Nick Carter: Run, Spy, Run

Nick Carter settled back in his forward seat and allowed himself to be lulled by the powerful throbs of the jet-thrust engines. The giant metal bird was moving as easily as a magic carpet. He folded his lean hands across his stomach and relaxed. There was nothing to do but wait. Yet the steel gray eyes remained alert beneath his lowered lids. Flight 16 from Jamaica to New York had long since passed its midpoint,' and still there had been no sign of anyone's interest in him.

Once again he surveyed his fellow passengers, mentally positioning those he could not see without turning his head. It would have to be someone on board, or the message didn't make much sense. Anyway, it was always a good habit to double-check those you were traveling with. And a bad habit to break. Nick had never broken it, which may have been one of the reasons he had survived a World War, five years with OSS, and seven years as Top Secret Operative for Mr. Hawk and the United States.

The assembled company was as before. Everyone was in the expected place wearing the expected expression. The young honeymooners directly in front of Nick were still billing and cooing, being predictably solicitous of each other's needs. Ahead of them, the two noisy executives — apparently business partners on their way back to the home office — were weighing the comparative merits of Mantle, Mays and Musial. The young brunette across the aisle from him was still supporting her thick paper-back textbook whose title had made him glad that his college days were far behind: Problems of Adaptation and Culture Clash in the Emerging Nations — A Socio-Psychological Study. Only she wasn't looking at the book. She was looking at him with appraising, speculative eyes. Then she caught his glance and blushed. He grinned at her cheerfully, Barnard, he thought, or Vassar, maybe. Nice if the message referred to her. Too young for him, though, and much better off with one of those Princeton lads three rows to the rear.

He closed his eyes and sighed a little wistfully. The good part of those days was also far behind. And so was Jamaica. Jamaica had been intoxicating. A tough assignment had turned, surprisingly, into a vacation. Two wonderful weeks of fun in the sun, far away from a Mr. Hawk who was fondly supposing his best operative — Nick Carter — to be risking his neck and racking his brains. It had been a breeze and a pure delight. A breeze that, among other things, had blown him a stack of bonus money from Uncle Sam for services rendered. And then there had been the delicious icing of the Countess de Fresnaye, a tall, willful wanton who had not only been the key to the case but its most delectable element. It was while he was dining with her in the Montego Room of the Cayman Hotel that the note had come. It read:

Nick Carter: Urgently need help. Our mutual friend. Max Dillman of Intour, has often spoken of you. Said he thought you were in Kingston. Looked for you and saw you in lounge tonight, overheard you saying you planned to leave in a day or two. Can't talk to you now to explain, but beg you to take Flight 16 tomorrow. Otherwise no way out of desperate situation that might interest you. Please help. Will contact you on plane. Please please please this is not a joke or trap.

The note had been hastily written on hotel stationery. It was unsigned. A waiter had handed it to him. He had received it from a busboy, who had had it from a porter, who had been given it by... well, he couldn't exactly say. There had been a party at the bar and another at table 23, and all sorts of notes had been passing back and forth all evening. He just couldn't recall where this one had come from.

The Countess had smiled, shaken her head, and raised her glass for more champagne.

"An admirer, Nick. A silly woman with a made-up story. Ignore it. Stay until Friday."

A woman, he thought now, opening his eyes to the small world of the plane. She was probably right. But not the kid on the aisle. She's shy, but she's not nervous. Nothing urgent on her mind. Who had been in the hotel the night before? Impossible to match last night's faces with anyone here.

There was the highly-strung, over-age blonde in the Paris clothes, with the small freckle-faced kid who kept running to the water cooler. There was the matron with the impossible hat, and the frail little fellow who squealed "My dear!" every few minutes and waved his fingers when he talked. Hardly anybody stood out from the crowd. An ordinary lot.

Except the man with the steel hand.

He had intrigued Nick from the moment of departure from sunny Jamaica. Clearly, he was not the type to write the imploring "Please please please help!" What type was he? An odd bird.

Short, squat, very wide in the shoulders, wearing expensive but poorly cut clothes. Bald, Brynner skull, small eyes ringed with pouches, indicating poor health or fatigue — tension? — rather than age. And then that hand...

The man had done nothing during the flight but sip tea and smoke short, thin cigarettes. From his seat, Nick had identified the pack as Rayettes, a type favored by Latin Americans. Yet the man was smooth-faced, fair of skin, and very nearly American looking. Or maybe Russian. But with the British tea-drinking habit. There she was again, the stewardess, dispensing tea from that bottomless server. Mmmm. Most attractive girl. Seemed to know the man. She smiled and chatted as she filled the upheld cup in the robot hand.

The hand was fascinating.

Tragedies of war had brought about fantastic advances in artificial limbs. It was engrossing to watch the bald man maneuver his tea and Rayettes with those gleaming, non-human fingers. He hardly used his good left hand, as if openly defying his disability.

Steel Hand, so far, has been the only non-routine aspect of Flight 16.

Nick stirred restlessly. The girl on the aisle looked at him sideways, sliding her glance over his handsome face and down the lean, whipcord length of his body. He was almost too good looking, with that classic profile and the firm, cleft chin. Those icy eyes looked cruel and dangerous. Until he smiled. Then the firm, straight mouth split into a grin and laugh-lines rayed out from much warmer eyes. Damn! He'd seen her staring again! She buried her nose in the book.

He'd seen her staring only because he was watching the hostess coming up the aisle and thinking that she had fine, firm hips, that the blue uniform was most becoming to her, and that he felt like some coffee.

"Hello," he said, as she came between them. "Does this line ever serve coffee, or would that be un-English?"

"Oh, of course, I'm sorry!" She looked a little flustered. "I'll bring it right away. It's just been such a day for tea-drinkers...!"

"Yes, I noticed. Especially your friend, hmm?" Nick glanced down the aisle at the man with the artificial hand, then back at the hostess. She was looking at him, somehow, too intently.

"And a Remy Martin with the coffee, if I may?"

"Why not?" she answered, smiling faintly and moving away.

Nick felt a frown gathering on his forehead.

Plane crews — out of uniform — often came to the Montego Room and the Henry Morgan Bar of the Cayman for entertainment. Why hadn't he thought of that? Well — didn't prove anything. Hundreds of people drifted in and out of that hotel last night.

Rita Jameson surveyed him from her vantage point in the commissary alcove, admiring the lithe, limber body in Seat 6E. Could anyone quite so good looking be really reliable? She poured the coffee and cognac and moved swiftly down the aisle.

"I wonder if you could help me with something," he said, very quietly.

She raised her eyebrows.