Athabasca

by Alistair MacLean

  Brady did not answer. Dermott went on: “The third thing is this: there must be some reason, albeit devious, why Bronowski was clobbered and Houston made the discovery. Look at it this way. What evidence do we have that Bronowski was assaulted? The only certain thing we know about him is that he’s lying in the sick bay with an impressive bandage round his head. I don’t think there’s a damn thing wrong with Bronowski. I don’t think anybody hit him. I suggest that if the bandage were removed, his temple would be unblemished, except, perhaps, for an artistic touch of gentian blue.”

  Brady assumed the expression of a man praying for inner strength. “So, besides not trusting security men, you don’t trust doctors, either?”

  “Some I do. Some I don’t. I’ve already told you that I’m leery of Blake.”

  “Got one single hard fact to back up your suspicions?”

  “No.”

  “Okay, then.” Brady didn’t enlarge on this brief statement.

  “We also rounded up the Prudhoe Bay members who were in Anchorage on the night of that telephone call,” Mackenzie said. “Fourteen in all. They seemed a pretty harmless bunch to me. However, Morrison of the F.B.I. did call up the law in Anchorage, gave names and addresses and asked them to see if they could turn up anything.”

  “You printed those fourteen, right?”

  “Yes. One of Morrison’s assistants did. Some Ivy League kid.”

  “No objections offered?”

  “None. They seemed eager to co-operate.”

  “Proves nothing. Anyway, I brought along the prints found on the phone booth. They’re being checked now against the prints of the fourteen.”

  “That won’t take long,” Mackenzie said. “Give them a call, shall I?” He called, listened briefly, hung up and said to Dermott: “Cassandra.”

  “So.” Brady looked positively lugubrious, no easy feat for a man without a line in his face. “Houston’s finest have run into a brick wall.”

  “Let’s not reproach ourselves too much,” Dermott said. He looked less downcast than the other two. “Our business is investigating oil sabotage, not murder, which is the province of the F.B.I. and the Alaskan State police. They appear to have run into the same brick wall. Besides, we may have the lead into another line of investigation—John Finlayson’s autopsy.”

  “Huh!” Brady gave a contemptuous lift of his hands. “That’s over. It turned up nothing.”

  “The first one didn’t. But the second one might.”

  Mackenzie said: “What! Another autopsy?”

  “The first one was pretty superficial and perfunctory.”

  “Unprecedented.” Brady shook his head. “Who the hell authorised this?”

  “Nobody really. I did ask for it, but politely.”

  Brady cursed, whether because of Dermott’s words or because he had spilled a goodly portion of a daiquiri over his immaculately trousered knee. He refilled his glass, breathed deeply and said: “Took your own goddamned good time in getting round to telling us, didn’t you?”

  “Everything in its own good time, Jim: just a matter of getting priorities right. It’ll be a couple of days before we get the results of this autopsy. I really can’t see why you are getting so steamed up.”

  “I can damn well tell you. Who the hell gave you the authorisation to make such a request without first getting permission from me?”

  “Nobody did.”

  “You had time before you left here this morning to discuss the matter with me.”

  “Sure I had time, but I hadn’t had the idea by then. I was half-way down to Anchorage before it occurred to me that there could be something far wrong. Do you imagine I’d talk to you in Prudhoe Bay over an open line?”

  “You talk as if this place is an international hotbed of espionage,” Brady came back to him sarcastically.

  “It only requires one disaffected ear, and we might as well pack our bags and return to Houston. We already know how good those people are at covering their tracks.”

  “George.” It was Mackenzie. “You’ve made your point. What triggered your suspicions?”

  “Dr Blake. You know that as far as the murdered engineers at Pump Station Four and Bronowski’s alleged accident were concerned, I already had reservations about Blake. I began to wonder if there was anything that could tie Blake in with Finlayson’s death. I was the only person who saw the body between the completion of Blake’s autopsy and the time the lid was screwed down on the coffin.” Dermott stopped to sip.

  “During that period Blake showed me marks on the back of the neck where, he said, Finlayson had been sand-bagged into unconsciousness. On the plane it occurred to me that I had never seen a bruise or contusion of that nature. There was no sign of discoloration, or of swelling. It seemed to me more than likely that the skin had been roughed up after death. Blake said Finlayson had been struck by a bag of damp salt. His neck smelled of salt all right, but it could have been rubbed on during the night, after the body had been brought back up to the room. If he had been coshed, the vertebrae would have been depressed or broken.”

  Mackenzie said: “Obvious question—were they?”

  “I don’t know. They looked okay to me. But Dr Parker will know.”

  “Dr Parker?”

  “Works with the Anchorage police in a forensic capacity. Struck me as a very bright old boy. My request wasn’t too well received at first. Like yourselves, he regarded the concept of a second autopsy as unprecedented or unconstitutional or whatever. He read Blake’s death certificate and seemed to think it perfectly in order.”

  “But you persuaded him to the contrary?”

  “Not exactly. He promised nothing. But he seemed interested enough to do something.”

  Brady said: “You are a persuasive cuss, George.”

  Dermott paused reflectively. “It may be nothing, or it may be another straw in the wind—but Dr Parker has never heard of Dr Blake.”

  Brady resumed his favourite steeple-fingered pontificating attitude. “You’re aware that Alaska is more than half the size of Western Europe?”

  “I’m also aware that in Western Europe there must be the odd hundred million people. In Alaska, a few hundred thousand. I’d be surprised, if, outside the few hospitals, there are more than sixty or seventy doctors, and a veteran like Parker would be bound to know or know of them all.”

  Brady unsteepled his fingertips and said: “There is hope for you. An immediate investigation into Doctor Blake’s antecedents would appear to be in order.”

  “Immediate,” Mackenzie agreed. “Morrison’s the man for that. Wouldn’t it be interesting, too, to have a run-down on the man who appointed or recommended Blake to this post?”

  “It would,” Dermott said. “And it would certainly narrow the field a bit. I wonder. You remember just after we arrived here asking whether there were any ideas about the type of weapon used on Bronowski, and Morrison said—I think I quote him accurately—‘Dr Blake says he’s no specialist in criminal acts of violence’?”

  Brady nodded.

  “So. This morning, when I was with him in Finlayson’s room discussing the reasons for the man’s death, he mentioned in an off-hand way that he used to be an expert in the forensic field. Obviously he said it to lend credence to his diagnosis. But it was a slip, all the same. One time or the other, he was lying.”

  Dermott looked at Brady and asked: “Your agents in New York who are investigating Bronowski’s security firm there—they aren’t, shall we say, exactly burning up the track. Give them a nudge?”

  “Negative. You said yourself that an open line…”

  “Who’s talking about an open line? We do it through Houston, in your code.”

  “Huh! That damn code. You encode any message you like and authorise it in my name.”

  Mackenzie winked unobtrusively, but Dermott ignored him and began to spell out a message to the telephone operator. It said much for his mastery of a code which its inventor found insupportably burdensome that he encoded t
he words straight out of his head, without having to make a prior transcript.

  He had barely finished when a knock on the door announced the arrival of Hamish Black. The pencil moustache on the Alaskan general manager was as immaculately trimmed as ever, the central parting of the hair still apparently drawn by ruler, the eyeglass so securely anchored that it looked as if it could have ridden out a hurricane. He still dressed in pure City accountant, first class. At that moment, however, there was a difference in his general demeanour: he looked like a first-class accountant who had just stumbled across proof of unmistakable and gross embezzlement in the books of his favourite client. Yet he maintained his cool—or cold.

  “Good evening, gentlemen.” He was a specialist in wintry smiles. “I hope I do not intrude, Mr Brady?”

  “Come in, come in.” Brady was affability itself, a sure sign that he didn’t care too much for his visitor. “Make yourself at home.” He glanced around the cramped confines of his room and at the only three already occupied chairs. “Well—”

  “Thank you, I’ll stand. I shall not detain you for long.”

  “A drink? One of my incomparable rum drinks? How about a cigar?”

  “Thank you. I neither smoke nor drink.” The minuscule twitch of the left-hand corner of his upper lip clearly indicated his opinion of those who did. “I have come here because in my capacity of general manager of Sohio/B.P. I felt it my duty to ask how much progress you have made in your investigations to date.”

  Dermott said: “What have we found out so far? Well—”

  “Will you please be quiet, sir. I was addressing—”

  “George!” Brady made a downward placatory movement of the hand towards a Dermott who was already half-way out of his seat. He looked coldly at Black. “We are not employees of yours, Mr Black. We are not even retained by you, but directly by your head office in London. I suggest that if you want to leave this room the way you entered it, you watch your language.”

  Black’s lips had disappeared somewhere. “Sir! I am not accustomed—”

  “Okay, okay. We all know that. You’re obviously in a hostile mood. Our progress so far? Not much. Would there be anything else?”

  Black was clearly taken aback. It is difficult for an old-time man-of-war to attack when the wind has been taken out of its sails.

  “So you admit—”

  “No admission. We’re just making a statement. Can we be of further help?”

  “Indeed you can. You can explain to me the justification for your staying on here. The firm can scarcely afford the fees you seem likely to charge, if it gets no advantage. You have achieved nothing, and seem unlikely to achieve anything. You investigate industrial sabotage, specifically oil-flow interruption. There is, I suggest, a considerable difference between the spilling of oil and the spilling of blood. One cannot but suspect but that you are out of your depth and that events are beyond your control. One further suspects that the investigation should be left to those qualified to investigate criminal matters—the F.B.I. and the Alaskan State police.”

  “We’d be interested to know what they’ve found out. Or don’t you feel free to tell us?”

  Black compressed his lips still tighter. Mackenzie said: “May I have a word, Mr Brady?”

  “Certainly, Donald.”

  “Mr Black: Your attitude here is singularly reminiscent of the one you adopted when first we met you. Have you the power to make us leave?”

  “Yes.”

  “Permanently?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “You know very well why not. London head office would reinstate you.”

  “Possibly with the qualification that if any such situation arose again it would be the general manager, Alaska, who would be required to leave.”

  “I couldn’t really say.”

  “I can. Or didn’t you know that Mr Brady is a close personal friend of the chairman of your company?”

  From the way that Black touched his collar, it was clear that this was news to him. From the way Jim Brady experienced a sudden difficulty in swallowing a mouthful of daiquiri, it was clear that it was news to him also.

  “To return to your earlier attitude, Mr Black,” Mackenzie persisted. “On that occasion Mr Dermott said he thought you might have something to hide. Mr Brady suggested you were being unduly secretive and had—what was it again?—some undisclosed and possibly discreditable reason for choosing to obstruct the best interests of your company. Reasonable requests you regarded as being preposterous. Finally, as I recall, Mr Dermott said that you were either standing on your high horse as general manager, Alaska, and were above such petty annoyances, or that you were concealing something you didn’t want us to know about.”

  Black was possibly a shade or two paler, but his pallor could well have been caused by anger. He reached for the door handle.

  “This is intolerable! I refuse to be the subject of character assassination.”

  As he pulled open the door, Mackenzie said, reproachingly, “I think it’s impolite to interrupt a man’s speech.”

  Black’s eyes matched well the icy conditions outside. “What does that mean?”

  “Just that I would like to finish what I’ve been saying.”

  Black looked at his watch. “Make it short.”

  “I know you have a great deal to do, Mr Black.” Two tiny spots of pink appeared on the pale cheekbones, for Mackenzie’s tone had made it abundantly clear he didn’t believe Black had anything to do. “So I’ll keep it short. Your intransigence interests us. You have made it abundantly clear that you would be happy to be rid of us. By your own admission you’ve acknowledged that we would be back very soon afterwards, perhaps even in a matter of days. The conclusion is that you want us out of the way even if for only a brief period. One wonders what you intend to do or have done during that short time?”

  “I see. You leave me with no alternative other than to report your gross incompetence and insolence to my board of directors in London.”

  When the door had closed Dermott said: “Not a bad exit line. He’ll do nothing of the kind, of course—not when he’s had time to reflect on Mr Brady’s close personal relationship with his board chairman.” Dermott looked at Brady. “I didn’t know—”

  “Neither did I.” Brady was positively jovial. He smacked one fat fist into the other podgy palm. “Tell me, Donald, how much of what you said did you mean?”

  “Who’s to know? Not me. I just don’t like the bastard.”

  “Hardly the basis for a dispassionate judgment,” Dermott said. “But a splendid demolition job, Donald. There are times when a man rises above himself.” He paused for a moment, then looked at Brady. “Remember the last time we had a run-in with our friend, you said that it was a pity that he acted so suspiciously, otherwise he would have made a splendid suspect? Maybe we’re outsmarting ourselves. It’s barely possible that he should be a suspect. Maybe, in addition, he’s outsmarting us. This won’t have escaped you?”

  Brady stopped being jovial. “Double-guessing again. How often do I have to tell you, George, I hate this goddamn double-guessing. General manager, Alaska. Jesus, George, somebody, by definition, has to be beyond suspicion.”

  In Dermott’s cabin Mackenzie said: “Took you a long time to transmit that coded message to Houston. Your brief was merely to ask them to expedite the boss’s earlier instructions. What the hell else did you say?”

  “I asked them to find out if anybody had left Bronowski’s security firm within six months before or after Bronowski’s leaving.”

  “Maybe Brady’s right. Maybe this security bit is getting to you. And even if Bronowski has hauled some of his old associates along with him, they may have changed their names.”

  “Hardly matters. Descriptions will be enough. And as for my being bitten by the bug, it’s high time you and Jim were too. How would you try to account for the fact that the bastards in Alberta know the Alaskan company’s code, while the villains in Ala
ska know the Albertan code, the private Sanmobil code?”

  “Ever since the first identical messages were received at Prudhoe Bay and Sanmobil, we’ve known our Alaskan and Athabascan friends were in cahoots, nicely co-ordinating their efforts to keep us wrong-footed and ensuring that we were in A while we should have been in B, and vice versa. There’s no doubt in my mind that both security corps have been infiltrated. Our only suspects on both sides are security people.”

  “So you think the overall co-ordinator must be a security man?”

  “Not necessarily. But what I’m sure of is that pretty soon we’re going to hear of some fresh calamity that has struck in Athabasca. The master puppeteer must be thinking it’s time the puppets were dancing again.”

  “Co-ordination,” Mackenzie said darkly.

  “In this instance?”

  “You heard what I said to Black. That he wants us out for a few days for some purpose. If he can’t get rid of us in one way—by asking us to leave—then he’ll do it in another by arranging a fresh Athabascan calamity.”

  Dermott sighed, drew a line under a list of names he had printed, and handed it over. “Names for investigation—let’s hope—by our friend Morrison of the F.B.I. What d’you think of it?”

  Mackenzie took the list and studied it. His eyebrows went up. “Make Morrison jump, for sure,” he said.

  “I don’t care if he jumps over the moon, as long as he gets on with it when he comes down,” said Dermott heavily. “We’ve got to get action somewhere.” He was about to say something else when the telephone rang. He picked up the receiver to listen, and gradually his face went chalk white. He seemed not to notice when the glass in his left hand shattered, crushed by the pressure he had put on it, and a little rivulet of blood ran down his palm.

  11

  “What a place!” exclaimed Stella as she came back into Corinne’s office. “Heavens—I had no idea it was so big. We seem to have driven about fifty miles.”

  “Well, it’s quite a size, that’s for sure.” Corinne grinned, pleased that her guests had enjoyed themselves. “I hope you found it interesting too, Mrs Brady?”