Rhodesia Read online

  "Listen to this — his skin has itched ever since he picked up something mysterious in Calcutta. The doctors have given him seven versions of antihistamines and recommend a year's session of allergy tests, meaning they're mystified. He buys little odd lots of stocks by living like a beggar when he's in the States because he can't resist the true-blue, sure-fire tips his rich travelers give him. But he's out of the country so much he can't watch the market and all his buys go down. He's lost touch with all the friends he likes. He'd like to own a dog but you can see how impossible that is. As for hobbies and interests, he can forget them unless he collects match covers from hotels he hopes hell never see again or restaurants that have made him sick."

  "Urrf." Booty made a growly sound and Nick stopped. "I know you re teasing me, but a lot of it sounds as if it could be true. If you and Gus show signs of living like that during the nest month, I'm starting a society for the prevention of cruelty to."

  "Just watch."

  Lufthansa served the usual magnificent dinner. Over the brandy and coffee the green eyes locked onto Nick's again. He felt the hairs on his neck tighten pleasantly. It's the perfume, he told himself, but he always had been susceptible to the alert blonde type. She said, "You made a mistake.'*

  "How?"

  "You told me all about an escort's life in the third person. You never said I or we. You guessed at a lot of that and made some up."

  Nick sighed, kept his face expressionless. A Chicago DA all the way. "You'll see for yourself."

  The stewardess took the cups away and tendrils of golden hair were tickling his cheek. Booty said, "If it is true, you poor man, I'll feel so sorry for you I'll just have to cheer you up and try and make you happy. I mean, you can ask me for anything. I think it's horrible in this day and age that fine young men like you and Gus have to live like galley slaves."

  He saw the twinkle in the emerald orbs, felt the hand — no glass in it now — on his leg. Some of the cabin lights had been turned off and the aisle was empty for the moment- He turned his head and fastened his lips to the soft red ones. She had been building up to it, he was sure, half in mockery, half shaping her woman's weapon, yet her head gave a tiny jerk as their lips met — but it did not retreat It was a nice, well-fitted, aromatic, and pliable molding of flesh. He had meant it to be a five-second thing. It was like stepping into sweet, cushiony quicksand with the menace hidden — or eating peanuts. The first move was the trap. He closed his eyes for a moment to savor the soft, tingly sensations that shot across to his lips and teeth and tongue like discharges from a powered circuit He opened one eye, saw that her lids were down, and shut out the world again for just a few seconds.

  A hand tapped his shoulder and he snapped alert and drew back. "Janet doesn't feel well," Gus Boyd said softly. "Not serious. Just a touch of air sickness. She says she's prone to it I've given her a couple of pills. But she'd like to see you for a minute please. Booty."

  Booty climbed out of the seat and Gus joined Nick. The younger man looked more relaxed, his attitude more friendly, as if what he had just seen guaranteed Nick's professional status. "That's a curie," he said. "Janet is a doll, but I can't keep my eyes off Teddy. She has the playful look. Glad to see you're getting acquainted. That Booty looks like speed with class."

  "Plus brains. She started a third degree. I gave her a sad story about an escort's hard life and need for kindness."

  Gus laughed. "That's a new approach. And it might work. Most of the boys blow themselves up, and hell, anybody with an ounce of sense knows they're just Grey Line guides without the megaphones. Janet pumped me pretty good, too. I talked about the wonders well see in Rhodesia."

  "This is not a cheap tour. All their families loaded?"

  "Except Ruth's, I think. She's on some sort of a scholarship deal or gift financed by her college. Washburn in accounting keeps me advised so I'll have an idea who to work for tips. Doesn't matter much with this bunch. Young gals are rotten. Selfish bitches."

  Nick's eyebrows rose in the gloom. "I used to prefer the older girls," he replied "Some of them would be very grateful."

  "Of course. Chuck Aforzio made a wonderful score last year. Married this old gal from Arizona. With homes in five or six other places. Supposed to be worth forty or fifty million. He's a cool cat Did you know him?"

  "No."

  "How long were you at American Express, Andy?"

  "Off and on for four, five years. I handled a lot of the special F. I. T. tours. But I never happened to touch Rhodesia although I've been in most of the rest of Africa. So don't forget you're the senior escort, Gus, and I won't. You can order me around wherever you need a hole plugged in the line. I know Manning probably told you I have a piece of the action and I'm along for the ride and may leave you for a few days. But if I do, I'll try and tell you in advance. Meanwhile — you're the boss."

  Boyd nodded. "Thanks. I knew the minute I saw you you're regular. If you take hold of Edman I imagine you'll be a good guy to work for. I was afraid I'd get another gay blade. I don't mind the sweethearts, but they can be a damn nuisance when there's real work to be done or the box gets tight You know about the troubles in Rhodesia? A bunch of blacks chased a Triggs and Son group right out of the marketplace. Scratched up a couple. I don't imagine it'll happen again. The Rhodesians are methodical and tough. Chances are we'll get a cop assigned to us. Anyway, I know the contractor. He'll give us a guard or two along with the cars if it looks like well need it."

  Nick thanked Boyd for the briefing and then asked casually, "How about side money? With all the sanctions and such are there any really good angles? They mine a lot of gold. Any available for us?"

  Although no one was close enough to hear them, and they had been talking in very low tones, Gus dropped his voice to an even softer level. "You ever deal in it, Andy?"

  "Yes. Some. All I'd ask out of life was the chance to buy at the rate in the U. S. or Europe and have a foolproof pipeline to India. I've heard there are good channels from Rhodesia to India so I was wondering..."

  "I might have an angle. I'm going to have to know you better."

  "You just said you knew the minute you saw me I'm a regular. What's wrong now?"

  Gus snorted impatiently. "If you're regular you know what I mean. I don't give a good damn about this job with Edman. But a gold operation is another story. A lot of the boys have made fortunes. I mean escorts, pilots, stewards, airline officials. But quite a few have wound up in barred furnished rooms. And in some of the countries they got busted in, the service where they're staying is real lousy." Gus paused and made a little shiver. "It ain't nice — five years with the lice. I worked hard for that pun but it tells you what I mean. If you've got a man on the scene working with you, say a customs guy in for a slice, you're home free if he's a hot operator. But if you're pushing in cold, you take some long chances. You can buy most of those Asian boys for a sliver off the cake, but they need victims all the time to show they're doing their jobs and cover up the deals they are getting cut in on. So if they make you, you can fall hard."

  "I have a friend in Calcutta," Nick revealed. "He's got enough weight to help us but the riming has to be set up in advance."

  "Maybe we'll get a chance," Gus answered. "Keep in touch with him if you can. It's a gamble operation unless you've got a smooth lock. The boys who run the stuff in in dhows figure automatically on a ten percent loss to let the government boys look like they're doing their job, and ten percent more for grease. That's off the gross, mind. Sometimes you go in, especially with a badge on that says Amex or Edman Tours or some such, and you're passed right by. They never even look under your spare shirts. Other times you get a full check and it's sudden death."

  "I handled quarter-bars once. We were very lucky."

  Gus was interested. "No sweat, huh? How much did you make on a bar?"

  Nick smiled briefly. His new associate was using the admission to check his knowledge and thus his truthfulness. "Figure for yourself. We had five. A hundred ounces
each. Profit thirty-one dollars an ounce and grease expense fifteen percent. There were two of us. We split about $11,000 for three days' work and two hours' worry."

  "Macao?"

  "Now Gus, I already mentioned Calcutta and you haven't told me much. As you say, let's get acquainted and see how we feel about each other. I'd say the main angle is this. If you can help set up a source in Rhodesia, I have the gate to India. One or both of us can travel the route on a pretended tour or en route to join a party in Delhi or what-have-you. Our cute badges and my connection will take us right in."

  "Let's give it plenty of thought."

  Nick told him he would. He would be thinking every moment, because a pipeline to illegal gold from Rhodesian mines should, somewhere along its joints and connections, reach into the world of Judas and Si Kalgan.

  Booty returned to the seat beside him and Gus rejoined Janet. The stewardess gave them pillows and offered blankets as they tilted their seats to the almost horizontal level. Nick accepted one blanket, and switched off the single reading light that had been aglow.

  They entered the odd quiet of a dry womb. The monotonous roar of the body that contained them, their own lightweight iron lung. Booty had made no protest when he took only one blanket, so he made a little ceremony of tucking it in over them both. If you could ignore the projections, you could fancy yourselves in a cozy double bed.

  Nick looked up at the ceiling and recalled Trixie Skidmore, a Pan Am stewardess he had once spent a few cultural days with in London. Trixie had said, "I was raised in Ocala, Florida, and I used to go back and forth to Jax on the Greyhound and believe me I thought I saw everything in the sex world done on those back seats. You know, the long ones that go right across the bus. Well, honey, I just never had an education hardly at all till I hit the air. I've seen fornication, hand jobs, blow jobs, sidewinders, spoon tucks, down the Y, and whip dillies."

  Nick had laughed heartily. "What do you do when you catch them?"

  "I wish em luck, darlin'. If they need another blanket or pillow or if knockin' out another light or two will help, I help." He recalled how Trixie had pressed her plump, full lips against his bare chest and murmured, "I love lovers, honey — because I love love and I need a whole lot of it"

  He felt Booty's soft breath against his jaw. "Andy — are you very sleepy?"

  "No, not especially. Just drowsy, Booty. Well fed — and it's been a busy day. I'm pleased with it."

  "Pleased? How?"

  "Meeting you. I know you're going to be good company. You've no idea how deadly a trip can be with nobody who is interesting. I don't mean because you're — very pretty and you've got beautiful bulges. You're a smart girl. You have ideas and thoughts that you hide."

  Nick was glad she could not see his expression in the semidarkness. He meant what he said, but there was so much he left out. She had ideas and thoughts that she hid, all right, and they might be interesting and valuable — or warped and deadly. He wished he knew exactly what her connection was with John J. Johnson and what the Negro had given her.

  "You're a strange man, Andy. Have you ever been in any other business than travel? I can imagine you as an executive of some kind. Not insurance or finance but some kind of business with action in it"

  "I've done a few things in other lines. Like most everybody. But the travel business appeals to me. An associate and I may buy a piece of Edman's operation." He could not tell if she was pumping him or just interested in his background. "What are your hopes, now that college is over?"

  "Work at something. Create. Live." She sighed and stretched and squirmed and snuggled, a rearranging of her soft curves that distributed them along his body, touching at many points. She kissed his chin.

  He ran his hand between her arm and body. There was no resistance; when he drew it up and back he felt the soft breast push at him. He caressed it gently, a slow Braille reading of the smooth wool. When his tactile fingertips detected the stiffening of the nipple he concentrated, reading the stirring phrase over and over and over again. Booty gave a small purring sound and he felt light, slim fingers explore his tie clip, unfasten shirt buttons, pull up his undershirt He thought the pads of her hand might be cool, but they were like warm feathers above his navel. He drew up the yellow sweater and her skin felt like warm silk.

  She fastened her lips to his and it was better than before, their flesh molding like ductile, buttery taffy into one sweet mass. He solved the brief puzzle of her bra catch and the Braille became alive and real, his senses rejoicing in the ancient contact, subconscious memories of well-being and nourishment stirred by the warm thrust of her firm breast.

  Her manipulations sent the memories and anticipations coursing along his backbone. She was deft, creative, patient. Just as he found the zipper on the side of her skirt she whispered, "Tell me what it is..."

  It's the nicest thing that has happened to me for a long, long time," he answered softly.

  "That's nice. But I mean the other thing."

  Her hand was a magnet, a vibrator without wires, a milkmaid's cloying persuasion, a tender giant's paw containing all of him, the clutch of a butterfly on a throbbing leaf. What did she want him to say? She knew what she was doing. "It's delicious," he said. "A swim in cotton candy. Being able to fly on moonbeams. A roller coaster ride in a good dream. How would you describe it when you..."

  "I mean the thing under your left arm," she murmured clearly. "You've been keeping it away from me ever since we sat down. Why are you carrying a gun?"

  Chapter Two

  He was yanked off his pleasant pink cloud. Oh, Wilhelmina, why do you have to be so fat and heavy to be so accurate and dependable? Stuart, AXE's chief weapons engineer, modified the Lugers with shortened barrels and thin plastic grips, but they were still big guns to hide even in the perfectly fitted underarm holsters. Walking, sitting, they rode snugly without a trace of a bulge, but when you wrestled with a sexpot kitten like Booty sooner or later she bumped metal.

  "We're going to Africa," Nick reminded her, "where our clients are exposed to a lot of dangers. Among other things I'm your security guard. We've never had any trouble there, the place is really civilized now, but..."

  "And you'll protect us from lions and tigers and natives with spears?"

  "That's the rough idea." He felt foolish. Booty had the most annoying way of saving ordinary things that laughed at you. The delightful fingers made one final stroke that made him squirm involuntarily, and were withdrawn. He felt both disappointed and foolish.

  "I think you're talking nonsense," Booty whispered. "Are you with the FBI?"

  "Of course not."

  "If you were I suppose you'd lie."

  "I hate lies." That was the truth. He hoped she didn't revert to her DA role and cross-examine him about other government agencies. Most people didn't know about AXE, but Booty wasn't most people.

  "Are you a private detective? Did any of our fathers hire you to keep an eye on one of us or all of us? If he did I'll..."

  "You've got a big imagination for such a young girl." That stopped her. "You've been in your comfortable, protected world so much of your life you think that's all there is. You ever go into the Mexican shack towns down home? Have you seen El Paso's slums? Remember the Indian hovels on the back roads in Navaho country?"

  "Yes," she replied hesitantly.

  He kept his voice low but crisp and firm. This might work — when in doubt and pressed, attack. "Where we're going those folks would qualify as high-income suburbanites. In Rhodesia itself the whites are outnumbered twenty to one. They keep a stiff upper lip and smile because if they don't their teeth will chatter. Count in the revolutionaries glaring over the borders and the odds in some places are seventy-five to one. When the opposition gets arms — and they're getting them — it'll be a worse setup than Israel facing the Arab legions."

  "But tourists aren't usually bothered — are they?"

  "There have been plenty of incidents, as they're called. There may be danger and it's
my job to cool it. If you're going to tease me about it I'll change my seat and we'll make the rest of the trip as business friends. You enjoy yourself. I'll work."

  "Don't be angry, Andy. What do you think about the African situation where we're going? I mean — the Europeans did grab the best parts of the country away from the natives, didn't they? And the raw materials..."

  "Politics don't interest me," Nick lied. "I suppose the natives get some benefits. Do you know the girls who are joining us at Frankfurt?"

  Booty didn't She fell asleep nestled against him.

  The eight additions to the group were all eye-catchers, each in her own way. Nick wondered if wealth helped good looks or if it was the good food, extra vitamins, educational polish, and expensive clothes. They changed airlines at Johannesburg, had their first looks at Africa's mountains, jungles, and endless plains of bundu, the veldt or bush country.

  Salisbury reminded Nick of Tucson, Arizona, with Atlanta, Georgia's, suburbs and vegetation added. They were given an introductory tour of the city in the contractor's shiny Austins. Nick noted that the contractor-trade name for local providers of cars, guides, and travel services — brought four big men with him in addition to the seven drivers with the cars. Security?

  They saw a modern city with wide streets lined with colorful, flowering trees, with plentiful parks and contemporary British architecture. Nick rode with Ian Masters, the contractor, with Booty and Ruth Crossman in the same car, and Masters pointed out sites they would revisit at leisure. Masters was a powerful man with a booming voice which fitted his curved black lancer's moustache. You expected him to roar at any moment, "Trooo-o-p. Canter. Charge!"

  "Well arrange special visits to suit individuals," he said. "I'll give out checklists at the dinner tonight You mustn't miss the museum and Rhodesia National Gallery. The National Archives' galleries are very worthwhile, and the Robert Mcllwaine National Park with its game reserve — it'll prime you for Wankie. You'll want to see the aloes and cycads at Ewanrigg Park and Mazoe and the Balancing Rocks."