Collins, Max Allan - Nathan Heller 11 (26 page)

None as pretty, though, as Nurse Maria Selff—herself.

Out in front of the hospital, the quartet of nurses, one of them my Maria, had—before going their separate ways to their separate cars—paused on the sidewalk, at the edge of the parking lot, for an end-of-shift gabfest, exchanging girlish laughter and, no doubt, gossip. Maria was right in there with them, her lovely Dorothy Lamour-like features animated, her gestures too, a giddy Maria I didn’t really know.

But then I didn’t really know her, did I?

The lustrous black hair was again tucked up under an overseas cap, only now her petite, curvy frame had been poured into a white naval uniform, in exchange for the khaki Air Force number. And as she laughed and talked, she was lighting up a cigarette—a very self-assured young woman, the frightened waif of Cloudcroft nowhere to be seen.

The pretty nurses were standing over to the right as I exited the hospital, my fedora snugged down, head lowered as well, and I cut sharply left, walking across the driveway toward the parking lot, away from the well-lighted entrance, into the shadows, skirting pools of lamppost light. There was no way I could be certain, but I felt fairly confident she hadn’t spotted me.

My plan, initially, was to get to my car while keeping an eye on her—right now she was still gaily chatting—and watch her walk to her vehicle and then tail her. But to avoid bumping into her, I’d entered the parking lot on the opposite side from where I’d parked; and in making my way across the dimly lighted lot, not terribly far from my own car, I noticed a sleek powder-blue coupe, a Studebaker …

… with New Mexico plates.

When she pitched her cigarette, shooting sparks into the night, and got into the car, her keys out and ready to insert in the ignition, I sat up in the backseat and said, “We have to quit meeting like this.”

Her eyes were enormous in the rearview mirror and the red-rouged mouth opened wide, possibly to emit a scream, and I slipped my left hand around from behind her and clamped down over those wonderful lips.

“No scream,” I whispered into her right ear; she was still using Evening in Paris perfume, I noted. “You’re not a helpless woman, Maria, it wouldn’t become you … besides, do you really want to attract attention? You might not like what I have to say to the authorities. Or Drew Pearson.”

She was breathing hard, but her eyes had gone back to their normal condition—merely huge, a new coldness in their long-lashed, deep blue loveliness—and I removed my hand.

“You going to behave?” I asked her.

We were looking at each other in the rearview mirror.

“Are
you?”
she gasped, her breath still coming hard. Her lipstick was smeared, the lovely mouth a gaudy wound.

I wiped the red off my palm onto the back of her car seat. “Give me the keys.”

She handed them back to me—a Studebaker key-chain with a number of keys on it.

“Slide over,” I ordered.

Maria scooched over onto the rider’s side, looking guardedly back at me, not in the mirror this time, as I said, “I’m gonna get out and come around and get behind the wheel. No funny business or it’s gonna be at least loud and maybe messy.”

That was when I showed her the nine-millimeter in my fist. Her eyes got wide again, momentarily, and she nodded.

Soon I was behind the wheel, slipping the nine-millimeter back into its shoulder holster.

“Normally I don’t carry this unless a job requires it,” I said pleasantly, patting the snugged-away automatic, “but ever since I got grabbed at Roswell, I been skittish.”

The smeared mouth worked up a tiny sneer. “Have you now?”

“You’re a beautiful woman, Maria. Is that still your name? Or are you somebody else, at Bethesda? I noticed your branch of the service has changed.”

“It’s Maria,” she said, and ever so subtly, she shifted gears into vulnerability, putting some quaver into that mellifluous alto. “Nathan, why are you treating me like this? I told you I was being transferred. I haven’t contacted you because I didn’t know if it was safe.”

“You figure it’s safe, now?”

“Maybe not. They could be watching this very moment.” Her brow furrowed; eyelashes fluttered. In the near-dark of the car, her creamy complexion had a ghostlike radiance, recalling the Lodge, and Rebecca—fond memories of phony passion.

She was saying, “I … I thought it was unusual when they stationed me here, and strange, too, how they had the paperwork all ready to go, to transfer me from the Air Force to the Navy—”

“It’s not that I don’t admire how fast you are on your feet, or anyway on your cute fanny; but we’ve moved past the stage where I’m a fucking idiot you can manipulate like a dog chasing a flashlight.”

She thought about that, drew in some air and, as she let it back out, her carriage changed again, the defenseless girl replaced by the self-confident woman.

Her voice seemed a little lower, less musical, as she asked, “What stage are you at now?”

“Not quite sure. Homicidal maniac, maybe. Pleasure of finally figuring out what the hell’s been going on, though, is helping keep my anger in check. Which is good, ’cause I do some of my best work, in a cold rage.”

“If you’re trying to frighten me,” she said, a little quaver in the voice, possibly not faked, “it’s working.”

I shrugged. “Well, I wasn’t really trying, but that’s probably a prudent response. Probably wise to keep in mind the fucking Marines kicked me out for mental instability.”

Trembling just a little, she reached tentatively toward her purse, on the seat between us. “You mind if I have a cigarette?”

I put my hand on her purse, and looked toward the hospital; nobody else seemed to be coming out. “Is this the end of shift? Is this parking lot gonna be flooded with people?”

“No. My friends and I were scheduled for extra hours. What about that cigarette?”

“I’ll get it for you.” I opened the purse—no guns or knives or anything, just lipstick and compact and Kleenex and so on; plus a half pack of Chesterfields. Found a book of matches in there, too, and lifted the Chesties to my lips, plucked one out for myself and handed them to her. Lighted her up, then me, off the same match.

“Let’s roll the windows down,” I said, waving out the match, sucking smoke into my lungs, “so we don’t suffocate. Enjoy some of this nice cool night air … but let’s keep our voices down, shall we? Keep it cozy, and private.”

“I thought you didn’t smoke,” she said, rolling down her window.

“I don’t, usually.” I blew a perfect smoke ring, then put another one inside it. “Only time and place I ever smoked was in the service, on the Island … you know—Guadalcanal. Now when I crave a smoke it’s … at odd times. Those rare occasions when civilian life mirrors battle conditions.”

“Now you are trying to scare me,” she said, but sounding not at all scared. “Trying a little too hard, maybe.” And she blew smoke out her nostrils, cutely contemptuous, the world’s prettiest dragon—or Dragon Lady.

“I mean, you’re familiar with that kind of neurotic behavior, right, baby? You know what a Section Eight is, you’re acquainted with battle neuroses. I figure you’re probably working as a psychiatric nurse, here at Bethesda … though I bet you stayed away from the sixteenth floor today, knowing I’d be there.”

She scowled at me; even her scowls were appealing. “Why the hell should I know that?”

“Actually, I’m surprised you worked at all today. Of course, that’s probably why you took the night shift, knowing I’d be around to see Forrestal, this afternoon.”

“I worked night shift this week,” she said tightly, plucking some tobacco off her pink tongue, “because that’s how I was assigned. From what I hear, James Forrestal committed suicide. What do you know that I don’t know?”

I blew another smoke ring. “Not much of anything, I’m sure … including that he was murdered.”

The smeary mouth made a disgusted half-smirk. “Don’t be more stupid than you already are. That man was a suicidal case and he stepped out a window; happens every day.” She took off her overseas cap and began unpinning her hair.

“Make yourself at home.”

She arched an eyebrow at me. “You don’t mind if I get comfortable, do you?”

“Strip, for all I care.”

Shaking her head, the lush blackness of her hair tumbling to her shoulders, she said cattily, “You’ve lost that privilege.”

“Tell me, Maria—were you really married? Was there a ‘Steve’?”

Smoothing her pageboy with a palm, she grunted a small laugh. “Why, you think I planned ahead and put a trunk of old clothes in my bedroom, just your size, so you could make your getaway?”

“Maybe. It’s no less tortuous than some of the other bullshit you people pulled on me.”

Folding her arms and resting them on the considerable shelf of her bosom, she gazed out at the parking lot, the shadows and pools of light separating us from the well-illuminated entrance.

“There was a Steve,” she said, then glanced at me with half-hooded eyes. “And you don’t look a goddamn thing like him.”

“But he was my size.”

“I can think of one place he was bigger.”

Now I grunted a laugh. “He really die at Dresden?”

Shook her head. “Pearl Harbor. He went down on the
Arizona
.”

“Well, jeez—why’d you change that story? That’s a good one.”

She still wasn’t looking at me, staring out the windshield instead. “It was felt I needed to be more … freshly widowed.”

“To sucker me, you mean? I think you went to too much trouble, baby. With your looks, I’d’ve believed just about anything you told me … hell! I did.”

“You are a little gullible, at that.”

Smiling, shaking my head, I said, “This afternoon, Forrestal told me about his Achilles’ heel, which was his pride, I guess…. Me, I’m a dick with an Achilles’ heel, all right, or is that a heel with an Achilles’ dick?”

That actually made her smile. She said, “Is it all right if I freshen my lipstick?”

“Why, you want to take another stab at me?”

She looked at me with both eyebrows arched, this time, and gestured to the clown-smear of her mouth. “Do you mind?”

I fished the tube of lipstick out. “This doesn’t shoot poison gas or anything, does it, Mata Hari?”

Maria smirked, snatched the lipstick from my hand, turned the mirror to where she could see herself. “Ugh,” she said, looking at herself. “Give me a Kleenex, would you?”

I gave her one and she cleaned off her mouth and reapplied glistening bright red lipstick on the full, sensuous lips. Satisfied, she put the mirror back in place, folded her arms across her bosom again and looked at me like a bored genie.

“What exactly do you hope to accomplish, Nathan? Who are you going to go to? The police? The press? And say what?”

“That Forrestal was murdered would be a good start.”

Now her expression turned impatient. “You
are
insane. I told you that was a suicide.”

“You almost sound like you believe it.”

“I do believe it, because it’s true. Look—Nathan … I’m not really at liberty to confirm or deny your suspicions about me….” And now, surprisingly, she worked up what seemed to be real indignation: “But I will say this—if you think I’m working against the best interests of my country, then you are sadly—”

“I know what you are.”

“You do.”

“Sure. You’re an undercover agent.”

“Very funny. Working for Russia, d’you suppose? Or the Chinese Commies, maybe?”

I nodded toward the hospital. “I’d say you’re working with Dr. Bernstein in that big white building over there.”

She made a face. “Why should I deny that? It’s not classified information; it’s not top-secret. I’m a nurse assigned to the Psychological Research and Development Department.”

“Which is of course a CIA operation; experimental mind control, via drugs, shock therapy, hypnosis and God knows what else.”

Now she looked at me with new respect—and genuine alarm. Her voice was hushed: “Nathan … sometimes it’s dangerous to know things.”

“No kiddin’. Ask Jim Forrestal.” Despite the open windows, our smoke was wreathing us, now. “Okay, let’s see how much I do know…. How about we start with your part in an elaborate disinformation scenario? Designed to cover up the crash of a strange aircraft in the desert?”

“Is that what you want me to admit? That flying saucers are real?” Her expression was blank now, but her eyes danced with the hope that I’d veered off onto the wrong track.

“Sure they’re real,” I said, laughing at her, “they’re just not from outer space—at least not the one that went down after the Fourth of July, near Roswell. That was a top-secret, experimental aircraft, of an advanced design, courtesy of our Nazi pals at White Sands.”

The blood drained out of her face, and the panic in her widened eyes was very real—the concern in her voice definitely not artifice. “Nathan, listen to me—if any small part is left of how you felt about me, know that I am
not
lying to you, and listen to me,
hear
me: you need to just walk away from this.”

I flipped my spent Chesterfield out the window. “I think the scientists involved are probably the Horten brothers, and of course von Braun …”

She gripped my arm. “Jesus Christ, Nathan, stop it! You don’t know what you’ve gotten yourself into …”

My eyes swung onto hers and locked them. “Do you, Maria? Know what
you’ve
gotten into?”

Nervous, for the first time vulnerable in a real way, she lowered her gaze, not able to stand up to mine. “I told you … I can’t confirm any of your suspicions about me. Don’t ask me to.”

“But you’re a good American, right? A patriot?”

Her chin jerked up and her eyes flew to mine. “I like to think I am.”

“Who just happens to collaborate with Nazis?”

Her voice was barely audible as she said, “That war is over. We’re in a new one.”

“Lesser of two evils, huh? The Communist threat is so perilous to the American way of life, it justifies climbing in bed with just about anybody—Japs, Nazis … me.”

“Trying to hurt my feelings, now, Nathan?” A tiny smile formed as she popped her cigarette, which she’d smoked down to the last inch, out the window. “Don’t be naive. That doesn’t become you.”