Alistair MacLean - Fear is the Key

"You been out of this room this evening, Talbot?" Vyland was rattled and edgy and he was giving his urbane top executive's voice a rest.

"Sure, I dematerialised myself and oozed out through the keyhole." I gazed at Royale with interest. "What's happened to the boy friend? Derrick fall on him?"

"It wasn't Talbot." Royale pushed away Vyland's supporting hand, fumbled under his coat and brought out his gun. His tiny deadly little gun, that would always be the first thought in Royale's mind. He was about to shove it back when a thought occurred to him and he broke open the magazine. Intact, all the deadly little cupro-nickel shells there. He replaced the magazine in the automatic and the gun in his holster and then, almost as an afterthought, felt in his inside breast pocket. There was a couple of flickers of his one good eye that a highly imaginative character might have interpreted as emotions of dismay, then relief, as he said to Vyland: "My wallet. It's gone."

"Your wallet?" There was no mistaking Vyland's feeling, it was one of pure relief. "A hit-and-run thief!"

"Your wallet! On my rig? An outrage, a damnable outrage! "The old boy's moustache was waffling to and fro, he had the Method school whacked any day. "God knows I hold no brief for you, Royale, but on my rig! I'll have a search instituted right away and the culprit—"

"You can save yourself the trouble, General," I interrupted dryly. "The culprit's got the money safely in his pants pocket and the wallet's at the bottom of the sea. Besides, anyone who takes money away from Royale deserves a medal."

"You talk too much, friend," Vyland said coldly. He looked at me in a thoughtful way I didn't like at all and went on softly: "It could have been a cover-up, a red herring, maybe Royale was knocked out for some other reason altogether. A reason you might know something about, Talbot."

I felt cold. Vyland was nobody's fool and I hadn't looked for this. If they got suspicious and started searching me and found either Larry's gun or the wound — and they would be bound to find both — then this was definitely Talbot's farewell appearance. Next moment I felt colder still. Royale said: "Maybe it was a plant," rose groggily to his feet, crossed over to my desk and stared down at the papers in front of me.

This was it. I remembered now the far too carefully casual glance Royale had given the papers as he had left the room. I'd covered maybe half a sheet with letters and figures before he had gone and hadn't added a single letter or figure since. It would be all the proof that Royale would ever want. I kept looking at his face, not daring to glance down at the papers, wondering how many bullets Royale could pump into me before I could even start dragging Larry's cannon from my waistband. And then, incredulously, I heard Royale speak.

"We're barking up the wrong tree. Talbot's in the clear. He's been working, Mr. Vyland. Pretty well non-stop, I should say."

I glanced at the papers in front of me. Where I'd left half a page of scribbled figures and letters there were now two and a half pages. They had been written with the same pen and it would have taken a pretty close look to see that they hadn't been written by the same hand — and it was upside down to Royale. The scribbled nonsense was as meaningless as my own had been, but it was enough, it was more than enough, it was my passport to life, given me by Kennedy, whose acute foresight in this case had far outstripped my own. I wished I had met Kennedy months ago.

"O.K. So it's somebody short of cash." Vyland was satisfied, the matter dismissed from his mind. "How did you make out, Talbot? We're getting pushed for time."

"No worry," I assured him. "All worked out. Guaranteed. Five minutes buttoning-up down in the scaphe and we're set to go."

"Excellent." Vyland looked pleased but that was only because he didn't know what I knew. He turned to the thug who had kicked the door open. "The general's daughter and his chauffeur — you'll find them in the general's stateroom. They're to come here at once. Ready, Talbot?"

"Ready." I got to my feet, a bit shakily, but compared to Royale I looked positively healthy and nobody noticed. "I've had a long hard day, Vyland. I could do with something to fortify me before we go below."

"I'll be surprised if Cibatti and his friend haven't enough supplies to stock a bar." Vyland was seeing the end of the road, he was all good humour now. "Come along."

We trooped out into the corridor and along to the door of the room that gave access to the caisson. Vyland gave his secret knock — I was glad to note that it was still the same — and we went inside.

Vyland had been right, Cibatti and his friend did indeed do themselves well in the liquor line and by the time I had three stiff fingers of Scotch inside me the two little men sawing with the crosscut on my shoulder had given up the piece-work and were back on time rates and I no longer felt like banging my head against the wall. It seemed logical to expect that the improvement might be maintained if I poured myself another shot of anaesthetic and I'd just done this when the door opened and the thug Vyland had sent to the other side of the rig appeared, ushering in Mary and Kennedy. My heart had been through a lot that night, heavy overtime stuff to which it wasn't accustomed, but it only required one look at Mary and it started doing its handsprings again. My mind wasn't doing handsprings, though, I looked at her face and my mind was filled with all sorts of pleasant thoughts about what I'd like to do to Vyland and Royale. There were big bluish-dark patches under her eyes, and she looked white and strained and more than a little sick. I'd have taken any odds that that last half hour with me had scared and shaken her as she'd never been scared and shaken before. It had certainly scared and shaken me enough. But neither Vyland nor Royale seemed to notice anything amiss, people forced to associate with them and not scared and shaken would be the exception rather than the rule.

Kennedy didn't look scared and shaken, he didn't look anything at all except the perfect chauffeur. But Royale wasn't any more fooled than I was. He turned to Cibatti and his side-kick and said: "Just go over this bird here, will you, and see that he's not wearing anything that he shouldn't be wearing,"

Vyland gave him a questioning look.

"He may be as harmless as he looks — but I doubt it," Royale explained. "He's had the run of the rig this afternoon. He might just possibly have picked up a gun and if he has he might just possibly get the drop on Cibatti and the others when they weren't looking." Royale nodded to the door in the convex wall. "I just wouldn't fancy climbing a hundred feet up an iron ladder with Kennedy pointing a gun down the way all the time."

They searched Kennedy and found nothing. Royale was smart all right, you could have put in your eye all the bits he missed. But he just wasn't smart enough. He should have searched me.

"We don't want to hurry you, Talbot," Vyland said with elaborate sarcasm.

"Right away," I said. I sent down the last of the anaesthetic, frowned owlishly at the notes in my hand, folded them away in a pocket and turned towards the entrance door to the pillar. I carefully avoided looking at Mary, the general or Kennedy.

Vyland touched me on my bad shoulder and if it hadn't been for the anaesthetic I'd have gone through the deckhead. As it was I jumped a couple of inches and the two lumberjacks on my shoulder started up again, sawing away more industriously than ever.

"Getting nervous, aren't we? "Vyland sneered. He nodded at a mechanism on the table, a simple solenoid switch that I'd brought up from the scaphe. "Forgotten something, haven't you?"

"No. We won't be needing that any more."

"Right, on your way. You first… Watch them real close, Cibatti, won't you?"