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of them to move. Then I saw what she was doing, and was more
scared than ever. She couldn t get away with it, not with these
people, but there was no way I could stop her. The telephone was
directly behind her. She had reached back, lifted off the receiver,
set it gently on the desk top, and was trying to dial Operator. I
picked up one of the Coke bottles. That kept their eyes on me for
another second or two. Then the dial clicked.
Bonner swung around, casually replaced the receiver, and
chopped his open right hand against the side of her face. It made a
sharp, cracking sound in the stillness, like a rifle shot, and she
spun around and sprawled on the floor in a confused welter of
skirt and slip and long bare legs. I was on him by then, swinging
the Coke bottle. It hit him a glancing blow and knocked the straw
The Sailcloth Shroud  88 
cap off. He straightened, and I swung it again. He took this one on
his forearm and smashed a fist into my stomach.
It tore the breath out of me, but I managed to stay on my feet. I
lashed out at his face with the bottle. He drew back his head just
enough to let it slide harmlessly past his jaw, grinned
contemptuously, and slipped a blackjack from his pocket. He was
an artist with it, like a good surgeon with a scalpel. Three swings
of it reduced my left arm to a numb and dangling weight; another
tore loose a flap of skin on my forehead, filling my eyes with blood.
I tried to clinch with him. He pushed me back, dropped the sap,
and slammed a short brutal right against my jaw. I fell back
against the controls of the air-conditioner unit and slid to the floor.
Patricia Reagan screamed. I brushed blood from my face and tried
to get up, and for an instant I saw the other man. He didn t even
bother to watch. He was half-sitting on the corner of the desk, idly
swinging his sunglasses by one curved frame while he looked at
some of her photographs.
I made it to my feet and hit Bonner once. That was the last time I
was in the fight. He knocked me back against the wall and I fell
again. He hauled me up and held me against it with his left while
he smashed the right into my face. It was like being pounded with
a concrete block. I felt teeth loosen. The room began to wheel
before my eyes. Just before it turned black altogether, he dropped
me. I tried to get up, and made it as far as my knees. He put his
shoe in my face and pushed. I fell back on the floor, gasping for
breath, with blood in my mouth and eyes. He looked down at me.
 That s for Tampa, sucker.
The other man tossed the photographs back on the desk and
stood up.  That ll do, he said crisply.  Put him in that chair.
Bonner hauled me across the floor by one arm and heaved me up
into one of the bamboo armchairs in the center of the room.
Somebody threw a towel that hit me in the face. I mopped at the
blood, trying not to be sick.
 All right, the other man said,  go back to the motel and get
Flowers. Then get the car out of sight. Over there in the trees
somewhere.
Patricia Reagan was sitting up. Bonner jerked his head toward
her.  What about the girl?
 She stays till we get through.
 Why? She ll just be in the way.
The Sailcloth Shroud  89 
 Use your head. Rogers has friends in Miami, and some of them
may know where he is. When he doesn t come back they may call
up here looking for him. Put her on the sofa.
Bonner jerked a thumb.  Park it, kid.
She stared at him with contempt.
He shrugged, hauled her up by one arm, and shoved. She shot
backward past the end of the coffee table and fell on the sofa
across from me. Bonner went out.
 I m sorry, I said.  It s my fault. But I thought I d lost them.
 You did, temporarily, the man put in.  But we didn t follow you
here. We were waiting for you.
I stared at him blankly.
He pulled the other chair around to the end of the coffee table
and sat down where he could watch us both. If Bonner was a
journeyman in the field of professional deadliness, this one was a
top-drawer executive. It was too evident in the crisp, incisive
manner, the stamp of intelligence on the face, and the pitiless,
unwavering stare. He could have been anywhere between forty
and fifty, and had short, wiry red hair, steel-gray eyes, and a lean
face that was coppery with fresh sunburn.
 She doesn t know anything about this, I said.
 We re aware of that, but we weren t sure you were.
When we lost you in Tampa we watched for you here among
other places.
Blood continued to drip off my face onto my shirt. I mopped at it
with the towel. My eyes were beginning to close and my whole
face felt swollen. Talking was difficult through the cut and puffy
lips. I wondered how long Bonner would be gone. At the moment I
was badly beaten, too weak and sick to get out of the chair, but
with a few minutes rest I might be able to take this one, or at least
hold him long enough for her to get away. Then, as if he d read my
thoughts, he lifted the gun from his pocket and shook his head.
 Don t move, Rogers, he said.  You re too valuable to kill, but
you wouldn t get far without a knee.
The room fell silent except for the humming of the air-
conditioner. Patricia s face was pale, but she forced herself to
reach out on the coffee table for a cigarette and light it, and look
at him without wavering.
 You can t get away with this, she said.
 Don t be stupid, Miss Reagan, he replied.  We know all about
your working habits; nobody comes out here to bother you. You
The Sailcloth Shroud  90 
won t even have any telephone calls unless it s somebody looking
for Rogers. In which case you ll say he s been here and gone.
She glared defiantly.  And if I don t?
 You will. Believe me.
 You re Slidell? I said.
He nodded.  You can call me that.
 Why were you after Reagan?
 We re still after him, he corrected.  Reagan stole a half million
dollars in bonds from me and some other men. We want it back, or
what s left of it.
 And I suppose you stole them in the first place?
He shrugged.  You might say they were a little hot. They were
negotiable, of course, but an amount that size is unwieldy; fencing
them through the usual channels would entail either a lot of time
or a large discount. I met Reagan in Las Vegas, and when I found
out what he did I sounded him out; he was just the connection we
needed. He didn t want to do it at first, but I found out he owed
money to some gamblers in Phoenix and arranged for a little
pressure. He came through then. He disposed of a hundred
thousand dollars worth for the commission we agreed on, and we
turned the rest of them over to him. I suppose she s told you what
happened?
I nodded.
He went on.  We were keeping a close watch on him, of course,
and even when he started out on the hunting trip that Saturday
morning we followed him long enough to be sure he wasn t trying
to skip out. But he was smarter than we thought. He either had
another car hidden out there somewhere, or somebody picked him
up. It took us two years to run him down, even with private
detectives watching for him in all the likely spots. He was in
Miami, but staying out of the night clubs and the big flashy places
on the Beach. It was just luck we located him at all. Somebody
spotted a picture in a hunting and fishing magazine that seemed to
resemble him, and when we ran down the photographer and had a
blowup made from the original negative, there was Reagan.
 But he beat us again. He apparently saw the picture too, and
when we got to Miami and tracked him down we found he d been [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]