The Unfair Fare Affair - Leslie Peter (книги онлайн полностью бесплатно .txt) 📗

Chapter 13

A Parley Between Friends

"I AM VERY PLEASED, Napoleon," Kuryakin said. "Tell me about it... You can talk for some time because my—er— conductor has gone off to find some food. We are both hungry."

"Okay. Tell me first, though—where are you? Or don't you know?"

"This time I do. We had to walk across the border. We left the trailer truck in some Godforsaken village near Berchtesgaden, but on the Austrian—"

"The trailer truck," Solo interrupted, "was it by any chance left in a junkyard?"

"Well, yes it was, as a matter of fact! How did you know? That's all the thing was fit for, the junkyard, believe me!"

"I do believe you, Illya. You've no idea how pleased it makes me to hear it!... But you were saying..."

"About the frontier. Yes, we sneaked over without being spotted. The actual border is not very well defined in that area. We seemed to walk over half the mountains in Europe. Part of the time we were above the snow line and I was frozen! Then at last we came to another village tucked away in a fold of the hills—and I was told we were in Germany. Big deal!"

"You said you knew where you were now."

"Still only fifteen or twenty miles from Salzburg. We picked up a closed truck at this village—"

"From a junk heap again, I suppose?"

"Kind of. From a lot behind a garage full of unbelievably old cars. They were labeled for sale... Anyway, we pried out this truck and drove to a little place called Siegsdorf, just off the Salzburg-Munich Autobahn. There's a river, a railway station, a beer cellar, a Gasthof —and us. And we're stuck unseen in the back of an old heap. Or at least I am!"

"When are you leaving, Illya?"

"'At night' is all I'm told. I think we're supposed to get into Switzerland through the tunnel beneath the Boden-See—and I imagine they want to wait until the night shift is on again. It seems easier for escaped murderers."

"Especially the way this routine works. Look... Illya… Waverly briefed you on such background as we have, didn't he?"

"I think so."

"Well, it all figures, man. It all figures. Listen—Waverly was picked up in an ancient Minerva taxi that nobody has ever seen before or since, right?... He met the men with the new passport in a lane leading to a junkyard, if I remember correctly—and they were standing by an old truck."

"Yes, Napoleon. That's right, but—"

"Mathieu, the man the French were after, got away from Paris in a dust cart... and it was of a pattern that is obsolete now, the kind you'd only find in a junkyard. He changed into a 'beat-up delivery van,' to quote my friend in the Police Judiciare. And then they lost the trail near Avallon—where there are several yards full of wrecks from the dangerous section of N.6. What d'you bet that van ended up in one of those yards, eh?"

"I'm sure you are right."

"Neither the dust cart nor the delivery van have ever been found. Nor has the prewar dump truck in which the insurance embezzlers were traced as far as Limoges before they disappeared into thin Spanish air. Nor has the van from which I escaped near Maastricht the day before yesterday—although I was telephoning the police and Interpol within minutes of leaving it. Nor, I am sure, has the old deux chevaux that nearly ran me down in Paris."

"Napoleon," Illya said. "This sounds most conclusive, but—"

"Right now, I'm actually in a junkyard," Solo continued excitedly. "This program comes to you by courtesy of the European Iron and Steel Federation, Oxydized Division… and among the rust is a truck that looks finished but has been restored mechanically to fair running condition."

"Napoleon…"

"What's the odds that all these mysterious disappearances, Minerva and all, have been into junkyards? What better place can you think of for hiding old vehicles? And conversely, suppose that a whole string of yards like this, a chain of them right across Europe, were fitted up, each with a 'Q' vehicle like the one I found here—what better system could you find for running a clandestine transport service?"

"If you would just let me—"

"It's perfect! There are wrecking yards everywhere, all along the length of every traffic artery on the Continent. There have to be, with the amount of accidents there are. And as far as the network goes, it's simple—the escapee is taken a certain distance in one of the trucks or whatever. Nobody pays any mind to an old truck—and they always travel at night anyway, you say. Also, there's nobody to complain about the truck being improperly used, as it doesn't belong to anyone."

"Yes, that's it. And you see—"

"If there is any doubt, however, or if for security reasons they want to switch vehicles, then they just rum into the nearest yard on their list, leave the truck and continue the journey in another tattered wreck that's ready waiting for them. They use the yards in fact exactly like horsemen and coaches used to use the stages, the coaching inns."

"I'd like to say just a word. One word—"

"But it's perfect! It's brilliant! A near write-off is difficult to identify. In the yards, nobody is likely to notice the absence of one vehicle and the addition of another. After all, one wreck is much like another! Even at the frontiers, I guess, they could pretend to be driving the thing through as scrap. It's easy enough to forge papers verifying a deal like that."

"Napoleon!" Illya Kuryakin said loudly and firmly into the transceiver. "You are absolutely right. I know this. I can prove it!"

"Eh? What's that? How do you know?"

"That is exactly how the network operates. My chauffeur told me."

"Well, why didn't you say so, for God's sake!" Solo grumbled. "What is this fellow like, anyway? He seems the only member of the gang we've actually run up against."

"He's a short man but very tough. He looks like a walnut on legs."

"Not by any chance with a great jaw jutting out? A huge blue chin?"

"That's the one! Why—do you know him?"

"He tried to persuade me to come for a ride… and he wasn't going to charge me anything at all," Solo said grimly.

"His name is Bartoluzzi. He's a Corsican—and he used to be on the poids lourds, the long-distance heavyweight trucks. He was doing it for twenty-five years, with a break during the war; that's why he knows the European road network like the back of your foot..."

"The back of your hand, Illya."

"He's very interesting about the organization, Napoleon. But, oh dear! It's become such a bore."

"What do you mean?"

"He thinks he's tremendously tough. He probably is. But you see—the man I'm impersonating is very tough too. So Bartoluzzi feels he has to spend the whole time boasting about just how tough, how ruthless, how crafty he is. And to keep in character, I have to try to go one better, boast even more, act even more unscrupulous."

"Well?"

"You know I am not a violent man," the Russian said plaintively. "Also there is the matter of the cold food and always eating cooped up in some confined space."

"I'm afraid I don't quite follow."

"That and the continual effort to speak in a snarl or a growl or with a deep voice––it's giving me indigestion!"

Solo laughed. "It'll broaden your horizons," he said. "But I'm glad your friend is talkative. Maybe you can get him to Tell All about the other members of the organization."