«I had every confidence in you, Sergeant. You’re prime meat for Advance G-Two.»
«Ees dat good?»
«We’ll talk about it later. Right now we’ve got to strip this clown to his skin and get out of here. We’re all between a rock and a hard place, adjutant. We’ve got to concentrate on our next moves, and for you and me it’s joining the others somewhere up north.»
«No problem, Heneral. Before I come back up here, I talked to my amigo on the car teléfono. Wherever dey go, Desi-Two will stay in the automobile so he can tell me where dey are.»
«Fine tactics, son—» The Hawk stopped at the sound of a door opening and then voices. A couple, obviously middle-aged guests of the hotel, walked out of their room. «Quickly!» whispered Mac, reaching down for the unconscious body on the floor. «Stand him up as if he just puked.»
«He came out dat door over there, Heneral. Ees still open!»
«Let’s go!» Together, Hawkins and his adjutant dragged the limp figure to the open door under the astonished stares of the hotel guests.
«Ees a crazy wedding downstairs, amigos!» shouted Desi the First, glancing behind him. «You wanna join de party?»
«No … no, thank you,» said the middle-aged man, hurrying his wife toward the elevators.
The ski lodge in the hills of Hooksett, New Hampshire, was rustic and sturdy, deserted and dank, and in the best of times would never be awarded more than two stars in the least impressive travel guide. Still, it was sanctuary, and operational in terms of electricity, heat, and telephone service. Also, as it was barely over an hour from Boston, Aaron Pinkus Associates found it to be a convenient out-of-the-city refuge for attorneys and teams of attorneys deliberating difficult cases. In fact, it had become so popular that Aaron had decided not to sell the property, opting instead for gradual and utilitarian remodeling.
«We really must return those two cars,» said Pinkus anxiously to the Hawk, as they sat beside each other in deep leather chairs in the lodge’s former lobby. «There’ll be police bulletins out everywhere.»
«Nothing to fear, Commander. My adjutants have ’em camouflaged in the back forty.»
«That’s not the point, General. It’s grand theft and Sam and I—officers of the court, I remind you—were willing accomplices. I really must insist.»
«Oh, hell, details! All right, I’ll have the sergeants drive ’em back and park ’em down the street from the hotel. It’s dark out now and even if they’re picked up, those cops won’t know how they landed up in the backseats of their patrol cars without their trousers. Hah!»
«Thank you very much, General.»
«Then they can wire up a couple of other vehicles—»
«Please, that won’t be necessary! The firm has a standing arrangement with a car rental agency and my chauffeur, Paddy, can drive one automobile out here and a friend of his can bring another.»
«They’ll have to pick up my adjutants. I’m not ready to dismiss them yet.»
«Of course. Under the circumstances you’ve described, I’d feel much better if those two young men were around. Here, I’ll write out the address of the rental agency; they can all meet there.» Pinkus reached into his pocket and withdrew a memo pad.
«Aaron, everything’s taken care of!» said Devereaux, somewhat louder than necessary as he walked into the ersatz Alpine lobby, Jennifer Redwing at his side. «The market in Hooksett is sending out a whole bunch of stuff and Red here said she can cook.»
«How do you want the split case of gin and bourbon?» asked Jennifer. «Fried?»
«Industrial lubricant, young lady.»
«Also, quite possibly on your own expense sheet,» added Pinkus. «How did you explain our presence?»
«I said our whole first team was up here busting our asses over a mess of probate problems.»
«Why probate?»
«They think it sounds sexy. Credibility, Aaron.»
«Mr. Pinkus?» interrupted Redwing, for the sixtieth time in twelve hours, glaring at Sam. «I’d like to use your phone to call San Francisco. I’ll reverse the charges, of course.»
«My dear, you may turn down a lucrative career with my firm, but you may not embarrass me with such a ploy as reversing charges. You’ll have quiet in what was the manager’s office behind the counter over there—he wasn’t much of a manager and it isn’t much of an office, but you’ll be alone and your privacy assured.»
«Thank you very much.» Jennifer turned and walked toward it as Hawkins got out of his chair.
«Have you seen my sergeants, Sam?» he asked.
«Would you believe they’re out back at the base of the hill about a hundred yards to the right trying to get that old rusted ski lift to work?»
«Very enterprising,» said Aaron.
«Very dumb,» said Devereaux. «That damn cable never worked properly from the beginning. I once got stuck thirty feet in the air for almost an hour, my lady of the day twenty feet in front of me screaming her head off. We drove back to Boston the moment we were down and I never got to see the bedroom.»
«I suspect you’ve seen more than one since we assumed the mortgage.»
«Hey, come on, Aaron. You yourself once told me to get out of the office and come up here to cool off.»
«You were furious over losing a case you should have won,» said Pinkus, writing on his notepad, tearing off the page and handing it to the general. «Because the judge was an ignorant political hack who couldn’t follow your reasoning… Also, if that was your method of cooling off, there was an inversion of temperatures.»
«This legal stuff is way beyond me,» announced the Hawk. «I’ll go find my adjutants myself. I’ve decided to go into Boston with them. Little Joseph said he wanted a meeting, so I believe I should surprise him prior to our formal conference… This is the car rental place?» Aaron nodded, and the Hawk walked to the door. «I’ll get back on my own. I want you to have two vehicles here.»
«Fine, General. And when Miss Redwing is finished, I’ll reach Paddy Lafferty and set everything in motion.»
«Good thinking, Commander.»
«I’d get up and salute, General Hawkins, but I don’t think I can manage it.»
Redwing closed the door of the minuscule office behind the counter, sat down at the desk, and picked up the telephone. She dialed her apartment number in San Francisco, startled by the fact that before the first ring was over the excited voice of her brother was on the line.
«Yes?»
«Charlie, it’s me—»
«Where the hell have you been? I’ve been trying to reach you for hours!»
«It’s all too absurd, too incredible, and too insane to go into—»
«Try every one of those adjectives to what I’ve learned!» interrupted the younger brother. «That nut son of a bitch outmaneuvered me—all of us—we’re screwed!»
«Charlie, calm down,» said Jennifer, contrarily feeling her blood pressure rise to uncontrollable limits. «Calm down and speak slowly.»
«Both are impossible, Sis!»
«Try, Charlie.»
«All right, all right.» In San Francisco, the brother took several audible deep breaths and did his best to be lucid. «Without my knowing it, without anyone telling me, a number of weeks ago our Chief Thunder Head convened the Council of Elders with some scumhead sleaze of a lawyer from Chicago calling the legal shots, and had himself legally proclaimed temporary sole and absolute arbiter of the Wopotami tribe for a period of six months.»
«He can’t do that!»