Weatherbee sighed and shook his head negative. “No, this is on the level, Bolan. Look, I’ve had you under observation. I’ve known that you’ve been playing some sort of game with these people. Well—now they know it. You didn’t really expect to insult their intelligence forever, did you?”
Bolan dug a spoon into the coffee jar, extracted a heaping spoonful, and slid the jar toward Weatherbee. “You’re speaking of the Matthews,” he declared. The water pot was just beginning to sizzle. Bolan glared at it, then lifted it off the stove and poured hot water into his cup, swizzling the coffee crystals mechanically with one hand while pouring water into his visitor’s cup with the other. “They haven’t seemed so intelligent,” he murmured.
“Many, many dead men have had that same first impression,” Weatherbee said. He stirred his coffee and took an experimental sip. “They’ve pegged you, Bolan,” he declared, exhaling noisily. “They know who you are—and obviously they know why you are interested in them. And there’s a contract out, with your name on it.”
“What can I do about it?” Bolan wondered aloud.
Their eyes met. Weatherbee smiled grimly and said: “Run. As fast and as far as you can. Southeast Asia, if you can get there.”
Bolan shook his head. “I’m not running anywhere. How long has this, uh, contract been in effect?”
Weatherbee glanced at his watch. “About four hours, if my informant’s information is accurate.”
“And how long does it take them to get something going?”
Weatherbee shrugged the massive shoulders. “Not long. They must figure it as a fairly easy hit. The price on the contract, I’m told, is only five thousand.” He sighed. “To tell the truth, Bolan, I rather half expected to find you already dead when I came up here.”
“Why all the intrigue?” Bolan wanted to know. “I’ve been under their noses for days. Why the cat and mouse routine? They could have taken me any time.”
“Why yours?”
“Huh?”
The big cop smiled. “Why have you been holding off? Your object is to kill them—and don’t bother denying or confirming that, I don’t expect you to. It’s a matter of modus operandi, isn’t it. The same is true of the Mafia. Contract killings are their way.” He pushed the coffee away from him with a grunt. “The coffee is lousy. You didn’t let the water boil. Well …” He got down off the stool, placed his hands on his hips and rocked back, stretching himself. “… I’ve told you. That’s my duty, as I see it. It’s all I can do, unless you want to request protective custody.”
Bolan’s reaction to the suggestion was a disparaging grunt. “Where do I stand legally? If I kill them first?” he asked.
“You’d be arrested and charged with first degree murder,” Weatherbee replied calmly. He was walking toward the front door.
Bolan stalked him through the apartment. “It would be self-defense,” he pointed out.
“You’d have to prove that in court,” the policeman informed him. He paused at the door and turned back with a taut smile. “Look, if it means anything—you have my sympathy. But that’s entirely unofficial. If you exercise that trigger finger once more in this town I’ll be right on top of you, and that’s the way it has to be. Now I’d say that you’re between the devil and the deep deep blue. I advise, first of all, that you admit to the killings of August twenty-second and surrender yourself. A good lawyer just might be able to build a good case on temporary insanity. If you don’t like that advice, then I can only say run. Run like hell. You can’t fight these people, Bolan. You just can’t fight them.” He opened the door and stepped into the hallway. “Well—you want to get dressed and go with me?”
Bolan shook his head, said, “Thanks, Lieutenant,” and closed the door. He went immediately to the bathroom, calmly brushed his teeth, then shaved, showered, and dressed. He examined the flip-out shoulder holster which had been provided by Turrin, inspected the snub-nosed pistol for the dozenth time, then slipped into the harness and secured it. Next he went to the kitchen and took four boxes of ammunition from a drawer, emptied the boxes, and redistributed the ammo for the .32 loosely into his pockets. Then he returned to the bedroom and rearranged the furniture, sliding the head of the bed against the east window, opened the blinds at that window to admit the strong rays of the rising sun, loosely rolled the blankets into soft lumps and pulled a sheet over them. He went through the apartment, then, carefully closing all blinds and extinguishing lamps, returning finally to the bedroom.
He positioned a chair inside the walk-in closet, went over and closed the bedroom door firmly, then returned to the closet and sat down, rolling the sliding doors to a faintly cracked closure directly in front of the chair, checked the .32 one last time, then waited with a calm and patience he had learned in another part of the world.
The second visitation to the Bolan apartment on the morning of August 31st occurred at just a few minutes before seven o’clock. This time the visitors were two in number, and they did not ring the bell. They stood in the hallway for a moment, ears pressed to the door of the Bolan apartment, while one of them fussed with a mechanical gadget of sliding blades and protruding prongs. He tried several combinations on the door, moving with quiet care, then whispered, “Think I got it.” The door swung softly open. The two men paused momentarily, then stepped quietly into the apartment, closing the door carefully behind them. The interior was not entirely darkened but they stood quietly by the door for a moment allowing their eyes to adjust to the gray gloom.
“Still in bed,” one hissed.
The other nodded silently and they moved slowly toward the rear of the apartment. The larger man paused near the bedroom door, squinting in the near dark to inspect a long-barrel pistol he held in his hand. A silencing device was attached to the barrel of the pistol. The other man touched the pistol, his teeth revealing themselves in a smile. “No pissin’ around,” he whispered. “This guy’s good with a gun, they say.”
The man with the pistol nodded and slowly turned the knob of the bedroom door, pushed the door wide, and stepped inside, the second man right behind. They were momentarily blinded, squinting into the bright rectangle of sunlight beyond the bed, but the gunman raised his arm and squeezed off three quick shots into the huddled lump on the bed, the big pistol “plutting” dully under the muzzle silencer. Then there was a sliding sound in the corner to their right and a voice announced, “Over here, Charlie.”
The two men spun as one, arms almost interlocking. Orange flame was spitting toward them and the room was vibrating with the testimony of a fast-talking pistol. A scarlet geyser erupted from the throat of the man with the gun. The other crumpled to his knees, one hand inside his jacket and frozen in a Napoleonic imitation, the jacket itself quickly turning crimson directly over the heart. Another projectile punched into the first man’s face, just beneath one eye, the impact snapping his head back grotesquely. He went down atop his companion, the thoroughly silenced pistol clutched spasmodically in an uncontrollably jerking hand.
The Executioner stepped out of the closet and stood over them momentarily to confirm the results with a professional eye, then hostered his gun and quickly left the apartment. He took the elevator to the basement, then hurried up the stairway of the rear service entrance to the building, crossed the alleyway, fitted a key into the service door to the opposite building, and went in. A minute or so later he entered a small apartment of that building and went to a hotplate and started some water for coffee. Then he removed the cushions from a couch and produced a high-powered rifle. The .444 Marlin sported a very businesslike telescope sight; the metal parts of the rifle were wrapped in a protective gauze. A metal ammunition box and a cleaning kit appeared from beneath the couch, and The Executioner began methodically preparing his tools for service.
“Who is insulting whose intelligence?” he muttered. To anyone who might have been interested, sniper-expert Bolan could have explained that every planned offensive also contained an avenue of retreat. “This’s
no retreat, though,” he told the Marlin, unfolding it affectionately from its gauze covering. “It’s just a tactical withdrawal to a holding position.” He walked to the window and gazed onto the street below. A siren was sounding from not far away. He wondered how The Matthews would feel when they learned that the contract was still wide open. He wondered, also, how Lieutenant Weatherbee would greet the news. The Executioner, he realized, would have to step with exceeding caution from this point onward. Everybody would be after him now—the cops, the Mafia, the contract killers, probably the whole damn world. Bolan shivered slightly.
Fear is a natural emotion, he told himself. Use it! Make it work for you! It was a pep talk he had used many times before. But then, he had never been completely alone before. Make it work for you! Of course! Scare the shit out of The Matthews. Get them running scared, keep them more scared than you are, and hope that they come unglued. But how do you handle cops? You do not, Bolan realized, handle cops. You evade them. How long could he evade them? Not long, he was realist enough to understand that fact. He had, probably, a few days at the most. A few days. Well—he’d have to do what he had to do in a few days. He had to crack the Mafia wide open, get them running scared, evade their killers, evade the cops, and keep himself from coming unglued in the process—all in a matter of two or three days. Could he do it? He patted the big Marlin. Well—he’d do it or die. It was that simple. A chill chased down his spine. It was as simple as that.
Bolan discovered a truth in that stark moment of self-confrontation. He had started this thing as an act of simple vengeance. He could face that truth now. A strong sense of justice, a galvanic feeling of frustration, and a willingess to undertake independent action—these three had conspired to spell vengeance for Mack Bolan. But vengeance was no longer the issue, nor was self-defense, and this was another realization of Bolan’s new truth. He no longer hated these people, these Matthews, as exemplified by Turrin, Plasky, and Seymour. He had almost learned to understand them and, in so doing, had found his hatred melting. He had come to regard them now in almost the same way he had learned to think of the enemy in Vietnam.
There was nothing personal between Bolan and the enemy, no hatred, no score to settle. Life was just an overgrown game of cowboys and Indians. There were good guys, and there were bad guys. The bad guys had to lose. It was as simple as that. The Executioner had come to realize that he was fighting a holy war, corny as it sounded. Good over evil, this was the issue. This was the cause, and Executioner Bolan knew that he would never find a better one to live for. To live for—not to die for. There was no victory in dying, this was so clear to him; the victory lay only in the death of evil, and Mack Bolan found himself irreversibly committed to that undertaking. The Mafia was evil. The Mafia must die. This was the cause.
2 — The Rattler
It was just a little past noon when the familiar black sedan pulled slowly through the iron gateway to the suburban estate, the front wheels pausing briefly on a raised lump in the driveway. The driver of the sedan nodded to the young man in the caretaker’s overalls and moved the car smoothly along the curving drive of Pinechester. He wheeled on around to the garage area, left the vehicle, and entered the large house through the side door, going directly to the pullcord in the clubroom, announcing his presence. After a small wait, the tall redhead appeared, again sporting silken hip-huggers, these of a flaming green and slitted strategically for ultimate effect. The tailored smile faded from the pretty face. “S-sarge,” she stuttered, eyes quickly flicking beyond him in search of another presence. “Wh-what …?”
“What am I doing here?” he finished the question for her, smiling. “Can’t you guess?”
The professional smile immediately reasserted itself. She laughed nervously and took a hesitant step toward him. “Mitzi told me you’re a devil,” she said, her voice rising in obvious discomfort. “I suppose you—you’ve come to tame me this time, eh? Okay.” She swayed forward, hands moving toward his neck.
He stepped back and batted her hands down. “You know better than that,” he told her.
“What do you want?” she asked, now obviously frightened.
“I want you to get your girls out of here,” he told her, “—unless you want them toasted like marshmallows.”
She stared at him uncomprehendingly for a brief moment. “Is the house on fire?” she mumbled.
“It’s going to be,” he assured her. “Start getting them out. Now!”
Her eyes flared angrily, then wavered under the unrelenting impact of the Bolan gaze, and she spun about uncertainly, then went quickly to a small desk near the doorway, opened a drawer, and fumbled inside. Bolan the cat had moved silently behind her; he shoved her roughly and she fell into a nearby chair with a startled cry. She got hesitantly to her feet, rubbing a scraped wrist against the silken pants, glowering darkly at Bolan as he removed the clip from a tiny automatic pistol he had taken from the desk drawer.
“You better hurry,” he told her mildly. “I’m putting the torch to this place in about thirty seconds. Take ’em down the fire escape in the back.” He slung the automatic across the room, picked up a newspaper, and held it over the flame of his cigarette lighter. Rheeda gasped and bolted up the stairway.
Bolan tossed the flaming newspaper to the floor, beneath the window draperies, then quickly lit another. Moments later the clubroom was a blazing inferno. Bolan exited the same way he’d arrived, climbed into the car, and drove back to the gate. “The joint’s on fire,” he called to the “gardener.” The man threw him a surprised look, then turned his gaze toward the house, reacted visibly, and immediately took off on a hard run for the flaming structure.
“These old places do go up fast,” Bolan muttered to himself, then he grinned and pulled on through the gateway and drove up the road, paralleling the fence, for a distance of about a hundred yards. He pulled onto the shoulder, stopped the car, then carefully eased it alongside the fence and killed the motor. He reached into the back seat and produced the big Marlin, then left the car and scaled the fence, dropping lightly inside with the rifle slung over his shoulder. Smiling grimly, he crossed the grounds to a small knoll overlooking the house and drive, lay down, and again took up a patient vigil.
Women were shrieking and running about, most of them in various stages of undress. Bolan could easily spot the flaming green of Rheeda’s outfit. He sighted her in with the scope and her angry face leaped into the field of vision. Bolan grinned. Rheeda was fit to be tied. The old structure was consumed in flames already. The “gardener” was moving slowly among the women, talking animatedly, a large revolver inanely clasped in one hand. The distant scream of fire trucks edged into Bolan’s consciousness and a Chief’s car flashed into the driveway moments later, executed a quick circle on the lawn, and bounced to a halt just inside the gate. A uniformed man jumped from the car and waved down the hook and ladder truck entering just behind him, passed some brief instructions, then stepped back and allowed the truck to proceed on toward the house. Bolan grinned again. Telling them to never-mind the hoses, he guessed. The place would be gutted before they could even get the hoses laid out. Rheeda and the women were now clustered about the truck. The firemen seemed to be showing more attention to the girls than to the blaze. Another truck was turned back at the gate by the Chief, who then returned to his car and drove on to the house.
Bolan grinned and waited. There was an explosion down in the fire, followed closely by another. Bolan supposed that nobody had thought to move the cars from the garage. The generally unclad women were beginning to move about restlessly, and one barefoot young lady in a nightgown was trudging along the driveway toward the road. Getting worried, Bolan decided. He could understand why. Some embarrassing questions would likely be raised concerning the presence of so many underdressed young women on the premises.
A police car turned into the drive, stopped and picked up the deserter, then proceeded to the group on the lawn. Bolan could see Rheeda talking to the cop. He sighted t
hem in, studying the faces. Old friends, obviously. The cop was grinning and nodding his head in response to something Rheeda was telling him.
The firemen were watching the house burn to the ground. Most of the young women were sitting on the lawn. Rheeda and two others were in the police car. The Fire Chief was leaning against the patrol cruiser watching the young women. A limousine pulled into the gateway, inched forward, as though from force of habit, and rested front wheels on the macadam hump. Bolan already had the occupants sighted in. Turrin sat on the passenger’s side, in front. The man behind the wheel he recognized as one of the “guns” of Seymour’s poolside party. Two other men, their faces not visible to Bolan, were in the back seat.
Bolan shot the front tires off the car as they rested on the hump, then put a quick round through the windshield between the two men. Turrin’s startled and frightened face passed swiftly through the scope viewer as he hit the deck. A back door swung open and a large man staggered onto the drive, one hand held to a bleeding scratch at the side of his head. Bolan clucked his tongue; he had not meant to hit any flesh on that first salvo. The sounds of the big rifle boomed across the open ground. The policeman leaped from his car and. started toward the fire; all attention in that area was directed to the roaring inferno. Bolan chuckled and swung once again onto the car in the gateway. The driver was trying to move the car on shattered tires. Bolan put an imaginary mark on the hood, under which the carburetor should rest, and levered two quick shots into there. The car stopped moving immediately; the hood blew open and resettled at a skewed angle, and flames licked up around the opening. All doors popped open and galvanized men erupted from the car and sprinted for the cover of the trees a few yards distant. Bolan had been expecting it; he punched a .444 through one man’s leg and let it go at that, swinging about to scope in the police car. The cop was tugging at his holstered gun and running toward the burning car in the gateway. The confusion around the firesite was working to Bolan’s advantage, this much was obvious; as yet, no one had connected the knoll with the gunshots. He decided to use the confusion while he could, and punched two shots down onto the police car, dropping two of its wheels onto the ground. The women vacated rapidly, darting about in panic while the Fire Chief’s car settled onto two of its rims.
War Against the Mafia Page 7
