The Cauldron (39 page)

As they walked out Vanity chattered on in her engaging manner. Paula was very thoughtful as they continued to explore the shops. The spray of Paramour had effectively masked whatever perfume Vanity normally used.

27

Vanity had gone inside an antique shop and Paula was looking in the window of another shop when Marler approached her, appearing out of nowhere. He stood a few feet from her and lit a king-size, then spoke quietly.

'Get back to Spanish Bay immediately. A Yellow Cab I've called will arrive any minute. Ah, here it is. Tell Vanity you've just realized you're late for a meeting with Tweed.'

Trouble?'

'Yes. We're being followed. Don't let Vanity take you back in her Audi. Tweed, Newman, Butler and Nield have gone to Spanish Bay in the Merc. I've borrowed the BMW.'

'Didn't see you.'

'Didn't intend you to. Go and tell the driver of the cab you'll be with him in a minute. Then go in that shop and make your apologies to Vanity

He turned, had gone before Paula could say anything else. From inside an alley he watched until she was safely inside the cab. Then he ran to the BMW parked among other cars higher up the street.

As he took off he glanced in his rear-view mirror. The grey Chrysler which had been tracking Paula moved faster, overtook Marler, followed the Yellow Cab which had Paula as a passenger. When, later, the cab took the road towards Spanish Bay the Chrysler gave up, soon turning on a route which would take it back to Highway One. Luis Martinez was behind the wheel.

'Thickhead.' Marler said to himself. 'You were so busy following the girl you never dreamt I was on your tail...'

There was more traffic on Highway One. Marler kept one vehicle between himself and Martinez, whose appearance had been described to him by Tweed. The Chrysler kept up a good speed along the magnificent coastal road. Marler presumed Martinez was returning to Black Ridge but he never relied on assumptions.

The wisdom of this attitude was proved later when Martinez suddenly swung left off the highway and vanished. Marler slowed down, glanced up the side road where Martinez had disappeared. Palo Eldorado, a signpost proclaimed. He continued driving along the highway until he reached a safe place to make a totally illegal U-turn.

He glanced up Palo Eldorado again as he paused. Narrow, the side road was shrouded in trees on both sides and mounted the hillside before going out of sight at a bend. Marler also noticed that near the exit from the side road, oil slicks smeared the road surface. He wondered whether this was where the two juggernauts had waited before attempting to push them over the cliff. Worth mentioning to Tweed.

In the living room of his apartment at Spanish Bay Tweed was holding a battle conference. Present were Newman and Nield. Outside in the corridor Butler strolled up and down to make sure they were not overheard. When Paula arrived Tweed began again.

'Time we summed up the present position. What we do next.'

Track down this bastard, The Accountant?' Newman suggested.

'No! Moloch remains the main target. And we must find out definitely what he is planning. I don't think we have much time left.'

'What did you think of him when you were at Black Ridge?' Paula asked.

'He has a first-rate brain, tremendous drive and the most persuasive personality - especially when he is being frank, which he was with me. I want you to look at these maps.'

He spread out on a table a detailed map of California and the map with zigzag lines given to him by Professor Weatherby. He waited while his team gathered round and looked at the maps, comparing one with the other. Tweed's index finger stabbed down on an area in northern California.

'That's Silicon Valley.'

'The main zigzag line runs right through it,' Paula observed.

'Exactly. Let me tell you what Moloch told me...'

They listened while he recalled every-word of his conversation at Black Ridge. When he had finished he gave his own reaction.

'This man came to America with high hopes. He worked like a Trojan to build up his first plant. With the new microchip he was a great success. Then five top firms in Silicon Valley combine to smash him. They use every dirty trick in the book, as you'll have gathered. They ruin him. Before that I'd say he was a decent, hardworking man who honestly built up his own company. It all turns to ashes. What more could turn him into an embittered man - determined to destroy those who destroyed him? With the help of Ethan Benyon, a genius in his field, he plans to wipe out Silicon Valley wholesale.'

'But how?' Paula asked.

'By triggering an earthquake along the San Moreno fault - and that, as you observed, Paula, runs straight through Silicon Valley.'

'But is it possible?' Newman asked. To do that?'

'A month ago I'd have said no. Now I'm not so sure. Science is advancing by leaps and bounds in so many fields. So why not in seismology? When a man like Professor Weatherby is worried about what Ethan is working on, then so am I.'

'Sounds so unlikely,' Pete Nield commented, fingering his moustache. 'But there was a time when landing on the moon would have seemed a pipe dream.'

'So how do we go about finding out?' Newman asked.

'We explore every avenue...'

He had just spoken when Marler walked in. He had heard what Tweed had just said.

'One avenue I suggest we explore now is Palo Eldorado. For two reasons c'

Tweed agreed immediately that they should check the mysterious road. Paula pressed to be allowed to join them and he decided it might be safer if she was with them. It was mid-afternoon when they were driving along Highway One. Paula sat in the front of the Merc, beside Newman while Tweed and Marler occupied the back seats.

Behind them Butler and Nield followed in the BMW. Marler had warned them all to have their weapons ready when they reached their destination. He hadn't liked the look of the strange side road.

The Pacific was not living up to its name. As they drove further and further from Carmel great waves rolled in and broke against the jagged capes which spread away along the coast. A strong wind was blowing offshore and storm clouds were building up.

'You're close to it.' Marler called out to Newman. 'Next turning on your left. You're on it before you realize it.'

Away from the scenic wonders of the highway Newman turned into a strange world. On the tarred road near the exit he saw the dried-out oil slicks Marler had noticed. He thought Marler had been right - that this was where the two juggernauts had waited in ambush.

As soon as they entered the road they were hemmed in on both sides with a dense screen of redwood and eucalyptus trees. In a gap a strange house was built on the slope, three floors, each stepped one above the other. They turned a corner and the highway was gone. They were driving through a dark tunnel where foliage from the trees arched over the winding road.

'Look at those weird places.' Paula called out.

To their left, where a slope rose steeply, were several tumbledown shacks which had an abandoned look. There was even an ancient stone fireplace among the trees. It had a chimney but the rest of the building had gone. More shacks, scattered at random and different levels, appeared amid the trees. Here and there old wooden bridges spanned stream beds. Paula thought she saw movement behind the shacks, shabby figures in bedraggled clothes, one carrying firewood.

'We've left civilization behind, I suspect,' joked Tweed.

He glanced at Paula in front of him. She looked recovered from her ordeal at the Standish apartment. As they climbed higher under the tunnel of trees Paula saw moss-covered walls, huge motionless ferns. The wind off the ocean had no chance of penetrating this wild place. This was a side of California the tourist never saw.

'And just look at that.' Paula called out again.

They had rounded a bend, still climbing, when she saw a small bus sagging to one side under the trees. Without wheels, its sides were smeared with psychedelic signs. More shacks came into view and crude fences made of bark, tilting over and covered with green from damp. Other figures lurched across the slope, dressed like scarecrows, and there was a lot of scrub oak, stunted, miserable versions of oak trees.

A propane gas cylinder perched on wooden struts stood on the slope - presumably for heating and cooking. Again shacks were piled up the slope, some with sagging balconies. Newman gestured upwards where overhead power cables were slung from ancient posts alongside the road.

'People live here,' he said with a note of wonderment.

'I think they're drop-outs,' Tweed commented. 'Relics of the hippies in the nineteen-sixties. They're the debris of so-called Californian civilization. We've gone back a good thirty years.' His voice sharpened. 'Look to the right, Bob.'

Parked up a track was a modern cream Jaguar. A uniformed driver with a peaked cap was slumped behind the wheel, so fast asleep he never noticed the two cars passing. Tweed spoke again, this time sharply.

'Stop, Bob. Switch off the engine. Look to your right.'

Paula was already looking. The trees were now giant sequoias, mighty trunks soaring up towards the invisible sky. Under them, on a level area halfway up the slope, a figure familiar to Tweed was dancing with a girl as a ghetto-blaster spewed out rock-and-roll.

The man was stripped to the waist, wore only a pair of denims and loafers. Without touching the girl, he was dancing back and forth, waving his arms, his hair all over the place. The girl had dark greasy hair, wore a shabby dress and tights with holes in them. Neither seemed to have heard the cars coming.

"That's Ethan Benyon.' Tweed said grimly.

'One way to get your kicks.' Marler drawled.

As they watched, Ethan approached more closely to the girl, his hands reaching out to clutch her. She retreated up the slope, picked up a heavy branch as he came after her. Using the branch as a weapon, she hit him across the ribs. Ethan froze, then let out a chilling scream which went on and on.

'Drive.' Tweed ordered. 'Find a turning place and get out of this Dante's Inferno ...'

He said nothing else until Newman had turned back on to Highway One. Paula took a deep breath of sea air through the window she had opened. The total silence inside Palo Eldorado had got on her nerves - until she heard the scream.

"That was Ethan Benyon.' Tweed said again. 'A genius, Moloch called him. No doubt he is in his own field of science. But he's as mad as a hatter. Not a comforting thought...'

The hammer blow fell when they returned to Spanish Bay. In the car park Tweed said he wanted to get in touch with Cord Dillon. He told Paula, Newman and Marler to stay in the car. Butler and Nield had just returned in the BMW. Newman waved to them to act as lookouts, then pressed buttons on the black box. Tweed automatically reached for the microphone.

'Is that you, Cord?'

'Speaking. Recognize your voice, Tweed.'

'It's time we took action. Urgently. I'd like Alvarez to send more frogmen down to the sealed hole under the Baja. They can be armed this time. I want to know whether there's some kind of wireless transmitter attached to the plate sealing the hole. It really is urgent...'

'Sorry, Tweed, I can't do that. The special unit which went down has already lost three men.'

"They weren't armed,' Tweed persisted. 'It's a vital act.'

'No can do. Tweed, I have bad news for you. I've been ordered not to harass our friend in any way. Powerful senators have visited the President in the White House. They threatened to veto any future bills he wants passing. You know who has put the pressure on them. I was called to the Oval Office myself, told to leave the target strictly alone. I felt like ignoring the order, but then I'd immediately be replaced. So where would that get us?'

'What about Alvarez?'

'One of my best men. I've recalled him to Langley.'

'What you're saying is we get no more cooperation from you,' Tweed said forcefully. 'Even though I'm sure a national disaster is imminent?'

'You've concrete evidence for that statement?'

'It's inside Black Ridge, I'm sure, and on the seabed, under the Baja.'

'Storm into Black Ridge? Risk more lives on the seabed? I can't do it. I have a wife and children to think of. I'd be had for gross dereliction of duty. I told you. I had to go to the White House. Urgent summons. Read the riot act.'

'We're on our own, then? Is that what you're saying?'

'Sure is. And my best advice is for all of you to get out of the US of A pretty damned fast.'