The Third Twin - Ken Follett [180]
60
MR. OLIVER PRODUCED AN ENORMOUS PISTOL HE HAD KEPT from World War II. “Took it off a German prisoner,” he said. “Colored soldiers weren’t generally allowed to carry firearms in those days.” He sat on Jeannie’s couch, pointing the gun at Harvey.
Lisa was on the phone, trying to find George Dassault.
Jeannie said: “I’m going to check myself into the hotel and reconnoiter.” She put a few things into a suitcase and drove to the Stouffer Hotel, thinking about how they would get Harvey to a room without attracting the attention of hotel security.
The Stouffer had an underground garage; that was a good start. She left her car there and took the elevator. It went only to the lobby, not to the rooms, she observed. To get to the rooms you had to take another elevator. But all elevators were grouped together in a passageway off the main lobby, not visible from the reception desk, and it would take only a few seconds to cross the passage from the garage elevator to the room elevator. Would they be carrying Harvey, or dragging him, or would he be cooperative and walk? She found it difficult to envisage.
She checked in, went to her room, put down her suitcase, then left immediately and drove back to her apartment.
“I reached George Dassault!” Lisa said excitedly as soon as she walked in.
“That’s great! Where?”
“I found his mother in Buffalo, and she gave me his number in New York. He’s an actor in a play off-off-off-Broadway.”
“Will he come tomorrow?”
“Yes. ‘I’ll do anything for publicity,’ he said. I fixed up his flight and I said I’d meet him at the airport.”
“That’s wonderful!”
“We’ll have three clones: it will look incredible on TV.”
“If we can get Harvey into the hotel.” Jeannie turned to Mr. Oliver. “We can avoid the hotel doorman by driving into the underground garage. The garage elevator goes only as far as the ground floor of the hotel. You have to get out there and get another elevator to the rooms. But the elevator bank is kind of concealed.”
Mr. Oliver said dubiously: “All the same, we’re going to have to keep him quiet for a good five, maybe ten, minutes while we get him from the car to the room. And what if some of the hotel guests see him all tied up? They might ask questions, or call security.”
Jeannie looked at Harvey, lying bound and gagged on the floor. He was watching them and listening. “I’ve been thinking about this, and I have some ideas,” Jeannie said. “Can you retie his feet so he can walk, but not very fast?”
“Sure.”
While Mr. Oliver was doing that, Jeannie went into her bedroom. From her closet she took a colorful sarong she had bought for the beach, a big wraparound shawl, a handkerchief, and a Nancy Reagan mask she had been given at a party and had forgotten to throw away.
Mr. Oliver was getting Harvey to his feet. As soon as he was upright, Harvey took a swing at Mr. Oliver with his bound hands. Jeannie gasped and Lisa screamed. But Mr. Oliver seemed to have been expecting it. He dodged the blow easily, then hit Harvey in the stomach with the butt of the gun. Harvey grunted and bent double, and Mr. Oliver hit him with the gun butt again, this time on his head. Harvey sank to his knees. Mr. Oliver hauled him up again. Now he seemed docile.
“I want to dress him up,” Jeannie said.
“You go ahead,” Mr. Oliver said. “I’ll just stand by and hurt him now and again to keep him cooperative.”
Nervously, Jeannie wrapped the sarong around Harvey’s waist and tied it like a skirt. Her hands were unsteady; she hated being this close to him. The skirt was long and covered Harvey’s ankles, concealing the length of electrical cable that hobbled him. She draped the shawl over his shoulders and fastened it with a safety pin to the bonds on Harvey’s wrists, so that he looked as if he were clutching the corners of the shawl like an old lady. Next she rolled the handkerchief and tied it across his open mouth, securing it with a knot behind his neck, so that the dishcloth could not fall out. Finally she put on the Nancy Reagan mask to hide the gag. “He’s been to a costume party, dressed as Nancy Reagan,