18 - The Unfair Fare Affair Read Online Free Page B

memorandum stating that a certain Ferenc Sujic, who robbed a bank at Plzen, in Czechoslovakia, of close to half a million dollars last month, was thought to be on one of the Peloponnesian Islands in the Aegean. It adds," Waverly commented dryly, "that he was believed to have spent several days in Liechtenstein on the way! No doubt to bank some of the money and form a tax-free company or two!
    "And the final exhibit is a newspaper cutting. This is a story that has, as it were, a beginning but no end—yet— whereas both the others were complete, inasmuch as you knew where the subject came from and where he went. Here, though—read it for yourself."
    The agent took the slip of newsprint and read,
PARIS, Tuesday—Gerard Mathieu, "The Man They Can't Convict," has got away with it again! The stocky nightclub owner, summoned to appear before an examining magistrate today on charges concerning a gang shooting in Montmartre last month, had fled just before detectives from the Police Judiciare arrived at his plush avenue Marceau apartment.
A spokesman from the quai des Orfèvres told me tonight that although they had thrown a ring around Paris immediately, Mathieu—against whom further charges involving extortion and drugs may soon be lodged—seemed to have escaped the net.
"We have every hope," the spokesman said, "that the malefactor will nevertheless be safely under lock and key within forty-eight hours." Underworld sources close to Mathieu were openly scornful of this claim this evening. I was told definitely that the wanted man had already left metropolitan France. Further rumors current in Montmartre hint that "The Man They Can't Convict" may be back among his own people in Corsica—and officials at Nice Airport confirmed that an unidentified private aircraft flying very high crossed the Côte d'Azur in a south easterly direction late this afternoon.
If Mathieu has in fact gone to ground in Corsica, informed opinion is that he will never be found by the mainland police. Born forty-eight years ago in Bastia, he is known—despite his record—to have become something of a hero to the people of the island.
    Solo handed the clipping back without comment. He looked at his chief with raised brows.
    Waverly was smiling, a benevolent owl behind his glasses. "Four movements," he said. "One south and east—from Denmark through Holland to Germany. One eastward, conveying someone behind the so-called Iron Curtain. Another west and then southeast, bringing someone from behind the Curtain. And finally one supposedly south, from Paris to Corsica. A swindler, a deserter, a bankrobber, and a gang boss. What have they all in common, Mr. Solo?"
    "That they're all on the run, I suppose—three of them from the law and the defector from the U. S. army authorities."
    "Nothing more?"
    Solo thought for a moment. "I guess not," he said at last.
    "Mr. Solo, you disappoint me. This suggests to me—taken in conjunction with my own experience—that there exists a highly organized and efficient escape network spreading all over Europe, that it is nonpolitical in conception (witness the two-way traffic vis-à-vis the Eastern bloc), and that persons availing themselves of the service can be transported in speed and apparent comfort from any European country to any other."
    Solo looked dubious. Beneath brown eyes, the set of his cleft chin was stubborn. "If you don't mind my saying so, sir, I think you're deducing a lot from a very few facts," he said. "And even assuming you're correct, I still don't see…"
    "That we have any right to investigate such a network?"
    "Yes, sir."
    Waverly joined together the tips of his fingers and sup ported the soft underside of his jaw on the steeple so formed. "By the book, of course, you are right," he said. "But I have a hunch; I'm certain I'm right—facts or no facts. And that being so—"
    "Oh, look, Mr. Waverly," Solo broke in agitatedly, "we can't... we simply cannot go in there and stir things up! It's none of