It was a pretty good scenario. Whether or not it was wholly accurate was up to the police to find out after I gave him to them.
But the primary question still had no answer: what was this project of Leo’s? What sort of project is big enough, important enough, to trigger a mad chain of murder and secrecy? What sort of project demands a melodramatic code name like Twospot…?
Light shimmered against the sky ahead of us, beyond the second hill from the cottages — another car approaching. The county police? But I did not hear sirens, and the light over there was yellow-white, not the red of dome flashers.
Alex sat forward tensely: he had noticed the lights too. I took the car up to the top of the hill, and from there I could see the outlines of the oncoming car behind the headlamp glare. It was not a sheriff’s cruiser; it was just a car, too far away and too indistinct to be recognizable, traveling at a good clip.
When the driver saw us the car slowed, and I slowed, and we both pulled over to opposite sides of the road and braked alongside each other. The driver was the guy I had talked to earlier, Boylan, and Mrs. Cappellani was leaning across the seat beside him. She called something to Alex with relief in her voice, and Boylan began asking questions, and Alex chattered something about Rosten. I put an end to the confusion by saying, “There’s no sense trying to talk here, follow us to Rosten’s cottage,” and then hitting the accelerator again.
In the rear-vision mirror I watched Boylan’s car swing into an abrupt U-turn and come after us. Then I gave my attention to the road until we were over the next hill and approaching the cottages. There was still no sign of the police. If Mrs. Cappellani had alerted any others besides Boylan, they were not out and around here either; all the cottages except Boylan’s were dark and the area was deserted.
I turned off the road beside Rosten’s place and cut the engine and the lights, and we got out. Boylan parked behind us. I said to Alex, “You take care of the explanations. I’m going inside.”
Without waiting for an answer or for Boylan and Rosa to come up, I left him and went to the cottage and tried the door. It was unlocked. I fumbled around on the wall inside, found a light switch, and flipped it.
As far as I could see in the pale glow of a ceiling globe the place had a living room, a bedroom, a bathroom, and a kitchenette. It was outfitted like a monk’s celclass="underline" neat, clean, with no more than five pieces of furniture in the living room and bedroom combined. On the far wall was an open rack that held rifles, a shotgun, and four handguns on wooden mounting pegs. Near the front window was a small table empty except for a portable radio and the telephone.
I made straight for the phone and looked at the row of buttons on its base. One of those buttons was depressed, the one with the numerals 116 below it. The number Dymo-labeled across the dial — Rosten’s number — was 208.
Turning, I crossed back to the doorway and stepped outside again. Alex and his mother were standing close together near my car — about as close together as they had ever been, I thought — and they were talking animatedly. Boylan was off to one side of them, looking bewildered. I caught his eye, gestured for him to come over to where I was.
When he did that I said, “The phones here — how does the intercom system work?”
He gave me a blank look. “The phones?”
“If I want to call your place from here, what do I do? Push the button with your number on it?”
“Yeah. But I don’t—”
“Whose extension number is one sixteen?”
“Mr. Cappellani’s,” Boylan said. “Leo’s. His room over at the main house…”
He was going to say something else, ask me questions, but I pivoted away from him and went back inside. All right, I was thinking, so that confirms it: it was Leo I overheard Rosten talking to. But it wasn’t hard evidence; I had no hard evidence of any kind to give the police when they came. Unless there was something here in Rosten’s effects that would point conclusively to Leo. Or something here that would give me an idea of what the Monday-noon project was.
I searched the living room first, quickly and easily because of its spartan furnishings. Nothing — no notes, no papers of any kind. Then I went into the bedroom and rummaged around in the dresser. Nothing. The only other thing in there besides the bed was a closet; I opened that up, looked through it.
And that was where I found them, in a box on the upper shelf.
Pamphlets — a dozen of them, all privately printed. Pamphlets with titles like Castro’s Rape of the World and The Cuban Octopus: Tentacles of Destruction and Fidel Castro and the Communist Conspiracy.
I stood there holding them in my hands, and the hackles began to rise on my neck. From outside, finally, I heard the first tentative wail of sirens — an eerie, unreal sound in the stillness that added to the chill forming along my back.
Castro, I thought.
The newspaper article I read last week: Castro was due to arrive in San Francisco on Monday, tomorrow, just another stop on his goodwill tour of American cities. Monday. At noon.
And Rosten had inflammatory right-wing literature in his closet. And Frank Cappellani had been a right-wing reactionary. And if Leo did not take after his mother at all, if he was his father’s son…
Twospot and the Monday-noon project.
The sirens got louder outside. I could wait for the police, but if I did that they might want full explanations before they took action, got in touch with Hastings. Time. It was after eleven now, it was almost Monday. Hastings had to be told and he had to be told immediately. If I was right — Jesus, if I was right — he had less than thirteen hours to find Leo and prevent what could turn into the most devastating political assassination since the murder of John F. Kennedy.
I threw the pamphlets back into the closet and ran out of there to the phone.
Part Four
The Police Lieutenant
19
Softly swearing, I hung up the phone and looked at the bedside clock. The time was one-twenty A.M. I sank back on my pillow, groaned, and allowed my eyes to close. For a moment I lay motionless. Beside me, Ann stirred drowsily. I heard her murmuring, then felt her drawing close to me, snuggling up.
“Have you got to go out?” Her voice was husky, sleepthickened. As she spoke, I felt her foot touch mine. Now her toes began a slow, sensuous movement up the calf of my leg. If I was weighing a decision, she was trying to tip the balance.
“Hmmm?” Her hand touched the top of my hip, moved slowly across my stomach, then up to my chest. My body was responding, rippling to a slow, erotic pulsing of desire. My genitals were tightening.
I groaned again. “That’s not fair.”
“Hmmm.” Her hand was high on my chest — and now descending.
Quickly I turned to her, kissed her hard, drew the full, warm length of her body close against mine — and pushed her away.
“You’re shameless, you know that?”
“Hmmm.” Lasciviously.
I kissed her again with firm finality, then turned to the phone and reluctantly began dialing.
“Who’re you calling?”