The Key to Irunium

II

Eventually the police officials finished their inquiries.

Eventually the reporters went away.

Eventually the passengers were told, reluctantly, that they could go.

Eventually—after a long hard time—Prestin could catch up on his sleep.

No one knew where Fritzy Upjohn was. Everyone agreed that they most likely wouldn’t ever find out. Search parties were still going over the flight path, but that contingency seemed remote; a single body, a light and fragile long-legged body, falling free down the sky chute would leave precious little for identification.

But—something might be found. The searchers probed desultorily on. And Robert Infamy Prestin went to sleep.

Or he tried to go to sleep. At last he gave up the futile attempt and ordered a sleepy hotel porter to bring up a pot of coffee. It was times like these—small hours, small feelings, big problems—that made him wish he hadn’t given up smoking.

In the morning, which would soon be here after what was left of the night, he would have to rouse himself and breeze along to the exposition, where he would be expected to talk knowingly of bypass jets, ratios of efficiency, V.G. and S.T.O.L. and all the other slick shorthand of his trade. He slumped back in the armchair and looked dispiritedly about the comfortable hotel bedroom. He felt thoroughly depressed. Fritzy had burst into his life, bringing with her a whiff of promise that at last—and now she was gone.

But where?

People just don’t disappear from airplanes—at least not without some clue as to their disappearance.

He hadn’t noticed her rise. He’d been asked that over and over. NO—he hadn’t been aware that she had stood up. Trying with a muzzy mind to think back he could recall her saying something, something light and scatty, and his equally careless answer. But they’d both been dozing a little then, eyes half-closed, partially cut off from the outside world. No—he hadn’t noticed when she’d gone.

He felt that he should have done something. He felt it was all his fault. He felt—well, admit it then, R.I.P.—he felt guilty.

Guilty as all hell.

The phone rang.

He answered it with “Pronto!” before he thought to pretend to be asleep in bed.

“Mr. Prestin?” The voice was firm but faded, as though a man who had once been a master singer had lost the full timbre of vocal chords in prime.

“Ah—ye-es—who is this?”

“You don’t know me, Mr. Prestin. My name is Macklin. David Macklin. I have to see you right away.”

“I’m sorry, but that’s out of the question—”

“It’s about the—ah—disappearance of the young lady.”

“Maybe it is, Mr. Macklin. I’ve had enough talk about that tonight. I’m sorry. Call me in the morning.”

He put the phone down. It rang again, almost immediately.

Fuming, he snatched it up and shouted, “Look! I’m tired, I’ve had a shock and I’m trying to go to sleep. Get lost, will you?”

The voice he heard in reply said huskily, throatily, very champagne and tame leopards, “Are you talking to me?”

“Uh,” said Prestin, clearing his throat. “I’m sorry. I thought–”

“Never mind what you thought, Bob—I may call you Bob, mayn’t I?—I’ll let you off this time.”

Like an idiot, he said, “Thank you.”

“I know how you must have suffered, poor boy. I thought I ought to ring and tell you how sorry I am. It must have been too awful for you!”

“Yes—uh—who am I talking to?”

She infused more smile into her throaty voice. “I am the Contessa Perdita Francesca Cammachia di Montevarchi. You may, dear boy, call me Perdita.”

“I see. You knew Miss Upjohn?”

“Well, of course! A very dear friend—very dear. I am so choked up about it all.” He heard, very demurely produced, a muffled sob. “I must see you, Bob! I can come around, can’t I?”

“What—you mean—now?”

“Of course. You sound—forgive me—you sound as though you’re an American—”

“Half.”

“That does explain that, then. But here in Rome…”

“I know.” He didn’t know whether to laugh, to feel annoyed, or to put the phone down. But he knew he would not do the latter. “I’ve been in Rome before.”

“Ah!” The syllable sighed and enticed. “What a pity we have not met before.”

Her English was remarkably good; the faintest tinge of accent now and again accentuated the charm of her personality, or so Prestin told himself.

“I’ll leave the door ajar,” he said. “Room Seven Seven Seven.”

Again she cooed that soft syllable of delight. “Ah! A notable number, my dear Bob. I shall not keep you waiting.”

The phone clicked dead before he had time to answer.

Well.

The technical expression to cover this situation was, he knew perfectly well, a right turn up for the book.

Still and all…

He went through to the bathroom and rubbed a hand over his chin, staring blearily into the mirror. Then he began to unpack his razor and shaving foam, electric razors had never satisfied him. He was a meticulous person about some things, if not all.

An odd thought occurred to him. Fritzy had said this was her first visit to Rome—or would have been had she reached the city—so the seductive Contessa di Montevarchi must have met her somewhere else. Interesting, though. He’d formed the obviously erroneous impression that Fritzy was still fresh from the nest, despite her job and her attitude.

He half expected the phone to ring again as he shaved.

He felt reasonably thrilled. After all, this was the first time he had entertained a real live contessa in his room in the early hours of the morning. Of course he knew well enough that only her friendship with Fritzy had really moved him; all the sophisticated allure he felt so strongly from this European woman would have meant absolutely nothing to him in the normal course of affairs. He was no sucker for sophistication. Even in their short acquaintance, his affection for Fritzy had mingled with pity over her attempts to ape the sophisticated.

The door opened quietly as he was shrugging into a lightweight gray jacket. He saw the door swing inward, saw the glimpse of marbled paper in the corridor blocked by a moving shape. Then he was striding angrily forward, waving his arms as though shooing sheep, and yelling. “What do you want, bursting into my room at this time of night! Go on, get out!”

His own vehemence astonished him.

The man in the doorway carefully transferred his hand from the doorknob outside to the doorknob inside. Next, moving with the deference of an impeccably trained butler of the old school, he closed the door and flicked the bolt home.

Prestin stood there, speechless with outraged indignation.

The man removed a shapeless flowing black cavalier hat and tossed it casually onto a chair. He smiled most charmingly at Prestin. The clothes he assumed were covered by a black caped cloak. Beneath that a tight mustard-and-pepper plus-four suit, almost a knickerbocker suit, screeched in a loud and unfashionable fashion. Prestin blinked. The man carried a thick and solid-looking silver-knobbed cane. He could, Prestin realized, have stepped right out of the 1890s.

“I am sorry to disturb you in this way, Mr. Prestin,” said his visitor.

Prestin recognized the voice.

“You’ve a damned cheek, Macklin. It is David Macklin, isn’t it? You did call me just now—?”

“And you told me to go to hell. Yes, that’s right.” Macklin’s laugh bubbled cheerily. His hair shone parchment white and profusely under the lights, an odd comparison for Prestin to make. His face, thin and yet with chubby ruddy cheeks, seamed with good humor, could have modeled for a Santa Claus on a diet. He appeared to be in perfect running order, as old as he might be. A certain dapper briskness about him, a gesture of slender yellowish hands, a pert turn of the head, or a turn of phrase, all added up to present Prestin with the picture of an oldster perfectly capable of keeping his end up in any weather.

“I’m expecting a visitor,” said Prestin with what he hoped was a finality that he had, disastrously, begun to lose. This man Macklin possessed an aura. It snapped from his eyes and hypnotized Prestin with a realization that here stood no ordinary man. He felt resentful of that.

“A visitor, eh, Prestin. And a pound to a pinch of moondust she’s the Montevarchi.”

“How the hell–?”

“Don’t be so indignant, laddie. Simmer down. D’you mind if I rest my old bones? No—” He sat down with a firm and controlled movement and quirked a hard eye up at Prestin. “No laddie. If we’re to work together I won’t pull the old Falstaff tricks on you. You deserve better of me than that.”

“You do me an honor.” Prestin clasped both hands behind his back. “Now, if you don’t mind, I would like you to leave.”

“I’ve told you, Prestin, we must work together. I’m an old man but I still have my strength and yet, and yet I need a younger and stronger man to aid me now—”

Prestin made a grimace. “You mentioned you’d put the old Falstaffian tricks away. You do not impress me. I am ringing for the manager and I would advise you to leave.”

Prestin crossed to the telephone, put out his hand.

He did not hear Macklin move.

His hand quivered inches away from the phone, moving forward slowly to give time, he thought, for Macklin to climb down decently and remove himself. His hand almost touched the phone.

The black stick crashed down hard on the table alongside the phone, scraping his fingers. The phone went tinnggg and joggled in its cradle. Prestin snatched his hand back as though he’d been about to shake hands with a cottonmouth.

“Take it easy, you maniac! Here—” He turned abruptly, with some idea of snatching the stick away.

Macklin stood there, swaying slightly, eyeing him with lordly insolence, the stick half raised.

“I suppose,” Macklin said in a. drawling voice, “the Montevarchi told you she was a bosom friend of poor Miss Upjohn? Yes,” he nodded. “Yes, she would. I have never met Miss Upjohn. Until she—ah—disappeared from the Trident I had never heard of her, or of you. And neither had the Contessa!”

“But she said—”

“Act your age, boy! Think! Use what brains God gave you!”

“Well–”

“Yes. You’ll find out that in this business you can never take anything at face value. Even me.” He chuckled with wet sardonic humor. “Especially me.”

“What business? What are you talking about, anyway?” Prestin felt uncomfortably aware that something or other—he had no idea what—was going on and he had been dumped right in the middle of it all, paddle-less.

“If you’re going to spin me a cock-and-bull story about spies and secret agents or dope and guff like that, save it. I’ve had mine.”

Macklin shot him a sharp glance from beneath those tufty eyebrows. “What do you mean, you’ve had yours?”

“I was involved with a stupid spy—aviation is riddled with them—and the idiot got himself shot. I kept my name out of it at the time. If you have anything to do with all that old stuff, I’ll complain to Colonel Black. He promised me—”

“I have nothing, my dear boy, to do with your debauched past except in one particular.”

“What’s that?”

Macklin laughed and resumed his seat, laying the stick across his mustard-and-peppered knees. “You are direct. Good. I have found out a great deal about you in the time you have been in Rome. But I know full well that the Contessa has too. She has an organization almost as efficient as mine.”

Prestin wished he hadn’t given up smoking. Confusion annoyed him. Colonel Black—no names, no pack drill—had promised him. The spy had been shot, the secrets had been kept safe, and Prestin had discreetly faded out. And now this. Could Fritzy have been another spy? Act your age, son…

“How does finding out about me help us find Fritzy?”

Macklin kept a hard, sparrow-bright eye fixed on Prestin. “If the Montevarchi is to visit you she will be here shortly. My friend in London knew you well enough; he, too, has many contacts in the world of aviation journalism, as well as in other less fantastic worlds.”

Prestin didn’t follow that remark and, despite his own feelings of urgency, had to ask, “What’s fantastic about aviation journalism?”

“Not necessarily the journalism, my boy. But your sort of people live in the clouds; you young aviators, you don’t know what goes on in the real world. Any bright young man in any air force feeds on a peculiar heady atmosphere generated by his service. It’s fed by pride and snap and the proficiency of weapons and aircraft—my God! You kids play with toys that can smash the entire world!”

“Don’t you think they know that?”

“They know it, yes, in their heads. But do they feel what it is that they may smash up? What do they know about life as a civvy has to live it—facing unemployment, the knife-edge of employers’ displeasure, or sickness with no comfortable base hospital—they’re all the trifling little worries that gnaw a civilian into baldness and your grand bemedaled aviators know nothing about them!”

Prestin stood up and walked across to Macklin. He saw the frail humanity now for the first time, and he prepared to assert himself. He began to speak in a gentle voice. “Now then, David Macklin. You’re upset and—”

That was as far as he was allowed to go.

“Upset! Of course I’m upset! I wasn’t a flyer for twenty-five years and kicked out at the end without having a right to be upset! Confound you!”

“My father was an airman for longer than that, and he wasn’t kicked out at the end—and he would not agree with your sentiments, Macklin.”

“I’ve heard about your father, young Prestin. R.A.F. Very high and mighty. Air Marshal, wasn’t he, before he retired? Isn’t that a failure? If he didn’t make C.A.S.—didn’t he fail, too?”

“Nobody I know thinks so. You’d better leave, Macklin. I’m too tired to argue about myself, but if you begin to insult my father I shall have to break your stick for you—in a place it will do the most good.”

Macklin’s thin face with the chubby red cheeks suddenly broke into myriad lines and wrinkles as he smiled his charming smile. His dark eyes caught the light and glittered. “What the blazes are we two arguing for, Bob! Confound it all, we’re allies! Friends! We’re both on the same side, aren’t we?”

“You’ve got a lot of nerve. I’m on nobody’s side until I know what’s going on. Good Lord! You come bursting into my room in the middle of the night, babbling about this and that, telling me nothing, and then you can’t understand when I insist on your leaving! Go on, Macklin! Get out!”

The strangeness of this nighttime interview had been working on Preston and he was only too aware that the atmosphere could easily influence him to actions he might regret afterwards. David Macklin did not look dangerous now, despite his stick-banging expertise. What did the man want? For that matter, now that doubt had been thrown on her genuineness, what did the Contessa Montevarchi want? Whatever it was, if it meant getting Fritzy back, Prestin wanted to know.

Shouting at Macklin to get out was a juvenile reaction to unexpected stimulus. He said, “No, Macklin. Don’t go. Not yet, at any rate. I guess I do want to know what you want—if it will help Miss Upjohn.”

“That’s better, my boy. Much better. I am an easily aroused man and my temper flares up—you’ll get used to it, you’ll get used to it.”

“Maybe. What do you know about Fritzy’s disappearance?”

“I might know a great deal, if I’m right. If I’m wrong—why, then, I know no more than you or the police or anyone else.” Macklin stood up, brushing his cloak into neat folds. “But we can’t hang about here if the Montevarchi is coming. She won’t be alone. Of that I can assure you.”

“Not alone—?”

“You are a simpleton, aren’t you? The Contessa is as aware as I am of the power you possess.”

Prestin raised a halting hand, a half smile of amazement moving his lips in disbelief. “Power I have? Me? What are you talking about now?”

“I thought you knew? You mean?—my friend in London told me that your acquaintances were aware that you kept losing things, and always had, so they said. You mean you didn’t know? I only wish I had met you years ago—”

But the horrible implications had gotten through to Prestin. He sat back on the edge of the chair, unsteadily, feeling sick. He licked his lips. “I—I!” He shook his head. “No! You’re wrong! It wasn’t me!”

“How else do you explain it?”

Prestin glared at the older man, pleading for a release from this suddenly descended guilt. “I couldn’t have! Fritzy’s not a thing, not a book or a pencil or a paper clip! She’s a girl—”

“And you made her vanish!”

A soft knock sounded on the door and a husky voice said, “Bob? It’s me, Perdita. Open the door.”