Бретт Холлидей - Count Backwards to Zero

“That’s one of the big ones. They have a plant in Georgia.”

“Yes — that’s where he’s supposed to work. But the way it looks now, he doesn’t expect to make it.”

She shook back her hair. “I didn’t believe it at first, and it’s so incredible I still don’t believe it all — I think he’s being tricked in some way. He’s going to have to explain part of this, and I just hope he hasn’t had anything more to drink.”

“In a nutshell, Anne.”

She drew a deep breath. “All right. He’s brought an old Bentley with him. He’s using it to smuggle in seventeen pounds of plutonium.”

Shayne snorted. “The hell he is.”

She gave him an angry look. “He’s been working with atomic reactors since he got out of grammar school. Plutonium to him is just — I don’t know, flour or something. And it’s not just the plutonium. It’s the whole damn thing, including the part that sets it off, the detonator. It’s a real functioning atom bomb.”

“Nobody imports atom bombs into the United States. That’s an export item.”

“I know it sounds insane! Let him explain it. He’s awake. I told him I’d call him as soon as you agreed to help.”

“I haven’t agreed to help.”

“But you know you have to,” she said reasonably. “Those men, whoever they are — if they wanted to keep you from talking to me, they didn’t succeed, did they? You’re part of it now, as far as they’re concerned.”

“What’s he planning to do with this bomb after he gets it in, blow up Washington?”

She blazed out at him. “It’s not so damn funny! Will you keep quiet and listen for a minute? He says it’s not big enough to blow up a whole city, but it would take out Capitol Hill and the White House and the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument, as well as a big piece of the black ghetto, if you know Washington. But of course he’s not going to do anything like that. He’s planning to be caught coming through Customs.”

About to strike a match, Shayne looked at her. “Explain that.”

“It’s not so easy. We went through the whole question-and-answer business, and I think I finally understand it, but that doesn’t mean I can boil it down. He wants to get himself shot, you see. It’s a form of suicide. His life is insured for a hundred thousand dollars, and he can show you the policy. I admit at first I thought he was putting me on, to make himself interesting. But damn it, something’s going on, isn’t it, or why would anybody bother to attack you?”

Shayne thought for a moment, becoming interested against his will. He lit his cigarette.

“Did you meet him on the ship?”

She nodded. “I’ll tell you how that happened, to get it in perspective. I don’t usually go drinking with eccentric 42-year-old atomic scientists. What I don’t know about atoms! But I’m coming off — well, a sort of unpleasant couple of months. I was in Europe with a man. He’s married, but he’s not married to me. The idea was — it doesn’t have any connection, but I might as well lay it all out — the idea was that if everything worked he’d go home and talk to a divorce lawyer. Everything didn’t work. We said goodbye in London, with tears. I was feeling lousy, and I thought an ocean voyage might help. Looking around the ship, you probably noticed a number of middle-aged widows, right? They set the tone. I was in the bar the first night, and when Quentin got up to go to the men’s room a revolver fell out of his pocket! Naturally I asked him why he was carrying a gun. He said I was an impertinent American, and a tactless bore. That kind of conversation went on for a couple of days. He kept trying to hide from me, poor man. I kept after him and he finally told me. The suicide plan, the insurance policy — the works. In one way it’s perfectly irrational. If you take out insurance and kill yourself, they won’t pay off. There has to be a year or so in between, isn’t that right?”

“Usually two.”

“And he couldn’t wait. Now that I know how his mind works, I can see it’s the kind of scheme that would appeal to him. Any moron can jump off a bridge. Can I tell him to come in now? He can explain all this better than I can.”

“Not yet. He convinced you there’s actually an atom bomb concealed on this ship?”

“I keep telling you, that’s the business he’s in. It sounds wild to us, but he’s very matter of fact about it. You know the way people tell you they’re smuggling in an extra bottle of perfume. He says this the same way. ‘I’ve got this little homemade atom bomb in the gas tank of my car.’ Petrol tank, excuse me.”

Shayne said thoughtfully, “He took the tank apart and built it in?”

“That’s the idea. And if you want to know if I’ve seen it, I haven’t. It’s down in the hold, wherever the hold is. That’s why we’ve absolutely got to get somebody like you. He doesn’t think we can stop it, it’s too far along, but I don’t agree. We could drop it overboard, if we could get it out of the car.”

Shayne scraped his thumbnail across his chin. “A Bentley’s a conspicuous car for a smuggler.”

“That’s why he picked it. That’s why he’s crossing to Miami, instead of New York. The Miami customs doesn’t get a trans-Atlantic ship more than once or twice a year, and would any sensible smuggler use a Bentley? He’s very smug about the job he did on the tank. It only holds a couple of gallons, but the needle registers full.”

That small detail convinced Shayne that Anne, at least, believed the improbable story.

“It’s pretty fancy.”

“Of course it is. And as soon as you talk to him, you’ll see that it’s in character. He started playing chess when he was four. Chess! Mr. Shayne, you realize we don’t have all the time in the world?”

“We’d better go to his cabin. I don’t think we ought to let this genius wander up and down the corridors alone.”

She jumped up. “I convinced you! I thought it might take a little longer.”

“I wouldn’t say you’ve convinced me,” Shayne said dryly. “An atom bomb in a Bentley.”

At the door of Quentin Little’s cabin, Anne crossed her fingers and said under her breath, “Quentin, if you know what’s good for you, be awake. Be sober.”

She tapped on the door. A voice said cautiously from within, “Anne, is that you?”

“Yes, open the door.”

The lock turned and the door opened. The man who stood in the doorway in oversize pajamas sent a quick look at Shayne. Behind large horn-rimmed glasses, his eyes seemed alert and intelligent.

“This is Michael Shayne,” she said. “He’s interested, I think, but he doesn’t really believe it yet.”

Little put out a hand and gave Shayne’s a quick, dry shake. “I think this is a waste of your time, but come in.”

“I hear we’re carrying an atom bomb,” Shayne said.

“Oh, there’s nothing to be alarmed about, it’s quite safe.”

He moved a suitcase off a chair and invited Shayne to sit down. His diction was a shade too careful, but otherwise he gave no sign of having been drinking. He was badly sunburned, and his nose and cheekbones were smeared with some kind of ointment. Shayne studied him. His face was deeply scored, particularly about the mouth, and there were hollows beneath his eyes. His eyes kept moving. He was controlling himself well, but behind the surface politeness, Shayne saw that he was very close to the edge.

“I can’t offer you anything to drink, I’m afraid,” Little said apologetically. “I’ve emptied every bottle, and yet I feel astonishingly clear-headed. My dear lovely Anne has communicated to me some of her own attachment to life. I find that a commitment of this kind has an extraordinary effect on the central nervous system. It neutralizes the alcohol.”