Алистер Маклин: Goodbye California

‘Has there ever been a case of a nuclear hi-jack on the open road?’

‘Hi-jacks don’t happen on the open road. Well, hardly ever. They occur at transfer points and driver’s stop-overs. Driver Jones visits the local locksmith and has a fresh set of keys for ignition and cab doors cut and hands it over to Smith. Next day he stops at a drivers’ pull-up, carefully locks the door and goes – either himself or with his mate – for his hamburger and french fries or whatever. When he comes out, he goes through the well-rehearsed routine of double-take, calling to heaven for vengeance and hot-footing it to the nearest phone box to call the cops, who know perfectly well what is going on but are completely incapable of proving anything. Those hi-jackings are rarely reported and pass virtually unnoticed because there are very rarely any crimes of violence involved.’

Ryder was patient. ‘I’ve been a cop all my life. I know that. Nuclear hi-jacks, I said.’

‘I don’t know.’

‘You don’t know or you aren’t telling?’

‘That’s up to you to decide, Sergeant.’

‘Yes. Thank you.’ It was impossible for anyone to say whether Ryder had decided anything or not. He turned to Jablonsky.

‘Okay, Doc, if we go and have a look at Susan’s office?’

Jablonsky’s voice was dry. ‘Unusual of you, Sergeant, to ask anybody’s permission for anything.’

‘That’s downright unkind. Fact is, we haven’t been officially assigned to this investigation.’

‘I know that.’ He looked at Jeff. ‘This is hardly the stamping ground for a highway patrolman. Have you been expressly forbidden to come here?’

‘No.’

‘Makes no difference. Heavens, man, in your place I’d be worried to death. Search the whole damned building if you want.’ He paused briefly. ‘I suggest I come with you.’

‘ “The whole damned building”, as you call it, can be left to Parker and Davidson, who are already here, and the lawmen in their droves who will be here in any moment. Why do you want to come with us to my wife’s office? I’ve never tampered with evidence in my life.’

‘Who says you did?’ He looked at Jeff. ‘You know your father has a long-standing and well-justified reputation for taking the law into his own hands?’

‘One does hear rumours, I have to admit. So you’d be a witness-stand guarantor for the good behaviour of one who is in need of care and protection?’ It was the first time that Jeff had smiled since he’d heard of his mother’s kidnapping.

Jablonsky said: ‘First time I ever heard anyone mention care and protection and Sergeant Ryder in the same breath.’

‘Jeff could be right.’ Ryder was unruffled. ‘I am getting on.’

Jablonsky smiled his total disbelief.

The office door, slightly ajar, had four splintered holes tightly grouped round the lock and handle. Ryder looked at them with no reaction, pushed open the door and walked inside. Sergeant Parker stopped from what he was doing, which was pushing scraps of paper around a desk-top with the rubber tip of a pencil, and turned round. He was a burly, pleasant-faced man in his late thirties who didn’t look a bit like a cop – which was one reason why his arrest record ranked second only to Ryder’s.

‘Been expecting you,’ he said. ‘One hell of a business, just incredible.’ He smiled as if to alleviate the tension which Ryder didn’t seem to be feeling at all. ‘Come to take over, have you, to show the incompetents how a professional goes about it?’

‘Just looking. I’m not on this and I’m sure old Fatso will take great pleasure in keeping me off it.’

‘Fatso’ referred to their far-from-revered police chief.

‘The sadistic blubber of lard would love to do just that.’ He ignored the slight frown of Dr Jablonsky who had never had the privilege of making the police chief’s acquaintance. ‘Why don’t you and I break his neck some day?’

‘Assuming he’s got a neck inside that twenty-inch collar.’ Ryder looked at the bullet-ridden door. ‘McCafferty – the gate guard – told me there was no shooting. Termites?’

‘Silencer.’

‘Why the gun at all?’

‘Susan is why.’ Parker was a family friend of long standing. ‘The villains had rounded up the staff and put them in the room across the hallway there. Susan just happened to look out of the door and saw them coming so she closed the door and locked it.’

‘So they blasted it open. Maybe they thought she was making a dive for the nearest telephone.’

‘You made the security report.’

‘That’s so. I remember. Only Dr Jablonsky here and Mr Ferguson were permitted direct lines to the outside. All other calls have to be cleared through the switchboard. They’d have taken care of the girl there first. Maybe they thought she was leaving through a window.’

‘Not a chance. From all I’ve heard – I haven’t had time to take statements yet – those villains would have been perfectly at home here with blindfolds on. They’d have known there was no fire-escape outside. They’d have known that every room is air-conditioned and that you can’t very well jump through plate-glass windows sealed like those are.’

‘Then why?’

‘Maybe in a hurry. Maybe just the impatient type. At least he gave warning. His words were: “Stand well to one side, Mrs Ryder, I’m going to blast open that door”.’

‘Well, that seems to prove two things. The first is that they’re not wanton killers. But I said “seem”. A dead hostage isn’t much good as a bargaining counter or as a lever to make reluctant physicists bend to their task. Second, they knew enough to be able to identify individual members of the staff.’

‘That they did.’

‘They seem to have been very well informed.’ Jeff tried to speak calmly, to emulate the monolithic calm of his father, but a rapidly beating pulse in his neck gave him away.

Ryder indicated the table-top strewn with scraps of torn paper. ‘Man of your age should be beyond jigsaws.’

‘You know me: thorough, painstaking, the conscientious detective who leaves no stone unturned.’

‘You’ve got all the pieces the right way up, I’ll say that for you. Make anything of it?’

‘No. You?’

‘No. Contents of Susan’s waste-paper basket, I take it?’

‘Yes.’ Parker looked at the tiny scraps in irritation. ‘I know secretaries and typists automatically tear up bits of papers destined for the waste-paper basket. But did she have to be so damned thorough about it?’

‘You know Susan. Never does things by halves. Or quarters. Or eighths.’ He pushed some of the scraps around – remnants of letters, carbons, some pieces of shorthand. ‘Sixteenths, yes. Not halves.’ He turned away. ‘Any other clues you haven’t come up with?’

‘Nothing on her desk, nothing in her desk. She took her handbag and umbrella with her.’

‘How do you know she had an umbrella?’

‘I asked,’ Parker said patiently. ‘Nothing but this left.’ He picked up a framed and unflattering picture of Ryder, replaced it on the desk and said à propos of nothing: ‘Some people can function efficiently under any circumstances. And that’s it, I’m afraid.’

Dr Jablonsky escorted them to the battered Peugeot. ‘If there’s anything I can do, Sergeant–’

‘Two things, as a matter of fact. Without letting Ferguson know, can you get hold of the dossier on Carlton? You know, the details of his past career, references, that sort of thing.’

‘Jesus, man, he’s number two in security.’

‘I know.’

‘Any reason to suspect him?’

‘None. I’m just curious why they took him as hostage. A senior security man is supposed to be tough and resourceful. Not the kind of man I’d have around. His record may show some reason why. Second thing, I’m still a pilgrim lost in this nuclear desert. If I need any more information can I contact you?’