Brett Halliday - Caught Dead

She came up on her toes and pressed her lips against his briefly, then turned and went out, cracking the door first to make sure there was no one in the hall.

Rourke’s smile faded abruptly. He opened the dispatch case. Taking out the yellow pad, he wrote a quick note. He ripped off the sheet, folded it, and slipped it into an unstamped envelope addressed to his friend Michael Shayne, the well-known Miami private detective. The envelope already contained another folded sheet, torn out of a memorandum book or a diary. The phone was clamoring again as he went out.

He knocked lightly on a door near the elevators. It was opened by an American in a T-shirt and slacks. Rourke gave him the envelope and a $20 bill.

“You’re still going up on the early plane?”

“Sure, no change,” the man said. “But I was thinking… Why don’t I wait and give it to the messenger service at the Fontainebleau, instead of at the airport? It’ll get delivered faster.”

“Fine. Just be damn sure you don’t forget.”

“Hell, it’s the easiest twenty bucks I ever made.”

Larry Howe, a long way from his usual genial self, was facing the elevators in the lobby. He was an old Latin American hand, almost entirely bald, with a moon face fitted out with big glasses and a big cigar.

Rourke looked at Menendez, who shifted weight patches-competent, plodding wire-service copy, a dim reflection of Howe himself, who drank heavily, pursued girls, and had had many lively adventures which never made it to the UPI wire.

Two of the men with him were new to Rourke. The third, Menendez, the Venezuelan information man who had handled the arrangements for the interview, seemed to wish he was somewhere else.

“The Tim Rourke legend,” Howe said sourly. “Stories breaking all over town, and he’s sacked out with a babe. We’re a little late, so this has to be abrupt. Plans have changed.”

Rourke looked at Menendez, who shifted weight and continued to look uncomfortable.

“I am sorry, you know. There are sometimes things one cannot help.”

Howe broke in impatiently. “I’ll grant you, the interview was your idea, Tim, and as a new face in town you had the leverage to put it across. But is it fair to the rest of us?”

“Who said it had to be fair?”

“Or good journalism. The whole idea, the way Menendez got the junta to approve, was to quash the rumors about Guillermo Alvares being tortured.”

“Larry, let’s talk about it over a drink,” Rourke suggested.

Howe shook his head. “We aren’t negotiating, Tim. It’s an accomplished fact. We’ve persuaded Menendez that the interview will fulfill its purpose only if it’s conducted by someone who has seen Alvares in action over the years. He’s what-fifty-nine, and he’s been sick lately. I had a conversation with him ten days ago. Do you see what I mean? I know the shape he was in then, and when I report how he looks tonight, I’ll have something to compare it with.”

“Glad to have you along, Larry. Just don’t step on my heels.”

Again Howe shook his head. “He isn’t holding a press conference. It’s a one-man interview. All the resident correspondents got together and drew for it. I drew the long straw.”

Rourke said philosophically, “I never have any luck drawing straws, especially when the drawing takes place somewhere else.”

“We wrote up a list of questions, and if you’ve got anything special you want to ask, fine. Everybody gets a copy of his answers, plus my appraisal of his physical condition. You can file your own story.”

“Gee, Larry, thanks. Did you have a hard time persuading the information office?”

He was looking at Menendez, who shrugged and looked down.

“It’s the only sensible way to do it.”

“If it’s all sewed up,” Rourke said, “the only thing I can do is write a story about under-the-counter payments made by the dean of the local press corps to venal information officials-”

Howe peered at him narrowly over his black-rimmed glasses and the Venezuelan made a placating gesture with both hands.

Rourke went on. “Nothing personal, Larry, but if you come back with a story that criticizes anybody, your sources will dry up. You’re going to be here after I’m gone. You have to deal with the powers-that-be.”

“Don’t be a horse’s ass,” Howe said quietly. “I’ve been assigned here a long time. I’ll be goddamned if I like being frozen out of a story in my own backyard.”

“Let’s be broadminded and do it together.”

Menendez said unhappily, “I have not that authority.”

“It’s set up for one man,” Howe explained, “and they’re new at this so they tend to be a little rigid. We can wait till tomorrow and try, but by then they may be having second thoughts about the whole thing. Is it that important, Tim?” He added, “Because it is to me. I got caught in the mountains and missed most of the excitement this week. I’ve been getting some nasty queries from New York. I need to recoup.”

Rourke’s mind was racing. “Hell,” he said, with a brusque gesture. “I don’t like to sound like a prima donna. Use my personal dice or I won’t play. Just give me your personal assurance, Larry, that this isn’t a cover up.”

“Absolutely nothing of the kind!” Menendez exclaimed.

Howe said, “I’ll call it the way I see it, Tim.”

“Then O.K. Here’s the question I want asked. Does he have any statement about CIA involvement in the coup? How much money did they throw in, and did they sabotage the getaway plane?”

“Absolutely not!” Menendez said. “We can’t permit such questions.”

“Why do you think I wanted this interview?” Rourke said roughly. “So he could show me his bruises? If you don’t feel like asking that question, Larry, you can expect a major stink. And there’s one other thing. I said I’d take him in a couple of cartons of cigarettes. That’s a real commitment.”

“You can give them to me,” Menendez said.

“No, I guaranteed I’d deliver them personally, and I have good private reasons for doing it. Make me a solemn promise, Larry, that you’ll lay these cigarettes on Alvares and nobody else, and maybe I won’t feel so annoyed about the rest of this.”

Howe agreed to take over the commission. After some discussion they compromised on a milder version of Rourke’s CIA question. Howe put one carton of Pall Malls in each side pocket of his jacket and assured Rourke again that he wouldn’t surrender them to anybody but Alvares himself.

“It’s a nice touch, as a matter of fact. I remember noticing he smoked Pall Malls. I’d judge he’s a two-pack-a-day man, and when he sees what I brought him he’s going to feel grateful as hell.”

Howe rode with the Venezuelan. The other correspondents arranged to meet him afterward at the UPI office on the Avenido Andres Bello. Rourke had a rented Ford. Menendez suggested that he follow them out, in case the prison people raised any objection to the last-minute substitution.

The La Vega prison had been in continuous use since the earliest years of the Republic. A fortress-like structure, it had narrow slits for windows and a red tile roof within an adobe wall topped with triple strands of barbed wire. At one time it had been surrounded by open countryside, but the city had grown up around it. It was a high-security prison, used mainly for political prisoners and others awaiting trial for capital offenses. Confined here, in addition to Alvares himself, were a half-dozen prominent Alvaresites, high Army officers who had chosen not to join the revolt, and a number of leftists who opposed both the Alvares regime and the one that had replaced it.

Rourke had spent hours studying a street plan of Los Carmenes, but knowing his facility for getting lost in strange towns, he and Paula had reconnoitered the area that afternoon and worked out the routes he was to follow.