The By-Pass Control (2 page)

“Except one,” the field man said.

“What?”

“You nailed him,” he told me.

Randolph’s smile was tight around the edges. “I’m afraid you don’t know our friend very well, Courtney. This is Tiger Mann and when you see his package in the department files it will surprise you. Moscow has him on their ‘A’ list, which makes him a dead boy almost any time at all. He was with the O.S.S. during the war and likes to play spy so much he couldn’t leave well enough alone, so now with the backing of millionaire industrialists who don’t seem to trust their government’s authorized agencies to do a satisfactory job, he gets entangled in everything from espionage to two-bit street brawls for the sake of a buck. I don’t know what he calls himself, but he’s a professional killer with enough power behind him to clean his hands for him but someday he’s going to fall and when he does it will be heard on two continents.”

“Three,” I said. “And don’t hold your breath waiting for it to happen.” I pushed myself out of the chair and got to my feet, the pain in my side giving me hell. “You’re talking too much, Randolph. I’ll be down in the morning to give you a detailed statement.”

“Where do you think you’re going?”

I found my hat and picked up my gun. “To see a doctor,” I said. “One who won’t report bullet wounds or knife slashes. Any objections?”

There was just a long moment of silence and Randolph shook his head. He knew I’d be in. I wanted some questions answered too. I got out, went down to the street and walked two blocks before a cab came by. I gave him the number of Rondine’s apartment and settled back against the cushions.

 

No matter how often I’d see her, this woman I loved so much, she was always a startling surprise, not because of the classic British beauty that radiated from the loveliness of a face framed by shoulder-length auburn hair or a contoured body so magnificent as to be almost unbelievable, but simply because
she was there.

For twenty years she had been dead to me. Twenty years ago she had tried to kill me and had, in turn, died herself. Yet here she was. Rondine? No, it’s not really so confusing at all. The first Rondine was her oldest sister who had gone to the Nazis and later to the Soviets. To the Caine family she had never even been born now, and long forgotten except when the memory was dredged up. With me the memory never had died at all. For twenty years I had wanted to kill her and almost did when I found her again. But it wasn’t her at all. It was the youngest sister who had inherited the same peculiar combination of genes and chromosomes to grow into the physical identity of the one forgotten.

To me, though, she was still Rondine. The cover name she had used could never be forgotten, only now it was Edith who used it because I had endowed it in the beginning and this one wore it with all the meaning it was intended to have.

She opened the door, stood there a few seconds and when I said, “Hello, Rondine,” she smiled and held out her hand, throwing the door wide.

Before I walked in she realized something had happened and the smile faded to sudden concern. “Again, Tiger?”

I knew my grin seemed foolish, but it was all I could manage. “Like the ball took a bad hop, kid.”

She tried to make sense out of the slang, got it, and the soft curve of her mouth went grim. “Bad?” With a hand under mine she steered me into the spacious living room and half pushed me into the corner of a sofa.

“I’ll live. You remember Dr. Kirkland?”

“The same one?”

I nodded. “Get him over.”

Without asking more questions she thumbed through the phone book, found a number and dialed it. The conversation was brief, then she hung up and went to the bar, mixing a drink with the unusual efficiency of women handling bottles at three A.M. When she handed me the glass I took a long pull of the whiskey and ginger, then leaned my head back and closed my eyes.

“Can I do anything?”

“No first aid, kid. Kirkland will be here fast enough and I’ve had too many of these things in me to know I’m okay until he comes.”

“Hurt to talk?”

“No.”

“Want to tell me what happened?”

I looked up at her face and saw the serious set to it. There was more in her expression than concern for me. We didn’t have to play games with each other any more at all. She wasn’t the simple U.N. translator she seemed to be, but a well trained operative with a good cover assigned to work under her embassy’s orders. She knew my business too, more than she had a right to know, but there are times when you can’t hide things and have to trust to integrity and understanding and the knowledge that other people can have the same ideals as your own.

 

I said, “Call Charlie Corbinet and get him here too.”

There was a slight narrowing of her eyes and she knew, all right. This one wasn’t just a street brawl or an accident. It was in the international realm again and it was far from over. Again, without a word, she went to the phone and did as I told her, then picked up my drink and built a new one. When she handed it to me there were tears showing on her cheeks and her lips brushed the back of my hand.

“Why?” she asked.

“Because I have to,” I told her.

 

Dr. Kirkland was painlessly adept at his profession. The bullet had gone through two thicknesses of tough leather of the gun belt, its force slackened, then had sliced sideways into the flesh along my ribs and come to a halt in a bluish welt just under the skin. Both cuts from the knife were more like surgical incisions, the deliberate thrusts having been lost when I twisted out of their way. He finished, gave me a small bottle of capsules to take if things got rough, told me to stop by at the proper intervals and didn’t ask for payment. Martin Grady would foot the bill.

Rondine let me finish dressing before she came out of the bedroom, shaking her head like I was a little kid who didn’t know any better. “You don’t suppose you’re leaving here tonight,” she said.

“Some things won’t wait, doll.”

“Nothing is that important.”

“No?”

“Tiger ...”

I reached my hand out and her fingers closed around mine. I said, “All the other things I’ve done... or you’ve been in on ... are nothing like this one. If it checks out all of us can be in trouble.” I looked at my watch. Charlie Corbinet was due any second now. “Make like a good secretary and get me one more call in.” I gave her the number and felt the sudden shock run through her hand in a spasm of tension. She had heard me call that number before and knew its implications. Only for a second did she stand there, then reached for the phone. When she dialed it she handed me the instrument silently and started to walk out of the room. “Stay,” I told her.

“You sure you want me to?”

“I’ve seen you kill too,” I reminded her. “This one will take more than me alone.” She nodded, then moved to an armchair and sat down.

On the third ring the phone was picked up, but as was usual, no voice answered. I gave the signal words and the other person said, “Go ahead, Tiger.”

Martin Grady was as casual as if he were discussing a simple stock merger, knowing I would never make this call unless it was a total emergency.

“Who’s in this area?” I asked.

“Don Lavois and Tony Williams.”

“Scrub Williams and send Don in.”

“Can you talk?”

“Ears only. We’re sitting on a big one. Take any of our top men out of projects you can shelve for the time being and have them on alert. Have them stand by at the usual place until I make contact. We’ll need one liaison man and a fast plane handy. You’ll be directly involved in this and will have to be ready to move fast.”

“The F-51 Mustang will be in from Sarasota tonight then. It will land at Newark.” There was a slight edge to his voice now, anticipation rather than nervousness. “You all right?”

“I’ll live.”

“Serious?”

“Doc Kirkland will send the bill and the details. Meanwhile scratch Vito Salvi. He’s had it.”

Grady hesitated, his voice cautious. “You
sure?”

“Positive ID.”

“This will get you very special attention in certain quarters, Tiger. They won’t like their best trigger man being rubbed out.”

“What choice have they got?”

“But
you
have a choice,” he said.

“Like a nice vacation in the Andes or that sleepy village in Baja California?”

“I’m thinking along those lines. We can’t afford to lose you.”

“You can’t afford to hold me off this one either. I’m the one Vito talked to before I killed him and a vacation will get you nothing but silence, so now the choice is back to you.”

I could almost hear the silent evaluation he was giving my statement, then he said, “You’re asking for it. Take it.”

“I got it.”

“Need anything?”

“So far, no. Be ready for anything though. This is bigger than anything we ever touched.”

“I’ll wait for the report. Tonight?”

“As soon as the plane gets in. Others will have to know about it too.”

“Use your own discretion. Will they cooperate?”

“They’ll have to,” I told him and grinned a little. They had no choice either. I hung up, waited until Rondine took the phone away and sipped at the last of my drink. Just as I finished it the doorbell rang, two short, impatient notes on the buzzer. the raunchy, hard-bitten type he had been when he was our colonel and twenty years hadn’t softened him any. Ostensibly, he headed up a small but important industry, but I.A.T.S. had recruited him back into their new organization for the simple reason that they needed his type, his brains and his foresight.

A few of his superiors knew about his connection with me and hated his guts for it but they couldn’t do without his guts either and they let our association alone.

Now he stood there in the middle of the room, tall and rangy, the hard planes of his face still an indication of his true profession, his eyes scrutinizing me while his mouth twisted into a wry smile, knowing the yeast had started bubbling in the batter again.

I said, “Hi, Colonel.”

“Someday you’ll remember they made me a General on my retirement.”

“Habit. Sorry.” I smiled back at him. “What kind of pay you pulling?”

“I do all right.”

“A hundred says I make five times as much.”

“You’re just greedy.”

“Damn right. I work for it too. It isn’t enough.”

“Ever think one of the right agencies might take you on in spite of your record?”

“Screw them. They don’t pay enough. This way I do the same work and make a lot more bucks. I like compensation for the chances I take.”

“There’s a chance you can wind up in the pokey, too.”

“Not as long as I know where the bodies are buried... and Martin Grady can bail me out.”

Rondine handed Charlie Corbinet a drink, reserving a small one for herself. “Don’t bother arguing with him,” she said quietly.

Charlie nodded. “I couldn’t be bothered.” He took a quick taste of his drink, nodded with satisfaction and looked at me again. “I had a phoned report on the Vito Salvi fracas. You sure can stir things up.”

“Randolph?”

“Yes. They had been after him for two years.”

“When was their last contact?”

“Eighteen months ago.”

“Then they’re lucky. They had their work done for them.” I let it go through his mind, then added, “He had two of your men in that back room. How he nailed them I won’t worry about, but what was he after?”

“Classified, Tiger.”

I shrugged, making a real production out of it. “It doesn’t matter. Whatever they told him won’t go any further. It’s over with.”

“Is it?”

He could see the edges of my teeth in the grin. “Not quite. You see, we had a little talk too... before I killed him.”

“That’s what I thought.” Charlie turned, walked to a chair and sat down with a sigh of relief. “Want to come out with it?”

“Sure, Charlie. Tell me why Salvi wanted those men and I’ll tell you what he told me. Maybe.”

“One of your men was dead too.”

“Nobody that counted.”

“He was in Martin Grady’s employ.”

I nodded. “In a minor capacity by government directive.

Grady owns pieces of many essential industries that come under the identical setup.”

Slowly, Charlie Corbinet turned the glass around in his hand, studied it before he took a drink, then decided. “You really want me to get my head chopped off,” he said.

“Not really. I’d just like to see you draw a full General’s pay with bonus for the work you do ... and some real authority to back you up instead of handing it to guys like Randolph.”

“Tell me, Tiger... why don’t you like the way Washington runs things?”

“Because I don’t like to be classified with the patsies. I don’t like the stupidity that went behind the Bay of Pigs invasion... or the Panama crap... or the way they can knock us off in Viet Nam while we sit on our thumbs and get laughed at by the real pigs on the other side of the Berlin Wall. Someday they’re going to find out a few people in this country got the message a long time ago and are doing something about it—using their time, money and talent to protect what they have. Funny, but it’s fun too. It’s a real pleasure to shove it up and break it off in Moscow’s tail. We’re not any better than the Washington boys. We just have more latitude to operate in and can buy what they can’t, and have that nice, juicy knowledge that we can’t be pushed too far because whatever we do, we’re protected, and in that respect we can use the Soviet’s own cute techniques to slam back at them.”

“I’ve heard that speech before.”

“And I never get tired of giving it, buddy.”

“So what did Vito Salvi tell you?”

“Let’s start from the beginning. You first,” I said.

As usual, he waited, digesting his thoughts, but as usual, he came across. He had to and I knew it so I just sat there until he was ready. “Tiger... those two men...”