by Jon Cleary
there was one organization that aimed at an empire among the city’s clubs but so far it had not reached the headlines. There was another loud crack from outside: the trees were being demolished limb by limb.
“Christ, how did I get into this?” He leaned his head back against the chair, exhausted by dread, hopelessness and anger. He sat there a moment, then abruptly he stood up. He grabbed up Padua’s card from the small table. “I’m going after him! I don’t care a bugger about you and New York-”
Forte stood in front of him. “You stay where you are! You try to go see Padua and I’ll have you picked up and held - “
“Held? Arrested? What for?”
“Disturbing the peace, suspicious behaviour - you’re a cop, you’ve used the same excuses whenever you’ve wanted anyone held. I’ll do it, Malone,” he emphasized, when he saw that the Australian didn’t quite believe him. “I’m sorry about your wife, but my wife’s in this too. And we’ll play it my way till I know there’s absolutely no alternative but to give in on the ransom terms!”
“That may be too bloody late - “
Then Roger and Pier came in, wrapped up against the storm outside. They paused at the door, sensing something was wrong. Then Roger said, “We’re ready, Dad. But I wish to hell we didn’t have to go down to Grandma’s. We’d rather be here -just in case they let Mother make a call - “
Forte hesitated, looked at Malone, then back at the children. “Okay, stay here. Look after Inspector Malone, keep him company.” He looked back at Malone. “And remember- I meant what I said!”
“Mother and Dad are on TV tonight,” said Pier.
Forte had gone, and for the past half-hour Malone had held a desultory, awkward conversation with the two chil-
dren. Roger, gauche in his attempt to sound older than he was, not helped at all by Malone’s inability to find a level with him, had soon lapsed into silence. Pier, more at ease, had tried to keep the conversation going by asking about Lisa; Malone, appreciating her effort, had done his best to reply in something other than monosyllables. But he was well aware that when he was in the company of anyone under the age of eighteen he was about as loquacious as an aborigine who had had the bone pointed at him. If the Irish were supposed to love children, he had been overlooked when his ration of charity had been handed out. Kids bored him, even ones he felt sorry for.
Pier led the way out to the study where Malone had taken the phone calls. Roger, unwinding himself like a young giraffe getting to its feet, followed his sister and Malone into the room, switched on the television set mounted in the wall, then fell into the nearest chair. Malone looked around for chairs for Pier and himself.
“Let Roger get them, Inspector.” The young girl looked at her brother. “On your feet, you slob. Your manners are execrable.”
“Ex-who? Jesus, what sorta words do they teach you at St Tim’s?” But the boy got to his feet, dragged two chairs up level with his own. “Sorry, Inspector. I guess I’m not functioning too well tonight.”
“Who is?” said Malone, but he smiled at the boy and for the first time there was some rapport between them.
“The segment was taped last week.” Pier arranged herself in her chair. Arranged is the word, Malone thought: she wasn’t sitting like himself or sprawled like her brother. “Mr Cronkite was here when I phoned Mother from school.”
“Who’s Mr Cronkite?”
The television screen almost cracked; certainly Roger’s face splintered. “He’s just about the biggest name in television news in America! Don’t you have TV in Australia?”
I must sound like someone from the Arunta tribe; they’re probably wondering why I haven’t got my boomerang and
spear with me. “Yes, but we’re still showing lantern slides on it.”
Roger stared at him, then abruptly grinned. “You’re okay, Inspector.”
But Pier wasn’t smiling. “When I phoned Mother, that was the last time I spoke to her.” She looked down at the hands folded in her lap and Malone, watching her closely, saw the fingers tighten. His own hand went out of its own volition, touched her arm. She looked up at him, blinked, then said quietly, “Thank you, Inspector. I’m going to be all right.”
Then Malone all at once felt at home with the two children; the three of them settled back like a family for a night’s television viewing. Mr Gronkite, the stranger to Malone, was already on the screen, green-hued enough to have passed for St Patrick; Roger got up, adjusted the colour tone, then flopped back in his chair. Malone listened to the introduction to the Fortes, wondering why all American commentators sounded like ventriloquial dolls for the voice of God, then the film of Michael and Sylvia Forte began to run.
The children both sat forward, something Malone was sure they had not done other times they had seen their parents on television. Roger’s face was wide open and very young, his love for his mother exposed through the cloak of sophistication that was several sizes too big for him; and Pier’s eyes were brimming with tears, her hands in her lap now held in the attitude of prayer. I wonder how much would show in my face, Malone wondered, if Lisa were also there on the screen ?
But Lisa was not there and so he looked at the woman he had never seen but whose fate was linked so tightly now with Lisa’s, who, blameless as she might be, was the reason Lisa was in danger. He now dimly remembered seeing a photograph of Sylvia Forte in Time, but it had not done her justice: he would have remembered her better if she had looked as she did now on the screen.
“Your mother’s beautiful.”
“Yes,” said Pier, and her brother nodded. “But she’s more than that. Dad loves her so much - you can see it even there.”
It was true: Michael Forte turned and smiled at his wife and there was a moment of intimacy between them when the camera suddenly was an intruder. Cronkite was interviewing them, but Malone was not listening to the words: the sound could have been turned off for all the notice he took of it. He stared at Michael and Sylvia Forte, and as he did, like a double image, he saw the ghosts of himself and Lisa behind them.
The phone rang. Malone, lost in the nightmare fantasy on the television screen, jumped nervously but recovered at once. He looked anxiously at Roger as the boy picked up the phone; then tried to tell himself that a hundred calls a day must come into this house and there was no reason why this one should be any different from all the others. Then he saw the puzzled look on Roger’s face.
“What is it?”
The boy put his hand over the mouthpiece. “It’s some dame wanting Dad - “
Malone took the phone. “This is Inspector Malone - “
A man’s voice answered. “This is Lieutenant Denning, Inspector. We’ve set up an emergency switchboard here, just in case something like this happened. We’ve told the woman the Mayor’s not here. Do you think we should tell her where she can get him? She could be just a crank- “
“Put her on,” said Malone. “If I keep her talking, can you trace the call?”
“We can try, sir. We’re linked through to Headquarters and they’ve alerted the telephone company.”
The woman’s voice was soft and pleasant, but Malone could notice the faint undertone of tension in it: whoever she was, he would bet she was not an old hand at this game. “I understand Mayor Forte is not there. Who is this?”
“Malone. You’re holding my wife with Mrs Forte.”
Behind him he could feel the strained attention of the children. Roger had taken hold of Pier’s hand, the first sign the boy had shown of any concern for his sister. The sound on the television set had been turned off, but Michael and Sylvia Forte still walked in the garden of the house, laughing at each other in the happy past of a week ago.
There was silence for a moment, then the woman said, “I am truly sorry about that, Mr Malone. We’d rather not have her with us, but we had to take her.”
“Is she still all right? Both of them?” The children leaned forward; he could almost hear them holding their breath. He stared at the
screen: Sylvia Forte was there in close-up, alone, a frown of amused puzzlement on her face as the unseen Mr Cronkite asked her a question.
“They are both well, Mr Malone.”
“Can you give us some proof of that? Can I speak to my wife? To both of them?” He had no real hope that the woman would grant him his request, but he had to keep her on the line: somewhere the electronics experts were seeking to pinpoint the call. “We want some proof that you’re going to carry out your part of the bargain - “
“Oh, we’ll carry it out, Mr Malone. But there may be a hitch-” Oh Christ, he thought, what’s gone wrong? Have we buggered up things at our end? “This storm - planes might not be able to get off the ground tomorrow here in New York. What happens then?”
“You name it. We’ll do whatever you say, just so long as we get my wife and Mrs Forte back safely.” He looked at the children, nodded reassuringly; but there was no reaction on their faces, they would believe nothing till the silent smiling ghost on the television screen was a live reality in the house again.
“You’ve decided to release Parker and his friends?”
“Yes.” She had asked him if he had decided: he was not speaking for Forte and the politicians who surrounded him.
“We’ll be back to you.” The tension went out of her voice; she sounded - relieved ? he wondered. “If the storm keeps
up, we’ll tell you our other plans. We’ll call again first thing in the morning.”
“Wait!” How could he keep her on the line? Had they succeeded in tracing the call yet? Michael Forte was now on the screen, looking directly into the camera, silently pleading for last week’s cause, whatever it had been: law and order? Then Malone said, “What about Frank Padua?”
“Who?”
“Your go-between - ” He hoped he sounded convincing. “He was here an hour ago, said he was acting for you - “
“Padua?”
“I don’t know him. He’s a - a political acquaintance of Mayor Forte’s - “
There was silence for a long moment, then a click. A man’s voice came on the line at once: “She’s hung up, Inspector. We traced the call, but I’m afraid it’s not gonna be much use. It was a phone booth out on the Island, at Patchogue. We’ve sent a coupla squad cars to it, but we’ll be lucky if she’s still there.”
Malone hung up, turned back to the children. He shook his head in answer to their silent question. Then Nathan, the butler, came to the door.
“Captain Jefferson is here, Inspector. He says he has something for you.”
Chapter Five
Carole hung up the phone, stood staring at the wall in front of her. Something was wrong; and once again she felt the uneasiness grip her. It had clutched her this afternoon when the wind had come battering at the cottage; it was the first warning that things might not go exactly as she had planned. She would have to find out who Frank Padua was, do something about him. She had no idea what could be done, if she did find him, but no outsiders could be allowed to interfere with her plan.
She ran across the sidewalk to her car, got in and drove down the deserted street. Neon signs glimmered like watery fires through the rain-swept windscreen; the lighted windows of stores splashed the pavements with gold that ran off into the gutters. A huge truck, loaded with potatoes, overtook her, riding alongside her for a full block, flinging up mud and water against the window beside her. She cursed the truck driver, urging him to get quickly by her. She did not see the two police cars speeding down the other side of the street, nor did they see her.
It had been a mistake to come out on such a night. But she had had to escape from the cottage; she had become as much a prisoner there as Sylvia Forte and the Australian woman. It would have been useless to explain to Abel; the only memories he retained were the ones he wore like a hair-shirt. He would never understand that pleasant memories could, in the sad realization that the experiences that had prompted them had gone forever, turn into a form of torture. Childhood and girlhood had scratched at her, raising welts of memory: Julie Birmingham had not been buried after all.
“You’re crazy, baby, wanting to go out nowV Abel had said.
“I have to. I - I think we ought to call them, tell them the storm may change our plans.” It was as good a reason as any, though she had had to invent it.
“The hell with them!” Abel was angry; he did not like the thought of her leaving him even for a couple of hours. “If they want the dames back, they’re gonna let those guys go, don’t matter what the weather’s like.”
“We’ve got to think of Parker and the other men - we can’t risk their lives by insisting that the plane take off for Cuba regardless of what the weather’s like. No, I’m going into Patchogue, honey - “
It was part of their plan that they should make no phone calls any closer than thirty miles to the cottage. There was a phone here in the living-room, but they had agreed it was to be used only in the utmost emergency; she had been pleased to find that her mother hadn’t changed, had, with her usual vagueness, forgotten to have the phone disconnected when the cottage had been closed up. The first call by herself had been made from the house in Jamaica; the second, by Abel, from a call-box in Flushing; so long as they spread the calls the police would have difficulty in pinning down their location. She would be safe enough driving into Patchogue: anywhere would be an escape from what was beginning to torment her in this cottage.
Unguardedly she said, “I need to get out - “
He had a trick of looking from the corners of his eyes, half-suspicious, half-frightened; as a small child he had learned not to trust anyone or anything, the helping hand had too often turned into a fist. “You getting tired of me?”
“Honey!” She put almost too much protest into the endearment; she leaned forward and kissed him, hoping he wouldn’t see the truth in her face. “That’s a terrible thing to say - we’re only at the beginning of things - “
He put his arms round her, pulled her to him. “Sorry, baby. I love you so much - too much, maybe - “
no
“Never too much. You can’t love too much - ” But maybe if she had not loved Roy too much her life would not have ended four years ago, she would not be enduring this husk of an existence …
As she drove out of Patchogue she debated whether she should stop and phone Abel; then she decided against it, exhausted even by the thought of the argument that would go on over the phone. He worried too much for her and, she had begun to realize only after she had driven away from the cottage, he too had made a prisoner of her.
She drove as fast as the storm would allow her. Several times, when she had got on to the parkway that led to Manhattan, she slowed, wondering if she should turn back. But each time she picked up speed again, driven on by the determination to find out who Frank Padua was, to stop him, if she could, from ruining her plans.
She knew where Michael Forte had his campaign headquarters and she reasoned that would be the best place to start looking for information on Padua - “he’s a political acquaintance of Mayor Forte’s,” the Australian had said. Once in Manhattan she had very little trouble finding a parking spot; tonight was a night for sensible people to stay at home. She got out into the wind and rain, staggering a little under the force of them, buttoned her raincoat to her neck and tied her rainhat firmly under her chin. Her wig and her dark glasses were in the glove compartment of the car, and this afternoon she had changed out of the suit she had worn this morning into a tan sweater and brown skirt. She was taking a risk going to the Biltmore Hotel, into Michael Forte’s very own territory. But she knew she would merge easily with those who were working for the Mayor; the newspapers had been full of stories of the number of young middle-class people he had gathered about him. And she had been middle class almost all her life.
The lobby of the Biltmore was thronged: sensible people might stay at home on such a night, but campaign workers and kidnappers were not sensible people. She smiled to her-
self at the thought
, and a passing young man, a Forte for Mayor button in his lapel, stopped beside her to help her off with her raincoat.
“You’re a real worker to come out on a night like this. You’ve lost your button, though.”
She smiled up at him. “Where can I get another?”
He took the button out of his lapel. “Be my guest. I haven’t seen you down here before - how about being my guest later on for a drink or something? I’m Bill Brewer.”
She looked him up and down, keeping her smile friendly. Does he know how much he is one of them, the ones Roy so despised? she wondered. Straight Ivy League: it was the image her parents had wanted for Mark, her brother. He had rebelled, turned his back on the image; but this smiling, good-looking man with his Brooks Brothers suit and shirt would go to his grave exactly as he was now, conservatism personified. The image of her own father … “I’ll think about it. First, I have to find Mr Padua - Frank Padua.”
Brewer frowned. “Frank Padua? I don’t think you’ll find him around here. But you might try up in one of the rooms -someone up there may know.”
As soon as she got out of the elevator on the floor that had been taken over as campaign headquarters, she was afraid; but the elevator doors had closed and she was trapped in the loud rapids of the crowd surging down the corridor. Then she heard the yells for Quiet! and she saw all the heads turn towards the far end of the corridor.
Four girls were standing on a bench against one wall; before she could protest one of the girls had grabbed her arm and pulled her up beside them. “You want to see our hero ? God, the poor man! Doesn’t he look sick and worried ?”
Michael Forte was coming down the corridor, a phalanx of aides pushing their way through the crowd ahead of him like the prow of a boat over-populated with figure-heads. Carole stepped down from the bench, suddenly realizing how conspicuous she was. Then all at once the crush of people in front of her thinned out and she was face to face