Десмонд Бэгли - Bahama Crisis

‘So has Frank. So have you.’

‘Yeah, but Frank is a young guy — and I’m not as close to it as you. I’m more objective. Why don’t you catch some sleep and come up tomorrow full of the old moxie?’

‘Maybe you’re right,’ said Jack. His face was grey with fatigue as he stood up slowly. ‘Frank, fill me in tomorrow morning. Hear?’

‘I’ll do that.’ A frown creased Frank’s forehead as he watched his father walk to the door.

I had a sudden insight into the workings of the Cunningham Corporation. It operated remarkably like the Kremlin — collective leadership. Everybody had a vote but some votes were heavier than others. Every so often the old bulls at the top would do battle over some issue and the weaker would be tossed out. I had the idea that this was happening now; that Billy One was in the process of tossing out Jack, just as Brezhnev had got rid of Podgorny.

Billy and Frank were fighting for second place. Where Jim Cunningham came into this I did not know; probably Billy One was sealing an alliance with a faction of the clan. Jim was lucky — he had been promoted to top table.

This was confirmed when, as the door closed, Billy One called, ‘Jim, come sit up here.’ He glowered at us under white eyebrows. ‘From now on we operate on “need to know”, and what they don’t know won’t hurt us, or Debbie. Hell, it only needs Joe to drop a loose word at home and Linda would spread it over half Houston. She’s a gossip.’

Frank said, ‘If she shoots her mouth off about what’s happened to Debbie she’ll wish she never married a Cunningham. I’ll see to it if Joe doesn’t.’

Billy One nodded. ‘Jim, you know more about the security angle than any of us. Got any ideas on this?’

Jim was a young chap of about twenty-five, dressed casually in jeans. He had a sleepy look about him which was deceptive because he was as sharp as a tack. He said, ‘Billy is right.’ He turned to me. ‘I’ll need your clothes — coat, pants, everything you wear down to socks and underwear. The outfit you’ll use when you go to make this lousy deal. We’ll have you radiating right through the electromagnetic spectrum.’ To Billy One he said, ‘We’ll need cars, light airplanes and maybe choppers. Better lay on a couple of fast boats, too; Tom might be taken out to sea.’

‘We’ll use my boat,’ said Frank. ‘Nothing faster in Texas.’

‘No!’ said Jim quickly. ‘We use nothing Cunningham. We rent everything.’

‘My job,’ said Billy.

I said, ‘But no one makes a move until Debbie’s safe.’

‘That’s understood,’ said Billy One. ‘What about a gun?’

I shook my head. ‘No gun. I don’t want to kill anybody.’

He looked disappointed; my way was not the Texan way. ‘You might need a gun to stop someone killing you. ’

‘A gun wouldn’t stop them — not the way I use one,’ I said dryly. ‘Anyway, they’ll search me. The joker who wrote this ransom note doesn’t sound like a damn fool.’

Jim agreed. ‘Finding a gun might make him nervous; nervous guys are dangerous.’

A telephone beeped discreetly in a corner of the room. Billy One jerked his head and Jim got up to answer it. Even though he had got to the inner cabinet he knew his place on the totem pole; he was still a messenger boy. Presently he said, ‘It’s the Security Officer speaking from the lobby. He says an envelope has been handed in addressed to Jack.’

Billy One grunted. ‘Have him bring it up.’

‘Our security force might need beefing up,’ said Billy. ‘The way this is turning out we might be spread thin. What about a detective agency?’

‘I’ll fix that,’ said Billy One. ‘I know a good one.’

Frank said, ‘We might not have time for all that. I have a gut feeling trouble is coming up in the elevator right now.’

Billy One looked at his watch. ‘If you’re right, it’s bad news.’ He picked up the ransom letter. ‘I know this guy said he’d know when Tom arrives, but Tom’s been here not much over an hour.’

‘Good intelligence service,’ said Billy.

‘Too goddamn good.’ Frank frowned. ‘Inside information? From this building, maybe?’

‘Who knows?’ Billy One irritably threw down the sheet of paper. ‘We’ll wait and see.’

If the information of my arrival had come from the inside of the building then it was bad news indeed, because we were sitting in the penthouse of the slab-sided glass tower that was the Cunningham Building, the latest addition to the Houston skyline. It would mean the Cunningham Corporation itself had been penetrated.

The long moments dragged by. Billy One must have parallelled my train of thought because he ceased his finger-tapping and said, ‘Jim, have security check this room for bugs first thing in the morning.’

‘Will do.’

There was a discreet tap at the door and Jim got up. After a brief colloquy he came back carrying a large envelope which he laid on the table. Billy One bent forward to read the superscription, then pulled the ransom letter towards him and compared. ‘Could be the same typewriter. Probably is.’

‘The guy has confidence,’ said Billy with a sideways glance at Frank.

‘Lot of stuff in here,’ said Billy One, hefting the envelope. ‘Who delivered it?’

‘A guy who said he’d been given five bucks in a bar.’ As Billy One picked up a paper-knife Jim said sharply, ‘Let’s do this right. Let’s not get our fingers all over what’s in there.’

‘You do it.’

Jim slit open the envelope and shook its contents on to the table. Most of it appeared to be eight-by-ten glossy black-and-white photographs, but there were also a couple of sheets of paper covered with typescript, single-spaced. Jim took a ballpoint pen and separated it all out, being careful not to touch anything with his fingers. He said, ‘I’ll have these put in glassine envelopes later. You can look at them now, but don’t touch.’

The two pages of typescript were complicated instructions of what to do and when to do it. The photographs were of places where certain actions had to be done, and had been annotated with a red fibre pen. On one, for instance, were the instructions, ‘Wait here exactly four minutes. Flash headlamps twice at end of each minute.’ There were eleven photographs, each numbered, and the eleventh showed the edge of a road with open country beyond and trees in the distance. A red dashed line traced a path from the road to the trees, and an inscription read, ‘Mangan goes this way alone. Deborah Mangan comes out same way ten minutes later. No tricks, please.’

It was all very complicated.

Billy was studying the first typed page. ‘What a nerve! This one begins: “Mr Thomas Mangan, welcome to Houston, the fastest growing city in America”.’

Frank said, ‘Well, he gives us until Thursday — three days. Enough time to get ready for the son of a bitch.’

Billy One grunted, but said nothing.

Jim looked down at the photographs. ‘I don’t think this guy is American. Look here, Billy.’ His finger hovered an inch over the table. ‘An American wouldn’t refer to headlamps — he’d say headlights.’

‘Yeah, could be. European usage, maybe.’

‘Why not come right out and say British?’ Frank looked at me unsmilingly. ‘What do you say in the Bahamas, Mangan? Headlamps or headlights?’ He could not resist needling me.

I shrugged. ‘I use them interchangeably. Both usages are valid. We’re being penetrated by the American language because most of our tourists are American.’

Billy One yawned. ‘Since we have time to spare I’m going home to bed. I want y’all in my office downstairs at ten a.m. Jim, don’t forget to have this room debugged. Where are you sleeping tonight, Tom? I don’t believe Jack made arrangements.’