The Menacers Read Online Free PDF

least the person watching me from the big chair by the far window was a girl, and a redhaired girl at that—a redhaired girl with a bandaged arm and a bruised cheek.
    After the damage, the long, straight hair was what one noticed first. It wasn’t any of those sissy shades of reddish gold they put into bottles nowadays and sell to blondes and other interlopers. This was red hair the way red hair used to be before the chemists got into the act: brick-red, carrot-red, unmistakably genuine, since nobody would go out deliberately and pick such a violent color to live with.
    As is often the case with real redheads, as opposed to the bottled variety, the girl was less striking than the hair. One expected a truly spectacular female to go with the fiery coiffure, but all there was was a slim, pale, faintly freckled young lady, wearing a short white skirt of the slick material called sharkskin, and a pale green jersey top that looked as if somebody had started out to make a turtle-necked sweater but had tired of the project before tackling the sleeves.
    “Helm?” she said, giving me a hard look across the room. “So this is the sinister character we’ve all been waiting for!”
    Priscilla said, “Mrs. Annette O’Leary, Mr. Matthew Helm.”
    Annette O’Leary pursed her lips thoughtfully, looking me up and down. When she spoke, it was with a deliberate country accent. “He’s not much for wide, is he?” she said to nobody in particular, “but he’s sure hell for tall.” Her voice reverted to normal. “So this is the imported strong-arm man who’s going to drag me back to the States whether I want to go or not! Where does he pack his little whip and gun?”
    Nobody answered her. I asked, “If she’s Mrs. O’Leary, who’s Mr. O’Leary?”
    There was a rather embarrassed silence from my two associates, so-called. It was the girl herself who answered: “If you must know, my husband, Jim O’Leary, died in Vietnam last year, being patriotic. It runs in the family, I guess. Look what I’m getting for being patriotic right here in Mexico!”
    I grinned. “Is that what you’re being, Mrs. O’Leary?”
    The red-haired girl said angrily, “Well, I could have kept quiet about what I saw out there on the water and stayed out of trouble, couldn’t I? Or I could have sold it to somebody who was interested—that woman your friends, here, claim to be a communist agent—for quite a bit of money. Don’t think the offer wasn’t made, and don’t think I can’t use the stuff. But instead of cashing in on what I’d seen, I got in touch with the representatives of my native land, like a good little girl, and had them send somebody to take it all down on tape for free. So what happens? So I’m cooped up in a hotel room under guard for days, waiting for a high-powered secret agent type to either escort me north across the border against my will or, I suppose, kill me if I object.”
    She gave me a quick, questioning glance to see if she’d guessed right. I said, “Smart girl. I’m glad you realize that if you object, or if other people object, you’re dead.” I looked from her to Priscilla and her good-looking male partner—well, good-looking if you like that kind of looks. I said, “You heard, I hope. I don’t know what instructions you’ve been operating under, but as of now, that’s the official word. This lady goes to Los Alamos. She goes nowhere else in the world—at least not in this world. If anything happens, if the situation looks the least bit doubtful, put a bullet right between her eyes. Do I make myself clear?”
    There was an embarrassed little silence, as if I’d said something vulgar or obscene. After a moment, Priscilla spoke in her prim way: “Well, it’s your problem now, isn’t it, Mr. Helm?”
    “Not quite yet,” I said. “Don’t be so quick to hand over the baby, Decker. You two are off the hook when Mrs. O’Leary and I are on the plane and it’s airborne, not before. Have you got