State Department Murders

by Edward S. Aarons

  “Well…” she said.

  He looked up and down the street for the man who had got off the trolley with him. He was not in sight. There were others on the street, walking in the shade of the tall trees that towered over the sidewalk, but no one seemed interested in him.

  “Well, good-by,” the girl said.

  “So long.”

  She looked at him, something stirring behind her eyes as if she were reluctant to go. He had an odd feeling as they stood there on the street that they were drawn together. She felt it, too, he thought. It was almost as if an invisible circle held them. It was only a momentary sensation, and then her eyes, warm and friendly, touched his face once more before propriety took command.

  “Good-by,” she said again.

  She walked quickly away. Cornell watched the curves of her body, not quite concealed by the linen fabric of her suit. He looked at his watch. He had ten minutes in which to keep his appointment with Kari.

  A cab took turn past Du Pont Circle and out Connecticut Avenue toward Rock Creek Park. The restaurant Kari had chosen for their rendezvous was a small one, without pretensions. He had never patronized it before, although he had heard about it, and nothing he had heard made him feel any easier. Nothing but the food in the café was normal. The clientele made him wonder why Kari had selected the spot. Even the waiters wore their hair too long. But he supposed it was safe enough as a rendezvous, provided both of them had shaken off their invisible escorts. Cornell was fairly sure that he himself had succeeded. He was not so sure about Kari.

  She was already there, waiting for him at a corner table near the open window, when he arrived. He felt the familiar, twisting wrench inside him when he saw the shadows under her lovely eyes. She gave him a quick, small smile and he reached across the red-checkered tablecloth to take her hand.

  “All right?” Kari asked, her voice lovely and husky.

  “Fine. And you?”

  “I think so.”

  “They didn’t follow you?”

  “I think not.”

  There was so much he wanted to say. He forced himself to glance away from her and study the other patrons in the restaurant. The place was fairly crowded. He looked at the others with wry humor. There wasn’t a face that would be found at a ball park or football stadium. Most of them, men and women, were too impeccably dressed, too soft in speech, with an almost feline grace in their movements. He felt a quick uneasiness. The place made him uncomfortable. He turned back to Kari, and her eyes were watching those at the bar. When he looked there, he saw no one he knew. It was impossible to tell who might be covertly watching them. They had been successful in one respect, anyway—none of the newspapers had connected Kari with him. He could imagine the added circus the press would make of it, if it became known that he and Mrs. Jason Stone were in love with each other,

  “Barney,” she said.

  Cornell looked at her again.

  “Barney, was it very bad today?” she asked.

  He grimaced. “Bad enough. You know what Congressman Keach is like. A dog with a bone, and he won’t let go. He sees saboteurs and traitors under everyone’s bed, and apparently he sees one in mine, too. Namely, me.”

  “Barney, don’t.”

  “That’s what it comes down to, doesn’t it?” he said impatiently. “Your precious husband submitted evidence to prove that I acted for a foreign power and sold out the country on Project Cirrus. It’s a lie, it’s all a clever web of fabrications and coincidence, and Keach is just Jay Stone’s unwitting tool. I bear Keach no malice for what he’s been doing to me every day for the past two weeks. I can take it, as long as none of the mud touches you. It’s Jason Stone I’d like to throttle.”

  “Don’t talk like that,” Kari said quickly.

  “It’s the way I feel, darling.”

  “I know, but—”

  “All right, Kari,” he said. “I’m sorry I’ve upset you. It’s been quite a day.”

  He felt better just looking at her. She was wearing one of her usual severely tailored suits that only made her beauty more breath-taking. She was a tall girl, with soft auburn hair and a heart-shaped face and long eyes slightly uptilted at the corners, giving her a faintly Oriental expression accented by her high cheekbones. She had once explained with amusement that her family in past generations had lived too long under the harsh heel of the Khan’s Mongolian hordes. And Cornell had found an odd remoteness in her spirit, a serenity and detachment that had resisted all but the simplest of his advances.

  The waiter came with a bottle of vermouth and glasses. As he set the bottle down, his hand brushed Cornell unnecessarily. Their eyes met, the waiter’s smiling secretly.

  “Well, hel-lo.” The waiter looked at Kari. “Hi, Kari.”

  Kari murmured stiffly, “Leave the bottle, Georgie.”

  The waiter slid away, and Cornell looked a question at Kari. “Have you been here before?”

  “Once or twice,” she said huskily. “For kicks.”

  Her glance moved toward the people at the bar again and came back, not quite meeting his. Cornell pushed the surprise out of his thoughts. The little restaurant seemed safe and remote enough now, but he knew that no place on earth would be safe enough or remote enough if Jason Stone’s lies found official recognition. The fear touched him again, and Kari, intuitively sensitive, smiled.

  “Yes, you’ve had a day of it, Barney. But everything will turn out fine. You’ll see.”

  “I can’t prove the lies are lies,” he said. His lean New England face was earnest. “You know I never sold any secrets abroad. The idea is ridiculous. They’ve turned my past inside out, and they’ve found nothing in it to verify Jay’s accusations. He’s lying, and I know why he’s lying. It’s because of you, Kari. So far he hasn’t come out with it, but that’s the main motive behind his attack on me.”

  “I don’t think so, Barney.”

  He pressed one fist into the palm of his other hand. “How do you go about proving white is white, black is black? How can you describe color to a blind man?”

  Kari looked worried. “Barney, what are you thinking of? Why did you ask me to go through all the rigmarole of meeting you? We’re both innocent; we have nothing to hide. I did as you asked me, and I’m sure I wasn’t followed, but I want to know why. You’ve been under such a terrible strain. I’m really worried about you.”

  Cornell smiled. “I can hold out. But it’s good to know how you feel, Kari.”

  “Well, why, Barney? I mean, why did you insist on seeing me tonight?”

  He said bluntly, “I’ve got to see Jason Stone.”

  Kari frowned. The light from the window modeled the sensitive planes of her face as she tilted her head.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “I want to see him alone,” Cornell explained. “Not with Keach or Stone’s hatchet man, Sam Hand, around. Alone. I want to have it out with him, once and for all.”

  “But you know he won’t—”

  “If it’s because of us, then I want to know for sure. But if he’s hounding me for any other reason, then perhaps I can persuade him to take another course.”

  Kari shuddered. “You don’t know Jay.”

  “I know him,” Cornell said grimly. “I know what he did to you.”

  “You don’t want to see him,” Kari insisted. “I don’t like the idea at all. I’m afraid, Barney.”

  “I’ll keep my temper,” he smiled.

  “He may not keep his. If there’s any violence—”

  “Please, Kari.”

  The waiter came with their Chincoteague oysters. Kari looked at the bar again. This time Cornell saw a shapely, pretty blonde girl, perched on one of the stools, smile at Kari’s reflection in the dimly lit mirror behind the bar. A small shock went through him, a question that he immediately pushed aside as unthinkable. They were silent until the waiter went away, then Kari spoke again.

  “But what can you hope to gain by seeing Jay alone? You know how stiff-necked and
stubborn he is. You’re not the first man he has set out to break.”

  “I intend to be the last,” Cornell said.

  Kari said, “You see? That’s what I mean.”

  “You misunderstand,” he said gently. “Jason Stone is out to break me, and I may never recover from the charges he got Keach to make against me. He’s done it to other men. But I don’t intend to go down easily. This time he’ll have a solid fight on his hands. If I can find the slightest chink in his armor, I’ll use it.”

  Kari said, “There are no chinks in Jay’s armor.”

  “Let me find out, then. Where can I meet him, Kari?”

  She hesitated. “He’s not in Washington. He told me he was going out of town till the end of the week.”

  “Has he gone to Overlook?”

  “Barney, I…”

  “Has he?”

  Kari nodded. “Yes.”

  “I’ll see him there, then,” Cornell decided.

  “But you can’t just—”

  “I can and I will.”

  Someone behind Cornell spoke in an irritated voice. “I don’t know what you intend to do, Barney, but this rendezvous is the most senseless thing I’ve seen. Good evening, Kari.”

  Cornell twisted in his chair. The man was big but dapper, with smooth blond hair and the quiet, expensive appearance of an upper-bracket diplomat. His smile touched Kari and broadened when he looked at Cornell. There was an air of immaculate cleanliness about the man, as if he had just stepped out of a barbershop. Cornell stood up and said, “Hello, Paul. How did you find us?”

  Paul Evarts smiled. “Kari told me about this game of hide-and-seek you decided to play.” He slid into the booth next to Cornell. Cornell looked at Kari, and the red-haired girl smiled apologetically. “I told Paul you wanted to see me.”

  “Far be it from me to be the third wheel at this party,” Evarts said. “But as your boss, Barney, I have to object to this added risk. You know I believe in you. We’ve worked together too long for me to believe Keach has anything solid. But so far there has been no connection between you and Kari, and if someone spotted you here—”

  “Nobody followed me,” Cornell said. “I’m sure of it.”

  “And Kari?”

  “I made reasonably certain,” Kari smiled. Her eyes were warm on the other man, and Cornell felt the thin edge of irritation over his momentary anger. “Paul, our impetuous young man wants to go to Overlook this week end.”

  “Jay’s place? Why?”

  “Barney thinks he can settle this out of court, so to speak. Jay has been feeding Congressman Keach a pack of lies. We all know Jay is Reach’s ‘confidential source of information.’ Barney feels he can get Jay to retract, if he can talk to him alone.”

  “That’s insane.” Paul Evarts frowned at Cornell. “Jay Stone is out to get you. Nothing ever changed that man’s plans.”

  “I’m going to try,” Cornell said stubbornly.

  “It won’t work.”

  “The very least I’ll get out of it will be an honest declaration of Stone’s enmity. It ought to help.”

  “No.”

  Kari said, “Let’s not quarrel. Let’s have our dinner. Paul, darling, wouldn’t you like a drink?”

  For the next hour, Cornell felt oddly excluded at the table. The fragment of intimacy with Kari was gone, as if it had never existed. Paul Evarts dominated the conversation as usual—smooth and loquacious, his manner polished to a high degree by his years in the State Department. Cornell told himself it was ridiculous to feel jealous. Paul was doing everything possible for him. He told himself he was getting jumpy and suspicious of everything and everybody, and listened to Evarts’ plans for his defense with only half an ear. Nothing was going to be settled in the committee’s inquiry chamber. Congressman Keach was convinced he dealt with a traitor, and the man had a fanatic’s tenacity to prove his conviction. Day by sweltering day, Cornell knew he had been losing ground with the other committee members, too. Having his past raked over from boyhood on up was a grueling experience. With the nose of a ferret and the zeal of a knight templar, Ira Keach managed to distort each normal peccadillo of Cornell’s past. Vindication seemed further away with each passing day.

  As they talked, Kari grew more distant, her stare lingering more openly on the girl at the bar. The waiter returned to their table and spoke to Paul as if they were old friends. Cornell told himself he was imagining things. It was this place, certainly, that was distorting his view of everyone, making him feel there was something unhealthy about Paul and Kari, about the whole setup. It hit him with a sudden explosive sense of revulsion—Kari and the girl at the bar, Paul’s knee against his, the soft unnaturalness of the other people around them.

  “Damn it to hell, let’s get out of here,” he exploded. “This crazy place is getting me down.”

  Kari looked at him in surprise. Paul laughed, his voice amused, and said, “Your nerves are acting up, old man.”

  Cornell said bluntly, “Nerves or not, I don’t like what I see. I don’t believe it.”

  Kari’s voice was edged and cool. “Really, Barney, aren’t you being a bit ridiculous?”

  “Am I?” he demanded.

  “Of course. You’re such a puritan.”

  He said, “Maybe you get kicks out of this place, but I don’t. Let’s get out of here.”

  Paul said soothingly, “Kari’s right, you know, old man. You are a puritan.”

  “Keep out of this,” Cornell said angrily. “This is something that’s been bothering me for a long time. This is between Kari and me.”

  Kari said, “Barney, don’t make a scene.”

  “I want you out of here,” Cornell said. “We can talk somewhere else. I don’t want you in places like this again.”

  “Now, wait a minute,” Kari began.

  Paul interrupted, “Don’t—”

  The explosive wrath in Cornell brought him to his feet and out of the booth, pushing Evarts aside. He paused, looking down at Kari’s suddenly strange face, seeing a taut remoteness there, and he had the queer, whirling impression that everything between himself and Kari had never actually existed. Kari was saying, “Don’t be possessive, Barney. Jay was like that.”

  The anger remained in him, pushing him on with it.

  “Kari, this is something I don’t understand. We’ve got to have this out.”

  “Here?” she smiled coolly. “Now?”

  “It’s as good a time as any. Better than most, perhaps. Now is when I want to know how we stand, you and I. Maybe I’ve been presuming too much.”

  “Maybe you have, Barney.”

  He stared at her. Her eyes still smiled, and again he felt her remoteness, a thing about her that was unreachable, which he had felt before. Her cool beauty was beyond possession, he thought. It flickered through his mind that maybe this, too, was breaking down with the rest of his life, as if everything with Kari had been a carefully planned illusion. Maybe it was just the climax of the whole day, listening to distortions and lies—and now, perhaps, in his mind he was creating the fabric of another lie. He looked at Kari with a plea.

  “I’m sorry, hon,” he said.

  Her words slapped him quickly. “Barney, we’ve been good friends. You’re in trouble, and I want to help. But it was never any good. Still, in our own fashion, things are just the same.”

  He looked at her cool beauty. “Are they?”

  “Of course.” She took his hand for a brief moment. “Don’t ever forget that, Barney.”

  We’re washed up, he thought.

  And suddenly all he wanted was to escape, to get away from the café and the strange people in it. Paul Evarts stood up, murmuring something in embarrassment, but Cornell scarcely heard the man’s words. Get out of this, he told himself.

  He picked up his check and Kari’s and strode away from the booth. While he waited for the cashier to make change, he saw the curvy little blonde number at the bar slide off her stool and make her way to the table. Cornell step
ped out of the café with an odd sense of freedom, as if he had closed a door that never really had been open to him.

  He took a cab back to his rooms, thinking of Jason Stone.

  His convertible was parked outside the modest apartment house where he lived. Someone had moved it from the parking lot downtown; someone with a wry sense of humor. He paused on the walk and glanced at the ignition lock. The keys were gone. And as if the man had been waiting for him, the elevator operator stepped from the apartment lobby to the pavement.

  “Mr. Cornell?”

  He had the car keys in his hand, and Cornell took them automatically. The boy said, “A friend of yours brought your car around, sir. He said you might want to use it.”

  “A friend?”

  “Nice young fellow. Said his name was Acorn. Johnny Acorn. Works in the Justice Department, he said.”

  “Thanks,” Cornell said dryly.

  He went up to his small, fourth-floor apartment, wondering just how clever he had been to risk sensation by meeting Kari. If the FBI men had followed him somehow, they must be properly puzzled by now.

  The corridor was warm and shadowed as he left the elevator and headed for his own door. From somewhere a radio throbbed softly, audible through the shuttered doors that stood ajar in the hall. Most of the doors stood partly open in an effort to capture any stray breeze that might break the muggy, gasping heat of evening. His own door stood ajar, too.

  He distinctly remembered having closed and locked it when he left that morning. He paused, then shrugged and pushed the door farther open with his fingertips. His face was a thin mask, concealing surprise, when he looked into his small bachelor’s room.

  A girl stood there, small and neat, preparing drinks she had obviously found in his kitchen. She seemed to have made herself quite at home. Turning, she smiled brightly as he came in.

  “Hello, Mr. Cornell. I thought you might like one of these.”

  She was the girl who, earlier, had got off the trolley with him. The girl in the feathered hat.

  CHAPTER THREE

  HER smile was amiable as she handed him a tall, frosted glass. “Here you are,” she said. “You’ll need it.”