Donald Hamilton - The Intriguers

"Stop it!" she snapped. "Herbert, you're wasting time. Ca!! off your boy."

"We have to have the information. If it bothers you to watch-"

"My dear man, I've seen blood before. I was raised on a farm, and when it was time for a chicken dinner, I was the girl who was handed the hatchet. This wouldn't bother me a bit if you were getting somewhere, but you aren't. I think you'd better let somebody else interrogate the man while he can still talk."

"What makes you think you-"

"What makes me think an elderly female can succeed where you strong young males have failed? My dear man, it's a matter of psychology. May I have a knife, please?"

"Mrs. Love-"

"A knife, Mr. Leonard. If you please! Thank you."

Lying on the floor, pretending to be in very bad shape – which didn't take hell of a lot of acting-I waited for her to approach, wondering if I'd misjudged her. If so, I was in serious trouble; but her footsteps went the other way, to the little group by the electronics department consisting of the radio operator, Martha, and her guard.

I heard Mrs. Love's voice. "Turn around, girl. Hold out your wrists. That's right. There you are. Now clean up your friend so I can see his expression when I talk with him. Young man, you with the gun, lend her your handkerchief and fetch her a pan of water from the kitchen. If you please!"

Then Martha was kneeling beside me, dabbing at my face. She was making the commiserating noises to be expected under the circumstance, but I was listening to Mrs. Love arguing with Leonard.

"You've tried your way, Herbert," she was saying. "Now let me try mine… All right, girl. He's presentable enough. Help him up… Mr. Helm, you're not unconscious. Don't try to fool an old woman. Over there on the settee. Good. Now go back where you were, girl, and behave yourself, or you'll find yourself tied up again so fast it will make your head swim… Mr. Helm?"

I wasn't unconscious, of course, but things were a trifle hazy. I looked up at the motherly figure in the printed dress, with the neatly waved blue-gray hair, and said, "Yes, ma'am."

"We've been trying to get the answers to a few questions-"

"No, ma'am," I said.

She frowned quickly. "What do you mean?"

"He's been trying," I said. "You haven't been trying."

She studied me for a moment. "Are you saying you'll talk to me, Mr. Helm? Why to me and not to him?"

"Why should I waste time talking to a dead man?" I asked. "I was kidding him along before you got here, telling him he'd be allowed to live, but it isn't true. I can't tell him anything that'll save him, and wouldn't if I could. Anyway, I can't let him go to his death thinking he can beat information out of a trained, experienced agent. He's got enough misconceptions about this racket already. There are methods, sure, but they don't involve fists."

Leonard, standing at the head of the ladder leading down and aft, with Jernegan and my former escort, Bostrom, beside him, stirred indignantly.

Mrs. Love snapped, "Be quiet, Herbert. You've had your turn. Mr. Helm?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Am I a dead woman?"

"Nobody's after you that I know of, Mrs. Love."

"Why Mr. Leonard and not me?"

"You're not one of us, ma'am. What you do isn't our concern. But he is, or he's trying to be, and he's sold out. He's tried to use his country's undercover services for private political purposes-"

"My purposes, Mr. Helm."

"Sure, but there are always ambitious politicians who'd like to use us," I said. "Their ambitions-your ambitions – have nothing to do with us. We're not responsible for keeping the whole world honest. What does concern us is us. Any time an agent sells out, or allows his knowledge or skill or training to be employed for private purposes, that's a black mark against the whole profession. At least I figure that's how my chief feels about it. He's spent most of his life at this business, and he has very strong opinions about the place of agencies like ours in a democratic society-strong enough for him to pass the death sentence on any agent who abuses his privileged position as Leonard has done and led a lot of others to do."

The woman was silent for a little. When she spoke again, it was on a totally different subject. "Why do you call me 'ma'am'?"

"Perhaps you remind me of a teacher I once had, Mrs. Love."

"Probably a tough old biddy," she said. "Well, we're wasting time. Let's get to the questions Mr. Leonard was asking you. How many?"

"I don't know."

Her eyes narrowed. "I can have that energetic young man turned loose on you again."

"I don't know, ma'am," I repeated. "That's the truth. All I know is that I was responsible for a list of ten names, and I have no reason to believe they weren't taken care of by the people I assigned to them."

"Tell us the names."

"Leonard already has them."

Mrs. Love turned quickly. "Is that true, Herbert?"

The white-haired man hesitated. "Well, yes, they fed me some kind of a list through the girl, there. I didn't really believe it, of course-"

"Why not?"

"Who could conceive that a supposedly civilized man like Arthur Borden would plan a deliberate massacre-"

"Your men have been shooting at his, I understand. What's so inconceivable about his shooting at yours? What steps did you take when you received this information?"

"I… I warned the individuals in question and arranged for protection where it seemed to be required. However, we were given the wrong date. We were led to believe that the attempt, if it was made at all, would be made on the seventeenth of the month, two days from now."

Mrs. Love regarded him coldly. She said, "But you did know, and your agents were warned, and they died anyway? I'd hardly call that an attempt, Herbert. I'd call it a successful execution of a carefully laid plan."

"We don't know that all the people listed-" She sniffed impatiently. "Don't quibble. You've checked on five of your key men, and all five are dead, if we figure that Mr. Dunn in Los Angeles isn't very likely to be returning from his yacht trip." She sighed. "It's really too bad. I had faith in you, Herbert. I counted on you. I was warned that your track record in this field wasn't impressive, but you talked a very good fight. You convinced me. Obviously, I was mistaken."

"Mrs. Love-" She ignored him, turning back to me. "If you had to guess, Mr. Helm, how many other groups like yours would you say your chief had operating around the country?"

I hesitated, then I shrugged, winced, and said, "Hell, it doesn't matter now. It's all over except sweeping up the pieces and dumping them into the trash can. If I had to guess, ma'am, I'd say none."

She frowned dubiously. "Then you think the total body count is only ten, assuming that all your agents performed successfully."

Getting smart, I refrained from shaking my head. "No, I didn't say that. You asked how many groups there were like mine. I think there was only one group like mine, operating independently. The list I was given pretty well covered the country, with the exception of a limited but important area on the East Coast. I noticed the gap when I received my instructions; and Leonard's man who died of botulism in Washington, DC was not on my list. 1 think that man and quite a few others-I have no way of estimating how many-were taken care of by agents working directly under my chief. I think Mac handled the critical East Coast area himself, leaving the hinterlands to me and my group. I figure that's why he had Leonard decoyed out of Washington, so he could have time to clean house without interference."

"I see." Mrs. Love was still frowning thoughtfully. "That would make, perhaps, twenty or thirty human beings violently dead in one night. Do you feel no remorse, Mr. Helm?"

"Do you, Mrs. Love?" I asked boldly. "You're the one who set the machinery of violence in motion. What did you expect when you started using men with guns, that nobody would ever shoot back?"