"So am I," Nick murmured.
He finished his meal and lit a small dear, fumbling in his pants pocket for the lighter. You couldn't say they didn't ask for it. He felt satisfaction at going over to the attack, and then reproved himself. A Killmaster must control his emotions, especially his ego. He must for about that surprise plop from the garage roof, about being trussed like a captured animal.
When he put the lighter away he removed the two oval, egglike containers from the pocket of his shorts. He was careful not to mistake them for the pellets on the left that contained explosives.
He studied the room. It was air-conditioned; the patio and hall doors had been slid shut. The servants had just gone through the swinging doors to the kitchen. It was a big room, but Stuart had designed big-expansion into the knock-out gas compressed under very high pressure. He felt the small toggles and turned them off safety. He said loudly, "Well — if we have to stay we'll make the best of it, I suppose. Can we..."
His voice did not cover the loud, double poof-poof and hiss as the two gas bombs released their loads.
"What was that?" van Prez roared and half-stood at the table.
Nick held his breath and began to count.
"I don't know." Maxwell replied from across the table and pushed back his chair. "Sounded like a small explosion. Somewhere on the floor?"
Van Prez bent down, gasped, and slowly collapsed like an oak run through by a chain saw.
"Pieter! What's the matter?" Maxwell started around the table, wobbled, and went down. Mrs. Ryerson's head tilted back as if she napped.
Booty's head fell forward into the remains of her salad. Howe choked, swore, thrust a hand inside his jacket, and then fell backward in his chair, looking like an unconscious, seated Napoleon. Tembo, three seats away, managed to reach Pieter. It was the worst direction he could have taken. He went to sleep like a tired baby.
John Johnson was the problem. He did not know what had happened but he got up and moved away from the table, sniffing suspiciously. The two dogs, which had been left outside, knew intuitively that something was wrong with their master. They hit the glass partition with a double crash, barking, their giant jaws red caverns rimmed with white teeth. The glass was strong — it held.
Johnson put a hand to his hip. Nick picked up his plate and scaled it accurately into the man s throat.
Johnson staggered back, his face calm and without hate, serenity in black. The hand he had at his hip suddenly dangled forward on the end of an arm gone leaden and powerless. He took a gasping breath, tried to control himself, determination clear in the helpless eyes. Nick picked up van Prez's plate and balanced it like a discus. The man didn't give up easily. Johnson's eyes closed and he fell.
Nick put van Prez's plate neatly back where it came from. He was still counting — one-hundred-and-twenty-one, one-hundred-and-twenty-two. He felt no need to breathe. One of his better skills was holding his breath; he could almost reach the unofficial record.
He plucked a small blue Spanish revolver from Johnson's pocket, took an assortment of guns from the unconscious van Prez, Howe. Maxwell, and Tembo. He retrieved Wilhelmina from Maxwell's belt and to make things look right, searched both Booty's and Mrs. Ryerson's handbags. Neither held a weapon.
Trotting to the double doors that opened on the butler's pantry, he slammed them open. The generous-size room, with an astonishing number of wall cabinets and three built-in sinks, was empty. He ran through tie room into the kitchen. Across the room the screen door slammed shut The man and woman who had served them were running across the service yard. Nick closed and latched the door to prevent the dogs getting in.
Fresh, oddly scented air blew softly through the screen. Nick let out his breath and emptied and filled his lungs. He wondered if they had a spice garden near the kitchen. The running Negroes vanished from sight.
The big house was suddenly silent. The only sounds were the distant cheeureep of a bird and the soft burble of water in the teakettle on the stove.
In a storage room off the kitchen Nick found a fifty-foot hank of nylon clothesline. He returned to the dining room. The men and women lay where they had fallen, looking sadly helpless. Only Johnson and Tembo showed signs of returning consciousness. Johnson was muttering unintelligible words. Tembo swayed his head very slowly from side to side.
Nick tied them up first, throwing clove hitches secured by square knots on their wrists and ankles. He did it almost without looking, like an old-time bosun's mate.
Chapter Five
Securing the others took only minutes. He tied Howe's and Maxwell's ankles — they were earnest chaps and wouldn't be above a foot attack with their hands tied — but fastened only van Prez's hands and left Booty and Mrs. Ryerson free. He collected the guns on the buffet table and unloaded them all, dropping the cartridge into a bowl greasy with the remains of a green salad.
Reflectively he swished the shells around in the goo and then put the bowl with some others and spooned salad into it from another one.
Then he took a clean plate, selected two thick slices of roast beef and a scoop of spiced beans and took the seat he had occupied for lunch.
Johnson and Tembo came to first. The dogs sat outside the glass partition, watching alertly, their hackles up. Johnson said thickly, "Damn... you... Grant. You'll... wish... you... never came to... our land."
"Your land?" Nick paused with a forkful of beef.
"My people's land. We'll get it back and we'll hang bastards like you. What are you interfering for? You honkies think you can run the world! We'll show you! We're doing it now and well do more..."
His tones went up and up the scale. Nick said sharply, "Shut up and get back in your chair if you can. I'm eating."
Johnson hitched himself around, struggled to his feet, and hopped back to his seat. Tembo, seeing the demonstration, said nothing but did the same. Nick reminded himself not to let Tembo get near him with a weapon.
By the time Nick had cleaned his plate and poured himself another cup of tea from the pot on the buffet table, snugly warm in its knitted woolen cozy, the others had followed the example of Johnson and Tembo. They said nothing, just glared at him. He wanted to feel victorious and avenged — instead he felt like the skeleton at the feast.
Van Prez's look was a blend of anger and disappointment that made him feel almost sorry for gaining the upper hand — as if he had done wrong. He had to break the silence himself. "Miss DeLong and I will be going back to Salisbury now. Unless you'd like to tell me more about your — er, program. And I'd appreciate any information you'd like to add about the Taylor-Hill-Boreman outfit."
"I'm not going anywhere with you, you beast!" Booty yelped.
"Now, now, Booty," van Prez said, his voice surprisingly soft. "Mr. Grant has the situation under his command. It would look worse if he returned without you. Do you plan to turn us in. Grant?"
"Turn you in? To whom? Why? We've had a little fun. I've learned a few things, but I'm not going to tell anyone about them. In fact I've forgotten all your names. Sounds silly, my memory is usually excellent. No — I walked into your ranch, found nothing except Miss DeLong, and we returned to town. How does that sound?"
"Spoken like a Highlander," van Prez said thoughtfully. "About Taylor-Hill. They made a pegging. Perhaps the greatest in the country. They're selling fast — but that you know. To everybody. And my advice still goes. Stay away from them. They have the political connections and the force. They'll scrag you if you go against them."
"How about both of us going against them?"
"We have no reason to."