The Kremlin File

I sighed and turned my attention to the stewardess with the guns. I saw her stir, open her eyes and try to lift a hand to the red welt on her neck. She looked down quickly, trying to see behind her but the pain of the movement brought her jerking upright.

“Oh...” It was a gasp. “My neck... It hurts.”

She raised her eyes to mine.

“It isn’t broken,” I told her. “And you’re a lousy shot.”

Her mouth turned down and she moaned, closing her eyes. I didn’t want her passing out again so I called another stewardess over to help. I told her to bring a glass with half water, half whiskey, and to see that her buddy drank it. She followed orders well, bending over the girl in the seat, holding her chin and tipping the head up, pouring into the mouth when it winced with pain. The girl swallowed, choked, gagged, breathed deeply and the stewardess poured again on top of the indrawn air. Part of that mouthful spilled down the uniform.

I asked, “Did you ever see her before this flight?”

The stewardess straightened, a tall beauty whose gray eyes smoked and whose voice, now that she was through nursemaiding her passengers, was clipped, tight with anger.

“Not until she showed up in the ready room. Our regular on this run, Edith, called in just before flight time, and said she was sick but was sending a friend to fill in. Some friend.”

“Does that happen often?”

“First time I know of. Normally we have regular standbys but tonight none of those girls came in.”

I frowned. “Didn’t that strike anybody as more than coincidence?”

The stew’s lips curled in a sardonic grimace of aggrieved helplessness. “Mister, in the airline business anything can happen and mostly does, always at the last minute. We quizzed her and she knew the job so we brought her along. What kind of a cop are you anyway?”

“A lucky one, tonight. Do you think you could find a blanket to cover the pilot? People seem to be staring.”

She threw another bitter look at the redhead and sashayed away, her pretty rump twitching in indignation. The ringer in the seat ignored her, watching me the way a wounded bird on the ground watches a hungry cat. I stepped across her feet and sat down beside her. Women talk to me better if I don’t scare them so I looked sympathetic, even apologetic.

“Your looks aren’t going to last out the prison term, honey. It’s a murder charge for killing the captain plus whatever they throw at you for the skyjack attempt. But if you level with me and I like your answers, I can get you a break. What’s your name?”

Hope and pleading came through the husky voice. “Mary Austin.”

“And your boyfriend’s?”

“Juan... Cardoza... Where is he?”

I hit her with it. “Dead.”

I wanted her reaction. It could tell me whether she knew what she was mixed up in or was a dupe only. Her face crumpled as though I had cut into her heart. Her eyes flooded with tears and pain. She was genuinely grieved.

I asked her gently, “Tell me about Juan, Mary, who he was.”

The voice had lost its life. “Just a Cuban exile. He was broke and he had to go back. He said he was a relative of Castro’s so they wouldn’t do anything to him.”

Juan sounded more like a member of the secret police, I thought. That was the trouble with letting in exiles — you couldn’t be sure who was legitimate and who was working for an enemy.

I said, “How long did you know him?”

“Six months.” It was a child crying over a broken doll. “I met him when I was working for Eastern, on a run from Miami. Then two weeks ago he asked me to quit. He needed my help. He was inheriting a lot of money in Cuba and when he got it we could get married. Now... you killed him.”

“Wrong, Mary, you killed him when you passed him that gun and shot the pilot.”

She was crying aloud. People were staring with puzzled faces, some angry, some still frightened.

“I shot... it was accident... the navigator jumped... he startled me... I just squeezed... I didn’t mean... I never meant... I only wanted them to turn...”

I stood up, pulled out the arm rests and hefted her onto the seats. I left her alone to cry it out. Later, maybe, I could sell Hawk on getting the charges softened somewhat for her. Obviously she had never heard of the first rule of weaponry — never pull a gun unless you mean to fire it. The second rule ought to be that children shouldn’t play with guns.

Two

My boss, David Hawk, has a way with him. When he calls me N3, my official code name as a senior Killmaster, I know he is going to ram a really tough job down my throat.

Ordinarily, when we are alone, he calls me Nick. But when he coughs and says “N3” I want to double my life insurance, though I haven’t any since no company is idiot enough to issue me a policy.

I had come to his office to make my report. AXE has the lousiest headquarters of any of the government investigating agencies. The CIA and FBI boys wouldn’t be caught dead in a place like this, and the Secret Service people are even harder to please. Because they guard the President, they consider themselves a cut above the rest of us.