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"Fremont. Pete Fremont. What's it to you?"

The men exchanged glances. The one with the glasses nodded and said, "Thanking you. We wished to be sure of the right man. You will get into the car, please."

Nick scowled. "What if I don't?"

The other man, short and muscular, did not smile. He poked Nick with the concealed gun. "Would be most regrettable. We kill you."

The street was thronged. People pushed and bustled around them. Nobody was paying them the slightest attention. It was how a lot of professional murders were committed. They would shoot him and drive off in the Mercedes and no one would see anything.

The short man shoved him toward the curb. "In the car. You come quietly and you will not be harmed. You not come we kill. So?"

Nick shrugged. "So I come quietly." He got in the car, alert to catch them in an unguarded moment, but the chance did not come. The short one followed him in, not too closely. The tall one went around and got in from the other side. They sandwiched him and the pistols came into view. Nambus. He was seeing a lot of Nambus these days.

The Mercedes pulled away from the curb and slipped deftly into traffic again. The driver was wearing chauffeur's livery and a dark, peaked cap. He drove like he knew his business.

Nick forced himself to relax. His chance would come. "Why all the rush? I was on my way to the Electric Palace. What's Johnny Chow so impatient about?"

The tall man was frisking Nick. At the name Chow he hissed and stared at his companion, who shrugged.

"Shizuki ni!"

Nick shut up. So they weren't from Johnny Chow. Who the hell then?

The man who was frisking him found the Colt and pulled it out of his belt. He showed it to his companion, who stared at Nick coldly. The man tucked the Colt away under his topcoat.

Under his calm Nick Carter was raging and anxious. He didn't know who they were or where they were taking him or why. It was a development out of the blue, impossible to foresee. But when he didn't show up at the Electric Palace Johnny Chow was going back to work on Tonaka. Frustration clawed at him. For the moment he was as helpless as a babe. There was not a goddamned thing he could do.

They drove a long time. They made no attempt to conceal their destination, whatever it was. The driver never spoke. The two men kept Nick under close watch, the pistols barely concealed by their topcoats.

The Mercedes ran out past the Tokyo Tower, slanted east on Sakurada briefly, then made a sharp right turn into Meiji dori. The rain had stopped now and a weak sun was trying to peer through low hanging gray clouds. They made good time even in the cluttered, boisterous traffic. The driver was a genius.

They skirted Arisugawa Park and in a few moments Nick spotted Shibuya Station off to the left. Just ahead now lay Olympic Village, with the National Stadium a little to the northeast.

Beyond Shinjuku Garden they made a sharp left past the Meiji Shrine. They were getting into the suburbs now and the country was opening up. Narrow lanes led off in various directions and Nick caught an occasional glimpse of big houses sitting well back from the road behind neatly barbered hedges and trim small orchards of plum and cherry.

They left the arterial road and slanted left into a blacktopped lane. After a mile, they took another, narrower lane that ended in a tall iron gate flanked by stone pillars covered with lichen. A plaque on one of the pillars said: Msumpto. It meant nothing to the AXEman.

The short man got out and pressed a button set into one of the pillars. After a moment the gate swung open. They drove through and up a winding macadamized road bordered by parkland. Nick saw a.flutter of movement to his left and watched a small herd of tiny white-tailed deer romp through squat umbrella-shaped trees. They rounded a line of peony trees, not yet blooming, and the house came in view. It was huge and it spoke quietly of money. Old money.

The drive curled into a crescent before broad stairs that led up to a terrace. Fountains played to right and left, and off to one side was a large swimming pool not yet filled for the summer.

Nick looked at the tall man. "Mitsubishi-san is expecting me?"

The man prodded him with his gun. "Out. No talk."

The shorter man thought it was reasonably funny. He looked at Nick and chuckled. "Mitsubishi-san? Ha-hah."

The central block of the house was enormous, built of dressed stone in which mica and veins of quartz still sparkled. Two lower wings angled back from the main block, paralleled by the balustrade of the terrace which was dotted here and there by vast urns in the form of amphorae.

They ushered Nick through arched doors into a vast tessellated foyer. The short man rapped on a door opening off to the right. From within a British voice, high with the nasality of the upper classes, said: "Come."

The tall man put his Nambu in the small of Nick's back and prodded. Nick went. He was eager now. Philston. Richard Philston! It had to be.

They halted just inside the door. The room was cavernous, some sort of a library-study with half-paneled walls and a groined shadowy ceiling. Battalions of books marched up the walls. Far back in a corner a single light glowed on a desk. Out of the light, in shadow, sat a man.

The man said: "You may go, you two. Wait just outside the door. Would you care for a drink, Mr. Fremont?"

The two Japanese gunmen left. The big door clicked oily behind them. There was an old-fashioned tea cart near the desk, laden with bottles and siphons and a large Thermos. Nick stalked toward it. Play it to the hilt, he told himself. Think Pete Fremont. Be Pete Fremont.

As he reached for the Scotch bottle he said, "Who are you? And what the hell do you mean having me snatched off the street like that! Don't you know I could sue hell out of you?"

The man behind the desk chuckled throatily. "Sue me, Mr. Fremont? Really! You Americans have a bizarre sense of humor. I learned that in Washington many years ago. One drink, Mr. Fremont! One. We are going to be perfectly candid and, you see, I know your failing. I am going to offer you a chance to make a great deal of money — but to earn it you must remain absolutely sober."

Pete. Fremont — it was Nick Carter who was dead now, and Fremont who lived — Pete Fremont dropped ice in a tall glass and tipped the Scotch bottle, poured heavily, defiantly. He swizzled it, then walked to a leather armchair near the desk and sat down. He unbuttoned the filthy trenchcoat — he wanted Philston to see the bedraggled suit — and kept the ancient hat on.

"All right," he growled. "So you know I'm an alcoholic. So? Who are you and what do you want with me?" He drank. "And take that damned light out of my eyes. That's an old trick."

The man tilted the lamp away. There was half shadow between them now.

"My name is Richard Philston," said the man. "You may have heard of me?"

Fremont nodded curtly. "I've heard of you."

"Yes," the man said smoothly. "I suppose I am rather, er, infamous."

Pete nodded again. "It's your word, not mine."

"Exactly. But now to business, Mr. Fremont. In perfect candor, as I said. We both know what we are and I see no reason to fence or to spare each others' feelings. You agree?"

Pete scowled. "I agree. So stop the damned fencing and get to the point. How much money? And what do I have to do to earn it?"

With the bright light shunted away he began to see the man behind the desk. The suit was a light pepper and salt tweed of impeccable cut, a little worn now. No Moscow tailor would ever duplicate it.

"I am talking about fifty thousand American dollars," said the man. "Half of it now — if you agree to my terms."

"Keep talking," said Pete. "I like the sounds you're making."

The shirt was lightly blue striped with a tab collar. The tie was knotted small. Royal Marines. The man who was playing Pete Fremont ran the files through his mind: Philston was no social poacher. He had once held a commission in the Royal Marines. That had been just after he had come down from Cambridge.