Pitt could have kissed her. Tidi had picked up the situation without the bat of an eye and come through like a trooper.
"I think it's time we mingled,"' he said, taking her by the arm and whisking her off toward the punch bowl.
He passed her a cup of punch and they helped themselves to the hors d'oeuvres. Pitt had to fight from yawning as he and Tidi drifted from one group to another. An experienced party-goer, Pitt usually mixed with ease, but this time he couldn't seem to make a beachhead. There was an odd atmosphere about this function. He couldn't put his finger on it, yet there was something definitely out of place. The usual subdivisions were present-bores, the drunks. snobs and the backslappers. Everyone they joined who could speak English was quite polite. No anti-American sentiments-a favorite, ploy during most conversations involving guests of other nations-came to the surface.
To all outward appearances, it seemed like the common, middle-of-the-road get-together. Then suddenly he had it. He bent down and whispered in Tidi's ear.
"Do you get the feeling we're persona non grata?"
Tidi looked at him curiously. "No, everyone seems friendly enough."
"Sure, they're sociable and polite, but it's forced."
"How can you be certain?"
"I know a warm, sincere smile when I see one.
We're not getting any. It's as though we're in a cage.
Feed and talk to the animals, but don't touch."
"That's silly. You can't really blame them for being uneasy when they talk to someone who's dressed the way you are."
"That's the catch. The oddball is always, without fail, the center of attraction. If I wasn't dead sure, I'd say this was a wake."
She looked up at Pitt with a sly smile. "You're just nervous because you're way out of your league."
He smiled back. "Care for an explanation?"
"See those two men over there?" She nodded her head sideways to her right. "Standing by the piano?"
Pitt casually rolled a slow glance in the direction Tidi indicated. A small, rotund, lively little man with a bald head was gesturing animatedly as he spoke in rapid bursts into a wiry, thick white beard no more than ten inches from his nose. The beard belonged to a thin, distinguished-looking man with silver hair that fell well below his collar, giving him the appearance of a Harvard professor. Pitt turned back to Tidi and shrugged.
"So?"
"You don't recognize them?"
"Should I?"
"You don't read the society pages of The New York Times."
"Playboy is the only publication I bother with."
She threw him a typical feminine disgusted-withthe-male-of-the-species expression and said: "It's a pretty sid state of affairs when the son of a United States Senator can't identify two of the richest men in the world."
Pitt was only half listening to Tidi. It took a few seconds for her words to sink in. But then they slowly began to register and he turned his head and brazenly stared at the two men who were still heavily involved in conversation. Then he swung back and gripped Tidi's arm so hard she winced.
63
"Their names?"
Her eyes flew wide in surprise. "The bald-headed fat man is Hans Von Hummel. The distinguished-looking one is F. James Kelly."
"You could be mistaken."
"Maybe . . . no, I'm positive. I saw Kelly once at the President's Inaugural Ball."
"Look around the room! Recognize anyone else?"
Tidi quickly did as she was told, scanning the main salon for a familiar face. Her gaze stopped not once, but three times.
"The old fellow with the funny-looking glasses sitting on the settee. That's Sir Eric Marks. And the attractive brunette next to him is Dorothy Howard, the British actress-"
"Never mind her. Concentrate on the men."
"The only other who looks vaguely familiar is the one who just came in, talking to Kirsti Fyrie. I'm pretty sure he's Jack Boyle, the Australian coal tycoon."
"How come you're such an authority on millionaires?"
Tidi gave a cute shrug. "A favorite pastime for a lot of unmarried girls. You never know when you might meet one, so you prepare for the occasion even if it only comes off in your imagination."
"For once your daydreams paid off."
"I don't understand."
"Neither do I except this is beginning to look like a meeting of the clan."
Pitt pulled Tidi out on the terrace and slowly walked her to a corner away from the mainstream of the crowd. He watched the small groups of guests milling about the expansive double doors, catching them looking his way and then turning back, not in embarrassment, but rather as if they were scientists observing an experiment and discussing its probable outcome. He began to get the uneasy feeling that coming into Rondheim's lair was a mistake. He was just in the process of thinking up an excuse to leave when Kirsti Fyrie spied them and came alongside.
"Would you care to be seated in the study? We're almost ready to begin."
"Who is giving the reading?" Tidi asked.
Kirsti's face brightened. "Why, Oskar, of course."
"Oh, dear God," Pitt mumbled under his breath.
Like a lamb to slaughter, he let Kirsti lead him to the study with Tidi tagging behind.
By the time they reached the study and found a seat among the long circular rows of plush armchairs grouped around a raised dais, the room was nearly brimming to capacity. It was small consolation, but Pitt considered he and Tidi fortunate to sit in the last row near the doorway, offering a possible means of unnoticed departure when the opportunity arose. Then his hopes went up in smoke-a servant closed and bolted the doors.
After a few moments, the servant turned a rheostat and dimmed the lights, throwing the study into solid darkness. Then Kirsti climbed the dais and two soft, pink spotlights came on, giving her the aura of a sculptured Greek goddess standing serenely on her pedestal in the Louvre. Pitt mentally undressed her, trying to imagine what an awesome picture she would have made in that revealing condition. He stole a glance at Tidi.
The enraptured quality of her expression made him wonder if it were possible that her thoughts were similar to his. He groped for her hand, found it and squeezed the fingers tightly. Tidi was so absorbed with the vision on the dais, she didn't even notice or respond to Pitts touch.
Standing there motionless, soaking up the stares from an audience still invisible beyond the glare of the spotlight . Fyrie smiled confidently with that inner glow of self-assurance that only a woman truly secure in her loveliness can possess.
She bowed her head toward the hushed bodies in the darkness and began to speak. "Ladies and gentlemen, distinguished guests. Tonight, our host, Mr. Oskar Rondheim, will offer for your enjoyment his latest work. This he will read in our native Icelandic tongue.
Then, since most of you understand English, he will read selected verses from the marvelous new contemporary Irish poet, Sean Magee."
Pitt turned and whispered to Tidi. "I should have fortified myself with at least ten more cups of that punch."
He couldn't see Tidi's face. He didn't have to-he felt her elbow jab him sharply in the ribs. When he turned back to Kirsti, she had disappeared and Rondheim hid taken her place.
It might have been said that Pitt suffered the agonies of the damned for the next hour and a half. But he didn't. Five minutes after Rondheim began delivering his Icelandic saga in a rolling monotone, Pitt was sound asleep, content in the fact that no one 64
would notice his lack of poetry appreciation in the darkened surroundings.
No sooner had the first wave of unconsciousness swept over him than Pitt found himself back on the beach for the hundredth time, cradling Dr. Hunnewell's head in his arms. Over and over he watched helplessly as Hunnewell stared vacantly into Pitts eyes, trying to speak, fighting desperately to make himself understood.
Then finally, barely uttering those three words that seemingly had no meaning, a cloud passed over his tired old features and he was dead.
&nbs
p; The strange phenomenon of the dream wasn't its actual recurrence, but rather the fact that no two sequences were exactly the same. Each time that Hunnewell died, something was different. In one dream the children would be present on the beach as they had been in reality. In the next, they would be missing, nowhere in sight'. Once the black jet circled overhead, dipping its wings in an unexpected salute. Even Sandecker appeared in one scene, standing over Pitt and Hunnewell and sadly shaking his head. The weather, the layout of the beach, the color of the sea-they all differed from fantasy to fantasy. Only one small detail always remained faithfully-Hunnewell's last words.
The audience's applause woke Pitt up. He stared at nothing in particular, stupidly gathering his thoughts.
The lights had come on and he spent several moments blinking and getting his eyes accustomed to the glare.
Rondheim was still on the dais, smugly accepting the generous acclaim. He held up his hands for silence.
"As most of you know, my favorite diversion is memorizing verse. With all due modesty, I must honestly state that my acquired knowledge is quite formidable. I would, at this time, like to put my reputation on the block and invite any of you in the audience to begin a line of any verse that comes to your mind. If I cannot finish the stanza that follows or, complete the poem to your total satisfaction, I shall personally donate fifty thousand dollars to your favorite charity." He waited until the murmur of excited voices tapered to silence once more.
"Shall we begin? Who will be first to challenge my memory?"
Sir Eric Marks stood." 'Should the guardian friend or mother-' Try that one for an introduction, Oskar."
Rondheim nodded. " 'Tell the woes of wilful waste, Scorn their counsel, scorn their pother; You can hang or drown at last!' "
He paused for effect. " 'One and Twenty' by Samuel Johnson."
Marks bowed in acknowledgment. "Absolutely correct."
F. James Kelly rose next. "Finish this one if you can and name the author. 'Now all my days are trances, And all my nightly dreams-' " Rondheim hardly skipped a beat.
" 'Are where thy grey eye glances, And where thy footstep gleams-In what ethereal dances, By what eternal streams!' 'The tine in Paradise' and it was written by Edgar Allan Poe."
"My compliments. Oskar." Kelly was visibly impressed. "You rate an A plus."
Rondheim looked about the room, a smile slowly spreading across his chiseled face as a familiar figure rose in the back. "Do you wish to try your luck, Major Pitt?"
Pitt looked at Rondheim somberly. "I can only offer you three words."
"I accept the challenge," Rondheim said confidently. "Please state them."
" 'God save thee,' " Pitt said very slowly, almost as if he were skeptical of any additional tines.
Rondheim laughed. "Elementary, Major. You've done me the kindness of allowing me to quote from my favorite verse." The contempt in Rondheim's voice was there; everyone in the room could feel it." 'God save thee, ancient Mariner, From the fiends, that plague thee thus. Why look'st thou so? With my crossbow I shot the albitross. The sun now rose upon the right. Out on the sea came he, Still hid in mist, and on the left went cioN,n into the sea. And the good south wind still blew behind, But no sweet bird did follow, Nor any day for lo-,mid or Dlay Came to the mariners' hollo. And I had done a hellish time, And it would work 'em woe. For all averred I had killed the bird That made the breeze to blow.' " Then suddenly Rondheim stopped, looking at Pitt curiously. "There's little need to continue. It's obvious to all present that you have asked me to quote 'The Rime of the Ancient Mariner' by Samuel Taylor Coleridge."
Pitt began to breathe a little easier. The light suddenly became brighter at the end of the tunnel. He knew something that he hadn't known before. It wasn't over yet, but things were looking up. He was glad now that he had played the proverbial long shot. The gamble had paid off in unexpected answers. The nightmare of Hunnewell's death would never trouble his sleep again.
A satisfied smile touched his lips. "Thank you, Mr. Rondheim. Your memory serves you well."
There was something about Pitts tone that made Rondheim uneasy. "The pleasure is mine, Major." He didn't like the smile on Pitt's face-he didn't like it at all.
65
Chapter 14
Pitt suffered for another half hour as rondheim continued to awe the audience with his vast repertoire of verse. At last the program was over. The doors were opened and the crowded room drained into the main salon, the women escorted onto the terrace to engage in small talk and sip a sweet alcoholic concoction passed about by the servants, the men directed to the trophy room for cigars and one hundred-year-old Rouche brandy.
The cigars were carried into the room within a sterling silver case and presented for everyone's selection except Pitt. He was blithely ignored. After the lighting ritual, each man holding his cigar over a candle, warming it to the desired temperature, the servants passed around the Rouche brandy, the heavy, yellowbrown fluid in exotically designed snifter glasses. Again Pitt was left empty-handed.
Apart from himself and Oskar Rondheim, Pitt counted thirty-two men gathered around the flames crackling in the immense fireplace at the end of the trophy room. The reaction to Pitts presence, as expressed by the faces, was interesting. No one even noticed him.
For a fleeting moment he pictured himself a ghost with no substance that had just walked through the wall and was waiting for a sance to begin so that he could put a spiritual appearance. Or so he thought. He could have imagined all sorts of strange scenes, but there was no imagining the blunt, circular gun barrel that was pressing into his spine.
He didn't bother to see whose hand held the gun.
It would have made little difference. Rondheim answered any doubt.
"Kirsti!" Rondheim stared behind Pitt. "You are early. I didn't expect you for another twenty minutes."
Von Hummel produced a handkerchief, mopped a brow that soaked the monogrammed linen and asked: "The girl he arrived with, has she been readied?"
"Miss Royal has been made quite comfortable," Kirsti said, staring right through Pitt. There was something in her tone that left him with a feeling of doubt.
Rondheim came over and took the gun from her hand as though he was a concerned parent. "Guns and beauty do not go together," he scolded. "You must allow a man to guard the major."
"Oh, I rather enjoyed it," she said in a throaty tone. "It's been so long since I've held one."
"I see no reason to delay any further,"$ Jack Boyle said. "Our timing is complex. We must proceed at once."
"There is time," Rondheim said tersely.
A Russian, a short, stocky man with thinning hair, brown eyes and a limping gait, stood and faced Rondheim. "I believe you owe us an explanation, Mr. Rondheim. Why is this man," he nodded in Pitt's direction, "being treated like a criminal? You told myself and the other gentlemen here he is a newspaperman and that it would not be wise to speak too freely with him. Yet, that is the fourth or fifth time tonight you have referred to him as Major."
Rondheim studied the man before him, then set down his glass and pushed the button on a telephone.
He didn't lift the receiver or talk into it, only picked up his glass and sipped at the remaining contents.
"Before your questions are answered, Comrade Tamareztov, I suggest you look behind you."
The Russian called Tamaretov swung around.
Everyone swung around and looked to their rear. Not Pitt, he didn't have to. He kept his eyes straight ahead at a mirror that betrayed several,bar-looking, expressionless men in black coveralls, who suddenly materialized at the opposite end of the room, all-17 automatic rifles braced in the firing position.
A round-shouldered, heavy character in his middle seventies, with blue knifing eyes deep set in a wizened face, grasped F.
James Kelly by the arm. "You invited me to join you tonight, James. I think you know what this is all about."
"Yes, I do." When Kelly spoke, the pained look in his eyes was plainly visible. The
n he turned away.
Slowly, very slowly, almost unnoticed, Kelly, Rondheim, Von Hummel, Marks and eight other men had grouped themselves on one side of the fireplace, leaving Pitt and the remaining guests standing opposite the flames in utter bewilderment. Pitt noted, with a touch of uneasiness, that all the guns were aimed at his group.
"I'm waiting, James," the old blue-eyed man said, his voice commanding.
Kelly hedged, looked rather sadly at Von Hummel and Marks. He waited expectantly. They finally nodded back, assuring him of their approval.
"Have any of you heard of Hermit Limited?"
66
The silence in the room became intense. Nobody spoke, nobody answered. Pitt was coolly calculating the chances of escape. He gave up, unable to bring the odds of success below fifty to one.
"Hermit Limited," Kelly went on, "is international in scope, but you won't find it on any stock exchange because it is vastly different in administration from any business you're familiar with. I don't have time to go into all the details of its operation, so just let me say that Hermit's main goal is to achieve control and take possession of South and of Central America."
"That's impossible," shouted a tall, raven-haired man with a pronounced French accent. "Absolutely unthinkable."