"There's something else that could be important, Smitty," Remo said gravely, before Smith could hang up. "The Twit of the Year in charge here said he had blueprints and diagrams of the White House layout. Stuff the public wouldn't have. I'm thinking big Hollywood contributors buying access."
Smith pursed his lips. "Is it possible the President would jeopardize his personal security for a contribution?"
"Where have you been, Smitry? For a thousand-buck legal-defense-fund contribution, you could probably buy the nuclear football. Anyway, I don't know what director or producers are behind Die Down IV, but there's hardly a summer that passes without Stefan Schoenburg or those other guys having a blockbuster."
"I will look into that angle," Smith promised.
"Okay, that's it. I'm outta here."
The line went dead in Smith's ear. The instant it did, the CURE director turned to his keyboard. He began entering the commands that would send agents swarming into the White House. He wasn't concerned that Remo would be caught. Smith knew better. He had seen Remo in action too many times.
After he was through, Smith paused at his keyboard.
His thoughts turned to Stefan Schoenburg and to the anger the President would doubtless display if his Hollywood friend were disgraced by CURE. Or worse.
In that moment, Smith decided that it didn't matter. Presidents came and Presidents went, but America and CURE had always survived them. He would use any and all means to learn who was behind this plot. The President's personal considerations be damned.
At that moment of decision, it was as if a weight had been lifted from the CURE director's frail shoulders.
Dropping his arthritic hands to his keyboard, Smith threw himself into his work with renewed vigor.
Chapter 26
The blinds were drawn tightly. The light dimmer was set just a hair above pitch-black. Bindle and Marmelstein were dark shadows in the claustrophobic gray of their sprawling Taurus office. They had built a barricade from the broken halves of Hank Bindle's desk. They hunkered behind their personal Maginot Line, bottles and tumblers arranged around them on the floor.
The only sound for a long time was the tinkle of glass on glass followed by grateful slurping. As the shadows around them lengthened, Hank Bindle finally peeked nervously over the desk.
"Are you crazy?" Bruce Marmelstein charged, dragging him back to the floor.
"I have to pee, Bruce," Bindle complained. Marmelstein shoved an empty Waterford decanter into his partner's hands. "Here," he whispered.
Bindle took the crystal container reluctantly. "Maybe we shouldn't stay here," he suggested as he filled the decanter with the contents of his nervous bladder. "He knows this is our office."
"Which is exactly why we should stay here," Bruce Marmelstein argued. "If he connects the White House thing to us, then he'll come looking for us."
Bindle put the now full decanter down. He was careful to separate it from the rest. "But won't he come straight here?" he asked, zipping up.
"Yes," Mannelstein agreed. "But since he knows we'll know he's coming here, then he'll think we wouldn't be stupid enough to stay here."
"But we are here," Bindle stressed.
"Which proves we're innocent," Marmelstein concluded.
"Stop it, Bruce," Bindle moaned. "You're making my boo-boo hurt." He held the cool crystal of his empty glass to his forehead. The bruise he'd gotten from bashing his head off the window pane was masked with makeup.
"America has a short attention span," Marmelstein argued. "Think MTV generation. No one'll remember the White House thing tomorrow. Not even Mr. Desk Hater."
But Bindle wasn't convinced. "I don't know," the Taurus cochair whispered. "The White House is, like, famous or something. What if they don't forget?"
"Hey, it was not our fault," Bruce Marmelstein hissed angrily. "Sure, we blew up one measly floor in some nothing New York building and tried to blow up our own-stress our own-studio complex. But that's it."
"But they might be mad about New York."
"Naw." Marmelstein waved dismissively. Bourbon splashed out of his tumbler. "That was just promotion. Everyone'd understand that."
Quietly, Hank Bindle hoped that Remo was part of the "everyone" to whom his partner referred. He was reaching for a fresh bottle when a soft bell sounded in the outer office. Their private elevator.
Bindle froze, hand locked around the neck of the bottle.
"It's him," he hissed.
Fear propelled them to their knees. As they watched from behind the shattered desk, a dark shape appeared in the glass office doors. Bindle and Marmelstein's eyes were sick as they waited for Remo to enter.
The figure cupped hands over eyes, peering into the darkness of the office interior. Slowly, the door pushed open. The dark shape slipped inside the room.
"Jeez, it's like the mummy's tomb in here," a nasal voice complained. "You guys ever see The Mummy? Boris Karloff acting, Karl Freund directing. I swiped enough from that to pad three movies. And mine had swearing."
A balled fist jabbed out in the darkness, punching the dimmer control on the wall near the door. The office was suddenly awash in glaring light.
Bindle and Marmelstein blinked away the stabbing pain in their eyes as they tried to focus on Quintly Tortilli.
"Turn that off," Bindle said.
"Why? So the big Oogidy-Boogidy can't find you?" Tortilli asked, fluttering his fingers. The director wore a neon-yellow leisure suit and a clashing green ruffled shirt.
"We wouldn't have to hide if you didn't do what you promised you wouldn't," Marmelstein pouted as Quintly strutted over to them. "Why did you take over the White House?"
As he perched on the side of the overturned desk, a grin split the knotted fist that was Quintly Tortilli's face. "What's it always about, fellas? Box office," he proclaimed.
"That doesn't help us," Bindle whined up at him. "This studio is going down the tubes, Quintly. Ten blockbusters won't pull us out of the hole we're in."
"One blockbuster and blowing up the studio might have helped," Marmelstein interjected. "If we'd collected the insurance money."
"Might have," Bindle agreed. "But you didn't blow it up, Quintly. And you promised." Marmelstein sniffled morosely. "At best, we've got one piddling blockbuster, a failed studio, two golden parachutes and the entire industry laughing at us when ET. shows us in line at the Tinseltown unemployment office."
Both Bindle and Marmelstein ducked behind the shattered desk. They reappeared a moment later, fat tumblers filled to the brims with scotch. They downed their drinks in simultaneous gulps.
"Turn those frowns upside down," Tortilli said. "You're thinking, like, yesterday. I'm thinking tomorrow."
"You can afford to think that way," Marmelstein said, his voice taking on an angry edge. "We might not even have a tomorrow. There's some desk-smashing psycho out there who's already been snooping around. You could have told us before yesterday you were the guy calling us for the past month, Quintly. But, no, you had to wait until you got back from Seattle-after you cashed all our checks. Now you've tied us in to the White House thing-which, as a promotional tool, was discussed, considered and ultimately rejected. By the by, if the cash for that was from a Taurus account, I want it back."
"Sorry, man, no can do." Quintly shrugged. "It's already gone."
"Well, you didn't blow up the studio," Bindle sniffed. "We want that money back."