Stranglers moon, p.12
Stranglers' Moon, page 12
"Why you miserable little bastard," Jules let his anger flare. "How dare you talk to me like that? I'll kill you!" And with that, he surged off his cot and over to where his cellmate was seated.
His large powerful hands closed over the smaller man's throat. To Passar it felt as though the newcomer was using all his strength in a murderous rage, though in truth Jules was using but a tenth of what he could have. He certainly didn't want to kill Passar, though the other had to think he would.
Passar had just enough warning and enough air left in his lungs to yell for the guard. He tried beating Jules off, but his blows were very light and struck uselessly on the attacker's toughened bide. Jules shifted position slightly, in what looked like an attempt to gain a better grip but what was actually a chance to let Passar get more air in his lungs to scream. The weaselly little criminal did so with gratifying volume.
"What's going on here?" came a voice from outside the cell. A large, burly guard stood there, his stun-gun drawn and aimed at the participants in the struggle. He was trying to get a clear shot at Jules, but in another second he would fire at both men, on the theory that stunning both of them would ease the problem and allow him time to sort out the bodies in peace afterwards.
Before he could fire, through, Jules suddenly dropped Passar and lunged with his arm through the bars at the guard. He caught the man's unhand and, with a vicious yank, pulled the guard towards him. The man hit his bead hard against the metal bars and was knocked unconscious. He would have slumped to the. floor had not Jules held his body upright. The stun-gun dropped from the guard's limp hand onto the floor of the cell, but Jules was much more interested in the other gun the guard had carried-a Mark Twenty blaster. Stretching his other hand between the bars, he pulled the heavy weapon out of the guard's holster. Then he let the man's body fall to the ground.
Wasting no time, Jules turned the blaster's sizzling beam on the lock mechanism of the cell. Within three seconds the lock had been burned away. The DesPlainian kicked open the door, picked up the stun-gun as well and turned back to the startled Passar, who had watched the action while cowering in his bunk. "Thanks," Jules told him. "I needed a commotion to draw the guard's attention, and it bad to seem realistic." He stepped out of the cell. "Be seeing you.
"What about me?" Passar called after him.
Jules shrugged. "Door's open. You're free to try a break, too, if you want.
Passar's weasel brain was working overtime. "You'll never be able to get out of here alone, and neither will I. You don't know the layout and I don't have a gun. Together, though, we stand a chance.
Though Jules pretended to consider that, it was actually exactly what he'd hoped for. The entire escape scene had been choreographed for Passar's benefit, with the guard being part of the drama. Ordinarily the man would never have stood within arm's length of the prisoners like that, and he would have stunned first and asked questions later. But the breakout had to look realistic enough so that Passar wouldn't smell a trap. Jules needed Passar, all right. Not to help him escape, as the old man thought Jules could have walked unmolested out of the prison, and he'd memorized its floor plan; instead, he needed Passar as a passport to whoever was recruiting the murderers.
"Khorosho, but hurry it up," he snarled. "The alarms must have gone off in the front office by now.
"Of course they have, the instant that door was opened," Passar said, racing out of the cell. "Let's go this way." "But the front entrance is that way," Jules protested, pointing in the opposite direction. "I remember that much from when they brought me in.
"Sure-and that's exactly the direction they'll expect us to go. This way's the laundry chute; they won't look for us in there right away." He pulled at Jules' sleeve. "Come on.
Jules followed the older man down the narrow corridors of cells. They passed plenty of other prisoners who watched them go by silently. Some of the men gave Jules the high sign as he went by, wishing him luck and wishing they could be along. None of them would utter a sound or do anything to ruin his chances of escape. Such was the camaraderie of prison life.
The sound of running footsteps came from the hall ahead of them. Passar found them a small side door and they turned into it just as a group of guards appeared at the far end of the hallway. While Jules and his partner scarcely dared breathe, the squad ran past their hiding place and back down the corridor the pair had just come from. Passar waited several seconds to make sure they'd all be gone, then burst out of the room and continued on his way. Jules was right behind him, brandishing his weapons menacingly.
They came to the laundry chute. Passar opened it up and slid down it without hesitation; again, Jules was right on his tai! Together the two men tumbled down the metal slide and landed with a soft whoosh amid a pile of smelly old prison uniforms. Climbing quickly out of the bin, they looked around.
It was Passar who found what they needed-some guard's uniforms that had been stained and were sent here for quick cleaning. Jules found one his size and was starting to get into it when an inmate-a trusty, no doubt-came around the corner. Before he could do much more than register his surprise, Jules had given him a light stun. As he fell to the floor, Jules continued dressing.
There were no uniforms in Passar's size, so they hastily devised a plan. "I'll be a guard transporting you to another cell block," Jules said. "If we play it right, no one'll give us a second glance. Which way do we go?
"'That way's out." Passar pointed to a small locked door that led out the side of the laundry area. A short blast from Jules' gun and the door was no longer a barrier. The two men walked out into the yard, Passar a little ahead with Jules holding the stun-gun on him.
There was great confusion in the yard as guards rats around everywhere, trying to look as though they did not know exactly what was going on. Actually, Jules' and Passar's actions had been monitored each step of the way, and all the guards had been told that the breakout was scheduled. Their major concern was to see that none of the other prisoners took advantage of the situation and tried any breaks on their own.
A number of guard cars had been scattered about the yard. Jules and Passar took the one that looked the fastest and got in. "We'll never get out the gates, though," Passar was muttering. "They close automatically at an escape attempt, and can only be opened from a guard station.
"Stop sniveling," Jules snapped at him. "I'm a guard now myself, remember? And I've got a couple of guns." As he drove up to the gate, he said, "Get down on the floor where they can't see you. I've got an idea." Passar did as he was told, and Jules stopped in front of the closed steel gate. A guard came over to him and recognized him instantly as the man he was supposed to let escape. Nevertheless, he had to make it look good.
"Where are you going?" he asked.
"The warden wants me to patrol the perimeter," Jules said. "He thinks they may have found a way to get outside the walls, and he wants me driving around to see if I can spot anything." He also winked at the guard, a gesture Passar could not see from his position on the floor.
The guard gave an imperceptible nod and said, "Khorosho, pass through." With a wave of his hand he signaled his companion in the booth to open the gate. As the monstrous steel doors swung wide, Jules gave him a wave of his hand and drove quickly outside.
He started around the wall until he was out of sight of the sentry, then tore off across the open countryside in the direction of Bhangora.
Passar climbed up off the floor to sit beside Jules again. "I didn't think it'd work," he said.
"I thought you had to have special papers or something to get out.
"Aah, we got them so confused right now they don't know what they're doing," Jules excused.
"In any event, we won't have more than a couple of minutes before they realize we're gone," Passar said. "Better gun it to Bhangora. That way." He pointed, and Jules drove obediently in the indicated direction. From here on, he'd have to let Passar lead him if he intended to get where he wanted to go.
Three minutes later, Passar, who'd been checking out the window behind them, said, "They're on our tail." Indeed they were. At least a dozen police cruisers were chasing them, making a pretense at trying to recapture them. Jules hit the accelerator as hard as he could and the escapees' car zoomed ahead at maximum speed. Jules' reflexes were superb, and he drove the car like an extension of himself. On the seat beside him, he knew that Passar was sitting white-knuckled at the recklessness of his driving. All part of the atmosphere, Jules thought, smiling inwardly.
If this were a real jailbreak, of course, there would be roadblocks ahead of them as well as pursuit from behind. There would be copters and personal flyers spotting them from the air, possibly even dropping small gas bombs. But this break was programmed to succeed, and it couldn't be made too difficult. At the same time, those cars to their rear had to be used so that it wouldn't look too easy to the suspicious Passar. The main point was that events had to move so fast that he wouldn't have time to think; he would have to accept events at their face value. For five minutes they zipped along country roads and through open fields where families of peasants were tending their crops. After that, though, they reached the edges of the city. Houses became bigger and more closely spaced; other types of buildings-factories, shops, grocery stores-began to make their appearance. People were more prevalent, too, walking along the sides of the road, carrying bundles, engaging in commerce. Despite his desire to hurry, Jules had to slow down to avoid hitting any of the pedestrians.
"We'll have to ditch the car soon," Passar said. "They'll have tracers on us in a little while.
We're getting into a neighborhood I know, though, so we'll be able to find hiding spots until some of the heat's off." He began directing Jules along the proper course.
They were definitely within the city now, and Jules' speed had been reduced practically to a crawl. The houses to either side were dirty and ill-kept. Windows were shattered more often than not. Children played naked in the streets, their shouts and squeals echoing down the canyons of buildings. Wash hung from lines that were strung across the streets themselves, sometimes only a meter or two above the tops of passing vehicles. The clothes could not get completely clean that way, but no one seemed to care very much.
The people living in the houses, though, were the lucky ones. The sidewalks were jammed sometimes two or three deep with people and their belongings. Tattered old blankets stretched out on the ground served some people as mattresses. Others lay down just in the hard-packed dirt or mud. Small fires were set right out at the edge of the street, where soup kettles seemed to be constantly boiling. Everywhere was the look of starvation and apathy. Jules shuddered to think of it, but kept his disgust hidden; as Har Koosman, such sights should be as familiar to him as his own face in the mirror.
At length they came to a spot where the street was frankly impassable. The press of people had become so great that they simply overflowed the sidewalks into the thoroughfare, and no vehicle could hope to get through. Jules looked at Passar for advice, but the latter only shrugged. "We'd've had to go on foot from here, anyhow," the older man said.
Jules stripped off his guard uniform to the caftan beneath it and the two escapees jumped from their car, leaving it stopped in the middle of the street to be stolen by anyone passing by. Passar started running through the crowd, slipping between the people who jammed the path as though he were a boneless figure. There obviously was an art to dodging through crowds like this, but it was one that Jules had not mastered.
Try though he did to follow Passar's motions exactly, be found himself knocking people over or stepping on their feet as he raced along after his companion. Every few meters he would have to leap over the body of someone sleeping or, possibly, dead on the sidewalk. How he managed to keep Passar in sight while maneuvering through the throng he was never sure afterwards; somehow, though, desperation gave him the extra edge he needed.
Passar never looked back to see whether Jules was following him or not. He assumed, probably, that Jules was as adept at street running as he was, and consequently didn't see how clumsy his partner really was. That might have broken Jules' cover right there.
But Passar's attention was focused on two things-first, to get them lost in the crowd as thoroughly as possible so that the police following them would not be able to find them; and second, to take them to a place of refuge.
At last, Passar turned off the main streets and into a back alley that ran between two rows of buildings. He raced about a third of the way down the row, then descended a short flight of stairs to a basement door. Jules broke free of the crowd in the streets and, with an extra burst of speed, managed to catch up with the older man enough to make him think he'd been right behind all the time.
Passar gave two quick raps on the door, paused, gave another rap, paused again, then gave one more rap. The door swung inward, and Passar and Jules slid inside into a darkened room. At first, Jules could not see a thing, his eyes being accustomed to the glare of the light outside; but as his eyes became adjusted to the gloom he could see that they were in a storage cellar. Racks of bottles ran the length of the room, with large stacks of boxes scattered in the aisles between the racks.
"Where are we?" Jules asked.
"Safe," Passar said ambiguously. "It don't pay you to know more than that.
Jules took the hint and shut up. The place must be a bar or cocktail lounge, judging from all the bottles piled around. It was also a hiding place of some repute, because the door had opened immediately at Passar's knocks, indicating it was constantly manned. On a planet where crime was as rife as on Chandakha, criminals would have systems of hideouts. It was also likely, Jules thought, that they would have to pay a price for their sanctuary.
"Oh, it's you, Passar," said the man who'd opened the door-a large, burly fellow with a face that had suffered through a thousand barroom brawls. "Funny; I didn't think we'd be seeing you for quite some time. We'd heard you'd found another hangout, eh?" He laughed at his own small joke.
Passar joined him in the laughter. "Well, it seems they didn't like my company, so they let me out a little early me and my friend here." He hesitated a moment, then added, "Ah, the only trouble is that we packed in such a hurry that we neglected to bring our wallets.
"That is a shame," the doorman agreed solemnly. "Gospodin Tuhlman will have to be apprized of this." "Of course," Passar said as the other man pressed an intercom button.
Turning to Jules, Passar said, "Don't worry, I know Tuhlman pretty well. He won't turn us out. There's always little odd jobs that need doing. We can trade services for our keep.
Everything'll be all right." And he winked at Jules.
Chapter 10
Games
Yvette spent most of the day after her talk with Myerson wandering aimlessly around Vesa, trying to get her thoughts in order. Think, girl, she commanded herself. You're behaving like a schoolchild. Don't let your brain turn to jelly. Think.
There was one weak link in the chain of killings, one spot where the killers would have to surface-the victim's hotel. Spaceship tickets could be cashed in over the phone and the money deposited to a blind bank account, but somebody would have to go to the hotel and remove the victim's belongings personally. The killers would have to have the compliance of some person or persons on the hotel staff to be able to clean out a room so thoroughly and so quickly. And they would need the assistance of someone to arrange all the checkouts. Which meant widespread corruption throughout the staffs of each tourist hotel on the moon.
At 0130 hours that night she walked calmly into the lobby of the Soyuz Hotel, where Dak had been staying. Even at this hour there were large numbers of people crossing the lobby or sitting around in chairs reading the local newsrolls. The nightclerk was on duty behind the desk, sorting some incoming mail.
Yvette strode confidently up to the desk, her bouppelande swirling as she moved. "Were you on duty here last night?" she asked.
"Yes, I was," the man replied without looking up from his task.
"I'm told that a man named Dak Lehman checked out exactly twenty-four hours ago.
"It's possible.
"I'd like to know some more of the details about his departure.
"Gospozha, so many people check in and out that I...." He stopped suddenly as he looked up from his work. Yvette was holding the stun-gun she had taken from Myerson, and the muzzle was only ten centimeters from the clerk's face. The bulk of her body hid the gun from the view of the rest of the people in the lobby. "What is this, a robbery?
"No, as I said, I only want some information, and I think you can give it to me. Is there somewhere private we can go?
"Th-there's the office back here," the clerk said, never taking his eyes off the barrel of the gun.
"Good; I suggest we go there at once. I also suggest you make no sudden movements. I am, by nature, a very nervous person, and this stun-gun is set on eight. It would paralyze you for days at least, with the possibility of permanent crippling. I'm sure you wouldn't like that, would you?
"No, gospozha, not at all," the man assured her. "Follow me, please.
He led her into a small, well-appointed office behind the front desk. She closed the door behind them and motioned for him to sit down in the easy chair. When he'd done so, she took a length of rope out of her purse and proceeded to tie him up quite securely.
"Now that we've got the preliminaries out of the way I can explain the rules of the game," Yvette said coolly. "I'll ask you questions and you'll provide me with answers. You have three alternatives-you can either lie, remain silent or tell the truth. I also have three alternatives-I can either accept what you've said, kick you where it hurts most or use my gun. Very simple rules, don't you agree?
The clerk was sweating profusely, and could only nod his head in reply.
Yvette had a fourth alternative, namely the nitrobarb that was still concealed in her shoe; but using it on so insignificant a cog in the killers' machine would be pointless. One doesn't use a blaster to kill gnats.
