Baker leaned across his desk and stared at Ileana. “Why did you come back? You were supposed to stay with him.”
“I was afraid, I told you.” Ileana looked at him nervously. “I had a feeling that he was going to kill me. That he knew…”
“What made you feel like that?” Baker asked quickly. “Was it something he said or did? Something you saw?”
Ileana shook her head. “It was nothing like that. It was just that flap on the suitcase that I told you about. When I touched it I had the feeling that death had taken possession of his soul. So I came back.”
“But you never saw a stiletto there,” Baker said. “I have a flap like that in my valise. It’s for my toothbrush holder and razor.” There was a knock at the door. “Come in,” he called.
An agent entered, carrying a teletype. He put it on Baker’s desk. “This just came in from Mexico City,” he said. “They found the bodies of Allie Fargo and some hood in a deserted hut on the desert about a half mile from where Cardinali’s car went off the road.”
Ileana rose excitedly. “See! I was right!”
Baker looked up at her. “Maybe if you had stayed, we would know more about this.”
“Maybe, also, I would be dead!” Ileana snapped. “I don’t like this at all.”
Baker looked up at the agent. “Where is Cardinali now?” he asked.
“On his way back to New York. His plane is due at Idlewild in the morning,” the agent replied. “He has a woman with him.”
Baker turned back to Ileana. “A woman?” he asked. “Is that why you came back?”
“Don’t be silly!” Ileana snapped.
Baker began to smile. “I’m beginning to get the picture. He found another girl friend and told you to beat it.”
Ileana rose to the bait. “That’s not true,” she retorted. “I know the girl. She’s his mechanic.”
“His mechanic?” Baker said skeptically.
She nodded. “Her name is Luke something. His regular mechanic was ill and he hired her down there.”
Baker turned back to the agent. “Wire down there and get me the rundown on her.”
“Yes, sir,” the agent said. “Do you want Cardinali picked up when the plane lands?”
Baker shook his head. “That won’t do any good. We have nothing to hold him on. Just have a car ready for me. I want to see where he goes when he lands.”
The agent left the room and Baker looked across the desk at Ileana. “You better go back to the hotel and stay as close to him as you can.”
“I will not!” Ileana said quickly.
“He won’t harm you as long as he doesn’t know about us.” His voice hardened. “Or would you prefer deportation?”
“Being deported is better than being dead,” she retorted.
“Moral turpitude is a pretty serious charge,” he continued. “It means you will never be able to enter this country again. And it doesn’t look pretty in the newspapers.”
She stared at him resentfully. “In Europe they are much more understanding. They realize some women are not made for work.” She took out a cigarette and tapped it nervously on the desk.
Baker lit it for her and leaned back. He knew he had her now. “I think we Americans know that too.” He smiled. “It’s just that we don’t talk about it.”
She drew deeply on her cigarette. “I am beginning to get the impression that sex is considered un-American!”
He stared at her for a moment then he leaned across the desk. When he spoke his voice was almost gentle. “You’re frightened, aren’t you?”
She looked up into his eyes, then she nodded slowly. “At first I thought it was all a big joke. But now I realize it is not. I am beginning to get very frightened.”
He got to his feet and walked around the desk to her. “Try not to, Baroness,” he said slowly. “We’ll keep an eye on you. And I promise we’ll get you out of there at the first sign of trouble.”
The young agent with Baker whistled as he saw Luke get into the taxi with Cesare in front of the airport. “Say, that guy does pretty good with the dames, doesn’t he, chief?”
Baker nodded. He watched the cab pull off. “Better get started,” he said.
The agent pulled the car out into traffic. Another car cut in front of them. He looked over at Baker. “Want me to jump in front of him?”
Baker shook his head. “No, it’s all right. Stay where you are. We can’t lose him on the expressway.”
They rode along silently for about ten minutes until they had almost reached the curve at Jamaica Bay. Baker looked at the car in front of them curiously. It still kept its position between their car and Cesare’s taxi. Now it began to pick up speed and swung into the left lane. A feeling that something was going wrong began to come over him.
He had been in this business too long to disregard hunches. He opened his coat and loosened the revolver in its holster. “Stay with that car,” he told the younger man. “I don’t like it.”
Obediently the agent swung into the left lane. “That car is acting peculiar,” he said. A sound of muffled explosions came back to them. “They’re shooting at him!” he shouted.
“Hit the gas!” Baker yelled back at him, whipping out his gun. He leaned out the window and fired at the car in front of them.
Cesare’s taxi was going off the road on to the shoulder of grass as they sped past it. Baker couldn’t tell whether anybody in it had been hurt. He fired his gun again.
A bullet hole appeared in the back window of the car directly behind the driver. The driver pitched forward across the wheel and the car plunged wildly off the road toward the bay. Just before it hit the water, Baker saw the door open and the man come tumbling out.
They were on the grass now and coming to a stop. Baker leaped from the car and took off after the running man. “Stop!” he shouted, firing a warning shot in the air.
The man turned for a moment. Baker saw something glint in his hand. There was a ping as the bullet went by him, then the sound of the shot.
Baker flung himself to the ground. The man was running again. Baker aimed low, for the man’s legs. He squeezed the trigger gently. He wanted this one alive, to talk. His first shot missed. He fired again.
This time the man tumbled headlong to the ground. He rolled over and over and down a slight crest of the ground.
The young agent came running up, his gun in his hand. He looked down at Baker. “You okay?”
Baker began to get to his feet. “I’m okay.”
“The one in the car is dead,” the agent said.
Baker looked at him. “Go and look at the one over there. I tried to hit him in the legs.”
The agent ran off and bent over the fallen man. “This one’s dead too!” he yelled back.
Grimly Baker began to place his gun back in the holster. Cesare’s voice came from behind him.
“You’re a good shot, Mr. Baker.” He was smiling.
Baker stared at him almost balefully. The man must have nerves of ice. He had just been shot at, two men had been killed and his voice was as calm as the day they met in his office. “You can’t tell me they weren’t shooting at you this time, Mr. Cardinali,” he said, trying to keep his voice as calm as the other’s.
Cesare shrugged his shoulders. “No, I can’t, Mr. Baker.” A kind of mocking challenge crept into his eyes. “What I don’t understand is—why?”
Baker’s eyes grew cold. He felt the pretenses slip away from him now. “And I suppose you don’t know why Allie Fargo was killed in a shack not a half mile from where your car went off the road in Mexico either?”
Cesare smiled. “I did not even know that he had been killed. You see I did not read the newspapers.”
“You can account for your time on the road?” Baker asked.
“Of course I can,” Cesare said. “I was with my mechanic every moment. You can check with her. She is still in the taxi, repairing her makeup.”
“You’re pretty good at coming up with women to alibi you,” Baker said
sarcastically.
Cesare was still smiling. “Most fortunate,” he agreed.
Baker stared at him for a moment as a police car came speeding up. “Go ahead, Cardinali, have your fun,” he said angrily. “Just remember, we won’t be around all the time to protect you!”
The cab pulled over to the curb and Cesare got out. He leaned back into the cab. “Wait here,” he said to Luke. “I have to run up to the office for a moment.”
The receptionist seemed surprised to see him. He went by her into the general office. There was a group of employees standing around the water cooler. They looked up as he approached and scattered to their desks. He nodded to them and went into his office.
“Come inside,” he said as he walked through Miss Martin’s anteroom.
Inside his own office, he turned to her. “What’s going on out there? Why aren’t they working?” he demanded.
Miss Martin looked at him. “Are you all right?” she asked.
“Of course, I’m all right,” he snapped.
“We just heard over the radio that somebody took some shots at you on the way into the city,” she said.
“What excuse is that for them to be standing around doing nothing?” he asked angrily. “They are being paid to do their jobs, not to gossip.”
“There is nothing for them to do,” Miss Martin said.
“What do you mean, nothing?” He was getting angrier. “Why not?”
She picked up a telegram lying on his desk and gave it to him. “Our franchises have been revoked. That’s the last one. It just came in about an hour ago.”
He looked down at it and then picked up the other telegrams from his desk. They all read practically the same. The two Italian companies, the two English companies, the French company and the Swedish company. He looked up at her. “When did this happen?” he asked.
“It began the morning you left for Mexico,” she said. “I don’t understand it. It was almost as if someone gave the signal.”
He looked down at the telegrams in his hand again. Angrily he threw them back on the desk. The Society was so sure of itself. So sure he would be dead that they didn’t need to continue the franchises with his company. He would have to reach Matteo now. This business had gone far enough.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Cardinali,” Miss Martin said sympathetically. “I tried to reach you but you had already left the hotel for the race. I guess it was because of all that business in the newspapers.”
He didn’t answer. He was thinking. Someone would have to get a message to the postmaster in his village in Sicily. He was sure that Matteo was in the country somewhere but he could spend the next twenty years and not find him. His secretary’s voice cut into his thoughts.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
He stared at her. “What else is there to do?” He shrugged. “Give everybody their severance pay and lay them off. Tell them we’ll call them back as soon as the situation clears up.”
“Do you think it will?” she asked.
“I don’t know,” he said, starting for the door. He stopped and looked back at her. “And, frankly, I don’t give a damn!”
22
Cesare turned the key in the lock. He swung open the door. “Go on in,” he said to Luke.
She walked into the apartment and he followed her, closing the door behind him. Ileana’s voice came from the bedroom.
“Is that you, Cesare?”
He looked at Luke for a moment. Her face was expressionless. Then he smiled. “Yes, Ileana,” he called.
Her voice still came from the bedroom. “I don’t know what this world is coming to! All the rich Texans I meet are either married or phonies! This one actually wanted me to help him shop for his wife!”
He couldn’t keep his smile from growing broader as the expression on Luke’s face became more fixed. “That’s too bad, Ileana,” he said.
“I can’t hear you,” she replied. “But no matter. I’ve had Tonio ice up some champagne for us. It’s on the liquor cabinet. Be a dear, will you, and pour some for me. I’ll be out in a minute!”
He walked over to the liquor cabinet. The champagne was there in an ice bucket with two glasses. Solemnly he took down another glass and stood it next to the others. Then he opened the bottle and began to pour the wine.
Ileana came to the doorway, tying the belt of her negligee. She was smiling. “I couldn’t wait for you—” Her smile faded as she saw Luke standing in the center of the room. She cast a questioning glance at Cesare.
He looked from one to the other, enjoying the situation. “I believe you ladies have only met en passant.” He smiled. “Allow me to introduce you.”
He performed the introduction and gave each of them a glass of wine. He raised his glass in a toast. “To a happy friendship.” He smiled and drank.
Ileana looked at Luke coldly. Then she turned to Cesare, smiling sweetly. “Though she is a little thin, don’t you think your apartment is still too small for a ménage à trois?” she asked in French.
Cesare answered in the same language. “Don’t be a cat, Ileana. She has unsuspected talents.”
“I don’t doubt it,” Ileana said dryly. “But if the hotel management objects to one, how do you think they will feel about two? Or have you told them you’ve turned Moslem?”
It was then the idea came to Cesare. He knew how to contact Matteo. The smile broadened on his lips. “It does not matter to them at all,” he continued in French. “You see I have already told them you are leaving for Italy tonight and that she will occupy your room until you return!”
Ileana stared at him. “I will not do it!” she said angrily, still in French. “I will not step aside while you roll in the hay with that chienne!” She flung the glass at him and went back into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her.
The glass smashed against the cabinet and shattered into tiny fragments. Cesare looked down at them, then up at Luke. “Ileana has a rather quick temper,” he said in English.
“The important thing is, will she go?” Luke asked in perfect French.
He stared at her for a moment, then began to laugh. “You understood?”
She was smiling now. “Every word,” She nodded. “But that doesn’t answer my question.” The smile faded from her lips. “Will she go?”
“Of course she will,” Cesare said confidently, still smiling. “Ileana and I are old friends. She will do anything for me.”
Tonio put down the telephone and went back into the dining room. They looked up at him. “It was the airlines, Excellency,” he said to Cesare. “They confirmed the Baroness’ reservation for tonight!”
“Thank you, Tonio,” Cesare said.
Ileana waited until Tonio had gone, then she turned to Cesare. “I won’t do it!” she said angrily. “I don’t care what you say. I won’t do it!”
Cesare stared at her. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Luke looking at him with a knowing expression. He began to get angry. “You will do as I say, Ileana!” he said, his voice going hard. “Or would you like the immigration authorities to learn that you do not really work for me?”
Ileana looked over at Luke. Luke kept her eyes down on her plate. “Why don’t you send her?” Ileana asked resentfully.
“You know I can’t,” Cesare snapped. “She would stick out like a sore thumb. Now, finish eating and pack your things. The jet to Rome leaves at midnight.”
Angrily Ileana threw down her spoon and stormed from the table. They heard the door slam angrily behind her.
Luke looked up from her plate. There was a faint smile on her lips. “Ileana will do anything for me,” she mimicked sarcastically.
Cesare stared at her, scowling. “Shut up!” he snapped angrily. “She’s going, isn’t she?”
Ileana came into her room and locked the door behind her. She crossed the room quickly and picked up the telephone and gave the operator a number. A voice answered. “Mr. Baker, please,” she said.
He came on to the phone.
“Yes?”
“He is sending me to Sicily, Mr. Baker,” she said quickly in a low voice. “To his village. I’m to see the postmaster there and give him a message.”
Baker’s voice picked up interest. “What message?” he asked.
“It is this,” Ileana said quoting. “‘Tell my uncle that I must meet with him.’ Then I’m to wait in the hotel until the postmaster gives me an answer to bring back to him.”
“Good,” Baker said. “Now we’re beginning to get somewhere.”
Ileana could feel the fear rising inside her. “Good. Is that all you have to say, Mr. Baker? Maybe you don’t know it but Cesare’s uncle has been dead for almost twelve years! One does not carry messages to and from a dead man!”
“Don’t worry,” he said soothingly. “The uncle you are taking a message to is very much alive. In the Society each man’s sponsor is addressed by him as ‘Uncle.’”
Her voice was suddenly very low. “If it is the Mafia I’m carrying a message to, Mr. Baker, then I am really frightened. They would not hesitate to kill me!”
“I told you before not to worry,” he said still soothingly. “There will be a man on the plane with you and every place you go. You will never be alone. You did say you preferred rich Texans, didn’t you? Well, look for the one on the plane with you.”
Slowly she put down the telephone and lit a cigarette. She walked over to the French doors, opened them and walked out on the terrace in spite of the cold. She looked down at the city, its lights sparkling coldly in the winter night.
The sound of voices came floating up to her. Curiously, she looked over the parapet and down. The voices didn’t come from the street but from the floor below her. Her balcony was set back from the one below. There was a young man and a girl in a close embrace down there.
In the night she could see the girl’s white face turn upward in a kiss. They seemed oblivious to the cold. She shivered slightly and started back inside. She closed the doors carefully behind her.
It had been a long time since she had felt like the girl down there. Vaguely she wondered if she ever would feel like that again. Suddenly she knew she never could. That was behind her, left in her mother’s bedroom when she was nineteen years old.
Harold Robbins Organized Crime Double Page 63