Noble House

"I recommend against it. This is my bailiwick and I rec—'
"Center approves and we will do it if it is ordered!" Suslev wanted to order Roger Crosse to shut up or else, but he was careful not to offend their best asset in Asia. "Can we meet tonight?"
"No, but I'll call you. How about four? At 10:30?" Four was their present code for 32 Sinclair Towers. 10:30 meant 9:30 P.M.
"Is that wise?"
He had heard that dry confident laugh. "Very wise. Would those fools come again? Of course it is wise. And I guarantee it!"
"All right. Arthur will be there. We should cement the plan."
Clinker swerved to avoid a taxi cutting in and he cursed, then ground the gears, peering through the windshield ahead, getting into motion again. On his side Suslev rubbed the condensation away. "God-cursed weather," he said, his mind elsewhere. What about Travkin? Stupid motherless turd to fall off after passing the winning post. I thought he'd won. Decadent fool! No real cossack'd ever get caught like that. So he's out now, him and his crippled old crone princess with the broken bones.
Now how do we entice Dunross to the apartment tomorrow instead of Tuesday as .Travkin had signaled. It has to be tonight or tomorrow. At the latest it must be tomorrow night. Arthur must arrange it or Roger. They are the keys to the Dunross plan.
And I must get those files—or Dunross—before I leave. One or the other. They're my only real protection against Center.
Bartlett and Casey got out of the Struan limo at the Hilton, the resplendent, turbaned Si':h doorman holding an unnecessary umbrella—the vast overhang already protecting them from the sheets of water.
"I'll be here, sir, whenever you're ready," Chauffeur Lim said.
"Great. Thanks," Bartlett replied. They went up the steps to the ground floor and took the escalator to the foyer.
"You're very quiet, Casey," he said. All the way from the racetrack they had hardly said a word to each other, both locked into their own thoughts.
"So're you, Line. I thought you didn't want to talk. You seemed distracted." She smiled tentatively. "Maybe it was all the excitement."
"It was a great day."
"You think the tai-pan's going to pull it off? The General Stores takeover?" "Monday will tell." Bartlett went to the reception desk. "Mr.
Banastasio please?"
The handsome Eurasian assistant manager said, "Just a moment please. Oh yes, he changed his room again. Now it's 832." He handed him a house phone. Bartlett dialed.
"Yeah?"
"Vincenzo? Line. I'm downstairs."
"Hey, Line, good to hear your voice. Casey with you?"
"Sure."
"You want to come up?"
"On our way." Bartlett went back to Casey.
"You sure you want me along?"
"He asked for you." Bartlett led the way to the elevator, thinking of Orlanda and their date later, thinking of Biltzmann and Gornt and Taipei tomorrow and whether or not he should ask Dunross if he could take her. Shit, life's complicated suddenly. "It'll only be a few minutes," he said, "then it's cocktails with the tai-pan. The weekend's going to be interesting. And next week."
"You out for dinner tonight?"
"Yes. We should have breakfast though. Seymour needs straightening out and as I'm off for a couple of days we'd better have our signals straight."
They crowded into the elevator. Casey casually avoided being trampled on and ground her heel into her assailant's instep. "Oh so sorry," she said sweetly, then muttered "Dew neh loh moh " which Peter Marlowe had taught her this afternoon, just loud enough for the woman to hear. She saw the sudden flush. Hastily the woman shoved her way out at the mezzanine floor and Casey knew she had won a great victory. Amused, she glanced at Bartlett but he was lost in thought, staring into space, and she wondered very much what the real problem was. Orlanda?
On the eighth floor they got out. She followed Bartlett down the corridor. "You know what this's all about, Line? What Banastasio wants?"
"He said he just wanted to say hi and pass the time of day." Bartlett pressed the button. The door opened.
Banastasio was a good-looking man with iron-gray hair and very dark eyes. He welcomed them cordially. "Hey, Casey, you've lost weight—you're looking great. Drink?" He waved a hand at the bar. It was stocked with everything. Casey fixed herself a martini after opening a can of beer for Bartlett, lost in thought. Peter Marlowe's right. So's the tai-pan. So's Line. All I have to do is decide. By when? Very soon. Today, tomorrow? By Tuesday dinner for sure, Absolutely one hundred percent for sure and meanwhile maybe I'd better begin a few diversionary raids.
"How's it going?" Banastasio was saying.
"Fine. With you?"
"Great." Banastasio sipped a Coke then reached forward and turned on a small tape recorder. Out of it came a confusing mishmash of voices, the sort of background heard at any busy cocktail party.
"Just a habit, Line, Casey, when I want to talk private," Banastasio said quietly.
Bartlett stared at him. "You think this place's bugged?"
"Maybe, maybe not. You never know who could be listening, huh?"
Bartlett glanced at Casey then back at Banastasio. "What's on your mind, Vincenzo?"
Banastasio smiled. "How's Par-Con?" the man asked.
"Same as ever—great," Bartlett said. "Our growth rate will be better'n forecast."
"By 7 percent," Casey added, all her senses equally sharpened.
"You going to deal with Struan's or Rothwell-Gornt?"
"We're working on it." Bartlett covered his surprise. "Isn't this new for you, Vincenzo? Asking about deals before they happen?"
"You going to deal with Struan's or Rothwell-Gornt?"
Bartlett watched the cold eyes and the strangely menacing smile. Casey was equally shocked. "When the deal's done I'll tell you. The same time I tell the other stockholders."
The smile did not change. The eyes got colder. "The boys and I'd like to get invol—"
"What boys?"
Banastasio sighed. "We've got a good piece of change in Par-Con, Line, and now we'd like to figure in some of the up-front decisions. We figure I should have a seat on the board. And on the Finance Committee and the New Acquisitions Committee."
Bartlett and Casey stared at him openly. "That was never part of the stock deal," Bartlett told him. "Up front you said it was just an investment."
"That's right," Casey added, her voice sounding thin to her. "You wrote us you were just an investor an—"
"Times've changed, little lady. Now we want in. Got it?" The man's voice was harsh. "Just one seat, Line. That much stock in General Motors and I'd have two seats."
"We're not General Motors."
"Sure. Sure, we know. But what we want isn't out of line. We want Par-Con to grow faster. Maybe I ca—"
"It's growing just fine. Don't you think it'd be bet—" Again Banastasio turned his bleak gaze on her. Casey stopped. Bartlett's fists began to clench but he held them still. Carefully.
Banastasio said, "It's settled." The smile came back. "I'm on the board from today, right?"
"Wrong. Directors get elected by the stockholders at the annual general meeting," Bartlett said, his voice raw. "Not before. There's no vacancy."
Banastasio laughed. "Maybe there will be."
"Do you want to say that again?"
Abruptly Banastasio hardened. "Listen, Line, that's not a threat, just a possibility. I can be good on the board. I've got connections. And I want to put in my two cents' worth here and there."
"About what?"
"Deals. For instance, Par-Con goes with Gornt."
"And if I don't agree?"
"A little nudge from us and Dunross'll be on the street. Gornt's our boy, Line. We checked and he's better."
Bartlett got up. Casey followed, her knees very weak. Banastasio didn't move. "I'll think about all this," Bartlett said. "As of right now it's a toss-up if we make a deal with either one."
Banastasio's eyes narrowed. "What?"
"I'm not convinced that either's good for us. Right, Casey?"
"Yes, Line."
"My vote says Gornt. Got it?"
"Go screw." Bartlett turned to go.
"Just a minute!" Banastasio stood up and came closer. "No one wants trouble, not me, not the boys, n—"
"What boys?"
Again the other man sighed. "C'mon, Line, you're over twentyone. You've had a good ride. We don't want to make waves, just money."
"We have that in common. We'll buy back your stock and give you a profit of si—"
"No deal. It's not for sale." Another sigh. "We bought in when you needed dough. We paid a fair price and you used our cash to expand. Now we want a piece of the exec action. Got it?"
"I'll put it to the stockholders at the annual gen—"
"Goddamnit, now!"
"Goddamnit no!" Bartlett was ready and very dangerous. "Got it?"
Banastasio looked at Casey, his eyes flat like a reptile's. "That your vote too, Miss Executive Vice-President and Treasurer?"
"Yes," she said, surprised that her voice sounded firm. "No seat on the board, Mr. Banastasio. If it comes to a vote, my stock's against you and totally against Gornt."
"When we get control, you're fired."
"When you get control, I'll already have left." Casey walked toward the door, astonished that her legs worked.
Bartlett stood in front of the other man, on guard. "See you around," he said.
"You'd better change your mind!"
"You'd better stay the hell out of Par-Con." Bartlett turned and followed Casey out of the room.
At the elevator he said, "Jesus!"
"Yes," she muttered as helplessly.
"We'd . . . we'd better talk."
"Sure. I think I need a drink. Jesus, Line, that man petrified me. I've never been so frightened in my whole life." She shook her head, as though trying to clear it. "That was like a goddamn nightmare."
In the bar on the top floor she ordered a martini and he a beer and when the drinks had been silently consumed, he ordered another round. All the while their minds had been sifting, pitting facts against theories, changing the theories.
Bartlett shifted in his chair. She looked across at him. "Ready for what I think?" she asked.
"Sure, sure, Casey. Go ahead."
"There's always been a rumor he's Mafia or connected with Mafia and after our little talk I'd say that's a good bet. Mafia jumps us to narcotics and all sorts of evil. Theory: maybe it also jumps us somehow to the guns?" The tiny lines beside Bartlett's eyes crinkled. "I reached that too.
Next?" "Fact: if Banastasio's scared of being bugged that jumps us to surveillance. That means FBI."
"Or CIA."
"Or CIA. Fact: if he's Mafia and if the CIA or FBI're involved, we're in a game we've no right to be in, with nowhere to go but down. Now, as to what he wan—" Casey stopped. She gasped.
"What?"
"I just… I just remembered Rosemont, you remember him from the party, Stanley Rosemont, the tall, good-looking, gray-haired man from the consulate? We met on the ferry yesterday, yesterday afternoon. By chance. Maybe it's a coincidence, maybe not, but now that I think of it he brought up Banastasio, said his friend Ed someone, also at the consulate, knew him slightly—and when I said he was arriving today he was knocked for a loop." She recapped her conversation. "I never thought much about it at the time . . . but the consulate and what he said adds up: CIA."
"Got to be. Sure. And if . . ." He stopped too. "Come to think of it, Ian brought up Banastasio out of the blue too. Tuesday, in the lobby when you were at the phone, just before we went to the gold vaults."
After a pause she said, "Maybe we're in real deep shit! Fact: we got a murder, kidnapping, guns, Banastasio, Mafia, John Chen. Come to think of it, John Chen and Tsu-yan were very friendly with that bum." Her eyes widened. "Banastasio and John Chen's killing. Does that tie? From what the papers've said, the Werewolves don't sound like Chinese—the ear bit. That's, that's brutal."
Bartlett sipped his beer, lost in thought. "Gornt? What about Gornt? Why did Banastasio go for him and not Struan's?"
"I don't know."
"Try this for size, Casey. Say Banastasio's end play is guns, or narcotics, or both guns and narcotics. Both companies would be good for him. Struan's have ships and a huge complex at the airport that dominates inward and outward cargoes, great for smuggling. Gornt has ships and wharfing too. And Gornt's got All Asia Airways. An in with Asia's major feeder airline would give him—them