And it was all Bolan had needed. He smoothly went inside the attack, turned Lavallo effortlessly around and held him there as a shield. Meanwhile the Belle of the Ball was whisking clear of her sideleather.
Don Gio was throwing lead pointblank into the stiffening and suddenly wracked human shield, and trying to scamper to one side for a better firing angle. Bolan accorded the old man one split second of his attention and a single blast from the Beretta, then he was flinging himself clear of his dying burden and swinging to meet the attack that counted.
Larry Turk was running toward him and blazing away with the .45, and Bolan was aware that at least two of those zinging chunks had carried away parts of his own flesh in their passage.
Bolan caressed the Belle's trigger four times, twice in mid-fling and twice from rolling-prone, and Larry Turk's charge faltered and died. He stood there for a moment giving Bolan the dazed, I-don't-believe-it stare then the Belle spoke once more and an I-beheve-it third eye opened at the bridge of Larry Turk's nose and he pitched over backwards, dead in the air.
Bolan rolled across the floor for an inspection of Don Giovanni. The old warrior had a Parabellum in his Nassau-softened belly, and Bolan could see the life draining away from those weary old eyes. The Capocoughed and a trickle of blood flowed across the corner of his mouth. He groaned, "Put me in my chair. Let me die with dignity."
Bolan told him, "You'll die as you lived, Gio, in blood and crap up to your neck." Then he got to his feet and went to the lounge where Joliet Jake was shuddering with pain, oblivious to the death scene about him.
Bolan bent over him, and something flickered in those pained eyes, and Vecci gasped, "It's you, th' telephone guy!"
Bolan said, "Yeh, I've been a lot of guys tonight, Jake. Busy busy busy."
"Well what a hell of a night this turns out to be," the subcapo groaned.
Bolan told him, "Count your blessings, Jake," and he stepped away, disengaged and ready to shake that joint.
But then another man ran into the office, the tails of his topcoat flying out behind him, and he halted abruptly at sight of the big guy in the white jumpsuit. The man said, "Oh God."
Bolan thought, yeah, oh God. It was a face familiar to millions of Americans around the country, an almost intimate face to anyone who'd ever watched a televised news program or any other national hi-jinks from Chicago. That face had appeared on the covers of Timeand in countless other magazines and newspapers. Pretty big stuff, this guy.
Bolan felt a bit queasy at his stomach as he glowered at the man and told him, "You got here late, Jim. Or do we call you CityJim in this hallowed place?"
The guy was staring at the black blaster in Bolan's clenched fist. In a voice of total resignation he declared, "Okay, let's get it over with."
"Not a chance," Bolan told him. "You'll have to meet your fate in its own time and place, bub."
And then Bolan went away from there, back across the sumptuous office built of terror and savage greed, up the winding iron stairway, and back along the route of entry.
He dropped lightly into the snow at the rear of the building and made for the river, mentally counting and assessing his own wounds, and listening appreciatively to the waning sounds of combat out front. The cops were taking over, and Bolan wished them well, both here and in the inevitable clouted courtrooms just beyond.
He reached his war-wagon and borrowed enough time from flight to tape compresses over the three flesh wounds he'd picked up from Larry the Late Turkeymaker, and then he drove confidently onto the ice and headed upriver.
As the scene for a wipe-out, the big windy city beside the lake had been a real charmer. Bolan quetly and humbly thanked Chicago... and he thanked the universe for all kind favors received.
Sure, it mattered who won. And the universe cared.
Epilogue
The signboard outside the modest North Side home had been hastily altered to read: LEOPOLD STEIN, LEGAL ADVISOR.
Bolan smiled and punched the doorbell. It was four o'clock in the morning, sure, but the joint was ablaze with lights, and the cute kid who answered the ring was looking as though she could remain awake for another twenty-four hours. Her eyes Were glistening as she led him into the living quarters, and she announced, "Daddy, it's the man."
Bolan could not think of kinder words nor a nicer tribute, and he could not imagine a warmer welcome than the six-feet of foxy womanhood who flung herself into his arms.
She checked him out, limb by limb and almost organ by organ, oozing and worrying over the miniscule losses of flesh here and there, and Bolan had to allow them to fuss over the wounds with antiseptics and bandages — and finally he was seated at a big dining table with Jimi on his lap and a heftily-laced cup of coffee in his hand, and he told his host, "I see you changed your shingle outside."
Stein grinned and replied, "The groundhog came out early and failed to see his shadow. To hell with that slime, Mack. I'll never hide from them again."
"Be careful, Leo," Bolan advised him. "The clout machine is probably as strong as ever."
"You forget," the lawyer reminded his guest. "We got the whole report on television, nearly an hour before you toddled in here. I never heard of such a slaughter. Out of the whole hierarchy of the Chicago syndicate, there's nothing but a few lieutenants and one lousy subcapo still alive. A guy named Meninghetti is in the clink, also a Drago."
"How about Benny Rocco?" Bolan asked. "And Spanno."
Stein shook his head. "They've seen their last appeals court."
"Okay, I'll scratch them from my book," Bolan murmured. "Uh, I meant what I said about being careful. There's still a lot of dirt in this town, Leo."
"Oh hell, I know that. Tell you what. I'll promise to be as careful as you. Okay?"
Bolan smiled soberly, trusting that the universe would be as concerned for men like Leo Stein as for wildass warriors like Mack Bolan. He realized, however, that the universe cares only for those who care for themselves — and for it— and the brief interlude of stolen camaraderie with friends he could trust was about used up.
He got to his feet and made ready for his re-entry into' the jungle of survival. He shook hands with his new friends, the Steins, and he pulled Jimi into the office foyer for a private farewell.
"You watch it," he growled, and poured an accumulation of loneliness and pent emotions into that goodbye kiss.
She clung to him and breathlessly asked him, "Where will you go? What will you do now?"
He whispered, "Down!" — and she stiffened momentarily in his embrace, then she shivered and clung to him all the more.
"That's where I live, Foxy," he reminded her. "It's home, and the only place I canlive."
"Well, you watch that beloved flesh, you hear?" she said huskily.
He disengaged from the embrace and went to the door, turned around for a final look, and then he was through the doorway and moving briskly into no-man's-land.
A man moves steadily, he knew, from the womb to the grave. It mattered little where he entered the world or where he left it. What counted was that route between the two. And Mack Bolan's only route lay in the jungle. It was the place where he lived. One day it would be the place for him to die. This was both his character and his fate. The Executioner accepted both... as a heritage. He would move forever along the wipeout trail, until the final decision was rendered.
Somewhere, somehow, the whole savage and bloody thing mattered. It was not a senseless game, from which a guy could just disengage any time the going became a little rough.
It was life, and Mack Bolan meant to live his to the bloody, bitter end. This was, simply, the kind of guy he was.