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"THIS is Fle"

"And who the hell are you?" Ordinary voice, Hell&039;s Kitchen accent Definitely aggressive

"Filling in for Gordy tonight You Kroun?"

"Yeah Where&039;s Hog?"

"I don&039;t know"

"What&039;s this about hi Gordy? He wouldn&039;t do that"

"Well, Kroun, you&039;re in for a disappointht and plenty ot away, and put himself where he can stay healthy"

"How you know all that?"

"I was there, saw everything What the hell were you thinking, sending that brainless thug out here to take over froaveyou only did once

"Hog says he can do a better job" Kroun sounded like he was si just short of boil-over

"All he wants is a place to get drunk every night"

"Thecan do better"

"Check the paper, there&039;s a depression on Gordy&039;s doing daht better than Bristoould He keeps his head clear and has a brain inside it-"

"Aw, go buy a violin So you&039;re filling in? What&039;re you going to do about this?"

"That&039;s up to Bristow He will be found" I hoped I wasn&039;t talking too fast for this guy " How he&039;s found is his choice He can be dead or alive His choice"

"You bury hiot friends here"

"Then he should go back to &039;eot here Listen very carefully, Kroun If I don&039;t talk to hiun They&039;re plenty sore about what he did to Gordy"

"I don&039;t hear no proof Hog did anything You think I&039;onna take your word for it?"

"Your favorite son will be explaining hi"

"What d&039;ya mean by that?"

"Just listen: I&039;h sense to keep him alive If he should happen to call houy in this toants to nail him to a wall I&039;m the one man here on&039;t kill him I knohat&039;s at stake" Not strictly true, but Kroun wouldn&039;t be asking for a list

"Hog won&039;t believe that"

"Then he&039;s dumber than he looks Gordy has to have told hiuys run your business It&039;s none ofcos-that&039;s bad for everyone&039;s business"

"So?"

"If you can talk hi smart, I can clean up the mess he made and see to it he&039;s happy with the deal"

"What d&039;ya mean by that? What deal?"

"Have him talk to me, and he&039;ll find out If he doesn&039;t wise up, then you can&039;t blame anyone but hi intothey can kick my friends around and not catch one on the chin for it like a man That kind ain&039;t worth the powder to blow &039;em to hell, and you and I both know it If Bristow thinks he&039;s got big enough balls to take on Chicago, he&039;s got to prove it to ht?"

Silence on the line

"I said, do you got that?"

"Oh, yeah And Hog&039;s gonna get every word" His voice was shaky Mad as hell kind of shaky

"Good Now I have things to do" I hung up

Strome didn&039;t move or speak Same for Lowrey, who looked out-and-out appalled for a second before covering it up

Derner opened and shut his mouth a few times and finally said, "Where you want the funeral?"

"Mine or Bristow&039;s?" I grinned

"Both What the hell were you thinking, kid? Talking to Kroun like that?"

"If I rolled on my back and pissed uess not, but Kroun-"

"Is probably calling Bristow right now and passing on e just the way I want I&039;ll wait here for him to phone Of course, if any of the boys finds hirand in petty cash lying around" With the a on in the private casino downstairs, that&039;s probably what they used for coffee and donut change

"That&039;s the boss&039;saround, reuys in Gordy&039;s organization talking like he could walk in any rand? That&039;s a lot, considering there&039;s no hit on"

I was fairly confident that no one would collect Bristoould call first Not because he was sht ofdust, I&039;d arrange awith him and do my evil-eye

"deal" In the uys chasing around and focused on so else besides me Of course, if one of the boys accidentally killed his, but I was optimistic about Bristow&039;s ability to survive, even with a bounty on his head His bodyguards would keep hiood for them "I think insurance people call it a finder&039;s fee Gordy can take it off his taxes"

"Taxes?" Derner spoke like it was an unfan word

"Never mind Anyone deliver a paper here today? I wanna read the news"

Stro&039;s papers I sprawled on Gordy&039;s wide leather sofa and looked over the headlines The others took the hint and parked themselves at the other end of the roo case had faded froe, replaced by a milk fund scandal, union troubles in Detroit, and the latest load of woe fro them The Chinese were in desperate need of pilots and people to teach the to learn were from the upper crust of a very caste-bound society and took criticisave your noble-born student a poor grade, you could have your head chopped off Along with the war, they were losing flying teachers by the bushel basket Though many outside the country were sympathetic, there weren&039;t a lot of A their place

I dug out the funny pages, finding the been walking on the edge for too long, I craved inanity Strome, Lowrey, and Derner didn&039;t hide their annoyance at ood

The crossword looked interesting, so I went to the desk- only then did I sit in the chair-and played at filling in the squares for a while The phone rang a few times, but it was ordinary club business that Derner handled quickly to keep the line clear

Halfway through the puzzle it hit hs and hadn&039;t once resorted to the evil eye Hadn&039;t even thought of it I was faster and stronger than any of them and had used that, but it was different, seemed more square for some reason And no headache from the effort

But all the rest was ab I&039;d thrown out, I&039;d been rock steady and still was; it felt good, even This ordinary kind of sreed with est was doing all right for hiratulation, I decided to check the inside headlines for thatEscott hadsupper, but then he&039;d slept in late andNeither of us had listened to the radio, either I shifted newsprint around on Gordy&039;s desk

The kidnapping had been relegated to page two, and I expected a , but there was fresh inforan&039;s ave excuses, requesting a postpones for tomorrow and sternly lectured the lawyer about the i the court&039;s tian would be on soitive roster He&039;d be in jail now if they&039;d been doing their jobs For crying out loud, kidnapping was a federal criirl across state lines He should have been stewing in jail, not Mrs Gladwell&039;s base liars

But tacked onto the bottouess was the news had coe Rather than ripping everything, they&039;dstory Under a s that read "Grim Discovery at Kidnap Hideout" was a report fro-literally-at the farmhouse Dumped in the cesspit under the partially destroyed outhouse were two bodies, an old man and woman, apparently the owners of the property

I stared at the print a long tiain, carefully, but the words hadn&039;t changed I stood, throwing the paper down, and paced a few ti, Mr Fle?"

"I want a new edition The latest you can find Now"

"Okay" He went to the office door and passed the errand to so paper taken fro was once e, this ties listed, with a truncated history of their lives

In summation, they were elderly, had no close relatives, and kept to thean&039;s purpose If they disappeared from their isolated farm, no one would be likely to notice for unshots to the head

How had he found theone along the back roads looking for just such a setup? It would be easy enough to pretend to have a breakdown, stroll up to a house, and ask to use a phone Dugan&039;s polished h any rustic door Sooner or later, they&039;d find a place not on the phone exchange Plenty of those in far country They&039;d narrow it to anyone who kept to thehbors They could find all that out over a friendly cup of coffee Then Dugan or the other guy would take out a gun and with a couple of bullets claim the house for their own

If I&039;d known that to start with, I&039;d have killed Dugan and his whole gang the first night and lived with a clean conscience afterward

Mostly clean

I&039;d killed before It wasn&039;t my solution to every problem, and I sure as hell hated what it did to me, but in this case I could honestly say their deaths would not have troubled me too an was trulyquestions about the murdered couple A lot too late, the editors had co after all The cops were again grilling family and friends for his whereabouts Well, they wouldn&039;t be lying when they said they didn&039;t know

I wondered if Escott had had a chance to read this stuff and reached for the phone, then changed my mind That could wait until after Bristow called I sat and stewed and thought seriously about killing Dugan even now in cold blood There&039;d be nothing to it: just go up to a man chained helpless to a wall and snap his neck

Or use a gun so I wouldn&039;t actually have to touch hiht about that a lot, what I&039;d have to do to get rid of the body, hoould deal with the after as I slept on htmares, and if I stayed busy and distracted, I wouldn&039;t have to think about it For decades to cole minute

I wondered what kind of hole in the world he wouldto kill, not necessarily a bad thing, but a big thing, the old toss a rock into a pool kind of thing Would the ripples be too al fuss with the law looking for him, but beyond that maybe it&039;d work

But it wasn&039;t practical Too many witnesses Vivian Glad-well trusted her servants, but I couldn&039;t I&039;d have to rean to some other place Escott would have to be told or I could hypnotize hi that to my best friend, and eventually it would wear off and he&039;d re what I had planned, he&039;d help, becoree ether, and I could count on him, but he didn&039;t need this kind of burden Okay,to be proud of, but in the end too much of a problem to drop on s would serve as they stood; no need for eance We&039;d continue as before: let Dugan rot for a time, then turn him over to the law It was slow, and justice was sometimes uncertain if not completely absent, but better that soan&039;s trial didn&039;t go the way I thought it should, I could always step in and have a "talk" with the judge, attorneys, and the whole damned jury

I cut the article out, shoved it in my pants pocket, and pretended to read

Across the large room, Strome told the other men how he&039;d spent his day in Clarson&039;s office, speaking soft to keep me out of it He complained about the food, hoas treated, and I picked up plenty about him and how hisStrome that Coldfield&039;s people had saved Gordy&039;s life and were continuing to preserve it Throwing it up in his face would not make our own uneasy collaboration any better, and he wasn&039;t the type to learn new stuff, anyway I&039;dback to watch over Gordy

His Bronze Belt surroundings were too distracting to hi more attention to himself than outside threats Better for Gordy that Coldfield&039;s people played bodyguard They knew the territory, as normal, asn&039;t

When talk shifted to the present situation, I sensed a few looks thrown ot softer, but my ears picked up every word Stros, but Derner had seen ht I had a chance

"He does so to people," he said "I donno what, but he talks and they listen The boss calls hiuy&039;s all piss and vinegar, the next he&039;s on a train to Florida and happy about it"

"So?" said Stroonna ith Bristow We listened to hiets Even the boss wasn&039;t crossin&039; hi to that crap"

"The boss was learning stuff," Lowrey put in

"Ain&039;t thatover"

"Fle&039;ll kill him first He an&039; the boss owe each other He&039;s stand-up He&039;ll back Gordy all the way"

"Fle don&039;t have the authority to do any killin&039; I don&039;t see that kid having the guts, neither It&039;s just shoith hi underneath We&039;ve seen a dozen punks just like hias loud, and then they ain&039;t around no more

New York likes that loudo, including Gordy"

"We go anyway if Bristow takes over," Lowery reminded hiood Even if Fle stops Bristohich he won&039;t-Gordy&039;s deadtown Plenty of places in Jersey or Florida to work"

"When you going?"

Strome seemed to consider "We&039;ll see how this punk handles a real piece of trouble, but I can promise you Bristoill bury hih the door"

Gordy had so for him, but it was the nature of the business When he was better, I&039;d let hih he was likely already aware of it

"Stroive hi hih

I swiveled Gordy&039;s chair to put estured for Stroht," I said

"Make soot a chair and sat I leaned forward He mirrored me to a lesser extent, but we definitely had privacy I could be confident that Derner and Loouldn&039;t overhear

"Yeah, what plans?" His talk with the to his self-assurance; after all, I was just a kid full of ar

I took care of his objections to ood sharp pain behind my eyes When I was done, we stood and shook hands

"Glad that&039;s settled Good luck"

Histo re to his pals as he passed I didn&039;t do anything drastic, just told his would be over, one way or another By then Gordy would still be with us or not I hated that latter possibility, but it had to be considered One thing that would not happen was Bristow taking his place

Derner stared after the departing Stros to people"

As it ticked toward nine o&039;clock with no word froot antsy and phoned n of Brockhurst yet?" I asked

"Not tonight I think he took a powder"

What the hell? "Okay, you can lay off" I , bo He&039;s the no-show"

"Charles?"

"Yeah?"

"How&039;s the dance act going over?"

"They&039;re burning up the floor That blond pippin&039;s laying &039;eo for that snooty type, but they&039;re eatin&039; it up We&039;re having grief froh It&039;s that short what needs fixing You need to get here and do that"

Right Well, he didn&039;t have to hit me tith a two-by-four "I&039;ll be over, but I can&039;t leave just yet"

"Where are you?"

"Looking after Gordy He&039;s ready to chew nails over Bristow, but I talked hier" Escott kneell as I that Gordy was still out Now he&039;d also know that I&039;d caught his e

"Maybe I should talk with him, too Where&039;s he parked?"

"Don&039;t worry about it You can see him tomorrow He&039;s in a bad mood"

"I can cheer hi the Aun to his head Certainly they were listening to everything

"Look, I&039;et to the club in oh about an hour If Brockhurst comes in, tell him to wait All I want is fifteenminutes"

"Yeah, but-"

"In an hour," I said, hanging up and bolting for the door

I&039;d wanted to work in a stop at the Stockyards at soht but had to nix that Not that I was in dire need of blood; it was just to keep h But events had bulled ahead and sideways ofnotice froot lucky, reaching Lady Cry space wasit in case someone was on watch I drove around the block and backedthe owners of the property didn&039;t have any night deliveries scheduled

The as still ugly but blowing in a favorable direction forthe nearly e thick exhaust that the wind immediately shredded I kneouldn&039;t do that to o invisible, but it raised unpleasantthe last corner, I paused to check the front of hts were on One of thecurtains was held partially open; a h to be Escott-was silhouetted there, looking out Very smart of them, but they didn&039;t expectnarrow, I sighted a sharpshooter&039;s bead on the entry, intending to bowl straight in Not caring if anyone walking by noticed, I vanished and let the wind speed ainst the doors like ghostly flotsam I hit so hard it nearly sentme to sieve under the cracks into the lobby

Busy night I sensed peopleabout, couldn&039;t tell how ht have felt a passing chill They&039;d blaed upstairs and down the hall,in the room next to my office

Dark and eone, only the tables, a couple chairs, and a phonograph on its stand remained Excelsior scraps littered the floor, left over fro from theI didn&039;t need the wall

I could hear just enough breathing to know more than one man was in the room No one spoke This was a rotten ti to just walk in blind Not in the strict sense I wanted to kno many and where they were

One way to find out Da through the wall, I eased quiet into the hall and slipped beneath the office door, then had to try locating Escott a the several individuals here Tere behind ether, another seated on the front corner of the desk near the door, one by the , another on the sofa They were too scattered for unplay

Guessing that the ive hihed and cleared his throat so I&039;d know his voice

"What&039;s with those lights?" soot a short," said Escott "I tol&039; ya They flicker like that all the time"

"Goddamn it!" This was from Bristow Unmistakable He was on the couch

"They&039;re out again! Soht"

I took a hell of a chance with Escott&039;s life, but he kneas there and would duck quick enough Materializing in the dark behind the guy nearest hiun away and sla alun was pointed at Bristoas on the sofa, glaring i in what for hihts abruptly caht away The guy I&039;d clobbered and I both wore dark coats I stood in his exact saot Bristow&039;s exasperated attention

"Hey! Why are y-"

Oh,once the bad news settled in and took root His mouth made like a fish&039;s His brain had called a sudden strike and wouldn&039;t be working for an indefinite period

The otheron the end of the desk happened to notice so was off with his boss and tardily turned to look He twitched at seeing un, which was holstered under his aruy at thehad his back to the room It must have been the abrupt silence that caused hi at me in disbelief Most importantly, he didn&039;t et stupid I just want to talk" When they looked like they&039;d behave, I motioned the two on their feet over toward the sofa The one I&039;d hit was still down, gray of face and breathing funny He&039;d probably be peeing blood for a couple days

Escott had sensibly leaned over and to the left, ready to slip frohing with relief

"That was a bloody long fifteen minutes," he said, annoyed He must have been pretty shaken Usually stuff like this put hilish accent was back

"How er did you have to wait?" I asked

"Until you finally telephoned? They invaded here around a quarter past eight

The one chap had his gun against the back of my skull the whole tiht it would better lure you in unawares if you called first I was to get you here or at least discover Gordy&039;s location from you"

I was surprised they didn&039;t try beating it out of hie in a spot of uncivilized behavior, but nothing that would show When you walked in, the plan was for you to see me here as usual, unnorance, that I was just a club er not privy to my e," said Hog Bristoith satisfaction "Told us everything"

Escott shook his head, not quite rolling his eyes "One of my finest perforhShall I continue his porcine analogy by adding a re pearls before swine, or would that be too trite?"

"It&039;s just as well for you he fell for it"

"What&039;s that supposed to mean?" deuy had any friends,over for Gordy "It means you really are dumber than you look"

"Hey!"

"Shut up" I waved the gun, reave you ot it Why d&039;ya think we&039;re here? You think I&039;d just walk into the Nightcrawler on your word? That you can keep me alive?"

"You&039;re alive now, aren&039;t you?"

"Enjoy it, you goddamn pink-eared mama&039;s boy When I&039;rinder to turn you into dog food"

"You still expect New York will protect you after trying to buet that&039;

Escott eased frout punches, for heout ofWebley back froo out

The men looked up, uneasy

"Goddamn short," Bristow muttered

"Myrna," I said softly "Her name is Myrna"

"Who the hell is Myrna?"

"Resident revenant and guardian angel" I addressed the air "Thanks, doll

You did good"

"Indeed Extre apparently lost his nervousness about her "You two gentlemen join your friend on the floor Lie facedown and clasp your hands at the small of your back A little ainst the Lot of you and shall shoot the slowest in a very undignified and disagreeable location That&039;s better Now lie perfectly still"