Vultures in the Sky

by Todd Downing

  “No, not that I remember, but then,” she forced the words, “when I am traveling I seldom pay any attention to the people about me. It becomes so fatiguing, you know. That’s why I always take a compartment.”

  Again she thought that there was an incipient movement of his lips and a little twinkle in his eyes. “You got on the train at San Antonio, too, I suppose?” he asked in the same conversational tone.

  “Yes.” She started to say something about having stopped to visit the Alamo and the Missions but decided not to.

  “At what time, may I ask?”

  She thought that this was going a little too far and put a distinct note of coolness in her voice as she replied: “I really do not remember exactly but it was soon after the Pullman was opened.” Remember? Would she ever forget a single second of that time as she had stood in straining expectancy, awaiting the opening of that door which was to be for her an escape into space?

  His insistence upon this point annoyed her. He asked: “You were upon the platform of the station before the car was opened?”

  “Yes, for a few minutes.”

  “And you did not go back onto the platform after you got on the train?”

  “No, of course not.”

  He leaned forward to deposit the ash from his cigarette into the tray and she thought that there vas a calculative look in his eyes, as if he were pondering something which she had said.

  When he looked up he was smiling pleasantly again. “I’m really very sorry to have to bother you like this, Miss Van Syle, but there are two or three more things which I’d like to ask you. While you were standing on the platform in San Antonio, did anything unusual happen?”

  “Anything unusual?” she frowned slightly. “What do you mean?”

  “Just try to recall any incident, however insignificant, which attracted your attention.”

  She felt strangely flustered, helplessly aware that she was not carrying this situation through as successfully as she had expected. “I don’t remember anything,” she said, “except a man fainting. He had to be carried out of the Station.”

  She saw him lean forward slightly.

  “Tell me,” he said, “just what you saw of this incident.”

  She fixed her gaze on the firmly tied knot of the necktie below his firm square chin and said: “That, really, is about all there was to it. He was standing near a post, in the crowd waiting for the Pullman to be opened. There was another train waiting there at the same time. He sort of—well, crumpled up. There was quite a bit of excitement for a few minutes and that’s all I saw until he was carried out.”

  “Could you describe him?”

  She thought a moment then shook her head. “No, I only saw him from a distance. He looked fairly tall and had on a soft brimmed hat, I think. That’s about all I can tell you about him.”

  “Miss Van Syle,” there was something compelling about the directness of his gaze “I have another question. Did you see near this man at any time any of the passengers who are back in the Pullman now?”

  She started as the ash from her cigarette dropped upon the skirt of her dress. She brushed it off and said: “I haven’t seen all of the Pullman passengers yet but one man I have seen was on the platform at the time. I don’t know his name but you were with him in the diner this morning. A sedate-looking little man with glasses. He was with his wife, I suppose it was. I happened to notice them because they were standing a little way in front of me and seemed to be having some kind of an argument. They both seemed nervous.”

  “His name,” Rennert said thoughtfully, “is Mr. King. And he was standing there with his wife when the man fell?”

  “No, she had left him by that time and gone back into the station. I remember seeing him kiss her good-by.”

  “This was before the man fell down?”

  “Yes.”

  “And did you see Mr. King at the time the man fell?”

  “No, I don’t believe that I did see him at exactly that time. He had walked back a little way with his wife toward the gates of the station.”

  Rennert’s smile was very very pleasant, she thought, as he leaned over and crushed his cigarette into a tray.

  “One more question, Miss Van Syle, and I’ll quit bothering you. It’s about this morning while we were passing through that tunnel this side of Monterrey. Mr. Spahr was in the diner when the train started through, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “Where was he sitting?”

  “At the table across the aisle and behind me.”

  “Was he there when the train came out of the tunnel?”

  “Yes, I remember looking out the window on the other side of the car. I saw him sitting there, though I didn’t know who he was at the time.”

  “You’re sure he didn’t get up and leave the diner, then, while it was dark?”

  She stared at him, puzzled. “Why, yes.”

  “But your back was turned to him, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Rennert got to his feet. “Thank you very much, Miss Van Syle. I trust that I haven’t annoyed you too much by these questions. I’m sure, however, that you would prefer to have them asked by me rather than by the Mexican officials.”

  She laid her cigarette and holder aside and rose too. “Certainly.” She glanced at herself covertly in the mirror, saw that she was standing with the proper poise. “I hope that I have been of assistance,” she said graciously.

  Rennert stood at the door and said: “Yes, Miss Van Syle, you have been of very great assistance indeed.” He opened the door, said: “Good afternoon and thank you again,” and was gone.

  She stood for several seconds, staring at the chair in which he had sat. She felt her teeth pressing into the lower lip as she fought back a feeling of culpability. She thought: I’m not sure! Really, I’m not sure at all! And, if I were sure, who but myself has a right to judge what I am doing? Determination steeled her and she walked directly to the table, opened the hand-bag and took out the syringe. Without looking down at it she started toward the bathroom. She was a fool, she told herself, not to have disposed of it before. At the door she paused at the realization that the train had stopped.

  She stood there for several moments, waiting, then walked back to the table, replaced the syringe in the bag and went to a window. She looked out at gleaming steel rails and hot gray dust and blank adobe walls over which no mountains were to be seen.

  8

  Wires Are Down! (4:50 P.M.)

  Vanegas lay flatly prostrate under the afternoon sun. An unnatural quietness seemed to weigh upon the usually noisy platform. Overalled railway employees stood in little groups conversing in low tones or moved about their tasks with grave-faced purposiveness. At a distance stood Indians, in gray-white pajama-like clothing, gazing at the train with contemplative eyes under straw sombreros. Even the vendors were few in number, merely a half dozen old women who stood beside baskets of fruit and tacos and brown jars of pulque and surveyed the windows with black eyes whose inveiled look did not conceal the hope that some belated purchaser might thrust out his head and require their wares.

  Rennert had sought the comparative privacy of the first-class coach and sat now upon a green plush chair, staring thoughtfully across the parched gray soil at the splash of color which was a pulquería. Two telegrams lay spread out upon his lap. He brought his eyes back to the one which he had opened first, read it again.

  It was from one ofhis associates in San Antonio, Texas, and ran:

  REPLYING YOUR TELEGRAM CONCERNING MAN WHO DIED STATION PLATFORM SAN ANTONIO LAST NIGHT FOLLOWING INFORMATION AVAILABLE STOP NAME EDGAR GRAVES OF BUREAU CRIMINAL INVESTIGATION STOP THOUGHT TO HAVE BEEN FOLLOWING SUSPECT IN MONTES KIDNAPPING CASE STOP GRAVES DIED FROM HYPODERMIC INJECTION NICOTINE POISON IN WRIST STOP NO INFORMATION AT PRESENT CONCERNING IDENTITY OF MURDERER STOP BELIEVED TO HAVE ESCAPED ON TRAIN PROBABLY ONE ON WHICH YOU NOW ARE STOP FURTHER DETAILS FROM YOU GREATLY DESIRED STOP WE ARE ASKING MEXICAN AUTHOR
ITIES TO COOPERATE WITH YOU.

  Rennert’s interest in the affair was quickened by the information contained in this telegram. Throughout the day, as he had considered possible motives which might lie behind the murder of Torner in the tunnel, the thought of a connection with the Montes kidnapping case had never occurred to him. He ran over in his mind the details of this case, made familiar to newspaper readers throughout the Southwest by the hue and cry which had been raised.

  Since the days when Texas was a stalwart and defiant young republic the name of Montes had been a household word along the lower reaches of the Rio Grande. A Montes had aided in establishing the freedom of Texas and had founded the dynasty of ranchers and cattlemen which had played an important part in the development of the new country. Sons and grandsons had intermarried with Anglo-American families and had kept the name of Montes alive as legislators and politicians. Today, if the financial and political power of the family had decayed slightly with the advent of industrialism to the Southwest, it still maintained its prestige unimpaired.

  Two weeks before, the newspapers had screamed the news of the kidnapping from the family home outside San Antonio of the three-year-old son of Austin Montes. Days had passed while the police followed up clue after clue to no avail. Newspapers, particularly the influential chain controlled by Montes interests, demanded results in no uncertain terms. Old Miguel Montes, grandfather of the missing boy, had fulminated from the armchair where he sat in partial paralyzation and had offered enormous rewards. The State had followed suit (the gubernatorial eyes being fixed on reelection) and had thrown every effort into the investigation.

  Three days after the abduction had come a brief note to the family assuring them of the boy’s safety and telling them that instructions for the payment of the ransom money would be forthcoming as soon as the agitation had been calmed. The family had at once endeavored to stop the investigation until contact could be made with the kidnapers. They found themselves balked. Too much interest had been aroused and the magnitude of the rewards offered had spurred amateur investigators throughout the Southwest. Pleas from the Montes-controlled newspapers for abstinence from interference were in vain. The hue and cry went on. On the part of the kidnapers, ominous silence.

  In time, however, the total absence of clues as to the identity of the kidnapers or to the whereabouts of the boy and unceasing pleas from the family began to have their effect. The case became relegated to the inside pages of the newspapers, where stories took on a monotonous sameness, despite the ingenuity of reporters. People began to turn their interest to the approaching political campaign and to forget the fiery gray-haired old man in the armchair and the grief-stricken parents with whom they had sympathized for so long.

  And then had come the news which had catapulted the case back to the front pages. In a ditch near a little border town had been found an overturned and burning automobile. When the blaze was extinguished there had been taken from the ruins the partially consumed body of little Antonio Montes. Excitement had reached fever heat again and groups of self-appointed vigilantes had scoured the country along the Rio Grande, patrolling roads along which the driver of the car might have escaped. Suspect after suspect had been detained, questioned—and released. It became the consensus of opinion that the kidnaper had turned northward into Texas rather than attempt a flight into Mexico, as had been anticipated. The search began to lag.

  Rennert had followed the case closely in the newspapers. He still retained memories of a weekend visit at the Montes mansion near San Antonio, the result of a case in which he had been of some service to Austin Montes, and he recalled now the brown curls of the youngster who had played about his grandfather’s chair.

  Throughout, what had struck him as peculiar was the absolute lack of any certainty as to the identity of the kidnaper or kidnapers. When the clues and rumors were sifted down there remained the unescapable fact that no one knew whether one or more than one person were involved, whether the kidnaper were a man or a woman, whether one familiar with the life of the Montes family or an absolute stranger.

  And now this telegram and the increasing certainty that the federal operative had been close upon the trail of the abductor in San Antonio; that the latter had been aware of the surveillance and had killed his pursuer in the throng upon the platform; that he had boarded the Mexico-bound train; that the man Eduardo Torner had either been aware of his identity or had witnessed the hypodermic injection of the poison, had followed him onto the train and threatened him with blackmail; that the tracked man had passed Monterrey without meeting the demands of the blackmailer and had made use of the same hypodermic needle to put the latter out of the way.

  And yet, Rennert admitted, there was as yet no certainty that the death of Torner was murder or that it had any connection with the Montes case. It might, after all, have been due to heart failure or other natural causes. If murder, it might have been linked with the strike which was agitating the workers and the railroad officials. Despite his conviction that such was not the case, Rennert could not deny the possibility. The connecting link, of course, would be the discovery that Torner had died from an injection of nicotine. And the telegram from the authorities at Saltillo, which had been handed to Rennert at Vanegas, had reported the doctor’s inability to determine the cause of the man’s death. He had at once wired them suggesting a search for the presence of nicotine. He expected a reply to be in his hands at San Luis Potosí, which the train would reach that night.

  If this telegram reported that the death of Torner had been due to nicotine poisoning, as he was confident would be the case, he was resolved to seek the aid of the Mexican authorities in enforcing a search of the passengers back in the Pullman. He knew the perfunctoriness of the examination of Pullman passengers at the border and, while he felt doubtful whether the criminal would have kept the incriminating hypodermic needle about his person or effects, he felt the importance of at least making the search.

  And of these passengers, to which one did the evidence of guilt most strongly point? There was the testimony of Jeanes that he had felt upon his hand the touch of some material that might have been the corduroy of Searcey’s trousers or the plaited bag of Miss Talcott. There was Jeanes himself and the undeniable fact that of all of them he had had the best opportunity of plunging the needle into the arm of the man who had sat in the seat in front of him. His mention of the fact that someone had bent over Torner in the darkness might have been invented for the purpose of throwing suspicion away from himself. On the other hand, there was Mr. King’s corroboration of this. Mr. King—

  And what, Rennert demanded thoughtfully of himself, about Mr. King? Of all the men in the Pullman probably the one least likely to attract attention, he had from the beginning been obtruding in such a fashion that significance must be attached to the question. His conversation with Rennert upon the observation platform that morning, whatever might have been its purpose, had been the first alarming note to presage the death which had followed so soon. His recollection of an event which occurred in the station at San Antonio had been responsible for Rennert’s theory that Tomer’s death was an outcome of that event and for his discovery that the whole affair was doubtless linked with the Montes kidnaping. Had the man’s purpose throughout been to effect this very end?

  If so, what about the melodramatic message of warning which King claimed to have been given him by a man in Saltillo who might be as apocryphal as the wife who had listened to a conversation upon the train the night before? It might well have been a none too subtle method of directing attention toward another of the passengers.

  Yet, at the present state of his knowledge, Rennert had to admit that it would not do to take this assumption for granted. The message might have been intended for one of the passengers who was unknown to the bearer of the message. King might have given inadvertently some signal which the watcher had interpreted as the prearranged one. There were the limes upon the crossed sticks. Rennert’s eyes narrowed thoughtfull
y. Once before that day the thought had come to him, as he had studied one of the passengers, that there might possibly be another factor involved in this matter—a factor which offered rather alarming possibilities. Again a feeling of distinct uneasiness came over Rennert. Ahead of them stretched the barren sparsely inhabited plains of San Luis Potosí, rimmed by mountains, and the wild upland districts of Guanajuato and Querétaro to be traversed before they arrived the next morning in Mexico City. He thought of Mexico City as a goal, clear in the light of morning, toward which they would speed through the black reaches of the night….

  He thrust the telegrams into a pocket and looked at his watch.

  It was five minutes past five. They had been in Vanegas for fifteen minutes, when the time-table called for only a ten-minute stop. And they were now forty-seven minutes behind their schedule.

  He got up and walked back through the diner.

  Coralie Van Syle and Spahr sat at the table which they had occupied at noon. Spahr was enjoying himself hugely, Rennert surmised as he glanced at the small whisky and cognac bottles which stood empty before him. His fingers were twisting a half-empty glass around and around as he talked in a too-loud voice. “Course the newspaper don’t pay for my drinks while I’m down here but I saved up a little money for this trip. Thought I might as well have a good time while I was about it.” A suppressed hiccough. “Come on, Miss Van Syle, drink that an’ we’ll have another one.” Miss Van Syle, looking cool and distant, sat across from him and smoked another cigarette. Crushed particles of paper and tobacco covered the bottom of the tray before her. She was gazing down at the wineglass with a faintly amused smile upon her red lips. Her eyes rose as Rennert passed and he felt them fixed upon his face. He turned his head, nodded and passed on.