The Black Mountain (16 page)

You couldn’t be more impertinent than to march into my office and announce you had no papers. What do you propose'

That you send Zov to America for a while. He could either go with us or come to us after he arrives, and we would see to his needs and his safety. It offers several advantages: it would remove him temporarily from peril here, if there is any, it would give us someone in America who is familiar with conditions here,

to advise us; it would give you an agent there whom you trust, to report on us and our associates; and it would give me a messenger I could rely on if I had something confidential or valuable to send to you. Wolfe flipped a hand. Of course, for some reason unknown to me, it may be quite impractical.

Stritar and Zov had exchanged not one glance, but several. Stritar said, It is worth considering. It may not be entirely impractical.

I thought it might not be, Wolfe said, since Zov returned only recently from a trip to America. That was what suggested it to me. I even thought it possible you might have another mission for him there. If so, he might need help, and what we did today, especially my son, may have demonstrated that we could be capable of supplying it.

Stritar looked at Zov. Then he studied Wolfe. Then he transferred to me. I was aware, from tones and expressions and the atmosphere, that we were at a crisis,

but I didn’t know what kind, so all I could do was meet his eyes and look loyal and confident and absolutely intrepid. After he had analyzed me clear through to my spine he returned to Wolfe.

Did you ever, he asked, hear of a man named Nero Wolfe'I claim a medal for handling not only my face but all my nerves and muscles. His pronunciation was fuzzy, but not too fuzzy for me to get it. I knew they were at a crisis, and suddenly that bozo snaps out the name Nero Wolfe. How I kept my hand from starting for my holster I don’t know. Wolfe showed no sign of panic, but that was no help. He wouldn’t panic if you paid him.

Of course, he said. If you mean the well-known detective in New York.

Everyone in America has heard of him.

Do you know him'

I haven’t met him, no. I know a man who has. He says I look like him, but I’ve seen a picture of him, and the only resemblance is that we’re both big and fat.

Did you know a man named Marko Vukcic'

No, but I heard his name today, as I told you, when Shuvalov was speaking to Zov. Was he any relation to Danilo Vukcic'

His uncle. He owned a de luxe restaurant. This detective, Nero Wolfe, was his friend, and there is reason to believe that he intends to take Vukcic’s place and send money and other help to the Spirit of the Black Mountain. In large amounts.

Wolfe grunted. Then it did no good to kill Vukcic.

I don’t agree. We couldn’t know that a friend of his would take over so promptly and effectively. But he has. I got the news only today.

And now you propose to kill Nero Wolfe.

Stritar snapped, I didn’t say so.

No, but you might as well. I haven’t got a quick mind, but it didn’t have to be quick for that. I suggested that you might have another mission for Zov in America, and you asked me if I had ever heard of this Nero Wolfe. That’s just adding two and two, or rather one and one. So you propose to kill him.

What if I do'

It may be necessary. I don’t know.

You told Zov that you disapprove of torture but that violence is often unavoidable, as it was on his mission to New York.

That’s true. I meant that. But I don’t think a man should be killed merely on suspicion. Have you any evidence that this Nero Wolfe will really help your enemies as Vukcic did'

I have. Stritar opened a drawer of his desk and took out a paper. Day before yesterday a man in Bari received a telegram from Nero Wolfe which read as follows: ‘Inform proper persons across Adriatic I am handling Vukcic’s affairs and assuming obligations. Two hundred thousand dollars available soon. Will send agent conference Bari next month.’ Stritar put the paper back and shut the drawer. Is that evidence'

It sounds like it. Who is the man in Bari that got the telegram'

That’s not important. You want to know too much.

I don’t think so. Comrade Stritar - if I am to call you Comrade. If I am to trust you on vital matters, as I am prepared to do, you will trust me to some extent. My son and I will have to go through Bari on our way back, to get our papers and effects, and we might possibly encounter him. His name'

Stritar shrugged his bulging shoulders. Paolo Telesio.

Wolfe’s eyes widened. What'

Stritar stared. What’s the matter'

Enough. Wolfe was grim. Paolo Telesio has our papers and belongings. We left them in his care. A man in Philadelphia gave me his name, as one trustworthy and capable, who would arrange for getting us across the Adriatic. And he serves the Spirit of the Black - No, wait! After all, you have that telegram. He shook his head. No, it is just as well we’re going back. Here it’s impossible to tell who you’re dealing with. My brain is not equipped for it.

Not many brains are, Stritar declared. Don’t make any assumptions about Telesio. I didn’t say he sent me the telegram. You are not to tell him I have seen it. You understand that'

Certainly. We’re not a pair of fools, though yesterday you called us that. Do you still think so'

I think it is possible I was wrong. I agree with you that you can do more good in America than you can here. It is in your favor that you are inclined to be skeptical, as for instance about Nero Wolfe. You asked for evidence that he intends to send major assistance to our subversive underground, and I furnished it. I regard it as conclusive. Do you'

Wolfe hesitated. Conclusive is a strong word. But I - yes. I will say yes.

Then he must be dealt with. Will you help'

That depends. If you mean will I or my son engage to kill him, no. Killing a man in America is not the same as killing a man here. Circumstances may develop that would lead us to undertake it, but I wont commit myself, and neither will he I didn’t ask you to. I asked if you will help when Peter Zov will need it. The Preparations and arrangements will have to be made for him, and provisions for his return afterward. You say Philadelphia is ninety miles from New York -

that’s a hundred and fifty kilometers - and that is well, for New York would be dangerous for him. Thats the kind of help he’ll need. Will you give him that?.

Wolfe considered. Theres a difficulty. No matter how well its aranged, it is conceivable that Zov will bulge. If he is under pressure he might blab on us You saw him under Pressure today. Will the American police use stronger pressure than that'

No. Wolfe looked at me Alex, it is suggested that Comrad Zov shall go to America, and we shall care for his necessities and also help him with the preparations to kill a man named Nero Wolfe. I am willing to undertake it if you are. I looked serious. I would have given eight thousand cents to be able to reply that I had been wanting to kill a man named Nero Wolfe for years, but I wasnt sure that Stritar and Zov understood English. I had to skip it. I said earnestly, I am willing, Father, to help with anything you approve of. He looked at Stritar. My son says he is willing. We want to leave here as soon as possible. Can you get us to Bari tonight'

Yes. But Zov will have to go by another route. Stritar looked at his watch.

There is much to arrange. He raised his voice to call, Jin!

The door opened, and one of the clerks came in. Stritar spoke to him. Find Trumbic and Levstik and get them here. I’ll be busy for an hour or more. No interruptions unless it’s urgent.

Zov had his Luger out, rubbing it with his palm.

We got arrested for having no papers after all, and it damn near boiled everything. Not in Montenegro. Stritar took no chances on our changing our minds and deciding to go to Belgrade, where we would probably mention the eight thousand dollars and the promise of more to come. He fed us there in his office,

on meat and cheese and bread and raisins that he had brought in, and a little after dark took us down to the street himself and put us in a 1953 Ford, a different color from Jube Bilic’s. Our destination was Budva, a coast village which Wolfe said was five miles north of the spot where we had been landed by Guido Battista two nights before. During the hour and a half that it took to cover the thirty miles, the driver had no more than a dozen words for Wolfe, and none at all for me. As he delivered us at the edge of a slip and exchanged noises with a man waiting there, it started to rain. It rained all the way across the Adriatic, but the boat was a few centuries newer than Guide’s, with a cabin where I could lie down. Wolfe tried it too, but the bench was so narrow he had to grip a bracket to keep from rolling off, and finally he gave up and stretched out on the floor. The boat, with a crew of two besides the skipper,

was fast, noisy, was rated 500 v.p.m., which means vibrations per minute, and was a steeplechaser. It loved to jump waves. No wonder it beat Guide’s time by nearly three hours. It was still raining, and dark as pitch, when it anchored in choppy water and we were herded into a dinghy some bigger than Guide’s. The skipper rowed us into the wall of night until he hit bottom, dumped us on the beach, shoved the nose of the dinghy off, hopped in, and was gone. Wolfe called to him,

Confound it, where are we'

He called back, Where you’re supposed to be!

The genial sonofabitch, I remarked. With the sweaters draped over our heads,

and flashlights, we headed inland. A road going to Molfetta, a fishing village two miles away if we had been landed in the right place, was supposed to be only two hundred yards from the shore, and we found it, turned left, and trudged along in the rain. It was 3:28 A.M. when we hit the road. I was thinking that when we got to the stucco house in Bari I would have Wolfe translate the directions on the water heater in the bathroom. We made it to Molfetta, knocked at the door of a white house with trees in front, and Wolfe spoke through a crack to the man who unlocked it, and handed him a slip of paper. He was about as genial as the skipper had been, but he agreed to drive us to Bari,

twenty-five kilometers down the coast, for five thousand lire. We weren’t invited in out of the rain. We waited under a tree, a European species called a dripping tree, while he put on some clothes, and when he appeared on the driveway in a little Fiat we climbed in the back and sat on wet fannies and were off. I took my mind off the wet by thinking. Wolfe had reported in full on the boat. There were some aspects that seemed to me a little sour, such as donating the eight grand to that character, but I had to admit he was justified in making his proposal as tempting to Stritar as he possibly could. The only bad flaw was that we didn’t have Zov, and no guarantee that we would get him again. He was to sneak into Italy at Gorizia, as he had before, I don’t know how often, and meet us at Genoa. Wolfe explained that even if Stritar had been willing to send him with us through Bari, having him along would have made matters very difficult. I was going over it when suddenly the car stopped, the left front door opened, and a beam of light focused on the driver. A man in a raincoat was there. He asked the driver some questions and got answered, and then opened the rear door, aimed the light at us, and spoke. Wolfe replied. It developed into quite a chat, with the man insisting on something and Wolfe insisting back. Finally the man shut the door, circled around the hood to the right front door, got in beside the driver, spoke to him, and twisted in the seat to face us. His hand, resting on the back of the seat, had a gun in it. I asked Wolfe,

Am I supposed to do something'

No. He wanted to see our papers.

Where are we going'

Jail.

But my God, aren’t we in Bari'

Entering it, yes.

Then tell him to take us to that house and we’ll show him the damn papers.

No. At the risk of having it get across the Adriatic tomorrow that I am here'

Impossible.

What did you tell him'

That I wish to see the American consul. Naturally he refuses to disturb him at this hour. I am thinking of starting a movement to push for a law requiring two consuls in every city, a day consul and a night consul, and you would join it if you had ever spent a night, or part of one, in the hoosegow at Bari.

We were questioned - or Wolfe was - first by a handsome baritone in a slick uniform and then by a fat animal in a soiled seersucker. Our guns and knives didn’t make them any more cordial. Then we were locked in a cell with two cots which were already occupied by fifty thousand others. Twenty thousand of the others were fleas, and another twenty thousand were bedbugs, but I never found out what the other ten thousand were. After a night in a haystack and one in a deep-freeze cave, it would have been reasonable to suppose that anything different would be an improvement, but it wasn’t. I got a lot of walking done,

back and forth the full length of the cell, a good ten feet, being careful not to step on Wolfe, who was sitting on the concrete floor. All I will say about the breakfast is that we didn’t eat it. The chocolate, what was left of it, was in the knapsacks, and they had been taken. Another section of that law will provide that day consuls will get to work at eight o’clock. It was after ten when the door of the cell opened and a man appeared and said something. Wolfe told me to come, and we were conducted down a corridor and some stairs and into a sunny room where two men sat talking. One of them spoke, and then the other, a lanky, tired-looking specimen with ears as big as saucers, said in American,

I’m Thomas Arnold, the American consul. I’m told you want to see me.

I have to see you - Wolfe glanced at the other man - in private.

This is Signor Angelo Bizzaro, the warden.

Thank you. All the same, privacy is essential. We are not armed.

I’m told that you were. Arnold turned and spoke to the warden, and after a little exchange Bizzaro got up and left the room. Now what is it'Arnold demanded. Are you American citizens'

We are. The quickest way to dispose of this, Mr. Arnold, would be for you to telephone the embassy in Rome and ask for Mr. Richard Courtney.

Not until you tell me who you are and why you were out on the road at night,

armed, with no papers.

You’ll have to know who we are, of course, Wolfe agreed. And so will the police, but I hope through you to arrange that our presence here will not be published. I thought a talk with Mr. Courtney would help, but it’s not essential. My name is Nero Wolfe. I am a licensed private detective with an office in New York. This is my assistant, Archie Goodwin.

The consul was smiling. I don’t believe it.

Then telephone Mr. Courtney. Or, perhaps better, do you know a man in Bari, a broker and agent, named Paolo Telesio'

Yes. I’ve met him.

If you’ll phone him and let me speak to him, he’ll bring our passports,

properly stamped at Rome when we arrived there on Sunday, four days ago. Also he’ll identify us.

I’ll be damned. You are Nero Wolfe'

I am.

Why the hell were you wandering around at night with guns and knives and no papers'

That was indiscreet but necessary. We are here on an important and confidential matter, and our presence must not be known.

I thought he was doing fine. His asking Arnold to phone the embassy would make the consul suspect that we were on a secret job for the State Department, and if he phoned and Courtney told him we weren’t that would only make him think the job was supersecret. He didn’t get the embassy, at least not from there. He got Telesio, let Wolfe talk to him, and then sat and chewed the fat with us until Telesio arrived with the passports. Wolfe had pressed it on him that as few people as possible should know we were there, so he didn’t tell even the warden our names. He made another phone call, and another signor came, who looked and acted more important than a warden, and he looked at our passports and made it legal for us to breathe. When we left with Telesio they shook hands with us,

perfectly friendly, but I noticed they avoided any close contact, which was understandable. They knew where we had been for five hours, that we hadn’t been alone, and that some of our companions were leaving with us. Telesio knew it too. When he stopped the car in the courtyard of the stuccoed house, and we got out and followed the path to the door, he spoke to Wolfe and Wolfe turned to me.

We’ll undress in the hall and throw these things outdoors. We did so. Telesio brought a chair for Wolfe, but I said I didn’t need one. Our first donning of those duds was in that house, and so was our first doffing. I won’t go into detail except for Wolfe’s shoes and socks. He was afraid to take them off. When he finally set his jaw and pitched in, he gazed at his feet in astonishment. I think he had expected to see nothing but a shapeless mass of raw red flesh, and it wasn’t bad at all, only a couple of heel blisters and a rosy glow, and the toes ridged and twisted some.

They’ll be back to normal in a year easy, I told him. I didn’t have to ask him for help with the water heater because Telesio had already gone up and turned it on. Two hours later, at a quarter past one, we were in the kitchen with Telesio,

eating mushroom soup and spaghetti and cheese, and drinking wine, clean and dressed and sleepy. Wolfe had phoned to Rome and had an appointment with Richard Courtney at the embassy at five o’clock. Telesio had arranged for a plane to be ready for us at the Bari airport at two-thirty. I never asked Wolfe for a full report of his conversation with Telesio that day, and probably wouldn’t have got it if I had, but I did want to know about two points, and he told me. First,

what did Telesio think of letting Stritar cop the eight grand'He had thought it was unnecessary, immoral, and outrageous. Second, what did Telesio think of what Wolfe had said to Stritar about Danilo Vukcic'Did he agree with me that Wolfe may have put Danilo on a spot'No. He said Danilo was a very smooth customer,

and for three years Stritar had been trying to decide whether he was coming or going, and in what direction, and nothing Wolfe had said would hurt him any.

That relieved my mind. I had hated to think that we might have helped to deprive Meta of her provider of flour to make bread with. I was telling Fritz only yesterday he should go to a certain address in Titograd and learn how to make bread. There had been a three-way argument in two languages, which made it complicated. Wolfe’s initials were not on his bag, but they were on his made-to-order shirts and pajamas. How much of a risk was there that Zov would snoop around and see them, and get suspicious, and also maybe get a bright idea'

Wolfe thought it was slight, but we ganged up on him and he gave in. The shirts and pajamas were left behind, to be shipped by Telesio, and Telesio went out and bought replacements, which were pretty classy but not big enough. My bag had my initials on it, but we agreed that AG wasn’t as risky as NW - that is, they agreed, and I said I did, not caring to start another argument. Telesio drove us to the airport in the Fiat, which still didn’t have a dent, though he hadn’t changed his attitude on obstructions. There were more people and activity at the airport than there had been on Palm Sunday, but apparently word had been passed along by the signer who had legalized us, for Telesio merely popped into a room with our passports and popped right out again, and took us out to a plane that was waiting on the apron. With tears in his eyes - which didn’t mean he was suffering, because I had noticed that they came when he laughed - he kissed Wolfe on both cheeks and me on one, and stood and watched us take off. Since on our way in we hadn’t left the airport, I couldn’t say I had been in Rome, but now I can. A taxi took us through the city to the American embassy, and later another one took us back to the airport, so I know Rome like a book. It has a population of 1,695,4773 and has many fine old buildings. When we entered one of the buildings, the embassy, we were ten minutes early for our appointment, but we didn’t have to wait. A young woman who was fair enough at the moment but would have two chins in a few years if she didn’t take steps was obviously interested in us, which was natural, since Wolfe declined to give our names,

saying only that we were expected by Mr. Courtney, and she had been briefed, for after a quick survey trying to guess whether we were CIA or just a couple of congressmen trying to be cagey, she used a phone, and before long Richard Courtney appeared, greeted us diplomatically without pronouncing names, and escorted us within, to a little room halfway down a long, wide corridor. Three chairs were about all it had room for without crowding. He invited us to take two of them and went to the third, which was behind a desk stacked with papers.

He eyed us. Superficially he was still a distinguished-looking college boy, but a lot more reserved than four days earlier. From the way he looked at us, he wasn’t exactly suspicious, but he intended to find out whether he ought to be.

You said on the phone, he told Wolfe, that you wanted to ask a favor.

Two favors, Wolfe corrected him. One was to let us get to you without mention of names.

That has been done. I’ve mentioned your name, since you phoned, only to Mr.

Teague, the Secretary. What’s the other one'

I’ll make it as brief as possible. Mr. Goodwin and I came to Italy on an important and confidential matter, a private matter. During our stay on Italian soil we have violated no law and committed no offense, except the minor one of being abroad without our papers. Our errand is satisfactorily completed and we’re ready to go home, but there is a small difficulty. We wish to sail tomorrow from Genoa on the Basilia, but incognito. The success of our errand will be compromised if it is known that we are sailing on the ship. From Bari I telephoned the Rome office of the steamship company and was able to reserve a double cabin in the names of Carl Gunther and Alex Gunther. I want to go there now and get the tickets. I ask you to telephone them and tell them it’s all right to let me have them.