Time of Terror Read Online Free Page B

in a simple cotton print that I knew, from my contacts with fashion shows, had set the Cleaves exchequer back about four hundred bucks.
    Her low, husky voice shook me, because she was obviously fighting terror. “You saw the girls, Mr. Haskell?”
    I tried to sound reassuring. “I saw them. They’re fine, Mrs. Cleaves. They said to tell you that they’re fine, that they aren’t afraid.”
    “Thank God!” she said.
    “They said to tell you they know you’re doing everything you can to get them released.”
    She turned away from me and her voice rose in a sort of cry of despair. “What are we doing? What in God’s name are we doing?”
    No one answered her. She turned back to me.
    “I don’t think you need to worry for the time being, Mrs. Cleaves,” I said. “They don’t expect decisions to be made quickly. The girls are being kept in one of the bedrooms with Miss Horn, who appears to have kept her cool.”
    Rather astonishingly, Constance Cleaves laughed—a short, sharp little laugh. “Katherine can be depended on to be cool,” she said. No love lost there, I thought. I remember thinking that while her speech pattern was cultivated, it didn’t sound British. I wondered if Terrence Cleaves had married an American.
    “I think you can count on the girls’ being safe for the time being, Mrs. Cleaves,” Chambrun said in a hard, flat voice. “If you will forgive us, there are a great many questions we need to ask Mark.”
    Several of the strange men in the room started to ask questions at the same time, but Chambrun cut them off.
    “First, a description of Coriander, Mark,” he said.
    “No dice,” I said. “Would you believe he was wearing a kid’s Halloween mask and a wig? I saw two other men, both wearing stocking masks. There is one thing, though. Coriander’s left arm is missing.”
    “That narrows it down some,” one of the men said. “An amputee, served in Vietnam. Hospital records.”
    This man was a slim, dark, thoughtful-looking fellow who turned out to be the local head of the FBI, Augustus V. Brand, known as Gus to his intimates. I came to like and respect him in the time ahead, but at that moment he was a zero to me. He spoke to a young man standing next to him who took off, apparently to check on Vietnam amputees. I told myself that could be a life work.
    Two men who had “cop” written all over them were standing to the left of Chambrun’s desk. One, a bald, sharp-eyed man with a fringe of blond hair around his shiny skull, was the Assistant Commissioner of Police named Treadway. The other was a great hulk of a man with a shock of iron-gray hair and unpleasant narrowed eyes. He turned out to be Captain Valentine of the bomb squad. Chambrun introduced them both.
    “These gentlemen are interested in what else you saw, Mark,” he said.
    “Just as Coriander said on the phone, enough guns and ammunition to hold off an army.”
    “What kind of guns?” the Assistant Commissioner asked.
    “Machine pistols, rifles, handguns. Boxes and trunks full of ammunition.”
    “How did they get all that stuff up there without anyone noticing?” Treadway asked Chambrun.
    Chambrun just shook his head.
    “Explosives?” Captain Valentine asked.
    “In every room I was shown; perhaps twelve of the twenty rooms in the north wing. Outside the elevator shaft and I was assured inside the shaft, too.”
    “But you didn’t see inside the shaft?”
    “No.”
    “How did you come down, Mark?” Chambrun asked. “From Fourteen or Sixteen?”
    “Fourteen,” I said. “I went down the fire stairs from Fifteen.”
    “Did you see any explosives on the fire stairs?”
    “No, but I have to tell you I wasn’t looking. I was in a hell of a hurry to get out of there. Two of Jerry’s men were on the stairs, though. They could tell you.”
    “What kind of explosives?” Valentine, the bomb squad man, asked.
    “I’m no expert,” I said. “It looked like sticks of dynamite tied together in little