The Threateners (4 page)

She took the glass I offered her and sipped from it while looking around the room. It was typical Santa Fe, with heavy mud-brick walls plastered smooth and painted white, a rounded kiva fireplace in the comer, and a rather low ceiling with the round exposed roof beams, natural timbers, that we call vigas. The wooden dining table and four chairs at one end of the room, and the cocktail table and the two big wooden armchairs facing the fireplace at the other, were all of local manufacture, heavy and dark and picturesque and ethnic as hell, but, I’ll admit, not remarkably comfortable.

Madeleine said, “I always thought people who went in for burglar alarms must be slightly paranoid.”

"It was already installed when I bought the house," I said. “The lady who lived here used it as a summer home; she spent the winters in Scottsdale, Arizona. The place was ripped off twice in her absence, so she put in the alarm system; but nothing could keep the crazy drivers from knocking down her front fence occasionally, and she was getting pretty old, so she decided to live in Scottsdale full-time and sold me the property complete with furniture, kitchen appliances, and security system. Considering my line of work, I feel I’d be tempting fate if I didn’t use it; and it does make me worry a bit less when I’m away on business. These days, around here, most people feel obliged to hire house sitters for protection while they’re gone.’’ I grimaced. ‘‘I can remember a time in this town, not too many years ago, when we didn’t even lock our doors.”

I took the Anschutz out of its case and slipped it into its place on the five-gun rack on the wall beside the fireplace, below the two shotguns that are designed to cope with big birds and little ones, and the two hunting rifles intended for use against larger animals and smaller ones. The firearms designed to cope with people of all sizes I do not keep on display; but there was a large knife in an elaborately carved leather sheath lying on the shelf below the guns. It was a giant Bowie of presentation quality, with elaborate grips and engraved blade. At fourteen inches it was really too big to be a practical fighting knife unless you had Tarzan dreams and a tiger in mind. It had been a tongue-in-cheek Christmas present from Jo, my late lady love. I locked up the gun rack and gestured toward one of the chairs by the fireplace, picked up my drink, and settled into the other.

Madeleine sipped her drink, watching me. “Matt?”

“Yes, Madeleine?”

“Why are you having me followed?”

We’d taken the long way around, but we’d finally got to it. I regarded her for a moment, thoughtfully.

“How many people do you think I have following you?” I asked.

She glanced at me sharply, but answered the question: “I made it four at the last count, but there could be more.” Then she said, angrily, “Damn it, I thought it was all over, five years ago when my conviction was reversed and my record was cleared and full citizenship was restored to me. . . . It didn’t make up for my lost career, or the years of my life wasted in that ghastly federal penitentiary, but goddamn it, at least it was over, or I thought it was. And then, just recently, I started seeing little men trailing me like before, when they were trying to pin all the treason in the world on me, Jesus! It was like a crazy time warp taking me back to that terrible year before the trial. . . . What are you trying to do to me, Matt?”

“When did you first spot these people watching you?” She glanced at me irritably, but again answered the question: “It must have been three or four weeks ago. And I shouldn’t say ‘men’; there seem to be two of each sexual persuasion—well, of the two standard sexual persuasions. An equal opportunity employer, hah! They could have been following me quite a bit longer. Denver is a big city; and it took me a while to realize that I kept seeing the same cars too often, and the same faces. I guess, after five years, I’d started to forget some of the lessons they taught me at that gruesome spy school of yours.”

“What makes you think these people are taking orders from me?”

Madeleine didn’t seem to hear the question; she drew a long breath and went on harshly: "Don’t you have any imagination at all, can’t you understand how being followed like that makes me feel? But to hell with my feelings, don’t you realize that even if my record has been cleansed, purged, completely purified, I can’t
afford
to be under surveillance? This new law firm has been very good to me, but if it got around that I was being tailed, as we ex-cons say . . . It would destroy everything I’ve built since I moved to Denver. No respectable firm can afford to employ a woman, innocent or guilty, who has teams of government agents following her around.”

“What makes you think they’re government agents, Madeleine?”

When she didn’t answer at once, I reached over to take her black purse out of her hands. I’d already noted that she handled it as if it was heavier than it should be. I looked inside and saw one of the smaller Colt revolvers, .38 caliber, with a four-inch barrel. I closed the purse and gave it back to her.

She spoke defiantly: “It’s perfectly legal. All my civil rights were restored, remember, including the right to buy a gun.”

Actually, while owning the pistol was legal enough out here in the west, where no pickup truck is properly equipped without a couple of firearms across the back window, carrying it concealed like that probably wasn’t; but it was no time for technicalities.

I repeated my question: “What makes you think they’re government agents, Madeleine? And how do you know I sent them?”

“They’ve got to be government agents if you’re involved, don’t they?” She smiled grimly. “One of them told me, Matt. Oh, not willingly, but eventually she spoke up like a good little girl and told me everything.”

I studied her face carefully and saw the burning anger she was trying to keep in check. “I see. You’re getting tough in your old age.”

She said harshly, “Remember, when we were traveling across the country together, after you picked me up at Fort Ames, that man you wanted to answer your questions who wouldn’t? Well, at first he wouldn’t. He must still be carrying the scar you gave him, unless he’s had a plastic job done. I catch on quickly, Matt; it only takes me five years or so to take a hint. So I cut the pretty one out of the herd and pistol-whipped her a little, following in the footsteps of the master.”

She was waiting for something, perhaps shocked disapproval. I said, “I had a hunch it was going to turn out to be all my fault.”

“Well, whose else? You shouldn’t have set me such a brutal example, back when I was weak and impressionable. And you shouldn’t have put me through that lethal course and then sent a bunch of wet-nosed kids after me. It didn’t take much to make the little bitch talk, just one good taste of the gun sight. I left her blubbering about her lousy face. To hell with her face, it’s my lousy life she and her friends are wrecking, damn it. What little of it I managed to save out of that other wreck!” She drew a long, shuddering breath. “Give me another drink, damn you!"

I took her glass away, refilled it, and returned it to her. She drank and sat for a moment staring into the glass.

“If you think I’m sorry for spoiling the stupid brat’s looks, think again! I’d happily mangle the whole lot of them. I didn’t fight back last time. I let them humiliate me and walk all over me and give me a farcical trial and call me a traitor to my country and lock me away; but this time it’s going to be different. Last time I was a starry-eyed young lawyer and I was naive enough to trust the law to protect me, ha! Well, I’m still a lawyer, because it’s the only way I know how to make a decent living, but I'm not starry-eyed and naive any longer. This time I know where the real protection is, right here!” She slapped the purse in her lap and lifted her head to look at me. “You see? You see what you’ve done? I was almost civilized again, almost human. I’d almost forgotten the gutless, prideless slob who crawled out of prison and the savage fighting beast you and your trainers and weapons instructors made of her. I’d almost forgotten about killing two men to save your life. But it’s coming back to me, darling! Nobody’ll ever put me behind bars again. They may kill me, but I promise you I won’t die alone, and if the bastards I take with me are wearing police badges or government IDs, so much the better. They still owe me for the years they cost me—‘Oops, just a slight mistake, ma’am, but it wasn’t really our fault, ma’am, we hear so many perpetrators claim they've been framed, sorry about that, ma’am.’ Well, this time, damn it, I’ll make them regret their little mistakes in spades, and that goes for you, too, Matt, if you’re trying to use me for something tricky!”

“Sounds like a threat,” I said mildly.

She glared at me. “Are you laughing at me? Oh, I know you’re tough and trained and experienced, and undoubtedly armed to the teeth, and all I have to work with is one crummy little pistol and a quickie course in mayhem that’s five years old, but don’t fool yourself that I’m going to be such an easy patsy a second time—”

“Nobody’s laughing,” I said. “Come on, let me show you something.”

“Matt, damn you—”

“Come on!” I rose and took her reluctant hand to help her out of her chair. ‘ ‘We’ll go out the back way through the bedroom.”

She started to protest further, but checked herself and allowed herself to be guided out of the living room and past the big double bed to the French doors opening onto the patio at the rear of the house. Happy, who spends most of his time in the front yard—perhaps he enjoys listening to the cars going by in the street outside—came charging around the comer to greet us as if he hadn’t seen us for a week.

I coped with his enthusiasm and said, “This way.”

The lot is a narrow one, leaving only room for a flagstone walk along the side of the house and a flower bed—well, decorative shrubs and small rosebushes—along the fence. Madeleine followed me with due regard for her nylons.

“It must be pretty when they’re in bloom,” she said. “I didn’t know you were a gardener.”

“I inherited the staff. It seemed a pity to let it all die, the old lady had spent a lot of time and love on it, so I have a man come in once a week. . . . Okay. Do you see that knothole in the fence over there near the gate? Take a peek through it and I’ll tell you what you see.”

“Isn’t this kind of silly?” Madeleine asked, making her way to the indicated spot. “Why don’t you just tell me—” But she rose on tiptoe to look through the hole.

I spoke in tour-guide fashion: “You are now looking up a typical old Santa Fe thoroughfare, ma’am, with houses and property walls right on the street, not much in the way of sidewalks, no front lawns, a few parked cars. Well, I don’t have to tell you about Santa Fe; you’ve lived here. There’s a gray Honda parked next door on this side, you can just see the rear of it, and a blue Audi across the way. At least they were there just now when we came inside. And somewhere well up the street, with some other heaps, probably on the other side facing this way with a good view of my gate, is an old tan Volvo station wagon. There’s a dark-haired woman sitting behind the wheel. Am I right?”

Madeleine hesitated. “Oh, up there. Yes, you’re right, although I can’t be sure it’s a woman, but what makes her so special—”

“They’re very systematic,” I said. “Six-hour shifts; this gal still has a few minutes to go. At noon sharp she’ll be relieved by a skinny young fellow with ragged jeans and a lot of dark beard, driving a white Chevy van. He was the first one I spotted, so I call him Spooky One; the lady is Spooky Three. At six in the evening, One will be replaced by Four, a sharp-looking Latin gent in a suit—with or without a tie depending on the mood of the moment—who’ll take up the watch in a sporty little red Pontiac of some kind. At midnight, a tall blond character in boots, jeans, and a cowboy hat, driving a husky blue Ford pickup with four-wheel drive, one of those jacked-up monsters with a row of lights over the cab, will take over. Spooky Two. At least that describes the costumes and rolling stock as of yesterday; they switch things around occasionally to confuse. . . . Now what’s happening?”

She’d suddenly become very intent on the knothole. “The station wagon is driving away, but there isn’t any—oh, yes, here comes the van. He’s parking a little closer. Like you said, a real Castro beard." She drew a long breath and turned to face me. “What are you trying to tell me, Matt?”

“Join the club, baby. We’re all wearing extra shadows these days, it’s the latest fashion.”

She said sharply, “You mean, you want me to believe you’re being watched, too? What makes you think I’ll fell for a crazy story like that? The way you know their schedule to the minute, they’re probably your bodyguards, assigned to protect you from people you’ve driven crazy, like me. . . . Oh, damn!”

Intent on our conversation, she’d snagged a stocking, cutting too close to the comer of the flower bed.

I said, “Why don’t you drop the act, Madeleine?”

She looked at me for a moment; then she bent over and touched a dampened forefinger to her damaged hose. I’ve never figured out why they do that; do they expect saliva to heal the broken nylon threads magically? She straightened up slowly to face me.

When she didn’t speak at once, I went on: “It’s the standard toughie-lawyer routine, isn’t it? Intimidate the witness by treating him as guilty and coming at him hard and watching his reactions, hoping he’ll give himself away, one way or the other. But this is Matt, sweetheart. You don’t have to run a bluff on me or put on an act for me. I’m on your side.

Her voice was harsh: "I had some people on my side once, long ago at the time of my trial; a lot of nice, friendly, helpful people. I have them to thank for my conviction. It made me, let’s say, a bit mistrustful of folks claiming to be on my side.” She drew a long breath. “That girl said she was there—they were all there—on account of you.”

It was an odd way of putting it, but this wasn’t the time to analyze it. I grinned. “That just means you didn’t hit her hard enough, or often enough, sweetheart. It would be interesting to know what other stories she’d have come up with.” I regarded her for a moment, rather grimly. "No matter what anybody said, you don’t really believe I’d send a bunch of creeps to harass you without a word of warning, do you, Madeleine?”