19 - The Power Cube Affair (7 page)

She took the wheel again for the delicate business of threading a way through the seaside town's busy streets, rolled to a halt in a parking area alongside the customs shed, and asked the two men to wait a moment while she made herself known to the authorities.

"Can't make her out," Solo confessed, scratching his head in the sunshine. "I've run into some fancy lines in my time, but hers has me beat. In any case, a dame with her assets doesn't need a come on line, doesn't need to do this kind of job at all."

"Hmm?" Kuryakin was only half-listening; his attention was caught by a magnificent black Rolls that was parked not far from them. "Why is she involved? Ask yourself, Napoleon, with her looks and talents and money—kicks must be pretty hard to come by."

"Talent?"

"She dances like a professional, as you know. She is a highly competent nurse. She drives extremely well. She is very handy with those pop guns of hers. And she puts up a firstclass impersonation of being one of the idle rich. I would call those talents. There is much more to Miss Perrell than meets the eye."

"You had me worried for a moment there, Illya. You do notice the 'meets the eye' parts, then?"

"Strategic arrangement of adipose tissue can create quite an effective diversion, and she knows it. There she is now!"

Miss Perrell came to stand in the doorway where she had disappeared and waved them to join her. She led them away and into another door, the customs shed.

"They say," Kuryakin murmured, as they took up a position to one side and away from the check point, "that customs men develop an instinct, which is just another way of saying they are good guessers. But you have a detailed description of the smugglers, Miss Perrell?"

"That's right. Want to match your intuition against the facts?"

"All right," Solo agreed readily. "See if we can spot 'em." He bent his gaze on the thin straggle of people now coming up the ramp into the shed. Which? That stout and harassed man with the small boy? The elderly dragon with her subdued companion? This newly rich couple with two doll-like little girls? Or that brisk and black suited businessman with his briefcase? Surely not that sloppy young couple so badly in need of discipline about their actions, faces and grooming? Which?

Then came a group to delight his eye. First a small, bustling, pattering woman, as lively as a hummingbird and almost as gaudy. She was twenty years older than beauty but could have been attractive if someone had persuaded her out of the shrieking green of her shapeless dress and a staring orange hair rinse. Piling poor taste on criminal error, she wore a string of enormous red stones about her neck. Genuine rubies that size, he mused, would be worth quite a packet. Striding at her heels came an obvious chauffeur. In his wake came a neutral martyr of a woman all in black, a "companion," with all the grace and dignity her mistress lacked, and devoting immense care to a double armful of smaller boxes. Next in the line was a truly exquisite male, groomed to perfection, his black hair gleaming, a pencil slim moustache arched over a straining mouth as he struggled with large suitcases.

Then, dawdling along at the end of the line, came the mother's daughter, a girl of no more than twenty, the likeness to the gaudy dame unmistakable but enhanced by the full blush of insolent youth. For all her boredom, the only adjective appropriate for her was "luscious." Solo stared, felt warm all over, and stared more, absorbing her from red gold mane to tiny toes. The in between of her was draped in a dress as brief as Miss Perrell's but paper white and pin pleated from neck to hem. He drew a deep and careful breath and reflected that he was looking at an unexploded bomb. Illya could say what he liked, but that was no camouflage. That was the real thing. The idea started another one. He whispered an aside to Miss Perrell.

"You were talking about dazzle to distract the eye," he reminded her. "On that basis, there are your smugglers."

"You couldn't be more wrong if you tried," she retorted, then put up a hand to pat her hair and make a covert gesture of pointing. Solo frowned as he saw the officials brisk up, dismiss the musical comedy group with a wave and then close in on two people he would never have given a second look. That red faced beery man and the skinny drab women with the lines of age and the mouth of a nagging drudge—were smugglers? Miss Perrell made a move, and they followed her outside into the sunshine.

"Fancy picking on Maggie!" she chuckled.

"Maggie?"

"Margaret, Lady Herriott, Countess of Danby, and entourage. Brinkley, her chauffeur. Maid companion Augustine. Secretary—and thinly disguised gigolo—Monty Hagen. Daughter Evadne. Like to meet them? It will be an education for you." She marched them across to where the eccentric group had gathered around the shiny black Rolls and greeted them as old friends.

"Hello, Maggie. Vad. You look disgustingly healthy and brown, the pair of you. Meet a couple of friends of mine. This is Napoleon, and this one's Illya."

The luscious red head opened her emerald green eyes wide on the two men, her boredom fading away as she took them in. "Very healthy," she murmured, to no one in particular. "Very nice." She drifted close, gazing up. Lady Herriott ran around in a small circle and came back to her starting spot, sighed and complained.

"Isn't it hot? Hot everywhere. You know, we decided to have three days on the Isle of Levant. You know, where everyone goes nude. But it was just as hot there." She shook her head as if puzzled by that, then beamed at Miss Perrell. "You're looking as delicious as ever, Nan. I don't know how you do it.?' Turning aimlessly she brushed her daughter gently aside and took Solo's hand as if seeking stability in an uncertain world. "There—I've forgotten your name already!"

"You try to do too much," Miss Perrell put in. "You really ought to take life a little easier, you know."

"Oh, but I like to do whatever I can while I can. So long as it's legal, of course."

"That's very commendable," Solo murmured. "Rather unfashionable, too, these days."

"Isn't it dreadful?" she agreed. "I mean, once the law goes where are you? What I say is, keep to the law and you need never worry about being virtuous. That will take care of itself." She patted his hand approvingly and trotted away to supervise baggage loading operations. Evadne surged in close again, seemed to trip and would have fallen had it not been for Kuryakin's quick and strong arm.

"My!" she breathed, leaning on him and almost purring. "You're very strong, aren't you?"

"Strong enough. You didn't like Levant then?"

"Dull! Unutterably tedious. I mean, everybody looks the same in the raw, don't they? There's no scope left. I'd rather have a good old orgy any time."

"An orgy?" Kuryakin repeated, raising his brows at Solo. Lady Herriott came trotting back in time to hear his words and smiled.

"We have marvelous orgies regularly. Only for the right people, of course." Her smile gave way to a calculating stare as she eyed Solo and then Kuryakin. "Of course, if you're friends of Nan, you're bound to be all right. Are they, Nan?"

"I really don't know." Miss Perrell seemed to be struggling with inner amusement, probably at the expression on Kuryakin's face. "I can find out and let you know. Will that do?"

"Splendid! Tomorrow night, then? And why don't you come along too, just for once?"

"You'll never persuade Nan," Evadne exclaimed, with edges on her voice. "She has her own diversions. But you'll come, won't you, both of you? Please?"

Solo shrugged, not knowing what it was all about, and looked to Miss Perrell for a lead. She had a gleam in her eye.

"I'll see about it. I may bring them myself, yet. I'll let you know what I decide."

As the gleaming Rolls crackled away over gravel and then into the road, Solo turned to her. "What was all that about an orgy?"

"I'll tell you in a minute, soon's I see what kind of fish I've caught. Get in the car, I'll be back in a minute." She went away swiftly.

"What d'you think, Illya?"

"I think it's time we got out from under, Napoleon. We have things to do more important than attending society gambols."

Miss Perrell returned to the ear, slid in behind the wheel, and started up the engine, but there was a faraway look in her eyes as she said:

"Guard's place is along the coast road on the way to Hythe, isn't it?"

"Right," Solo told her. Then, after they had been rolling awhile, "What's on your mind?"

"Am I that obvious?" She laughed harshly and flicked a glance at the two men by her side. "All right, try this on your experienced minds. I have just caught two hundred thousand pounds' worth of heroin and assorted hard drugs, on a tipoff. Good, yes? But wait a bit. That's the eleventh tipoff in two years. Always accurate, always the same type of people, and always the same story. That couple will go through the mill, and the answer will be—nil! No leads, commercial connections, contacts, distribution network, nothing! It's crazy. They will swear they don't know a thing."

"Maybe the stuff has been planted on them for some body else to grab?"

"We've thought of that. We've had other people shadowed, followed. Same answer. Nothing. Somebody has just lost two hundred thousand pounds' worth of dope, and we have no idea who, nor where it was going. Mad!"

"Always on that same boat?" Kuryakin demanded, and she frowned.

"Now you come to mention it, yes. But that's just a coincidence, I'm sure. Maggie travels on the Continent regularly, for her charity work."

"Charity?" Solo demanded. "Pardon me, but the countess struck me as being far removed from anything as real as that."

"She's real enough." Miss Perrell began to grin. "I've known her for years, and she is absolutely genuine. Charity!" She laughed softly to herself, and Solo realized all over again just how attractive she could be.

"Let us in on the joke," he said.

"All right, Maggie––she used to be Margaret Wallace, daughter of a fairly well off family, bitten with the stage bug very early, had something of a career, then married Danby—all strictly story book stuff up to that point. But she was also bitten by the goodwill bug after seeing the seamier side of life. And she is, as she said, completely without any sense of propriety. For Maggie, so long as there's no law against it, it goes. She hit on her orgy notion, oh, a long time ago now. And they are orgies, literally. Bacchanalia in the Nero Roman style. Once a month at Danby Hall, and no holds barred. Everything goes. Everything!"

"But isn't that breaking half a dozen laws?"

"No, Illya, not at all. Maggie is very careful who she picks. Only the best people. Rich people. People with status, reputation, fame and renown. Quite clever people, too, mostly."

"How does that make it legal?"

"It doesn't, in itself, but so long as the affair takes place on private property, and the people are there by invitation only, and no one complains, the law cannot intervene. The only other way anyone can interfere is by moral protest, and there would be plenty to do that, but their guns are very neatly spiked. Because, you see, she really is operating a charity. Every guest is expected to contribute a substantial sum—and they all do—which then goes to famine relief. And it does, every last penny. That has been checked a score of times, and it is quite genuine."

"Very neat," Solo approved.

"It is. You see, the 'holier than thou' brigade can't say a word. And, so I'm told, everybody has enormous fun. Including Maggie herself. When you come to think of it, the kind of people she invites seldom have such an opportunity to let their hair down and relax."

"You're speaking from hearsay," Kuryakin pointed out. "You've never been to one of these Roman scandals?"

"I have other things to do." She snapped the words off sharp, then. "What did you think of her rubies?"

"Those hideous red beads were rubies?"

"They were," Miss Perrell said carefully, "either the genuine Danby rubies, which are something like five hundred years old and famous, even if they are hideous—or a replica—or a replica."

"Why the echo?" Kuryakin wondered, and she laughed again.

"Because, as you saw, Maggie has no taste at all, no color sense, but she adores those rubies. And they are immensely valuable, as antiques. And she likes to wear them whenever possible. So a long time ago now, she had them copied, twice, so perfectly that even she can't tell the real from the copy. At least, that's the story. And she switches them at random. So, if you were a jewel thief, would you care to try to snatch them, in those circumstances?"

"She sounds quite a girl," Solo chuckled. "That orgy might be fun after all." Before she could comment, he put a hand on her wrist. "Johnny's place is just around the next corner, left hand side."

As the car slowed to a stop, Solo got an idea. "Look," he suggested, "it's still a mess in there. You drop Illya and me here, while you go on to the hospital, see Guard and tell him how things are moving. By the time you get back we'll have the place tidy enough for visitors, maybe a meal if we can find the ingredients for it. You can find this place easily enough on the way back."

They watched the car glide away then went indoors to dried blood and silence, to find mops and buckets, to use hot water and muscle and clean the place up fit to be seen. And all the while a strange idea circulated in Solo's mind. Stones. Here the beach was full of them. Some on the window ledge. Red stones in a necklace. And the crystal jewels the greasy voiced man had spoken of, on that tape, were stones too. Solo felt certain of that. But why the "seventh stone"?

SIX

MISS PERRELL came back with a strange glow in her eye. "I saw him, talked to him," she told them. "The doctor was very kind and understanding, spoke to me privately after wards. Apparently Mr. Guard will be on his feet again in a week, would be up and about now if they would let him. He really is a fantastic man. So quiet and gentle, and yet you get the impression he would charge straight through a brick wall if it got in his way. He said he wished he had been there when you had your little mixup with the thugs,"