“No, I just meant I knew which guy on Star Trek you meant.”
Maybe he wouldn’t be a manager someday.
“How long are you on?”
“Till five.”
“Two other shifts, then, after you?”
“Yes.”
“When does the graveyard shift start?”
“One A.M.”
“Good.” I handed him two twenties, folded once, lengthwise. “I’ll talk to the two night men personally. You just keep this to yourself.”
“That isn’t necessary, sir,” he said, meaning the money, which he was trying not to look at.
“Sure it is.” I let go of the bills and they made a little tent on the counter. “Now, I’m going to have to look things over for security purposes. Where is the press conference going to be held?”
He pointed across the lobby to some stairs going down. “The Bix Beiderbecke Room,” he said. “At nine o’clock Tuesday morning.”
“Thanks. By the way, my status with the Freed campaign is known only by the top-level people. So don’t go throwing my name around.”
“Uh, what is your name, sir?”
“Ryan. Jack.”
“Of course,” he said, smiling, as if the name had just momentarily slipped his mind.
I gave him a smile and a little forefinger salute and left him and the money behind.
The Blackhawk was an older, recently refurbished hotel; the lobby’s black and white marble floor gave it an art deco feel, though the extensive mahogany woodwork and whorehouse-red-trimmed-gold ceiling harked back to frontier days. The lobby wasn’t small, but a low ceiling and comfortable furnishings made it seem intimate, as did the way the thick pillars separated it off into areas. A row of shops and offices—one of them the rear end of the Freed campaign headquarters—was just around the corner from the check-in desk.
I went down marble stairs, following a sign that said ARCADE, and found an arcade in the earlier, pre-Pac Man sense: a row of shops and businesses, about a half a block long, beneath the hotel lobby. The walls were light plaster and decorated with amateurish murals depicting New Orleans street scenes, in honor of Davenport’s legendary Dixieland jazzman, Bix Beiderbecke, who died young. Frightened by the mural, possibly, with its grotesque Mardi Gras figures and frozen Basin Street musicians.
The shops were closed today, although from the looks of things, several stalls were shuttered no matter what day it was. Among those currently in business were a barber shop, a beauty shop, a shoeshine stand and an architect’s office. A ghost town on Sunday; I was alone down here, despite the crowd brunching it upstairs at the hotel’s Sundance Restaurant.
The arcade walkway was really just a hall—perhaps eight feet wide—with a fairly low ceiling made lower by chandelier-style light fixtures. At the end of the hallway were carpeted steps moving up into a newer, beige-brick section of the hotel.
But just prior to that was the entry to the Bix Beiderbecke Room, a short hallway with a short flight of steps that led down to an open area outside the room itself: a medium-size meeting hall with a door at right and another down at its other end, at left. I peeked in the door at right.
A podium was set up facing a room full of chairs, arranged in rows with a central aisle. Seating for probably a hundred or so. Standing in that doorway, I was within twenty feet of the podium.
I looked at my watch, waited for the second hand to point straight up. Then quickly ran from the doorway, down the short hall out to the arcade and up the carpeted steps. Checked the second hand.
Ten seconds.
I looked up from my watch and saw that I was indeed in the new part of the hotel, a high-ceilinged add-on that connected the Blackhawk with its parking. I was a few steps away from a door to the street, where there was plenty of parking at the curb on both sides of the wide one-way; and a few steps away from the parking garage itself, where if I had a car parked on the bottom floor nearby I was within seconds of wheeling out of here. A few more steps to my right, down a gentle Oriental-carpeted ramp-like walkway, were hotel elevators.
Back up the ramp, still in the beige-brick modern addendum, which was overseen by a huge, old-fashioned wall clock, I was facing the glass wall of the indoor swimming pool/sauna area. A few families were in there splashing around. I’d have a swim later. The door was kept locked, but your room key would open it.
The upper lobby’s arcade connected nearby, and I wandered back in, thinking over what I’d seen. A row of telephone booths, set in the mahogany walls, was on my right. I used one of the phones to call the number Freed had given me.
After several rings, Freed himself answered.
“Yes?” he said, thickly, obviously awakened by the call.
“This is Quarry.”
“Quarry!”
“That’s Jack Ryan to you.”
“Yes, certainly—what is it?”
“I’ve had a look around here at the Blackhawk Hotel. We better have that security briefing we talked about. Gather the key people who are going to be covering your butt at the press conference. I need to talk to them.”
“I can do that. When?”
“Is this afternoon too soon?”
“One o’clock?”
So I went in the front way this time, a hunting-jacketed sentry in the brown Ford climbing out to open the unpainted metal gate, and I drove down the paved drive, forest on either side of me, until I was driving along the edge of the quarry drop-off, the lake below shimmering with what little sunlight was filtering through today’s overcast.
I parked in back and was met by an armed guard in a brown leather bomber jacket and tan slacks; he had that same deputy sheriff look as some of those I’d stun-gunned last night, but I didn’t recognize this one, a round-faced man with rosy cheeks and thinning hair.
Me, I wasn’t in ninja black today, but spiffed up in a suit and tie and brown leather overcoat.
Freed came down the wooden stairway in back, off the kitchen, its railing freshly repaired, and greeted me with a smile and an extended hand. I shook it, smiled back. He was wearing a blue suede jacket and a light blue shirt with a string tie; his mane of white hair brushed neatly back, and the light blue eyes in the tanned face, made him seem almost otherworldly.
“Jack,” he said, “it’s good to see you again.” And he slipped his arm around my shoulder.
“Been a long time,” I said.
Soon we were in the open-beamed conference room, where the oil portrait of Freed as a riverboat captain held sway; at a large table sat four men, two of whom I recognized. All four stood as Freed introduced me, and one by one shook hands with me.
One of them was campaign manager Frank Neely, he of the steel-gray gaze and fleshy, intelligent face. He was wearing a sweatshirt that said WHY NOT A REAL PRESIDENT? VOTE FREED, with the last word given extra prominence by a somewhat protruding belly.
“Mr. Ryan,” he said, smiling warily, “please excuse my informality—this was a last-minute meeting . . .”
The other one that I recognized was a thirtyish, somewhat heavy-set, balding blond guy, who I’d met in this very room last night, introducing myself by way of a brass Presidential seal in the belly. He was dressed much the same as the night before: blue workshirt and jeans. When we shook hands he kept his grip insolently limp, dark eyes drilling into me, his smile a scowl. His name, Freed said, was Larry.
“You can stuff the apology,” Larry said, sneering.
“What apology?” I said.
“Larry,” Freed said. “Just sit down.”
Larry sat down and did a slow burn. Nobody’s favorite stooge.
The other two men were named Blake and Simmons; one had brown hair and the other blond, but they were pretty much interchangeable, a pair of oversize WASP ex-cops who had probably been football players in college or anyway high school. Linebackers, I’d say. They were, Freed had informed me last night, his security chiefs on the primary swing.
Both had f
irm grips; both smiled without revealing any warmth—or teeth, for that matter.
We all sat, except Freed, who stood at the head of the table, his back to the fireplace, which was going, his own portrait looking over his shoulder.
“Jack Ryan is an old friend of mine,” Freed said, beaming at me, so convincing a liar I almost had memories of our friendship, “who also happens to be one of the best security men around. Yesterday he handed Frank here a line, and Frank was ready to set up a meeting between Jack and myself, without running any kind of security check first. I think we’ve learned something, haven’t we, Frank?”
Freed said this gently, and Neely seemed to take it well, smiling a little, though the smile was tight at its corners.
The candidate continued, in his mellifluous baritone: “Last night—as Larry can tell you first hand—Jack ran a little test on my security team here at the house. We came up a little short, didn’t we, Larry?”
“Yes, Mr. Freed.”
“We’re going to be making some changes. Adding some staff. Changing some procedures. But that’s not why Mr. Ryan is here today. Jack, would you like to take over?”
Freed sat and I stood.
“As the candidate probably has told you,” I said, “we have reason to believe an assassination attempt may be made at the press conference Tuesday morning.”
Blake—or was it Simmons?—chimed in. “With all due respect, Mr. Ryan,” he said in a gravelly voice (maybe he’d been a tackle), “we got that covered.” He opened his coat and revealed the holstered revolver there.
“Ah, a .38,” I said.
He nodded.
“Must help you remember your I.Q.”
Simmons—or was it Blake?—glowered at me, but I got over it.
“First suggestion,” I said, looking at Freed, “is you change the site of the press conference. But don’t announce the change till the last minute.”
“That’s impossible,” Neely said, shaking his head. “It would be a logistical nightmare, and make for very bad relations with the media.”
I looked at Simmons and Blake. “Have you people scoped out the Bix Beiderbecke Room?” I looked at Freed. “Appropriately named, ’cause you could die before your time there.”
Freed was watching me intently. “Why do you say that, Jack?”
“If I were doing this thing,” I said, “I could shoot you and be on my way, in my car, moving, in under thirty seconds.”
Simmons and Blake smirked at each other, eyes rolling.
But Freed said, “Explain.”
“An assassin staying in the hotel could take the elevator from his room down to the parking garage entry area, walk down the steps to the Bix Beiderbecke Room, block the meeting room door at left—with a table or whatever—open the door at right, getting a direct shot at the speaker at the podium, take that shot, quickly block that door, run up the steps, walk to his car—either in the garage or on the street—and be gone before anybody’s figured out whether the candidate’s dead or not.”
Neely said, “It would be difficult to change locations. Not impossible perhaps, but . . .”
Freed said, “The location stays. What can we do to secure that location, Jack?”
I sighed. “Well. Post several men outside the conference room. They need detailed descriptions of the man we believe will be attempting the hit—which I’ll provide—but they just generally will need to play heads-up ball. For what’s at stake, our man could easily shoot more people than just the candidate. How big is your security force?”
Blake—or was it Simmons?—said, “Half a dozen.”
“Armed, of course,” the other one said.
“Add a couple men,” I said. “You have the advantage of knowing that he’s coming.”
“Are you convinced of that now?” Freed said.
“After seeing the set-up for the press conference,” I said, “I tend to be. Anybody wanting a crack at you would be crazy not to take advantage of this. Will there be any cops on hand?”
Neely said, “We requested police support, but were denied. We’re not popular at City Hall.”
Freed said, “Should I wear a bullet-proof vest?”
“Soft body armor might be worth the trouble,” I said, “but, frankly, he’s going to go for a head shot.”
“And he could do it from the doorway, there?”
“At that range, he could throw a glass ashtray and get the job done.”
Simmons and Blake, no longer rolling their eyes or smirking, seemed to be convinced. Larry didn’t like me, but I could tell he was taking me seriously, too. Neely looked ashen, sick. The thought of his campaign starting off with this kind of bang didn’t seem to agree with him.
“And for God’s sake,” I said, “tighten up security at the hotel itself. I went to the desk and told the guy I was with the Freed campaign and without even asking my name, let alone to see credentials, he went along with everything I asked him and pointed to where the press conference was going to be held and you name it. Put a lid on this thing, boys. You’ve got a controversial candidate with a lot of enemies. Get on the defensive.”
Simmons and Blake swallowed, glanced at each other embarrassedly. Neely remained ashen, and Freed looked glazed. Larry was picking his nose.
“Now, gentleman,” I said, “if you’ll excuse me, I need to use the facilities. Talk this over amongst yourselves, and we’ll get into some of the specifics of revising your security plan when I get back. And I’ll give you a detailed description of the man we believe will be the assassin.”
“Let’s make that would-be assassin,” Freed said, with a nervous smile.
“That’s up to your friends here,” I said pleasantly, and left the room.
I walked out through the adjacent secretarial room and out where the waterfall gurgled by the winding staircase. I went up those stairs, and crossed the circular bar to the door that opened onto the hallway that led to Freed’s bedroom.
About half-way down that hallway, at my left, was a closed door. A closet door, one might assume. I hadn’t paid it much notice the night before, when the glow at the end of the hall had beckoned. But right now I was more interested in what was behind this door, to which I put my ear—and heard nothing. Gently, I tried the knob; locked.
But not very locked: a credit card opened it. This was a fairly quiet operation, though not a silent one, so I paused and listened for the sounds of anybody else who might be up here—a bodyguard in that room across the bar, for example—but heard nothing.
I opened the door and entered a room that wasn’t a closet, though it wasn’t much bigger than one. At right was a window; a video camera on a tripod was aimed at the window, and on a table nearby a big bulky video tape machine squatted, not a home VCR, but an industrial model. I glanced out the window and saw Freed’s bedroom. The camera was pointed directly at the waterbed with its elaborate western headboard and its black silk sheets. I didn’t remember a mirror on the wall, but there must’ve been one. The mirrors overhead must’ve been strictly for fun, not two-way video windows.
Otherwise the rumor that Angela Jordan had heard would seem to be no rumor.
Because at my left was a library of video tapes, shelves of the black plastic boxes; on the spine of each black box was a woman’s name written in bold white letters: Sheila, Jane, Sally, Heather, Clarice, thirty-some women in all.
And one tape box had the name “Angela” on its spine.
I removed it from the shelf, took the tape from the box, and put the empty box back on the shelf. Then I went to the video tape machine near the camera and pressed the eject button. I removed the tape; on the counter nearby was what I presumed was the tape’s black plastic box, which had the name “Becky” on the spine, and Becky was (if memory served) the name of the eager staffer I’d encountered at Freed campaign HQ and whose butt I’d electrically prodded last night.
I slipped the “Angela” tape in one of my suitcoat pockets, and the �
�Becky” tape in the other. I was surprised that Angela had actually made it onto a tape—she’d said several times that Freed had come on to her but that she’d rebuffed him—but it was an understandable lie. I don’t always tell the truth myself.
The tapes, somewhat larger than the home-machine variety, were bulky in my pockets, so I went to the kitchen where I’d left my brown leather overcoat and transferred the tapes to those deeper pockets.
Then I went back into the conference room and joined in on the discussion about how to keep candidate (and home-video buff) Preston Freed from getting blown away (as opposed to just blown) on the first day of his primary campaign.
15
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PENNANTS FLAPPED LAZILY overhead as the last few Sunday afternoon browsers strolled around the BEST BUY lot, peering in windows, perusing price stickers, kicking the tires. The day was too cloudy, too cold, to attract much business; and the sales personnel, Angela Jordan among them, had finally made a concession to the undeniable reality of winter by wearing heavy coats of various sorts over their identical red blazers. It was almost five. Quitting time.
I waited for Angela to deal with the young couple looking droolingly at a shiny silver Firebird, and when they left in a boxy little brown AMC something-or-other, talking animatedly, I figured she had another sale in the bag.
“Next trip in,” I said, “and you’ll sell ’em.”
“I think so,” she smiled. “Just hope they can afford it. I’m trying to steer them toward something a little smaller.”
“Better not let your boss hear you talk like that.”
“You don’t understand the car business,” she said. “If I treat those two right, they’ll be my customers for the next thirty years.”
We walked toward the showroom.
I said, “I’m sorry about last night.”
“No need to apologize. I understand. It’s tough enough adjusting to the single life, after divorcing somebody you don’t love anymore, let alone after . . . losing somebody you still do love.”
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