Part 10 (1/2)

”I doubt that,” Turrin replied worriedly. ”The CID has a h.e.l.l of a lot of pride. They're just not going to let you run wild over here, that's all.”

Bolan said, ”Well, we'd better cut this short. What can I do to help your operation?”

Turrin produced a small notebook, jotted a phone number, and tore out the sheet and handed it to Bolan. ”Contact me here, sometime today if you can. We'll work out a meet.”

”Okay. Where were all the cars headed?”

”Airport. Arnie Farmer Castiglione is bringing in a big head party, due to land at six. Staccio insisted that we come on ahead and try to get a jump on them. But n.o.body's been home here all night and h.e.l.l, we've just been sitting around waiting for someone to show.”

”What do you mean, get a jump?”

Turrin grinned. ”It's the big squeeze, buddy. Peace in one hand and war in the other. If we make contact first, meaning the peace delegation, the Farmer is supposed to lay off and give us a chance to work something out.”

”But you think he won't.”

”Right, that's the feeling. But we're supposed to give it the old college try. For what it's worth, Staccio brought with him the full authority of the Commissione Commissione to make a deal with you.” to make a deal with you.”

”Castiglione's on that Commissione Commissione.”

”Right. But you know how these things go. The old warrior hates your guts, Sarge.”

Bolan shrugged. ”So, old warriors die too, you know.”

Turrin said, ”Yeah, you could look at it that way, I guess. Listen, I don't really know all the details... Staccio's playing this thing pretty close to the chest. Fin just supposed to make the contact and set up the meet. Maybe you should listen to what he has to say. It might be your out.”

”Who says I want an out?”

Turrin smiled faintly. ”You can't keep this going forever, Sarge.”

Bolan grinned and said, ”I can try.”

”Well... okay. It's your decision. h.e.l.l don't look to me for advice, of all people. Uh, you need anything from me that doesn't come under that heading?”

”I could use some intelligence.”

”I'll do what I can. What do you need?”

”I need a make on an old man named Edwin Charles, age about seventy or seventy-five. I think he was a biggie in OSS liaison during World War Two. Maybe someone can get a line from that angle. He died tonight.”

Turrin said, ”Friend or foe?”

”That's what I'm hoping you can tell me.”

”Okay. I have a line to Brognola. I'll put him on it.”

”While you're at it, look into a Major Mervyn Stone. The major part is a carryover, he's not active military anymore. The name's all I have, but there a connection with Charles.”

”Pretty important stuff, Sarge?”

”Yeah, pretty important. My head might be attached to it.”

”Okay, well shake the tree. You watch it, huh?”

Turrin moved casually back across the street, pulled the gate shut, and walked up the drive whistling a pop tune. Bolan watched him out of sight, then faded away into the night.

That was a good cop back there, a d.a.m.n good cop. Bolan wished him long life. But he feared a short one for him. Perhaps as short as Bolan's own.

Chapter Fourteen.

THE PACT.

Another night had all but ended when Bolan returned to Russell Square. Lights were on here and there inside Queen's House and a faint illumination marked the rectangle of Ann Franklin's window. After a cautious recon, Bolan went in through the rear entrance and let himself into the flat with the key the girl had given him.

Ann was waiting for him. She was in a chair directly facing the door, she was entirely awake, and she was holding the big Weatherby in a tense grip and pointing it right at his belly b.u.t.ton.

He closed the door and asked her, ”Forgotten me already?”

”I haven't forgotten you,” she replied coldly. ”What are you doing with my rifle?”

”Protecting myself.”

”Against me?”

She tipped her head in a deliberate nod. ”Against you.”

Bolan tried a grin that didn't quite come off. ”Is it all right with you, Lady Gunner, if I have a cigarette?”

”If that means may you reach inside your jacket, no, you may not.”

Bolan did not like a bit of this. He said, ”Look, I'm not feeling up to games. Don't believe it about an infantryman's feet. They get as tender as anybody's, and I've been on mine all night. Now what's going on?”

She murmured, ”Thank goodness your tender feet are no concern of mine.”

He said, ”Forget the feet, it's tough shoulders that count. Particularly the gun shoulder. When those big pieces go off they buck into you like an enraged bull. I've known guys to come off the firing line with fractured collarbones.”

”I've handled firearms before,” she a.s.sured him.

Bolan did not like the icy stare she was giving him. He wondered, but would not ask, where Major Stone was at the moment. He said, ”Where have you handled firearms? On the clay pigeon line?” He shook his head. ”That's no pop gun you're holding there, Lady Gunner. It was made to deliver a killing punch at better than a thousand yards. That's three thousand feet, better than half a mile, or roughly one kilometer, to put it in your terms. That kind of killing power requires a muzzle energy of more than four thousand pounds- that's where the enraged bull comes from-and it takes a bullet of at least 300 grains. No military style steel jackets on those jobbies, either. That Weatherby is a big game rifle, meaning the bullets are blunt-nose expanders, designed for high shocking power. They mushroom on impact, and they tear through like a small bomb. You pop me with that charge from where you're sitting and you'll be cleaning pieces of me off of every wall in the room, and maybe even some out in the hall. If you want to try for something really gory, then lay it in right between my eyes. You might get some scrambled brains clear into your frying pan. Or if-”

”That will be quite enough of that,” she interrupted. Her face had gone white and a nervous tic was beginning to work at the corner of her mouth.

Bolan said, ”I think so, too. So if you really mean to shoot me, then why don't you put the clip in?”

”The what?”

”The ammo clip. Why didn't you load the gun?”