‘Yes, I’m here.’
‘This would be the time to do it, sir. Our man tailing him said Stein seemed to be in a terrible state.’
‘Thanks,’ said Stuart. ‘Keep me in touch.’
He hung up the phone and reached for his hat. Like Billy Stein, he decided that the weather was not good enough for him to go without his raincoat.
‘I’m calling on Mr Stein,’ Boyd Stuart told the hotel receptionist. ‘I want to surprise him.’
‘I’m sorry, sir, but… ’
Boyd Stuart’s hand reached out and grabbed the wrist of the man at the desk before it got near to the house-phone. ‘I want to surprise him,’ said Stuart again, this time flipping open the Metropolitan Police warrant card he kept for such occasions.
The clerk stared at the identification. ‘I’ll have to get the manager.’
‘Get no one,’ said Boyd Stuart, ‘or I’ll have you inside on a charge of obstructing a police officer in the execution of his duty,’ He was speaking very quietly but he held on to the man’s wrist with enough force to make him wince with pain ‘I’m just going upstairs for a nice quiet chat. You understand?’
‘I understand.’ said the man. Boyd Stuart released his grip and walked quickly across to catch the doors of the lift. By the time the reception clerk looked up from rubbing his wrist. Stuart had gone.
Room 301 was next to the lifts. Such 01 rooms were always next to the lifts, and experienced travellers tried to avoid them, Stuart wondered why Stein didn’t have a suite. According to the results of the check they had run on the family’s credit and level of spending, it would be well within his means. Stuart switched off the light in the corridor and then knocked at the door.
‘Yes.’ It was Billy Stein’s voice.
‘Room service.’
‘What do you want?”
‘I’ve got a packet for you-from somewhere abroad. It’s got foreign postage.’
‘Put it under the door.’
Stuart smiled. He remembered being caught out like that before. ‘It’s a packet, I said. It won’t go under the door’ There was another long silence and then Stuart heard the lock being turned. He knew he would have to be fast, and hoped fervently that Stein didn’t put the chain on the catch.
Billy Stein opened the door a fraction and Stuart lowered his shoulder and charged it with all his weight. Stein was prepared, but not prepared enough. He went reeling back into the room; Stuart followed, stumbling over Stein’s baggage, and saving himself from falling only by steadying himself on the bed end. By that time Stein was sitting on the floor and Stuart was facing him with a Smith & Wesson Magnum held twelve niches from his nose.
‘Freeze,’ said Stuart and the young man froze. It was not the first time Stuart had selected from the armoury this big gun that only just fitted into his shoulder holster and weighted him to one side. But he had seen the way its.357 Magnum bullets could go through the metal of car bodies, and he had also seen the way the sight of it stopped men in their tracks, as now it froze Billy Stein sprawled on the bedroom floor.
‘There’s no cash here,’ said Billy Stein, still looking at the huge pistol ‘No cameras, no travellers cheques.’ He managed a touch of derision ‘You dialled the wrong number, buddy. I’m down to my last few bucks and looking for a job.’
Stuart smiled, ‘You disappoint me, Billy.’
Stein looked up and scowled. ‘How the hell did you get my name?’
Stuart did not reply. He looked round the room. Stein was wearing a dressing gown and had been on the bed trying to sleep. His gold wristwatch was on the side table together with Geographia’s London Atlas and his yellow-tinted spectacles.
‘Next time you answer a knock at the door in a hotel room, put your glasses on. You might have to sign something.’
“Next time, punk?’ said Billy Stein. He was recovering from his surprise enough to show anger. ‘Next time I’ll take you to pieces with my bare hands.’ Stein tried to get to his feet.
‘Stay right where you are,’ said Stuart. ‘I know how to use this shooter, and I’ll give you what you gave those poor kids up in King’s Cross this morning if you provide the slightest excuse.’
‘Wait a minute,’ said Billy. ‘Wait a minute. What kids? What are you babbling about?’
‘Don’t give me all that stuff, Stein. I know what you did this morning before returning to your nice hotel for a doze. You killed those two kids and hacked their heads off. What did they do to you? Were you trying to sell them some of your dad’s fancy Hitler documents, or were they behind with the rent?’
‘Oh, now I get it,’ said Billy Stein. ‘You’re one of the Brits talking to my dad about his papers. You know all about that stuff.’
‘I know about the papers,’ said Stuart. ‘What I didn’t know is the lengths that you and your dad would go to hang on to them What did you use, Billy? A hacksaw, was it, or a chopper?’
‘You don’t talk to me like that, you bastard,’ said Billy. ‘I didn’t kill those people-kids you say they were; I don’t know if they were kids or what-I was set up… ’
‘Set up? Set up how, and by whom? You fly into London -first class with all the trimmings-and check into this flashy hotel. You leave here this morning and go directly to an address in King’s Cross-not a regular call on the average tourist itinerary, you’ll agree-and stay inside about twenty minutes. Is that about the time you required to do the deed, Stein? Set up? What in hell are you talking about?’
‘This is your territory. I’m out of place here; I’m vulnerable. OK. But I didn’t kill those people up there in that stinking little place. I swear to God, I didn’t.’
‘So who did kill them, you little creep?’ Stein moved. ‘Keep still, or I’ll blow your head off.’
Stein laboriously described his father’s arrest by the highway patrol, and the phone call from Paul Bock which was waiting for him when eventually he returned to his home in Cresta Ridge Drive. Stuart knew that the slow recital of events was calculated to provide Stein with a chance to collect his wits and talk his way out of his predicament, but he did nothing to hurry him or interrupt. He just waited until Stein ran out of steam and when Stein looked up at him for his reaction, Stuart was standing, gun in hand, smiling politely.
‘What’s so funny?’ said Stein.
‘Am I getting this right?’ said Stuart. ‘You’re telling me that a man phoned your father in Los Angeles, a man you’ve never heard of before, and on the strength of one phone call you leapt aboard a plane and came to London? Pull the other leg, Stein, it’s got bells on.’
‘He said it was about the documents.’
‘Oh, he said it was about the documents,’ said Stuart mockingly. ‘Well, that explains everything. Naturally if someone phones up and says… ’
‘The hell with you,’ said Stein. Now he had heard Stuart deride his explanation, he realized how improbable it would sound to the jury.
‘Shall I tell you what they do with people who go into the homes of law-abiding inhabitants of north London and hack their heads and hands off? They put them into the lock-up for altogether too long. Did you ever see an English prison, Stein? Or, more pertinently, did you ever smell one? Did you ever smell one first thing in the morning, when they are slopping out? No flushing toilets there, my friend. You won’t be sitting in the lounge watching colour TV, like they do in those nice California state prisons. We’re more primitive over here. This morning’s headlines make it seem you’ll beat the hangman, Billy. But you’ll spend the rest of your natural life in some dirty, smelly, old Victorian slum that looks like an illustration to a Charles Dickens novel.’
Billy Stein hammered a fist against the carpet, ‘I didn’t kill anyone.’
‘What did they do? Steal some of your Nazi documents? I noticed that the shop was filled with Nazi swords and daggers and that kind of junk. Is that what they did?’