His guts had not come unchurned since he first learned of the disappearance at Pittsfield, and he had lived with the constant vision of Mafia turkeymeat lurking at the threshold of his thinking mind throughout that period.
He was weary, soul-sick and he had already slain more men than he liked to think about since his arrival in Boston.
But he had to get out there again, and he had to blitz. He had to keep the pressures on, had to keep hitting and hitting until the rats had scurried their way totally out of options … he had to make them come to him, humbly and repentantly, with two olive branches held tenderly forward as evidence of that repentance—two olive branches named Johnny and Val.
He began the next round of hard persuasion at a lottery drop near Haymarket Square. There he executed a couple of small-timers who were no strangers to the Boston police.
Within ten minutes of that strike, he had hit two other mob hangouts in that same district and bloodily closed the police files on several more well-known citizens.
Then, while police sirens shrieked in all directions about his line of travel, he crossed the Longfellow Bridge into Cambridge and deposited a swath of hellfire through that sedate community, knocking over two “powder factories”—wholesale distribution centers for hard narcotics—a loan company specializing in “vigorish” loans to students, a used-car sales lot which was actually a fencing operation for stolen vehicles, a call girl “agency” which had lately been recruiting local coeds—and a bar and grill which, by some strange coincidence, was a hangout for mob figures and off-duty policemen alike.
The Cambridge blitz was climaxed by a personal visit to the offices of a student newspaper—a brief “interview” with the Executioner by an agog staff, and a list left behind tersely identifying mob activities and the men behind them in the Ivory Tower city.
And at three o’clock, Bolan again made contact with Leo Turrin.
“You were right,” his ally told the Executioner. “A concerned citizen here by the name of Albert Greene is making all kinds of noises about cooling this quote slaughter unquote. He’s climbing the walls over at Government Center right now and demanding that quote something fresh unquote be initiated.”
Bolan had read the guy pretty well.
He said, “Okay. Is anybody listening?”
“Everybody’s listening,” Turrin replied. “The guy is owed a lot of favors around this town. He’s in the mood to collect now.”
Bolan commented, “Okay, that’s just what I wanted.”
“I’ve … uh … had the ear and the sympathies of Hal Brognola.”
“So?”
“So you’re pretty cute, aren’t you. Hell, he poked a long-distance program into the computers in Washington and come up with some damned amazing stuff. How come it takes a million-dollar computer to tell us something you already know, Sarge?”
Bolan said, “I actually know very little, Leo. It was about 90 percent hunch.”
“Well your hunches are batting a thousand. This fucking Greene or Guarini or whatever you want to call him—this guy has even dined at the White House, Christ’s sake. This is dynamite, absolutely scary damned double-dynamite. Brognola is shaking all over. I’ve never seen the guy like this.”
“I hope he’s playing it cool,” Bolan muttered.
“Cool? Try frozen. Some of his own goddam bosses could be involved with this guy, Mack, unwittingly or otherwise. If I hadn’t been sitting right there when the stuff was ticking in, I’d have never caught a peek at it. I know that.”
“That bad, huh?” Bolan commented glumly.
“Yeah it’s that bad. This is the kind of stuff that topples governments, my friend. You can come up with some of the damnedest …”
“That’s not the top of my mind right now, Leo.”
“Oh yeah, sorry.”
“What’s new at the front?”
“Well, I told you, you were right. The guy wants a meet.”
“Okay, when and where?”
“Not so damned fast. There are conditions.”
“I accept the conditions.”
“Without even hearing them? Here’s the set. Greene is volunteering to act as go-between between you and the quote hostile forces unquote. The object, of course, is to arrange the release of Johnny and Val and to get you the hell out of this town.”
Bolan said, “Okay, so far.”
“He’s posing as a concerned citizen who simply wants to cool the war here. Now he’s engineered a moratorium—not a pardon, now, just a moratorium. The cops will not bother you if you will agree to the conditions, and if you promise to behave yourself in the meantime. They’ll remain clear and allow you to negotiate the release of prisoners.”
Bolan said, “Damned nice of them.”
“There’s more. You’ll meet with Greene at the center of Boston Common. You’ll be guaranteed safe passage, in and out. There will be no cops around the Common, and in fact they will establish a buffer zone to guarantee absolutely no accidental police interference. But you’ve got to knock off the war in the meantime. No more of that crap like at Haymarket and over in Cambridge.”
Bolan said, “You’ve heard about that, eh?”
“Me and all of Boston. The TV stations are breaking in on scheduled programming to keep the town informed. This is all very embarassing to the fuzz, buddy. One radio station has started referring to them in editorials as quote the Toonerville Cops unquote.”
“That hasn’t been my intention, you know that,” Bolan muttered. “People shouldn’t blame the cops. They’re not equipped for this kind of war.”
“Yeah, well, they’ll get over it. They’ve been called worse things than that in this town.”
“When is the meet?”
“Midnight.”
Bolan said, “No.”
“That’s not negotiable, Mack. And Greene didn’t set that requirement. The Public Safety people insisted on it. They’re going to make sure the park area is cleared out, and they say it’s midnight or after, period.”
“Midnight is too far off.”
“It’s not negotiable, Mack.”
Bolan sighed. “Okay. Maybe it’s for the best. Maybe a bit of cooling will get these people to thinking more clearly. Okay. I’ll meet him at midnight. Tell him to bring Johnny and Val with him.”
“What? I don’t believe—that wasn’t in the deal, Mack. His story is that he will talk to you and get your terms. Then he will try to communicate those terms to the other side.”
“There are no terms,” Bolan said tiredly. “He knows that. He’s just trying to cover his own tracks. Tell him to bring them with him. I’ll give him until midnight to bring them in. Give him this, for Sicilia. I’ll call it a fair trade, their flesh for his. I’ll call it even.”
“Well … okay.”
“That’s the deal, Leo, the only deal. It gives him nine hours to produce Johnny and Val. Give him this message, also. If they are not there, safe and sound, at midnight … if they are not there with him then I don’t even go in. Instead I blow the whistle on everything I know about the mob routes into this town and out of it. I’ll write Johnny and Val off as dead. And I’ll turn him and his operations here into hamburger. You tell him that. He’ll know what I mean.”
“Well …”
“That’s the whole deal, Leo. I want it plainly understood what’s at stake, so you see that he understands completely.”
“Okay,” Turrin said, the voice thinning out a bit. “I guess you know what you’re doing. But you may be giving the guy an impossible task. You should understand that. I mean, with so much at stake on your end.”
“I understand it. A guy who has the moxie to get himself a dinner seat at the White House, Leo—don’t you think he should be enterprising enough to handle a hood like Skip Sicilia?”
“Maybe you’re right. But, uh …”
“But what?”
“Why do you want him to bring them to the Common, Mack? Wouldn’t it be better to have them turned over
on some neutral ground? Let him have them delivered to the cops, to a hospital, anywhere that’s safe.”
“No. I’ll have to see them with my own eyes. I may not be able to walk away from this one, Leo.”
“I—uh, yeah, I see what you mean. Okay. I’ll deliver the message. You’ll have to honor the conditions, Sarge. No more war during the moratorium period.”
Bolan said, “Okay, I’ll give them that much. They’d just better deliver, that’s all. I’m through playing button-button. They’d better understand that. Midnight is the absolute deadline. If I’m not happy by then, the whole damn cookie crumbles. Be sure he realizes that.”
“He’ll understand it.”
“Thanks, Leo. Your cover still tight?”
“Yeah.”
“Does, uh, Brognola know that you’re talking to me?”
“Oh sure, unofficially.”
“Okay. Let’s keep it that way. Leo … If I don’t walk away …”
“You will.”
“If not … get them to a safe place.”
“You know I will.”
“Yeah, I know that. Okay. To seal the deal, I’m becoming unavailable. No more talks until midnight, and that’s the end of the road.”
Bolan hung up and massaged his weary eyes with both hands.
Yeah, the end of the road.
It had been a brutal one.
He just hoped that midnight was a deadline which would make it all worthwhile.
If not …
If not, then hell, nothing in the entire human involvement was worthwhile.
Let it all fall to hell.
If gentle, harmless people like Valentina Querente and vital young men like Johnny Bolan could not find a safe place to love and prosper in this only world available to them … then let it all go to hell.
Midnight could very well become a deadline for death.
He had not been kidding.
Without Johnny and Val at his side, Mack Bolan would never leave Boston. He would die here, and they could bury him here. Along with what was left of Boston. Until midnight, then.
Bolan was not merely posturing before himself.
And he was entertaining no illusions about that meeting with Al 88.
Either way it went, whether the guy actually sprung Johnny and Val or not, Al 88 would have to be desperately determined that Mack the Bastard Bolan would never walk away from Boston Common alive.
Not with what Mack Bolan knew about Albert Greene.
Call it a deadline for death. Until midnight, then. Then somebody was going to die.
Maybe everybody would die at midnight.
Bolan left the decision in the hands of the universe, and he went to find a place to rest his weary bones and to wait out the longest nine hours of his troubled lifetime.
17: The Deployment
It was a few minutes past eight o’clock on the evening of Day Two, when Books Figarone was moving slowly and tiredly as he entered the crumbling warehouse on Boston’s waterfront. This had been the most agonizing and exhausting 24 hours the ex-professor had ever lived through, and he was thankful that the thing was coming to a head at last.
The others were waiting for him in the dusty and dimly lighted warehouse office.
Skip Sicilia was there, looking wan and wrung out.
Hoops Tramitelli sat tensely expectant, a nervous tic working at his left eye.
Each had brought a backup man inside with him, and these two were eyeing each other suspiciously from their chairs at the opposite sides of the small office.
Figarone quietly took his place at the table, cleared his throat, and told them, “You understand, I’m here in a double capacity. Let’s keep that fact visible. I’m here primarily to present Al 88’s recommendations for bringing our thing together again. Secondly, I am here as personal friend and adviser to all principals. Is that understood?”
Tramitelli waved his hand to signify understanding.
“This’s no court, right?” Sicilia put into the record.
“It’s no court,” the consigliere assured him. “But we are all bound to the same extent as if it were a court.”
“Okay, I go along with that.”
Figarone told them, “First we’ll take up the internal affairs.”
“I’d like to say something first,” Tramitelli said quietly. “I think we all got to understand something here. Al 88 is not the enemy. Skip ain’t the enemy, and you, counselor, you’re not the enemy. Neither am I. Now it’s been a hell of a bad time for all of us. We got to keep remembering that we’re all together in this. Right? What hurts one of us hurts all of us. Let’s bury our hatchets, what ones we might have, right here and now.”
Sicilia murmured, “Thanks, Hoops. I’m glad you said that.”
Without a word, Figarone produced a small penknife. He pursed his lips and made a small, quick incision in the puffy tip of one of his fingers. Blood oozed onto the table. He passed the knife to Tramitelli and moved his bleeding finger into the center of the table.
Tramitelli duplicated the procedure and passed the knife on to Sicilia, who did likewise.
Their blood mingled on the table between them, then they pressed the wounds together and Figarone muttered something in Italian.
The ritual apparently held a deep and emotional significance for all three, even for the educated gentleman from Cambridge. He wrapped a handkerchief around his injured member and smiled at the other two. “Now let’s get down to business,” he said.
“I apologize for that crummy deal last night, Books,” Sicilia murmured. “I guess I lost my head a little.”
“It’s forgotten.”
“Okay. What’s this internal affair?”
The lawyer’s eyes dwelled on the huge figure of Hoops Tramitelli. “First I think Hoops should know about his inheritance. He gets the territory left behind by the passing of our old friend Manny Greco. That’s your country now, Hoops. You get full title to everything Manny had going, and we’ll bind all licenses and grants to you without restrictions of any nature.”
Tramitelli nodded his head, a sour smile registering briefly upon the tense face. “I hate to get it this way, but I got to say, it’s about time. I been playing second and third fiddle for damn near thirty years.”
“You’re the maestro now,” Figarone told him. “Do you have any questions or any representations?”
The veteran triggerman shook his head. “No, it’s fine. I’m perfectly satisfied.”
“Then accept my congratulations,” Figarone said soberly. “I’ve always respected you, Hoops.”
“Thanks.”
Figarone then stared at Harold Sicilia for a long moment, then he told him, “You get the territory left vacant by the passing of our old friend Andy Nova, in addition to what’s already yours by rights. You get full title to everything Andy had going, and we’ll bind all licenses to you in full loyalty and without restrictions of any kind.”
Sicilia seemed torn between a smile and a frown. He asked, “What happens to all those other northern territories?”
“For the time being,” Figarone replied, “they will be carried under the full protection of Al 88, acting as the representative of La Commissione—until such time as final disposition may be made.”
“I guess that’s okay by me, then,” Sicilia replied, pointedly adding, “For now.”
The lawyer told him, “I’m not finished with you, Skip. In addition to the foregoing, you get full title to the muscle franchise throughout eastern Massachusetts.”
The fisherman’s face broke into an ear-to-ear grin. “I guess that’s fair enough,” he said.
“Well, Al wants everybody to be happy. He wants to cool this area, and get us all pulling together. Uh, in connection with that last, Skip, you’ll get the usual tax, assessed according to services performed. You’ll answer directly to Al 88 and to nobody else until such time as he is officially relieved of local responsibilities.”
“Great. That’s great.”
“And you’ll bind yourself with full loyalty to whomever is eventually recognized as the Boston representative on La Commissione.”
“Naturally. That goes without having to be said.”
“And you pay, within thirty days of this date, a fine of one hundred thousand dollars, as full restitution for the mistake you made here in this present trouble.”
The smile slowly faded from the fisherman’s broad face. He said, “What’s that again now?”
“You heard it, Skip, that’s bound into the agreement. The money will be divided among the widows and families left behind by our dear friends who died here during this unfortunate thing that has happened to us. You brought that to us, Skipper, and you will pay the fine.”
Sicilia’s eyes fell. He lit a cigarette, slowly exhaled a lungful of smoke, and muttered, “Okay, I’ll give the money to the survivor’s fund.”
“That takes care of that, then,” the lawyer declared with a sigh of relief. “Now we know where we stand, we can get on to the other business. Where’s that merchandise, Skip?”
Sicilia’s eyes flickered. He seemed to be trying very hard to keep remembering that the consigliere was speaking for Al 88’s mouth. He sighed and said, “Not far from here.”
“I hope they’re in good condition.”
“Don’t worry about that. I wouldn’t let nothing happen to my little golden gooses.”
“Fine. We’re giving them back to Bolan. At midnight.”
Sicilia’s eyes wavered, then clashed with Tramitelli’s. The troubled gaze returned abruptly to Figarone and he muttered, “I haven’t said yet that I want to give them back.”
“It’s not your decision,” the consigliere told him. “They are what started all this trouble. They are what is going to end it. The other disposition is tied to this one all the way, Skipper. You can’t eat your cake and still keep it.”
“It ain’t that,” Sicilia replied testily. “I just can’t stand the thought of giving in to that damn Bolan.”
“Who said we’re giving in?” Figarone asked, smiling.
“Oh, well, if that—okay then, if you’re working something, fine. I’ll go along with anything honorable.”
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