Blowout

by Don Pendleton

  Freddie Leonhardt's local pass, along with the Beretta in its shoulder rig, had been taken from Bolan when he was frisked.

  "It's not my card," he said. "I borrowed it. The story sounds complicated, but I can explain exactly…"

  "Where is your own card?" Fischer interrupted. "If you have one."

  "In my hotel room."

  "Apart from this, uh, borrowed card, do you have any means of identifying yourself? Can you substantiate your claim to be…?"

  "Of course I do. Of course I can!" Bolan's voice was angry. "Telex messages and office memos addressed to me. Letters. Notes from my interviews. A driver's license. My passport." All these papers were part of the ID supplied to him by Hal Brognola via the diplomatic bag.

  "Ah, yes," Fischer said. "A passport. And where would this valuable document be?"

  Bolan sighed. "In my hotel room. Along with the press card, a checkbook and all the other stuff."

  The policeman smoothed his mustache with a forefinger and nodded. "Just so. Odd, nevertheless, that a foreigner — and apparently an experienced journalist at that — should omit to retain such papers on his person while at the same time carrying a large-caliber automatic pistol in an extremely professional underarm holster."

  "I wasn't expecting to face a police interrogation."

  "Clearly. That's probably the truest thing you've said yet." Fischer paused for a moment, then said, "You have, of course, a Ministry of Interior permit to carry this weapon?"

  Bolan was silent.

  "Exactly. Well, Herr Belasko, you will, for the moment, remain here as our guest…" another cold smile"…while your claims are checked and further inquiries are made."

  Bolan was locked in a cell. The further inquiries, he was to learn, were negative from his point of view. Neither the passport nor the press card was in his room. Nor could the law find any trace of a driver's license, a checkbook or a single scrap of paper relating him in any way to World Review or even bearing the Belasko name. The guy who'd stolen the scarf had been well briefed.

  The frame was ingenious. Bolan wondered if he had been mistaken and Arvell Asticot, aware all the time that the Executioner was after him, was responsible.

  That could wait. Just two things had priority now. To convince the police of his — or Mike Belasko's — identity, and to get out of there. Once they believed he really was a respectable American newspaperman, surely they would believe his story and he could go ahead with helping them find out what had actually happened at Dagmar's apartment, and why.

  Bolan was determined to keep his real identity secret. He still had one trump card: the rented BMW that was parked on the lowest floor of the Hotel Oper garage. His Mike Blanski ID papers, along with a spare Beretta and the rest of the gear that had arrived in the diplomatic bag, were taped beneath the driver's seat.

  Okay, so how to verify the Belasko identity?

  There had been American Express checks in the pocket of his sheepskin coat, but Fischer said they could have been stolen. No supporting testimony. Cable Chicago? It was an explicit part of the deal with Michaelson that the World Review management would never be dragged into any trouble the Executioner had gotten himself into. The same applied to the consulate; Bolan knew he would be instantly disowned as an embarrassment in a situation of this kind. He hoped to hell there was no automatic feedback whereby the consul general was informed of the arrest of any American citizen.

  The more he thought about it, the more he realized there was only one runner in the race — Freddie Leonhardt. He knew Belasko; he had met him. Technically speaking Leonhardt was working for him on a specific assignment. It seemed reasonable, then, to ask the law to rope him in, especially since he could explain the press card routine. He should also be able to verify Bolan's cover without involving Chicago.

  But Fischer beat him to the punch. When Bolan was taken to the policeman's office the following morning, Leonhardt was already there, wearing a charcoal pinstripe suit, a paisley necktie and an embarrassed expression.

  The office was in a steel-and-glass building loud with the clacking of typewriters. Fischer sat like a mustached Buddha behind his desk, with his assistant, the same young sergeant who had been with him the previous night, off to one side with the usual notebook. A uniformed cop, with the flap of his white holster unfastened at his belt, stood by the door.

  "Perhaps we can wrap up this nonsense about who I am now," Bolan said. "Freddie, you can do that for me, can't you?"

  For the first time he became aware that Leonhardt was avoiding eye contact. He was standing by a window, staring at gray stone and red brick. There had been a partial thaw during the night, and a thin sleet was washing blocks of snow down the shining slate roofs. The office was pretty gloomy, too, despite the ultramodern architecture — too many dossiers, too many scarred wood filing cabinets, not enough light. The walls were a bilious green up to waist height, a cold ivory above. "Do you know this man, Herr Leonhardt?" Fischer asked formally.

  Freddie swung around. The sergeant's pencil poised over a blank page. "Yes, I know him. I've known him a few days."

  "Can you identify him?"

  "He represented himself to me as a journalist named Mike Belasko, who is employed by an American paper 1 work for sometimes."

  "What the hell do you mean, 'represented himself?" Bolan interrupted. "I am Mike Belasko and you damn well…"

  "Silence!" Fischer snapped. "Please elaborate that statement, Herr Leonhardt." The sergeant's pencil was flying across the page.

  "Well, I mean I was expecting Mike Belasko. The office had cabled me with instructions to help him all I could. And when this Johnnie turned up, I naturally assumed…"

  "Naturally you assumed this was the genuine article. Quite so. Are you saying now that subsequent events caused you to modify that view."

  Leonhardt shifted his feet uncomfortably. "Not exactly. But…"

  "Yes?"

  "Well… he seemed to be going about his piece — an East-West situationer — you know, in, well, rather an odd way."

  "Can you tell me in what way his behavior was odd?"

  Leonhardt darted Bolan a glance out of the corner of his eye and then looked away. "Well, yes, I mean the story, that is to say the subject he was working on, had nothing to do with the places he went to. He kept asking me how to get to certain low-life haunts. St. Pauli and that kind of thing. And it… I wouldn't have thought that had any connection with the kind of articles he writes. That Belasko writes, that is."

  "What the hell do you know about it, you snotty bastard?" Bolan rasped, half rising from his chair. "You don't know the first thing about the way an American paper works. You only have to look at the copy you turn in to see that. What do you know about interviewing the ordinary man in the street?"

  The cop on the door pushed the Executioner down again. Fischer, who had listened impassively with his hands flat on the desk in front of him, now asked Leonhardt, "Was it to gain entry to these places that he took possession of your press card?"

  Leonhardt nodded.

  "And you gave it to him, despite the fact that the card explicitly states that it is nontransferable?"

  The local news hawk flushed. "He was rather… persuasive."

  "He talked you into giving him the card? He insisted?"

  "I suppose so, yes."

  "In view of this man's… unexpected actions since you first met him, have you now, on reflection, any reason to modify your original opinion that this is Belasko?"

  "I, that is, I don't have any comment to make on that," Leonhardt said.

  "Thank you, Herr Leonhardt. I don't think we need detain you any longer."

  On his way out Freddie shot the Executioner a sheepish grin. "Sorry, old lad," he said awkwardly. "Got to own up in front of the jolly old beak, what!"

  Bolan ignored him. "Okay," he said to Fischer. "Let's quit horsing around, shall we? This is a frame. Surely you can see that? Nobody in their right senses is going to leave themselves wide open like th
at — a foreigner without papers of any kind! — and then go around murdering dancers in St. Pauli. Come on now!"

  "Murderers are rarely in their right senses," the policeman said equably. "Even if they were, the killing could be an impulsive act. The anonymity could be deliberate, a cloak for other illegal activities quite unconnected with it."

  Fischer was a Kriminalkommissar, the equivalent of a homicide squad lieutenant or a British CID detective-inspector. He eyed Bolan coldly, "Whether or not you're an American reporter on an international assignment doesn't affect our evidence."

  "What evidence?" Bolan demanded. "Apart from the fact that you found me in the apartment of a murdered girl — and the fact that someone has stolen my papers — there is no evidence. There can't be."

  Fischer sighed. "Better tell him what we have, Wertheim." The sergeant flipped back forty pages of his notebook and cleared his throat. Fischer turned his back and stared out the window. "This is off the record," he told the sleet slanting down from the sky. "No notes are being taken. I should just like you to know the score. It may save time."

  "Okay. Lay it on me," Bolan said.

  "Observation kept over the past two months in the St. Pauli, Altona and Hammerbrook districts," Wertheim read aloud, "suggests that the following conclusions can be drawn. One, an organized system of extortion is in operation, mainly among the proprietors of drinking clubs, small restaurants, strip shows and quasi-legal gaming establishments.

  "The system works like the so-called protection racket in the United States. That is, victims agree to pay the racketeers a certain percentage of their profits, or a fixed sum every week, in return for 'protection' against other, similar racketeers. In fact, the payments merely buy immunity from the attentions of those extorting the money. Failure to pay involves the wrecking of the establishment, sometimes with injury to the owner or members of his family. A second refusal results in more serious assaults, or in some cases even death."

  Bolan was watching the man as he read. He was young, probably in his late twenties, with ginger hair, very pale eyes and a bristly mustache. He was wearing gray pants and a tweed sport jacket. Somehow his face looked familiar.

  "Two," the young man continued, "although this crime technique has been practiced in Hamburg for some time, it has until recently been confined to isolated areas, with a number of small-time gangs each terrorizing comparatively few victims. Within the past two weeks the situation has altered. Today one highly organized group operates on a citywide basis. Other gangs have been eliminated or frightened off, and it is now thought that the newcomers also control gaming and prostitution and plan a greatly increased distribution of drugs."

  Wertheim turned a page. His fingers were ingrained with dirt — or oil — and suddenly the Executioner remembered where he had seen him before. He was the driver of the beat-up Opel who had been tailing the customized Cadillac in the Albertplatz…and pretending he had a mechanical breakdown in the market outside the Schroeder apartment. Had he been keeping a special watch on the apartment? Or was he just briefed to watch St. Pauli as a whole? If so, Bolan wondered how many more of his own movements had been noted — and how incriminating they might seem, observed in the light of a murder investigation.

  "Three," Wertheim said, "there was of course opposition to this crime cartel — principally from the St. Pauli gang led by Ferdinand Kraul. For a time the situation was fluid, with many establishments terrorized by both groups, but there appears to have been some kind of climax within the past few days and Kraul has not been seen since the sack of the Becker Cafe and the murder of its owner in the Albertplatz. Underworld rumors suppose that he was assassinated and his body dismembered and dropped into the ocean from an airplane, but there is no confirmation of this. There is, nevertheless, virtually no obstacle now to the main protection gang, known locally as the Team, ruling the whole of the city's illegal population.

  "Four, although it is well-known that the Team's strong-arm enforcement squad is headed by Hansie Schiller, their methods are so ruthless and so violent that victims refuse to complain or prefer a charge for fear of further reprisals. Schiller himself is a homosexual sadist with convictions for robbery with violence, uttering threats and GBH."

  "What's GBH?" Bolan interrupted.

  "In English, grievous bodily harm," Fischer said without turning around.

  "Five," the sergeant went on, "it is known that the campaign resulting in the Team's success was masterminded by a member of the American Mafia, specially hired to come to Europe and plan the operation. So far this criminal's identity remains a mystery. He has only been referred to by the nickname the Yank. He has, however, been described as very tall, lean and dark, with a Midwestern accent."

  Tall, lean, dark, Bolan thought to himself. That has to be Lattuada. It's just the kind of organization job he could pull. At the same time he was forced to admit the description applied equally well to him. Were they trying to hang the whole Yank-in-Hamburg number on him?

  They were.

  The lieutenant swung back to face into the room. "There is one more point." He looked expectantly at his sidekick.

  "Yes, sir. The leader of the Team is known to have accompanied the enforcement thugs on a number of bloody affrays in a white Cadillac automobile, registration number HH777-CDE. No description of this person is available, nor can a direct link with the American be proved. The Mafia man can, nevertheless, be shown to have had a liaison with a young woman having no criminal connections, but who is thought to have acted as a contact for him in certain activities concerned with narcotics." Wertheim closed the notebook with a snap. "The girl is… was originally a dancer. Name of Dagmar Schroeder."

  Fischer picked up a sheet of paper from his desk and glanced at it. "You yourself," he said to Bolan, "were seen by the sergeant here to visit the Kinderplatz day before yesterday." He read from the paper. "'Subject rang the bell of the Schroeder apartment. When there was no reply, he went into the delicatessen known as Fritz's, where he was joined by Fraulein Schroeder. They emerged, apparently in the middle of a dispute, and returned to the apartment. Subject did not, however, go inside but left shortly afterward, having first kissed the young woman with an angry expression.»

  In the silence that followed those two revelations, Bolan heard the rumble of traffic, the greasy hiss of tires along a street veneered with melting snow, an occasional blast from a taxi horn. "I want a lawyer," he said.

  "You'll have one," Fischer replied. He leaned forward, supporting his weight on arms lowered to the desk. "Look, Belasko, this isn't your turf. You may be a big noise in the Mob back home, but you don't know the form here. You just heard some of the stuff we've got against you."

  "You've got zip against me," Bolan said. "You've got a load of facts concerning Hamburg crime. You've got gossip concerning an American. And you've got nothing substantial to connect me with either. You've got nothing to connect me with the Mafia. You can only connect me with Dagmar Schroeder because I was seen talking to her for five minutes outside her house…and, of course, through the murder frame. Any lawyer could blow your case wide open in ten minutes."

  "Aha!" A hand came up and a finger wagged. "Maybe he could — if we were proceeding on a simple extortion charge. I'm not saying you would be wrong. But this is murder, and all that material is admissible because it tends to show character."

  "You say this mafioso has been organizing your crime wave for a couple of months. I only hit town at the beginning of this week. The day before that I was in Frankfurt, and twenty-four hours earlier in Munich, with fifty witnesses who can testify to that."

  "I don't doubt it," Fischer said. "It doesn't mean you couldn't have been here before, secretly, several times perhaps." He straightened and scratched the back of his thick neck. "Why not make it easier for yourself and come clean? There's no death penalty here. It would save a lot of time and trouble all around. I could block any extradition attempt in return, and you'd probably get away with ten years. We'd make it a crim
e passionnel. Otherwise…" He shook his head. "You may be able to frighten the petty crooks and the sex shop owners into silence when you're out on the loose. But once they know you're inside, the snitches will start coming out of the woodwork. Believe me."

  Bolan didn't say anything. He just stared at Fischer.

  The German cop sighed. "If that's the way you want it, we won't waste any more time. I'll make arrangements for a preliminary hearing. Wertheim, you better set up an ID parade."

  * * *

  Sergeant Wertheim's underlings had done their homework. There had been matchbooks from Tondelayo's and a couple of cafe bills in the warrior's pockets, and they had roped in the entire cast — the doorman from the Sugar Hill, the boss of the Cellar, the bartender at the Mandrake Root, the men's wear sales-clerk and the waiter and Joe from Tondelayo's. Even Sally Ann was there.

  With one exception, all those folks could testify how eager he'd been to locate Dagmar Schroeder. And the exception would tell how he'd bought the wool scarf he was supposed to have strangled her with. If they succeeded in picking him out of a lineup, of course.

  They did. He was fingered by all the men except Joe, who swore he'd never seen any of the people in the lineup before — on principle, Bolan guessed. Sally Ann was the last to be shown into the room. Bolan was still wondering whose side she was on, and how much she had to do with his present predicament.

  She walked up and down the line twice, shook her wild head and turned to Fischer, who was standing in back, smoking a short pipe with a large meerschaum bowl. "I never saw any of these gentlemen before," she said, "but I like the look of this one." She grabbed Bolan's arm. "I'll take him, thank you."

  "This is no time for joking, Fraulein," Fischer said severely. "An identity parade is a serious matter. A crime may have been committed."

  Sally Ann pouted. "If Comrade Gorbachev can fraternize with Americans," she said, "I don't see why I can't!"

  She was at the door on her way out when Fischer said gently, "Since none of the men spoke, Fraulein, how did you know this one was American?"