Queen Victoria's Revenge (17 page)

She was back in a moment with a most thoughtful look on her face. “We have just had a report from our stakeout at the colonel's house. A very dirty VW bus is parked there now and five Cubans have entered the house. Do you know anything about this?”

“I certainly do. That's the thing we went to Scotland in. It must be Jorge and the others returning with their tails between their legs because the Scots grabbed the colonel. They don't know what to do without him.”

“Is Jorge the one from the airplane?”

“Right, the second in command of the Cuban skyjackers.”

“Is there a chance he might know who the fence might be?”

“Every chance in the world.”

“And what he does not know that Jasmin person might. Or someone else in the house. I think the time has come to interview the people there. Would you like to come with us while we talk to them? I must warn you it is completely illegal and might be dangerous.”

“Let's go.” He laughed hollowly. “Unless we find out who has the money I'll be a wanted criminal on the run for the rest of my life. What's one more charge?”

“That's the spirit. You would make a good international agent if you only put your mind to it.”

Bolstered by this dubious compliment, Tony sipped a little more Old Mortality while the wheels of organization began rolling for the raid. A number of scruffy lodgers appeared who, up close, were not that scruffy at all. Jinon and Isaj organized things quickly. Within twenty minutes all was ready and the raiders departed while Esther and Tony hailed a cab and followed at a more leisurely pace.

“Give them a few minutes start,” Esther said. “We can arrive after the fireworks are over. We don't want you getting hurt.”

Tony waggled his eyebrows rapidly and shook his thumb at the driver, whose large, red cockney ear was just beyond the open partition. A typical London cabbie, thick of neck, strong of jaw, solid as Gibraltar, English to the core.

“Shalom,” Esther said.

“Shalom, Estherla,” the cabbie answered. “How's your poppa these days?”

“Happy on the kibbutz. He's raising oranges, very proud of them.”

“Oranges, yes. Mishugganah Arabs, no. He can keep it. Say hello when you see him.”

Whatever the carload of Israeli agents had done had been done swiftly. The cab drove through the darkened streets and stopped before a familiar house, behind an even more familiar VW bus, hijacker transport deluxe. As Tony and Esther walked up the steps the front door opened and Jinon, or perhaps Isaj, waved them in.

“A piece of cake,” he announced. “Most of them were asleep when we broke in. We have them in a sort of conference room on the first floor.”

The only evidence of forced entry was a splintered gouge next to the lock on the front door and a Marmion bed & breakfast lodger lolling on a settee in the hall with a Bren gun in his lap; he waved to them happily as they climbed the stairs.

“It looks more like the Pentagon war room,” Tony said when they entered the board room where the newly captured prisoners were being held. A large and gleaming table, surrounded by chairs, stretched the length of the chamber. Curtained windows covered one long wall, while the facing wall was filled by an immense map of the world. As in the aggrandizing maps and postcards sold to tourists in the great state of Texas, here Cuba had been expanded to match her size in the hearts of her expatriate sons. It loomed, large and green, off the shores of a pallid United States, next to a shriveled Central America, a great and prosperous island about two thirds the size of Africa. From it green streamers—even red tape was not allowed in this bastion of anti-communism—led to all the major capitals of the world. In case this inflation of a simple Caribbean island to world status might be misunderstood, the wall at the far end of the room contained one mighty black-draped, gold-framed portrait of a scowling individual in the uniform of commander of the galaxy armies, or some equivalent rank, who bore a resemblance to the gone but not forgotten Fulgencio Batista. Farther down the wall, to the left of course, was a much smaller portrait, hanging crookedly, of Fidel Castro. It had been used as a target and was pincushioned full of darts, contained a number of bullet holes and was impaled by a steel-tipped hunting arrow.

Relaxed Israelis were standing in the corners of the room, and seated in the chairs around the conference table were six unshaven red-eyed scowling men and a single equally scowling woman. Jorge looked up and bared his teeth when Tony came in, arid then spoke out clearly:

“¡No te arrugues cuero viejo que te quiero para tambor!”

“Shut up,” Tony suggested. “There are women present and they do not wish to hear that kind of language. Hello, Jasmin.”

“Svinja, cochon, merde…”

“On second thought, maybe they do. When you are through with the language lesson, Jasmin, I want you to tell me what you are doing here with these skyjackers of your plane.”

“I tell you nozzing.”

“Oh, you can talk a bit of English,” Esther said, smiling sweetly. “That's nice.”

Both women looked each other up and down swiftly, efficiently, radiating suspicion, examination, hatred, disgust, loathing, all with the use of eyebrows and nostrils and without the use of words. Esther added a lifted shoulder of contempt and the turned back of rejection. Jasmin bit her lips in silence. Tony shook his head ruefully at her.

“You know, at one time I really felt sorry for you. Knocked about by that horrid skyjacker. It was very realistic, I have to admit that. But he knocked you down so you could stay on the plane because you were part of the plot all along. What was your job—getting the weapons aboard in Karachi?”

She turned her face away from him and did not answer. Jorge spoke in her stead, a crisp low-voiced rattle of
barrio
insults that had the other Cubans smirking covertly and craftily, all smarmily describing Tony's female relatives and going back a number of generations.

Fatigue, excitement, strange hours and even stranger drinks had, without his knowledge, tightened Tony to the snapping point. He rarely lost his temper, it was not something he enjoyed, but when he did a hundred generations of pure-blood Apaches raised their heads and war-whooped. In a bound he was across the room and had seized Jorge and hurled him from his chair to the floor, standing over him with fists clenched. Jorge gaped. The anger dimmed and Tony wondered just what to do with the prostrate skyjacker when memory supplied the answer. Hadn't Jorge been happy to hold him when the colonel had pressed the gun to his skull and threatened to pull the trigger? He had, playing right shoulder as Tony remembered.

“You two, pick him up,” Tony ordered, waving two of the Israelis forward. He was not aware of their hesitation or Esther's quick nod in their direction. They hauled Jorge to his feet. “A pistol,” Tony shouted, his hand out, still glaring at the frightened man. Frightened? Good, keep it going. Esther slapped a pistol into his palm and he pushed the muzzle against Jorge's head.

“Now, you know how this goes. You are going to answer my question. You two—hold him but move aside, don't stand behind him, that's fine. I want to know the name of the fence that the colonel was going to take the skyjacked bills to. I want his name and where I can find him—”

“I don't know!”

“That doesn't matter to me. If you don't know, then you are a dead man. If you do know, you will speak before I say three or I pull the trigger and that is your end. Think of the name, ready. One, two…”

“Uncle Tom!” Shouted hoarsely.

“What? You make jokes on your deathbed?”

“No, I swear, on my honor, the name, a store, a pawnshop, not far, Woolwich. I'll give you the address, on Plumstead Common. You can find it.”

Tony slowly lowered the gun and turned away, drained. Esther took the gun from him and spoke quietly. “The safety catch was on all the time. Would you have pulled the trigger?”

He shrugged and went and pulled one of the darts from Castro's portrait. “I don't think so. And if I had I would probably have missed. I'm a lousy shot.” He hurled the dart at Batista and impaled his left earlobe. “Even with darts. I was aiming at his heart.”

“You are a wonderful brave man and there are plenty of killers in the world so you should be happy not to be one. It is more important to be brave, and you will have to be braver still.”

“What do you mean?” With a sinking feeling.

“I thought it was obvious. Someone must approach this Uncle Tom with the American bank notes and pretend to be a Cuban trying to sell them, able to speak Spanish and all that. Who but you could do that?”

TWELVE

Esther had all the arguments ready, Tony had nothing but stammered defenses. The world of the underworld, sinister fences with furtive gunmen, waited close by. It was a closed book to him and, as far as he was concerned, it would remain forever that way. But opposed to his natural reflexes were all of Esther's sound conclusions. She counted them off on her fingers as she led him from the room and up the stairs again, right up to the top of the house. The only lead they had was Uncle Tom. It was doubtful if information could be forced out of Uncle Tom, so if anything were to be learned it would have to be learned by trickery. Tony would present himself as a Cuban bearing skyjacked money. Esther and her competent companions would be waiting nearby, ready to intercede in case of difficulties. And, after all, he was the one who was in trouble, wanted by the police, anxious to clear his good name. They would give him all the help they could, but he was the only one who could approach the fence in the needed guise.

“But what do we do with the skyjackers?” he asked, quickly throwing up one more defensive barricade. “The second we leave here Jorge gets in touch with Uncle Tom and I end up in the Thames wearing a concrete overcoat,”

“That is no problem.” She opened the door at the end of the long hall and showed him in. The light switch was on the wall outside. “Isaj found this. Charming don't you think?”

Here was the colonel's workshop, or hobby room, where he relaxed after a hard day's skyjacking. The door was thick metal, padded on the inside, as were the walls. There were no windows; air came in from heavy metal ducts in the ceiling. There were manacles hanging from all the walls and in the far corner stood a homely umbrella stand filled with whips of various sizes and strengths. Esther looked around disapprovingly.

“Old habits die hard. I suppose no one will tell us if the colonel ever used this charming chamber, but he certainly had it ready for use when the time came. A very not-nice man and we must see to it that he is put away somewhere out of harm's way. Meanwhile we can put all the others in here and they will be secure. You can be sure there is no way out when the door is locked. But we'll check in any case. Once you are through with your conversation with Uncle Tom we can send someone back here to open the door. They are rather awful people, aren't they?”

For some reason the room decided Tony. It reminded him of the colonel and of the tobacconist in Glasgow and stiffened his backbone considerably. “Right. Let's do it before my spirit wilts.”

“You are a wonderful man, Tony Hawkin,” Esther said, sincere emotion in her voice. She put her slim arms over his shoulders and planted a warm and lingering kiss on his surprised lips. “It is just too bad you aren't Jewish,” she whispered into his ear and gave it a gentle bite.

“I'm a comrade in arms,” he said, enthusiastically returning the kiss. “I'm the only American Indian FBI man who ever worked for the Israeli underground in Mexico.”

“Hush.” She put a finger to his lips. “That information is still classified and even I don't know about it.”

“You two through yet?” Isaj (or was it Jinon?) asked from the doorway, gun cradled in arms, one world-weary eyebrow raised. “The natives are getting restless downstairs.”

“Get them up here and lock them in. We are going to have a look at Uncle Tom.”

With many dark glances and muttered complaints, the skyjackers were locked into the colonel's game room. Jasmin protested at being imprisoned with all these men and Esther gave her a knowing look that spoke louder than words. The door was indeed soundproof and capable of being heavily bolted so, with their flank held strongly, the Jewish-Apache raiding party restored weapons to suitcases and shopping bags and left even more quietly than they had entered.

“We'll take the VW too,” Jinon (Isaj?) said, holding up the keys. “I liberated them from your friend Jorge.”

“But it's a rental car,” Tony, for some indecipherable reason, protested.

“Then they'll just have to pay for the extra mileage,” Esther told him, with woman's unarguable logic, and they climbed in.

From Tony's point of view the ride was over far too hurriedly. The rush-hour traffic had already swept by so they were able to cross the Thames on a spired bridge with great ease. After that the road led east, with Esther pointing out all the sights, until they slowed to a halt beside a large green area set about with trees, surrounded tightly by buildings. “Plumstead Common,” Esther announced. “The shop is on the other side.”

“What is that?” Tony asked, pointing at the yellow glow of windows, the colorful blazon of arms above.

“A pub, as you very well know.”

“I do know. I intend to take you there for a drink while your forces get into position, then you will lead me to the door and slip away. Is it a deal?”

“You are very brave. It is a deal.”

The door moved easily under Tony's hand to reveal a humming, low-ceilinged chamber filled with strong tobacco smoke, which instantly set him to coughing, and crowded with men almost shoulder to shoulder. There were a few women at tiny tables on the periphery, most of them past their prime, all industriously talking, but it was the men who dominated the establishment. They seemed uniformly dressed in tan raincoats that were stained in similar patterns, and wore caps pulled low over their eyes or pushed back as the case may be. Leading Esther by the hand, Tony pushed through the pack and managed to make the haven of the bar, where he clutched to the rounded wooden edge while he fought hard to catch the eye of one of the laboring bartenders. Both were well-muscled and white-shirted, pumping hard on the beer handles and sending forth a steady stream of large full glasses. One of them finally noticed Tony's frantic waving, perhaps his beer-pump arm was tired, though that did not seem possible, and he came over with a wet rag, which he used to spread the pools of beer into a sort of countertop-wide lake.