwood asked, “Why didn’t you turn down the application?”
“I never saw the application.”
“You never saw it?”
“I never saw it!”
“Isn’t that against the board’s policy?”
“Damn right!” Gray shouted. “Would never have happened in Gordon, Sr.’s day, too, you can believe that!”
“Will you stop shouting?” Lockwood shouted back.
It was useless for Lockwood to think he could stop Mr. Gray from being overbearing for long. Lockwood even liked Mr. Gray—sometimes; it was just that when it came to claims his boss had a one-track mind, and Mr. Gray rarely had anything but claims on his mind.
Gray eyed his senior investigator with a hard stare and pursed his lips. He saw a solidly built man of about thirty-seven who sat straight in his chair. Gray resented Lockwood’s youth and smooth good looks, the way Lockwood almost always looked as if he had just stepped out of an Arrow collar advertisement. Everything Lockwood did he did with style and verve, a quality Gray both loathed and envied. He hated people for whom life came easily; and while Lockwood ran into as many problems as the next fellow, to Gray he seemed to solve them with a minimum of huffing and grunting. Of course, Lockwood had been to college and Gray had not. The older man figured that this accounted for the difference between them, and it made him dislike college men all the more.
Without acknowledging that he had been shouting, Mr. Gray quieted. “The old man didn’t think he knew every damn thing about insurance, Lockwood, even though he did,” Gray went on. “You won’t believe this, but we have only one copy of this policy, and it was written by Junior G. himself and has never left his personal safe.”
Lockwood winced. “Irregular.”
“Damned irregular,” Gray said with some satisfaction. The claims chief sat back and lit another English Oval while his other hand spread ashes from the last cigarette into his gray vest. Between rapid puffs, Mr. Gray went on, “Now Gordon—Mr. Gordon, Jr.—wants me to have you investigate the claim. I almost refused.”
Lockwood was caught up now in the puzzle. “This is crazy, Mr. Gray.”
“I know it’s crazy,” Gray said. “He says he can’t tell me anything about it because of the government, although what the government has to do with a product a refrigerator company’s making is beyond me.”
“A refrigerator company?”
“Yes, damn it! Don’t repeat everything I say.” Mr. Gray took a deep drag on the Oval cigarette, turning almost a fifth of it into ash. He mused, “I wonder if I could get away with refusing. The board would back me, I think.”
Lockwood almost smiled a thin smile of amusement at his boss, but he knew that Gray would have no sense of humor about the situation. Mr. Gray was all business, the insurance business, all the time. Lockwood was pretty sure Gray would do what Gordon wanted. For all of the claims chief’s disdain of Thomas Gordon’s way of running the Transatlantic Underwriters company, still Gray knew who was his boss and who owned 35 percent of TA’s shares. Sure, Tom Gordon had only inherited them, and yes, he had elected himself president just five years before when he was but a sprout of thirty, but young Gordon had pushed the company’s business forward during the lean years from 1933 to the present, doubling business during hard times.
Intrigued as well as irritated, Lockwood said, “Why don’t you tell me about it?”
“The ‘insured product’ weighs five hundred pounds. It was stolen—no, discovered ‘missing’—this morning at 8:00 when the plant opened.”
“Are we sure there was an ‘insured product’?” Lockwood asked. The remark was a telling blow.
Gray threw his hands a foot and a half above the glass desk top, dropping another inch of ash on his vest. “I want you out there fast, Lockwood, and find this thing—if it ever existed—or we have got to fork over $75,000.”
Lockwood whistled at the size of the figure. “And Gordon doesn’t know what we insured?”
“Doesn’t know, or won’t—maybe can’t—say.” Gray shoved a policy in Lockwood’s general direction. “Here, read it—right here. I’m not allowed to let you take it out of here, and I have to take it back to Mr. Gordon’s office myself.”
Lockwood looked at the face of the policy and grimaced. “What’s this ‘time of the essence’ clause? Pay the claim in ninety-six hours—we never write a policy like this. We pay in weeks and months—not in hours—and only after an investigation.”
“Look at the premium,” Gray said in a dry tone that heaped scorn on men who would endanger the company’s asset base for a few dollars more in income.
“It’s five times as high as it would be for jewels or paintings,” Lockwood said. “What’s this all about?”
“That’s what you’re going to find out. Read it.”
So, while Mr. Gray sat there and smoked his English Ovals, Lockwood skimmed through fourteen pages of small print.
It wasn’t easy for Lockwood to concentrate with Gray keeping one glass-covered eye on him, but inside Lockwood smiled a bit at Gray’s habitual suspicion. Mr. Gray trusted no one and nothing. The joke among all the claims investigators at Transatlantic Underwriters was “Gray hates to pay,” for if there were any possible way to refuse a claim, Gray pounced on i
t. More than once Lockwood had found his boss asking him to bend an investigation to get the company off the hook even when the suspicious claim appeared to be legitimate. Several times a year Lockwood suppressed evidence that he knew Mr. Gray would use to deny a proper claim. After all, some claimants deserved to get paid.
The ageless old man sat in his corner office high in the RCA building, steadily moving files from the left-hand side of his desk to the right-hand side, deciding, at the steady rate of twenty files per hour, which claims Transatlantic Underwriters would pay, which would be investigated, and who of Lockwood and the other nine claims investigators would do the investigating.
Mr. Gray was the envy of presidents of other insurance companies. For his part, Lockwood was sure that Gray’s big advantage over any other claims chief was his never leaving his office. He sat here in his corner office, the window shades pulled down, rain or shine, like a spider at the center of its web, ready to snare claimants after Transatlantic Underwriters’ money. Every claim passed through his hands, whether it was a railroad widow’s $1500 from her husband’s roadbed accident to the most brazen Garment District scam, and Gray gave every file the same hard-eyed scrutiny, sure that at the bottom of each claim lay fraud.
Lockwood knew he had been put on this mysterious Long Island claim because he was the best investigator Mr. Gray had, and he was proud of the old man’s opinion, even if Gray did take the attitude no claims investigator was ever as bright or clever as he, Gray, was.
When he had finished reading the policy, Lockwood asked, “You want me to go out to Patchogue?”
“Right now.”
Lockwood stood up and dropped the policy on the desk. “I’m off.”
“Call me the first thing this afternoon and let me know what’s going on,” Gray said.
He picked up the next file from the pile at his left hand. “Don’t go nuts again on the expense account, hear me? We’d be fools to pay off on a policy written like this. I’m sure we can win a refusal to pay in court.”
Lockwood just sighed, smiled, nodded, and left. There had never been a policy claim about which Mr. Gray hadn’t said those exact words. Gray ought to have little cards printed up that simply read, “Forget it—we won’t pay.”
On his way back to his office, Lockwood reflected again on what he figured was Mr. Gray’s ideal insurance company—one whose only function would be to collect premiums, never to pay claims.
Chapter 2
Back in his own office, Lockwood’s spirits soared. Nothing excited him more than a case that took him out of New York City, and a drive out on Long Island with the top down on his convertible was a glorious way to spend an April morning.
He quickly prepared to leave. First he jotted down what details he remembered from the policy, and then he packed the attaché case he kept at the foot of his office closet with two extra shirts, socks, underwear, and two subdued silk neckties. From his desk drawer he took out his .38 Detective Special and a box of .38 shells. You never knew. He clipped the spring holster just to the right of his backbone under the waistband of his trousers, cop-style.
He stashed four packs of Camels and fresh underwear in the case and pocketed his silver and black Dunhill lighter. He carefully topped off his silver pint flask with Canadian. Before walking out he called down to the garage and asked Hank to bring his car up, and to make sure it was filled with gas and oil.
An hour later found Lockwood, still in high spirits, driving a bit faster than might have been safe for the average motorist on Highway 27 toward Patchogue, the top down on his gunmetal gray ’37 Cord. Lockwood loved the gorgeous spring day, the open road, and the way the Cord handled. The car had racing shocks and front-wheel drive, and because he considered the stock Cord a bit underpowered, Lockwood had hopped it up with a Packard Twin Six under its coffin hood. The car could burn rubber for a block and outperformed almost every car he met on the road.
When Lockwood figured he was within a half-hour of Patchogue, he turned on his police radio, curious to see what kind of law was crawling around this part of the Island, but he heard only faint words, as if there was little law this far out into the Atlantic Ocean.
A service station attendant on the outskirts of the village told him how to get to the Northstar Company, and he was startled to be stopped by a U.S. Marine at the company gate.
Lockwood consulted his notebook and said, “I’m here to see Mr. Dzeloski, soldier.”
“Move your car back, mister,” the marine said with a hard wooden face as he bolted a cartridge home in his Springfield’s breech. “Get back behind the line.”
Lockwood looked down and saw a stripe painted on the asphalt road. Though exasperated, he decided not to argue with the Springfield. He backed the Cord up five feet. “What gives?” he asked.
Not answering, keeping a steady eye on Lockwood, the marine backed into the guard shack. Without taking his eyes off Lockwood he called someone on the telephone.
Fuming a bit, Lockwood looked around. The sign over the gate read, The Northstar Refrigerator Company, all right. What the hell was a marine doing guarding the front gate of an icebox factory? Wire mesh fence, with three strands of barbed wire at the top, ran from each side of the gate around the premises. Inside stood a concrete block building some three stories high—it was hard to gauge the size of the building for it was built entirely without windows. What could have been stolen from an icebox factory with a marine guard? None of this made sense.
Another marine came running up to the guard shack.
“If you’ll get out of the car, sir,” the first marine said, “we’ll have to search you, and Sergeant Cummins here will take you to Mr. Dzeloski’s office.”
“Search me? You’re kidding?”
“No, sir.”
“Search me for what?”
The beefy sergeant said, “To see what you got.”
Both marines had a look on their faces—blank deadpan looks of poker players with full houses or straight flushes—that made Lockwood wary. It took them fifteen minutes to search him and his car. Sergeant Cummins took his .38 and the box of shells.
“I’m licensed to carry that, Sergeant,” Lockwood told him.
“Sir, I’ll turn it over to Dr. Dzeloski.”
Lockwood nodded. This whole thing was more and more of a mystery. He offered the first marine a Camel. As the soldier took one, he relaxed a bit. Lockwood smiled and pressed another two on him. The sergeant glared at both of them.
“Doesn’t look like you get much company out here,” Lockwood said to the private, hoping to learn something.
“I don’t know,” the soldier answered. “We just got out here this morning. I don’t know what kind of detail this is going to be. The C.O.’s jumpy as hell.”
The sergeant left his Springfield with the marine at the guardhouse, unhooked the restraining strap of his holstered .45 automatic, and got in Lockwood’s car on the passenger side.
“Drive on, Mr. Lockwood. There’s a parking lot behind the building.”
As they rounded the building, Lockwood asked, “Think you’ll like it out here?”
“Park it in that third spot, if you will, Mr. Lockwood.”
They entered the huge concrete building, and Lockwood was led through a maze of corridors and stairways. None of the many metal doors they passed had a name on it, only numbers or signs that read KEEP OUT—AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. Odors of machine oil hit them in waves, but Lockwood heard no sounds of machinery. They met few people, and those were serious-faced young men in white shirts and drab neckties with long slide-rule cases flapping against their hips. They displayed no curiosity about Lockwood and his escort.
On the third floor they turned into a numbered door, and a secretary looked up and said, “Oh, there you are! Come right in,” and she led Lockwood and Sergeant Cummins into the office behind her desk.
A small, middle-aged man with a large handlebar moustache and smile stood up from a huge desk to greet Lockwood.
&nb
sp; “Mr. Lockwood! From Transatlantic! How good of you to come so fast.” The man came around the desk, his hand outstretched. “I’m Josef Dzeloski, president of Northstar.”
Lockwood smiled and allowed himself to be steered into a club chair next to the sofa on which Dzeloski sat.
“Thank you, Sergeant Cummings,” Dzeloski said, dismissing him.
“Dr. Dzeloski, what should I do with Mr. Lockwood’s things?” The sergeant held up the .38 pistol and the box of cartridges.
“On my desk, Sergeant.”
When they were alone, Dzeloski sighed and said, “That’s the trouble with government work. The only thing that counts with that kind of mentality is not breaking the rules. Now, when can we expect reimbursement, Mr. Lockwood?”
Lockwood grinned at the man’s presumption. “Mr. Dzeloski—”
“Dr. Dzeloski,” he was corrected with a friendly smile.
“Dr. Dzeloski, we don’t even know what was taken, or for sure that something was taken. How about you telling me what this is all about?”
The man’s friendly smile disappeared. “You mean you don’t know?”
He stood up, went to his desk, and pushed a button on an intercom.
“Myra,” he called. “Find out if that clearance on William Lockwood from Transatlantic has come through. And then, you and Stanley come in, will you?”
When he came back, Dzeloski looked sheepish and said, “I almost forgot completely about security. God, I hate this secrecy. I’ll just give you some general background till the others get here.”
Dzeloski began by saying he’d first started Northstar in 1931, when he’d been able to set up a refrigerator company cheaply after the Crash. For several years the company had done poorly, had almost gone under three times, until Dzeloski had managed to land a contract to make field refrigerators for the U.S. Army. Then the Army Air Corps needed some special parts machined for its newest biplanes, and one thing led to another, till now—with the addition of some bright young engineering types—Northstar invented and developed “devices” for the Air Corps. To keep what they did under wraps, the Air Corps had even come up with the money to move them into this plant out here with the potato farmers.