The wrong Venus Read online

  “No.” She smiled and exhaled smoke. “After awhile you don’t even hear it.” She took another puff, pressed the microphone button, and went on, “—comma aflame with that age-old exultation in the terrible urgency of his need for her—thanks, Colby.”

  “Not at all.” He set the bottle on the chair and got up.

  “—Period With a gibbering little cry of unbearable ecstasy comma she thrust her hips upward against him comma—”

  He went back to the office. He dialed the number in Nice, and in a few minutes was through to Clavel. He introduced himself and said he was a friend of Martine Randall.

  “I know,” Clavel broke in. ‘”What do you need?”

  Transportation, Colby replied. For himself? No, for a young lady whose doctor had prescribed a change of scene; she’d developed a strange allergy to crowds and to people wearing blue, and he thought perhaps North Africa—

  “I’ve got a hunch I know who you mean,” Clavel said. “We have newspapers here too. Any particular place?”

  “Anywhere she could catch a ship or plane to the United States without a stop in France. She’d need an entry stamp—and visa if it’s called for—to clear her on the way out.”

  “We’ve got one of the top men. Passport, UN credentials—you name it.”

  “She can use her own passport once she’s out of France.”

  “We’ve got a boat leaving for Rabat Saturday night. How about that?”

  This was Thursday; Saturday would be perfect, with plenty of leeway for getting there. “Good. Where could you pick her up?”

  “There’s a cove west of Cannes. You’d better write this down.” He gave directions and exact mileage. Colby jotted it down. “Have her there at nine p.m.”

  “Check,” Colby said. “And what’s the tab?”

  ‘Twenty-five thousand francs.”

  “Okay. Now, there’s one more thing; there may be a price being offered around to take her somewhere else—”

  “If we’re talking about the same girl, there is.”

  “If the twenty-five thousand doesn’t top it, say so now. I want to pay her fare all the way across.”

  “Forget it. I know the guy that’s after her, and we don’t do business with him. Have her there, the captain’ll wait five minutes, and that’s it.”

  “He won’t have to wait at all. If she’s not there it’ll be in the papers.”

  He hung up and repeated the conversation to Martine. “Good so far. Now, from here to Cannes?”

  “That’s the easiest part of it.” She went on to explain. Roberto would take her; she’d already talked to him. He was out now looking for the vehicle, one of those pickup trucks with the camper body on it. She thought he could get a good used one for around six thousand francs.

  Colby nodded. “Still good.”

  “So. . . .” She smiled. “We’ve solved everything but the problem. Any ideas?”

  “No. You couldn’t smuggle a hamster out of here as long as he’s there, and you can’t move him.”

  “We have to move him, that’s the only solution. So approach it from there. What would induce him to go away?”

  “Nothing on earth. Till he gets her. God knows how many people he’s killed, but this is the first time there’s ever been a witness—”

  “Wait a minute!” she interrupted. She leaned back in the chair. Seconds stretched out as she continued to stare straight ahead of her, biting her lip. Then she sat up abruptly. “Colby! We’ve got it!”

  She explained. It took five minutes, while he listened with increasing awe.

  He whistled. “Mother, dear. But can we cast a production like that?”

  “Why not? All we need is Henri, Roberto, the moving van, and four plain-clothes cops. I can do it on the phone in twenty minutes.”

  * * *

  Colby made a complete tour of the house from the attic downward to be sure there was no place they could get in after it was dark. When he came to the salon, he peered out. Decaux was still there, as well as one of the cars.

  Dudley indicated the bound man lying against the wall. I think he wants to say something. Keeps trying to make a noise.”

  Colby removed the gag and was greeted by a geyser of abuse in a Marseille accent.

  “What’d he say?” Dudley asked.

  “The only thing printable is that he wants to go to the john.”

  “The hell with him.”

  “Oh, I’ll take him. Give me the gun and you untie him. Just his arms, he can hop.”

  Dudley loosed the bonds and stepped back. “Nearest one’s Miss Manning’s bathroom. Through that door and down the hall.”

  Colby followed the man’s kangaroo progress with the gun centered on his back. Miss Manning’s rooms consisted of a book-lined study, a large bedroom carpeted with a shaggy white rug, and a bathroom that had been modernized and done over in coral and black. He looked around the study and bedroom, thinking of the unhappy spinster now completely withdrawn and made bitter by the final rejection. It was a shame.

  They came back. “You are kidnapers,” the man said angrily as Dudley tied his hands again.

  “That we are,” Colby agreed. “But who knows, perhaps you will return to your friends tomorrow.”

  “You are dirty—” A mouthful of dish towel cut off the rest of his comment.

  * * *

  Madame Buffet made sandwiches and opened some bottles of wine. Kendall took hers in her room while she went on dictating. Colby and Martine ate at the desk in the office. She gave him a report. Everything was falling into place for H-hour, eight tomorrow morning.

  She’d located four friends, three of them bit players in films, who were willing to impersonate inspectors from the Quai des Orfèvres for a half-hour for five hundred francs. Two of them looked a little like Jean Gabin, and it was one of these, Émile Voivin, who would have the speaking part. She’d rehearsed him in it. Roberto had called. He’d found a used pickup camper that could be had for fifty-two hundred francs. A cruise ship named the Heraldic was calling at Rabat a week from Saturday, bound for New York by way of Gibraltar, the West Indies, and Nassau. She’d made a reservation for first-class passage in Kendall’s name.

  Roberto arrived in a taxi shortly after four P.M. They gave him the money for the truck, for the provisions he would need, and for Kendall’s steamship ticket, which he would pick up after he was certain he wasn’t being followed.

  “They won’t follow anybody now,” Colby said. “They know where she is.”

  They brought out the map of Paris and briefed him. “You’ll rendezvous at this point on the Rue Céleste at eight a.m.,” Martine went on. “That’s only four blocks from here and you don’t have to go through any traffic lights or cross any arterials to get here, which could wreck the timing. You park the pickup truck and get in the van with Henri. Voivin and the other three men will be in another car.

  “Lawrence will arrive at the same time in my car. He’ll get in the back of the van. Henri will have an extra-large coverall he can put on over his suit, and a beret, the same things you’ll be wearing. As soon as he’s gone over it once more with Voivin, Henri will drive the van around here, going very fast once you’ve turned into this street and you’re visible to Decaux and his men. Voivin will leave exactly two minutes later. The timing has to be very precise. If Voivin gets here too soon we won’t fool him, and if he’s too late it could be very dangerous. Everything clear?”

  “Yes,” Roberto said.

  “Good. Here are the instructions for finding the cove after you get to Cannes. You can keep the truck, or sell it, whichever you wish. See you in the morning.”

  Roberto left. Martine had found another recorder, one with a foot switch, and she began to transcribe the first of Kendall’s tapes. It seemed a waste of effort to Colby, typing a worthless manuscript, but they couldn’t sit and do nothing. The suspense of waiting for eight A.M. Would have them going up the wall.

  * * *

  Decaux disappeared from in
front of the house, but there were two cars on station and the state of siege went on as night began. Madame Buffet made coffee. Dudley continued to watch in the now-darkened salon, alert for the first warning sounds of attempted entry. The house was silent except for the clatter of Martine's typewriter in the office. Colby took over. He was dead tired, now close to forty hours without sleep. He took one of Martine's Dexedrine tablets and came to life again.

  Shortly after eleven the cook arrived in a taxi, identified himself, and was let in, carrying an armful of newspapers. Voilà!

  WHO IS BOUGIE? The headlines cried. WHERE IS BOUGIE? DID BOUGIE KILL PEPE? Was Bougie protecting her lover, the real assassin? Was Bougie a Russian spy, a Magyar princess, a reincarnated Viking, a publicity stunt by some American cereal manufacturer? At various times and places Bougie had spoken French with an American accent, English accent, German accent, Balkan accent, Vaudois accent, and the accents of four different provinces of France. The photograph was emblazoned on the front pages of most of them, and two carried a picture of Colby drawn by a police artist from the descriptions of eyewitnesses in the café at St.-Médard. He looked like the man who is always questioned by police after a series of mysterious stranglings. There was a picture of the café, with a dotted line showing the trajectory of the gendarme, and several photographs of Pepe Torreon, one without a blonde.

  The briefcase now contained two million francs and bore an indecipherable coat of arms. Little credence was given in most circles, however, to the theory that Colby might have been implicated in the assassination of Rasputin.

  An arrest was expected momentarily.

  * * *

  The night wore on. The cook relieved Dudley, patrolling the downstairs areas. Martine typed. Colby took over again, mechanically pounding out words that had lost all meaning. Martine was dozing in a chair and he had just rolled page three hundred and eighty-one into the machine when Kendall came down the hall, dressed in blue pajamas and carrying the other recorder. She set it on the desk in front of him and reached for a cigarette.

  “The baby’s born,” she said. It was six forty-five A.M.

  Martine was instantly alert. She went to the head of the stairs and called out to Dudley, who came running up, followed almost immediately by Madame Buffet and Georges with a bottle of champagne and six glasses.

  Martine indicated the pile of manuscript. “Three hundred and eighty pages typed, and one more roll of tape on Kendall’s machine. We’ll have it ready by noon.”

  Dudley looked dazed. He gave a wondering shake of the head. “Oh, boy,” he whispered, “if she’ll only stay away a little longer.”

  Kendall raised her glass. “To biogenesis.”

  They drank several toasts. Dudley and Georges went back downstairs. Colby and Martine explained the proposed escape route to Kendall, and gave her the folder containing her passport and the twenty-five thousand francs for Clavel’s boat captain.

  “Get your bag packed,” Martine said, “but stay in those pajamas—it’ll be easier to put on the coverall. There’s nothing to it the rest of the way, if we can just get you out of here. It all depends on whether we can move Decaux. Be downstairs and ready to go by ten till eight.”

  Kendall left. Colby thought of something else. “You wouldn’t have any sleeping pills in that pharmacy of yours, would you?” he asked Martine.

  “Sure. Why?”

  “Give me three of ‘em. For our friend downstairs.”

  They went down to the salon. Colby sent Madame Buffet to the kitchen for a glass of water, a hammer, and a screwdriver. He asked Dudley to hold the gun on the man while he unbound his hands and then re-lashed them against his body so he could lie on his back.

  “Okay, in with him,” Colby said. They lifted him into Kendall’s crate. Colby removed the gag.

  “What’s that for?” Dudley asked.

  Colby indicated the pills in Martine’s hand. “There’s no way to tie him in there so he can’t kick around and make a lot of noise. So we just put him to sleep.”

  “It’ll be interesting to see how you get him to swallow them,” Martine said.

  “He’ll swallow or drown,” Colby replied in French.

  “But how are you going to get ‘em in his mouth?” she asked. The man’s string of curses had cut off and he’d clenched his jaw as soon as he saw the pills.

  “Easy,” Colby said. He knelt beside the box and took the hammer and screwdriver from Madame Buffet. He inserted the screwdriver blade between the man’s lips, selected an incisor, and drew “Back the hammer. “Just knock out a tooth,” he went on in French, “and drop ‘em in. If he swallows the tooth too it won’t hurt him.” The man’s mouth opened in a great hippo yawn, the pills fell in, and were washed down with a swallow of water.

  Colby retied the gag, and began to nail the lid on.

  * * *

  It was seven thirty-five. “Time to go,” he said. He took a last look through the window drapes. Decaux was nowhere in sight yet, but a car with one man in it was parked across the street. Martine gave Colby the car keys, and silently held up crossed fingers. He went out and got in the Jaguar.

  A block away he met Decaux coming along the opposite sidewalk with his easel and box of paints. He sighed with relief. Decaux was infinitely the most dangerous of them, but he was probably the only one with the intelligence and daring to see the opportunity and seize it. He went on two more blocks and turned toward the Bois de Bologne. There was probably less than one chance in a hundred he was being followed, but he had to eliminate that one.

  It was a beautiful morning, crisp and clear with pockets of opalescent mist that reminded him of Turner and flashes of crimson and gold on every side. His own personal choice for Heaven, he thought, would be an eternity of successive hand-picked October days in Paris. After, of course, the last automobile in it had been hunted down and beaten to death with flails. He doubled back and forth across the Bois at different speeds for ten minutes, and stopped to smoke a cigarette. Nobody was following him. He drove back to the Rue Celéste. The van was already parked at the rendezvous point, and Roberto was just pulling in with the pickup. It was five of eight.

  They greeted him warmly and with suppressed but still evident excitement. “Take a look,” Roberto said proudly, opening the rear door of the camper body.

  It held two bunks with mattresses and pillows, and a shelf at the forward end supported a radio and reading lamp. There were small windows on each side, well-covered with dark green curtains. Most of the floor space between the bunks was taken up with boxes of food and a small icebox. Once she was in there she was out of sight all the way to the boat.

  “Good,” Colby said.

  Henri sighed. “Lucky Roberto.”

  “Well, I offered to cut cards, didn’t I?” Roberto said. “If it was all right with your wife—”

  “The gambler!”

  Roberto locked the door. They went back to the van. Colby opened the doors, hopped up inside, and began to pull on the big blue denim coverall. He put on the beret. A Peugeot pulled in to the curb behind them and four men got out. Colby knelt on the tailgate and asked, “Which one is Monsieur Voivin?”

  “Me,” said the one who’d been driving. He was a heavy-set man in early middle age with wiry gray hair and a totally masculine but still somehow gentle face. He looked like a cop, all right, and a good one, Colby thought. He introduced himself and brought out an envelope containing two thousand francs. He passed it out to them, and spoke to Voivin.

  “Let’s run through it once, the way Martine explained it on the phone. You pull up right behind us. Take it from there.”

  Voivin ran through his part without hesitation. “Perfect,” Colby said. “In two minutes exactly.” They got back in the Peugeot.

  He spoke to Henri. “And the gasoline?”

  “Less than a liter. Four kilometers at the most.”

  “Good. And it’s already been reported stolen?”

  “An hour ago. Driven off from an addre
ss on the Boulevard Montparnasse.” He grinned. “The ignition switch is jumpered.”

  Colby nodded. “Leave the engine running, the wires twisted together but out of sight under the dash.”

  “D’accord.”

  Colby looked at his watch. It was three minutes after eight. He felt the stirring of butterfly wings. “Take it away.”

  The doors closed. They began to move.

  They turned right. They were on the Avenue Victor Hugo. He looked around the dim interior of the van. It contained a disassembled bedstead, a chest of drawers, an old trunk, and a couple of small rugs. Traffic snarled around them. They swung right again, into the Rue des Feuilles Mortes, and began to gather speed. Decaux would have seen them by now and recognized the van. Brakes squealed and they swerved in to the curb.

  Cab doors banged and there was the sound of running footsteps. The rear doors opened. Colby jumped down, not even looking toward Decaux, and the three of them strode up the walk. The front door opened as they hit the steps, and closed behind them. Everybody was in the salon. Martine was peering through a tiny opening in the drapes. They grabbed up the crate.

  Madame Buffet swung the door open again. They squeezed through and she closed it.

  They hurried down the walk, trying to keep stride. Decaux merely glanced toward them once, held up his thumb for perspective, and went on sketching. Wondering what kind of collection of damned fools he’s dealing with, Colby thought, believing they could draw him away with as obvious a decoy as this. Bougie wouldn’t be in the box. But still—why the hurry?

  They set it on the tailgate and shoved. It slid on. This was where it had to be when the carload of detectives swung into the street, merely sitting there, with only Decaux knowing it had come from the house. Henri hopped up inside to help slide it back. He was out of sight of Decaux now, and facing back toward the avenue. He nodded. Voivin was coming.

  13

  The Peugeot swerved into the curb and stopped some six feet behind them. Colby and Roberto, still shoving on the box, turned at the sound. They exchanged a quick glance and assumed attitudes of studied nonchalance. The four men piled out of the car and onto the sidewalk.