by J. B. Hadley
Harvey at one time would have been intimidated by a university atmosphere, thinking he was too stupid to open his mouth—or even if he knew what he was talking about, he would be afraid of sounding stupid because he didn’t know the right words to use. He had no time to waste on such crap now. He went where his work took him. If anyone meddled with him, he stomped all over them. He even liked Cambridge. People here weren’t goddam over—friendly. They let him alone.
Twenty minutes later he was out on the street, walking toward the river. On the grass edge along the river, occasional people with notebooks walked briskly. It was too cold not to wear a coat, but he had no choice about that. Harvey strode along like a health fanatic taking in the river air. He passed one old boy, a dignified professorial type with a stoop, thick-glassed spectacles and a bulging briefcase. In a couple of minutes, Harvey turned and followed him.
He gauged his walking speed so he caught up to the man at the bridge. He crossed over on the bridge’s side—walk behind him, the traffic heavy in both directions over the bridge. Harvey tossed his packaged sweatshirt over the bridge wall into the water. He unwrapped his umbrella and threw the paper over the wall. Then he unscrewed the metal tip of the furled umbrella and flicked that into the water.
Walking only a few feet now behind the man with the briefcase, Harvey tested the half-inch hypodermic needle at the tip of the umbrella. He held the needle shaft and pressed it in very slightly so that the hidden rubber bulb exuded liquid at the needle’s sharp point. Like a snake’s fang. He had taken the umbrella from a Bulgarian in Gaithersburg, Maryland, who would not be needing it anymore. They were at the center of the bridge. A lot of cars. No other pedestrians on their side.
Harvey walked a few quick steps directly behind his victim and poked him in the right buttock with the tip of the umbrella.
“Yikes!” the old fellow howled and dropped his briefcase. He waved his arms and shouted and cursed in Russian at Harvey.
“I’m very song, mister,” Harvey told him. “I thought you was someone else.”
The Russian switched to excellent English. “Even if I were someone who had the misfortune of your friendship, that umbrella of yours delivers a painful jab.”
Harvey looked contrite and threw the offending umbrella over the bridge wall into the water. “I’ll never do it again, sir.”
Surprised at Harvey’s gesture, the Russian nodded. Harvey picked up his briefcase and handed it to him. “Thank you,” the man said.
“Commie motherfucker,” Harvey said pleasantly to him and continued quickly across the bridge.
He looked back from the Harvard Business School side and saw to his satisfaction that the old geezer had started to stagger a bit, as if he had had one too many.
Dwight Quincy Poynings had no true need for an office except as somewhere to go during the day when he hadn’t any particular plans. A reception area, a conference room and his private office made up the suite. An executive secretary answered the phone and typed his occasional letters. Family lawyers and accountants watched over the family businesses. The enterprises that Dwight had initiated himself—the TV stations and the major-league baseball team—were managed by professionals who made it clear to him they would resign instantly if he encroached upon their areas of responsibility. This he did now and then, till he grew bored and had to rehire the people who had walked out—often having to pay them ridiculous in—creases in the process. If it weren’t for his ocean-racing yacht and his political views, Dwight felt he would be lost. And first time he won either the Bermuda or the Fastnet, he was going to start building a boat for the America’s Cup.
Two sons at Dartmouth, one daughter married, and then there was Sally. He never could make head or tail of that girl, even when she was little. Even so, this El Salvador business was a bit much. What could she have in mind?
He was depending on Harrison Sloane Dudley to enlighten him. Dudley and he had been to Dartmouth together in the old days. Now that Dudley was a leading light at the State Department, Dwight felt he would get reliable inside information. In addition, Dudley had been terribly embarrassed by the fact that Dwight had heard first from those awful Nicaraguan people about Sally’s whereabouts. Dwight sat in his office and waited for him, without much to do. The baseball season hadn’t started yet, so there was nothing but women’s programs on TV.
The two old friends greeted each other heartily.
“Sorry I couldn’t make lunch, Dwight, because I’ve a heck of a schedule here in Boston today. Gave them your office number here, in case something comes in. I hope that’s all right.”
“Of course. How’re things in Washington?”
“What’s not tying itself into knots is unraveling,” Harrison Sloane Dudley said without too much concern. “Pity about this wretched thing with Sally. They found her suitcase with her passport inside. It was left on some hillside, apparently. The Salvadoran army thinks it’s been planted there to trap them and they refuse to send troops into the area. Which may be a blessing in a way, because they seem to cause as much harm as good whenever they actually get around to doing something. No note or any—thing like a message in her hotel room. But unlike Bennett Ward, who seems to have been abducted at gunpoint from the hotel, she left of her own free will. Very confusing. The Ward boy’s body will arrive here in Boston tomorrow.”
“I’ve spoken to his parents,” Dwight said, “and of course I’ll attend the funeral. It’s decent of them to keep Sally’s name out of this. I must say I appreciate your efforts also.”
Dudley looked uncomfortable. “You can’t allow your—self to be blackmailed in this matter.”
Dwight looked at him in surprise. “But I’m not. I was the one who told you about that Nicaraguan’s demands.”
“Quite so. However, any softening of your position as evidenced by the content of newscasts from the TV stations you control could create major tax, licensing and other difficulties for you.”
Dwight’s mouth dropped open in indignation, and a red flush crept over his jowls. “Are you threatening me?”
“Passing along a message and not mincing my words, as promised. Sorry.”
“Now that we know what’s required of me”—Dwight’s voice trembled with anger—”what the hell are you people doing about my daughter’s plight?”
“Nothing.”
“That’s about as I guessed.”
“I’m being straight with you,” Harrison said. “Next time she shows, we’ll go all out to rescue her. But as you know, we can’t do much because of possible political repercussions—the U.S. Army is in El Salvador solely in an advisorial role, and the hands of the CIA are tied. I just hope we don’t have a Patty Hearst-type scenario here, Dwight.”
Poynings looked aghast. “Sally would never do that to me.”
This was enough to confirm in Dudley’s mind that Sally very likely would.
The executive secretary buzzed. “Call for Mr. Dudley.”
He was on the phone for a time, and Dwight moved politely out of earshot. If his old friend Harrison Dudley could sit there and threaten him with income-tax audits and the loss of his broadcast licenses, it was imperative he take action on this mess himself. What could the girl be doing down there? He understood about the boy’s wanting to make films and that. But what was she doing now?
This Chips Stadnick person who was due at three would be a start. Certainly Stadnick was his only contact in this rather shady area, although he had never met him.
Dwight looked at Harrison impatiently. They had nothing more to talk about. If at all possible—meaning that if it did not interfere with Harrison’s own interests—he would look out for Dwight. That did not need to be stated between them. What friends are for. Dwight wished the fellow would get off the phone and go.
Harrison finally replaced the receiver and stood. “Have to be off. You won’t forget you’ve all sorts of people looking over your shoulder, will you, Dwight? By the way, there was a little news item that might inter
est your TV people. I’ll tell you, but don’t reveal your source. Seems that Russian scientist who died at Harvard earlier today didn’t have a heart attack. He was killed with poison, perhaps with a dart from a blowgun. In Cambridge, of all places. You can’t say you weren’t the first to get that news from us.”
As Dwight walked his old friend to the elevator, he saw what looked like a retired pro-football player with a flat face and a broken nose sitting in the reception area. He had no doubt that would prove to be Chips Stadnick.
When Dwight came back, he ushered Stadnick into his office before him, closed the door after him and went alone to the conference room to phone his news team with the information Dudley had given him on this Russian’s death. They loved things like poison darts and blowguns.
“How are things going?” Dwight asked cheerfully when he came back to his office.
“I’m afraid I lost him, sir,” Stadnick said.
“Who?”
“The subject I was assigned, sir. The man who tried to kill your reporter last Tuesday. But I’ll get him for sure next week.”
“Good. Good.”
Dwight had other things on his mind. He did not associate the Russian’s death with the man they had under investigation, and Stadnick did not mention he had lost his quarry in Cambridge.
“He’s a tough nut to crack,” Chips said to break the silence that had developed. “But we got a real lead on him now for the first time. One of your reporters remembered seeing him in old footage taken in Thailand after those mercenaries grabbed the Vanderhoven grandson in Vietnam.”
“He was one of them?” Dwight asked with interest. “Who was that man they said was commander of the group? A Green Beret they called ‘Mad Mike,’ wasn’t it?”
“Right, sir. Mike Campbell. If you ask me, he’s probably some kind of wacko maniac—”
“But he does get results.”
“Yes, sir. So I hen.”
“That’s what’s important, Mr. Stadnick.”
“Yes, sir. I’ll do better this Tuesday.”
“I want you to leave tomorrow for El Salvador.”
Stadnick recoiled as if hit. “Oh, no. Not me.”
“I’m going to tell you something which I want kept very quiet. But first we’ll discuss economics. W. Stadnick, I know you’ve heard the phrase ‘Money is no object.’ That condition applies here. Succeed or fail, you will consider—ably enrich yourself by going to El Salvador for me tomorrow.”
Dwight almost smiled at the look of greed on Stadnick’s broken face. This man would be a good start. If he could find Sally without undue publicity, Dwight would not have to hide his face from his political friends. Most of all, he would not have to tell his wife their daughter was missing and have to live through her emotional hysteria. He could feel he was getting events back under control. There were so many other things Sally could have done. Why this?
Mike Campbell joined Andre Verdoux on a grassy bank some distance outside an alpine village after passing around bottles of beer and wine to the rest of the company. They had just climbed from the village, laden with shopping bags of bottles. Since Swiss soldiers on maneuvers were forbidden to enter stores to purchase things for themselves, the presence of two foreign observers provided them with a convenient loophole in these regulations.
Mike had phoned Tina in Arizona while they were in the village. He said to Andre, “I think she’s finally begun to believe I really am in Switzerland with you, like I told her. She knows I’d never contact her during a real mission.”
“She sounds like a fine woman,” Andre said. “I notice you take care that I never meet her.”
Mike smiled. “Not because I’m afraid she would fall for your Gallic charm, Andre. It’s just that I think she’ll be safer if she knows nothing—absolutely nothing—about my mercenary activities, including who else is involved in them.”
“I agree with you. Try some of this—it’s not at all bad, for a Swiss wine. Not up to our French standards, of course, but palatable.”
They washed down cheese, smoked sausage, nuts and Swiss chocolate with two bottles of tart white wine and looked at the jagged snow-capped peaks all around them. A warm breeze blew on them from the direction of Italy.
This pastoral serenity was suddenly shattered by a jet fighter that swooped down upon them without warning from behind a rock face, bent the tall grass about them with its wind as it screamed overhead, crawled like a lizard up a mountain face and disappeared over the top.
The soldiers laughed and one shouted, “I bet the top brass will let us know they have aerial photos of us drinking beer and wine on a hillside while we’re meant to be defending our country.”
This drew several toasts of an obscene nature to the top brass and more laughter.
Andre said, “That man is not exaggerating when he says they will have photos. There’s a story of a Swiss air show at which the American, Russian and Chinese military attaches, along with those of twenty other nations, were settling themselves in the grandstand for the show when a Mirage came in the back door, almost scraped the hats off the men in the grandstand and did a backflip over a mountain. When the show ended, each attache was presented with an aerial photo of himself looking up with a startled expression.”
Mike laughed. “You forgot to mention, Andre, that Mirages are French-built.”
“I did? We French are so modest.”
“Yes, indeed.”
“In the late fifties, the French army had a group of us training with Mirages in the Charente,” Andre said. “The countryside there, all around the town of Cognac, is gently rolling hills with a lot of vineyards. The planes would fly just above the ground, moving up and down with its contours, at incredible speeds. Sometimes the Mirages had to search for us while we advanced from one point to another, both points known to the pilots. Some of those fliers could almost cut bunches of grapes off the vines with a wingtip. They dropped canisters of dye on us and took photos. At other times the planes worked with us against a designated target or a moving enemy. They moved too fast to be of much use for that—helicopters were better.”
“I think the Russians would take a bigger hammering here in Switzerland than they are taking in Afghanistan,” Mike said, and added, “if they were dumb enough to try conventional warfare in these mountains.”
It was time for their company to move on. As they passed over a bridge that took the only road over a ravine, Andre and Mike looked over the side till they found the unobtrusive metal door in its ferroconcrete side. They knew that inside that locked steel door explosives had already been set in place to blow up the bridge. Everything was ready to go. And some local men back in the village they had just passed through had the keys and necessary instructions.
It was said that every key bridge, tunnel and pass in Switzerland was similarly mined and ready to blow on short notice. The Swiss could make their mountains impassible in a couple of hours.
The Russians would almost certainly choose some easier way around them, as had the Germans in World War B.
Mike was glad he had come. He realized what Andre had wanted him to see—a well-armed and well-prepared populace determined to fight, if they had to, for their freedom and way of life. Not a bunch of freeloaders hoping that politicians would keep their vague promises to them.
Rosita insisted on driving. “Please, Chips, let me. I am very good driver.”
The hired car was insured, so Stadnick did not care how good she was. He gave her the keys. He had picked her up the previous night in a hotel cocktail lounge and paid her to spend the night with him. Besides being pretty and being a good lay, she spoke reasonable English and knew her way around. She gave him what sounded to be a reasonable three-day rate.
She wasn’t bad as a driver when she remembered to keep her eyes on the road. They were leaving the city of San Salvador, passing through its outer ring of shanties, hovels and lean-tos.
“Are these the people who have come in from the rural areas to escape the
violence?” he asked, remembering something he had seen on TV that, so far as he could recall, had been about El Salvador.
“Yes,” Rosita said, waving a hand. “They come for work, but there’s so little work for anybody. These people are not as poor as others.”
Chips looked at the miserable conditions about him and wondered what being really poor here must look like. Odd-shaped pieces of lumber leaning against each other like houses built of playing cards, sheets of plastic, scrap metal, running children, bony dogs, scorching sun.
“Look down there,” he said. “They’re living in a dried-up river gulley.”
“That’s what we call barranca.”
“Doesn’t it flood them out?” he asked.
“Sometimes, in the rainy season.”
“You grew up in a place like this?”
“Yes, it was a nice place, iot of friendly people,” she said. Then she smiled and touched his knee, taking her eyes off the road to look at him. “I prefer living in luxury hotel.”
He pointed out that she was veering left into oncoming traffic.
A minute later she cut off a guy in a big car, who blew his horn furiously, then raced after and overtook them. When the driver saw it was a pretty girl who had cut him off, his anger changed to laughter and the two cars had a friendly race, side by side, that made Stadnick’s hair stand on end.
Rosita laughed and slowed down. “You come all this way to El Salvador, Chips, and it is not the guerrillas who kill you, it is a woman driver.”
After an hour, they pulled into the small town’s dusty square.
“It’s the one with the Coca-Cola sign.” He pointed, checking once again the typed instructions that had been ready for him at the American embassy.
Inside the cinder-block hut, the heavyset man behind the counter politely bade them good day.
Rosita told him in Spanish what Chips had told her to say. “This norteamericano works for the blond girl’s father, the one you drove out to the guerrillas. We know it was you who took her. The National Police reported it to the American embassy. The embassy has insisted that you be allowed to remain free.”