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The doorman was a big pink man about forty who in his elaborate uniform with epaulets looked like a chorus member in a Victor Herbert operetta. It was a role he took seriously, however, because he held out his hand in a pompous stop gesture.

"This is a private building," he said, chin up, eyes down.

"This is public business," Ness said, pleasantly, and with a thumb lifted his lapel to reveal the gold safety director's shield.

The doorman looked down his nose at the badge and Ness grunted and brushed the big man aside, then pushed the glass door open and went in; behind him, Patrolman Lewis was telling the doorman, "Don't warn 'em upstairs, or you'll be an accessory."

The offended but now docile doorman didn't reply, although it might have been a fair question to ask accessory to what.

The lobby was small, clean, and modem, with assorted mirrors and potted plants; Ness and the patrolman took the elevator up to the third floor, where in Suite 3C the Emperor ruled his roost.

Ness knocked on the bright red door. Three hard, rifle-shot knocks.

There was no response.

He knocked again. Three more hard rifle shots.

"Guess I'll have to kick it in," Ness said, matter-of-fact but purposely loud.

A muffled female voice from behind the door called out: ''Willie ain't here!"

Ness spoke to the door. "Are you Mrs. Rushing?"

There was a pause. "I is gonna be."

"Who am I speaking to?"

"Jewel LaVerne. We engaged."

"Well, that's very romantic, Miss LaVerne. Open the door, please. We have a warrant."

"Let me see it."

"Open the door, Miss LaVerne, and I'll show it to you."

She reluctantly eased open the door, halfway, leaning against the doorjamb with studied insolence that failed to mask her fear; a yellow-complexioned girl of perhaps twenty, she had a round face with sultry, long-lashed eyes and a full mouth and a lack of make-up made her no less sullenly pretty. She was wearing a man's silk pajamas, which she filled out interestingly, sleeves and pant legs rolled up to accommodate her shapely five-five frame. She smelled of lilac perfume and sleep.

Ness dug the folded warrant out of his suitcoat pocket and showed it to her. She looked at it blankly; his guess was she couldn't read.

She looked at him, batting her lashes in slow motion and gazing at him like a bored cat; but there was tension in the eyes nonetheless.

"Willie ain't here, I tole you. He's outa town."

"Where, out of town?"

"Two hundred miles away."

"Please stand aside, Miss LaVerne."

The sullen face squeezed into a childish pout and she stepped back and slammed the door in Ness's face, damn near breaking his nose.

He stood back, feeling more stupid than angry, rubbed his sore nose, and sighed.

Patrolman Lewis asked, "You want me to bust it down?"

"No thanks," Ness said, with a faint smile. "This is a specialty of mine."

He kicked the red door three times, with the flat of his foot, emphasis on the heel, enjoying the feel of the impact as it climbed the muscles of his leg, shaking his whole body, rattling his teeth. The door sprang open on the fourth kick and Ness knifed through the apartment, pushing the sweet-smelling woman aside. The apartment was ornately furnished, the carpets thick-napped Orientals; the Emperor had himself a palace, all right.

"Stay out here," Ness ordered Lewis. "Keep an eye on her, and the door!"

Ness quickly found the bedroom, a room so garish it startled him, from the fancy brocade wallpaper, blood-red, to the ornate white furniture and huge polished brass bed with red silk sheets and overhead mirror. The smell of the woman's lilac perfume was in the room.

Willie was, too.

The big middle-aged man was climbing out the window-while his girl had been stalling the cops, fastidious Willie had taken time to get dressed, in a powder-blue shantung-silk suit and pale yellow crepe linen-silk shirt with a dark blue silk-knit tie. He was weighted down with gold jewelry-rings and cufflinks and diamond stickpin-and in his left hand was an alligator traveling bag.

"All dressed up and nowhere to go, Willie," Ness said, standing with his hands on hips, grinning. "Except jail, of course."

Willie stepped back inside; he let the alligator bag drop to the floor and put his jewelry-heavy hands up and his smile was as wide and white as a picket fence.

"Mister Ness," he said. "I was jus' about to leave town on business."

"Were you," Ness said, approaching Willie cautiously. "Do I have to cuff you, Willie, or will you come along quietly?"

"What the charge?"

"We're just going to hold you for questioning. No big deal."

"Fine with me, boss," Willie said, and he shoved Ness with two big hard hands, knocking him back against the foot of the brass bed. Willie slipped out the window, with a deep laugh, and Ness picked himself up and smiled tightly and went after him, catching him on the fire-escape landing.

Willie turned and swung a ham-size fist, but Ness ducked it, tackling Willie; the two men slammed into the metal railing and began wrestling, and soon the Emperor, a big bear of a man, was on top, the cross-hatching of the metal grill-work digging into Ness's back. The cool night was damn near day, with the full moon above, and Ness could see clearly the vicious expression over him as the Emperor drew back a massive fist and was about to let fly, when Ness grabbed the gun out from under his shoulder and pointed it straight up into the big man's face.

The Emperor's two white wide eyes looked down into the smaller black infinite one of the. 38 and he froze, his drawn-back arm and fist caught in midair, as if stiffened there.

"Think about it, Willie," Ness said. "You can be dead, or we can go back inside and pretend this never happened."

The Emperor swallowed and smiled the picket-fence grin again and crawled off Ness like a satisfied lover. He stood on the fire-escape landing and brushed off his fancy silk suit with whisk-broom hands.

"Pretend what happened, Mr. Ness?" Willie asked innocently.

Ness was on his feet now. It was a little windy up here, he noticed.

"Are you all right, Mr. Ness?" the patrolman below called up. The fire escape was on the east side of the building and it had taken a while for the man stationed out back to notice the struggle.

"Everything's under control," Ness yelled down. Then to Willie, with a gesture of the. 38, he said, "After you, Emperor."

Willie stepped back inside.

"Them indictments is comin' down," Willie said, "ain't they?"

"Let's put it this way," Ness said. "You're about to be deposed."

Ness led the man through his apartment, where the girl stuck her pink pointy tongue out at the safety director; Ness, Rushing, and Lewis went down the elevator and out front, where a Black Maria was waiting.

Lewis stood eagerly by as the paddy wagon officer closed the back door of the buggy on the glumly seated Emperor, and Ness checked his watch.

"We're on schedule," Ness said to Lewis, "but barely. Let's go."

CHAPTER 15

The Demo League Hall was at East 71st and Central, a huge yellow-brick two-story building that came right up to the sidewalk in a thriving ghetto business district. The lower floor of the building was taken up by small businesses- liquor store, delicatessen, tavern, drug store. Curry stood, in the light of the moon and streetlamps, studying with a tourist's curiosity the cluttered display behind the iron-grilled window of Cohn's Drug, an array that included blood tonics, skin bleaching creams, and electric hair-straightening irons.

Finding a place to park the unmarked sedan had been a trick; both sides of the street were thick with parked cars. They left it in the alley behind the massive building, Moeller saying it wasn't a bad idea blocking the alley, anyway. The windows up on the second floor were dark and shut tight, but the sound of a raucous party going on was seeping out none-the-less.