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For Shayne’s plans to work, a large number of people had to appear at exactly the right time, and perform exactly as expected. After all his years of experience, Shayne had no real hope that this would happen. Bobby Burns and Will Gentry were equally unpredictable, in different ways. But even if the big confrontation failed to come off, Shayne now knew — thanks to Philly Tucker — that he could salvage something, and he was ready to move.

Using the telephone in the game room, he dialed Liz O’Donnell’s number. He let it ring twice, hung up with a frown, looked up the number again, and redialed it. Again, after hearing the two rings, he hung up. This was the agreed-upon signal that would bring Liz and her boat across to a point sixty yards west of the De Blasio dock, on a direct line between the main house and a lighted tower on Biscayne Boulevard, on the Miami side of the bay.

The television had been turned down to a mutter. Pool balls clicked and fell. At the bar, the drinkers talked in low tones, clearly aware of the important conference that was taking place elsewhere in the house.

No one spoke to Shayne. He returned to the garage apartment and let himself in.

Sarah came out of the bedroom and shut the door. “I’m having a time with her, Mike. She wants to find her husband and have it out with him.”

“This wouldn’t be a good time to do that.”

Nicola, very drunk, stumbled out. Shayne caught her.

“Nikki, Carl and I have had a long session. He knows he hasn’t been spending enough time with you, and he’s sorry about it. He wants you to go to the Beach with him, to catch the show at one of the hotels.”

“Carl? Change my dress.”

“No, you’re all right. He wants to leave right away, before they grab him for some detail. Brush your hair. Sarah, give her a hand. I’ll be right with you.” The girls retired to the bedroom. Using the lock-picking attachments built into his pocketknife, Shayne picked the simple spring lock on the door to the gun room. A moment later he came out with two ugly-looking magnetic mines studded with explosive sensors and attached to disk anchors with fifteen-foot lengths of line.

“What are those?” Sarah asked as he passed the open bedroom door.

“Meet me downstairs.”

He camouflaged each mine with a dish towel and carried them to the water’s edge. Going over the aerial photographs with Burns, he had marked out a landing zone, a shingle beach an eighth of a mile west of the dock, on the northwest curve of the oval. He planted both mines here, scaling the anchors out some twenty feet offshore.

When he returned, Nicola was ready, washed, brushed, with fresh lipstick. She was wobbly, but erect.

“You come with us, Mike. Sarah. I want all my friends.”

“We have to go in two cars,” Shayne said. “There’s some kind of summit meeting going on in the house, and your father-in-law told Carl to stay on call. So we’ve got to fool them.”

“Mike, you’re a marvelous person.”

“I like to help,” he said with a glance at Sarah.

The girls got in. He drove back to Carl’s house and tapped the horn. Philly burst out, dragging Carl.

“I had to hit him, but he’s going to be a good boy, aren’t you, Carl?”

“I suppose I have to,” Carl said sulkily.

His wife, in the front seat, gave him a tremulous smile. “You don’t know how unhappy I’ve been.”

“You’re drunk,” he said with disgust.

“I had a few drinks with Sarah. I’m not drunk. You know this is the first time you’ve asked me to go anywhere with you in months?”

Shayne drew Philly aside. “Drive her out to the causeway. You won’t have any trouble getting that far, but then you’ll run into a police block. Tell them you’re working for me.”

“Baby, that’s no way to wind up a party. Fuzz?”

“Don’t worry about it. Just get rid of any dope you’re carrying. How have you broken the law otherwise?”

“Well, Mike, if you really don’t know…” He indicated Nicola with a nod. “I’ve had some bad times with female drunks. What do I do if she makes trouble?”

“Cool her,” Shayne said, and he made his next remark even more confidential. “The guns start going off about three minutes from now.”

“In that case…” Philly said hastily. He moved in swiftly and nearly succeeded in kissing Shayne’s cheek. He laughed as the detective pulled away. “Mike, you’re as skittish as a racehorse. Bye.”

Following Shayne’s directions, Philly drove them back to the garage, where he dropped them. Nicola made an attempt to get out and stay with Carl. “Carlo—”

Carl hit the door with both hands as it opened. “Goddamn it, will you start shaping up for a change?” he shouted. “Do what you’re told, and don’t ask any questions!”

His fury drained the color out of her face. Philly drove off.

“That’s the spirit,” Shayne said. “Do as you’re told, and don’t ask questions. I couldn’t improve on that.”

“I have to, don’t I?” Carl said sourly. “You’ve got me over a barrel.”

Larry Zito and another man stepped out of the garage. The second man, named Tony P., was one of the two who had accompanied Zito back from St. Albans. He was holding a shotgun.

“What’s this about a barrel?” Zito demanded. “That’s what guys say to shylocks. Is Shayne blackmailing you?”

“No-o! Larry, just don’t interfere, all right?”

“I think I’m called on to interfere. Up to the house, Shayne. I’ve been watching you for twenty minutes. What’s all this coming and going? What did you throw in the bay a couple of minutes ago? Who’s that fag driving the car? I never saw him around here before.”

“He’s a classmate of mine,” Carl said. “And he’s anything but a fag, as you put it. He’s taking Nikki over to the Beach for a drink. I didn’t want them around while the meeting’s going on. Do you mind?”

“In Shayne’s car? That was Shayne’s car he was driving.”

“I loaned it to them,” Shayne said. “We’re meeting them later.”

Zito remained firm. “Carlo, I want you to talk to the Don. I speak as an uncle. Shayne’s trying to work something.”

Carl seized his shirtfront and shook him. “Trying to mess me up, shylock…”

Tony grunted and brought the shotgun around. Stooping swiftly, Sarah picked up a loose coil of garden hose and flung it over his head. The nozzle rapped him on the cheek. As the coil tightened, Shayne hit him from the blind side, knocking the shotgun barrel away with one hand and connecting a split second later with a hard shot behind the ear.

The shotgun fired, and the recoil pulled it out of Tony’s weakening grasp. Shayne jerked the barrel hard, and it came free. He swung viciously and broke the stock over Zito’s head.

“Now we move,” Shayne said. “Grab the other guy, Carlo. Stay with me.”

He caught the semiconscious Zito around the waist and ran him down to the dock. Carl and Sarah followed with Tony, each with an arm. Shayne let Zito fall, and quickly prepared one of his two remaining needles, pulled down the loan shark’s pants, and hit him with it. He used the other on Tony.

The shotgun blast had brought several figures out on the lighted terrace. Shayne lined up the conspicuous tower that was their aiming point in downtown Miami, and was relieved to see a dark shadow on the water.