"Yes, dear," said the Countess Krak. "I find that all very interesting. But could you tell me what you are doing, right now, to get us home?"
Heller looked at her a bit defensively. "Just now, I was listing the contemporary content of atmospheric pollutants: carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, hydrocarbons, nitrogen oxides and particles from various burning and industrial sources. You see, aside from making it increasingly difficult to breathe, these block the sun out. They also hold reradiated solar reflection in. One gets a heating and a cooling factor at the same time. But the planet has been warming up gradually over the last century and this is connected to increased industrialization. The main danger, however, is that these particles do not permit adequately large water drops to form and so there is an increasing scarcity of rain. Aridity is a factor in reducing life-support capability...."
"That is very fascinating, Jettero. And I am very glad to know it. However, looking at this head on, so to speak, what could you DO, RIGHT NOW, to speed up your program? Some VITAL point you could PUSH on."
"Well, I suppose I ought to be working on how to make some money. If Izzy doesn't come through, we'll even lose these offices."
"Oh, Jettero. I could buy what we need with my credit card."
"Oh, I'm afraid the finance required is way out of the range of a credit card. We need billions. We have to set up a spore-release plant. We have to get Chryster Motor Corporation out of the hands of IRS and get it producing carburetors. Such things really require billions and billions."
Krak looked very determined. She said, "No more Atlantic City!"
Heller looked shocked. "Oh, dear, no!"
She tapped the edge of the desk with her finger. "Plans get executed when they are, at least, worked on. Even a little bit at a time. You don't have to wait until you graduate to make billions." She wagged her finger emphatically at him. "I think you had better get very busy, Jettero, and make these billions right away. And do it in a manner that does NOT include ANY Miss Americas! Not a single one!"
I really had to laugh. She was pushing on him, yes.
But after the fiasco he had just made I had no fears at all that he would suddenly come up with pots of money. All the money he had gotten so far was hit money put up to waste him that he, by luck, had gotten into his own hands. High finance is an entirely different variety of slaughter. The hit men there wear top hats and are very suave and clever and they do their shooting cunningly across desks. It was wholly out of his field. He didn't have, in my opinion, the ghost of a chance.
Billions, indeed!
What amateurs they were compared to me and the huge coup I had just pulled off.
I loaded the recorders with strips. I dropped the blanket on them. Let them stew. I had my own high expectations. Madison was on the job. And I had Crobe in reserve.
And one day, when they had loafed around, Heller and Krak would be caught up with the order from Lombar that it was time to slay.
It was high time I took some air and saw what daylight looked like once more!
Chapter 6
It was bitter cold but, for all that, a bright and sunshiny day. The shrubs in the villa yard were all bound up for winter like corpses in shrouds and not a single songbird was in sight. Beautiful.
I stretched my arms and inhaled deeply.
I stopped right there.
I gaped.
Was that a locomotive in the yard?
The CAR!
I let out my breath in a swoosh. My Gods, but it was big!
There it stood, blocking the whole gate. Seen head on, the vertical chrome slats of the custom radiator grill looked like the cowcatcher on a train.
I sped forward, travelling to one side so that I could see it in profile.
Half a block long!
The black paint was a little dull but, oh, did that limousine have lines! Classic!
Blazoned on the door was the scarlet eagle, wings outstretched, wearing horns, wild-eyed and savage.
My, was I impressed!
I rushed around to the other side. Another eagle.
I opened the rear door. What space! All along the other side was a kind of bunk. The back of the front seat was a bar. A field radio-telephone was in a ledge. The interior upholstery was all new cloth and leatherette, a dark red.
I stood back. So this was a 1962 Daimler-Benz, specially built! I tapped a window. Bulletproof!
I stepped back further. Then I saw it. Below the huge, red eagle on the door they had painted my name in gold:
Sultan Bey
Magnificent!
The quiet of the day was marred by an evil laugh. I whirled. The toothless, beak-nosed old man was standing there. He was dressed in an olive-drab chauffeur's uniform much too big for him.
The taxi driver came out of the villa staff quarters. "You like it?" he beamed.
"What is that old man doing here?" I said.
"Oh, him? That's Ters. He comes with the car. He was the general's chauffeur, and unemployment being what it is, he hasn't had a job for more than a quarter of a century. He drove it down here from Istanbul."
Ters? That means "unlucky" or "unfortunate" in Turkish. I hoped it didn't combine with the taxi driver's Modon name, Deplor. Unfortunate Fate was something I didn't want anything to do with.
"But look at this great car!" said the taxi driver. "And didn't they do a great job of repairing it? A real Daimler-Benz, probably the only one of its kind left in the world. Distinctive! Fits you like a glove. Look, I even had them put your name on the door, real big, in gold. They'll know who is coming, believe you me!"
He jumped around to the other side and hit the horn. It almost blew the roof off the villa!
"Now," said the taxi driver, "I just told Karagoz to have a couple shrubs cut down so we can get it fully inside the gate and still get other cars in and out. So don't have any qualms about its size. Besides, you want people to SEE it. Makes you a big man! And if you park it right over there anyone can spot it going down the road. I tell you, it isn't everybody that has a car like this! Get in and try out the back seat!"
I did. The taxi driver got in the front seat. He shut the doors and turned to me confidentially. "Now we're in business. You wanted women. There isn't a woman in the world that could resist this car. Right?"
I allowed he must be correct. It sure was big and impressive.
"I have all this figured out. As this was a general's car, we ought to go about this like a military operation, a field campaign. That's what he used it for. That's why it has that ledge down the side you can sleep on. Now, in a military campaign, the timetable is everything, so let's synchronize our watches."
We did. I was getting excited.
"Now," he said, "I arrive at the villa here each evening at 6:00 in my taxi. I park it over there. I get in the limousine with Ters and he and I go out and get the woman. We'd be back around 8:30."
"Why so long?" I said.
"Finding the woman, time it takes to persuade her, time and distance to make the drive. We will have to go all over the Afyon plateau because we aren't going to repeat on women. You want them fresh every night."
"Go on," I said, my appetite whetting up.
"We don't come back through the gate, here. That would expose the woman to gossip. Instead, we park under that cedar tree just up the road. You know the place. Only a few hundred feet away. Then, when we're all ready, I blow the horn like this." He hit it and a chicken that was in the yard took off straight up.
"Now, the moment you hear that horn," said the taxi driver, "you come running. I introduce you to the woman. I come back here and get my cab and leave. You do what you want with the woman," and he leered, "and when you're through, you simply walk back here and the old man takes her home. Now synchronize our watches again just to make sure. The woman will be so hot for you, you mustn't keep her waiting. Promise?"
"Oh, I won't keep her waiting," I said and eagerly synchronized my watch again.
"One more thing,
" said the taxi driver. "Give me two hundred thousand lira so I can get a woman this very night."
"Two hundred thousand lira?" I said. "That's two thousand dollars! In Istanbul brothels, that would be a whole year of women!"
"No, no. You don't understand the quality you are getting. These women aren't prostitutes, no sir! These are girls trying to earn their dowries, their bride money. If they have a big enough offer, even the hottest and most beautiful maiden will be slavering to get it. It means they can then marry a good husband. With that much, they'll come flocking! You'll have the best-looking women for miles around panting to tear their veils and robes off and get under you. Thin, plump, tall, short, a new one every night. Imagine it! A beautiful, passionate woman lying naked on that ledge, her hips twitching, stretching out her arms to you, begging, begging for it."
I ran into the house, opened my safe and got two hundred thousand lira and put it in a big sack and came back.
The taxi driver peeked in. He nodded.
The old chauffeur laughed an evil laugh.
"See you when I blow the horn!" yelled the taxi driver and drove off in his cab.
I could hardly wait.
Chapter 7
Eight-thirty came. No signal to come.
I was waiting in the patio, all steamed up to go. I looked at my watch. It was eight thirty-one and ten seconds.
The car had left on time, sliding smoothly out onto the road, running very quietly in the night.
Eight thirty-two. No signal to come.
I began to pace. I was very eager to get going, in no mind whatever to suffer through delay.
Eight thirty-six. No signal to come.
I paced faster.
This was cruel. I was beginning to ache.
Eight forty-six. No signal to come.
What could be keeping them? Had the girl said no? Oh, if she knew what Prahd had given me she would certainly never say no! Maybe I should have given Ahmed a portrait of it.
But never mind. After this once, word would get around!
Eight fifty-one. Still no signal to come!
I was beginning to perspire. My hands were shaking.
Eight fifty-nine. No call as yet!
Nine o'clock.
THE HORN!
It blasted hard as an earthquake!
I went out of there like a racehorse from the starting gate.
Racehorses, however, usually don't run into camel drivers, nor camels, or donkeys, either. I did. For some reason, the farmers along that road must have decided it was a superhighway. Caravan after caravan, lanterns bobbing in the moonlight, was choking the thoroughfare with slow-moving, evil-smelling traffic. Drivers fended me off with sticks and even a camel took a nip at me.
I dived into a ditch to avoid the lashing heels of a donkey and looked wildly about for the Daimler-Benz.
Anxiously, thrusting caravans out of my road with threatening yells, I rushed on.
Just short of the cedar tree, I ran into Ahmed. He stopped me. It was moonlight. The car was very visible from the road. You could even see the eagle on the door. The dome light showed there was somebody inside.
"What was this delay!?" I said, trying to get away from him and to the car.
"She is a new girl. An untried maiden. She was shy. I had to convince her all over again when she got here. It took both old Ters and myself to keep her from bolting. But we convinced her. Let me introduce you."
He took me to the car.
I pushed an inquiring camel out of the way and got the door open.
Reclining on the ledge under her cloak, still veiled, dimly seen by the dome light, a woman lay.
"Blank Hanim," said Ahmed. "This is Sultan Bey." He pointed his finger at her. "Remember what I told you and be good. You please him, you hear me?"
Her eyes were big as saucers above the veil. I heard her swallow convulsively. A good sign.
I started to get in but a camel thought my coattail was edible and pulled me back.
I whirled to free myself. I cocked a fist, but a donkey was standing there. I thought better of it.
"Get in, get in!" said Ahmed. "Don't be shy. She's all yours!"
"Get these beasts out of here!" I yelled at him. "I don't want any (bleepety-bleep) audience! And you get out of here, too! I'm shy!"
"Oh, well, if you say so," Ahmed said. He helped me in and banged the door.
Unfortunately, when he slammed it, the side curtain rolled up. I turned to yell at him to be careful of the car and found I was staring at a camel's face. I tried to get the curtain down: the bottom snap had parted. After two tries, I gave up. To Hells with the camel. I had more interesting things to do!
The woman's great black eyes were pools of passion– or terror. I did not bother to decide which.
With a ripping yank, I got the veil off her face.
"O Allah," she said.
She was beautiful.
I started to get out of my clothes.
"O Allah," she said.
There was a tap at the window. I faced it in a rage. A donkey was standing there, staring.
I rolled down the window.
I still held the veil. I hit him in the face with it.
He deafened me with a bray.
He didn't go away.
To Hells with him.
I grabbed the woman.
"O ALLAH!" she screamed.
The car springs began to rock.
"OOOO ALLLLLLLAAAAAAAH!" screamed the woman.
The moonlit world went into a spin for me.
There was a hissing sound. I listened to it a while.
I looked up.
The donkey and two camels were looking in the window.
I yelled at them.
They raced away.
The hissing sound continued.
I realized a car tire was going flat.
To Hells with it.
Once more the car springs began to rock.
The sound of the woman's voice racketed clear to the road. "I'm drowning! I'm drowning!" The caravans dodged.
A camel driver came up to the car. He saw the springs rocking.
He stuck his head in the window.
"O Allah!" he said.
I was able to set up again. I saw what the trouble was. The dome light was still on. I reached over and hit it savagely. It went off.
The camel driver raised his lantern up, flooding the interior again with light.
I grabbed the woman's cloak and threw it in his face.
I got busy again.
Above the squeak of car springs, I could hear him outside talking.
To Hells with them.
"O ALLLLLLLLLLLLLLAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHH!" screamed the woman.
It was dark and it was quiet.
There seemed to be a chinking sound.
I looked out of the window.
A donkey and three camels were standing there. The chinking was from their bridles as they chewed the woman's cloak. An entirely different camel driver was trying to get it away from them. He succeeded, put it under his arm and walked off.
The donkey and three camels all tried to get their noses through the window.
I was too tired to argue with them. I climbed over the front seat back and got out of the other side of the car. I hadn't fastened my belt buckle and I tripped.
I stumbled around the car and tried to shoo the onlookers away. They ignored me. Then I shrugged. Let the animals gratify their voyeur tendencies: it had been great.
Ters appeared from somewhere and gave vent to his evil laugh.
Not even that fazed me.
Ters saw that a tire was flat, got out a pressure can with goo and inflated it.
He got in the car, gave another evil laugh and drove off.
In the back window, lit by moonlight, I could see the woman staring back at me. She had a very beseeching look.
Ah, I thought triumphantly, there goes a VERY satisfied female!
Despite all the disturbance, it had been quite a night!
Chapter 8
The very next night was quite similar to the first. The half-hour delay was the same. This girl looked a little plumper and a little older. She seemed, however, strangely tired and wan when I arrived.
The caravan traffic was even more intense and its interest in the car was just as great, but I did not let little things bother me. I am the sort of man who stays right on course, regardless of minor disturbances, and gets the job done.
The only major difference between the first and second nights was that a donkey, since the window had stuck open, reached right in and nipped me. I got rid of him with a punch in the nose.
But Ters had at last driven the second woman away with her staring out the rear window, her eyes and gestures pleading. I felt I was really making a hit!
The third night had some variation. Some camel drivers had built a campfire near the car and were sitting around it. The red eagles and the gold letters of my name were really prominent in the leaping firelight.
Ahmed came to me where I eagerly waited, just outside the gate before he blew his horn.
"I've got to get rid of them first," he told me. "Give me a few lira and go back inside the villa compound: these rendezvous of yours are secret and mustn't be seen.
I did as he told me. An awful lot of time passed: another half hour. Eventually the horn was sounded. I rushed out again.
The fire that had been flaming there was almost out: just a few sparks remained.
"What was the delay?" I demanded. "Those camel drivers are long gone!"
"It's the woman," Ahmed said. "She's a very virtuous girl, this one. Terrified of her reputation. When we arrived and she spotted the camel drivers and fire, she fainted. It took us until just now to bring her to!"
I was eager to get down to business and leaped into the car. But they hadn't done a very good job in bringing her around. She still seemed to be unconscious.
I yanked the veil off her face. This third one had a tawny complexion. She seemed to be quite young. Then I saw that tears were running out of her eyes.
I understood at once. She had just worn herself out in the eagerness of waiting.
Well, here was one that wasn't waiting!
Mission: Earth Fortune of Fear Page 17