Montezuma’s Revenge

Four

Memories of old grease hung in the air, aroma of potato and coleslaw long gone, odor of legions of chickens who had passed through and on to alimentary destiny. Tony sat on the high stool, elbows on the well-scrubbed wood of the counter, sipping the latest cup of coffee. The single light above threw long shadows across the empty kitchen and struck plastic highlights from Higginson’s wig. He sat across from Tony gnawing away steadily on a leg of cold fried chicken. Tony nodded over his cup and wished that he had used the hours for sleep rather than the drinking of all the coffee that Higginson had forced on him.

“Three minutes to three,” the CIA man said softly. “Get ready.”

“I’m ready, I’m ready,” Tony muttered wishing, not for the first time, that this were over with and he was nicely asleep in bed. Or better still back in Washington, at his old job away from all this unhappy business.

“Here he is ....” It was just three. The unlocked rear door opened silently and a man entered; apparently, the unlocked door gambit was the normal way of doing business in these circles. The newcomer had a shaven head, a broken nose, saber scars on his cheekbones and an outthrust bulldog jaw, all of which identified his nationality long before he opened his mouth.

“Which of you is the painting authority?” he said, or rather tried to say. But his which was more like a vich, the closer to der, and painting definitely started with a b.

“Your name?” Higginson asked, ignoring the question.

“You may call me Hans.”

“I may call you Kurt, much better. Kurt Robl. Born Gstadt, Germany, in nineteen ten, joined the Nazi party in ...”

“I know I am in your verdawrmte CIA book, so let’s get on with the business, Higginson. Is this the art man?”

“He is.”

Robl turned his attention to Tony, eying him up and down thoroughly before speaking again.

“You are acquainted with this painting?”

“Certainly. One of the more ambitious works of the artist. Completed in 1503, background work undoubtedly by his assistants, but the figures, particularly the superb horse in the foreground, are the work of the master. Berenson rates it among the best of Da Vinci’s work and I concur. Furthermore ...”

“All right.” Robl turned his attention back to Higginson. “Here is what we are going to do. In five minutes my car will drive up and park under the street light across the way. The motor will be running. One man—and one man only—will go out this back door and cross the street. He will carry this electric torch and it will be lit. He will open the boot of the car, it will be unlocked, and he will use the torch to examine the painting inside. For two minutes, no longer. He will then come back here. If there is any variation from this order the driver will leave at once. More than one man, anything different, and the entire deal will be off. Others can afford to pay as well for this painting, I assure you.”

He passed the flashlight to Tony with a final warning. “The painting is covered with armored glass and bolted down, so do not even consider the smash and grab that is now running through your mind.”

“I was thinking nothing of the sort!”

This innocent answer produced only a sneer of contempt from Robl who certainly knew better. He looked at his watch and waved Tony over to the door.

“Get ready. And put this on.” He produced a tyrolean hat from his side pocket, complete with a large curling feather, and handed it over to Tony. “If you are not wearing this the driver will leave.”

It fitted well enough, the band damply greasy around his head. With the flashlight in his hand, turned on and ready, Tony stood

before the door, while Robl looked at his watch, and was suddenly very nervous about the entire affair. Though it was altogether too late to consider turning back or getting out of the situation, no matter how much he desired it.

“Now!” The door opened wide and he marched out.

The street was empty and dark between the far-spaced street lights; a car went by on the cross street a block away and the sound of its tires was loud in the silence. Under the light in its appointed place stood a black Mercedes sedan with its motor turning over quietly. Tony walked slowly over to it, showing far more resolution than he felt, aware of the silhouette of the man sitting in the back seat who was watching him intently. The trunk was unlocked, the handle turned easily; Tony took a deep breath and opened it. Inside was a colorful Mexican blanket that had been neatly laid over a bulky rectangular object. The painting. He leaned forward and seized a corner of the blanket and pulled.

Sudden pain struck his head just below the right ear, a very great pain indeed that brought a hoarse cry to his lips that was never spoken, for he fell into black unconsciousness even as he drew in his breath. His last memory was of falling, bumping against the back of the car as it shot out from under him. After that, nothing.

No matter which way he turned his head the annoyance would not stop. The pain in the back of his skull persisted with a steady throb, while the pain came and went on his face; it could not be avoided. After a while Tony realized that his eyes were closed and he might find out more about the pain if he opened them. He did. Everything was very blurry, but at least the pain in his cheeks ebbed away. Realization slowly penetrated that a man was holding him up by the collar with one hand and had been slapping him steadily with the other.

“Stop that ...” he mumbled and the man hit him again.

“Haben Sie etwas %u verzollen? Schnelll”

“Can’t understand you ...” Another slap.

Tony tried to swing a fist at his tormentor but it was neatly blocked, As his vision cleared he saw that he was sitting on a cot in a brightly lit room that appeared to be lined with cardboard cases. A hard-eyed young man was still holding him by the collar while another stood next to him, tanned and blond-haired, looking very much like the first.

“You know, I think you are making a big mistake,” Tony said.

“I think so too,” a voice said from behind the two men, and they moved aside to let the newcomer through. He was a different type altogether; middle-aged and plump, with a round red Santa Claus kind of face. A white apron was tied about his midriff, riding high on top of his ample stomach, and he stood at ease with his thumbs tucked into its supporting string. “Just tell us your name, young man, there is nothing to be afraid of.” His smile was very Santa-like as well, warm and cheery.

“I am Tony Hawkin, American citizen, and I would like to know just what it is you think you are doing to me?”

“Hawkin, American. Yes indeed, you do certainly sound like an American.”

His smile faded as he turned to the younger men and spoke to them in a different language that had far more guttural sounds than the German, but never an umlaut. In a moment he warmed to the occasion, shaking a finger and administering what was obviously a full-scale dressing down to the pair, who wilted beneath the attack and began to look as chagrined as schoolboys. Then they were dismissed with a pointing finger at the door and seemed very glad to leave.

“Have a cigarette,” said the plump man, seating himself comfortably on a large box labeled zion salami. He held the pack out to Tony then took one himself. The cigarettes were thin and black and had a rank smell. “Delicados” the donor said, “strong but nice.” He struck a wooden kitchen match on the seat of his trousers. “I should introduce myself. My name is Jacob Goldstein.”

“A pleasure to meet you, Mr. Goldstein ...” The sentence faded away into a spasm of coughing as the fumes of the rank burning leaf bit deep into Tony’s lung. With every cough his head rang as though someone were plying it with a hammer. Goldstein looked on kindly with the smoke trickling unperturbably from his nostrils.

“The name means something to you?”

“Sorry, no ... the cigarette’s a little strong. If you don’t mind.” Without waiting for permission he ground the smoldering object out under his heel.

“It would mean nothing to you either if I mentioned another name maybe. A party called Wilhelm Ulrich Vogel.”

“Vogel the Vulture, of course.” Tony wondered what this was all about. “Captured by Israeli Nazi hunters in Brazil and smuggled back to Germany. I read about it ...” The hammering had done his head no good at all but his synapses were finally beginning to click on and off again and produce results. “Vogel. Tracked down by the greatest hunter of them all. Goldstein?”

Jacob Goldstein nodded his head slightly and drew deeply on the cigarette. For a moment there was a gleam of something deep in his eyes and Tony had the realization that the fat old man outside was just the disguise for the tiger within. He shivered without realizing it.

“Now that we have exchanged names and you know who I am perhaps you will tell me just what your relationship is to Kurt Robl.”

“I met him tonight for the first time, honestly.”

“Please, be honest, that I appreciate. You met the man for the first time, yet you wear his hat so that my enthusiastic boys mistake you for him, sabras, big on muscles, short on brains, believe me. You wear his hat, you have the key to the trunk of his car ... ?” The sentence ended with an unspoken question.

“I am being honest. It is, well, a little complicated. A business deal, that’s all, the hat sort of identification, nothing else. There was something in the trunk, it was unlocked, that I had to look at, something important, and I must say your sabras wrecked that deal as well as wrecking my head. They are going to be in trouble, Goldstein, you can be sure of that.”

The Nazi catcher seemed undisturbed by the threat; he lit a second cigarette from the still glowing end of the first. “What kind of business?”

“That is confidential.”

“It should be. Three a.m. meetings with known war criminals engaged in with the aid of a well-known CIA man. The law looks dimly upon this sort of monkey business.”

“It was entirely harmless, I assure you.”

“I find that hard to believe since you were carrying these.”

He produced a revolver and the cigar-case knife and held them up for inspection. The gun bore more than a slight resemblance to Davidson’s gun that Tony had put in his pocket and forgotten about. He fought a strong impulse to groan aloud.

“That can be explained. Personal protection, nothing more.”

“Why did you need personal protection? What is this harmless business you are engaged in that required you go armed?”

“I am afraid I cannot say. A matter of national secrecy, to be exact.” He could say that at least, they knew the CIA was involved.

“Since when does the stealing of an Italian national treasure by Nazi crooks become a matter of American national secrecy?”

Tony opened his mouth, then shut it again, started to stand but changed his mind and sat down again. Goldstein smiled warmly.

“That’s a good one, isn’t it? What used to be called in the good old days of the faked quiz games the $64,000 question. You think about the answer. I’ll make a little nosh, give us strength. Nice hot pastrami sandwich and a glass of tea.”

He went out, humming to himself, and left the door ajar. After a moment Tony rose, as quietly as he could, and tiptoed over and peered through the crack. Goldstein was behind the counter of the delicatessen dining room beyond, industriously slicing smoking meat on a whirring machine. Was there another way out of here? Moving quickly he looked behind the tiered boxes and crates until he found the back door. There appeared to be no lock on it but it was closed tight by a large bolt that sealed it to the jamb. A well-oiled bolt he discovered as he eased it over, then turned the doorknob. It was time to leave. The door opened as noiselessly as the bolt and Tony found himself staring into the cold green eyes of one of the sabras. He slammed the door shut and bolted it quickly and went back to sit on the bed again. Goldstein returned carrying a tray with thick sandwiches that were framed in the cool green of sliced pickles, flanked by steaming glasses of tea, each with a wedge of lemon slipped over the rim. Appetite struck with a grumble of internal lightning as he realized he had not eaten since the previous afternoon aboard the plane. He ate.

“This is very good. The tea too.”

“It should be. The meat is flown in once a week direct from the supplier in Brooklyn. So you have had time to think, so now you can tell me about your dealings with Robl.”

Tony had been thinking and had decided that a certain amount of candor might be needed; Goldstein knew a good deal as it was. He was in over his head through no fault of his own and if he had to violate security to get out of this, well, security would just have to enjoy being violated.

“I told you truthfully, I never saw him before this evening. I arrived in Mexico today, right from the United States, about this painting you mentioned. I am, well, an art expert.” B.A., San Diego State, they should only know. “I was supposed to look at this painting and identify it, nothing more, and Robl said he had the painting in the back of his car. After that I had no idea what was going to happen, I swear that’s the truth.”

Goldstein nodded slowly and sipped noisily at his tea.

“Art expert, huh? Possible. Tell me, Mr. Expert, what year was Mr. Michelangelo born?”

“Michelangelo? I’m not good on dates really. Fifteenth century of course. Almost ninety when he died, fifteen sixty something, which would have him born fourteen seventyish. Right?”

“Perhaps. And who painted ‘A View of Toledo’?”

“El Greco. Must we do this twenty-question thing?”

“Just one more. Where is Hochhande?”

“All right, so you win. I don’t know. And to tell you the truth I don’t know if it is a painting or an artist since I have never heard the name before this moment.”

“For some reason I believe you, Mr. Hawkin. But I want you to remember that last name and think about it. It is late and you will need some rest. Nahum, who you met outside the back door a few minutes ago, has a car there and will drive you back. Good-by.” And just as Tony reached the door, he added, “We’ll meet again.”

Not if I can help it Tony thought as the cold-faced Israeli pointed to the car. The interview had not been an easy one and he felt that he definitely had not gotten the better of it. With a quick rush of hindsight he realized that Goldstein had extracted far more information than he had delivered. Tony, in exchange for being hit on the head, had told almost everything he knew about Operation Buttercup. His career as a secret agent had an auspicious beginning. One thing he hadn’t talked about at least was Davidson’s death.

Dead. He had forgotten about the murder in the rush of events and he now became thoroughly depressed again. What to do next? Get in touch with the CIA man Higginson and ask for further instructions? Contact the FBI? What about a quick little flight back to Washington to ask for orders on the spot? That seemed like a fine idea, the best produced yet tonight, and he cradled it to him as the car stopped around the corner from his hotel. Still without a word the Israeli sped away and, coldly lit by the first glimmer of dawn, Tony walked most wearily to the hotel.

Was that a suspicious look the night clerk delivered along with the key? Or were his nerves eroded to the point where all men were suspect? He yearned after the comforts of his bed. The elevator was a long time coming and it only rose one floor before stopping again. A bellboy—no, the bellboy got on, smiling warmly, and did something with the controls so that the doors stayed shut but the car did not move.

“I have some free information for you,” the bellboy said.

“That’s very nice. Could you tell me while the elevator takes us up?”

“Certainly not or it will be known I have talked to you. You have been kind to me so I will be kind to you. There is a police officer now waiting in your room.”

“Yes, Christ, that’s land of you. I really did need that news. Perhaps I ought to just go back down and make my exit peacefully.”

“That is not to be recommended since another officer sits in the lobby and has witnessed your entrance.”

“Well, the police don’t worry me!” Hollow bravado indeed. “So start this thing up and let me get it over with and get to bed.”

“In a little-little moment. First I thought you might be happy to pay some recompense for my continued interest in your security. With all the policemen so thickly around my silence is surely appreciated.”

“Yes, I think you might appreciate a hundred pesos.”

“I would appreciate two hundred more.”

Tony paid in silence and watched his grateful employee exit. The elevator rose again, though his spirits fell, and he walked to his room as a man to his execution.

When he unlocked the door and went in he saw the man sitting at ease in the armchair, leafing through Tony’s passport and the contents of his attache case. Surprise, which he was prepared to simulate, was replaced by real anger.

“Just who the hell are you and what do you think you are doing?”

The man nodded in a most friendly manner, a handsome dark-haired man dressed in a conservative brown suit, putting the papers on the table and rising.

“You are of course the Mr. Tony Hawkin of the photo in the passport. My pleasure. I am Ricardo Gonzales y Alvarez and I am a lieutenant of the police.”

“Does being a lieutenant give you the right to enter here and go through my papers without a search warrant?”

“Yes, indeed, it does in Mexico. Particularly when the occupant of the room has been associating with known foreign agents.”

What an understatement—he had met more of them in the few hours he had been in the country than he had Mexicans.

“That is a nasty allegation, Lieutenant, and certainly not true.”

“I fear it is. For a witness we respect, you would call him an informer, tells us that the agent George Higginson came to your room tonight, more than once, and that you left with him.”

“Higginson is not a foreign agent, he’s an American.”

“Mr. Hawkin, please. In this country an American is a foreigner. And the CIA a secret foreign organization. Now I would appreciate your telling me just what your business is with this Higginson. Be brief and more important, be truthful.”

“I don’t have to answer your questions.”

“Of course not. Nor do we have to have you in our country.”

“Yes, there is that, I’m sorry. It has been a long night. Been drinking, no sleep. Drinking, that’s all. Never knew that Higginson was a CIA man, news to me certainly. Friend of my father’s, asked to look him up, that sort of thing.”

Gonzales was not convinced; he pursed his lips and tapped his fingers on the papers. “Yet isn’t it interesting that he is a CIA man and you an FBI agent? A certain suspicion attaches to this relationship, does it not?”

You're fishing, Lieutenant. You know something is going on but not what it is. “Not really. Washington is populated almost completely by government employees, they know one another, they meet when abroad, it is as simple as that. And, if you have gone through my papers as well as you seem to, you will have discovered that I am not an FBI agent but an employee of the agency who runs a souvenir stand there. Will that be all?”

“For the moment.” Gonzales stood up and started for the door. “Just one other question. Where is your roommate, Mr. Davidson?”

Tony had been waiting for this question and was not put off by the casual approach. “I’m sure I don’t know.” True enough! “He is a grown man and undoubtedly can take care of himself. We are just casual acquaintances and sharing the room for economy’s sake. We both have separate plans for our vacation, I assure you.”

Lieutenant Gonzales looked into his eyes for a long, silent moment before nodding slowly. “That will be all for now, Mr. Hawkin. I will perhaps be seeing you again. For your own sake I hope you are involved in nothing that is in violation of our Mexican laws.”

“Good night, Lieutenant.”

That was that. At least for the moment. Tony discovered that his hand had a distinct shake to it when he locked and bolted the door. The thought of a scotch whiskey loomed large as a trembler killer. He poured one, a healthy one, drained most of it, then slipped off his jacket and went to the closet to hang it up. Fatigue was clutching at him.

The man who stared back at him from inside the closet was holding a pointed gun in his hand.

“Now we can have our talk, Signore Hawkin,” he said.