Алистер Маклин - Partisans

‘Blue it shall be.’ Petersen broke the ampoule into a test tube, inserted the needle of the hypodermic and began to withdraw the plunger. Alessandro stared in terrified fascination as the blue liquid seeped up into the hypodermic.

‘I’m afraid I’m not very good at this job.’ Petersen’s conversational calm was more terrifying than any sibilant threats could ever have hoped to be. ‘If you’re careless an air bubble can get in and an air bubble in the blood stream can be very unpleasant. I mean, it can kill you. However, in your case, I don’t think it’s going to make very much difference one way or another.’

Alessandro’s eyes were staring, his whitened lips drawn back in a rictus of terror. Petersen touched the inside of Alessandro’s right elbow. ‘Seems a suitable vein to me.’ He pinched the vein and advanced the syringe.

‘No! No! No!’ Alessandro’s voice was an inhuman scream torn from his throat. ‘God, no! No!’

‘You’ve nothing to worry about,’ Petersen said soothingly. ‘If it’s a non-lethal dose you’ll just slip away from us and come back in a few minutes. If it’s a lethal dose, you’ll just slip away.’ He paused. ‘Just a minute, though. He just might die in screaming agony.’ He brought out a pad of white linen cloth and handed it to George. ‘Just in case. But watch your hand, though. When a dying man’s teeth clench they stay clenched. Worse, if he draws blood you’ll get infected too.’

Petersen pinched the vein between fingers and thumb. Alessandro screamed. George applied the pad to his mouth. After a few seconds, at a nod from Petersen, he withdrew the pad. Alessandro had stopped screaming now and a weird moaning noise came from deep in his throat. He was struggling insanely against his bonds, his face was a mask of madness and a seizure, a heart attack, seemed imminent Petersen looked at George: the big man’s face was masked in sweat.

Petersen said in a quiet voice: ‘This is the killer dose, isn’t it?’ Alessandro didn’t hear him. Petersen had to repeat the questions twice before the question penetrated the fear crazed mind.

‘It’s the killer dose! It’s the killer dose.’ He repeated the words several times, the words a babble of near-incoherent terror.

‘And you die in agony?’

‘Yes, yes! Yes, yes!’ He was gasping for breath like a man in the final stages of suffocation. ‘Agony! Agony!’

‘Which means you have administered this yourself. There can be no pity, Alessandro, no mercy. Besides, you could still be telling a lie.’ He touched the tip of the needle against the skin. Alessandro screamed again and again. George applied the clamp.

‘Who sent you?’ Twice Petersen repeated the question before Alessandro rolled his eyes. George removed the pad.

‘Cipriano.’ The voice was a barely distinguishable croak. ‘Major Cipriano.’

‘That’s a lie. No major could authorize this.’ Careful not to touch the plunger Petersen inserted the tip of the needle just outside the vein. Alessandro opened his mouth to scream again but George cut him off before he could make a sound. ‘Who authorized this? The needle’s inside the vein now, Alessandro. All I have to do is press the plunger. Who authorized this?’

George removed the pad. For a moment it seemed that Alessandro had lost consciousness. Then his eyes rolled again.

‘Granelli.’ The voice was a faint whisper. ‘General Granelli.’ Granelli was the much-feared, much-hated Chief of Italian Intelligence.

‘The needle is still inside the vein, my hand is still on the plunger. Does Colonel Lunz know of this?’

‘No. I swear it. No!’

‘General von Löhr?’

‘No.’

‘Then how did Granelli know I was on board?’

‘Colonel Lunz told him.’

‘Well, well. The usual trusting faith between the loyal allies. What did you want from my cabin tonight?’

‘A paper. A message.’

‘Perhaps you’d better withdraw that syringe,’ George said. ‘I think he’s going to faint. Or die. Or something.’

‘What were you going to do with it, Alessandro?’ The tip of the needle had remained where it was.

‘Compare it with a message.’ Alessandro really did look very ill indeed. ‘My jacket.’

Petersen found the message in the inside pocket of the jacket. It was the duplicate of the one he had in his cabin. He refolded the paper and put it in his own inside pocket.

‘Odd,’ George said. ‘I do believe he’s fainted.’

‘I’ll bet his victims never had a chance to faint. I wish,’ Petersen said with genuine regret, ‘that I had pressed that plunger. No question our friend here is – was – a one-man extermination squad.’ Petersen sniffed at the test-tube, dropped it and the ampoule to the deck, crushed them both beneath his heel and then squirted the contents of the hypodermic on the deck.

‘Spirit-based,’ Petersen said. ‘It will evaporate quickly enough. Well, that’s it.’

In the passage-way, George mopped his forehead. ‘I wouldn’t care to go through that again. Neither, I’m sure, would Alessandro.’

‘Me neither,’ Petersen said. ‘How do you feel about it, Alex?’

‘I wish,’ Alex said morosely, ‘that you had pushed that plunger. I could have shot him as easy as a wink.’

‘That would have been an idea. At least he’d have gone without the agony. In any event, he’s all washed up as an operative of any kind or will be as soon as he gets back to Termoli. Or even to Ploče. Let’s fix this door.’

All eight water-tight clips were engaged and with each clip in turn, to muffle sound, Alex held in position the pad that had been so lately used for another purpose, while George hammered home the clip. When the eighth had been so dealt with, George said: ‘That should hold it for a while. Especially if we throw this hammer overboard.’

‘Let’s make sure,’ Petersen said. He left and returned within a minute with a gas cylinder, a welder’s rod and a face-mask. Petersen was, at best, but an amateur welder but what he lacked in expertise he made up in enthusiasm. The completed result would have won him no prizes for finesse but that was unimportant. What was important was that for all practical purposes that door was sealed for life.

‘What I’d like to do now,’ Petersen said, ‘is to have a word with Carlos and Michael. But first, I think, a pause for reflection.’

‘How does this sound,’ Petersen said. He was seated at Carlos’ desk, a scotch in front of him and, beside it, a message he had just drafted. ‘We’ll have Michael send it off by and by. Plain language, of course. COLONEL LUNZ. Then his code number. YOUR WOULD-BE ASSASSINS AND/OR EXTERMINATORS A BUNCH OF INCOMPETENTS STOP ALESSANDRO AND OTHER BUNGLERS NOW CONFINED FORE CABIN COLOMBO BEHIND WELDED STEEL DOOR STOP SORRY CANNOT CONGRATULATE YOU GENERAL VON LÖHR GENERAL GRANELLI MAJOR CIPRIANO ON CHOICE OF OPERATIVES REGARDS ZEPPO. “Zeppo”, you may recall, is my code name.’

George steepled his fingers. ‘Fair,’ he said judicially, ‘fair. Not entirely accurate, though. We don’t know that they are assassins and/or etc.’

‘How are they to know that we don’t know? Should cause quite a stirring in the dovecote. Not too much billing and cooing, wouldn’t you think?’

George smiled broadly. ‘Colonel Lunz and General von Löhr are going to be fearfully upset. Alessandro said they knew nothing of this set-up.’

‘How are they to know that we didn’t know,’ Petersen said reasonably. ‘They’ll be fit to be tied and ready to assume anything. I’d love to be listening in to the heated telephone calls among the named parties later on today. Nothing like spreading confusion, dissension, suspicion and mistrust among the loyal allies. Not a bad night’s work, gentlemen. I think we’re entitled to a small nightcap before going to have a word with Carlos.’