Quest

by Richard Ben Sapir

  That was the worst case. The best was that he would shoot Rawson’s head in with the gun that would be untraceable, then throw the tulip away, and call Claire at her Carney home. Yes, he knew she wanted to do it her way. He knew her way was logical. But she had never dealt with killers. There was no talk. There was no reason. They killed. That’s what he knew from the streets.

  Artie would not admit it to himself, but he had panicked.

  “Looking good, Harry,” Artie said when they met that evening for dinner at Rawson’s Sherry Netherland suite.

  “Where’s Claire?” asked Rawson. He wore a light suit, without a vest but with a regimental tie. The suit was cut a bit closer than American fashion. His hair, as ever, was styled perfectly.

  “She’s going to meet us later for drinks. Look, I have the buy on the bowl if you still want it. They’ve got a couple of jade lions and lapis lazuli chips, too.”

  “I might. How much?”

  “Could you go for two hundred thousand dollars?”

  “Not on such short notice, Artie. I am landed, but not flush.”

  “What could you go for?”

  “On a moment’s notice?”

  “Yeah. Tonight.”

  “Maybe twenty-five thousand dollars.”

  “I don’t know if I could swing that,” said Artie.

  “Thirty-five.”

  “I think they’ll go for fifty. That’s what I’m hearing.”

  “We’d have to wait. I don’t know if I could get it.”

  “Let me see if they’ll go for thirty-five,” said Artie.

  It was clear enough now to Rawson that Artie was really doing the negotiation.

  “You can use these phones, Artie. A drink?”

  “No on that. And I have to meet this guy.”

  “He’s waiting nearby?”

  “Not with the stuff.”

  “Well, do hurry. And thank you, Artie,” said Rawson.

  “Yeah, I’ll hurry back,” said Artie, who phoned the suite fifteen minutes later to say there was no deal. “Guy’s got to have fifty.”

  “Would he take traveler’s checks?”

  “Are you kidding?” said Artie, and after another proper lapse of time, he phoned back Rawson to say thirty-five thousand would do, but the seller had to set up the buy in his own territory. Rawson asked where that was, and Artie said he didn’t know yet, but would find out on the way. He didn’t want to give Rawson a chance to set up something. He felt bad when he saw Rawson and almost decided to do things Claire’s way. But when he thought of Claire, and he thought of all the victims, he knew at last he could kill a man for one simple reason. He was scared witless. Looking at Rawson come down the street in his Burberry raincoat, twirling his umbrella and whistling, Artie understood revenge never would have been enough.

  “Charge,” said Rawson on the corner of Forty-seventh Street and Madison Avenue.

  “I got to phone the guy to find the place,” said Artie, reminding himself to keep his back away from the man who had killed Feldman. The main thing Artie had going for him was the fact that Rawson thought he was going to get his Grail. Until then, he had at least one free shot. He walked Rawson around a few blocks until they found a pay phone, which Artie used to dial his old telephone number. The tulip felt heavy in his side pocket. Strange how tight even his jaw was. He forced himself not to show it.

  “Okay, I’ve got the place. It’s near Bed Stuy,” said Artie.

  “Negro section?” asked Rawson.

  “Nearby,” said Artie. He hailed a cab and tried to see if Rawson had someone tailing them, some extra muscle. He didn’t see it, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t there. When they left the cab, he took Rawson through a park where they could notice anyone nearby. They safely passed a few small gangs of blacks, who now owned the park at night. They would undoubtedly think both of them were police.

  “Are we getting near?”

  “A coupla blocks,” said Artie.

  When Artie was almost certain no one was following them, he suddenly turned into one of the many abandoned buildings.

  “He’s in here,” said Artie.

  “After you,” said Rawson.

  “Sure,” said Artie. He walked carefully through the debris, lit only randomly with the light that could make it in from the the street, shadowy light, slivers of light, and lots of bottles and garbage underneath.

  Artie stopped.

  “Shhhh,” he said, as he reached into his side jacket pocket and got a good grip on the tulip, hiding the motion with his body. There was no worry about prints. They never got prints from handles of guns. Nor from triggers. Only if someone grabbed a flat metal part or the barrel would the oils that made the prints be able to adhere correctly.

  “I don’t hear anything,” said Rawson.

  Artie had the tulip out, hidden in front of his stomach, and still running the scam, said “Back there” as he turned smoothly and fired. A shot went wildly into a wall, as the gun disappeared. Something painful had ripped into his wrist, and Artie felt a tearing yank at his shoulder as he felt himself hurtle over the Burberry raincoat.

  He landed cracking on his back, with his ear and face cut by glass and Rawson diving on him. But Artie had powerful legs, and he smashed them upward at Rawson, who took the blow and got his own kick excruciatingly into Artie’s groin. Rawson proved a gutter fighter of the first rank. Everywhere Artie swung, Rawson seemed to be able to glance by it and deliver pain. Then there was the knee into Artie’s face, and the flashing lights, and waking up in a place with a dulled flashlight and no windows.

  Knives tore at his wrists. Someone was piercing knives into each wrist and into one leg too. He was pinned by the knives, and he screamed, but the scream choked him, choked in his throat right back into his stomach. His mouth was held by a slab of tape that just let him breathe through his nose. The flashlight shone on one wrist and then the other. It was then that Artie saw the nails.

  “Artie, there is no way I can not kill you now,” came the voice from behind the flashlight that had showed him the nails. It was Rawson. He was speaking with a softened voice, but some urgency. “You understand that, of course. I am going to have to have certain information. When I get it, I will let you go peacefully. There will be no pain. The pain will end. I’ve seen death. We’re all having it sooner or later, and there is nothing bad in the death itself. At worst, old boy, it’s the best sleep ever. I’m sorry about this really. I liked you. I would have loved to have done the world with you. Do you understand? Blink if you do.”

  Artie shut his eyes. He felt the spike in his left hand tear tendons and he screamed. There was no sound.

  “Artie, please. Please don’t make me do this, not with you. I don’t want to have to do this. Do you understand?”

  Artie blinked.

  “Good. Now, I am going to have to know two things. Where is Claire Andrews and where is the poorish bowl?”

  Artie blinked.

  “Does that mean you’re going to tell me?”

  Artie blinked.

  Rawson reached over and carefully lifted up the adhesive, strangely careful not to cause more pain.

  “Where?”

  “She’s here in Brooklyn. She’s got it.”

  Rawson gently rolled back the tape, and merely shook Artie’s right hand like a limp hello to send Artie writhing against the nails, screaming back into his own throat and then quivering to a halt, trying desperately not to move anything, lest the nails cause pain again.

  “Artie, I know when you’re telling the truth and when you’re not. There is a fairly set pattern to these things. You don’t know the pattern, so you don’t know how to lie to me. Really you don’t. This is beyond what you know. Artie, I don’t want to hurt you. I don’t want to do this to you.”

  Artie did not blink. He thought, If with one yank I can get both hands free, maybe I can get out of this, or force a fight, or even get killed. But the hands he thought about were the ones he dared not move, not a fract
ion, not a speck, because that was where his hell was.

  He was had. There was no way he was getting out of this, until Rawson put him out for good.

  Rawson shook hands again. Artie wrenched again. He was crying and sobbing, but no one heard the sobs. And Rawson wrenched again, and Artie quivered, and screamed the soundless scream.

  He felt water on his forehead. Rawson was gently bathing his forehead.

  “You know, I should tell you the secret of the thousand-dollar whore, old boy. They are not different in any way from your five-pound screw. They give you the illusion that you’re not paying for it, really that they enjoy you. And of course they’re prettier and younger and that’s about it. So do not think I would let you die without knowing that.”

  Had Artie told? He had passed out, he was sure. He didn’t remember Rawson starting to bathe his head. Was Claire going to die now, too?

  “Look, just a couple of more details, if you would. What sort of shape was the bowl in when you got it? You already told me where she is, so you can tell me that. Blink if you are going to make us go through this again.”

  Artie did not blink. He felt the tape come off, and he spat out blood, and got some water, and then the tape went back on, and the pain came again to his left wrist. He had not talked. Even in the pain, he knew that making someone believe their information was not really needed that badly was a way to get it through the back door.

  He felt the water on his head again. He had passed out again, he knew.

  “One word, tell me one word, Artie. Is she still in New York? Yes or no?”

  Thank God. He hadn’t told. But he did not know if he could go on. He would go on for the next moment. That’s all he promised himself. Just the next moment, he would go on. He would give Claire, precious Claire, that moment of safety. And thinking that, he saw her face in front of him, that precious courageous face that he wished he could merely die for. He knew he could do that now, but he did not know if he could last another instant of pain. He screamed back into his throat, trying to control the convulsion so the leg and other arm would not tear from him.

  XXVIII

  You shall reign over all things whatsover the air touches, all creatures, tame and wild shall serve you and the utmost of power and riches shall be yours.

  —SIR THOMAS MALORY

  Morte d’Arthur, ca. 1470

  (Addressed to winner of the Holy Grail)

  “He’s not there,” said Claire’s mother.

  Claire put down the morning coffee that Cissy, the cook, had made, that awful family favorite with chicory.

  “You phoned as Mrs. Donaldson?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right, thank you,” said Claire.

  “Something has gone wrong?”

  “I believe,” said Claire.

  “We can always get Frank Broyles to phone the New York City Police Department,” said Mother, referring to the police chief of Carney.

  “No. No,” said Claire. “Phone my home in New York and see if he answers.”

  “There is a problem,” said Mother.

  “Yes. Please phone.”

  Her mother was about to ask Claire if she were sure this were the right thing, but she saw a desperate strength in her daughter, a knowledge of worlds her young girl could not share with her immediately, if ever. She had just found her daughter as a friend the night before. Now she might be losing her, as a friend and as her only child. Lenore McCafferty Andrews felt helpless.

  Claire’s voice on her machine answered the phone. Lenore put her hand over the receiver.

  “He’s not there. Do you want me to leave a message?”

  “No. Phone the Sherry Netherland. Find out if a Harry Rawson has checked in.”

  “Are you all right?”

  “I don’t think so, Mother,” said Claire. “We’ll find out.”

  Claire finished her coffee. She could phone McKiernan and Marino in Homicide. They would be more likely to help, but that was all. Just more likely, and not definite, considering what they were up against. There was no one in any large government office she could trust not to be influenced by the British. She had perfected the technique of operating with unknowns and calculated presumptions while she had tracked the coming together of the Tilbury Cellar through history.

  “They say he checked in from Cairo yesterday morning,” Mother said.

  There was no point in waiting any longer.

  “I’ll take it, thank you,” said Claire, getting up from the white tablecloth with the April sun streaming onto the dining room table, casting shadows from the buds on the trees, so that spotted patterns made the cloth look as though Rusty had run across a hundred times leaving paw prints.

  “I’d like to speak to Mr. Rawson,” said Claire, when she got the phone.

  “He does not seem to be in his room. You may leave a message. He does check in roughly every two hours.”

  “Yes, tell Mr. Rawson that Claire Andrews has what he wants, and she is at home in Carney, Ohio,” she said and gave her home phone number. Then she asked Mother if Frank Broyles might not stop over for a while and keep someone about.

  “Are we in danger?”

  “Yes, but I don’t think anything will happen yet. If you can ask Mr. Broyles if any more people are calling about us, I would appreciate that, too. I think Arthur might be in trouble.”

  “Oh, dear,” said her mother.

  “We’ll be all right.”

  “Your father used to say that, but not as kindly. He would get angry when you questioned him. I think you’re stronger than he was.”

  “The McCafferty blood, Mom?” asked Claire.

  “Well, I was thinking that. You’re not going to get angry about that, are you?”

  “Later, Mom. I don’t have time.”

  Everything was ready, and when Mother said a very pleasant English gentleman was on the phone, Claire knew Rawson had gotten the message. She took the call in her bedroom, and while looking at Puffy, the stuffed dragon, and the Carney C she had gotten when she made cheerleader in her junior year at high school, she went head to head with one of the more ruthless killers of the world.

  “So nice of you to phone, Claire,” said Rawson.

  “I have what you want,” said Claire.

  “The bowl?”

  “The Holy Grail,” said Claire.

  There was a pause on the line. Finally, Rawson said, most cheerily for someone who had to be taken aback, “Well, none of us really does know about that for certain, do we? So let us establish a price if we can and get this thing over with, happily for one and all.”

  “I want Arthur to be nearby.”

  “That might be a bit difficult.”

  Claire felt her body grow numb. But all she had heard was Rawson imply that Arthur was dead. If he were dead, then there was nothing she could do. On the other hand, Rawson might be feeling her out to see if he could finish Arthur off with impunity. She did not know either as fact. But she had to work on the latter possibility. It was the only thing she had.

  “That’s too bad, because without Arthur, you are never getting the Holy Grail,” said Claire.

  “We’re talking price. Let’s at least negotiate.”

  “He is not negotiable.”

  “Well let’s say, he would be impossible. What’s done is done, and nothing can bring him back. Then do you really wish to pass up the small fortune?”

  “Without question and absolutely.”

  “Well, then, we’ll just have to make sure Arthur is about, won’t we?”

  “I would say,” said Claire, feeling her body release almost to tears, yet knowing, on the other hand, that this is what Rawson would have to say, even if Arthur were dead. She told Rawson he would be met at the airport and hung up.

  She met him as planned, in Bob Truet’s office after Frank Broyles escorted the British visitor up through the newsroom. Bob Truet himself brought up the box she had asked him to hold in the main safe of the Carney Daily News. It was a
black gift box from the local jewelry store for something the size of a toaster. Two pieces of clear adhesive tape held down the edges.

  Captain Harry Rawson of Her Majesty’s Argyle Sutherlanders wore a light tweed suit with a vest, regimental tie, and polished cordovan shoes. He was shaved, fresh, immaculately groomed. And he had arrived without Arthur.

  Claire could find nothing at home but a frilly blouse from Mother. It didn’t matter. She didn’t need a power suit when there was so much blood on the table already.

  She could have worn her Carney C sweater.

  “Well, here we are,” said Rawson, looking around the large corner room with the view of Main Street shops and the church at the corner and the civic and news awards against the wall.

  “It’s in the box,” said Claire.

  “May I?” said Rawson.

  Claire nodded. She felt weak. She felt tired. She felt angry. She felt frightened. And she didn’t care. She was here. She had prepared everything, and she was never going to be in a better place or a better time. If it were going to work, it would work. And if it weren’t, there was nothing she could do now.

  “Looks somewhat pitiful. One has to say, as one says upon first sex, is that all there is?”

  “That’s it,” said Claire.

  “Well, then, let’s get on with things. What do you want for it?”

  “Two and a half million dollars.”

  “The money is no problem. There will be no difficulty with that. There is some difficulty with your boyfriend. I am afraid he’s dead.”

  Claire didn’t know how she was able to answer, but she heard the words come clearly from her mouth, hard words, words she had prepared and hoped she would never have to use.

  “Then you lose, Captain Rawson. We have a news story already prepared about Britain’s killings for the Holy Grail, and we will run a picture of it, just as we will run the picture taken of you when you entered, Captain Harry Rawson of the Queen’s Argyle Sutherlanders, coming to make the deal on the Grail. You’re in Ohio now, Captain, not some international city. Ohio, America. It will be the biggest story here ever, and let me tell you how newspapers work. There is a service called the World Associated Press, of which this newspaper is a member. That wire service goes all over the world, as you can imagine. And the nice thing is, it will take the story as written, and there are some very good facts, including maps showing what Britain was when you had the Grail and what you are now without it. I am sorry it came to this.”