Shayne feinted. The murderous bottle neck returned the feint, a tick slow. The boy darted at him, missed with an upward swipe, and raked Shayne’s arm, from the elbow to the wrist. Shayne slammed his left fist into the boy’s abdomen, all but breaking him in two. At almost that exact second, Ward swung the Schmeisser like a hatchet; Shayne pulled out of the boy’s way as he fell.
There was an instant’s silence as the record completed one track and moved to the next.
Ward had snatched up the Schmeisser Shayne had dropped, and now he had them both, which wasn’t the way Shayne had wanted the argument to end. Shayne went into the salon and turned off the record player. When Nikko started to come to his feet, Shayne dragged him into the bedroom. Moving the key to the outside of the lock, he closed the door and locked it. The Negro, between Shayne and the door to the deck, watched with a slight smile.
“What do you do now?” Shayne said. “Shoot me, or do you want to gloat a little first?”
CHAPTER 19
“Oh, have a drink,” Ward said. “I take it you know who I am?”
Shayne went to the bar. “I’d say you’re probably Sir Geoffrey Adam, in blackface. How did you persuade anybody to give you a title?”
“I bought it. Can’t I ever surprise you? I expected you to stagger in amazement.”
Shayne poured a drink. “Sanchez ripped your shirt just before I shot him. You didn’t bother with body makeup.”
“I didn’t expect to get involved in knife fights, either. You amaze me, Shayne, and I’m almost sorry I have to kill you. But that’s been the whole object, and how can I change my plans this late in the day?”
Shayne wrapped the bar towel around the gash on his arm, and sat down on the white sofa. He swirled the cognac and drank.
“I still think I’m going to take you in,” he said evenly. “LeFevre told me some interesting things about you, and they all seem to be true. He said you don’t go after a money deal unless there’s some kind of excitement connected with it. He said you like to be in on the finish yourself. I’ve been waiting for you to turn up. I thought you might be one of the guerrillas. I know you won’t get any pleasure out of killing me without telling me about it, so go ahead. Take as long as you like. Who knows? Something else may happen.”
Adam pulled a straight chair around and sat down, bringing one of the two guns to bear on Shayne. The other stayed on his left shoulder. One of the two submachine guns was loaded, one was empty. They were identical German Schmeissers, the standard Wehrmacht burp gun from World War II, and which one was pointed at Shayne now, the full one or the empty one, Shayne didn’t know. There would be a considerable difference in weight, but Adam had already shown his unfamiliarity with hand guns, and there was a chance he might not wonder why one was heavier than the other.
Adam smiled. “I admit to a fondness for tidy endings. But do sit still, Shayne, or I’ll have to deprive myself of the pleasure of telling you what a fool you’ve been.”
He closed the flap of the Schmeisser. “Now the safety is on. Correct?” Pointing the gun at Shayne, he attempted to press the trigger. “Correct.” He opened the flap again. “And now, as you observe, the safety is off. Think twice before you make a move in my direction.”
“Why don’t we let Moss out of the head?” Shayne suggested. “He’ll want to hear this.”
“No. No more rabbits out of the hat, Shayne. This is between you and me. I’ve had enough excitement to last me for a while. I didn’t expect to end up aboard the Paladin. If Nikko had recognized me, he would have killed me without a moment’s thought. But all he saw was my color, the idiot. Shayne, do you realize now who your client has been for the last two days?”
“You?”
“Quite right. I needed to find out who stole a million and a half dollars from me last summer, and who has been betraying me to Interpol. You found out for me.”
“Is that why you had LeFevre killed?”
“Did I do that? I don’t want to take the credit for everything. Let’s just say that I succeeded, by whatever means, in getting you out of Miami and aboard the plane. And I must say you lived up to my expectations, in every way but one. You didn’t locate the gold.”
“It’s somewhere on this boat.”
Adam repeated flatly, “Somewhere on this boat. The gold from last summer?”
“Yeah. In the bilge, probably. You didn’t hear what Nikko was telling me. LeFevre made the arrangements and supplied the props. Mary Ocain and George Savage were the ones who handled the actual switch and Nikko took care of the transportation.”
“Did you say Mary Ocain?”
“That’s right. She’s like you, she’s tired of living in the ordinary way. I just checked her passport. It has visas for all the Eastern Mediterranean countries. Nobody’s more invisible in Europe or the Middle East in the summer than an American schoolteacher with a camera. They’re part of the scenery.”
“Do you know for a fact that the Paladin-”
“I suppose you checked the canal records. LeFevre invested some money and took care of that. Since then, the boat’s been stuck in the Mediterranean. But they were in no hurry to get rid of the gold. They’d have to feed it into the market a little at a time.”
“I’ve been watching for it, and it hasn’t showed up. But this is really a bit nervy! Using my own yacht! So you’ve carried out your full assignment, after all. Magnificent. It’s been a pleasure watching you work. I can say that now that it’s over. I’m nearly fifty, you know. A little excitement, properly controlled, slows down the aging process. And now,” he said, his voice hardening, “we come to the question of your fee.”
Shayne said quickly, “The excitement isn’t over yet. Look out the window.”
The boat swerved, overcorrected, and came back too far. The helicopter, clacking loudly, had overtaken them again and was hovering directly overhead. One of the sailors yelled exuberantly. The Paladin was moving at maximum speed, executing maneuvers that would have been excessive in a twenty-foot speedboat.
Holding Shayne’s eyes, Adam came slowly to his feet. Shayne was studying his face. Under the artificial pigment, he could see the added age lines. The cheeks had been padded.
Adam raised the gun. “I think I’ll say goodbye now, Shayne.”
Shayne dived, flipping the cognac glass with a quick underhand snap. The gun was silent. Adam swore viciously. But he adjusted quickly, and as Shayne came to his feet, charging, he was met with a hard slap of the gun barrel.
That delayed him long enough for Adam to switch guns. He flipped open the safety flap and backed away, his face working.
The boat swerved violently, nearly sending him off his feet. He fired a quick burst. Through the big portside window, Shayne saw that they were heading at full speed for a crowded bathing beach.
Another sailor dashed past the window, waving his arms like a happy madman. The helmsman threw the wheel over hard and the bottom of the boat scraped on sand.
In the salon, bottles crashed from the shelves and Adam made a complete pivot and slammed back against the wall. Shayne was on one knee, surrounded by records that had cascaded out of the cabinet below the record player. He scooped up several of these and sailed them at Adam. If the boat held steady on its course for only a few seconds, he knew that a burst from the submachine gun would catch him at the door. He kept throwing, bottles, records, a small chair.
The Paladin was now headed for a long jetty at the entrance to a small harbor. The helicopter noise was overpowering.
Something crashed through the big window behind Adam. It gave Shayne another instant. The drawer had shot out of the big table. Loose forty-five rounds were rolling about the floor. Shayne skidded and fell. A hammering burst from Adam’s gun went into the wall. Shayne lunged for the empty submachine gun. He had never moved faster. Snatching it up, he slammed a round into the chamber and fired.