Spice said chattily, “Now dey’re here, de hard part’s over an’ done. Dey jus’ need to be serviced and cased. Like to know de dispatch drill?”
Shaw stared at him.
Spice said, “Okay, so you’ll get it anyways. We have a doc comes in to service de corpses. Sometimes we embalm dem, other times we don’. Depends how dey’re makin’ de trip. Properly done up, a stiff can keep quite a while, even through de hot weader, dough for de record we do in fact embalm mos’ of dem goin’ out from here. Not always from de San Francisco depot, where de sea trip’s dat much de shorter. Sometimes dey goes out in a refrigerated cargo, like dey was beef corpses, and dat’s dead easy. Other times, dey gets crated as part of an ordinary dry cargo. Jus’ a question of air exclusion… dat’s all.” He nodded towards the row of iron doors and confirmed Shaw’s earlier thought. “Ovens,” he said briefly. “We keeps dem in a nice, dry atmosphere for a bit and den we cases dem right away in lead-sealed, vacuumatic containers. Dat way dey stays dry an’ no organisms gets at dem to make dem decompose and putrefy. Dey kind of mummifies demselves… skin goes all tight and shrivelled. Dat’s when we don’ do a proper embalmin’ job. We’ll know what’s to happen to dese two when Doc’s seen dem,” he added.
“And after that?”
Spice shrugged. “Weder or not dey’re embalmed, dese two will be crated for shipment in an ordinary dry cargo. We take dem up at night, all ready crated, and stow dem in de bonded warehouse… we have a trap dat lets us in, a trap de customs don’ know about. When we have a shipment for de East, say maybe Hong Kong, maybe somewhere in Malaysia or dereabouts — somewhere wid British connexions dat trades wid Communist China — we extract one crate after de whole consignment’s been cleared by de customs, an’ we substitute de corpse, whose crate’s been prepared wid all de right markings on. When de ship leaves, we notify our agents in de port of destination and dey takes delivery in de ordinary way. Den dey ships de corpse out again in a vessel tradin’ to de Chinese mainland.” He added, “We have a vessel berthin’ at de pier day after tomorrow… takin’ aboard a consignment of office appliances and other dry cargo, all heavy stuff, for Asian ports.”
“What puzzles me,” Shaw said, “is how you’ve got away with this to date.”
Spice laughed. “Mister, it’s not jus’ to date! We’ll go on gettin’ away with it as long as we need to. We’re very highly organized—”
“Do you run the whole show yourself?”
“No, Ah see to bringin’ in de bodies dis side of de States, along with Mr Vilera. Dere’s Whites working in de warehouse and we have genuine members of de International Longshoremen’s Association on our payroll, loadin’ de ships. Dey don’ know what goes on. If anybody looks like getting’ wise who shouldn’t — an accident happens. Overall direction, dat’s run by Hound-Tucson. Hound-Tucson are a small outfit but dey have a high reputation… de customs don’ bother all dat much most times, and when dey do, well, we have all de answers. De top brass of Hound-Tucson are all our men. Over de years we’ve infiltrated de people we wanted dere and now we run it t’rough dem, t’rough our nominees.”
“Whites?”
“Sure, Whites! Very respected Whites.” Spice laughed again. “Even McCarthy missed dem out. De Un-American Activities Commission never got a smell of dem.”
“They’re members of the Communist Party, I take it?”
“Nobody’s dat, mister — only underground, get me?”
Shaw nodded. “Quite. I get you. Watch out the police don’t.”
“Cops!” The Negro spat viciously. “Ah’m jus’ not worried, nor’s Hound-Tucson. Whites disappear, nobody finds dem. No body, no murder rap. Ain’t nobody found a body yet. Cops… why, dey’re accustomed to watching ports an’ airfields for live guys hopping de twig for one reason an’ another… not dead corpses! Dey’re under a psychological disadvantage right from de start. Dey jus’ don’ use their imaginations, don’ ever think about stiffs bein’ for export. Same when British bodies leave Britain.”
Shaw asked, “What’s the point of all this, anyway?”
“Mister,” Spice said flatly, “we’re sick to de guts of de soft approach, de non-violence preached by guys like Martin Lut’er King. Never got us nowhere, dat didn’t! We want to clean up America, get rid of bastards like Osterman that yak away ’bout Negroes not bein’ supposed to have rights. So having killed dem, we need to get rid of de bodies before dere’s any investigation started or any discoveries made. In de interval, dey’re jus’ missin’… dat’s all. Now, bodies got rid of by most odder means have a habit of turnin’ up when dey’re least expected or wanted. Even when dey’s weighted in sacks an’ chucked in de Hudson, dey can bump de shore now an’ again. But de chief point is dat in Peking dey have a high propaganda value. Since de Chinese people have seen for demselves de corpses of our rich imperialists and capitalists, an’ had deir crime sheets read out, dey’ve gotten real keen on hatin’ de West.”
“They’ve always hated the West.” This was the same argument Shaw had had with Fellowes back in London.
“Sure,” Spice said, “sure!” Suddenly the man seemed to grow cagey, as if he felt he had already said too much — though that could hardly matter now. He went on, “Now we come to you and de girl. You don’ have much longer to live, but den Ah guess you already realized dat.”
He walked across the cellar towards Flame and stood in front of her, leering at her. In a silky-smooth voice he said, “Well now, missy… you ever had any particular desires ’bout de way you’d like to die if you could choose? Cos dat’s what Ah’m offering you… a choice. Mr Vilera, he’ll be happy to oblige if you’ll let him know.”
Flame’s lips trembled. Shaw took a pace forward and snapped, “Drop that line, you bastard!”
Spice’s hand came up like a snake and took Shaw’s cheek in a head-rocking swipe. “Mr Spice to you, limey. Apologize.”
It couldn’t do any good now, but Shaw did it. Swift as light his left fist jabbed hard into Spice’s guts. The man’s gun went off and the bullet grazed Shaw’s arm and at the same instant his right smacked Spice in the mouth. Spice, however, was as tough as he looked. He kept hold of the gun and kept Shaw covered. His expression was murderous and Shaw expected the gun to be smashed into his face as two of the Negroes grabbed his arms from behind and twisted them up his back; but Spice had dreamed up something better than that. Spice drew his bloodied, split lips back in a vicious grin and said softly, “Okay, so de girl won’ specify what she wants. So Ah’ll decide for de two of you.” He gave a jerk of his head towards the corpses on the shelves behind. “You go out with dem, you and de girl. You’ll be tight-packed alive into a sealed container with Osterman and his grand-daughter… like sardines. You won’ live long, limey bastard, but by glory, dose las’ few minutes are goin’ to feel like a godalmighty long while.…”
Chapter Twelve
Spice ordered the tables down the centre of the cellar to be cleared of the paraphernalia of death — the hypodermics and the bottles. All these were put away in one of the great iron-doored ovens and a heavy padlock was snapped shut. Then Spice said, “We’re leavin’ you alone a while. Make all de racket you likes. Nobody’ll hear you, not even us. De masonry at de top of de steps is soun’proof an’ all aroun’ you is Modder Earth. It don’ conduc’ sound. When you’ve shouted all you want, simmer down an’ say your prayers.”
After that they all backed out behind the guns. There was dead silence after their footsteps had faded and a few minutes later the lights went out. One of the men must have used a master switch up in the clean fresh air. Shaw and the girl were left with the corpses and the smell of formaldehyde, in the darkness they could almost feel as it blanketed their eyes.