Brett Halliday - Violence Is Golden

He called down, “Let’s do it this way, Thompson. You might not feel like answering questions after you get out. Two things I want to know. Throw your gun out first.”

Thompson screamed an obscenity and tried to come in under the blade. Shayne put a forty-five slug in the dirt a few inches from his hand.

Thompson scrambled back. He had lost his glasses. His clothes were torn and filthy. He lay on his back, breathing heavily and staring into the bulldozer’s single headlight.

“Two questions,” Shayne said. “Who are you working for? Where’s the gold going?”

Thompson stared up without answering.

As Shayne started the motor again, Thompson did a terrified scrabbling dance in the loose dirt.

“The Paladin!” he yelled. “Forced landing. That’s all she told me- Shayne, look out!”

The bulldozer lurched. The left stabilizer had gone down to solid ground, but the right one was beginning to slip. The cab swung. Shayne yanked at the hydraulic control. The stabilizer went in deeper, arresting the tilt for an instant. Then the edge of the hole caved in and the big machine started to go.

Thompson, below, twisted onto his hands and knees and scrambled desperately. “The Paladin!”

Shayne pulled himself to the door and jumped. Thompson looked up over his shoulder and screamed. Slowly and deliberately, the bulldozer leaned forward and came down on top of him.

Ward walked into the light. He had a cut over one eye, and his black clerical coat had been torn in front, showing the straps of the shoulder harness.

He and Shayne looked at each other.

“If this is what you’re like with your hands and feet tied-” Ward said.

Shayne made no reply. He returned to the house for the lantern, then hunted outside until he found George Savage, lying on the cement-flecked dirt in his own thin vomit.

George moaned as the light hit him. Gathering a handful of his shirt front in one hand, Shayne jerked him up into a sitting posture and said savagely, “We’re going to talk now, George. The Paladin. What is it, a boat?”

George’s head lolled. Shayne shook, him angrily. George dribbled something and batted at the light. Then he fell forward against Shayne’s arm.

“Sick. Leave me alone.”

When Shayne released him, he crumpled into a tight crouch.

“I can tell you about the Paladin,” Ward said.

“It wouldn’t surprise me a bit,” Shayne said briefly.

He took the lantern to the edge of the cliff and shone it down on the tumble of broken rock fifty feet below. The body of the Japanese lay face down in a pool at the base of the waterfall.

Shayne put the lantern down. Filling his cupped hands with cold water, he dashed it in his face. After repeating this several times, he washed the edges of his scalp cut with his fingers. Shaking water from his hands, he returned to George Savage.

Pulling him roughly out of his fetal crouch, Shayne slung him over his back and carried him to the stream, where he put him down and splashed water in his face.

“Information, George,” Shayne said grimly. “Your two friends are dead. What are the plans for tomorrow?”

George doubled forward and threw up. When the spasm had passed, Shayne pulled him up with one hand and slapped him.

“The Paladin, Goddamn it. Where are you taking the gold?”

George’s head fell back. Shayne flashed the light in his eyes. He was unconscious.

With a disgusted exclamation, Shayne carried him to the cab, tore his shirt into strips and lashed his hands and feet together, tightening the knots cruelly. Then he returned to the house, where the Negro was waiting, seated on an upended cinder block.

“OK,” Shayne said. He directed the beam at the Negro’s chest. “Who are you?”

“My name’s really Crane Ward, but thank God I can drop the ‘Reverend.’ It seemed like a cute idea when we thought of it, but it was hard as hell to sustain. You’ve probably guessed that I’m a Treasury Department field agent.”

“Is that why they gave me the runaround in Washington last month? Because you already had the operation covered?”

“Hell, Mike,” Ward said apologetically, “everybody knows you’re not an easy man to control. You have every reason to be mad, but I’ll just remind you that if I hadn’t followed you up here-”

Shayne cut him short. “I keep telling people I can get along without that kind of help. Two people are dead, and I don’t know a Goddamn thing more than I did before.”

“If you’ll simmer down, Mike,” Ward said more sharply, “I may be able to tell you a few things you don’t know. The reason I didn’t identify myself is because Washington ordered me not to. They didn’t tell me to use my own judgment. I called in the minute we landed in St. Albans. They said to stick to the clergyman story and find out how much you knew. They’re great believers in making the standard moves. And you must have crossed swords with the Assistant Director at some point, because he doesn’t seem to like you. Just the same, orders or no orders, I didn’t want you to get in too much trouble. You may have noticed that I’ve been dogging you around.”

“So you could knock them off when I drew them out in the open for you.”

“It’s a legitimate technique,” Ward said. “You’ve used it yourself. And there’s another angle. You won’t like this one, but I might as well tell you. The Department’s under budget pressure. We’ve been criticized for the amounts we’ve been paying in informers’ fees.”

Shayne made a gesture of suppressed fury.

“Mike, will you cork it? Ten percent of this deal would wipe out the budget item. I’m on salary. If I could wrap it up without any outside help, I’d save the Department money. But I repeat: It wasn’t my idea! I only work there. Obviously it was a mistake. If you and I had put our heads together in the beginning, this wouldn’t have happened tonight. OK. It’s water under the bridge. It’s time to adjust our sights and start over.”

“Did you know I was approached by Jules LeFevre?”

“LeFevre! Of Interpol? To do what?”

Shayne told him briefly about LeFevre’s proposition and what had happened afterward.

Ward fitted a cigarette carefully into a holder, lit it, and smoked for a time in silence.

“He was a double agent,” he said, reaching a decision. “He was working for both sides, and both sides knew it. That’s not the healthiest occupation in the world. I wonder-well, never mind for now. Mike, the Paladin is Adam’s yacht. It’s a big diesel-powered eighty-five footer, usually based in the Mediterranean. I don’t understand what it’s doing around here. Why would Adam want to have anything to do with the gold directly?”

“Mary Ocain heard talk about a ship called the Mansfield City in La Guaira.”

“The Mansfield City,” Ward said slowly. “That sounds more like it. But if they’re going to use the Paladin -”

He came to his feet. “What if this isn’t a simple change of plans? What if there are two sets of people involved? Don’t say anything for a minute. Let me work this out.”

Unable to contain himself, he took several steps, wheeled, and came back, running his fingers through his hair. “By God, if I’m right, we’re going to have the coup of the decade. Did LeFevre tell you about Adam’s big loss last summer?”

“He mentioned it.”

“All right. What if that wasn’t an accident? What if LeFevre himself-Mike, I’ll tell it to you fast. I want to get back to a phone and wake up a few people in Washington. We’ve computed that Adam has been netting over two million a year from the gold trade for the last ten years. A very low rate of loss, mostly from pilfering by his own people. Last summer he lost an entire shipment, worth a million and a half. One of his dhows went down in a storm on the Indian Ocean. A three-man crew-no survivors. They carried a good ship-to-shore radio, but they didn’t succeed in sending out any distress signals. Certainly Adam has the resources to absorb the loss, but he pulled out of the Mideast gold trade directly afterward and all at once a question occurs to me. What if that gold isn’t really at the bottom of the Indian Ocean?”