I inhaled on the cigarette, breathing hard. The enormity of what I was doing, what I was saying into a tape recorder, was beginning to hit home. Men have been shot for less. Much much less.
". . . but again, how do I know all this? What proof do I have? Several interesting contradictions, which by themselves mean little but combined add up to a different story. The only story. The boy who introduced himself to me as Torin Bird never struck me as older than ten, and twelve was hard to swallow. But when he said he was fifteen going on sixteen, I couldn't buy it. I guess he didn't lie about the age because it was a well-known fact to anyone connected with the operation, and he didn't want to be caught in a lie. There are exceptionally skinny, very young boys who don't look their age, I know, but all the difference in the world lies between, say, twelve and almost sixteen. This Torin Bird's voice was so light, he sounded almost girlish. But the capper was the phrase in the statement taken by Superintendent Gridley of Scotland Yard, in the delirious words of the man calling himself Cursitor. He described Torin Bird as, quote, a perfect physical specimen. Unquote. I submit, in my best Perry Mason manner, that a boy of fifteen going on sixteen who looks no more than twelve is not a quote perfect physical specimen. Unquote. He couldn't be and look that undersized . . . so that was the beginning of my doubts along with all the other insane paradoxes . . . there just wasn't enough of a manhunt for Cursitor . . . he'd only been missing about a month or so. It was too soon for a fever pitch to die down, if he'd really been missing. The real one, I mean."
I checked the spool of tape. There was plenty of footage left. I plunged right back into the narrative. The facts and the theories.
"So I'm convinced right now that Malvolio Morrow is on his way back to Moscow with a ringer. A boy impersonating Torin Bird. That the man lying in Gridley's Sick Bay is a ringer, too. Another impersonator. I don't know who they are or why they're doing it, but it all adds up to only that, for me. I read Cursitor's diary. I remember it too well. It made a deep impression on me. How could a man, the real one I mean, who went to London to pick up a walking load of dynamite like this boy, even consider going to a play in West End on the night he disappeared if he hadn't already accomplished his mission? Not Desmond Allan Cursitor, I think. He would have been too weighted down with the importance of his job, if it was still undone, family or no family. I think he accomplished his Torin Bird mission in Southampton, continued on to London to have a good, well-deserved, time and somewhere before the time of going out to the hall to see the porter about tickets, the switch was made. Yes, I know what I am saying. For there to be a second Desmond Allan Cursitor, he had to know about it. Just as if there is a second Torin Bird, he had to know that, too. And I'm sure Nan Cursitor, somewhere back in the U.S., knows her husband is not missing, knows that he is off somewhere with the real Torin Bird, performing some high secret mission for the country. A mission that depends somehow on Desmond Allan Cursitor being thought the victim of international foul play. I haven't the slightest idea what that is or what it may be, but it's the only answer I can come up with. But I'll bet a dollar to a doughnut that if I ask Superintendent Gridley to take a set of prints of the man in his hospital and match it up with the prints on record of Desmond Allan Cursitor, they won't match. There must be a great physical resemblance between Cursitor and his double for a smart operator like Malvolio Morrow seemed to be, to be taken. The scientist was too well-known to begin with. The boy, of course, was a secret entity from the start. Nobody was sure what he looked like."
The room was quiet and still. No sounds came up from the mob scene that usually went on below, thanks to the nearness of the Circus. I brushed the fatigue out of my eyes and smoked on. And talked on.
". . . so here's what I'm left with, and I don't like it very much. My President sent me on a wild goose chase, knowing Cursitor was safe somewhere and not missing at all. Knowing that this Torin Bird was also in the hands of the United States. So I don't know why he sent me unless he wanted me blundering around this Cursitor-Bird imposture that was going on, hoping perhaps I would learn the name of the traitor back in the White House. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and believe that. But I do not like the way he went about it. He could have, should have told me. A little knowledge, and incorrect knowledge at that, is worse than dangerous. It's fatal. If there is a Troy O'Connell and he is walking in and out of the Situation Room at the White House, I agree it's important that he is found and pinned down for the rat he is. But let me also point out, there is a poor kid somewhere—and I don't know how he got talked into it—going behind enemy lines, and they won't be happy with him when they find out he's a ringer. Not to mention the godalmighty beating and bruising the slob took who played Cursitor while the real one went back home with his wife, the kids, and the genuine boy wonder. You see what I mean, I hope. This jazz about sacrificing the individual for the public good has to go. It won't wash with me. It never will. Finding Troy O'Connell isn't worth that. Protecting the real Cursitor and the real Bird while they go about planning another great overkill for the population of a foreign country isn't the answer either. God help us all when this kind of double-dealing becomes rule-of-thumb and rudimentary politics; I quit. Here and now. Without the usual two weeks notice. It's not my bag and it's never going to be. Hear me good, out there. And for the love of God, do something about that dumb plucky kid who let himself get talked into playing James Bond and sticking his neck out for Queen and Country. Or Flag and Foolishness. It couldn't have been money. Money wouldn't mean a thing to a kid that age. And that's about all I want to say now. All I can say . . . except, just one last farewell note . . . the statement purportedly made by Cursitor and then given to me by Superintendent Gridley is simply one of those things where Art really imitates Life. The man impersonating Cursitor has gone so far into the characterization, he even thinks, talks, and sounds like Cursitor when he's delirious . . . see how deadly this whole kind of business can be? Nineteen Eighty Four, here we all come, and George Orwell, where are you, now that we need you . . .?"
I stopped the tape again, wanting to collect some more thoughts, trying to remember if I had left anything out. I had, of course. Like how would the phony Torin Bird have known about me at all unless he had been tipped off by the White House and, say, Troy O'Connell? It was also obvious that Troy O'Connell had had to go back to Washington for duty, or else he could certainly have been the one to tell Malvolio Morrow that he had his hands on an impersonator. O'Connell would have to have known what the real Cursitor looked like—but I guessed he couldn't run back to England to check it out, and anyway, he couldn't have dreamed of such a scheme being foisted on him by a country he was sure he was fooling—
What a mess it all was. With the tape off, alone with my thoughts, I wasn't that sure that anything I had figured out was correct. It's always like that when you go too far out with logic in your solutions.
But I had to be right. It even had to be that both my country and The United Kingdom had worked together on the whole deal. Gridley and Scotland Yard had known too much—known all the key names—for the whole organization to be in the dark. Gridley probably didn't know all there was to know—he'd probably been duped with half-truths, just like myself. There had to be some sort of cooperation for the whole deal to have been pulled off so easily. I couldn't see it any other way.
That's my trouble. I just don't understand politics.
I'm as naive as a child in that department.
As naive as the kid who'd let himself play a dangerous role. A deception that was sure to cost him his life. If it hadn't already.
I smoked one more cigarette, still thinking, before I finally got off the bed and stored the spool of tape in the attache case. Then I put my shoes back on, dressed fully, and started packing. London held no more charm for me. The mood was broken completely. There was nothing left for me to do but go back home. I wasn't even interested in seeing the bogus Desmond Allan Cursitor to test out my wild solution. At least I had the tape, an
d I wasn't going to hang around and have Scotland Yard play more games with me. Gridley was going to be mad as a hornet as it was. I couldn't help that. There was only one man in the world who could help me, who could tell me whether I was right or wrong. That man was in the White House. The President of the United States.
If Superintendent Gridley stopped me before I got on the plane, I could always play the tape for him and show him just how smart I was. Or wasn't. Either way, I wanted out of London. And fast.
And somebody else wanted me out of London, too.
Out of this world, really.
There was a slight click of sound and I looked up from the bed and my explosive tape-recital to find a familiar and haunting apparition, somehow like an old friend, come marching out of the room closet. I should have realized why the room bed hadn't been made. Somebody had stayed in the room, behind a locked door, and convinced the maid that I was still mucking about. A late-rising American.
Nobody less than old Mr. Badger, last seen at Heath-row Airport, doing tricks with exploding cameras. He hadn't changed a bit.
I saw the goggle-eyes, the bony face with its window-dressing of Morrow-like eyebrows, and the smirking one-up-on-you-Yank shine of his expression. The bowler hat, walrus moustache, and underweight body were as memorable as ever. No trick camera this time.
I also saw the long-barreled pistol with silencer attached in his scrawny right hand. The rainproof he wore was a size too large for him. And I had foolishly overlooked the oldest dodge in the books. I hadn't checked the room closet at all. Too busy making like a second-rate William B. Williams. Stick to your own trade, folks.
Mr. Badger drew closer and extended his bony left hand.
"I'll have that tape now, Yank. Wouldn't do at all leaving that about. Won't be of any service to you—where you're heading. Will it now? You see that don't you, sir?"
I had a cigarette in my mouth and my hand had been reaching for a light. The little automatic cigarette lighter on the end table. But I stiffened and elaborately shook my head. For the fink's benefit.
"Mr. Badger," I breathed in a low tone.
"Mr. Noon," he agreed, smiling because he was sure he had all the cards and I wasn't even going to get a chance to play a hand.
"Bit o' fun listening to that recording of yours, sir. Quite a broadcast, wasn't it? Pity it won't do you any good. Any last requests, mate? I'm afraid it's got to be more than your eyes this trip—"
"What a surprise to hear you say that, Badger," I mocked. "Us being such old friends and all." I reached for the cigarette lighter.
The one that was actually a .22 calibre automatic.
Mr. Badger let me because, like all two-bit cheats and liars, he liked to revel in his moments of unrecorded glory. And my last cigarette.
"We were never that, Mr. Noon. And I have my orders. There's a Mr. O'Connell in your country who just couldn't bear to have that tape of yours mucked about all over the place. You see that, don't you?"
I did.
I saw a lot of things——now.
When it was practically too late.
FAREWELL TO ALL THAT
□ There was no more time to talk, no more seconds to spare for cute touches. Badger did not exactly strike me as the kindest man in the world. Nor the dumbest. There was no telling when he might get restless and skip all the chitchat.
I handed him the cartridge, reaching into the attache case to do so, and as he reached for it, I lit my cigarette. Two quick things happened at once. The lighter made a tiny splat of sound as I tripped the thumb-wheel, and Mr. Badger muttered a sigh of pleasure as his free hand closed over the tape. Then I ducked, rolling off the bed to the floor to get out of the way. Some habits are always good ones and always pay off. Badger's grunt of joy dissolved into a bark of pain and surprise as the little .22 calibre slug imbedded itself in his left cheekbone, and the long-nosed destroyer in his hands went off reflexively.
There was more sound. A whoosh and another splat, like a cough and across the room. The bureau dresser's top drawer suddenly splintered and shot wood around the room. But the accumulated noises wouldn't have awakened or disturbed anyone sleeping or up and about in the next room. And all of it only took a shooting second. A deadly second.
Badger went down backwards, sprawling toward the closet and flopping like a fish hooked on the line, trying to get away. But he was dead before he slid to the floor. The slug had gone in and at an angle, finding the mysterious and shabby recesses of his tiny, crooked brain. The range had been close, very close, but I've never made a better shot. And I didn't have two seconds of remorse or compunction about the bony bastard. The past history of his crimes might have outnumbered the pages of Desmond Allan Cursitor's diary. Or the Old Testament, King James' version.
I raced through his clothes, turning pockets in and out, but came up empty. No more than the usual handful of pence, crumpled pound notes, matchboxes (because there weren't any bookcover jobs in London), a ring of keys, and nothing written down or incriminating. Mr. Badger had been the ideal assassin or assassin's helper. There would be no link or trace back to anyone. All of which figured, and didn't really matter anymore. If I'd had any doubts at all about leaving old Blighty, they were gone with the wind and Scarlett O'Hara. Superintendent Gridley might want Old Badger and want him very badly, but he wasn't going to want him this way, dead and unexplained. A messy homicide with the room tenant off and winging back to the States. A fugitive from Scotland Yard.
I left Mr. Badger where he was and put a DO NOT DISTURB sign over the outer doorknob, where it would stand off all comers.
Mr. Badger, or rather his corpse, would cool its heels a long, long time before anyone tumbled to the condition of the only tenant of the room booked to Mr. Noon of the United States.
I took a quiet elevator down to the main floor of the hotel, mentally grappling with the turmoil of all I was thinking, the last bit of masterminding that had sent a Badger to kill a Noon. It was all part of the whole mess, somehow. O'Connell, Desmond Allan Cursitor, Torin Bird, Malvolio Morrow, Christine Clearlake, Gridley and Allister—the President. That President. The Man.
I didn't want to think about him just then, so I didn't. Instead, I hummed It's A Long Long Way To Tipperary, trying to remember all the words. It had been a very long time since I'd sung that old goldie. I couldn't remember the last time.
The words, the lyrics, stuck in my head.
They wouldn't come, for some reason. I was "over-bottled."
I was confused, tired, skipping whole snatches of phrases. It was as if the nostalgic old tune were mocking me. I didn't have to wonder why. My stay in London, as short as it was, had been the quintessence of lies, double-deals, and plain old-fashioned horse manure.
I'd been had.
Me.
The so-called smart operator.
The big shot private eye from Manhattan, New York.
London had given me the horselaugh.
And now, in turn, I was feeling all the misery and agony that a deceived lover goes through. I'd had it with old London Town.
The British Museum had lost its charm . . . you said it, George Gershwin. I was up to here with Piccadilly, Trafalgar Square, Hyde Park, the double-decker buses, the taxis, the whole new pence of the town. I'd lost a case, maybe the biggest one of my life. And I was going home with my tail between my legs. With only a cartridge courtesy of cassette to show for my troubles. And my eyes still ached a little.
There was one last thing to do before saying goodbye to Piccadilly and farewell to Leicester Square. I did it as soon as I checked out of the Regent Palace. It was still raining but I found a Western Union office and wrote out a valentine for Miss Maralee Mitchum, care of Pinetree Studios. Maybe it wasn't her home base, but it was the only movie address I could think of, and it was bound to catch up with her one way or the other. I made it short and sweet and memorable:
I ONLY HAVE EYES FOR YOU. FOND KISSES AND GOD BLESS.
A GRATEFUL YANK,
&n
bsp; ED NOON NEW YORK
Right after that. I hailed a cab on Charing Cross Road. I asked the driver to stop for a minute on Waterloo Bridge, and there I had a last Camel in the rain, feeling as sad as Robert Taylor remembering Vivien Leigh in the old romantic movie of the same name. The cabbie said nothing and happily watched his meter adding up. Then I got back in, the mood all gone, and said: "London Airport, man. And don't spare the horses. I've had my brief encounter, I have no more great expectations, and all I want to do is go back home. Give my regrets to the Queen. Maybe next time. I didn't have my formal with me, anyhow."
The driver had met my kind before. All kinds. He was obviously used to bloody mad Yanks. "Heathrow it is, sir", he snapped, and off we went, skimming between the raindrops toward the Albert Embankment on the other side of the long and winding Thames. I took my long, last look at the panorama behind me. Big Ben and Westminster and the Gothic outline of the Houses of Parliament all glistened in the rain. Black and grey and beautiful. Big Ben's mighty hands were meeting at twenty after four.
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