Crag kicked in the screen.
Seven hundred dollars, he’d learned by now, was the cost of replacement of a screen on that video. And his suite cost two thirty and he’d managed to spend about a hundred otherwise. Another day, another thousand dollars. But even at that rate, half a million was going to last a long time. What was Gardin doing?
He went out on the balcony and stared up at the sky. The new planet wasn’t in sight; it was still below the horizon. Anyway, to hell with it.
Earth was in the sky, though, and he stared at it for a while, wondering if he should go back there for a while. But why? Earth was just as corrupt, just as decadent as Mars. Neither had anything to offer that the other hadn’t, except that Earth was more crowded. And just a bit better policed, which made it just a bit less dangerous than Mars.
He went back in and to the bar and got himself a drink. Was that the only answer, drink, escape? Hell, if he had nothing better to do than to escape, why didn’t he kill himself and get it over with? Why, except that a tiger doesn’t commit suicide, even with nephthin, which lets him take however-many along with him in the process.
He drank enough to make him slightly sleepy, although he didn’t feel it otherwise, and went to bed.
And slept, and dreamed. About a bronze-haired beautiful woman who was his wife—and in the dream, he didn’t know that she had betrayed and deserted him, because it hadn’t happened yet, and he was crazy in love with her. Only gradually—and yet understandably, because in dreams things that don’t make sense otherwise are understandable—she changed. Her hair stayed the same, but she became more beautiful, more and more loved—and farther and farther away from him at the same time, and across a void of space and time he was calling out to her “Judeth! Judeth!” And wasn’t aware of the change, didn’t know that that hadn’t been his wife’s name. Because in that dream all women were the woman; there was only one woman and had never been any others. And then she came to him and he put his arms around her and—in the sudden quick inconsequence of dreams he was holding in his arms a dead woman, a corpse, and then his arms were empty as the corpse disintegrated and—
The phone was buzzing.
He swung himself to the edge of the bed and picked it up. “Yes?”
“Ah—Mr. Ah. There is a telephone call for you. A woman who refuses to give her name. But she says it is very important, a matter of life and death. Shall I—?”
“Put her on.” He didn’t ask for privacy on the circuit, although he had a hunch who it might be and what it might be about; because asking for a closed circuit was sure to make the management curious enough to listen in, whereas otherwise they wouldn’t bother. In Mars City, only one woman could be calling him here.
“Yes?” he said.
It was the voice he expected, Bea’s. It said, “I don’t want to give my name, but you’ll know who I am when I tell you we met at—”
“I know who you are,” he interrupted. “What’s the matter?” Although he could guess that, too.
“Our—mutual friend. I won’t mention his name, but if you recognize my voice, you know who I mean. He’s in an awful jam; I don’t think there’s anything you can do, but—”
“Where are you? Try to tell me without naming it.”
“At our apartment. But I don’t think it’s going to be safe here. I’d better get out right away. Can you meet me at—at the place where he and you once played mara with three spacemen just back from a Callisto run and they tried to work a squeeze play on you in the game and you—”
“I’ll be there in ten minutes,” Crag said, and put down the phone.
He threw on clothes and dashed cold water into his face. He felt—awake, with danger and action impending.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
IT WAS a bar like any bar, except for the few swanky expensive ones in the quarter. Crag made it in ten minutes, but Bea was there before him. Had apparently just got there, for she was just sliding into a booth at the side. A big cargo walloper from the Port had seen her come in and was just swaggering over from the bar to open negotiations, whatever type of negotiations he had in mind. Crag would have liked a fight, but there wasn’t the time for one, so he walked fast and got there ahead of the dock hand, spoke to Bea by name—not her right one of course—and slipped into the booth across from her. The dock hand stood a moment, irresolute, and then went back to where he’d been standing at the bar.
Crag’s first question was, “Do minutes, or seconds matter?”
She leaned forward and he could see that she’d been crying, although she’d covered the signs with make-up and they wouldn’t show at a distance of more than a couple of feet. “I don’t think so,” she said. “But I don’t know what you can do, if anything, but he’s—”
“Wait, then.” Crag got out coins and pushed several into the slot of the musicon at the end of the booth, turned up the volume control. The place was too quiet, and their conversation might have carried. A voice blared at them. “I’d like to get you on a slow ship to Venus! Honey-wunny-bunny—”
Crag winced, but didn’t turn down the volume. He leaned close and said, “All right, give it to me fast.”
“It was a jewel job, wholesale place. Curme’s, on the top floor of the Rasher building, about ten blocks north of—”
“I know where it is. Go on.”
“He’s caught in there, and they’ve got a cordon around the place, around the whole block, and helis over the roof. He must have tripped an alarm or—”
“Is he alone?”
“Yes, he was working solo. He’s been casing the place for two weeks and—”
“No one knew about it—except you?”
“Right. It must have been an alarm circuit. There’s no way they could have been tipped off. It’s not a cross. It’s—”
“How do you know about it? I mean, about the fact that he’s trapped now?”
She opened her purse and took out what looked like a fairly large make-up compact. She said, “It’s a two-way; he carries the other end of it, except his looks like a tobacco pouch, and—”
“I’ve seen it. He called you on it, from Curme’s?”
“Yes. It makes a faint buzz when he calls. And when he’s on a job, I keep it right close in case he calls and there’s anything I can do or—”
“What did he ask you to do? Notify me?”
“No, this time he didn’t want anything—except to say so-long to me. He said it was hopeless, that they had every exit blocked solid—there are dozens of cops, hundreds maybe—and all he wanted me to do was get out of the apartment quick, before they got there to get me. I stayed long enough to call you, and then I got”
“They know who he is?”
She nodded. “I don’t know how—unless one of them got a look at him when he was firing out a window and recognized him, but the loud-speaker they set up is calling him by name to come out and give himself up. That’s how he knew they’d find out where he lived and get there to the apartment and why he called me to warn me to—”
“Can you call him back on that thing now?”
“Yes, but—”
“Get him, fast. Tell him I want to talk to him, and then put me on.”
She held up the compact and opened it; there was a mirror inside the top and she pretended to be looking into it, and, after pressing a button somewhere, pretended to be talking to Crag.
“Gardin? You know who this is. And a friend of yours is here and wants to talk to you—you’ll know his voice.”
Crag reached for the tiny two-way; he held it as though he was examining it. And he talked as though he was talking to the woman across from him. “Let’s talk fast, Gardin, before they might get a tracer beam on this thing and get to us here. They know where and who you are, so don’t be coy on that end. What’s the score?”
“They’ve got me bottled.” The tiny, tinny voice just reached his ear over the blare of the music. “Nothing you can do about it, but thanks. They’ve got over a hundred cops her
e.”
“How long can you hold out?”
“As long as I want to. They’re not coming in to shoot it out. They’ll wait till I give up or get bored and go through the door to shoot it out with them.”
“How long can you hold out, damn it? In days or hours.”
“Hell, a week if I have to. There’s no food here but I won’t starve in less than that. And there’s plenty of water.”
“Ammunition?”
“Whole rack of guards’ weapons besides the one I brought. They know I’m well heeled.”
“Can they gas you out?”
“Not without firing gas shells through the windows, and they’re not going to take a chance on that. Why should they? They’ve got me cold, and they like sieges.”
“Okay, hold out, Gardin, I’ll get you out of there. May be a few days, but I’ll get you.”
“You can’t. Don’t try. It’s—”
“I’m not telling you how in case they’re finding this beam. Or exactly when, even if I knew. But hold out, damn it, and I’ll get you out of there.”
Crag snapped shut the compact and stood up quickly. “Come on, we’re getting out of here, in case the cops did get on that beam and are tracing it now.”
There was a helicab waiting outside and he pushed Bea into it and followed her in, gave the address of another bar. Once Bea grabbed his arm. “Crag, it’s suicide—you can’t—”
He shook off her grip. “We can, if he can hold out two days. Maybe we can do it in less, if we can get some more manpower. Has Gardin any other friends you’d trust in this?”
“One, Crag. Hauser. But—the cops are looking for him already. He’s in hiding and that’s why you haven’t met him. And it’s a rough rap; he’s—”
“Good. That makes him just the one we want, he’s got nothing to lose. You can reach him?”
“Of course, but—”
“Don’t argue. We’ll go in the bar I told this cabby to take us to, so it doesn’t look funny to him; we’re almost there anyway. One quick drink; then split up and here’s what you do. Stay away from Gardin’s apartment—he’s probably right that they’re there by now. Get Hauser, come with him to the Luxor, if he’ll come. Or—do you want to go through with this, Bea? I can get Gardin alone, but it’ll take longer.”
They were entering the bar and Crag ordered quickly, then turned to Bea. “Well,” he said, “made your mind up?”
“It’s been made up all along. You’re going right to the Luxor?”
“I’ve got a few things to buy first. How long will it take you to get this Hauser, or find out that you can’t get him?”
“At least two hours. Unless I risk phoning him, and since he’s in hiding he asked me not to.”
“Don’t phone him then. But I’ll get to the Luxor before you do, in that case. Good luck, Bea.”
They downed their drinks and Crag left first. He headed straight for an aircar agency and bought himself a six-place Dragoon, paid cash, and a premium price, to get the demonstrator model that was already on the roof, gassed and ready to go. He landed it on the roof of the Luxor only minutes later.
The attendant ran to get it and to put it away. Crag asked him, “Is there a store near that sells tools, hardware?”
“Yes, sir, about three blocks north on—”
“Can you go there right away and buy me three shovels and put them in the car?”
“Right now, sir, I’m afraid I couldn’t take off for that long. Perhaps one of the bellboys—”
Crag handed him a hundred-dollar bill. “I don’t want to waste time. You send one of the bellboys, fast. Large sand shovels. And split the change out of this between you. Also don’t bury that aircar behind any others. Keep it out where I can take off the second I come back on the roof.”
“Yes, sir.” Since the shovels wouldn’t cost over ten dollars apiece, it was a generous enough tip to get fast service on both them and on the aircar.
Crag took the elevator down to his suite and let himself in. He buzzed the desk. “Two people are coming to see me. Send them up without delay the minute they get here.”
“Yes, sir. Their names?”
“Never mind what names they give. Send up anyone who asks for me.”
He tossed a few things into a small suitcase. To hell with the rest of it; he wouldn’t need it where he was going.
He took a screwdriver and unscrewed the plate of the main fluorescent switch, the first of the four hiding places in each of which he had stashed a hundred thousand dollars.
The money wasn’t there. Crag swore and was beginning to work on the second of the hiding places—whoever had searched his room couldn’t possibly have found all of them—when the door buzzer sounded and he went to answer it.
Bea stood there, and there were two other people with her. A small man, shifty-eyed and bald, but tough-looking, and a small dark Gypsy-looking woman—beautiful except for her eyes; they were the small beady eyes of a rodent.
Crag let them in and locked the door behind them.
“Crag, this is Hauser, and Gert. He says he’ll help us get Gardin, but his woman has to go along—especially if we’re all heading anywhere afterward.”
Crag nodded. “Okay. Go in the bar and make drinks. We’re almost ready; I’ve got one thing to do.”
There was no money in the second cache. Or in the third or the fourth.
He went into the bar. “Job for you,” he said. “Put down the drinks. I had money, big money, hidden in four different places in this suite. It’s gone, from all of them. That means somebody watched me doing the hiding. No kind of a search—not even a squad of cops spending weeks at it—would have found all four of those places. That means there are one-way observation panels looking into this suite. Help me find them.”
Hauser said, “Probably the mirrors. You’ve got them all over and they’re set into the wall, not hanging. I worked a luxury hotel once and that’s the usual thing, the mirrors.”
Crag nodded. There was a mirror in the wall beside where he was standing, a small one. He picked up a bottle and smashed at the mirror; it crashed through, showing space, a passageway, behind it. But the space was too small for him to get through and he picked up another bottle and went out into the living room, looking for a big mirror. He found one and smashed it out.
Hauser was behind him. “Going to get your money back? Want help? I’ve got a heater.”
Crag stepped through the space where the mirror had been. “This is a private deal; I’ll take care of it. Keep the women amused but see that nobody drinks too much. We’re going to have work to do.”
There was a maze of passageways; every room of his own suite and of all the other suites on the floor were under observation from at least one mirror. Especially the bedrooms. And the passageways were used; there wasn’t a bit of dust on their floors. Probably, besides their uses for criminal purposes, these passageways were rented occasionally to favored patrons, voyeurs, those who would rather watch than do. Well, the voyeurs would have been disappointed in watching the doings in Crag’s suite.
Not so the suite adjacent. As he passed its master bedroom he couldn’t help seeing through a big mirror that the three women who had welcomed him on his own arrival, the blonde, the brunette and the redhead, had all three been kept by the renter of the adjacent suite. And were very busy, all three of them.
He had to pass a lot of mirrors, a lot of suites, before he found steps leading downward. And from what he couldn’t help seeing, he decided that he liked the clientele of the Luxor even less than he liked its management. There may have been those among the clientele who went in for ordinary unperverted sexual amusements, but he didn’t happen to see any of them.
However, he wasn’t interested in censoring morals, but in getting his money back. And he had a strong hunch, almost a certainty, that the management was responsible for the theft. He remembered now the gleam behind Carleton’s pince-nez glasses when he had pulled out a sheaf of big bills to make an adv
ance payment on the suite. Probably the manager had from that moment posted a bellboy or other menial to watch and see whether Crag would cache money in his quarters. The bellboy would have been in on it, of course, but he’d have been lucky if the manager had given him a single thousand out of the four hundred thousand.
He didn’t investigate what was going on in any of the other floors of suites—one had been more than enough. He counted flights of stairs down until he knew he was on the main floor. And there he started looking for, and found, a panel that was locked from the other side. That would be either the manager’s private office or his personal quarters. There was no peephole or one-way mirror here, of course, so he didn’t know what was on the other side and picked the lock as silently as he had ever picked one in his life.
He inched open the panel quietly. It opened into the manager’s office, and he could see Carleton’s back only a yard from him. The manager was seated at an ornate desk, leafing through a sheaf of papers.
Crag stepped through and closed the panel behind him. He reached his right hand around the scrawny neck of the manager, squeezing just hard enough to prevent any outcry and pulling back just far enough to keep Carleton’s frantically groping hands from reaching any of the buttons on or under the desk.
He said quietly. “If you don’t already guess, or recognize my voice, you’ll know who this is when I tell you I want four hundred thousand dollars. Where is it?”
He relaxed pressure enough to permit a whisper, and when none came he tightened his fingers again.
A trembling hand came up and pointed to a metal door with a combination knob set in the wall directly across the office. Crag relaxed pressure enough to hear a croaking voice: “Left four, then six, one, eight.”
Crag pulled him out of the chair, to his feet. “Come on. You’re going with me while I open it. If there’s an alarm and any help comes, you’ll die the second it gets here.” He walked the man across the room until they stood facing the safe, Carleton between Crag and the knob. He reached, with his free left hand, around Carleton’s body.
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