"Go in the park," Bolan directed.
"Into the park, Bolan?"
"That's what I said, Stevie."
They crossed over the tip of a lake moments later and Giliamo nervously asked, "What're we doing here?"
"That depends," Bolan told him. "There's an open air theatre straight ahead. I want you to stop there, Stevie."
The blood at Bolan's ribs had congealed, the wounds minimal, the pellets from the shotgun blast obviously having grazed the ribs and gone on. Still, there was some discomfort there and Bolan was finding his patience beginning to fray.
They pulled to a halt in the theatre circle. Bolan said, "Give me the keys and get out."
Giliamo did so, watching his captor narrowly as Bolan slid out from the other side.
"Over there," Bolan said, waggling the Uzi.
"Over where?"
"Up on the stage."
Giliamo stared at Bolan for a silent moment, then whirled about and trudged away with Bolan close behind. They climbed the steps to the stage, then Giliamo blurted, "Hey look, what the hell are we doing up here?"
"You like to act, Danno," Bolan quietly replied. "I thought I'd give you a stage."
The big man stiffened, then sagged noticeably. His voice was muffled with anger as he said, "If you knew who I was, why'd you let me keep it up?"
"Get out there at the center of the stage," Bolan commanded.
"You go to hell," Giliamo snarled. "If you're gonna kill me, do it right here."
Bolan rapped him across the face with the butt of the Vzi, not lightly. Giliamo staggered back, holding one hand to the injured jaw, and went where Bolan directed.
"Down on your knees," Bolan said.
The caporegimeglared at him, but did as he was told.
"Where do you want it?" Bolan asked, thrusting the Vziforward.
Giliamo choked on the words. "You know I don't want it anywheres, Bolan."
"You've been bullshitting me for ten full minutes, Danno. You can stop it now anytime you want. You can stop something else too, Danno."
"You know I can't. If I talk, and you don't kill me, then they'll just do it later on anyway. I'd rather just get it over with right here."
"Who's going to know you talked, Danno? Who's going to tell them?"
The Jerseyite was thinking about it. Presently, in an almost inaudible voice, he asked, "Just what is it you want to know?"
"Who did it to the old man?"
"You ast me that a dozen times already! And I still don't know what you're talkin' about!"
"The old man in the museum, Danno. Who tied him up like a turkey and shoved a hot iron under his back?"
"Shit, I don't know what you're talking about, Bolan, that's God's truth."
"Are you saying that you or none of your boys did it?"
"That's what I'm saying, whatever it is."
"You were in that museum, Danno."
"Sure. I was in there for about a minute. Me'n Nick, and Sal, and one other boy I can't think of his name right now. But we didn't do nothing to no old man."
"Who is Nick?"
"Nick Trigger, also known as Nick Endante. Maybe you heard of him. He used to work for DonManzacatti, way back when."
Bolan was becoming more and more satisfied with the tone of the interrogation. Giliamo was loosening up nicely. He said, "Yeah. So what is Nick Trigger doing in England?"
"He's enforcing."
"So what was he enforcing at that museum tonight?"
"Nick was my contact here, see. I come over about a week ago, while you was in France. Look, I didn't ask for the lousy job, Bolan. I never wanted it. I got nothing personal against you. But when the bosses say go, the Danno Giliamo goes. You gotta understand that."
"Yeah, I understand that, Danno. But about this Nick Trigger. How'd he get onto that thing at the museum?"
The prisoner was obviously working towards a decision, a very important one to him. Life and death hung in the balance, and his soul was sweating. He grimaced and said, "You're putting me on one hell of a spot, you know that."
Bolan shrugged his shoulders. "It's just between you and me, Danno. But you better make up your mind. I'm not standing out here all night."
"How do I know you're not going to execute me anyway?"
Bolan shrugged again. "I guess that's just the chance you have to take, Danno. But for what it's worth, I don't kill my friends. Not even temporary ones."
Giliamo took a deep breath and said, "Okay. What was it you ast me?"
"I want to know the connection between Nick Trigger and that museum back there."
"Well, like I said, he's enforcing. He's got some hooks into the guys that run that place. I don't know what exactly. They're a bunch of queers or something I think, and Nick's got it into them over that I guess."
"Okay, so how did he know to look for me there?"
"Honest to God, Bolan, I don't know. Nick isn't— wasn't, I guess he's a toasted weenie right now—he wasn't the most talkative boy around. He called me up the other night and told me to look for you at Dover.
He even gave me the name of the boat and the time and everything. Then after we lost you down there, he told me to look for you at that joint, that museum up there. That's all I know about it."
"But you guess he had a pipeline, eh?"
"Yeah, it sure looks like it."
"Okay, now about tonight. You said you were inside the museum. When was that?"
"That was about ten thirty, maybe a quarter 'til eleven. But we didn't see no old man. There was just this uppity little prick, talked with a fancy English accent. We spent most of our time just getting up there where he was at, hadda tramp through all those queer rooms. They got some sick stuff in that joint, Bolan. Or I guess you know about that."
Bolan said, "Yeah." His jaw had stiffened and his mouth was suddenly quite dry. "What about those little rooms on the second floor? What was in them?"
"Buncha fuckin' torture stuff, you know what."
"No people?"
"No people 'cept us. What're you getting at?"
"This little guy," Bolan said. "About five-six or seven? Stiff as a ramrod?"
"Yeah, that's the guy. Talked to us like we were dirt, and him queer as a three dollar bill I guess. I felt like sluggin 'im."
"What'd you talk to him about?"
"Not me, it was Nick. They went off to themselves and parleyed about something. Just took a minute, then we left. Nick—"
"Who else did you see in there, besides this little guy?"
"There was a lotta people down in that cunt room, you know, kids. Getting ready for a party or something, I guess."
"Okay, go on with what you were saying about Nick."
"What was that?"
"You left. Then Nick did something."
"Oh. Well, Nick sat out in the car with us 'til this guy came out, about ten minutes later. Then they took off together."
"Whotook off together?"
"Nick and this queer little prick. They took off together. Few minutes later the other queers started draggin' in. In fancy limousines, some of 'em. Cars dropped 'em off and went on. I never went back inside after that."
Thoughtfully, Bolan said, "But there were three boys inside during the firefight. They came out and threw down on me."
"Well, that was something else all over again. Those boys found a tunnel or something, just before the fight started. We figured that was your way in and out, and we found your callin' cards—the three boys with the broken necks or whatever. Those boys went in under the ground to smoke you out, Bolan. That's all I know about that."
"I think you're giving it to me straight, Danno," Bolan said quietly.
"I am."
"Okay, just one more thing. Where's the family headquarters in this town?"
"Aw shit, I just can't give you that, Bolan. That's too much, I could never live with myself."
Bolan watched him for a moment, then said, "Okay, I guess you're right. Get going, Danno."
"
You're letting me go?"
"A deal's a deal. Goodbye, Danno."
"You're not, uh, going to shoot me in the back, Bolan."
"You know better." Bolan removed the clip from the Uziand jammed it into his pouch. "Just go on."
The caporegimecould hardly believe his good luck. He struggled to his feet and said, "I ain't really told you anything to be ashamed of."
"You bet you haven't," Bolan assured him.
"Uh, look Bolan. You're not all that rotten. I mean, no offense, I didn't mean it that way. I just mean I wish you'd been with us all along, instead of against us."
"War is like that, Danno," Bolan said tiredly. "Now go on. Next time we meet, one of us will probably come out of it dead."
"Just the same, I'm not forgetting how straight you are," Giliamo told him. He stepped to the edge of the stage and leapt off, turned to stare back at Bolan briefly, then hurried off into the night.
Bolan murmured to himself, "I'm not all that straight, Danno." He put the clip back in the Uzi, went down the steps and returned to the car. His outer garments were lying across the back seat. Affectionately he patted the little submachine gun, knowing that he would not be using it again, and lay it on the rear floor, then he quietly began getting into his clothing.
It was shaping into a hell of a war, he was thinking. How was a guy supposed to separate the good guys from the bad. If the Mafiosiwere not responsible for the torture death of old Edwin Charles, then who the hell was? And for what possible motive?
He was wishing that he had never become involved with the Sades. But he had. And things were getting pretty badly entangled. Instinctively he knew that Danno had finally levelled with him. Bolan had taken all of the ham out of him as Stevie Carbon—Danno Giliamo had been talking straight. He was sure of that. So what did it all mean? That Ann Franklin's foster father was a rat? And if it should turn out that way, what would this mean to the girl? And what would it all mean to Bolan and to his ability to get the hell out of the country?
Yeah, it was getting tangled. Very soon now he would have to be doing something toward a firm identification of friend and foe. And then there was Charles. Bolan had liked the old man, even if the acquaintance had been microscopically brief. Living as Bolan did, you learned to take your likes quick, and he had definitely taken to the old soldier.
So somewhere along the tangled threads Bolan meant to identify a sadistic killer, and he meant to see that justice was done.
Right now, though, more pressing business was demanding his attention. He completed his dressing and sent the Lincoln rolling silently back through the park, lights out and prowling on the scent of an ex-POW.
Bolan spotted him on the third pass, huffing along on foot down the west perimeter of the park. The slightly overweight Mafiosiwas making better time than Bolan had expected. He ran the Lincoln into a stand of shrubbery, quietly said goodbye to it, and closed in on the prey on foot, taking up the stalk at a proper distance.
No, Bolan was not all that straight. There was more than one way to extract intelligence from an enemy. Whether he knew it or not, Danno was not yet entirely free and the interrogation was still underway.
And The Executioner was closing on the enemy camp. The Assault on Soho, Stage Two, was in progress.
Chapter Thirteen
The meet
The house was one of those inner London rarities, with a lawn, a courtyard, and an iron fence encircling the whole thing. Off to the side was a portico and a huge circular drive that could probably take a f airsized funeral procession. In better days it had probably been the townhouse of some nobleman; now it served as the local business hub and visitor center for the most powerful crime syndicate in history. And it was within easy walking distance of the neon wonderland of Picadilly, but a hell of a long walk from Regents Park. Giliamo had apparently been in no great hurry to get back. Although the subway trains in London cease operation after midnight, there were still buses and taxicabs… and the Mafia underboss had spurned them all, staying with his feet.
This was fine with Bolan; it made his task much easier. Maybe, he thought, the long walk was Giliamo's idea of penance for his imagined sins against the family. Or maybe he was just walking off a sense of anger and frustration and humiliation. Humiliated he had certainly been. Bolan knew the writhings of psyche required for a high ranking Mafiosoto bargain for his life with the likes of a Mack Bolan.
Whatever the reasons, the journey from Regents Park back to Soho was a long and tiring one, consuming most of the early morning hours, and made worse by Giliamo's obvious unfamiliarity with the streets of London. He did a lot of doubling back and circling, dipping down to within sight of Picadilly Circus before orienting himself into the final beeline to the house with the iron fence. During this last leg, Bolan noted that Danno was limping and moving along with more and more difficulty. Blisters, Bolan diagnosed. He had to smile at that. Blisters on the heel were armor for the soul, or so they'd told him in the army.
Now Bolan stood in the darkness across from the big house and wondered what was going on inside there. Every room in the place was ablaze with lights and vehicles were lined up in the circular drive inside the gates. A group of men stood under bright porchlights, another smaller group idled near the vehicles.
As Giliamo ascended the steps to the porch, Bolan heard a loud greeting of, "Hey Danno, where the hell you been?"
A swirl of conversation hummed across the darkness to Bolan's stakeout position, then the group on the porch went inside with Giliamo. Another man came out a few minutes later and lit a cigarette. He called down some barely audible instruction to the men at the vehicles. That group promptly melted and the men went to separate cars. Then the man on the porch called out something else in a half-chiding tone—it sounded to Bolan like, "The gates, the gates!"
The man in the lead vehicle leapt out and trotted down to open the large iron gate of the driveway, then hurried back to his car.
The man on the porch called, "Don't worry, I'll get 'em behind you."
The motorcade pulled out and Bolan drew back to avoid the headlamps as the line of vehicles swerved into the street and headed toward Picadilly. As the last car cleared, the guy from the porch was walking down the drive toward the gate. Instead of closing it immediately, however, he stepped on through and stood on the sidewalk, gazing up and down the street. He threw the cigarette down and stepped on it, then put another between his lips and casually lit it, allowing the lighter to flame for an overlong time, putting his features in stark relief from the darkness.
Bolan's soul stirred in the recognition of that face over there. It belonged to Leo Turrin, the double-life Mafiosoand undercover cop from Pittsfield. Once Bolan had been sworn to execute the cocky little Italian, whom he had known then only as the vice lord of Bolan's home town, and it had been through that involvement that Bolan had first successfully penetrated the Cosa Nostra and learned so much of their operation. Bolan had worked closely with Turrin during those early days at Pittsfield and had found himself growing more and more reluctant to collect his "blood debt" from this likeable little guy. As things had turned out at Pittsfield, of course, Bolan had plenty of reason to be thankful that the Turrin execution had never come off. The guy had saved Bolan's skin more than once—and then, of course, he had turned out to be an undercover cop.
Now this glimpse of a face from the past was received with mixed emotions. Leo lived in the same brand of constant peril as Bolan's. The slightest hint that Turrin was enjoying friendly relations with The Executioner could mean his immediate undoing, and the loss of a five year undercover operation. Also, on the other side of the coin, Bolan was not all that certain that, with all chips down, Turrin would not hesitate to sacrifice Bolan to the greater good. Cops were like that, sometimes, even good cops.
Bolan's inner conflict was resolved much quicker than the telling of it, however. He ejected a bullet from the Bererta and tossed it across the street to land at Turrin's feet. The little guy bent over
and picked it up, hefted it casually in his palm, glanced up the driveway toward the house, then unhurriedly crossed the street.
Bolan stepped out of the shadows, smiling faintly, and said, "Why didn't you just light up a neon sign?"
They solemnly shook hands. Turrin gave Bolan his cigarette and told him, "I figured you'd be somewhere close by—just a hunch. What'd you do to poor Danno? He looks like he's been to hell and back."
"He has. What brings you to London?"
"You."
Bolan chuckled. "It figures. They calling in the reserves now?"
Turrin nodded. "And more. Don't laugh when I tell you this. I'm supposed to be bringing you a pardon."
Bolan did laugh. "A what?"
"You heard me. They want to bury the hatchet."
"Yeah, right in my head," Bolan said.
"They're serious about it. I think. I believe Staccio has his doubts, secretly though."
"JoeStaccio, upper New York?"
"Right. He's heading up the peace delegation. He's a little worried that the other bosses are setting him up for something. You know how that crap goes, none of them really trust each other."
Bolan said, "Yeah. Well, so what's your role in all this?"
Turrin grinned. "They haven't forgotten that you used to be one of my boys. They figured I could make the contact. By the way, have you heard? I'm running Pittsfield now."
Bolan chuckled and said, "Congratulations, that's some territory. No more girls, eh?"
Turrin laughed softly and stiffened his hand into a flat plane and tipped it from side to side. "I still keep my hand in," he said. "They'll never let me forget it anyway. I've got a new name, you know."
"No, I didn't know."
"They call me Leo Pussy."
"It's a name that should stick," Bolan commented, grinning.
"Yeah," Turrin said drily. "Well, so what are you up to? I mean, other than terrorizing the continent and bringing the blitz back to Britain?"
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