Page 13 of The Number of Love
There was enough shift in the bloke’s eyes to prove he was familiar with Pietro and Barto. “Barto? But he’s such a good dog!”
“He is.” And Drake hated to malign him. “I don’t know what has come over him. But he ran around the back of your building here, and then I lost him. I think he may have slipped under that door in the back. Could I check?”
“Of course!” The bloke opened the door and waved him in, searching the street behind him. “Where is your uncle? Does he need to come in, to rest?”
“Ah.” Drake motioned to the corner he’d turned. “I got him settled with a cigar. He will be all right until I return with Barto.”
The guard chuckled. “I imagine. Go, go. Find the dog. I’m afraid I must stay here at my post, or I would help you.”
“No matter, I’m sure I’ll find him soon enough. Gracias.” Victory singing through his veins, Drake hurried down the short corridor that blocked the warehouse proper from this door. He whistled and called for Barto as he went, darting one look over his shoulder to make sure the helpful guard really was staying at his post.
All clear. Drake muttered a prayer of thanksgiving and jogged into the cavernous, dim space.
Inside were crates of various sizes. Equipment. Shelves. The light coming in through the grimy windows was barely sufficient to show him anything, so he withdrew a small electric torch from his pocket and got down to business.
“Barto!” he called again for good measure as he moved along one row of wooden crates. He switched his light on and shined it on the black words stamped onto the wood. This stack, apparently, was grain. He shook his head at the sheer volume of it. All this grain sitting here, and yet Pietro would probably go to bed hungry tonight. The owners of these warehouses and shipping ventures were getting rich from the war, while the average worker was all but starving.
He couldn’t worry about that right now though. Hall wasn’t interested in grain—or at least that’s not what he’d sent him here to investigate. He moved down another row, calling for the dog now and then, until the black words he sought filled his torch’s circle of light.
Tungsteno.
Wolfram.
Yes! Drake flashed the light along the row, counting how many crates there were, making note of the weight stamped on them. He’d have to do the actual math later with paper and pencil, but a quick estimation was sufficient to confirm that this tonnage was enough to tempt the Germans to try to obtain it—and to tempt England to let them, so that they could then confiscate it.
Drake rounded the corner of the stack to make sure there were no more crates hidden behind what he could see. He’d done a bit of research on wolfram after Hall mentioned it—enough to know that it was crucial not only in armor plating but in weapons themselves. It was rather impressive, having the highest boiling and melting temperatures of any known metal, and had first been identified right here in Spain some hundred and thirty years before.
More importantly, it was here now, in this warehouse.
A scuffing sound made him pause. It was not coming from the front of the warehouse, where the guard presumably still stood sentinel, but from the rear. Another guard? He’d have thought the first would have mentioned if there were someone else who could help him search for the dog.
It almost sounded like a dog. Or some sort of animal, scraping and shuffling. Drake eased forward, switching off his torch and sliding it back into his pocket. Gripping the handle of his pistol instead, he pulled it out of his waistband. He’d never actually had to use it—but he would, if necessary.
It was probably just a big rat, scrounging for spilled grain. Or a cat. A dog. Nothing to warrant his alarm. He’d not assume so, though. He picked his foot up and set it silently back down, moving stealthily along until he could see the bar of afternoon light spilling through the scanty inches left open by the massive door at the rear.
Not an animal. A man, squeezing through the space, as Drake had considered and then dismissed doing. Someone out to liberate a few pounds of grain?
No. As the bloke squeezed through and stood, Drake caught a glimpse of his face. A face he’d seen before, skulking about much like he himself tended to do. Thus far he hadn’t found a name, but he was all but certain the man was a German agent—Drake’s opposite number.
In the same instant, the man spotted him and apparently recognized him just as quickly. In a flash, he’d whipped something from his own waistband and squeezed the trigger.
Drake ducked behind the crate of wolfram as a bullet bit into it, and he swallowed back a curse. The shot wouldn’t have drawn any attention. There’d been a Maxim Silencer on the pistol’s barrel, something he didn’t have on his.
And attention was the last thing he wanted. Attention would mean more guards and possibly the move of this supply of metal. The undoing of all his weeks of searching. No, he wouldn’t go shooting at the man shooting athim.
Keeping his head down, he ran in a hunch along the crates. Another muffled shot sounded, another bullet bit into the floor an inch from his heel. The man must have come to the end of this aisle. Drake tossed himself over another stack of crates and rolled across it, dropping to his feet on the other side. “Barto! Get back here, you mutt!”
Footsteps sounded from the front. From his crouched position, Drake saw the shadow of the German freeze, then melt away as he sought cover.
The friendly guard must have come to the end of his corridor. “Is all well?”
Drake emerged from the rows of crates, putting himself in plain sight of the German, no doubt, but also of the guard. His gut told him that the agent wanted secrecy as much as he did, otherwise he wouldn’t have that silencer on the end of his barrel. He wouldn’t shoot him with anyone watching.
He hoped.
Pasting fond exasperation on his face, Drake jogged to the front. “Silly animal slid back out the rolling door. I’ll get him.” He moved into the stubby corridor, smiling despite the breath he held.Please, God. Please.A prayer not for his own safety at this point—the chap had had a clear shot of him as he’d moved and would have taken it already if that were his intent—but for the guard. He didn’tthinkthe opposite number would attack him. If he were here to scope out the wolfram, too, then he wouldn’t want it moved any more than Drake did, and shooting a guard would pretty much guarantee that anything valuable in this warehouse would be shipped to another. But sometimes the Germans surprised him.
The guard chuckled and opened the front door for him, obviously blissful in his ignorance of the bullets that had just seared their way through his warehouse. “Better hurry. Best of luck!”
