“He’d pick up Czech porn stars every year, and he wouldn’t put them back. And after he killed them, he’d always take a run in that stupid orange-yellow wrestling singlet. I didn’t figure out the connection until last year. He didn’t always kill them here. Sometimes he’d arrived wearing the singlet. Can you imagine wandering the airports of Europe wearing that? You know he was a wrestler as well as a football player in high school.”
“I don’t care. He was a disgusting human being.”
“Yes, well, he was also rich.”
“The porn stars died? Someone covered up all the crimes?”
“I don’t think Henry Tudor knew about the first few. Klimpton was in on the knowledge of the secret room before anyone was aware he was into snuffing his sex partners.”
“Once you knew about the room you were protected?”
“Yes.”
I felt my mouth gaping. My level of incredulity had risen with each of his answers.
Crushton said, “I had a little talk with Klimpton after you guys left him. You two were quite a problem. His buddy’s cause of death would be explicitly revealed if you two got some kind of police authority to show up here. That’s something you two just have not caught on to. The rich don’t want any publicity. They want to get their way, and most often they do get it. You saw the bruises on the kid’s body. Klimpton had smacked him around pretty good. His treatment of them and the murder would probably all come out. Klimpton had a reputation to protect. That was the key to this island. Yes, it was a resort, but even more it was a place the rich could be themselves completely and totally. Free from interference.”
“This was a murder-incorporated island?”
“Nothing that dramatic. Accidents happened. Henry Tudor knew how to clean them up.”
“You killed your own lover.”
“Sherebury? You guys are so gullible. He wasn’t my lover. He’d barely give me a look.”
“Why tell us he was?”
“Sympathy from you. When I came to offer you help, it was much more likely you’d be willing to invite me into your confidences if you felt sorry for me.”
“Why offer to help?”
“Somebody had to keep track of you. It was unlikely that you would trust anyone, but perhaps you would trust your old concierge. You did, mostly.”
Scott said, “You still can’t get off the island. Almost everybody is dead but us.”
Crushton said, “Not quite everybody.”
I knew of Movado and Feige.
“Except the people who went for help,” Scott said.
Alice Gavin, the archeologist, walked in. She said, “Their boat will sink. I made sure of that.”
Scott said, “That’s a lot of innocent people.”
“Depends how you define innocent.” She waved a Magnum 45 big gun thing at us.
I said, “You’re not dead. That’s depressing.” She wore a hooded sweatshirt, poncho, and wide-brimmed hat. No ski mask.
“Drop your gun,” she ordered.
Scott began to move our gun in her direction. She fired. He dropped the gun. Scott and I looked at each other. No bullet holes in either one of us. Yet.
“Move over there.” She jerked her head away toward the corner of the room farthest from the door. I thought of trying a mad dash to escape. While she began to untie Crushton, she said, “I wouldn’t try a mad dash to escape. We’ll have to kill you, but later is a little better than now.”
Scott said, “I’m voting for now.” He dove for her legs.
As she began lowering the gun, swiveling toward him, and firing, I tackled her around the waist. Crushton attempted to block me. I wasn’t about to be stopped while someone was shooting at my lover. Fortunately, she’d only gotten Crushton’s left arm free. I bulled past him, then knocked her against the floor. She hit with a nasty thump. I grabbed her gun then checked her. She was unconscious. I resecured Crushton then leapt for Scott. His head wound had reopened. She’d shot the heel of his left running shoe clean through.
When I was sure Scott was okay, I paused to draw more deep breaths. Every muscle in my body wanted to sleep for several eons. As Scott and I recovered and Crushton cursed, Alice Gavin came to.
I began some serious questioning. I asked her, “Where are the others who set out with you in the boat?”
“Dead,” she said.
“How’d you get back through the storm?”
“Simple. We didn’t go far. I sabotaged the boat. I got a little wet. They got a lot wet. I had the only life jacket. They put up a bit of a fight. It wasn’t easy. I pitched one of them into the sea. He reached out his hands to me while we were both trying to make it back to shore. I didn’t reach back to help. He sank. I didn’t.”
“Hell of a chance even with a life vest.”
“I got the ultramodern, you-can’t-sink-with-it-on kind. I knew what I was doing.”
“Are you really an archeologist?” Scott asked. “Was this a real expedition?”
“Yes.”
“You knew you’d be killing your coworkers before you started?”
“They’d have to be eliminated,” Gavin admitted.
Scott said, “You know the storm was awfully convenient.”
Gavin said, “I’ve been coming to these waters for years. The confluence of events would happen eventually. A message is a message, new or old.”
“And that’s why you killed all these people?” Scott asked. “To send a message?”
“I was a radical with Crushton. I went underground at the same time he did. I resurfaced in my disguise as an archeologist. I actually have a prestigious degree from a first-rate university. The poor saps who accompanied me on this dig were extras. There will be no record that we made it to the island in this storm. It will be presumed we were lost at sea.”
“But you killed all those people,” Scott said.
“Well, they weren’t all supposed to die. Bonehead here screwed it up just like he did in Greenwich Village.”
We looked at Crushton. He said, “Yeah, like you were perfect.”
“What did he do wrong?” I asked.
“He got too much explosive in the charge in the castle basement. It was supposed to knock out the electronics. He screwed it up. First he put too little and it just knocked out some of the local communication. So he put more in and cablooey the castle tower disappears and the explosion, the huge chunks of debris, and the storm, and poof, the Atrium just disappears. Of course, the old eyesore was nearly a century old.”
Crushton added, “Once so many of the staff died in the collapse of the Atrium, things began to get out of hand. She panicked. Just like she did in Greenwich Village. We didn’t actually need to kill all these people, although things got out of control pretty quick. We didn’t count on the collapse of the Atrium.”
Gavin said, “You messed things up like you always do.”
I asked, “Did you know Feige was an Israeli agent when you started out?”
Gavin looked genuinely surprised. She said, “I’m suspicious of everyone.” Not an exact answer. He’d been something she hadn’t planned on.
I said, “Neither of you killed him?”
They shook their heads. There was an exchange of mystified, mysterious, and worried looks. So maybe one of the good guys was alive.
“Why kill all these people?” Scott asked.
Gavin said, “Just like in the sixties, I got tired of being a radical who did nothing. I worked in academia and nothing ever changed. I’d known Crushton back in the old days. I ran into him on the street in Athens. We renewed old times. We knew that we might eventually be found out, although I’d never killed anyone back in the sixties. When I met Barney again, I’d just broken up with my lover of sixteen years. She decided to get married to a man. I’ve been interested in the artifacts on this island since Barney started telling me about them. So we began planning this. You haven’t won yet.”
I said, “Don’t tell me another conspirator is going to pop in the doo
r and announce himself.”
“Works for me,” said a voice at the door.
Everybody turned to look at this new voice. It was Movado with a gun aimed at Scott’s head.
“Drop it,” he ordered. “Raise your gun the slightest fraction of an inch, I kill you now instead of later.”
Scott dropped the gun.
Movado wore a hooded sweatshirt, poncho, and a wide-brimmed hat. Obviously I’d missed the memo on this new fashion trend. No ski mask. I guess unless you were actually killing somebody, you didn’t need the mask. He said, “You two move against that wall and sit down.” He motioned with the gun to a point halfway between the bed and the door. We moved. We sat.
I said, “Well, you sure as hell aren’t as dead as I’d prefer you to be. You are supposed to be dead?”
“Not quite as dead as some people hoped,” Movado said.
I said, “I feel like I’m in the middle of a bad teenage horror slasher movie. The killer keeps coming back alive.”
“Well, it isn’t that bad. None of us is pretending to be dead. Nobody is in a silly costume, and once we kill you, you will stay dead.”
“Somehow not as comforting as it might be if it was you doing the dying. Why the hell are you killing all these people?”
Movado said, “I just think it’s kind of fun. Watching you two desperately running around was kind of amusing. I get bored being rich. I haven’t contributed to any of the improper evil causes. I caught on to the game these two were playing and just sort of watched and waited. Those rumors about me producing snuff films were a bit more than rumors. I’m the resident nut job in this relationship.”
I said, “Sort of a growth industry on this island.” As we talked he freed the others while keeping his gun aimed at us. He looked and sounded quite capable of using the damn gun on us and based on their record, obviously any one of these three would cheerfully murder us.
I said, “You don’t kill this many people just because it’s fun.”
“I’ve been coming here since I was fourteen. I inherited a small part of this island back then. Even better, I inherit next.”
I said, “But it will be known that you were on the island.”
“By whom?”
“You must have servants, family, someone who keeps track of where you are.”
“Silly boy. The rich aren’t accountable to anyone. Especially not you. I will have plenty of people to testify to wherever I chose to have been at this time, if it ever gets back to me. That’s why I have tons of lawyers. Do you really think the rich pay for their crimes?”
I said, “Not the way others do, no.”
Scott said, “It is just the three of you? You’re not going to pull all the dead people out of a hat?”
“Yep,” Movado said, “everybody else is really dead, except you. I expect all of them to stay that way and for you to be joining them. We’ll have to pitch you over a convenient cliff.” The other two were untied by now. They formed a semicircle about ten feet from us. Movado said, “You want to die now, or have a titanic struggle as we tie you up and die during it, or die later?”
Scott said, “If we fight now, at least we can die with a little pride.”
All three killers laughed hysterically. “Noble, dignified, and dead. Good for you guys.”
A moment to induce chagrin in all but the most desperate captive. I qualified as among the excessively desperate.
Scott asked, “How’d you keep those stupid wide-brimmed hats on over those ponchos and hooded sweatshirts?” The hats perched on top of the ponchos might have been comical if the distinct possibility of us being dead in the next few seconds wasn’t looming over our heads.
“Velcro,” Crushton said. “It was my idea.”
“What about the Israeli agent?” Crushton asked.
Movado looked annoyed. He turned to Gavin. “I assume you sabotaged the electronics room in Tudor’s villa.”
“Yes. I did it properly. If he or anyone else tried to get it working, they’d be fried.”
“How?” I asked. “The electricity isn’t working.”
Movado gave me a pitying look. He said, “You are so stunningly naive. Of course Henry Tudor had a power source in his villa. He kept it secret except to a very few. If the agent got it working, a little fritz and fizz and he would die.”
Gavin said, “And I sabotaged it right, not like bonehead here who couldn’t set a charge to save his life.”
I said, “You sabotaged it, but you didn’t know who it would kill?”
Gavin said, “A dead secret agent? Who’s going to care?”
At this point I would very much care. I said, “There was a way to communicate all this time?”
“Of course, you fool,” Movado said. “I don’t take that kind of chance. Henry had it installed as a safety device decades ago. It’s been updated ever since with every possible technological advance that comes along.”
I asked, “All three of you are going to get away? How?”
“One excellent alternative,” Movado said, “is to leave the two of you alive. When the authorities get here, you’d have all the explaining to do.”
“And we’d tell on you.”
Alice Gavin said, “But two of us don’t exist. There is no record of us anywhere. Like Barney, I’ve got several identities.”
I said, “The other help must know Crushton. He’ll be on a roster.”
Crushton said, “My public identity will be known. There is no record anywhere of who I really am. My true identity will remain a mystery.”
“Same for me,” Gavin said. “You don’t stay on the run this long without lots of escape plans.”
Movado said, “I already explained my escape clause.”
“But you will be indebted to those among your staff and servants who know you were here.”
“You really don’t know how it works among the rich, do you? New money never does catch on until far too late. That’s so American of you.”
“Or,” Crushton said, “we just push you off the nearest convenient cliff.”
Scott said, “That still doesn’t answer the question about how the hell you’re going to get away.”
“Or,” Crushton said, “we could blow up what’s left of the castle with you in the middle of it.”
I said, “Forensics must exist, even in this out-of-the-way part of the world.”
“Not if money and bribes to the right officials says it doesn’t,” Movado said.
“Money doesn’t cover everything,” I said.
“A brave but, frankly, pointless statement,” Alice Gavin said.
Movado said, “To give you an answer to your question, my family has been close for over one hundred fifty years to the family of the man who currently is in charge of the British fleet in the Mediterranean Sea. The current admiral and I attended prep school together in Switzerland. He and a few attractive young sailors stop by Korkasi once in a while.”
“The British fleet?” Scott’s voice dripped with incredulity. “Craveté was right?”
Movado said, “He got a few of his rumors right. Remember, even a stopped clock is right twice a day.”
I said, “Take your cliché, sit on it, and rotate.”
Movado said, “If I need it, the admiral will be happy to have a helicopter from one of his ships come pick me up.”
“Why couldn’t we get one of those from Santorini?” Scott asked.
“They don’t have one. If the Greek government does, it’s probably on the mainland. Remember, for all any of them know, we have only been inconvenienced because of the absence of help which did not leave Santorini. There won’t be any dead bodies discovered until the employees show up when the storm is over.”
“How are you going to communicate with your rescuer? If the secret electronic system was sabotaged and the agent got fried, how are you going to be able to use it?”
“My dear dope,” Movado said, “do you really think we would leave such a thing to chance? There are secre
ts within secrets on Korkasi. The closet, not gay liberation, was the rule for much of its existence. The founder’s suite in the basement of Mr. Tudor’s villa has several backup generators. We’ll use those.”
Scott asked, “What if the storm had gotten over sooner?”
Gavin said, “We waited for the right low-pressure system before executing the plan. The collapse of the Atrium was a bonus for getting rid of some extras, but we had it all set. These storms aren’t rare. We just waited.”
“You could have been wrong,” Scott said.
“But then we would have been part of the put-upon frightened people,” Crushton said. “No need to reveal secret identities or to be part of the secret plan. Until you two blundered about, we were doing quite well.”
I asked, “Why move Sherebury’s body?”
Gavin said, “The goal was to frighten the hell out of everybody. If you all stuck together in one spot, we’d have had to come up with another plan. Fear was our friend.”
Movado said, “For now let’s put these two in the secret treasure room. Then we can finish what we need to do.” They could kill us here. Why bother moving us? I was not about to ask that question.
They marched us out through the storm. The wind was up again, but the rain had eased considerably. The pellets of moisture had become a tornadic mist around us.
The castle smelled musty and burnt.
In the Great Hall Movado asked, “Have we got any explosives left?”
Gavin said, “Yeah. Enough to knock the rest of the castle to hell and gone. Along with these two.”
I asked, “Is the stuff down there real? If it is, can you really want to be responsible for destroying so much valuable art? Killing all these people is a horror. Killing us would be equally depressing, but you’re really going to do in centuries of artwork, the glories of mankind?”
“You really give a rat’s ass about that stuff at a moment like this?” Crushton asked.
I said, “Maybe that’s what I’d prefer to be focusing on.”
Alice Gavin said, “I had a look earlier when I dragged Virl Morgan down here. I think some of it might be genuine.”
“Really?” Crushton said. “Maybe we should take some of it. We could be rich.”
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