Deep Cover (28 page)

There was still a way. But it had been tedious. Like most ranch-style houses in Tucson, Trumble's had a slightly peaked roof shingled with asbestos. The low attic contained ceiling insulation and aluminum ductwork systems that fed
air-conditioned and heated air into wall vents in all the rooms. The ducts were less than a foot square in cross-section but the attics through which they ran had to be designed big enough for servicemen to crawl in alongside the ducts. There was a large metal grating at one end of the house under the eaved roofpeak, giving access to the electric exhaust fan that ventilated the attic space, and at the other end was another grating which provided a place for air to come in so it could circulate through the exhaust fan. Spode had tackled the second grating. He had had Jill's help; she had stood on his shoulders and unscrewed the grating and then jumped down and given him a boost. He had crawled in, twisting his shoulders to fit through, and found himself buried in an itching mess of excelsior-style insulation. He'd found the service crawlway and climbed up on it and spent quite a while picking insulation out of his hair and clothes because he couldn't very well leave a spoor of the stuff all over the house. Then he'd crawled from rafter to rafter with the pencil flashlight and eventually found the plywood trapdoor that gave access to the house below. He'd spent a good while examining it for magnetic leads but so far as he could tell it wasn't wired. It was sunk in the ceiling of a clothes closet. When he opened it he climbed down onto the hat shelf and then dropped to the floor through a thick row of Trumble's jackets and coats; the closet had the vaguely decaying smell of dried sweat.

This time he had to jump to reach the grating. He chinned himself inside. He knew the route now so this second intrusion was easier. He pried the trapdoor up and went down into the house and walked through it looking for the attaché case.

The black case wasn't wired with explosives, though it wouldn't have surprised him. He picked the locks and set up his camera on a C-clamp mounting which he screwed to the lid of the toilet. He put the documents on the tile floor to make the pictures; he had chosen the bathroom because it had no window, only an exhaust fan, and the neighbors wouldn't
see the light. When he had what he had come for he put the papers back in the case, locked the case and put it back on the living-room desk where he'd found it. He wiped everything for fingerprints and looked at his watch, and because there was plenty of time he took the little voice-activated bugs out of his pockets and began planting them in various places around the house, particularly near the three extension telephones. They were button-sized micro-transmitters with a maximum range of about three hundred yards but that was more than sufficient for Spode's purposes. He pasted them under the telephone stand and under a lamp base and behind the bed's headboard and under the frame of the living-room couch.

Traffic was a faint distant mutter in the room. He had one bug left and he was trying to decide where to put it when he heard a car stop just outside, a door thud shut, shoes come up the walk with authoritative stride. Spode's hair rose.

He waited for the doorbell to ring because if it rang then this wasn't Trumble coming home. But it didn't ring and when he heard the key go into the lock he wheeled and went back through the house.

Before he reached the closet he heard the front door open. Footsteps came inside and he knew he couldn't climb up into the attic without making noise. He would have to sneak out after Trumble went to bed. He spoke a silent oath and darted across the hall into the guest bathroom; closed the door and flicked the pencil torch around to orient himself so he wouldn't go banging into anything. When his eyes had memorized the room he switched off the light and stood breathing shallowly through his mouth, listening.

Footfalls moved around but there was something odd here. The feet went from room to room, pausing now and then but never settling down. Somebody was searching the house and it wasn't Trumble because Trumble would have turned lights on.

Spode felt the stir of his blood. If the man was armed and surprised him here it could be trouble.

He wrinkled his brain trying to remember whether he'd
seen anything here that might make a weapon. A faucet dripped relentlessly.

Somebody—one of Trumble's endless string of women—had left a jar of cold cream on the shelf above the sink. Spode wrapped it in a guest towel and twisted the towel ends to make a handle.

The intruder was looking for something big because he wasn't opening drawers and cabinets. Maybe he had been keeping surveillance on the house, had seen Spode and was now searching for him. But Spode had been trained to spot that kind of thing and there hadn't been any sign of watchers on the street or in the shrubbery. A neighbor from another house? But he'd arrived in a car.

Shoes came down the hall and stopped. Spode tensed, knowing the man was just beyond the door and listening with the same taut apprehension.

He heard the doorknob turn. A crack of light appeared—a pencil torch like his own, masked and reddened by fingers. The door came open a little wider and Spode saw the hard black oily gleam of an automatic pistol with a perforated silencer screwed to the barrel.

He brought the wadded jar down on the gun wrist hard enough to paralyze the tensor muscles which otherwise would have pulled the trigger involuntarily.

The gun dropped and clattered but the man had presence of mind to yank the door shut. The gun got caught on the floor between the door and jamb and the door bounced open again. One certainty: it wasn't a chance burglar. Sneak thieves seldom carried guns and never stayed to fight. But this one did: came in and slammed the door back hard enough to shatter the mottled glass of the shower stall. A shard cut the back of Spode's hand but Spode was in motion. The penlight made an arc and there was enought light: he smashed the blade of his hand into the man's larynx.

The intruder had only one good hand now. It brought the penlight up to the injured throat and Spode went for the solar plexus with board-stiff fingertips. He folded the man but the wild-swinging right hand smashed against the side of Spode's
jaw. It was going to hurt to chew for a day or two. Spode cracked him across the back of the neck and the man went down.

The first thing Spode went for was the automatic pistol. He checked the safety as he turned. The penlight was on the floor under the sink, still burning, rolling slowly. The man was blinking. Spode switched on the ceiling light and had a look at him.

Now Spode recognized him—the man he'd seen drive past the house slowly a little while ago. An ordinary round face, brown hair, unexceptional eyes. Middle-aged and on the burly side. He looked like a civil servant, a faceless assistant to an assistant. But the side-vented brown suit had been tailored to accommodate the belt holster.

“Who are you?”

“I guess it's my turn to ask that question. Got a wallet? Let's see it.”

“Stop waving that gun at me. You're not going to use it until you've found out what you want to know from me.”

Spode said, “Let's have your ID.”

“May I get up?”

“Stay put a while.”

The man moved with the kind of care a professional used when he knew he was dealing with another professional. There was no chance of misinterpreting any of his moves. He produced a flat wallet; Spode stepped back out of reach before he opened it. His heels crunched broken glass.

There was a blue-gray identification card with official seals that said the man was Meldon R. Kemp, Grade G7, assistant research director for the World War II Division of the National Archives in Alexandria, Virginia. The driver's license and other cards had been issued in California and there were two blank checks on the First National Bank of Fresno. A California concealed-weapon permit and a Federal Government handgun license. The man was well papered with documentation.

Spode showed his teeth and his disbelief. He tossed the wallet back and Kemp put it in his pocket. When Spode made gestures Kemp got up and sat on the closed toilet lid. “And who are you?”

“Call me Sitting Bull. The ID card says NARS but it's the wrong color. The FBI uses those colors; you're not FBI.”

“Are
you
?”

Spode grinned. “I'm just a tourist.” He threw it out casually to see what reaction he'd get; the word could have a particular meaning.

He got the reaction. Kemp smiled a little. “That's all right then, we've just got our wires crossed. Look, Area Code 703, 306-8585. Ask for Extension 520 and describe me to the man who answers.”

Now that was interesting. It was one of the Agency's numbers. It made Spode doubly suspicious because Kemp had given him a little too much in answer to a simple question. Agency people weren't supposed to go around giving out their phone numbers at the drop of a hat. Kemp had to be working on two alternate assumptions: that Spode was a colleague or that he wasn't. If Spode was in fact an agent and called the number, the Agency would deny Kemp's existence irrespective of the truth and Spode would be expected to believe Kemp was on a top-secret assignment. On the other hand if Spode was not a colleague then Spode wouldn't take the risk of calling himself to the attention of a government agency because Kemp had surprised him burglarizing a house and if Spode wasn't an agent himself he'd be questioned about it. Conclusion: in giving Spode an answer Kemp had actually posed a question, and it would be answered for him by Spode's response. If Spode called the number, Spode was an agent. If not, he wasn't.

It was rather neat but Spode punctured it. “It's easy to sling out vague hints that you're a G-man. It's a handy cover and it would take me a long time to prove you're not what you pretend to be. If I call that number they'll just tell me they never heard of you.”

Spode got out his camera. It was a pocket Minox loaded with Tri-X film for document work under poor light; it would be a bit grainy for a portrait blowup.

Kemp didn't like it but Spode had the gun and Kemp couldn't play games. “Keep still a minute,” Spode drawled, and took five or six snaps of his face. He pocketed the camera and let the gun droop in his fist. “Now we're going to talk. I haven't got the patience to wait you out while you bring out a few yards of standard evasions and cut them to fit. Either I take you somewhere and work on you or we can get it done here—but if we do it here let's forget about the S.O.P. preambles.”

He could see Kemp was mildly amused. The idea of interrogation didn't intimidate him a bit. It was only to be expected; whoever Kemp was working for, he was a pro.

Kemp was a curious one. Opaque eyes, neutral American accent, elusive, characterless, neither large nor small: an unobtrusive shadow.

Kemp said, “Let's not take it anywhere else. I'd only keep looking for a chance to jump you and violence attracts too much attention, don't you think?”

“Suit yourself. You can start talking, then.”

“I guess not. If the tables were turned how much would you tell me?”

“That'd depend on how much I had to lose.”

“You're in an awkward bind, you know. You could break a few of the bones I need the most but there's no guarantee that would make me open up. You don't know what kind of repercussions would come back at you, because you're not sure who's back of me.”

“You're just not going to budge, are you?”

“Not an inch,” Kemp agreed amiably. “We might as well call it a draw and part company.”

Spode had to smile. The guy was good. Too smug, maybe, but nonetheless very good. Spode was pretty sure he could break him down, but if he did and Kemp turned out to be an Agency man it would put Spode between a rock and a hard place, and nothing about this incident seemed important
enough to justify that sort of risk. Of course that was exactly the reaction Kemp was counting on, but you didn't make trouble solely because the other fellow expected you not to.

So Kemp was right; it was a standoff. Spode circled him cautiously and got down on one knee to get a light grip on the edges of a glass shard Kemp had pushed out of his way on the floor. It would have fingerprints on it. Spode wrapped it in his handkerchief and put it in his pocket with the Minox. Kemp watched drowsily and massaged the back of his neck; his control of his emotions was superb.

Spode took his time wiping his own prints off the cold-cream jar and the surfaces he might have touched in the scuffle. Kemp said, “It's a shame about that busted shower stall. Maybe your people can arrange to have it replaced and get the mess cleaned up before the owner of the house comes back.”

Again the statement concealed questions: Did Spode work for an organization big enough to handle that kind of chore quickly? Did Spode know how soon the occupant would return?

Spode gave him no satisfaction but took what he could from Kemp's statement: Kemp didn't know where Trumble was or how long he would be away.

It was all shadowboxing and Spode could do better away from here. It was time to clear out. He said, “I'll go out first. You can lock up when you leave. When I'm gone give me a few minutes to get clear—I might get trigger happy if you're too tight on my ass.”

“Sure you might. I can see you're the type who'd just go all to pieces.”

“Why take the chance?”

“I'll give you five minutes. Do I get my gun back? If I lose the thing I not only have to pay for a replacement but I've got to explain how I lost it. You understand.”

“I understand, but I'll keep it. Next time you'll know better.” Spode backed out into the hallway.

“You've probably left prints on some more of that glass. Was I you I'd wipe them off before I left.”

“I guess I'll have time for that.”

“I guess you will.” Spode turned and walked toward the front of the house, not hurrying.

In a hedge across the street Spode concealed the battery tape recorder that would pick up signals from the bugs he had planted in Trumble's house. The bugs were voice-activated and the tape would run only when there was sound, but just the same there was only two hours' tape on the machine and that meant someone would have to retrieve the tape once or twice a day and replace it. Spode didn't know what good it would do to monitor Trumble but sometimes a blind shot paid off.