Free Hamilton, Donald - Matt Helm 14 by The Intriguers (v1.1) Page A

government employees have died at your hands. . . ." He
stopped and was silent for several seconds. I waited. At last he went on,
rather uncertainly, "I-I just don't know, Eric. Maybe . . . I think you'd
better come in and we'll see what can be done to clear up the situation. In
fact, that's an order. I still have a few resources
                I said, "The hell with that,
sir. With all due respect, I doubt that I'd live ten minutes if these
characters caught me inside four walls. But obviously Leonard doesn't want
publicity for what he's doing. That gives me a slight edge. You go ahead and
see what you can accomplish at your end, sir, but I'll keep on here as
originally planned." I waited, but he didn't speak. 1 drew a long breath,
and put some crude arrogance into my voice. "Oh, and tell our white-haired Herbie -boy that he'd better call up his first team if
he's got one. The stuff he's been sending at me so far has been kind of
pitiful, like swatting a bunch of sick flies."
                Hanging up without waiting for a
response, I expected the girl to jump me at once and tell me again what a
horrible man I was, but she was silent all the way back to the car and until we
got going on the highway once more. Even then, she wasn't her usual critical
self at first.
                What she said, as the car gathered
speed, was, "He-he sounded so old. So old and tired, Mr. Helm."
                "He's in a bad spot," I
said.
                With some of her former spirit, she
said sharply, "And you didn't make it any better, demanding that he
forward your crude message of defiance."
                "Wake up, doll," I said.
"Nobody needs to forward anything. Mac and I were both talking for public
consumption. There's not a chance in the world that line wasn't bugged." 1
shook my head irritably. "I was just trying to take the heat off him,
Borden. The tape will show that I was instructed to come in and refused, in my
usual high-handed and arrogant manner. Mac can't be held responsible if an
agent deliberately disobeys an order, can he? That's presumably why he gave it,
and that's certainly why I said what I did. Okay?"
                She glanced at me and looked away.
"Maybe I was wrong. If so, I'm sorry. But if you knew you'd be overheard,
why did you call at all?"
                "So they'd know where their
boys were and get out there and rake them up before the police found them. One
complication nobody wants is cops."
                "I can't believe all this is
really happening! The head of a government agency ordering men out to kill his
own people!"
                "It's not the first time,"
I said. "The spook shops have always been dangerous to cross.
                They've got a tremendous amount of
power and, since their operations are secret, very few real restraints. But you're
missing the point. The point is that we're not Herbert Leonard's people, and he
knows we'll never be, from Mac right on down to the lowest filing clerk in the
outer office. He can gain control of the big, sprawling organizations by the
usual bureaucratic procedures, because there's seldom much personal loyalty
involved there, but he knows he'll never really take over a small, specialized,
one-man agency like ours. We'll always be Mac's people, not his; and apparently
he doesn't trust Mac to go along with his grandiose political plans-I, don't
know what they are, yet, but if they're Leonard's they're bound to be
grandiose."
                "But," she protested,
"but he's in charge! He could just -just fire you all, couldn't he? He
doesn't have to shoot you!"
                I grinned. "Sweetheart, you're
forgetting a little thing called civil service. There's also the question of
publicity; if he just up and cans us all, somebody may ask why. But you have
spotted the really interesting angle: the fact that he feels he has to do it this
way.