The Demolishers (11 page)

He sat down and drank from his wineglass. “How did a guy like you ever make connections with Giuseppe Velo?”

“I did him a favor once, kind of accidentally, in the line of duty.”

Varek frowned. “Hell, Seppi retired from his New York enterprises and moved down here, it must be twenty years ago. He must be pretty damned old by now.”

I said, “I don’t know his age, but he looks ancient enough, like a lizard that’s died and dried out in the sun. But he still keeps in touch, a little.”

“I know. Everybody knows. He says . . . Well, to hell
with what he says about you. You knew what he’d say or you wouldn’t have had me call him. So what do we do next?”

The phone was an elaborate job with a keyboard, some extra mysterious buttons, and, in addition to the usual handset, a loudspeaker. There had to be a mike in there, too, since you could talk into it as well as listen to talk coming out of it. Philip had to check me out on the controls before he’d trust me to fly it. He was very polite about it, going heavy on the “sirs.”

I’d asked for a speaker-phone so both ends of the forthcoming conversation could be heard by everyone present. A gesture of good faith. No tricks. No secret messages. Nothing up my sleeve. Call me Honest Helm for short. I punched out the number for the direct line, and Mac’s voice came on almost at once.

“Yes?”

“Matt here,” I said, using my real name rather than my code name, our signal that the conversation wasn’t private. Well, honesty and frankness can be overdone.

“Yes, Matt?”

I said, “We’ve had some activity down here in Palm Beach—actually over in West Palm—but I’ll make my full report later. Right now I’d like to speak with Miss Delgado if she’s available.”

“I believe she left the office several hours ago, but she’s on call. Just a minute.”

It wasn’t surprising that the lady had left for home, since my wristwatch read close to eight o’clock. Mac, of course, never requires food or sleep as far as anyone has been able to determine—evidence to support the theory, very popular throughout our small agency, that he’s not really human. Evidence against: the fact that he has a lady out west, a fairly powerful businesswoman, with whom he spends some time occasionally. However, he doesn’t seem to let this relationship affect the organization, although it can’t be an easy thing to manage.

We’d left the dinner table and returned to the gunroom for coffee, because our hostess felt it was cozier than the enormous, formal living room for a small party like ours. As we waited for Mac’s voice to stir the speaker into action once more, she came in accompanied by a maid carrying a tray, which was placed, at her direction, on the low table by the red-leather sofa. Lia settled herself gracefully behind the tray.

“Matt? Regular or decaffeinated?”

“I’ll just have a touch of brandy if it’s available.”

“It will be,” Lia said, “but right now we’re in the coffee business, darling. Sandra, you’ll have decaffeinated, won’t you?”

Instinctively, the girl started to protest against being protected from real coffee as if she were a child; but she checked herself.

“Yes, Lia,” she said. “We wouldn’t want to stunt my lousy growth, would we?”

As the maid was carrying the steaming cup across the room, the speaker came alive again.

“Go ahead, Miss Delgado.” That was Mac’s voice.

I heard Lia say, “That will be all, Maria.”

The maid delivered the cup to Sandra and went out, closing the door behind her.

Another voice, female, came through the speaker: “Delgado here.”

It seemed unnatural to carry on a phone conversation without holding something to my face, but I spoke to the electronic marvel on the table. “This is Helm. Have you got your screen and keyboard handy? ’ ’

“I’m at my apartment, Mr. Helm, but I have a computer terminal here, yes. Do you have some information for me? Just a minute . . . All right, go ahead.”

I said, “For your information, present and listening to this conversation are Mr. and Mrs. Alexander Varek, and Mr. Varek’s daughter, Mrs. Cassandra Helm. I wouldn’t be surprised if we were also being recorded. How about it, Alex?”

Varek said, “The boys tape all phone conversations in the house unless they’re told to get off the line. You want me to tell them?”

I said, “Hell, no, let them get an earful. Anyway, we may want a record of some names and addresses. . . . Why don’t you start the ball rolling by telling Miss Delgado about the maid who was planted on you?”

Varek shrugged. “Whatever you say. Her name was Bernadette Saiz. Loverboy was Ronnie Juan Jackson.” “Did you get that?” I asked the phone. “Bernadette Saiz. Ronnie Juan Jackson.”

“I heard.” There was a little pause before Miss Delgado spoke again. “Sorry. We have no data on those names.”

I said, “Well, file them and asterisk them, or whatever you do to indicate that they’re no longer with us. They helped set up a hit for the CLL, but it didn’t work and they didn’t get clear.”

“Give me the details, please. We never know what information will be useful.”

“Mr. Varek will tell you all about it.”

While he was relating how the girl had come to be
hired as a maid, Sandra put a big round glass into my hand. There was a splash of brandy rolling around in the bottom of it. Very high class, but I’ll have to admit that I prefer less glass and more booze. I have a tendency to strangle on that strong stuff, trying to sip it daintily from one of those big snifters. I listened to Varek telling the microphone what little had been learned about Bernadette and her boyfriend.

"Could I have the name of the former employee, please?” asked the speaker. “The one who quit and recommended Saiz.”

“Ernestine Jaramillo.”

“Jaramillo with a 7?”

“That’s right,” Varek said. He’d pronounced it Haramijo, Spanish fashion.

“Go on.”

“That’s all I have,” Varek said. “Except that they were on their way to Puerto Rico when we stopped them. Matt?”

I said, “Okay, I’ll take over. Miss Delgado?”

“Yes?”

“Mr. Varek’s people got the impression that those two had been promised sanctuary in San Juan somewhere; but apparently they hadn’t been given the address. They expected to be taken there on arrival.”

Dana Delgado’s voice said, “Yes, there are indications that the Legion is operating from a San Juan base convenient to both Gobemador and Montego. It is being investigated. Anything else?”

I said, “Antonio Morelos.”

There was a pause. “No data . . . Wait. Morelos? Young?”

“He was well under twenty and he won’t get any older.”

“I see.” The voice was steady. “Another asterisk job, Mr. Helm?” '

“That’s right. Why did you ask the age?”

“We have no Antonio Morelos, but we do have a Dominic Morelos. This one is on our master list. Member of the Caribbean Legion of Liberty, member of the Council of Thirteen. One reference to a nameless kid brother on record.”

“Give me Dominic, please.”

“Thirty-three, five-ten, two-ten. A burly, muscular type. Hair black, medium length at last report. Large
bandido
moustache at last report. Eyes brown. Small scar on left side of chin. Nails of left hand missing or deformed—we understand that, as a guest of the current government of Gobemador, our great democratic ally in that island region, Morelos underwent an interrogation involving a pair of pliers. Primitive, brutal, and apparently useless; we understand that the desired information was not forthcoming. Morelos seems to consider himself God’s gift to women; and some women seem to agree. The record shows considerable military training. Unarmed combat, expert. Edged weapons, expert. Firearms, average. It is recommended that, if you have to deal with Mr. Morelos, you take him at long range. Don’t let him get close.”

“Yes, ma’am,” I said.

“I know. You’re all supermen out there in the field; no advice required. Unconfirmed reports credit Morelos with five kills, two bare-handed. Also ...” She stopped abruptly.

“Also what?”

“It’s highly classified, Mr. Helm.”

“Everything’s highly classified in Washington, up to and including the location of the public johns.” I winked at Varek. “We’re all good trusting friends together here, so fire away.”

“Very well. The responsibility is yours. But I’ll have
to report that the information has been compromised at your request.”

I started to get annoyed at her stuffy, bureaucratic attitude. Then I detected an undercurrent of amusement in her voice and realized that, guessing what I was trying to accomplish, she was deliberately impressing our audience with the fact that it was being made privy to great government secrets. Bright girl.

‘‘You do that,” I said, deadpan.

Miss Dana Delgado cleared her throat in Washington, a thousand miles to the north. ‘‘We recently, very recently, came across some evidence indicating that Dominic Morelos may actually be the mysterious chairman of the Legion’s thirteen-person council.”

“You mean the guy who calls himself, or is called,
El Martillo,
The Hammer?”

“It’s only a possibility, unconfirmed.”

“An unconfirmed possibility is better than no possibility at all. Any more on Morelos, like a home address?”

“The last fix we had put him in San Felipe, a small village at the western end of Hawkins Island, the main island of the sovereign nation of Montego. Incidentally, I feel obliged to point out, Mr. Helm, that if Antonio Morelos was Dominic’s young brother, and you’re the one who killed Antonio ...”

“I am.”

“Then
El Martillo,
if he is
El Martillo,
is not going to like you very much. You might check from time to time, as you proceed with this missjon, to make perfectly certain who is hunting whom.”

“The thought had already occurred to me, but thanks anyway, ma’am.”

“I know, I know, you’re all bulletproof and immortal out there. I apologize for wasting your time with my foolish suggestions. Anything else?”

“One more problem, but first, you’d better have the details of Antonio’s demise for your hungry computer.”

I told her how the shooting had come about, and went on: “After he was shot, I tried to get out of him the name of the woman who was seen outside La Mariposa at the time of the bombing. I figured there was a good chance he’d know something about it, working with them like that; and in any interrogation, it’s better to ask for the name of a specific person. I figured if we got the identity of the bomb lady we could probably work from that to the names of her two companions, and maybe even get a line on those who’d sent the three of them out with the whiz-bang. Anyway, Antonio was reluctant, but just before he died he said something about an angel. A little angel. Can your computer field that one?”

“Just a minute.” Presently Miss Delgado’s voice returned. “The Morelos file contains a reference to, among a number of other women, an Angelita Johansen. A small blonde girl. One of several attractive tourist-ladies who were privileged to spend a night in Dominic’s hotel room—the Privateer Hotel, Morganville, Montego.” “Morganville, for Sir Henry Morgan. Hawkins Island, for Sir John Hawkins. Those old English sea captains got around, although I never read of Hawkins navigating in that area. But, hell, if local legends can put Leif Eriksson on Cape Cod, I guess they can put Sir John Hawkins in Montego.” I frowned thoughtfully; a wasted frown since she couldn’t see it. “But I thought you said Morelos operated out of a place called San Felipe.”

“Yes, but according to our information he also kept a room in the capital city sixty miles away. Data on Morelos is still coming in, but it seems that he was in the area primarily to observe, and maybe supervise, the progress of the Legion unit of about eighty men training with Heinrich Bultman’s strike force, now numbering about four hundred. However, he’d slip away frequently to Morganville, presumably on CLL business although he often managed to mix it with private pleasure. Usually he went there to meet people arriving by plane.” ‘‘People like Angelita Johansen?”

“Not exactly. Most of the ones he met were new recruits for the invasion force. But Senor Morelos’ nights in the Privateer Hotel were seldom spent alone. Apparently, while keeping his hands off the local ladies so as not to arouse hostility among the Montegan natives, he preyed quite successfully on the female tourist traffic. Angelita Johansen came to Morganville by plane, all right, but with an organized tour group. The evening after her arrival, she wandered away from her tour and came into the hotel bar alone, exploring. Morelos zeroed in on her. Our informant states that, from what he could learn without asking too many questions, the contact seemed casual enough. The locals apparently admire Morelos’ sexual prowess; they enjoy watching him stalk his prey of the evening. It seems to be a local spectator sport; there’s even some betting. Apparently the little Johansen looked proper and ladylike enough that quite a bit of money said she’d brush him off; but in the end she succumbed to the Morelos charm like most of his other targets. Typically, in the morning when she rejoined her friends she was rather the worse for wear, noticeably bruised and rumpled, but glowing in a very improper and unladylike fashion. The local consensus was that there was one little
gringa
schoolteacher—actually she works in an architect’s office—who’d go home feeling that she’d got her money’s worth from the travel agency.”