The Weapon of Night (17 page)

“Jesus, get the cops! Christ, Curly, look — he’s killed a guy!

With a pen, by God! Willya looka that”

Hands tugged at Hakim.

“Hey, look! It’s a mask, he’s wearing a mask. Gawd, see the face? It’s one of
them!
Jeeze, kill the dirty bastard!”

Hakim felt the plastic mask being ripped away from his face, the rain of kicks and blows that slammed into his body. Dimly, very dimly, he heard the sound of a police whistle as his clothes tore and he felt a trickle of blood make its way wetly down his face.

“Lemme at him, Billy Joe! For Chrissake, gimme a turn, will you?”

He felt one more agonizing pain in his ribs and heard a cry of savage delight. Then he heard no more.

Mr. Judas heard about the new riot even before he reached the railroad station.

T.S. was not in the men’s room. Judas was not surprised. Savagely angry, but not surprised.

He left the station and went to the washroom of a small cafe. There, between other people’s visits to the place, he succeeded in making contact with his remaining four. He gave them new instructions.

An hour later he boarded another plane. In spite of his losses he was grimly satisfied. A few dead men were nothing to him. But the chaos he had heard about and seen made him chuckle to himself. And nothing, now —
nothing
— could prevent the fulfillment of his master plan.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Meeting For Murder

Five down, if Hakim had been lucky. That left four plus one to go.

Ten little, nine little, eight little Red Chinamen . . .

Going down like ninepins, but too slowly. And no sign, yet, of the Kingpin, while the precious hours passed in tedious search.

Nick watched the indicators on the panel as he guided the AXE “copter through the night. His gaze was intent, because now at last he had something to look at. The whole craft seemed to be ticking and whirring like a bomb about to burst.

He tightened his circular flight pattern and watched the sizzling green light of the main detectorscope. It narrowed briefly and broadened again as he swung north toward the lake, and the indicator needle on the panel beneath it took a sideways dive and quivered convulsively.

About time.

It had already taken much longer than he had hoped; time enough for him to hear reports of a strange occurrence in Little Rock and for Hawk to jet Julia down to check into it; time enough to begin to wonder if he had not been mistaken after all.

But now he knew he had been right.

If there was a cache somewhere it
had
to be in the general vicinity of the West Valley plant for the late Mr. Parry’s convenience; it had to be accessible by road for the sake of the others; and it was probably not far, in road miles, from a fair-sized airport. Or so he had figured until he had begun to doubt and punch holes into his own argument.

The holes were plugging themselves up rapidly. The broad band of the dectorscope billowed outward in a spreading, jagged pattern that told him the cache lay down below. South of Buffalo, north of West Valley, close to the shores of Erie.

He circled again until he had the location pinpointed exactly. There was nothing to be seen below him in the darkness but a sweep of breach and a glint of pale moonlight on the water that cast the faintest of glows on a shapeless mass of trees and rocks, but his whole bank of supersensitive instruments assured him that there was something down there that did not belong.

“N3 to Hawk, N3 to Hawk”

Nick gave his report as he circled again, this time slightly to the south toward a landing area.

“If they’re down there they must have heard me,” he said, hovering low over a strip of grassland bordering a sweep of lake sand. “Suggest you put a watch on Buffalo airport and all nearby roads in case they’re sneaking off.”

“I haven’t any more men,” Hawk said tensely. “I have them checking out disturbances from here to hell and back — Hell Gate to Hell’s Kitchen. My God, Carter, I wish you knew just how much trouble we have on our hands. But we did make positive identification of the man in Little Rock, and we did find his suitcase abandoned in his hotel room. Same contents as the one you found.”

“And Hakim?”

There was a pause.

“Beaten brutally,” Hawk said grimly, “Panic victim. He’s alive, but . . . but let’s get on with the job. I’ll have radiation experts standing by to follow you in when you’re sure. But, you understand, I am positively unable to send you reinforcements.”

“Don’t want any,” said Nick, as the AXE craft came to a feather-soft landing on the grass. “But the roads and the airport —

“I’ll do my best,” Hawk interrupted.

Nick signed off and strapped the AXE-designed portable Geiger counter at his waist with its single earphone against his ear.

Wilhelmina, Hugo and Pierre were waiting in their usual places for the action to begin.

Now for the difficult part — finding the place on foot.

He padded along the beach and through the fringes of trees, following the fluctuating hum in his ear.

Time ticked by. The sensitive instrument sang quietly to him.

He skirted the lake shore and flitted, shadowlike, through groves of trees, cursing the waste of time and urging himself on as the humming grew louder in his ear.

The line of beach and intermittent trees gave way to a stretch of rocks and then to humps of root-tangled land jutting out into the water. He picked his way silently through the bushes, over more rocks, past a great boulder and through another small grove of trees.

He came out of the grove and rounded a pile of boulders. And suddenly the sound in his ear was almost deafening.

He was standing, now, on the outer rim of a small inlet, and his view of the inner curve was blocked by a clump of bushes. It took him a moment to pick his way around them, but when he did he could see the full sweep of the cove and the ancient jetty that jutted into it from the shore. By this time the sound in his ear was so loud that it was unbearable. He turned the instrument off, he did not need it any more.

They had been lucky to find this place. Judas, no doubt, had done the scouting, and he had the expert’s nose for searching out such hidden places. There could not be many such inlets along the coasts of Erie. Someone, long ago, had built a boathouse here in this wild cove, and abandoned it. Maybe because it was so wild; maybe because the rocks here were treacherous. Maybe he had gone broke. But he had gone, and left his shack and jetty for a Judas to make use of.

There was an old but sturdy cabin cruiser bobbing beside the sagging planks with only one dim blue light to give away its presence. Beyond it was the boathouse, sagging like the jetty and apparently unusable, but no doubt reinforced from within and quite capable of storing enough material to keep the Ten busy for many weeks. It must have been quite easy to build, say, a false flooring or wall, and give it a weathered appearance. No reason at all why anyone should ever have stumbled on their cache until it had served its purpose. Nor would the ordinary Geiger counter have picked up the message given off by its contents. However, AXE equipment was not ordinary.

Nick picked his way silently along the curve of the inlet toward the pier. The boathouse was behind it, and behind the boathouse was another grove of trees. Somewhere beyond it, Nick judged, there would be a back road leading to a main highway — one that branched off both to Buffalo and to the West Valley plant.

And the cabin cruiser itself made a useful vehicle, especially if those who used it knew a landing place on the Canadian side of the lake where they might slip off, undetected. . . .

He reviewed his mental map as he glided through the darkness. Niagara Falls was only a stretch of lake and a strip of land to the north. Very, very handy to reach from here, if one had business to attend to in that part of Canada — or any part, for that matter and a certain amount of spy’s skill to go with it.

Judas’s skill was a master of record. And there was no doubt at all that his business interests reached across the border.

Nick passed parallel to the jetty and rounded the inner curve of the inlet toward it. The boathouse was a dark and silent hulk. Only the boat alongside the pier showed any sign of life, and that was no more than a rhythmic bobbing on the water and a pale gleam of blue light.

But the boat could wait. Right now he wanted to be sure about the boathouse.

He edged around it cautiously, staring into the grove of trees for any sign of a watcher and feeling with his hands for an entrance to the rickety building. He found it easily enough, but, of course, the doors that should have been as ramshackle as the building were not only firm but securely locked and barred. The rust on the locks seemed genuine, but he was sure that it was not.

The padlock clanked softly at his touch — and something rustled in the trees.

He drew back into the darkest of the shadows and listened to the night. He heard crickets, the flutter of birds’ wings, the sigh of a low breeze in the leaves, a frog, the splat of water as the cruiser gently swayed and rocked. Nothing alarming, nothing out of place. Yet, his muscles were taut with expectancy, and the hair on the back of his neck stood out like porcupine quills.

Someone was near. He was sure of it.

But nothing moved as he strained his eyes and cars into the darkness, and after a long, waiting moment he took the tiny compasslike device from his pocket and trained it first in the direction of the boat and then at the shambles of the boathouse. It gave no reaction to the boat. But as Nick swung it back toward the boathouse he could see the little illuminated needle jerking convulsively around the dial in his cupped hands, and then he was sure the boathouse was the supply depot and the boat was the meeting place.

So. He would attend their next meeting, whenever it might be.

Blue light from the boat spilled across the jetty and made a shining path of it. He would have to turn back around the curve of the inlet, strip, and slide into the water, or he might be seen by . . . by whatever it was that was making his skin crawl.

He inched his way forward, wishing for the thousandth time in his life that he had eyes in the back of his head, eyes with built-in night sights to turn the darkness into light. But he did not. His night senses were exceptionally acute, but he was only human.

His foot scrunched across a tiny, unseen twig when he was about five feet from the boathouse and heading stealthily for a cluster of tall boulders. He heard the other sound in that same instant and knew that he had given himself away. There was a rustle of cloth behind him and the softest of footfalls; he flung himself sideways and jerked Hugo loose from his sheath. But the two muscular arms were already locking themselves around his neck in a blinding stranglehold. They tightened around his windpipe, squeezing mercilessly. Nick kicked backwards violently as his own hands shot up to claw at the ones at his throat. His kick missed, as the man behind him sidestepped with an agile, twisting movement. The grip became a neck-breaking bear hug.

Hugo’s flicking blade bit deep into the pressing hands. They loosened infinitesimally to change position, but then the grip became a choking armlock. The man was tall and incredibly powerful. His clutch was iron and his determination must have been made of the same stuff, because Hugo was making no impression. The grip tightened further and then there was a sudden savage twist that had Nick almost off his feet. He thrust backward with the stiletto’s ice-pick blade and had the satisfaction of hearing a pained grunt. Then he rolled with his attacker’s own twisting movement and threw himself hard on the ground, dragging the other with him. Again there was a gasp of pain, but the grip still held him. Dizziness began to blur his mind. His throat and chest were burning in a blaze of agony. Even as his mind swirled he grudgingly admired the other man’s tenacity, because apparently Hugo’s bite was beginning to take effect at last, although the iron hold was still choking him inexorably.

He brought his elbow back with all his strength and slammed it hard and deep into the other man’s stomach, and when the loud grunt came and the feet flailed he twisted abruptly and wrenched himself free. A long, bony knee jabbed upward toward his groin and he dodged it with a rapid rollover. It struck his thigh but he brushed it aside with a swift kick of his own that brought a savage sound from the other man and a miraculously swift movement.

The man was on his feet — incredibly, on his feet — and his right hand was thrust inside his jacket.

Nick was up and pouncing. His left hand caught at the other’s reaching arm and twisted it, and Hugo sank into the chest. The tall man uttered an animal sound and kicked out in a whiplike motion that snaked his leg past Nick’s and made his own long body sway like a falling tree. The man swore furiously and chopped out with both hands.

Nick ducked low and kicked upward from his half-crouch even as he rose. His toe connected with the chin and the tall man rocked and grunted. He cursed. In Chinese.

“That was your last chance, friend,” Nick said conversationally, and nailed Hugo through the fellow’s neck.

The man gurgled and kicked out, his lanky body flailing like an injured octopus, and his hands and feet thrashed in motions of attack. Again Nick felt a wave of reluctant admiration. The fellow was refusing to die, prolonging the battle and his own agony.

Hugo drew back and darted forward one more time.

The tall man’s hands clawed wildly at Nick’s face, while his body, still almost upright, teetered crazily, fighting death itself. For a long moment the tall figure stood there, swaying and squirming. Then it dropped like a felled oak.

Nick crouched beside it, waiting, meticulously wiping Hugo’s blade on the other man’s sleeve and probing the darkness with his ears and eyes. The dying heart slowed and stopped. The silence was even deeper than before.

His listening ears caught nothing but normal night sounds.

He hoisted the body over his shoulders and carried it to the nearest clump of rocks. When he had dumped it on the other side he played the thin beam of his flash over the narrow, flat-planed face and powerful body.