Free The Intimidators by Donald Hamilton

procedure in that place. If you don’t mind checking them all out, I’d appreciate it.” He nodded, relaxing a little, and I said: “Swell, now what have you got on the girl?”
    “Lacey Matilda Rockwell, twenty-four, from Winter Harbor, Maine. Unmarried. Degree from the University of Maine. Studied oceanography at Woods Hole, wherever that may be. The little lady is an expert diver, sailor, surfer... anything on the water or under it, she can do it, is the information we have.”
    I seemed to have an affinity for salty maidens brought up on sheets and halliards. Well, they came in handy sometimes. Maybe I could find a use for this one.
    “What’s she doing around here, oceanographing?” I asked.
    “No sir,” Fred said. “She’s looking for somebody, a Harlan Enos Rockwell, twenty-two, her younger brother. Apparently an embryo singlehander, following in the footsteps of the late Sir Francis Chichester. Had a twenty-four-foot cruising sloop, the Star Trek —named after a TV program, I believe. He’d bought the Fiberglas hull and finished it himself, beefing it up for ocean work. Went missing at sea late this summer after heading out the Northeast Providence Channel bound for the Virgin Islands.... Did you say something, Mr. Helm?”
    “No,” I said. After all, that was another phase of the operation—the Haseltine phase; the Treacherous-Triangle phase—and one that didn’t concern Fred or his cohorts, or did it?

VIII.
    Mac said, “I have been subjected to a certain amount of criticism, Eric. Some people here in Washington are disturbed. They point out that you were instructed to obtain some information before making the touch. They feel that your action was, shall we say, a little precipitate?”
    It didn’t bother me, really. I mean, you don’t call Washington expecting solicitoius inquiries about your health—not even right after being released from the hospital—or congratulations on the success of a difficult mission. Not unless you’re a naïve damned fool you don’t.
    I grimaced at the dark-faced pedestrians moving past the phone booth as if they were in no great hurry to get where they were going. There were some light-faced ones as well. I made a face at those, too, so as not to seem guilty of prejudice. Nevertheless, despite the standard Washington static, I was feeling pretty good. My headache was almost gone, and Nassau didn’t seem like such a bad place, after all. The people looked cheerful and friendly, and the sun was shining. Maybe I’d just been in a bad mood when I arrived, looking for things to criticize. There’s nothing like surviving a little brush with death to make the world look attractive just about anywhere.
    “Yes, sir, precipitate,” I said. “But I’m working on the information angle now.”
    “How? Minsk was buried yesterday.”
    I said, “We probably know everything the Mink ever knew about this deal: the identity and location of his target in Nassau. That was all he needed to know to carry out his assignment, so that was all the information he’d care to burden himself with. Question, sir.”
    “Yes, Eric?”
    “How did we learn of his impending visit to this island paradise?”
    “The intelligence people picked it up through one of their informants overseas, I believe. Why?”
    “I don’t like it,” I said. “There’s a funny smell here, somewhere.”
    “What do you mean?”
    I said, “Goddamn it, sir, it was too damned easy!”
    “The medical report I have says you came within a fraction of an inch of getting killed.”
    “I had orders not to muddy the international waters, remember? Also, I felt obliged to save a lady’s life. Without those handicaps, I could have picked him off like a pigeon on a telephone wire. Pavel Minsk, for God’s sake! Walking into ambush like that, like a kid on his first assignment! Take my word for it, sir, it stinks!”
    There was a little pause; then Mac said: “Old professionals do get careless and overconfident