Mrs. Pollifax Pursued Page 5

  "Barely. He's in the hospital, in critical condition—and he was sent by Willie's Rich Uncle, you understand?"

  She understood; strange as it might seem to find such a person in this bizarre environment he meant that Lazlo was an intelligence agent who had withstood dangers she could only imagine, and he had been sent here to be safe. And tonight someone had tried to kill him.

  She said, frowning, "But you called it an accident!"

  He leaned back in his chair, eyes narrowed. "I'm keeping this short because you'll see I've work to do, but what's important—and suspicious—is that after the ambulance took Lazlo away I couldn't find anyone who had shouted 'Hey Rube,' and not a single carnie reported having had any trouble to need one."

  Startled by this she said, "But would they tell you?"

  He glanced at his watch. "Most I can vouch for, they're back every season and they'd tell me, yes. I run a clean carnival, no fly-by-nighter gets in unless he can prove he's not parking his car behind his tent for a quick getaway after robbing the tip blind. A couple of the acts in the Ten-in-One are new—had to be, I have to take what I can get—and a couple of concessions are new to me. Those I can't vouch for."

  "Perhaps there'd been a quarrel?" she hazarded.

  His gaze was scornful. "Why should there be a quarrel? A good man, very quiet. Once he'd rested I put him to work collecting tickets for the merry-go-round. He bunked alone, I never saw him talk to anyone."

  Mrs. Pollifax fought back another yawn, longing for sleep, and with the feeling that she'd already sustained enough shocks during the past hours, she struggled to make sense of everything he had told her. She said, "What sort of trouble usually produces this 'Hey Rube' you spoke of?"

  He shrugged. "A townie who feels he's been cheated, a drunk trying to pick a fight. The whiz mob causing trouble— pickpockets that would be. One of the grifters playing too strong and taking a mark for everything he's got. Doesn't happen often."

  "So you actually think," began Mrs. Pollifax, but he stopped her by rising from his chair.

  "What I think I've got no proof of," he said flatly. "If it was someone from outside who traced him here they could be gone by now, but how did they find him'! If there's a leak at Willie's Rich Uncle, that's something else. But if there's a rotten apple in my show, if somebody got planted here—" His eyes glittered. "Somebody knew enough about us to shout 'Hey Rube.' I can't be everywhere at once and they've told me you have good eyes and good instincts."

  As she stood up, too, he said roughly, "You can surely spare a few days in spite of the danger?"

  "Danger?" she repeated.

  "Of course—to you and the girl. If Lazlo's cover got blown, somebody may know too much about a certain connection with Willie's Rich Uncle and blow this cover, too. The plane may have been heard landing, and God knows you don't look like a carnie, you'll stand out like a dog in a duck pond."

  "Yes," she said, and realized that her jaws had begun to ache from yawning.

  He looked her over critically. "But Willie's Uncle says you'll do. I'll see Gertie gets you some old clothes to wear. Any good at fortune telling?"

  Startled, Mrs. Pollifax said, "I've never done any."

  He nodded. "We'll think of something. The girl's small, the Professor's magic show can use a small girl to saw in half." With his hand on the door he paused. "That's for tomorrow, now I'll show you where to sleep, but what's your name?"

  "Mrs. Pollifax, Emily Pollifax."

  He shook his head. "Not here. Better be called Emmy something. Emmy Smith? Jones?"

  Since she was married to Cyrus Reed she said dryly, "Reed?"

  "Okay, Emmy Reed." He opened the door to the living room where Kadi sat patiently waiting. She jumped up at the sight of Mrs. Pollifax and said, "Is everything all right?"

  She nodded. "Everything's all right, Kadi, we'll stay here for just a few days, if you agree. Just to be sure."

  With a shiver Kadi said, "Oh, I'd like to be sure, yes."

  Outside, the buzz of sounds from the midway had diminished, the ferris wheel had stilled, and the merry-go-round was silent. Willie led them past two brightly-lighted trailers to a small and shabby dark one, and taking a key from his pocket he unlocked the door and pushed it open. "You'll have a quiet sleep, nobody wakes up here before ten or eleven," he told them. "We're here one more night and then it's tear-down and we move on to the next town. Give you time to get acquainted." He walked around Kadi, reached inside and turned on a light that shone garishly on shabby walls and broken Venetian blinds.

  "Beds," said Kadi, pointing, as Willie left.

  Mrs. Pollifax saw them: a pair of narrow bunk beds, each with a blanket folded at one end and a pillow lying at the other. She thought, Well, if I've exchanged a frying pan for a fire, at least VII face it rested tomorrow. She stepped inside, sat down on the bed to test it, abruptly stretched out, turned over, and immediately fell asleep.

  Kadi, surprised, looked down at her, and then with a smile she covered her with a blanket and gave Mrs. Pollifax a shy kiss on the cheek.

  "Zilcomo, friend," she whispered.

  8

  When Carstairs arrived in his office the next morning he found Bishop at his desk drinking what was apparently his fourth cup of coffee, given the empties lined up beside the In and Out baskets. "Late night?" said Carstairs tactfully.

  "Not the kind you think," Bishop told him gloomily. "I was called twice by Betsey during the night. In my bed, sound asleep. Now I'm trying to wake up. The first call was Mrs. Pollifax, who I sent to Willie's—"

  "Mrs. Pollifax!" exclaimed Carstairs. "To Willie's? What happened? What on earth—"

  "The second call," went on Bishop, interrupting him, "was from Willie himself, reporting an attempt made on one of our men there sometime after midnight. He's in the hospital, stabbed in the back and in critical condition."

  Carstairs whistled through his teeth. "I don't like the sound of that. Who was it?"

  "Lazlo, a.k.a. Aziz Kalad."

  Carstairs looked stunned. "We smuggled him out of Iran four months ago, what the devil is he doing in hiding at Willie's?"

  "We turned him over to Farnesworth, remember?" said Bishop. "Lazlo refused a leave, said after four years of undercover work in Iran he was too edgy to lie in the Caribbean sun or take any sort of vacation, said it would drive him crazy. He asked for quieter work to get back the taste of being free again. Farnesworth put him to work in Boston. Simple surveillance jobs, I believe."

  Carstairs said angrily, "Couldn't have been very simple if he's ended up in a safe house. Damn it, he's invaluable to us. What does Willie think, a random knifing or did 'they' find him? In which case—"

  "Willie finds it pretty suspicious," Bishop said. "It seems a call of 'Hey Rube' went out around midnight that sent everyone running to the gate, which is where Aziz—Lazlo, that is—was stabbed in the crowd, except that later Willie couldn't find anyone who had shouted this 'Hey Rube,' and what's more couldn't find anyone in the entire show who'd run into any trouble that demanded it."

  "Damn," said Carstairs. "Willie's always been snug harbor, a perfect back-up place. Does Farnesworth know about this?"

  Bishop shook his head. "Not yet, I figured Willie's strictly our business."

  "And so is Lazlo. Bishop, contact Farnesworth's office and tell them we need to know—top priority—why and how Lazlo happened to be at Willie's—to be knifed like a sitting duck. Details, Bishop, I want details."

  As he rose from his desk Carstairs added with a frown, "And Mrs. Pollifax, what the devil's happened to her? She's not on assignment."

  "There wasn't time to ask," Bishop told him. "Her call came through at half-past eleven, before Willie's call. She sounded at the end of her tether, said she'd been chased from Connecticut to Massachusetts and was calling from Worcester's City Hospital where she'd taken refuge for the moment. She was asking for help."

  "Alone?"

  Bishop frowned. "I don't think so. ... No, she mentioned a compa
nion feigning appendicitis, that's how she put it. Not Cyrus, or she'd have said so."

  Carstairs sighed. "Well, give her a call and find out. If it's fallout from one of her past assignments, and someone is tracking her down, too—"

  Bishop shook his head. "Show people sleep until noon. A thought that turns me green with envy," he added. "Willie said she needed sleep pretty badly."

  "Well, contact her later when you've time," growled Carstairs. "You've notified Upstairs about Lazlo?"

  Bishop nodded. "They're setting things in motion, there's a guard posted now at the hospital in Ellsworth, Lazlo's in intensive care but they're checking everyone with access to the hospital."

  "Good. Now, I've got a job for you," Carstairs told him. "If you can stay awake to do it. I want you to fly to New York— Helga can take over your desk for you—because I've set up an 11 a.m, appointment for you with the acting CEO at Claiborne-Osborne International." He dropped a file on Bishop's desk. "Reading material for you en route so you can ask intelligent questions."

  Surprised, Bishop said, "Has the FBI cleared this visit, or are we being sub rosa1"

  Carstairs said silkily, "When did the FBI ask us to check our files? We set our clocks back a day, Bishop, it's today they approached us. Or late yesterday. We're only following up their queries in regard to Bid well versus terrorist groups in Europe."

  Bishop gave him a long hard look. "All of which is camouflage for what specific question?"

  Carstairs smiled at him benevolently. "Why, to learn what their interest is in Ubangiba, of course. Without revealing our interest."

  "You mean your interest," Bishop told him accusingly. "I don't get it, I really don't. What is it you suspect?"

  Carstairs' face sobered. "I honestly don't know, Bishop, but those blank pages in Bidwell's engagement book bother me, I can't get them out of my head .., a book locked away in his drawer and therefore not for public consumption, or so one presumes, it troubles me, yes. And the man's been kidnapped, is being held for some incredible ransom, and why Bidwell, of all people?"

  "He was featured in Fortune magazine last year," pointed out Bishop. "It was made clear enough then how rich he is. A billionaire, if I remember correctly. Enough to entice any nefarious schemer."

  "Then why didn't they abduct him last year? Nobody's found any secrets in his life, yet he wrote no names on those blank pages, no record of appointments, left no clues—and now he's been kidnapped. I'm hoping your trip to New York will explain everything so that I can put it out of my head once and for all." He glanced at his wrist watch. "You'll miss your plane. Ah—here's Helga," he murmured as Bishop's secretary appeared in the doorway. "Get moving," he told his assistant. "Be subtle, be tactful. Take over, Helga—all hell's been breaking loose today."

  "So I've heard," she said demurely, and seated herself at Bishop's desk and began gathering up the empty coffee cups.

  Carstairs moved on to his office, where Departmental reports and data had begun collecting on his desk. The hospital to which Lazlo had been rushed in Ellsworth, Maine, reported him out of intensive care but not in stable enough condition yet to be flown to Boston to a specialist; the guards posted in the building reported no attempts to infiltrate, and no suspicious approaches. It was still possible, thought Carstairs, that Lazlo had simply been the victim of a random incident, some young local punk on drugs or out to prove his manhood. . . . With some relief he turned to the paperwork that was always waiting for him, and called in Helga to dictate further memos and reports.

  He had finished lunch at his desk when Bishop phoned him from New York.

  "Well?" growled Carstairs. "Has Claiborne-Osborne found plutonium in Ubangiba? A rich lode of gold, or possibly oil?"

  Bishop did not immediately reply, and Carstairs stiffened. "Well?" he said sharply.

  "Claiborne-Osborne International," Bishop said at last, "has never heard of Ubangiba. I had to show the acting CEO where the blasted place was on the map."

  Carstairs said quickly, "Do you believe him?"

  "He'd have to be a candidate for an Academy Award if he was lying," said Bishop. "He seemed honestly and genuinely puzzled by my query. When I pressed him, he called in a few other people who seemed just as blank on the subject."

  "And?"

  "I stopped on my way out to query Bidwell's secretary. She too had never heard Bidwell or anyone in the company refer to Ubangiba, but at least she reads the newspapers and knew the country existed."

  "I see," murmured Carstairs. "Curiouser and curiouser . . .

  Good work, Bishop, I'd like to tell you to stay and sample a few fleshpots in the Big City but you're needed. Come home."

  "Yes, sir. Incidentally, I'm calling from a bar where the TV news is turned on, and Bidwell's wife was just making a plea to her husband's kidnappers to release him."

  "What's she like.7" Carstairs asked idly.

  "Very groomed, very top-drawer. Finishing school accent. I'd say nothing in her life's prepared her for this sort of thing."

  "How's she taking it?"

  "I detect a mix of shock and embarrassment, the embarrassment at having to be seen on television making such a public plea, and the shock as expected."

  "Right. See you." After wishing him a good flight back Carstairs sat for some moments thinking about what Bishop had told him. If Bishop was right, then Bidwell's flights on 1192 had been strictly his own business, but what had taken him there so mysteriously?

  One of Bidwell's appointments in Paris had been with a Rogere Desforges whom Bernard had identified as a geophysicist. Perhaps there was something graspable there: it was possible that Desforges had been more than a casual luncheon guest, but certainly it was time to find out.

  Switching on his intercom he said, "Helga, bring me a Who's Who, will you? American, British, and French."

  It would have taken Bishop three minutes to secure these; Carstairs could not help but notice that Helga needed twelve minutes to find them.

  "Stand by," he told her, opening each one to D. "I'm looking up one Rogere Desforges, geophysicist, and if I've any luck you can put a call through to France for me and see if he's out geophysicing or reachable. I'd like to speak to him today. What time is it in Paris?"

  "Seven o'clock in the evening, sir," Helga said crisply.

  "Damn," swore Carstairs. "I see that his office is in Paris, his residence in Rouen. Try both, and keep your fingers crossed."

  9

  Kadi, waking in the morning, was not particularly startled at finding herself in a strange bed. She had slept under a number of roofs when she was being smuggled out of Ubangiba, after the coup that had cost her parents their lives, and from there she had gone to Ohio to live with an aunt and then to New York City to art school. She liked to think this was what Emerson called 'revolutions' in a life that accustomed one to change. Her father had been very partial to Emerson.

  There was a stirring in the bed across the narrow aisle, and seeing Mrs. Pollifax, Kadi abruptly remembered the last few days, and the fear that she'd lived with, and she felt a wave of gratitude toward this woman. This was followed by a frown because she found it very mysterious, Mrs. Pollifax summoning a pilot, a plane, and an escape from Chigi Scap Metal with such dispatch, rather like a genie producing a miracle.

  She thought, There is more to this than she's told me, and she is certainly not the person I first thought; there are dimensions here that interest me very much.

  But what a relief it was to feel safe!

  She sat up as the door opened and a woman in jeans and a baseball cap walked in. "Hello, dearies," she said cheerfully, "I've some clothes for you, Willie's orders."

  Mrs. Pollifax, waking, gave the woman a puzzled glance, saw Kadi, looked around the trailer and sat up, too. "Obviously I wasn't dreaming—I'm still here," she announced. "Hello, Kadi ... And you?"

  "I'm Gertie, Pogo's wife." She had a weathered midlife face under the baseball cap, and now she began to sort the clothes that she carried over one arm. "F
or you—jeans, socks, and T-shirt," she told Kadi, blithely tossing them at her. "And for the lady—Emmy Reed, isn't it? Nothing yet, but we're looking for a shirt and if you're cold tonight here's a sweater. A bit moth-eaten, but what the heck it's warm."

  "Thank you very much," said Mrs. Pollifax, accepting her largesse. "And is there food in that little refrigerator?"

  "Bless you no ... Turn left when you leave and head out into the midway, breakfast's at the grab-joint. Cook-house," she explained. "Can't miss it, sign says BIGGEST HOT-DOGS IN USA, and only place open." To Kadi she said, "You'll find the Professor there, you'll have to learn the ropes by six o'clock."

  "For what?" asked Kadi.

  "Why, to be sawed in half," she said in surprise, and went out, closing the door behind her.

  Kadi looked at Mrs. Pollifax in astonishment. "I'm to be sawed in half and she called you Emmy Reed?"

  "I'll explain later," Mrs. Pollifax told her, "but just now we need breakfast. And," she added with a smile, "after I've seen you sawed in half I must speak with Willie about certain matters, having been quite blurred last night. Let's go!"

  "But—sawed in half?"

  Mrs. Pollifax nodded. "It seems we must both sing for our supper while we're here, and join the carnival."

  "Oh," said Kadi, brightening, "what /un!"

  Mrs. Pollifax wasn't at all certain that it was going to prove fun, not if there was a murderer hiding among these people, but she could admire Kadi's attitude. They walked out onto the midway, past the transformer and the Loop-o-Plane and found the Professor waiting for them outside the tent that housed the portable kitchen. He strode toward them at once, happily measuring Kadi's smallness.

  "She'll do, she'll do," he said triumphantly, and to Kadi, with a bow, "I'm the Professor, purveyor of magic and wizardry, enchantments and all the wonders of illusion. And you?"

  "Kadi Hopkirk," she said eagerly.

  Mrs. Pollifax, obviously of no importance to him in his world of wonders, looked at him with amusement. His most distinguishing feature was a bright yellow goatee trimmed to a knife-edged point; otherwise he was a rather pale and plainfaced middle-aged man with a dyed goatee and what looked to be a toupee dyed to match it. There was, however, an earring in his left ear, and his fingers glittered with rings and she found this satisfying: he was clearly a man who did the best with what he'd been given. He led them under the canvas to the counter and introduced them to Mickey. "Coffee and breakfast for them, Mick," he said. "On the double, we've work to do."