The Golden Gate (20 page)

O'Hare said wearily: 'It's an ophthalmic torch. Every physician carries one. You can diagnose a dozen different diseases by the dilation of the pupils of the eyes.'
'This can be useful. Come with me.' He went down the rear steps of the ambulance, went round to the front and jerked open the driver's door. The driver, peering at a lurid magazine in the now fading light, looked round in surprise.
Branson said: 'Out!' The man descended and Branson, offering no explanation, searched him comprehensively from head to foot. He then climbed inside the driving compartment, examined the upholstery, opened various lockers and shone the torch inside. He descended and said to the driver: 'Open the engine hood.'
This was done. Again with the aid of the torch he carried out a thorough inspection of the compartment and found nothing worthy of his attention. He went round to the rear of the ambulance and re-entered. O'Hare followed, politely removed the torch from Branson's hand and replaced it. Branson indicated a metal canister held in place by a spring dip. He said: "What's that?'
O'Hare gave a creditable impression of a man whose patience was wearing very very thin. 'An aerosol air-freshener.' It was the fake Prestige can that contained the knock-out gas.
Branson freed the can. "Sandalwood," he said. 'You have an exotic taste in perfumes.' He shook the can, listened to the gurgling inside, then replaced the canister in its clip. O'Hare hoped that the dampness on his brow didn't show.
Branson finally directed his attention to die big oiled-wood box on the floor. 'And what's this?'
O'Hare didn't answer. Branson looked at him. O'Hare was leaning with a negligent elbow on top of a locker, his expression a mixture of barely concealed impatience and bored indifference.
Branson said sharply: 'You heard me.'
'I heard you. I've had just about enough of you, Branson. If you expect me to show any obedience or respect for you, then you're way out of your mind. I'm beginning to think you are illiterate. Can't you see those big red letters? They spell out "Cardiac Arrest Unit". Emergency equipment for patients who have, or may shortly be expected to have, a heart attack.'
'Why the big red seal in front?'
There's more to it than just that red seal. The whole unit is hermetically sealed. The entire interior of that box and all the equipment it contains is completely sterilized before the box is sealed. One does not inject an unsterilized needle in or near the heart of a cardiac patient.'
'What would happen if I broke that seal?'
To you, nothing. You'd just be committing the most cardinal sin in any hospital. You'd render the contents useless.
'And the way you're carrying on the President is a prime candidate for a heart attack at any moment.' O'Hare was acutely conscious that the aerosol can was only inches from his hand. If Branson broke the seal and started delving deeper he intended to use the aerosol without a second thought: Branson could hardly be expected to be the person who would fail to recognize a cyanide air pistol when he saw it Branson's face was without expression. The President -'
'I'd sooner turn in my licence than insure the President for anything. I am a doctor. Twice your needling and public humiliation have driven him into a state of near-apoplexy. You never know, third time you may be lucky. Go on and break the bloody seal. What's another death on your conscience?'
'I've never been responsible for anybody's death in my life.' Without as much as looking at O'Hare, Branson abruptly left the ambulance. O'Hare went to the rear door and looked after him thoughtfully. Revson was ambling across the roadway and Branson spared him neither a word nor a glance, behaviour uncharacteristic of Branson who was much given to directing penetrating glances at everyone, usually for no reason whatsoever. Revson looked after him in some puzzlement, then strolled off towards the ambulance.
Revson said: 'You just been put through the grinder, too?'
That you can say again.' O'Hare spoke with some feeling. 'You, too?'
'Not me. I've been searched so often that nobody would bother. Everybody else was, though. It must have been pretty thorough. I heard more than one ladylike scream of protest.' He looked after the departing Branson. 'Our mastermind seems unusually preoccupied.'
'He was acting a bit oddly when he left'
"He drew a blank, obviously.'
'Yes."
'Didn't even investigate your one sealed container-the cardiac unit?'
That's when he started behaving oddly. I'm pretty sure that he was about to break the seal when I pointed out that that would de-sterilize the equipment and render it useless. I also pointed out that I considered the President a prime candidate for a heart attack and that I regarded him as being the prime cause for this. That was when he backed off.'
'Understandable, I would have thought. He doesn't want to lose his principal hostage.'
That wasn't the impression he gave me. He also said another funny thing when he left, that he'd never been responsible for anyone's death in his life.'
To the best of my knowledge that's true. Maybe he just didn't want to spoil his good record.'
'Could have been, could have been.' But the puzzled expression was still on O'Hare's face.
Van Effen regarded Branson with a curiosity that his face didn't register. Branson, he thought, was a shade less than his old ebullient self. Van Effen said: 'Well, how did you find the ambulance and the good doctor? Clean?'
The ambulance is. God damn it all, I quite forgot to go over O'Hare.'
Van Effen smiled. 'One tends to. Pillars of moral rectitude. I'll go look at him.'
'How did it go with you?'
There were ten of us and we were pretty thorough-and pretty thoroughly unpopular. If there was a silver dollar on the Golden Gate Bridge we'd have found it We didn't find any silver dollars.'
But then Branson and his men had been searching the wrong places and the wrong people. They should have searched Chief of Police Hendrix before he'd been allowed to leave the bridge.
Hagenbach, Milton, Quarry, Newson and Carter were seated round the long oblong table in the communications wagon. There were bottles of liquor on a wall-mounted sideboard and, judging from the levels of the liquids in the bottles and the glasses in front of the five men, they weren't there for purely decorative purposes. The five appeared to be concentrating on two things only: not speaking to one another and not looking at one another. The bottoms of their glasses appeared to hold a singular fascination for them: comparatively, the average funeral parlour could have qualified as an amusement arcade.
A bell rang softly at the inner end of the wagon. A shirt-sleeved policeman, seated before a battery of telephones, lifted one and spoke softly into it. He turned and said: 'Mr Quarry, sir. Washington.'
Quarry rose to his feet with the alacrity of a French aristocrat going to the guillotine and made his way to the communications desk. His end of the conversation appeared to consist of a series of dispirited grunts. Finally he said, 'Yes, as planned,' returned to the table and slumped into his chair. The money has been arranged just in case it's needed.'
Milton said heavily: 'Can you see it not being needed?'
The Treasury also agrees that we should stall them for up to twenty-four hours from noon tomorrow.'
Milton's lugubriousness didn't alter. 'By Branson's escalation demands that means close on another fifty million dollars.'
'Peanuts to what he's asking.' Milton made a still-born attempt to smile. 'Might give one of our brilliant minds time to come up with a brilliant idea.' He relapsed into a silence which no one seemed inclined to break. Hagenbach reached for a bottle of scotch, helped himself and passed the bottle around. They resumed their mournful inspection of the depth of their glasses.
The bottle was not long left undisturbed. Richards and Hendrix entered and, without speaking, sat down heavily in two vacant chairs. The Vice-President's hand reached the bottle just fractionally before that of Hendrix.
Richards said: 'How did we look on TV tonight?'
'God-damned awful. But no more awful than the seven of us sitting around here without a single idea in our heads.' Milton sighed. 'Seven of the allegedly best governmental and law enforcement minds in the business. The best we can do is drink scotch. Not a single idea among us.'
Hendrix said: 'I think perhaps Revson has.' He fished a piece of paper from the inside of a sock and handed it to Hagenbach. 'For you.'
Hagenbach unfolded the note, cursed and shouted to the operator.
'My decoder. Quick.' Hagenbach was back in business and, predictably, he turned to Hendrix: he wouldn't have asked Richards for the time of day. 'How are things out there? Anything we don't know? How come Hansen died?"
To put it brutally, hunger, greed. Seemingly he snitched one of the food trays before he could be warned which were the dangerous ones and how they could be identified.'
Milton sighed. 'He always was a voracious eater. Compulsive, you might say. Something wrong with his metabolic system, I suppose. Speak no ill of the dead but I often told him that he was digging his grave with his own teeth. Looks like that's what happened.'
'No fault of Revson's?'
'None in the world. But there's worse. Your man Revson is under heavy suspicion. Branson, as we all have cause to know, is a very very clever man and he's convinced there's an infiltrator in their midst. He's also almost equally convinced that it's Revson. I think the man is working on sheer instinct. He can't pin a thing on Revson.'
'Who's also a very very clever man.' Hagenbach paused then looked sharply at Hendrix. 'If Branson is so suspicious of Revson would he let him get within a mile of you, knowing that you were going ashore?'
'Revson didn't come anywhere near me. General Cartland gave me the message. Revson gave the message to Cartland.'
'So Cartland is in on this?'
'He knows as much about it as we do. Revson is going to give him the cyanide pistol. Never thought our Chief of Staff was so positively blood-thirsty. He seems actually to be looking forward to using it.'
Carter said: 'You know Cartland's reputation as a tank commander in the Second World War. After all the comparatively decent Italians and Germans he disposed of then, do you think he's going to worry about doing away with a few really bad hats'''
'You should know. Anyway, I went into one of their awful rest rooms and shoved the note down my sock. I suspected that the Vice-President here and I might be searched before we left the bridge. We weren't. Your Revson is right. Branson is Horn over-confident and under-conscious of security precautions.'
Revson and O'Hare watched Van Men walk away. Revson himself walked away a few steps, indicating that O'Hare should follow him. Revson said: 'Well that was a pretty thorough going-over our friend gave you. I don't think he much appreciated your remark about your hoping that he would he a patient of yours some day.'
O'Hare looked up at the darkly threatening sky, now almost directly overhead. The wind was freshening and, two hundred feet below, the white horses were showing in the Golden Gate.
O'Hare said: 'Looks like a rough night coming up. We'd be more comfortable inside the ambulance, I think, and I've some excellent whisky and brandy in there. Used, you understand, solely for the resuscitation of the sick and ailing.'
'You're going to go far in your profession. Sick and ailing describes my symptoms precisely. But I'd rather be succoured out here.'
'Whatever for?'
Revson gave him a pitying look. 'If it weren't for your good fortune in having me here, you'd very probably be the main object of Branson's suspicions. Has it not occurred to you that, during his intensive search of your ambulance, he might have planted a tiny electronic bug which you wouldn't discover in a week of searching?'
'It occurs to me now. There's a dearth of devious minds in the medical profession.'
'Do you have any gin?'
'It's odd you should ask that. I do.'
That's for me. I told Branson that I didn't drink and that's why I have a nose like a bloodhound. I shouldn't care for him to see me with a glass of something amber in my hand.'
'Devious, devious minds.' O'Hare disappeared inside the ambulance and reappeared shortly with two glasses, the clear one for Revson. 'Health.'
'Indeed. I shouldn't wonder if that's going to be in short supply inside the next twenty-four hours.'
'Cryptic, aren't we?'
'Psychic.' Revson looked speculatively at the nearest helicopter. 'I wonder if the pilot - Johnson, I think - intends to sleep in his machine tonight.'
O'Hare gave a mock shiver. 'You ever been in a helicopter?'
'Oddly, perhaps, no.'
'I have several times. Strictly, I assure you, in the line of medical duty. These army jobs are fitted with steel-framed canvas chairs, if that's the word for them. For me, it would be a toss-up between that and a bed of nails.'
'So much I suspected. So hell probably bed down with his fellow-villains in the rear coach.'
'The chopper appears to interest you strangely' Revson glanced casually around. There was no one within possible earshot.
'The detonating mechanism for the explosives is inside there. I intend - note that I only say intend - to deactivate it tonight.'
O'Hare was silent for a long moment, then said kindly: 'I think I should give you a medical. For that space between the ears. There'll be at least one armed guard on all night patrol. You know the bridge is a blaze of light all night long. So you just dematerialize yourself - '
The sentry I can take care of. The lights will be switched off when I want them.'
'Abracadabra!'
'I've already sent a message ashore.'
'I didn't know that secret agents doubled as magicians. You produce a carrier pigeon from your hat -'
'Hendrix took it ashore for me.'
O'Hare stared at him then said: 'Another drink?'
'No befuddled wits tonight, thank you.'
Then I'll have one.' He took both glasses and reappeared with his own. 'Look, that guy Kowalski has the general appearance and the eyes of a hawk. I'm not exactly short-sighted myself. He never took his eyes off you all the time the Vice-President and Hendrix were out here. Branson's orders, I'm certain.'
'Me, too. Who else? I never went near Hendrix. I gave the message to Cartland who passed it on to Hendrix. Kowalski was too busy watching me to bother about Cartland and Hendrix.'
'What time will the lights go off?'
'I don't know yet. I'll send a signal.'
This means Cartland is in on this?'
'What else? By the way, I promised the General the cyanide gun. Can you get it to him?'