The Longer the Thread Page 14

  “I was just talking to one of the cops,” Annie said. Her tone of level common sense came as a surprise. Everyone else, Thatcher realized, had been talking in voices transformed by emotion. Only Annie remained Annie.

  “Someone got the watchman out of the way by cracking him over the head.”

  “Do we have a watchman down here?” Lippert muttered. “I didn’t know that.”

  Eric Marten explained that a watchman for the whole block made the rounds, including Slax as well as other warehouses. “My God,” he said in dismay, “I forgot all about him. He wasn’t in there, was he?”

  Annie reassured him. “No, somebody clubbed him when he turned off the pier. He’s not badly hurt.”

  A new voice corroborated her. “Yes, the watchman was lucky. They only wanted to get him out of the way for a few hours.”

  Captain Vallejo had strolled up and now surveyed them with his customary bland authority.

  “When I heard of trouble at the Slax warehouse,” he explained, “I decided to come down.”

  “Great!” Marten’s explosion was a release of tension. “How much more of this do you expect us to take? When are you going to make some arrests?”

  Vallejo did not reply directly. “To prove that anybody set a fire is not so easy, Mr. Marten,” he said. “Unfortunately the courts demand evidence. So first the arson squad must work, when they can. No doubt they will find proof that this fire was set. But after that, things become more difficult.”

  David Lippert thrust his face at Vallejo. “What the hell do you want—a diagram? Jesus Christ, we need protection! Everybody knows it was Prudencio Nadal! Has he paid you off or something? Are you going to drag your feet—”

  This incoherent spate froze everybody. It was hard to see Vallejo’s expression in the flicker of light and shadow. He could have been smiling.

  David slapped away Eric’s minatory hand. “No, Eric, let me tell this guy. Who are you trying to kid, Vallejo? You don’t need a complete court case before you make an arrest. Why don’t you put Nadal where he can’t do any more damage? Then get your proof!”

  Vallejo was stiff. “You have a strange conception of our police procedure, Mr. Lippert. And there are other difficulties as well. You yourself know that Prudencio Nadal was busy in Old San Juan this evening.”

  It was Annie who made the obvious retort. “We were all in Old San Juan,” she said. “And now we’re all here in Cataño.”

  Vallejo was willing to make concessions to her. “We know that anybody could have taken the ferry from the old city to Cataño,” he agreed. “Crossing the harbor only takes fifteen minutes.”

  “What ferry is he talking about?” Norma demanded imperiously.

  Annie was contemptuous. “The ferry I took when I came over. And the ferry most of these people took, too.” She pointed to the crowd still growing behind the cordon. “That’s how people who can’t afford cars get to Cataño.”

  Cesar Romero hastily constituted himself Slax’s spokesman. “So we are back where we started, Captain Vallejo?” he inquired. “We all know who set this fire, but you say there is no proof.”

  Vallejo enjoyed scoring points. “I said we needed proof. I did not say there was none. We have already made a beginning. This was pinned to the watchman’s shirt.”

  He brandished a sheet of paper with crude lettering:

  FREEDOM FOR PUERTO RICO

  DOWN WITH IMPERIALISM

  VIVA NADAL!

  Chapter 14.

  A Dart Here, a Dart There

  It was nearly dawn before Norma Lippert finally consented to leave Cataño. Now, some hours later, she was lying in her bedroom in Isla Verde, in a sleep so profound that it might have been drugged.

  But downstairs, David was on the phone, as he had been for over an hour.

  “Person to person, operator,” he repeated. “That’s Harry Zimmerman. Z—I—M . . .”

  He mopped his brow. Still no word from Harry, and this was the fourth call. It was important . . . important . . .

  Just then the front doorbell rang.

  Hurrying to answer it, he almost tripped in his eagerness.

  “Harry—” he exclaimed, flinging open the door.

  But it was not Harry. It was two uniformed policemen.

  Lippert was not the only one working early.

  “I’m on my way back to the warehouse, John,” Pete Olmsted reported by phone. There was the sound of a suppressed yawn. “I’ll be talking with Marten about Slax’s insurance.”

  “Fine,” said Thatcher. At the same time he was shoveling papers into his briefcase. He had decided to return to New York on schedule, come hell or high water. Or, more accurately, sabotage and fire. “Let me know if anything interesting turns up, Pete.”

  Olmsted hesitated, then wished Thatcher a good trip before hanging up. He had been tempted, Thatcher guessed, to deliver a last-minute pitch on behalf of Commercial Credit. It would not have done him much good.

  When the phone rang again, five minutes later, Dudley Humble proved to be less self-denying.

  “So you’re going back today after all,” he announced, sounding too much like a man who has already played his eighteen holes. “Oh, by the way, John, have you heard about the fire at Slax—”

  “All about it,” said Thatcher emphatically.

  Humble took the hint. “Well, everybody here in Hato Rey will be interested to know the Sloan’s final decision about Puerto Rico.”

  Thatcher said that it would be forthcoming soon, then thanked Humble for courtesies rendered.

  “And if there’s any further information you want—about the situation down here?” Humble insinuated.

  Thatcher was tempted to retort that he had too much information about Puerto Rico already. Instead he said, “No, I think I have everything I’ll need, Dudley. I would be interested in anything new in the political situation.”

  “I doubt if we’re in for any surprises,” said Humble grandly.

  “Don’t tempt fate,” said Thatcher, replacing the receiver firmly.

  The taxi drive to the airport was, as usual, marked by enough near-misses to put from his mind any thoughts but survival. He arrived early.

  There was an acquaintance sitting next to him at the coffee shop.

  “I didn’t know you were returning to New York so soon,” he remarked.

  Annie Galiano was frank. “Didn’t know it myself,” she admitted. “But I got thinking this might be a good time to talk with the boys at headquarters.”

  “About Slax?” Thatcher inquired. After all, sharing the small hours watching a fire made avoiding the subject absurd.

  She replied obliquely, “That damned fire is the last thing they need. Especially right now.”

  Thatcher checked his watch. He had time to accept a refill from the cheerful counterman. “It didn’t do Zimmerman much good to avoid that strike,” he observed.

  “Not Zimmerman,” she corrected him firmly. “Annie.”

  Thatcher begged her pardon.

  “Granted,” she said graciously. “But to tell the truth, I think Harry could have handled it himself. The way I see it, anybody could handle that Nadal kid. He doesn’t know which way is up.”

  This was a far cry from the Ramírez evaluation. Thatcher wondered if sex explained the difference.

  “In fact,” she went on reflectively, “they’re all losing their heads out at Slax. Still, that’s their problem. I’ve got a day-care center—that’s the important thing.”

  Amused, Thatcher reached for the check and said, “You wouldn’t use Nadal and the radicals for your own purposes, would you?”

  “I’d use anything,” she assured him. “Here, give me that.”

  Gravely Thatcher told her that it was the Sloan’s privilege and pleasure to contribute to the American labor movement.

  He rose and waited for her to gather her belongings, which included an amazing number of bags of one sort and another. Midway in the endless trek to the boarding gate, he miss
ed one of her remarks.

  “I said I wonder what they’re doing here,” she repeated.

  Thatcher looked up.

  A detachment of helmeted police was fanning through the airport.

  At the same time that Thatcher and Annie were taking off, Pete Olmsted was clambering out of a taxi at the docks in Cataño. By daylight, the scene was a tragic monument to loss. Under the brilliant blue sky the Slax warehouse was a charred ruin.

  Eric Marten, moodily kicking a board out of his path, barely acknowledged Olmsted’s greeting.

  “A total loss,” he said. For once, his burly figure looked defeated. He was drained of energy.

  “Did you get any sleep last night, Eric?” Olmsted asked sympathetically.

  “Hell, no!” said Marten. “After we packed David and Norma—” He broke off as if he regretted mentioning the Lipperts. “Cesar and I went back to Bayamón. We wanted to check our coverage.”

  “What’s the bad news?” Olmsted asked. Insurance coverage is always adequate until after the fire.

  “It could be worse. Harry kept us pretty well covered. It looks as if the insurance will meet most of the dollars-and-cents loss. But that’s not the important thing right now.”

  “It helps,” Olmsted commented, but he knew Eric Marten was right. Insurance could pay for the money Slax lost; it could not buy back infuriated customers.

  “How’s Harry taking it?” he asked. “He was pretty wild yesterday, even before all this happened.”

  Marten was terse. “David says he can’t contact him.”

  The two men were trudging around the perimeter of the blackened shell. There was no possibility of salvage here. Slax was going to need a new warehouse. Olmsted said as much.

  “That’s one of the reasons we want to raise Harry,” Marten said. “Cesar’s back at the office trying now. We don’t want to go ahead and rent a new one without his okay. And we’ve got stuff coming into port next week—hell, it’s a mess. A goddam mess.”

  Olmsted knew that between the Lipperts, Romero and Marten, the Slax plant in Puerto Rico could operate almost independently. Still, everybody was hesitating, waiting on Harry. Olmsted did not blame them.

  “What do you think Harry’s going to say?” he asked.

  “Who knows?” Marten was genuinely uncertain.

  “You can’t blame him for turning sour on Puerto Rico,” Olmsted ruminated.

  He had struck a spark. “God, Pete, do you think this is normal for Puerto Rico? Sabotage and arson? I’ve lived here for years. Cesar is a Puerto Rican! This doesn’t make any sense to us either. You can’t blame Puerto Rico for a bunch of crazy kids. I wish to God somebody would do something about them—something final!”

  He subsided as swiftly as he had flared up.

  “This doesn’t help Slax much, does it?” he said with a bitter laugh. “I hope Harry is going to fight. But honest to God, if he decides to cut and run—well, I hate to say it, but I’d understand.”

  “How do David and Norma feel?” Olmsted asked.

  There was a long silence. Then, in a voice that gave nothing away, Eric Marten said, “I don’t know what they’ll say, either.”

  Olmsted would have pressed harder, but they were interrupted.

  “I thought you might be here,” said Captain Vallejo. Behind him were two squad cars.

  Francisco Ramírez Rivera was prepared to look beyond the fire in Cataño to broader possibilities. Although he had not abandoned the fiesta to watch the blaze, he knew all about it from many sources. Ernesto was not the only one of his supporters who had left El Convento to take the ferry and watch the Slax warehouse burn.

  “Say what you will about Nadal, he is dramatizing the cry for independence,” he said complacently.

  Ernesto was too sleepy to follow this reasoning. “But, Uncle,” he protested, “I thought we were committed to a peaceful transition to independence. Won’t many voters be nervous about what Nadal is doing?”

  When things were going his way, Ramírez enjoyed guiding his followers. “No one has tears for the property of Americans,” he said expansively. “Bloodshed, personal violence—that is what frightens people. Who cares how much money Slax loses, except the people at Slax?”

  Ernesto digested this, then raised a point that effectively dissipated Ramírez’ good humor. “Well, then,” he said, painfully working out his thoughts, “if the independistas like what Nadal is doing, won’t they support him instead of you?”

  Ramírez glared at him. “There is always that danger. A statesman learns to provide for the future. You will see, Ernesto, that the voters will not approve of Prudencio Nadal for long.”

  Ernesto would have asked for more detail, but the telephone buzzed imperatively. Automatically, he answered it. “Yes, sir. . . . Yes, of course. . . . I will inform him immediately . . . as speedily as possible.”

  When he cradled the receiver, he was wide-eyed.

  “Uncle,” he stammered excitedly, “the Governor has summoned an emergency session of the Legislature.”

  For once, Ramírez stared back at him in wild surmise.

  At the Capitol, later that morning, the Governor was eloquent, somber and decisive.

  “Today, Puerto Rico faces a crisis which threatens the very foundations of our democratic way of life. An attempt to undermine the right of the people to determine their own destiny . . .”

  Radio, newspapers and television summed up his long message tersely:

  The Radical Independents had kidnapped Harry Zimmerman.

  Chapter 15.

  Out of Whole Cloth

  The Governor’s message signaled the onset of a state of emergency that swiftly pervaded all Puerto Rico. Everywhere, from the airport in San Juan to the waterfront at Mayagüez, police and security forces were already swinging into action—rounding up terrorists, confiscating firearms, hunting door to door. Even the isolation of the resort hotels was breached; police combed pool clubs, casinos, marinas. The crisis preempted newspapers and television. In place of disk jockeys, social notes and commercials, there were photographs and descriptions of the victim.

  Over and over, announcers repeated the meager facts. “The ransom note, delivered to the editor of El Mundo this morning, read as follows: ‘We have Zimmerman. He will be released Only When U.S. gangsters promise to free Puerto Ricol Radicals for Independence!’”

  Radios in homes, in bars, in automobiles, in stores blared another message:

  “. . . Anyone who can assist is urged to contact the police. Also desired is information about the whereabouts of Prudencio Nadal, aged twenty-two, formerly a student at the University of Puerto Rico. Also sought is a female companion, Antonia Viera, aged eighteen. Both are wanted for questioning. . . .”

  Emergency measures were already disrupting the fabric of life. The university was closed; the National Guard was activated; military and naval installations all over Puerto Rico were put on the alert. Buses, cars, boats, trucks—everything that moved was halted, searched.

  Some emergency measures were as visible as the Coast Guard helicopters scanning every inch of coastline. Others were not. Behind closed doors at La Fortaleza, a hastily appointed committee was in session. Their subject was the proposed suspension of the constitution.

  “Unless, of course, Zimmerman is released safely in the immediate future,” said the Governor’s aide. “But we must be prepared for a longer ordeal. The experience of Canada, as well as Uruguay . . .”

  Francisco Ramírez Rivera knew the line he had to take.

  “The Independence Party protests,” he said perfunctorily. “There is no need for precipitate action. It is a grave matter to suspend the constitution, especially in view of the plebiscite. We will have to take under advisement any measure—”

  “Exactly!” a voice seconded him.

  “To suspend the constitution,” Ramírez went on, “is an extreme measure—”

  “For extreme times!” the Governor’s aide cut him off. “Puerto Rico demands u
nanimity, gentlemen.”

  This was not a threat; it was realism. The ground swell of popular support for vigorous action was growing by the hour.

  He swept on. “The people of Puerto Rico will not condone this outrage—no matter what their political persuasion. They support every effort the Governor has proposed. The whole machinery of government is working . . .”

  But hours of work by the whole machinery of government produced nothing. That day ended almost as it had begun—with one notable change. By evening, Harry Zimmerman had become part of Puerto Rico. He had been seared into the consciousness of people who had never met him or heard of him before. Total strangers worried about him, talked endlessly of his plight, prayed for his well-being and safe deliverance. In a way, kidnapping had made Zimmerman larger than life; he had become part of modern history.

  But the people for whom Harry was real suffered a more wrenching anxiety.

  “Why don’t they call up, or send another note or something? Why did they kidnap Harry, if they don’t want us to do something? My God, we could give them money if they want it. . . .” Norma had been talking feverishly all day.

  “Norma, you have to control yourself. You are making things harder for yourself—” Elena Romero hesitated only a shade before going on—“and for everybody else.”

  Mechanically, Norma twisted and untwisted her handkerchief. “I’m all right,” she said. “But Harry—oh, God, I know they’re searching all over Puerto Rico. But maybe they’ve taken him out of the country. St. Thomas. Cuba. Have the police thought of that? Anyway, what if they frighten the kidnappers? Maybe we should wait . . .”

  By now, Norma was unable to focus on anything but Harry. As for how her behavior was affecting others—including David—she was virtually unconscious. Since the news had first broken, she had been in the grip of uncontrollable tension. In those hours, the contours of her face had grown sharper; her eyes had become too bright. Her fingers, convulsively twitching, had turned into talons. If Harry’s ordeal were prolonged, Elena knew, Norma would collapse.

  “Why don’t you try to get some sleep?” Elena murmured, although it was only nine o’clock.