Marvel Novel Series 08 - The Amazing Spider-Man - Crime Campaign

by Paul Kupperberg

  Aunt May beamed at her nephew’s glowing face and patted his arm. “Take care now, Peter,” she said. “Oh, my, it’s getting rather chilly out. Is that jacket warm enough, dear?”

  Peter laughed happily and left, holding hands with Cindy all the way to the subway. It was still early enough, so Peter suggested they take in a movie, to which Cindy readily agreed.

  They sat side by side in the theater holding hands, and, for Peter at least, it was next to impossible to follow the movie. The girl beside him was too much of a distraction, and, midway through the second feature, he couldn’t resist any longer. He leaned over and kissed her.

  “You were right,” she whispered. “You aren’t shy.”

  Peter grinned, Mary Jane who?

  By the time the evening ended, all too soon as far as Peter was concerned, there was no longer any doubt in his mind. He was head-over-heels in love with Cindy Sayers.

  He walked her back to her Upper West Side apartment building, taking her past the sleeping doorman in the lobby.

  “I’d love to ask you in, Pete,” she said. “But it is kind of late and I do have to be up early tomorrow . . .”

  “Sure.” He smiled. “I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”

  Cindy smiled back at him and kissed him before stepping into her apartment. She started to close the door behind her, but Peter was still there, holding the door open with his hand. “On second thought, gorgeous,” he said, “maybe I’ll call you as soon as I can find a phone booth. I don’t think I can wait until tomorrow.”

  She laughed and ruffled his hair affectionately. “Nut!” she said. And he left, whistling all the way to the elevator.

  Cindy Sayers sighed and pulled off her coat to hang it in the hall closet before walking into her darkened living room. She flopped wearily onto the couch and reached up to a switch on one of the two genuine Tiffany lamps that stood on either side of the sofa. The single bulb barely served to illuminate the spacious room, lavishly furnished and appointed with the finest of furniture and antiques.

  “Quite a touching scene, my dear.”

  Cindy leaped up, startled by the gruff voice that came from the shadows that still hung over the corners of the room. Her hand went quickly to her mouth to stifle a cry of surprise. She turned to face the speaker, her eyes searching the gloom until she could discern his dark shape seated comfortably in an easy chair.

  “What are you doing here?” she demanded. Her hand reached for the second Tiffany lamp to switch it on.

  “No!” His voice was loud in the corner. “There’s enough light in here already, more than enough for you to tell me what you learned tonight from Parker.”

  Cindy put her hands on her hips and stared at the man in the corner, not speaking.

  “I said, Ms. Sayers, what’ve you learned for me tonight?”

  Cindy looked up suddenly, her green eyes dull. “Please, Peter is such a nice guy . . . really! So sweet and considerate. I feel lousy doing this to him.”

  The man chuckled sinisterly. “But you’re going to tell me anyway, my dear—unless, of course, you’d prefer I tell him the real reason you’re dating him.”

  Cindy’s eyes flashed her hatred for the man, but that merely caused him to chuckle harder.

  “Now, tell me everything!”

  And, in a low, faltering voice, Cindy Sayers began to speak.

  Three

  “The incumbent?”

  Glory Grant shook her head at the outburst from the office behind her. “It’s been like that all morning, Peter,” she said. “The man’s just not seeing anybody today. I mean, the governor called this morning and when I buzzed inside to tell him, you know what he did?”

  Peter Parker tried to look thoughtful. “He fired you?”

  “Ha! No such luck, my man. No, he blew that police whistle of his into the phone. I nearly lost the use of my left ear . . . What’s so funny, wise guy?”

  Peter laughed. “Oh, that Jameson,” he roared. “What’s the argument about this time, and with whom is he having it?”

  “Politics. He and Joe Robertson are trying to decide which lucky mayoral candidate gloms the Bugle’s endorsement this year for the primary.”

  “That shouldn’t be all that hard to decide. The way the Bugle made the incumbent sound more like a candidate for sainthood than the mayor’s job four years ago, I’d think Jameson would back him again this year.”

  Glory shook her head. “As you may have gathered from the last broadcast from the front lines,” she said, pointing over her shoulder at the closed office door, “the present Mr. Mayor isn’t on J. Jonah’s current hit parade.”

  “Who ever is?”

  “I dunno—Attila the Hun, Jack the Ripper, Hitler, maybe.”

  The oak door behind Glory burst open and J. Jonah Jameson, the grizzled, gray-haired editor and publisher of the Daily Bugle, stuck his head out. “Ms. Grant,” he growled, the sarcasm dripping from his every syllable, “if I’m not interfering with your socializing, could I impose on you for a favor?”

  Glory swiveled in her chair. “Oh! Mr. Jameson.”

  Jameson pulled the ten-cent El Ropo Special cigar from his mouth, grinning suddenly at his pretty black secretary. Glory shivered inwardly. Jameson’s rare smiles were not a pretty sight to behold, being something akin to the look a vulture has as it awaits a dying victim’s death rattle. “I’m glad to see you still remember me.” He shifted his gaze to Peter and the smile mercifully vanished. “What’d you want, Parker? I’m not buying any pictures today. Get lost!”

  Peter stood and shuffled his feet in mock humility as he grinned boyishly at his boss. “Well, you old charmer, you, you’ve talked me into it! Mr. Jameson, I’ll . . .”

  “I said get lost, Parker,” Jameson barked. “Get me Lewis Neil on the phone, Ms. Grant!”

  Jameson grunted and disappeared behind the slamming door. Glory turned back to Peter, who had frozen in his shuffling pose. “He can’t help it, Peter. I heard they dropped him on his head a lot when he was a baby.”

  “Can you believe that guy?” Peter grumbled angrily. “Last week he was practically begging me to work with his niece, and now he won’t even give me the time of day.”

  Glory Grant feigned shock. “Why, Peter, m’man, our Mr. Jameson’s a mover and a shaker . . . one of the king-makers! He can’t be bothered with the minor annoyances of us peons.”

  “Yeah, well, this is one peon who’s revolting,” Peter declared as he set his shoulders and marched to the door.

  “You can say that again.”

  “Har-de-har-har! I’m going in there to give old shark-face a piece of my mind.”

  “Albert Einstein ain’t got enough to spare to make any difference with that man!”

  “We’ll just see about that, lady!”

  Peter grasped the doorknob and stepped meaningfully into the paneled office. Jameson was sitting behind his desk, deep in thought. Joe Robertson, the Bugle’s city editor and Jameson’s righthand man, stood in front of the desk, both hands planted firmly on its top. “Face it, Jonah,” Robertson said, “it looks bad for us to drop the mayor like this, especially after we backed him to the hilt last time.”

  “He’s a jerk,” Jameson growled without looking up. “He’s a jerk, and he suckered me into backing him. Well, J. Jonah Jameson doesn’t make the same mistake twice. The mayor is out!”

  Robbie sighed. Jonah Jameson was a hard man to argue with, especially if you wanted to win that argument, but Robbie would rather be doing this than anything else he had ever tried in newspaper work. Here, with Jameson, he was in the thick of things, having to struggle with the real problems that face a city every day rather than sitting behind a desk doing nothing but editing other people’s words.

  Frankly, Robbie loved his job.

  Peter cleared his throat, but neither man heard him over the low murmur of the small Sony television that stood, unwatched, in the corner of the room. He saw it was tuned to Ian Forester’s network news program, “The Fores
ter A.M. Report.”

  “Excuse me,” Peter called out.

  Jameson’s head snapped up. “Parker!”

  “That’s right, Mr. Jameson. I’ve got something to say to you, and you’re going to . . .”

  Jameson was out of his seat and rushing across the room to where Peter stood, defiant in his righteousness. “I am busy, Parker. Do you understand the concept? Do not disturb. Otherwise engaged. I can’t see you now. I don’t want to see you now . . . or ever!” His face was inches away from Peter’s, the noxious fumes from his cigar wafting up the younger man’s nostrils. “So whatever it is you’ve got on that tiny little brain of yours, I don’t care! Am I making myself clear, Parker? Blink twice for yes and then get your butt out of my office.”

  Peter stood firm, arms folded across his chest. “Nope.” He snuffled, trying to hold back a sneeze.

  His eyes bulging, Jameson faced Robbie. “What’re you sitting there gaping at, Robertson? Help me throw this insolent young pup the hell out of here.”

  Robbie tried to cover a grin with his hand by lighting his pipe. “The boy’s almost as stubborn as you are, Jonah. Don’t you think it’d be quicker for you to hear him out instead of spending all this time arguing about it?”

  “Traitors!” Jameson roared. “I’m surrounded by traitors and mutineers!”

  He stormed back to his desk and dropped heavily into his thickly padded chair. He made an elaborate show of removing his watch and placing it on the desk before him. He fixed his glare on Peter. “Sixty seconds. Talk fast, Parker,” he said.

  Peter sauntered up to his employer’s desk and seated himself casually on its corner. “You’re too kind, Mr. Jameson. I’ve decided to do you a favor and give your niece a chance.”

  Jameson frowned. “Niece?”

  “Yeah. Cindy Sayers, your niece. I’m taking her on as an apprentice to teach her the photo news game.”

  “Great. Swell kid. Just like a daughter to me.” He picked up his watch and replaced it on his wrist. “Good-bye, Parker.” Thus finished with old, albeit unimportant, business, Jameson turned his back on the young photographer and resumed his conversation with Robbie Robertson. Peter stuck his tongue out at the older man’s back, a move which caught the amused glance of Robbie. The city editor nodded his head minutely, his mouth clamped around his pipe in a tight, bemused line. Peter grinned and walked across the room to watch Ian Forester, America’s most watched newsman, on the T.V.

  Good ol’ Robbie. No matter how loud Jameson screams, he just grins and bears it like a champ. He’s probably the only person on the Bugle staff that shark-face can’t intimidate with his butter-knife-sharp wit.

  Meanwhile, Joe Robertson was trying to avoid future intimidation at the hands of his boss. The current mayor, the level-headed black city editor assured Jameson, was the lesser of all the evils presented in this year’s primary election.

  “That,” Jameson declared dramatically, “is exactly my point, Robbie! Why should the voters of this city have to choose between bad, badder, and baddest?”

  “Jonah,” Robbie said patiently, “we’re just trying to decide which man we should back. We’re not choosing the candidates.”

  Jameson came out from behind his desk and paced back and forth across the thick carpeting. “I wish to hell we were,” he grumbled. “It’d be a refreshing change to have something other than a political hack in Gracie Mansion, someone the people of this city can put their trust in. We need another La Guardia.”

  Peter looked up from the T.V. “Like you, huh, Mr. Jameson?” he said.

  Jameson stopped in his tracks and looked over at Peter. He was about to snap at the young man to shut up and get out, but instead he leaned slowly against the edge of his desk and folded his arms thoughtfully across his chest. He puffed billows of smoke from his cigar and fixed a gaze on Peter.

  “Don’t be such a wiseass, Parker. The people of New York could do a lot worse than to have me as their mayor.”

  Behind Jameson’s back, Robbie waved his hand to get Parker off this dangerous topic of conversation. Robbie knew his boss’s ego far too well. But Peter was having too much fun.

  “They have done worse, Mr. Jameson,” he said.

  “Darn tootin’ they have, boy. I mean, let’s look at this logically: What do the people want in a mayor?” Jameson asked rhetorically, relishing the idea more and more with every passing second. “They want honesty, integrity, fiscal know-how, managerial skills . . . a man who’s got a good image, who can talk knowledgeably about the problems of New York with an eye toward solving those problems.”

  Peter slapped his knee and pointed at Jameson. “That sounds just like you, Mr. Jameson!”

  Robbie had his head in his hands when Jameson turned back to him.

  “Well, Robertson, what’s the matter with you?”

  “I think,” the city editor said, “I’m coming down with a headache.”

  Jameson stared thoughtfully at the ceiling for a full minute. “His Honor the Mayor, J. Jonah Jameson,” he muttered. “I like it!” The Bugle publisher whirled and declared regally, “Robbie, I have decided! I, J. Jonah Jameson, am going to run for my party’s nomination for mayor of the city of New York.”

  Robbie stared at his employer, not quite believing what he had heard. “Well, now, Jonah,” he began. Peter sat hunched over his corner, his attempts at stifling the giggle that rose in him rather unsuccessful.

  “What’s the matter, Robertson? Don’t you think I’d be a good mayor?”

  “It’s not that, Jonah. But you’ve never run for elective office before. Being mayor of the city the size of New York is a big job, not the kind you can do and still run a daily newspaper.”

  Jameson shrugged that off. “We’ll work it out.” He sat down behind his desk and busied himself relighting his cold stogie. “Yessir—Mayor Jameson! That does have a ring to it, doesn’t it, Parker?”

  “Real Quasimodo-like, chief.”

  But Jameson was impervious to all sarcasm at that point. Already he had visions of himself behind that great desk in Gracie Mansion, issuing executive orders, dealing firmly and courageously with striking police and firemen . . . and presenting the key to the city to Dolly Parton.

  “I mean,” he explained to the skeptical Joe Robertson, “it’s not like I don’t know from politics. I’ve been in the thick of things since the Thirties, when politics were dirty and made great copy. Hell, I’ve spent more than my share of time in smoke-filled back rooms.” He leaned back, puffing thick clouds of pungent blue smoke into the air.

  “They weren’t smoke-filled until you got there, Mr. Jameson,” Peter said.

  Both men ignored him. Robbie said, “I don’t know if you’re making the right decision, Jonah. Running a newspaper is a lot easier than running a city of nine million people. Besides, I think your job here is just as, if not more, important as being mayor. Somebody’s got to act as a watchdog for the public.”

  Peter tuned out the conversation, still snickering softly, and turned his attention back to the television. On the screen, he discovered with a jolt, were videotaped highlights of his rescue last night at the sporting goods store. He leaned forward and cranked up the volume to catch the middle of Ian Forester’s voice-over commentary.

  “. . . night at dusk. Though police had cordoned off the area, WNYC T.V. cameraman Nick Landau managed to take these video-tapes with his mini-cam from atop a nearby telephone pole.

  “Spider-Man, perhaps the most mysterious of New York’s resident super-heroes and heroines, arrived on the scene shortly after police . . .” The scene shifted to Spider-Man’s acrobatic leaps and rolls out of the range of the police sharpshooters. Peter nodded to himself. Show them those moves, Spidey! Hot stuff! The picture changed again to an extreme close-up of the front of Tockman’s Sporting Emporium, showing the brief battle between the Web-slinger and the two thugs in silhouette.

  “ . . . and though police sharpshooters fired warning shots at the masked man to warn him away
from the scene, Spider-Man managed to enter the store through an air-conditioning duct and subdue the alleged kidnappers in short order. No one was injured, and Chaim Tockman, the seventy-three-year-old owner of the store who suffered a heart attack, is reported in stable condition at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan.”

  Ian Forester, his open, gently lined face set in a somber expression, appeared next on the screen. “I chose this story to close my broadcast this morning, ladies and gentlemen, because it fits in with what I next have to say.” His steel-gray eyes stared directly and professionally into the camera. “And that is, this is my last program with WNYC T.V. news. Effective immediately, I am resigning from television broadcasting.”

  “Robbie, Mr. Jameson!” Peter called without turning from the television set. “I think you might want to see this!”

  The two newspapermen broke off from their discussion. “What the devil are you still doing here, Parker? I thought I told you to take a hike.”

  Peter turned up the volume so the others could hear it. “As little more than a reader of news, I do not feel I can accomplish what I think needs to be done. I have, over the years, witnessed much from this seat, become intimate with the most powerful men and women in this city and this country, and I am convinced that I am needed elsewhere. In short, ladies and gentlemen, I feel there is one place in particular I can do the most good, and, therefore, I must concentrate all my time and energies there. That, my friends, is in the grand city of New York, my home for most of my fifty-seven years.”

  Jameson and Robertson watched over Peter’s shoulder as the T.V. camera zoomed in for a close-up of the newsman. “Therefore, my friends, I have decided to place my name in nomination for the upcoming mayoral primary in New York.”

  Jameson groaned and slapped himself on the forehead. “He’s doing this on purpose, Robbie,” the Bugle publisher moaned. “Do you hear what that glorified news reader is saying!?”

  Robbie Robertson nodded slowly as he whistled through his teeth. “I hear him, Jonah,” he said. “That man is going to cream you!