“Last charge recovered,” said Bang-Bang. “We got no five o’clock class today.”
“What’s this?” said Izzy.
Heller told him about the recorders Bang-Bang had planted in the course rooms.
Izzy was shocked. “Oh,” he said. “That must be very tiring. And dangerous, too! There will be quizzes and lab periods. It is really just a problem in business administration. For a small expenditure, I may be able to unburden your day a bit.”
“Go ahead,” said Heller.
“I’ll do a time-motion efficiency study and let you know,” said Izzy. “But here, I am wasting your valuable time right now.” He opened his case, got out some papers and handed them to Bang-Bang. “If you will just sign these, it makes you a Social-Security, withholding-tax employee of the New York Amazing Investment Company. I understand you have to have something to show a parole officer tomorrow morning.”
Bang-Bang signed, kneeling on the steps. Izzy made him keep some of the papers and took the rest. “I did get some odds and ends complete, Mr. Jet. I have not been entirely idle. Now, if you’re at liberty and would care to indulge me, we should be going. I have to know if you think we are ready to receive your capital.”
I knew it! He was only after Heller’s remaining money. This decrepit, apologetic little shrimp in his Salvation Army Good Will Store clothes might be a real boon to me!
They followed him down to the subway station and boarded a downtown train. They switched at Times Square.
“Where we going?” Bang-Bang wanted to know.
“We have to have an address,” said Izzy. “I took the only one I could get on short notice.”
They got off at 34th Street. They started up some steps.
“I do hope you approve,” mourned Izzy.
They were in an elevator. It rocketed upwards.
“You see,” said Izzy, “it was the only thing available at the bankruptcy court just now. This firm couldn’t take the high New York taxes on corporations—didn’t know how to get around them, I should say. They had distributed and marketed fancy office fittings and furnishings but the demand dropped. The three-year office lease and all their furnishings were sold by the court and I bought them. I hope you don’t think it was exorbitant. I had to pay out two thousand dollars for it. And it’s only half a floor.”
Heller said, “Half a floor?”
“Yes. There’s a clothing design firm and a sporting and athletic goods distributor and a foreign language school and a modeling agency. There are also about forty other firms. They have the other half. They wouldn’t sell their leases but I think they will be good neighbors. We can probably do some business with them—fancy new clothes, athletic goods; we are multinational and can use some additional languages and the models that parade around are not in the way. If you don’t think there’s enough space, we can move.”
They were now in a huge, gothic-arched, palatial-looking hallway. Space stretched away in all directions. A vast area.
Heller looked at the rounded cornices, inspected the quality of the colorful marble and sort of caressed an arch.
“It’s a bit old, you know,” Izzy said. “It was finished in 1931. But I hope you think it has something special about it.”
“This stone work is beautiful!” said Heller. “Where are we? What is this place?”
“Oh,” said Izzy. “It has its own subway entrance so you didn’t get a chance to see it from the outside. I’m sorry. It’s the Empire State Building.”
“My God!” said Bang-Bang and hastily removed his cap.
“Now, we have everything to the right of the elevator,” said Izzy. “So if you will come along . . .”
They were confronted by sign company men who were just finishing the placing of a series of bronze company nameplates to direct visitors down the vast stretches of marble hallways. Bang-Bang was in the way and I couldn’t read them.
“Now, this first office,” said Izzy, “is just one of the mask companies.” The sign said:
INCREDIBLE OPPORTUNITIES, INC.
President: G. H. Ginsberg
Secretary: Rebecca Mossberg
Izzy opened the door. A palatial waiting room with all-chrome furniture and murals of industries was being cleaned industriously by a young man. A further door inside had President on it in chrome.
But Izzy did not take them in. “I didn’t get a chance to finish up,” he said. “Some cleaning and lettering is still in progress. I am sorry.”
He took them to the next office. The door sign said:
FANTASTIC MERGERS, INC.
A Delaware Corporation
President: Isaac Stein
Secretary: Rabbi Schultman
The waiting room was in black onyx. Two young girls with their hair done up in bandannas were cleaning. Izzy shut the door quickly.
One after another, Izzy opened up office suites. The Reliable this and the Astonishing that and each one with different presidents and secretaries and boards. Each one was furnished in superlative, startlingly different furniture.
“Who are all these people?” said Heller. “These presidents and secretaries and things?”
“They’re not interlocking!” said Izzy hastily. “They cannot be penetrated by your enemies. They even have different furnishings but that’s because this was an office furniture firm and it liked to show off its wares.”
“But who are these people?” said Heller.
Izzy sighed. “Some were very hard to contact but we know where they all are now. Some live in Curaçao, some in Israel, there’s even one who lives in an old folks’ home in New Jersey. We have all their signatures,” he added hastily.
Izzy pushed on. “Now, I regret to say, we come to one that is giving us trouble. Not the corporation. The decoration.” The door sign said:
THE BEAUTIFUL TAHITI GILT-EDGED BEACHES
WONDER CORPORATION
Incorporated in Tahiti
President: Simon Levy
Secretary: Jeane le Zippe
When he opened the door, an expanse of bamboo furniture was tumbled about. The walls were white and bare. “It’s the mural. I didn’t get a chance to arrange anything. I am sorry.” He shut the door hastily.
They went along further. “But here is one that IS finished,” said Izzy. On the door it said:
MULTINATIONAL
Inside, everything was of solid steel. A map of the world spread around all four walls, all done in facsimiles of different monies.
“There’s no President sign on that inside door,” said Bang-Bang, and he went to open it.
Revealed to view was an office, very bare, and packing boxes for desks and a mattress in the corner.
Izzy hastily got the door away from Bang-Bang and closed it. “That’s my office,” he said. “But I do have something nice to show you now.”
He led them down a hall and they came to an imposing door at the end. “I was able to get this finished. I knew how important it was.”
There was no sign as such on the door. But there was a picture of a modern Boeing airliner.
“You see?” said Izzy. “Kind of hidden. That’s a JET! Are you pleased?”
“You mean this is my office?” said Heller.
Izzy opened the door.
A vast suite was before them, done in the most modern design. Side doors opened off it. A huge white desk sat before the windows. And from the big windows one could view the whole panoramic sweep of lower Manhattan. Impressive!
Heller went over and tried the big white chair. He fiddled with some drawers. He lifted the white phones and found them live. He went over to some recessed cabinets and checked them. Then he noticed the white shag rug was so thick he was sinking in it to his ankles.
“I know you will want to add your personal touches,” said Izzy, “so it’s sort of bare.”
Heller said, “It’s great! A Fleet Admiral couldn’t ask for better! What are the side doors?”
Izzy went over, opening one. “They’re
your own bathroom and shower. A little day room to rest in.” He opened another, “A secretary’s boudoir.” And the last one, “Golf clubs and things. But come along. I won’t bore you with all the other corporations. But I do have to show you the communications room.”
He led them down a hall and, as they passed doors, Heller noted that Hong Kong, Singapore, London, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and the Bahamas all seemed to be represented.
Izzy opened a door on a mass of telex equipment, telephones and electronic calculators. A young man was sitting at a telex machine typing out a message.
“This,” said Izzy, “is all hooked up and ready to roll. We can get in reports of exchange values of currencies anywhere in the world. The bank accounts are ready to function and so are the brokers. By buying a currency in one place and selling it in another where it is higher priced, we can send money whizzing around the world making money. Every hour this equipment sits here idle is costing us a fortune.”
“So why is it idle?” said Heller.
“No money to start,” said Izzy. “Now downstairs,” he glanced at his watch, “a Brinks Armored Truck will draw up in about ten minutes. It will take you home and you can have the guards transport your hundred thousand right back here and tomorrow morning we will be in business.” He looked at Heller apologetically. “It won’t make any huge fortune at first. But the exchange profits will pay all our monthly expenses and we can get down to serious moneymaking when we have these few essentials completed.”
I thought, what a con artist!
Heller and Bang-Bang and Izzy went down and, despite rush hour and parking jams, there was the armored truck. They got in and it roared away.
A few minutes later, Heller took the hundred thousand out of his safe at the Gracious Palms. Izzy put it in a sack and away he and the armored truck went. Again, no receipt.
In the lobby, Bang-Bang said, “Hey, who am I working for—Tahiti or Delaware? I forgot. Jesus, I never seen such office setups in my life. And in the Empire State Building! We’re big time, kid. Do I wear a tuxedo or a general’s uniform?”
Vantagio came out. “Where’s the bodies?”
“Jesus, Vantagio,” said Bang-Bang. “You ought to see this kid’s offices!”
“What offices?”
“Half a whole god (bleeped) floor of the Empire State Building!” said Bang-Bang.
Vantagio looked at Heller. “You got to keep Bang-Bang off the booze. He’s getting the DTs. I came out to tell you Mike called and said your cab would be ready tomorrow. You better go over and get it, Bang-Bang.”
“Can’t,” said Bang-Bang. “It’s not Saturday night.”
“Hey, what’s this Saturday night?” said Heller.
“That’s when the Civic Betterment League meets,” said Vantagio. “All the top officials of the city. So there’s not much of anything checked up on at that time. Bang-Bang, being on parole, wouldn’t risk much if he was out of town a few hours.”
“You mean everybody meets?” said Heller.
“Yeah, the heads of police and the mayor and so on. It’s a bad thing for us, too. Faustino Narcotici presides and he hands out all the Mafia payoff dough at that time. It’s worse on the first Saturday night of the month—the governor and state officials are there, too.”
“Well, if it isn’t Saturday night, I’ll go over and get the cab myself,” said Heller.
“Hell, no, you can’t do that!” said Vantagio. “Don’t you know nobody under eighteen is permitted to drive at all in New York City? That’s why you got to have a driver. I’ll send one of the boys over for it. But what’s this about the Empire State Building?”
“Just a little sideline that came up,” said Heller.
Possibly it was the way Heller said it. Too casual. But a little stirring of alarm began to rise. Suppose Izzy didn’t steal his money?
In college, two cars, the Geological Survey and now this strange new development of the Empire State Building . . . My wits simply would not mesh! Only one thing was loud: Heller was up to no good.
And I had not had the slightest word from the New York office concerning agents Raht and Terb. Heller had to be stopped! I couldn’t figure out what he was doing but it had to be stopped anyway. The man was a howling menace! A private office with a view of all lower Manhattan indeed!
PART TWENTY
Chapter 3
Keeping the hours I kept due to time differences between New York and Turkey, I had fallen into the necessity of sleeping all morning. I was furious to find that old (bleepard) Karagoz standing beside my bed bowing and muttering. I stared at my watch. It was only eleven! I glared at him.
“Two men in yard, Sultan Bey.” He waved his hands helplessly. “They come in. They sit down on bench. They refuse to go away.”
“I’ll make them go away!” I shouted. I grabbed a ten-gauge shotgun and sprang to the door.
“Sultan Bey!” shouted Karagoz. “You got no clothes on!”
I rushed out anyway. Nobody is going to tell me what to do!
Two men were sitting on a bench, sure enough. They were faced the other way. I leaped in front of them, leveling the gun.
It was Raht and Terb!
Raht’s mustache stuck out even further in surprise.
Terb’s swarthy, plump face went a bit white.
“What in the name of seventeen brindle Devils are you doing here?” I thundered at them.
Raht had the effrontery to put his finger to his lips to shush me.
Terb was trying to get back on the bench.
“Account for yourselves!” I thundered even louder.
Raht was making even more urgent finger motions and I abruptly realized I had been speaking Voltarian. But no matter. When the staff sees me coming, they vanish.
“We . . . we obeyed your order,” stammered Raht. That was more like it. I had him stammering.
“You s . . . s . . . said,” quavered Terb, “‘Find them and force them to report in.’”
“We . . . we were sending radio messages every day and . . . and so we thought you could only mean to come here.”
So the message was unclear. Leave it to subordinates to take advantage of you.
“You (bleeped) fools have been watching the bug that was sewn into his clothes. Somebody at the store threw them in the garbage when he bought new clothes!” I leveled the gun barrels at them. “He’s not in the Atlantic! He’s right in that UN whorehouse, the Gracious Palms, having the time of his life!”
Raht gaped. “How do you know that?”
Anger had caused me to be incautious. They must never know I had had Heller bugged on Voltar and was monitoring everything he saw or heard. “I have other sources of information. You think you are the only spies in the world? I got spies all over the place. Even spies on you!”
They seemed cowed so I herded them into the patio of the house. I made them stand there.
Then I went and put away the gun and got a robe and buzzed the kitchen for some hot kahve, served with lots of sugar, sekerli.
While I drank it, I got to thinking that maybe this wasn’t too bad. I could brief them very exactly. I could also force them to take, no matter how many Voltarian Codes it violated, a receiver and decoder.
I went back, drinking more kahve and keeping them standing. It gave me a certain satisfaction to realize they must have just come off a long plane ride and had had no sleep. It was also nice that it was a boiling hot Turkish September day and that they were probably dying for a cold drink. You have to keep such people in place—riffraff.
“You are not going to be executed,” I said, to open the conversation and put them at ease. “Unless, of course, you keep fouling up.”
They shifted about uneasily.
“The agent I have trailing you is a complete madman,” I said. “But I think I can hold him in check.”
Karagoz and a waiter came in with a silver pitcher of sira that was beaded with mist, and three glasses. I sent two of the glasses and the servants away and sa
t there sipping the cold drink.
So far, everything I had done was just textbook. But it made the rest easier.
“There is a platen,” I said. “It is about so big.” And I made a motion with my hands. “It is just a sheet with slots in it. Do you know what one is?”
“A platen code sheet,” said Raht.
“You put it over a piece of paper and write the real message in the slots,” said Terb. “And then you fill in the rest of the letter.”
“Your target has one. We must get it!” I said. “Even if it costs you your lives.” Also textbook. “It is somewhere in his baggage and that baggage is in the old secretary-general’s suite on the top floor of the Gracious Palms. Do I make myself clear?”
They both nodded.
“You are to disguise yourselves as diplomats. You are to pretend to buy services. You are to go to that suite. The door is never locked. He is never there during the day. You are to ransack the place and find that platen! Understood?”
They nodded.
“One more thing. Another agent tried to plant a bug there. But there is some sort of interference, some carbon disturbance. You are to find that and disable it.”
They nodded.
“And one more thing,” I said. “You, Raht, must shave off your mustache.”
Horror went over him. “But it hides a knife scar that is very plain and identifies me!”
“All right,” I said. “Then just trim it.”
“My beautiful mustache!”
One must be firm. “It’s better than trimming your throat,” I said.
He got the point.
“Now, there are no taxis,” I said.
“We just came in one.”
“There are no taxis,” I said. “So walk to the airport, spend the night in the waiting room and get a plane tomorrow morning.”
They nodded glumly.
I swirled my glass and made the ice in it rattle and tinkle. “Any questions?”
“Those two devices you gave us with orders to keep them within two hundred miles of him are hidden on the television antenna of the Empire State Building,” said Terb. “Is that all right?”
Hey, that was very all right. The units to relay the signals from Heller’s bugs were right above him. “It will serve at the moment,” I said, coldly. “Is that all?”