I thought fast. I was dealing with incompetents, sure-fire bunglers. What if all this messed up? What if Heller did win? Ouch! He'd be the most famous guy on the planet! Rockecenter and Lombar would be finished whether they knew each other or not!
"You can give me Faustino Narcotici's address," I said.
"Certainly," he said and quickly wrote it and the phone number out. "It's also in the yellow classified phone book under 'Family Counseling—Total Control, Inc.'" He tossed me the card.
I left him to his happy day.
I found myself before a splendid new high-rise in the Bowery. It was all black glass and chrome. I thought I must be in the wrong place and almost didn't get out of the cab.
"Sure, this is the Narcotici mob building," the cabby said, somewhat aggrieved that his knowledge of Manhattan was being questioned. "Cantcha see the U.S. Courthouse and Police Headquarters right over there? And up that street, the Federal Building? This place used to be a slum but now it's got some real tone. That'll be five extra for the guided-tour fee."
The splendid sign, Total Control, Inc., fanned above a splendid arch. The lobby had murals of American flags, depicting its evolution from Betsy Tea—calmly sewing the first flag with a joint in her smiling mouth—and adding star by star the appropriate and applicable drug of the state with charming little frescoes of the events. Obviously, American history was firmly based on drugs. The murals stopped with fifty-four stars, which dated the mural. A group of schoolchildren were on a guided tour but I pushed through them.
At the information desk, I asked for Faustino "The Noose" Narcotici and a charming Sicilian girl came right out from behind the counter and personally led me into what I thought was an elevator, until the sliding door closed. In privacy, then, she pressed what looked like a stop-button panel and my side of the floor suddenly opened.
I went down like a rocket! A chute!
Unsteadily, I came to rest at the bottom and found myself looking into the rather large muzzle of a Bernadelli Model 80 .380 ACP, seven-shot automatic pistol. The face above it was very thin and Sicilian.
Somebody behind me plucked my Colt Python out of my shoulder holster and jammed it into my spine. Another Sicilian came running up and lifted out my wallet and I.D.
"Oh, (bleep)," he said. "It's only a Fed."
"A pretty (bleeped) dumb Fed," said the Sicilian with the Bernadelli. "Walking up to a metal detector with a rod on him!" He waved the others away. "You new or something? You coulda got yourself shot! Didn't you see the cloakroom? You check your God (bleeped) gun there."
They gave me back my I.D. and wallet after removing the $400 that was in it to pay them for their trouble.
"Now whatcha want?" said the Sicilian with the gun. "Scarin' Angelina half to death. Ain't you got no sense of decency? Fed appointment time is over! Two o'clock. You want to see some executive, it's gotta be before two o'clock. Green," he said to the other two.
"I want to see Mr. Narcotici," I said politely. "I'm sure you don't classify him as an 'executive.'"
"(Bleep) no. He's the capo di tutti capi and don't you forget it. Whatcha want to see him about?"
"Mr. Bury sent me," I said.
He turned to a computer, pushed it and it came up blank.
"Oh, (bleep)," said the one who had taken my gun.
"And this is a good rod. Brand-new." He gave it back to me.
The man who had taken the $400 gave it back to me.
"Well, excuse me for callin' you green," said the man with the Bernadelli, putting it nervously away.
He went to an internal red phone. He picked it up. He said, "Would you tell Mr. Narcotici we got a Bury messenger here under cover as a Federal agent?"
They took me over to another elevator door and I was shortly rocketing upward.
A young man who looked like an Executive Magazine clothing ad was at the elevator to meet me. He escorted me courteously through a huge banquet hall decorated with baskets of money and naked brunettes holding them. So this was the place the officials of New York got paid off every Saturday night! Beyond it was a big door. He gently pushed me in.
It was a huge office with murals of Sicily. Warm, artificial sunlight filled the room. Sitting in a shady cupola was a very fat man whose fingers were solidly metal with rings.
He got up and bowed. It was obviously Faustino. He was so fat you could hardly see his eyes. "And how is my good friend, Mr. Bury?" he said.
"Very fine," I replied. "He's particularly happy today."
"Must be a lot of dead bodies around then," said Faustino. "Me, I'm just small time. Bury, he deals in whole countries! Whole populations. Sit down. Would you like a cigar?"
There wasn't any place to sit but it was nice of him to ask. I cut through all the Italian preliminaries. I shifted to Italian to make him feel more at home. "I just need a couple of snipers. For one day only."
"What date?" he said, shifting easily in language.
I told him.
"Oh, I don't know," he said. "That's a crowded date. But you didn't have to come to see me about it. All you had to do was call in at the Personnel Department on the 50th floor."
"I think Mr. Bury wanted someone to look into your health," I said. "He commented you seemed very carefree lately."
He went sort of white. He hastily scribbled something on a card. He seemed very glad to see me leave.
At the Personnel Department a charming young man heard my request.
"That date," he said in a cultured accent. "It's crowded. Isn't that the date of the Spreeport Demolition Endurance Derby? Yes, it is. Well, I don't see..."
I gave him Faustino's card. He instantly started punching personnel computers like he was trying to put holes in them.
Really upset, he said, "I can't get two hit men for that date!"
"I'm only asking for snipers," I said. "Just plain snipers that are good shots."
He went back at it again. With relief he came up with two. I told him where they were to report and how. For I had all my plans exactly made.
He promised they would be there.
I went back to the lobby. I stopped by the Information Desk. "I am very sorry, Angelina," I said to the girl. "I didn't mean to frighten you." It was unlike me but I wanted good relations here. She was quite pretty.
"Excuse me, sir," she said, "but please get the hell out of the lobby. You've got every gun detector going again!"
I left. Reminded of the gun and being both Apparatus trained and of a cautious nature, I stepped into the facsimile of an old-time Bowery Bar, kept there for tourists, I supposed. In a booth I checked the Colt Python. Sure enough, that (bleepard) behind my back had slipped an explosive plug in the barrel just ahead of the cylinder. I withdrew it gingerly and threw it in a spittoon. Right then I knew you shouldn't trust the Mafia too far, even if it did run a lot of the country. If I had tried to assassinate Faustino, the gun would have blown my hand off. They weren't honest.
But I had accomplished what I had come for.
If Heller won that race, he'd do it on wings!
Even if the carburetor failed, it was no longer a factor. I was going to post two snipers with silenced rifles to blow out his tires one by one until he didn't have a single tire left! Providing he hadn't already wound up in the hospital.
Be certain of the result, my professors used to say.
Madison and Bury might both be crazy. But I still had a grip on my wits.
The very thought of Heller succeeding on top of all this publicity was gall upon my soul.