Ransom (23 page)

Finally they fell asleep, she turned away from him, he with his arms wrapped round her. When the phone beside the bed rang once, they both came awake instantly. Carole, nearer to the phone, automatically reached for it, then stopped her hand. The phone had gone silent again, but the one buzzing note rang in their ears like an explosion.

Lisa, lying awake in the other bedroom, heard the single buzz of the phone out in the living-room. But the phone rang only once and after a few moments’ strained listening she convinced herself it had been a trick of hearing, perhaps a noise made by the storm. Then, because her hearing was for the moment so acute, she heard the diminishing note in the fury of the storm. She saw Sylvia lift her head and stare at her.

“Did you hear that?”

“The phone?” Sylvia said.

So she hadn’t imagined it. “Yes. But why didn’t it ring further? Do you think it was some sort of message for them?”

“Who from? Do you think there is someone else in this with them?”

But they had no answers: they could do nothing but ask pointless questions. But if the storm was petering out … “Listen! Is the storm easing off?”

Sylvia struggled up, her head cocked to one side. There was a waning of the tumult outside; the rain beat less strongly against the shutters, the wind was dropping. They both knew it would still be a wild night outside, but Hurricane Myrtle was moving away.

“How long do hurricanes take to blow themselves out?”

“It could be a perfectly fine day in four or five hours,” Sylvia said. “That is if it doesn’t, swing around again. Sometimes it goes on raining, but not always.”

“Then those men could be on a plane for Cuba by eight or nine o’clock. Perhaps earlier.”

“Yes.” Sylvia lay back, stared up at the ceiling. The light had been left on and they were glad of it; the darkness was too vast, left them wandering at the mercy of their imagination. “Today’s Election Day. I’d forgotten about it.”

“Do you want to go on being - what do they call you? In Sydney she’s the Lady Mayoress.”

“In America you’re never anything but your husband’s wife, whatever he happens to be. I’m the Mayor’s wife, nothing more.” She was still staring at the ceiling. “I don’t know - I mean, if I want to go on being the Mayor’s wife. Just being Michael’s wife is enough. None of this would have happened - to you or me - if I’d been a nobody. I’m sorry.”

“What for?”

“Do you - ” She turned her head, looked at this woman who for fifteen or sixteen hours had been closer to her than any other woman since her girlhood, yet whom after today she might never see again. Who, and the thought chilled her, might also die with her. “Do you hate me for what’s happened to you?”

“No,” said Lisa slowly. “Unlike my husband, I’m a fatalist. This was in my stars - you just happened to be part of the plot.”

“Thank you,” said Sylvia, but she was incapable of fatalism and she did not know whether to believe Lisa Malone or not.

Chapter Ten

“That was a stupid thing to try,” said Jefferson. “Do you want all four of you to finish up in prison?”

“I didn’t stop to think.” Mrs Birmingham, in a white raincoat and hood, sat slumped in the back seat of the car beside Malone. “It was a mother’s instinct, I guess.”

Your mother’s instinct has been a bit bloody slow up till now, Malone thought. “Your daughter had better be at the cottage,” he said. “If she isn’t - if she has been there and she’s skedaddled with my wife and Mrs Forte, I’ll see you do finish up in prison.”

“I can understand your bitterness, Inspector,” said Birmingham, sitting beside Jefferson in the front seat. “We have nothing personal against you or the police - “

“Mr Birmingham,” said Malone with none of his usual tolerance, “your tolerance gives me a pain in the arse.”

Now the small clues were linking up into a definite trail, no matter how inconclusive it might prove in the end, he had thrown off his exhaustion but at the expense of not being able to control his raw nerves. His self-control was not helped by the fact that he was sustained only by hope; he had placed all his bets on the Birminghams’ daughter being one of the kidnappers and Lisa being in the cottage out at Sunday Harbor. He shut his mind against the thought of what his reaction might be if the cottage should prove to be empty. For the first time in his life he was afraid of the black mysteries that lay within himself.

Jefferson, behind the wheel of the car, remarked the change in Malone but made no comment. He saw Willard Birmingham stiffen at the Australian’s reply; then the tall man turned up the collar of his raincoat, sank back in the seat and stared out of the car. Jefferson felt only a flicker of

sympathy for him, but it was not enough to prompt an apology for Malone’s rudeness. He knew where his real sympathy lay.

They were on the Long Island Expressway again, deserted at this hour of the morning but for the occasional patrolling police car looking for vehicles that might have broken down in the storm.

The four of them rode in a prickly silence for several miles. Then Elizabeth Birmingham glanced at the dark, stiff profile beside her. “If our daughter has - has kidnapped your wife and Mrs Forte, then I suppose we’re to blame in some way.”

“Not necessarily.” Malone realized she was trying to offer him some sympathy. He turned towards her, softening his tone. “Don’t torture yourself with the idea, Mrs Birmingham. Your daughter, whatever she’s done, has chosen her own life.”

“I sometimes wonder,” said Elizabeth Birmingham, and looked at the silent shape of her husband in front of her. “Though that’s the first time I’ve ever admitted it to anyone.”

Her husband looked back at her. “We should’ve been franker with each other. Because I’ve often wondered the same thing myself.”

Dear Christ, never let Lisa and I have secrets from each other, not if they lead to situations like this.

Then Jefferson said, “Do you know the cops out at Sunday Harbor?”

“Just casually. I’ve never had any cause to call on them for anything.” Birmingham sat up, like a man gradually becoming aware of the fact that he was going into battle.

Jefferson had phoned Police Headquarters and he knew that Ken Lewton and probably someone from the FBI would already be on their way out to the far end of the Island. Headquarters would have contacted the Sunday Harbor police and the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Department and asked them to watch the Birmingham cottage but to make

no move till Lewton and the FBI men had arrived. Until they did arrive Jefferson knew he would have to be the liaison man and he was always very much aware of his colour and his rank whenever he had to deal with out-of-town cops. There were still a lot of country law enforcement officers who could not understand how a coon had got to be a captain. He did not know how metropolitan the Sunday Harbor cops would be in their thinking.

He noticed the car had seemingly picked up speed of its own accord. “I think the storm’s easing up. We could be lucky.”

“How?” asked Malone.

“You want that plane to be able to get off, don’t you?” Then he screwed up his face, shook his head. He was tired; he would have to watch himself out at Sunday Harbor. He did not want to bitch things up for Malone by making the wrong remarks out there. He glanced at Birmingham. “I’m not gonna explain it to you now, but if your daughter is in this, she could have backed herself into a corner where she can’t get out.”

“Don’t be enigmatic, Captain. Don’t you trust me?”

“No,” said Jefferson flatly. “But what worries me more is will your daughter trust you when we get you to talk to her?”

Birmingham had no answer to that and he turned his head away, took off his hat and leaned his face against the cold glass of the car window. In the back seat his wife drew her hood about her face and began to weep quietly. Malone sat unmoving beside her, his hands thrust into his raincoat pockets, his eyes gazing unseeingly out at the rain hitting the window like silver splinters. He could feel a sickness growing in him, a fear that he might not be able to face whatever lay ahead of them out at the cottage. For he had convinced himself that Lisa was there, that in another hour or so they would have reached the end of the trail. But he had reached a stage where despair was beginning to weigh heavier than hope. He was, against his will, digging a grave, just in case …

By the time they reached Sunday Harbor the wind had dropped to no more than a gentle blow with occasional strong gusts, like last salvoes from Hurricane Myrtle. It was still raining, a steady downpour that was the final deluge from clouds that, high up in the darkness, had already begun to move away. Two local police cars and four cars from the Sheriff’s Department were parked at the end of the street to which Birmingham had directed Jefferson. They were without lights and Jefferson switched off his own lights as soon as he saw them.

A man in a slicker and rain-hat got out of one of the cars and came running through the rain. Malone opened the back door and the man got in, apologizing for bringing so much water with him.

“I’m Jack Narvo, the Deputy Sheriff of the county.” He was a tall thin man but it was impossible for Malone and the others, in the darkness of the car, to see his features clearly; he had a light, friendly voice and a trick of putting his head on one side as if expecting a question after each remark he made. “Which is Captain Jefferson?”

“I am.”

The long narrow head went on one side and there was a moment’s pause. “Okay, Captain. We have three more cars down at the other end of the street and two cars in the street behind this one, just in case your guess proves correct. One of my men has been down to the house, checked the car in the driveway beside it. It has Missouri plates.”

“We don’t know anyone from Missouri,” said Birmingham.

Jefferson introduced the Birminghams and Malone, and Narvo’s head ducked to one side as he acknowledged each of them. “We’re pretty sure there’s someone in the house, but we don’t know how many. The car’s been out tonight. The motor’s cold, but in this weather it could have cooled off pretty quick. But there are tracks in the gravel of the driveway that haven’t been washed out yet.”

“Your man seems pretty observant,” said Jefferson.

“We try to be.” The head went to one side again and the light voice just for a moment lost its friendliness; but it was impossible to tell whether he resented being complimented by a city cop or a black cop. “The Sheriff and the local police chief are away on an administration course - this is usually the quiet time of the year for us. This part of town is unincorporated, so it comes under my jurisdiction.”

Oh Christ, thought Malone, here we go again with the bloody jurisdictional protocol again.

“Well, you talk it over with Captain Lewton and the FBI when they get out here,” said Jefferson. “Kidnapping is a Federal offence, so I guess the FBI are running things now.”

“Who are you then?” Narvo’s head looked as if it would fall sideways off his neck.

“Just a friend of Inspector Malone’s,” said Jefferson. “He needs one, with all the goddam red tape that’s been tangling him ever since this business started. That looks like Captain Lewton arriving now. Let’s go and introduce him to your jurisdiction, Sheriff.”

He and Narvo, the latter stiff and awkward with anger and embarrassment, got out of the car, leaving Malone alone with the Birminghams. The husband reached back over the front seat and took his wife’s hand.

“She may not be in there after all, dear. This sort of thing isn’t Julie-”

“I know it isn’t. But - ” Then both of them looked at Malone.

“Look,” said Malone quietly, “I’ve been a cop for quite a long time. One thing that keeps repeating itself in my experience is the number of parents who don’t know their children. You don’t seem to have known your son too well. What makes you think you knew your daughter?”

“You sound as if you want her to be in there!” Mrs Birmingham pushed back the hood of her raincoat, sat forward to be closer to her husband.

“All I want is for my wife - and Mrs Forte - to be in there. At least that will mean I know where they are - up till now

I haven’t had any idea where they are or even if they’re still alive.” Again the Celtic shadow darkened his mind; he shook it off. “I don’t care who the kidnappers are - your daughter or Bill Buggerlugs - but if your daughter is in there, I’m hoping that you can talk her into letting my wife and Mrs Forte come out safely. What happens after that, I don’t care.”

The Birminghams looked at each other, then the husband said, “We’ll try, Inspector.”

Then Jefferson came back, opened the door of the car and leaned in out of the rain. “They’re busting into the house opposite yours, Mr Birmingham. They’re gonna set that up as the command post. Captain Lewton would like you down there. We can’t take the car down, but we should be able to get down there on foot without whoever is in your house seeing us.”

Five minutes later the four of them, their lower legs drenched and their shoes covered in mud, were in the large kitchen of the house across the street from the Birminghams’. On the way down Malone had tried to catch a glimpse of the cottage where Lisa might be held, but darkness, the heavy rain and the need to hurry had prevented him from seeing it.

“Oh, what a mess we’re making,” said Elizabeth Birmingham. “I hope Nell Royce will understand.”

“This is Dr Royce’s house,” said her husband. “I hope you did no damage when you were breaking in.”

It was a large house, built ranch style in fieldstone and timber, and the kitchen reminded Malone of illustrations he had seen in the American home magazines Lisa had started buying once they had become engaged. He wondered what sort of money the owners had that they could leave such a house closed up for six months of the year. This was not a holiday place but what he would have thought of as a luxury home. He was beginning to appreciate that his own values were way down the scale from those he had seen in the past few hours.

“We broke the lock on the back door there.” Lewton was brusque; he had no patience with a couple who seemed more concerned with their neighbours’ property than with who might be in their own house. “Sheriff Narvo has made a note of it and we’ll see the damage is repaired. We’ve also had the phone reconnected - we’ll let Dr Royce know about that too.”

“Who’s in charge?” asked Birmingham.

Lewton looked at Norman Cartwright. He and the FBI man had ridden out together from Manhattan and on the way he had explained to Cartwright the background to Commissioner Hungerford’s determination that the Police Department should wrap up this case. Though the case was now a Federal matter, Cartwright had not insisted on asserting his authority; he had explained, though without elaboration, that he did not like to see any man close to retirement being kicked out of his job. For the time being they would be a partnership.

“Is it any concern of yours, Mr Birmingham?”

“Yes! If my daughter is across the street there, I don’t want you busting in, maybe harming her. Maybe even -killing her!”

His wife gasped and he put his arms around her. Lewton looked at them both, then he jerked his head and went out of the kitchen towards the front of the house. Several of the men followed him; Jefferson looked at Malone, then they too went towards the front of the house. The light was on in the kitchen, but the rest of the house was in darkness. Malone found himself in a wide hall dimly lit by a guarded flashlight held by a local patrolman who stood with his back to the heavy front door. Lewton and the other men were in the big living-room off to one side of the hall, only their voices telling Malone and Jefferson where they were.

“Inspector Malone,” said Lewton, “we have to make up our minds whether to rush that house across the street or just wait till they come out. Assuming, of course, that the people over there are the ones we want. If your wife and

Mrs Forte are across the street, do you want us to run the risk of rushing the place?”

Malone could only dimly see the other men, but he could read their minds. He didn’t blame them for what he read there; he had tried the same trick himself in the past. No cop ever wanted to take the whole blame for something that might go wrong.

“No, I don’t,” he said. “Back home I’ve been in two cases in the past twelve months where the set-up was something like this. Not a kidnapping, but blokes wanted for armed robbery. At the first place the bloke gave up without a struggle - he had a gun but he didn’t even fire a shot from it. The second bloke went berserk - he even killed the dog he had in the house with him. It was panic as much as anything else - but he wounded two of my mates before he finally blew his own brains out. Fifty-fifty, that’s my experience of what chances you’ve got when you rush a place. I want better odds than that for my wife.”

Lewton sensed that the men around him agreed with Malone. It relieved him of a decision he would not have cared to make alone. There would have been no future at all for a captain of detectives who gave an order that might have resulted in the death of the Mayor’s wife.