Fallen Sparrow (26 page)

“No!” he denied fiercely.

“Better never to have met than to have had it this way. I’m sorry.”

“You sound as if you didn’t expect to see me again.” He tried to laugh but there was an obstruction in his throat.

She whispered, “I know I must not see you again.” She looked up at him. Her heart was bleeding in her eyes. “Don’t you see? They have a hold on me that can never be broken until—”

“We’ll take care of that.”

She continued as if he hadn’t spoken, “—until he and his legions are gone from the face of the earth. Until then you mustn’t try to see me.” Quiet despair enveloped her. “You know that. You know that I—and mine—will never be safe until that day no matter how many decent channels there are. Even if he lets us go free now, he can hunt us down again. He can force me to act for him again when he so wills.” Her look was level. “You could never trust me until that day.”

He cried wildly, “Toni—”

She said, “Your heart rejects it now but your instinct knows its truth. There might come a time when your heart would be unable to rebel longer against the dictates of all the wiser and saner fibres of you. Under compulsion, when you were forced to choose, you’d know I wasn’t as important to you as other things.”

He said, “No, Toni.” But under compulsion values became livid with clarity. Under compulsion tonight he had killed a man.

“I don’t want to know you then. I’d rather remember other days, however brief.”

He was hollow within him. “You’re leaving me with nothing.”

“I’m leaving you with everything, Kit. I’m leaving you with the strength and will to conquer him—the little man.”

“Ideals are cold comfort in the dark.”

She said, “You aren’t alone. You have Content.”

He was brittle. “A child.”

“There aren’t many children left today. She’ll never confuse the issue for you as I might. Nor will you ever feel the need to compromise with her. When I’m gone—”

He asked quickly, “What do you mean?”

“I must go back of course. If you will let me go.” She pleaded silently.

He said, “I’m not going to turn you over to the police, if that’s what you mean. I want you to get away from here now—quickly—”

Hope stirred in her.

“But not back to them. I’ll give you some money. You can go somewhere, anywhere that you’ll be safe until I get things settled. There’s no reason for you to be caught in it. You didn’t do anything.”

She cried softly, “If I return they can’t keep my little girl from me. I did all I could. With Christian Skaas dead they’ll have to start all over again. They can’t use me. I’d be known.”

He said, “You can’t risk it. They might do something to you because it failed. We’ll bring your baby over, Toni. There are methods—underground railways for refugees. We’ll bring her out to you and no one can ever take her from you again. I’ll see that you’ll both be safe here in the United States.” He faltered. “There’s one thing I’d like to know.”

“Yes, Kit.” She seemed fearful of the question.

“Do you love him—the other Otto?”

She was quiet, seeing a far forgotten past. “I thought once that I did. I must have been very young once.”

He urged her now. “Pack a few things. My cab is outside. Take the next train to Chicago. Let me know where you are there. Use a new name. Get a job if you can, anything to assume a new life. I think I can make Tobin understand but we mustn’t risk it. When it’s safe you can come back to Det.”

Maybe in time there would be feeling in her again; maybe in time, she would turn to him.

He took her down to the cab. Before she climbed in, she put the moonstone into his hand. “I don’t want to keep this now.” She was crying a little. “You are so good, Kit. I wish—”

He watched until the red tail light was dim, gone. He returned to the apartment, flooded the rooms with light, called Tobin and waited. Even now, his nerves rustled. He felt relief when he heard the cab pull up below, watched Tobin emerge. He opened the door to him.

Tobin eyed the empty apartment.

Kit said, “Birds had flown when I got back from Washington.”

Tobin’s mouth was wide. “They won’t get away. I’ll send out a call.”

“Wait.” Give her time to get clear. “I can tell you where they are. I have plenty to tell you. Sit down.”

Tobin sat. “Shoot.”

He didn’t want to confess to murder. He knew that he must, that was a part of the terrible honesty old Chris had willed him. He delayed it. “Jake has José on ice. Det has the Prince incommunicado. The F.B.I. has Otto. Christian Skaas is—dead.” He walked to the window, turned and looked Tobin in the eye. “I killed him.”

He stilled the flash in Tobin’s eyes. “Let me tell it. I killed a man tonight. Maybe it was self-defense. Maybe not. I wanted to kill him. But I didn’t want to when the time came. Then I had to, to save myself.”

He said, “He’s upstairs. Maybe there’s traces in the fireplace of what he was trying to do to me. Maybe not. He was pretty smart.”

Tobin said, “This will be a matter for the Department of Justice.”

“He was a spy. He wasn’t Christian Skaas. He was a little Balkan thug working for hire. The proof is in Jake’s vault. It’s safer there than any place I know of. He’ll give it to you when I tell him to.” He was honest. “I’m not afraid to stand trial for killing him, Toby. I think I’ll get a medal instead of a sentence. But there’s something I have to do first.”

The Inspector was noncommittal. “Spill it all. Then I’ll talk.”

Kit said, “It’s up to you. I’ve put in my application this week for intelligence work. I can’t pass the army regulations because of some of the things that happened to me. The Department of Justice doesn’t care about that. They’ll use me. Besides, Dantone’s in the family so I get a break. He’s rushing my orders through. If they had come before tonight I’d have had a right to kill Skaas. Skip it. They didn’t. I’m willing to take my medicine.”

“Get to it.”

“It’s personal. I’ve no right to ask it of you. But I fixed it up with Dantone this week. They’re holding a seat for me on the Clipper. I’m going back to get the cups.”

“Where are they?”

Kit looked at him, decided. “You’ll be the second man to know. You and me. They’re holed up in a hotel room in Lisbon. Under the wall. After they fell into my hands, I wangled a leave. I had a break in Lisbon. The hotel where I stopped was being redecorated. Some of the rooms were still unpapered. I saw how the walls were built. I could take a week’s time; no one was after me then; it was before they knew I had the loot. It wasn’t hard to remove a strip of fresh paper in my room and replace it. I worked at night with my radio blasting. The cups are daubed all over with mud and clay. If anyone did tear out the wall they’d look like so much rubble. If I don’t get them, it’ll be the same thing over again. More death. More torture. I told you it’s personal. But I won’t let
him
have the cups. It’s like a cancer in me. He’s spewed too much evil. He’s had his own way too long. The tide’s got to start turning against him. I know this is a little thing. In the long run it doesn’t matter a damn who owns a couple of pounds of gold and jewels. But to me it’s more than that. It’s letting him know that he isn’t a god, that one person had dared defy him, not with bombs and tanks, not because of fear of the alternative, not for any economic or social reason but for something more deep and more real. For an intangible abstraction. Someone has defied him because of decency and beauty and truth. If one can do it, there’ll be another and another and more. He’ll see it. He’ll have the first doubt, the first tremor. There will be the first shadow writing on the wall.” He shook his head. “Maybe that’s rationalization. Maybe it’s just that I’m making a play for my own safety. If I can turn the cups over to the Metropolitan Museum, I’ll be out of it.”

“Yeah,” Tobin said.

“I’m asking you to let me take the Clipper, Wednesday. I’ll come back on the next flight. Dantone’s fixing things up. The consul in Lisbon is an old family friend. He’ll meet me. There’ll be picked men go with me to the hotel. We all know Lisbon is a dangerous place now. Maybe I won’t come through. I think I will. But it has to be done at once. It has to be before their intelligence sends another bunch after me. Even if they manage to code a cable through on Skaas’ death now, they won’t know where I am. I’ll be traveling under another name on a diplomatic passport.”

“Who knows Dr. Skaas is dead?”

“Otto. But I don’t think that he’ll have a chance to pass out the news. José. If you’ll allow it, Jake will keep him safe. Det.”

“O.K.”

“Toni.” He wanted Tobin to believe. “She wouldn’t work against me. She helped them because she had to, but with Skaas dead—she’s the one who’s told me most of what I know.”

“Where is Toni?”

“I don’t know.” He hurried on. “Only those at the top knew of the cups.” Even Otto hadn’t known. Whatever underlings Skaas had employed would be in ignorance of the larger plan. With Skaas dead, they would wait for new orders before they moved.

If Tobin would only agree. A short delay couldn’t be important to a trial. He could take anything once he was free of his albatross. He watched the Inspector drop ash into the fern.

“I’m thinking,” Tobin said.

Kit waited.

“Why should Dr. Skaas die?”

His heart began to sink, his mouth opened for further explanation, but Tobin silenced him. “I’m talking now. Why shouldn’t Skaas have a little sick spell? His heart or something. I think I can keep him alive until you get back.”

Kit couldn’t speak now. His eyes were stretching wide.

“I can’t speak for the Washington end of things. Anybody liable to slip a cable through on Otto Skaas being in custody?”

Kit said, “Christian picked him up on this side. I don’t believe anyone in Germany knows of his existence. Moreover, if you’ll pass on the word that his real monicker is Schoonmacher, occupation Jersey hood, no one would care if he existed.”

“That’s that,” Tobin said.

“You’ll fix it so I can go?”

“Far as I can see, you’ve fixed it up pretty well yourself. Outside of calling the ambulance for the Doc. Moore and I can handle that. I already had Pierre bring in that maid of yours.”

Kit walked over to him, held out his hand. “I can’t say it. But you won’t be sorry you gave me this chance. I’ll be back to face it on the next flight.”

Tobin took his hand. “Confidentially I see no reason to try this in the papers.” His hat tilted over his eyes. “Kit, before you were two years old, old Chris deputized you in the department. So far as I know that’s never been erased from the books.” He cleared his throat. “We take care of our own.”

C
ONTENT RAISED HER LIPS
. “Isn’t it marvelous, Kit? The studio call coming the way it did.” She looked like a doll in her pink sleepers. “I don’t think I could have stood the waiting for you to return Monday night, after Jake left, if I hadn’t had it to think about.”

He kissed her, took up his brief case, not a limp black one, and his bag.

“You’ll fly out to Hollywood to see me just as soon as you can get away from Florida?”

“You can bet on it.” He patted her head. “Just as soon as I get back, I’ll head West.”

She hesitated. She wanted to say something but it came hard. He waited. She began, “A year ago I couldn’t have expressed it, Kit. I had words but no feeling with which to understand them. I guess we’ve all grown up since then. Now I can say it. Ab died a hero’s death.”

He said, “Yes. You’re right.”

A hero wasn’t one of the boys in the front office with the news photographers shouting, “Hold it,” and the columnists battening on his clichés. It was men like Ab, like Louie, the ones behind the scenes each one doing his minute part. If they weren’t there, there wouldn’t be a structure. That was why the unimportant ones walked in immediate danger. That was why they were put out of the way.

He said as to himself, “Ab wasn’t a fool. He knew the danger he was in when he went to Washington. But he went. He proved to himself there at the end that he could stand up and fight even without weapons. He didn’t win but he didn’t weaken the structure. I don’t think he minded much what happened to him. He knew they couldn’t win by killing him.”

Ab had held ideals. He had died for them. Once Kit had thought that he held them. But ideals weren’t something to carry on the tongue and lips; they weren’t a bright pylon flagging adventure in a strange romantic land, a rag to be torn down in the face of adversity. Ideals had roots. If they were granted you, they could not be eradicated no matter to what ordeal they led. Maybe he had them now.

He touched her again. “Goodbye. Not for too long.”

He’d had twenty-four hours to prepare, twenty-four hours to hope nothing had gone wrong. Maybe he would relax in the sky; maybe it was better to remain tensed, tight this way, until the interlude was in the past and he stood on American soil again. He could endure it that much longer. If he hadn’t miscalculated, he’d come through Lisbon unscathed.

He checked in at the airport. Everything had been prearranged. As he started to the field, Tobin shouldered him. He was surprised to see the Inspector there. An underbreath mutter, “Everything under control. Luck.” He might have been saying, “Get out of my way.” He didn’t recognize Kit, and he joined two business suits on the field. The profile of one had been in Dantone’s office, intelligence service. He didn’t know Kit now.

The early morning was wintry cold. Kit didn’t linger on the field. He walked to the massive ship, stepped inside, started up the aisle. He looked into the startled face of Toni Donne.

He stood over her, spoke quietly, “You’re leaving?”

“I had to, Kit.” Her breath was fearful, impassioned. “I have to find her. I can’t risk waiting—for the other.”

He couldn’t chance it. It would have been impossible for her to obtain a Clipper seat on a moment’s notice. This had been released to her by someone, even as his ticket was prearranged. She could be all lies, one facet of their Borghese determination. He had already put into motion the wheels to rescue the child, if she were truly hostage. He didn’t know. True or false, the hold of the little man over Toni had not diminished. He would never know. “My bread shall be the anguish of my mind …” He’d gone too far to turn soft now. Last night was in the far past.