I took a long drag on the cigarette and snuffed it out in the empty beer can. “Almost everything, Al. Or do you know about that too?”
“You even look at his wife sidewise and you’ll be dead, buddy. Like D-E-A-D.”
“I wasn’t intending to. I just said there were some things you just can’t buy.”
“Dog, you’re nuts. Those two are crazy in love. They always have been.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“Maybe there’s an age differential. Not much, but they’re sure as hell in love.”
“I wasn’t talking about that,” I said.
“What them?”
“Nothing that makes any difference right now.”
We sat there rocking a few minutes, looking up Broadway. North of Thirty-fourth Street a gray cloud was beginning to encompass the Empire State Building.
“It’s going to rain.” I said.
For the first time, old Al DeVecchio’s face was a study in consternation. I never had seen him like that before. It was like he had stumbled into somebody else’s foxhole and found it full of shit.
“I never should have answered your letter,” he said.
REFLECTIONS: AL DEVECCHIO
Who the hell is he now? You think you get to know somebody under four long years of war and gunfire and he zeroes out like a pissed-on cigar butt and the guy you knew isn’t there anymore.
“Say, mate, you wanted Spit time, didn’t you?”
“Now?”
“Really, Major, if it wasn’t for this girl ... daughter of one of your senators, y‘know ... sort of asked for me and it’s hands across the ocean and all that sort of crap, y’know? Now, she’s a new Mark Thirteen and never been scratched. Only two milk runs on photo across to the sub pens...”
“She armored?”
“Full up, Major.”
“If I get my ass snarled on this one ...”
“Blimey, Major, I got them all prepped. No sorting out to do at all. Beansey, Jerry and Tag are off your wings. Good chaps, those. Twelve kills among them. Relatively new and not like you at all, but remember, dear boy, you wanted to fly the Spit ...”
“No time goes on my record?”
“’Pon my word, Major. I wouldn’t want to go before Old Snarly for anything. Realize you and the flight surgeon are having it out over those missing missions, but don’t forget, it was that little niece of mine who lifted your records. Good job, what?”
“Yeah, lovely.”
“Too bad you chaps get rotated so soon. It’s really a gorgeous war,” he said. “Tell me, Major, why don’t you want to go home?”
“Long story, my friend, And like you said, it’s a gorgeous war. I always did want Spit time. That crate handle well?”
“You should know, Major. Much better than the Nines. Just remember to find me an empty Mustang on the next Nuremberg run. There’s a farmhouse there occupied by a particularly nasty character who stuck a pitchfork in my buttock when I bailed out on his property. Damned near didn’t escape. If it weren’t for the little beauty across the river who always had been partial to the sons of John Bull I never would have made it. Quite an interesting stay, that was.”
“You Limeys are nuts,” Dog said.
“Determined, you must admit.”
“Sure, to lay an American senator’s daughter.”
“Oh, just trying to improve our relationship with the colonials, Major. Enjoy the Spit, old boy. My batman has everything arranged. Would appreciate it if you could bring her back more or less unscathed. Old Snarly has an eye for details like bullet holes and he knows my new buggy is still a virgin. Unpenetrated, y’know?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, cheerio.”
“Dog,” I asked him, “why the hell do you squeeze In extra missions? You coulda been out long ago. You like all this crazy fighting?”
“Something to be learned,” he told me. “You survive or you don’t. Get the worst of it in now and all the rest will look easy.”
He survived, all right. I wish I could confirm all those rumors that had been seeping out of Europe the past twenty years. But no matter what I heard, they didn’t jell with the Dogeron Kelly I knew. Nice guys just don’t change. And the rumors were all screwed up too. One told of a darkly lethal character who blew the whole postwar black market business to hell and gone when he creamed out the hard operators, using Stateside mob money to disrupt the economy. Nobody wanted to talk about what happened after that. Then there was the other “El Lobo” ... the Wolf ... who tangled with the international financiers and took them for all they were worth. The Dog and The Wolf. There was a sameness there. The difference was that Dog could hardly handle simple mathematics. He never could solve a navigatio n problem when he had to use a Weems Computer or triangulate a course. If he hadn’t had a pigeon’s instinctive memory for time, distance and direction, he couldn’t have hit the floor with his hat. But he had, and he was always on target and always back again, sometimes leading strays and once a squadron whose numbers failed them. When it came to finance, he couldn’t even make sense out of British money, far less a French franc. If it wasn’t the American dollar it was all play money. The only other rate of ex- . change he understood was cigarettes and candy bars.
Yet, there was that change. Those damn eyes of his. They watched everything. He moved funny too, always knowing who was behind him and on either side, an odd awareness of where everyone else was and, when they were out of position, he knew and was ready to pounce.
Two Dogs? Three? It was possible. He was here now and I’d see him again. Digging into the dark corners was my game and now I’d really get to the answers. I had to. I was curious: I hoped I’d like what I’d find.
I was afraid I wouldn’t.
V
I never could figure out why people didn’t like the rain. A dull day, a little wet and it was growl time. Women brooded in tight little apartments tying up the telephones; husbands fidgeted on barstools, dragging out lunch hours into early hangovers; the few on the streets fought for taxicabs whose drivers seemed to take a sadistic satisfaction out of their predicament. Hell, the rain was nice. It cleaned things out. A good rain in New York was the city’s only mouthwash and it gargled happily and rumbled with pleasure as the garbage got spewed out down the drain.
At Park Avenue I turned north and walked a dozen blocks to the old Tritchett Building, found Chet Linden’s office number on the directory and took the elevator up to the sixth floor. He grinned when I walked in, waved me toward a chair, finished his phone conversation and swung around toward me. “Having trouble adjusting, Dog?”
“Catching up fast. The town sure has changed.”
“Not for the better.”
“That’s for sure,” I said. “When did you get in?”
“A week ago today. I miss London already. Get your ten grand yet?”
I pulled out my last cigarette and lit it. “There’s a morals clause attached to it.”
A slow laugh spread across his face. “And you can’t beat the rap?”
“Hardly.”
“That’s no statement for a quick thinker like you to make,” he said. “Besides, I still figure you for a nut to even bother with the deal.”
“Let’s say it’s a matter of principle.”
“Sure. You toss over the whole European operation to play games. Oh, not that we’re not properly appreciative, buddy. You handed us quite a nut, but I’m not so sure we like you entirely out of the picture. You were the iron fist in the velvet glove that kept everything greased. So far we haven’t found anybody who’s up to your ability.”
“How about Purcell?”
“Still got too many rough edges. Give him a year and he may mellow.”
“Montgomery?”
“We’re considering him. If he makes it on the new assignment he may get the spot. Incidentally, we picked up that other block of stock in Barrin from the Woodring kid. He was glad to dump it at the price. We made you a present of it, and as far as I
know it’s the last of the stuff floating around. You know a Cross McMillan?”
“Uh-huh.”
“He had tracked it down too, but our price was higher and the kid sold before McMillan could raise the ante.” He stopped a moment, then stared at me, frowning. “You onto something, Dog?”
“Just my ten grand.”
“Somehow I get the feeling you’re holding a fungo bat with the bases loaded.”
“Let me have my fun, Chet.”
“Okay, clam. Just keep the repercussions down. Right now we don’t need any static. We got things fairly quiet on the Continent, John Bull has retired back into politics and you’re nothing but a legend now. That Mafia bunch had a housecleaning, a few mass funerals and even Interpol is sitting back smugly enjoying the scene no matter how it came off. If they only knew.”
“And we’re not telling, are we?” I asked him.
“Indeedy no, my crazy friend. The other side carries too much heavy artillery.” He rocked forward and leaned on his desk. “You going to be needing any of the contacts?”
“Unlikely, but keep them open for me.”
“That fungo bat’s getting longer.”
“No sweat, kid, it’s just that I’m used to thinking that way. Besides, you never know what’s going to turn up.”
“Yeah,” he growled sarcastically. “So what’s on the agenda?”
I looked at my watch and stretched out of my seat. “Little party tonight. Should be fun.”
“Your buddy Shay showing you the town?”
“He thinks I need reorienting.”
“Do you?”
“It’s not like the Old Country, Chet. They’ve screwed everything up back here. The broads...”
“All broads are alike, Dog.”
“The kind you pick are.”
“Lucky Linden, they call me. My little beauties never give me any trouble. Very clean, very quiet and very commercial. Now take you, what those classy dolls ever saw in you I just can’t figure. I’d think you’d scare them to death.”
“I got class.”
“You got more than that, but it’s something only the dames can smell.”
I grinned at him and snuffed the cigarette out. “Where’s that paper you want signed?”
He slid open the desk drawer, drew out three sheets of printed copy and pushed them toward me. “The dotted line, Dog. Three autographs and you’re on your own. If you do use any of the contacts, make damn sure it’s an emergency and one foul-up will leave you wide open. From here on in you’re out of the picture. Completely. This office is closing down today; the others have already moved. The old numbers and exchanges have been switched and our people have been informed that you’re nothing more than another Johnny-on-the-street.”
“The picture’s clear, Chet. I know the rules.”
“Maybe you forgot one, Dog.”
“What’s that?”
“They wanted you hit. The board was one vote shy of having you knocked off.”
“Yours, Chet?”
“Mine, Dog.”
“Why? I didn’t know you were that sentimental.”
“I’m not. I just didn’t want to see a lot of our good people go down before they finally tagged you. It was a case of choosing the lesser of two evils.”
I slapped my hat on and grinned at him, reaching for the door.
“Dog,” he said.
“Yeah?”
“I though about it a long time before I cast that vote,” he told me.
Lee had a pair of TV dinners staying warm in the oven when I finally reached his apartment. A couple of drinks had obviously taken off his jumpy edge and he gave me that old half-silly grin I remembered so well. He took one look at me and shook his head. “They got cabs and subways in this town, buddy. Did you forget how to hustle one?”
“I walked.”
“No kidding. A new suit and you walked. I hope the raincoat worked.”
“Good enough. I’ll press the pants dry later.”
“Where were you?”
“Taking care of some business details.”
His grin faded and he held up his hands. “Don’t tell me about them, Dog. Whatever they are, I don’t want to know.”
“Hell, you wouldn’t believe it anyhow.”
“The hell I wouldn’t.” He grabbed my arm and led me over to the bar. When he mixed a drink and handed it to me he said, “Look, Dog, about tonight ...”
“Relax. I won’t embarrass you. Besides, I told you I had met Walt Gentry.”
“It’s not you I’m worried about. They’re a pretty hairy bunch, Dog. Me, I know them. We speak the same language. It’s when somebody new they can’t cross-index comes on the scene that you see the fangs come out. They’re nosy as hell and know how to dig things out and I’m just scared they’ll latch onto you.”
“So what’s there to find out?” I tasted the drink, nodded and put half of it down.
“About all that money, for one thing.”
“Let them call the bank.”
“Dog—I’m not kidding. That Merriman chick who writes the gossip column will be there, Dick Lagen who handles the political stuff from Washington ...”
“For Pete’s sake, Lee, I’m not big news.”
“Not news ... just new. And you got that look.”
“What look?”
“Like you could be news. Listen, I know these people...”
“I’m glad you do. How’s the female situation?”
“Don’t you ever think of anything besides women? It used to be flying ... now all of a sudden you’re dame happy.”
I finished the rest of the drink. “They’re kind of nice to have around.”
“Pardon me for sounding redundant again, but you’re absolutely nuts. Absolutely.”
“That didn’t answer my question.”
Lee gave a hopeless shrug and a short pull right out of the Scotch bottle. “Every damn she-wolf in New York will be there—and don’t say it.”
“Say what?”
“Good company for an old dog like you.”
I laughed at him and let him make me a refill.
VI
Originally, Sharon had planned to forego the cocktail bash at Walt Gentry’s penthouse. It would be the same old crowd; a few live celebrities who owed a favor to the host, a half-dozen oldies still recognizable from their reruns on the late late movies and a host of hangers-on who lived in the fringe areas of show business. A handful of new ones would make an appearance, mainly recently imports from Europe or the West Coast, and a handful of regulars would be missing, either bored with the routine or having shipped out to some remote comer with a stock show or picking up a bit part “on location.”
Sharon had expected to see a special screening of the new Cable Howard production, but S. C. Cable, who long ago had assumed that employees worked for him twenty-four hours a day every day, made a special request that she handle the social action, since it was rumored that Walt Gentry was thinking of dropping a few millions into a coproduction venture on some property he had discovered ... if he could find the right partners. And if Cable Howard Productions managed a deal with Walt Gentry, there would be a nice bonus, or perhaps even a small running percentage for Sharon Cass.
Nice, she thought. I have become an economic seductress. I am expected to give my all for Cable Howard. And they call the streetwalkers names and arrest them. Beautiful, modem morality.
She looked at herself framed in the six lights that encircled the vanity mirror, concentrated on getting the left false eyelash properly fixed, then steadied her hand to apply the black eyeliner that gave her the final naive touch and sat back, satisfied.
Pretty, she mused. I’m all sleekly feminine, grossly beautiful and the perfect target of attack. Bait. A lousy piece of bait. Fifteen thousand a year and expenses to draw the suckers into the net. A bonus when S.C. thought the job was worth it. What happened, Sharon? You used to be a little country girl smothered in ideals, with starry eyes. You
liked the smell of cut grass and the wind coming off the ocean. You collected seashells and bugs, then one day you grew up and the bull dike editor from Future called you in to do some more teen-age modeling, saw the change and did the spread that got Cable Howard Productions to pick you up for that sun-fun picture. Oh, you were great, little sexpot, only you didn’t like to have to walk the plank of assistant directors and fat-lipped agents who had been mail room clerks the year before. Your Coke bottle made old S.C.’s ears ring and he thought you were cute enough to work out your option on his staff ... except that you did your work a little too well and here you were.
She got up, posed in front of the full-length mirror, a naked, overgrown pixie. “I still like me,” she whispered. “At least there’s still one thing left.”
The lovely, tanned image stared back at her, its eyes traversing the curves of her body, then meeting her eyes with a direct, peculiar stare. “I have a funny feeling,” she said.
The image looked back without saying anything. Then, slowly, it smiled.
The invitation had said six thirty, and Sharon was fashionably late, two propositions and a champagne cocktail down, a roomful of people to say hello to still and a conversation with Raul Fucia to contend with. Somehow she couldn’t remember how it started, but she pulled herself back from thoughts that were too many years old into the near-mesmerizing voice of the sensually lean man beside her.
“But, my dear, women are the true predators. They are the ones who do the ... how do you say it? ... the prowling. The men simply make themselves available when they desire to.”
“Your attitude is a little too European, Mr. Fucia.”
“Please, call me Raul ... and my attitude is only universal. The masculine viewpoint, and especially true here in New York.”
“We New Yorkers pride ourselves on being rather sophisticated. I don’t think it’s true at all.”
“Oh? Then look around you. See the men? They stand and let themselves be surrounded. They listen to the overtures, gauge the quality of the bodies and select the one they believe will be most appreciative of their favors. Already there has been some discreet pairing off.”
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