Ник Картер - The Spanish Connection

But then I thought I could hear the murmuring of voices inside. I could hear one light, high voice — a woman’s. Elena Morales’ voice, certainly. But who was she talking to?

No one. She was using the phone — of course!

Then the murmuring stopped and I couldn’t hear anything more. I waited for the sound of the receiver being replaced on the base, but I missed it. Then a door opened and squeaked shut. A closet? Was she dressing to go outside?

I moved quickly to the far end of the corridor and went out onto the balcony that surrounded the building on three sides. I pulled back out of sight and crouched there against the outside wall, waiting for Elena to come out into the corridor.

But she didn’t appear.

I glanced at my watch.

Fifteen minutes.

I moved back down the hallway and stopped in front of her door, craning my neck and putting my ear to the paneling.

Nothing.

I drew the Luger and held it against my chest as I stepped forward and turned the knob. The latch was still unlocked, just as Kelly and I had left it.

Quickly I moved inside, placing my back against the door and holding the Luger out in front of me.

There was no one there — alive.

Parson’s body lay exactly where we had left it.

But there was no one else in the room.

Where was Elena Morales?

I glanced at the closet doors, but the closet was too small for anyone to hide there. And yet—

It was a faint sound, and at first I wasn’t even sure that I had heard it. But as I stood there, hardly daring to breathe, I heard it again. It was the unmistakable sound of someone trying to keep very still but shifting his body slightly. I glanced at the closet again, but the sound hadn’t come from that direction.

No. It had come from the bathroom.

I held the Luger tightly and moved over to the bathroom door. It was closed.

“Elena,” I said in a low voice.

There was no response.

Someone was in there, and it was not Elena. Where had she gone? Or was she in there with someone else?

“Elena,” I said, louder this time.

Nothing.

“I’m going to open this door. I have a gun. Come out with your hands above your head,” I snapped, standing just to one side of the door.

Nothing.

I grasped the door knob, still standing pressed against the paneling of the door, and twisted it. The door opened and swung inward. I tensed. There wasn’t a sound.

Through the open crack I could see inside the bathroom. The light was on. And there, pale and tense, stood Tina Bergson — terrified out of her mind.

I moved around, covering her with the Luger. Then I saw the paraphernalia on the basin, spread out for use. A hypodermic, a bottle of fluid, swabs of cotton.

She watched me, her eyes wide.

“Where is Elena?” I asked her, though there were a hundred other questions I could have asked instead.

She shook her head. “I did not see Elena. I saw only Barry. And he — he was dead.” Her voice sank to a whisper. She was on the verge of fainting.

I moved inside the bathroom and gripped her roughly by the elbow. She sagged against me, breathing heavily.

“She killed him?” her voice whispered in my ear.

I said nothing. How could I tell her it was Kelly and me?

“Why did you come back to Sol y Nieve?” I asked her quietly.

Her eyes turned to stare at me. I pushed her around and made her sit down on the edge of the tub. I sank down beside her. I held the Luger on her chest. She was a devious woman, and 1 didn’t trust her at all.

“To see... to see—”

“Barry Parson,” I supplied. “To show him Corelli, so he could kill him.”

There wasn’t a sound.

Her lips trembled, and her eyes moved away from me. “Yes,” she whispered.

“You hired Barry Parson to kill Corelli,” I said flatly. “You can’t deny it. He told us before—”

“I don’t deny it,” she said steadily. Her face was regaining some of its color. My eyes slid to the hypodermic needle.

“Motive?” I asked. “You’re an addict? Is that it?”

She shrugged. “I am all mixed up. I do not know why I want to kill him, except that I hate him more than anyone else in the world.”

“But he’s giving it up, turning in everyone involved in the drug chain,” I said.

She hung her head.

“Why did you come back?” I asked again.

“To find Barry,” Tina said softly. “I came up along the balcony, and I looked in and saw him. Dead. I came in—”

I stared past her shoulder. Of course! The balcony! That was how Elena had left the room without my seeing her. When Elena had found Barry dead she had been frightened out of her wits, and she had fled. She had simply opened the French doors, stepped out onto the balcony, and hurried away. Then, just after that, Tina had come up the back way to meet Barry in his room — perhaps the two of them had planned to meet — and she had found Barry dead. Her need for drugs had taken over, and she had gone into the bathroom for a fix just as I had blundered in.

“I came in and found that he had been shot. I thought at first Elena might have killed him. But perhaps Corelli discovered Barry was after him. Perhaps Corelli knew that I—” Her eyes began to fill with tears. “I’m frightened, Nick!”

I shook her. “You’ve got to take me to Corelli, Tina. It’s the only answer. Too many people have tried to keep us from getting that list of names. Too many. Now it’s up to you, Tina.”

She turned pale. “He’ll know, Nick! He’ll guess I hired someone to kill him! You can’t make me do that. You’ve got to let me go!”

“No way, Tina!” I snapped. “You’re the only answer. You’re taking me to him right now. Just point him out to me, and—”

“He won’t admit it!” she cried. “He’ll deny his identity.”

“Tina—”

She reached around for the hypodermic needle. I guessed what she was going to do the moment she turned her shoulder. I pressed the muzzle of the Luger into the soft part of her neck. “No, no, Tina! Not the needle. Sure, that’ll make things seem fine for a few minutes, but you’ll always have to come back to reality.”

“Nick!” she sobbed, still holding the needle.

I slipped the Luger into my pocket and reached for the needle. Her face changed almost instantaneously. From that placid beautiful mask, it turned into the face of a hellcat — eyes flashing, teeth bared, lips pulled back in an animal snarl.

The needle plunged into my forearm before I could defend myself against the crazy, slashing stab.

She laughed in a low, mirthless howl.

I felt everything drain out of me. I felt like a lump of putty.

She was leading me into the next room, then pushing me down into a chair.

“A little mixture of our very own, Nick,” she was saying with that satanic smile of hers. “You stay there like a nice little boy. I’m going to get out of here.”

No, Tina! I tried to say, but nothing came out.

She seemed to be moving in speeded-up motion — a hundred frames per second — as she ran through the French doors and along the balcony. Then there was silence.

After what seemed like centuries, I heard someone banging on the door. It was Kelly.

“Nick! Are you in there? Nick?”

I opened my mouth. At least it moved. But I had no voice. Was the paralysis wearing off?

The door shot open, and Kelly hurtled into the room, gun drawn. He just stood there gaping at me in astonishment.

“Hey, Nick!”

I moved my lips again. The paralysis was wearing off. I got out a grunt.

Kelly glanced around, checked the bathroom, and smelled the hypodermic needle. Instantly he came back to me, slapped me in the face, lifted me off the chair, and dragged me into the bathroom. He put my head under the shower, and cold water slammed down on my neck.