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  A couple of floods lit the front lawn. Faint night-lights glowed at the rear. There were no signs of security guards or night watchmen—indeed, no sign of human presence whatever.

  Bolan pulled his vehicle into a stand of trees at the edge of the parking area and quietly got out to sniff the night. It was then he heard the murmur of distant voices. He quickly stripped down to the black combat outfit which he wore beneath the street clothes and thoughtfully selected his weapons. There was no way to anticipate what may be encountered during the probe. Perhaps nothing more threatening than a steward or janitor. On the other hand …

  When he left the vehicle, the .44 AutoMag head-buster was riding military web at the right hip and the 9mm Beretta Brigadier—silencer equipped—rode shoulder harness beneath the left arm. Spare clips for both pistols were touch-placed at the waist. Special accessories, routine for such missions, occupied slit pockets of the blacksuit. Black sneakers on the feet completed the rig.

  A light probe, yeah. Hopefully. He blended with the night for a quick and silent recon, remaining well clear of the lighted areas, carefully testing the darkness as he homed in on those muted voices.

  The judge had mentioned the pro shop, which should be over toward the golf course. But there was nothing but darkness out there—and there was no need to travel beyond the main clubhouse.

  Those voices were coming from the pool area. Male, two of them, a bit argumentative but seemingly allied in some joint enterprise. Some damn deadly enterprise, yeah.

  “I say we put a bathing suit on her.”

  “Bullshit, go find one then.”

  “I could find one. They got a whole shop full of them in there.”

  “Forget it. This is just as good. She was here alone, see, after everybody left. She decided to have a swim. Why not bare-assed? Who’s to look?”

  “God it’s almost a shame, ain’t it? I’d look at that any day.”

  “Stop, you’re breaking my heart. It’s just another broad, Lenny. A wise broad, at that Now gimme a hand here, dammit. If she tries kicking me in the balls again, I’ll have your ass.”

  “I guess she’s all kicked out. Lookit that, would you? She’s screaming with her eyes. She’s afraid to open her mouth.” The guy chuckled wickedly. “She believed you, Chuck. She really thinks you’ll give her something to chew on.”

  “I’ll give you something to chew on if you don’t stop dicking around. Grab her feet, dammit.”

  Bolan had then in view now.

  The submerged lights inside the pool were providing a rather mellow illumination to the macabre scene at poolside. A beautifully voluptuous and quite naked young lady lay passively on her back at the water’s edge. At this point, Bolan did not have a clear view of her face but he had the impression that she was conscious and aware. Strangled little sobs on the borderline of hysteria provided a strange contrast to the docile manner in which she was accepting an unhappy fate. The two guys were standing waist deep in the pool, preparing to drag the girl in with them.

  A chain-link fence stood across Bolan’s way and the gate was at the far end. He hit that barrier at the run, vaulting over and landing lightly on the other side at almost the precise spot where the girl had been lying. She was now in the water, submerged between the two fully clothed torpedoes, horrified eyes open and—yeah, Lenny—screaming.

  The two savages seemed to be getting some weird kick out of the girl’s suffering. Apparently they had been playing with her for some time, holding her just barely submerged and perhaps even hauling her out at intervals—purely in the interests of game preservation—prolonging the drowning and in the process reducing that fragile mind to a paralyzed lump of passive terror.

  It had been awhile since Mack Bolan had felt such compassionate rage.

  Those bulging blue eyes were staring up at him—and he knew that she saw, six inches of water and mindbusting terror notwithstanding. Bolan knew, too, that she had never lost hope, had never totally surrendered to the terror.

  Lenny’s eyes had caught something also—traveling up from the girl’s feet and slowly lifting into that confrontation with icy outrage.

  “Oh shit,” he muttered.

  They were appropriate last words. The big silver hawgleg thundered its disgust with savage games. A chunk of Lenny’s head skipped off across the water, trailing muck and crimson fluids behind it.

  The other guy turned loose of the girl as though she had suddenly developed great heat, hands rising toward the stars in a silent plea for mercy. Bolan sent the guy all the mercy he could find, a big mushrooming bullet squarely between the eyes. Then he snatched that tormented girl from the muck and delivered her from terror, carrying her tenderly to his breast and murmuring soothing words of reassurance.

  He took her to a sunning board and gently lay her down, manipulating cold arms and abdomen to assist her in expelling unwanted fluids. She spluttered and coughed in cooperation but those terrorized eyes never left his until he got up and went in search of her clothing. He dressed her, slung her bag over his shoulder, then lifted her again into his arms and carried her away from that abominable place.

  He’d come for answers and found only more questions.

  But Mack Bolan was not complaining—and all the new questions could await a better time and place. So could the Executioner. Sparks—yeah, maybe. But it had definitely become a night for Sergeant Mercy.

  And that was okay, too.

  3

  IDENTITIES

  Bolan took the girl to his “safe house” on the West Shore and put her to bed. He was a bit concerned about her condition but—knowing the enemy—he was also reluctant to entrust her safety to others until he learned the full dimensions of her problem. He had seen too many cute kids—or what was left of them—who’d incurred the wrath of human monsters in the Mob.

  But she had told him nothing whatever, and he was sort of stuck with her for the moment. The physical condition seemed okay. The breathing was a bit rapid but the pulse was good, the eyes looked okay, the body was unmarked except for a couple of small scrapes on the backside. It was her mental condition that was bothering Bolan. At first, she’d acted almost as someone in a waking trance—seemingly conscious and aware yet totally unresponsive to his presence. She’d said not a word, not even with those great eyes which had been so expressive in the knowledge of death. Those eyes closed at some point during the quiet journey. She seemed to be sleeping but Bolan could not be sure of even that.

  Thanks to a driver’s license found in her purse, he knew her name and vital statistics. The only other identifying items were a couple of credit cards, which told him only that she was a good credit risk. Beyond those, nothing. So he’d simply put her to bed and hoped for the best.

  Bolan went to the telephone then, and began the involved procedure toward a “clean” telephone contact with his friend and confidante in the enemy camp—the one and only Leo Turrin, undercover fed extraordinaire. He direct-dialed a New York number and received a sleepy “yeah” on the third ring.

  “La Mancha?” Bolan inquired.

  “You got the wrong number, dammit, at four o’clock in the damn morning!” was the angry response.

  Bolan said, “Go to hell, then,” and hung up.

  He lit a cigarette and went to the kitchen to kill a necessary five minutes before returning to direct-dial another New York number. That good voice at the other end was still a bit thick with sleep but the nature was good. “Don’t you ever sleep?” it asked him.

  “Some day I’m going to,” Bolan soberly promised. “I think I’ve struck a spark here, Leo.”

  “What’s happening?”

  “I’m hoping your encyclopedic mind can tell me that. Put a federal district judge in your computer for me. The name is Daly.”

  “Yeah. Edwin, I think. Ohio, northern district.”

  “That’s the one,” Bolan assured him.

  “Far as I know, he’s clean,” Turrin reported.

  “Maybe that’s the pro
blem, then,” Bolan mused.

  “Someone leaning on him?”

  “I think so, yeah. I’ll need some help here, Leo.”

  “Okay. I’ll get you all his present sitting cases. What else?”

  “A lady. Name is Susan Landry.” Bolan spelled it. “Age twenty-three, residence Cleveland. Eyes blue, hair brown, height five-six, weight one twenty-five. Everything in the right place and plenty of it. Carries a BankAmeriCard and Master Charge. Do you need the numbers?”

  “No. What’s her problem?”

  “Remaining alive.”

  “I see.” The little fed sent a heavy sigh across the connection. “Do you ever meet any other kind, guy?”

  “Not usually,” Bolan admitted wryly. “I need her pedigree, Leo.”

  “I’ll see what I can do. But listen. You’re liable to encounter a lot of those in Bad Tony’s territory. He collects them by the bushels.”

  “I don’t read it that way with this one,” Bolan said.

  “Well … okay. But listen, that guy cleared a cool five mil’ last year on his porn interests. He’s got everything from vibrating dildoes to snuff films. So—”

  “Give me that last again.”

  “You know what a snuff film is.”

  “I think so. But let’s make sure.”

  “Sickies. The star always dies. I mean really dies.”

  Bolan sighed. “Yeah, okay. South American traffic—right?”

  “Not exclusively,” Turrin said. “Not even usually, anymore. I’ve heard about a couple that were made in this country.”

  Bolan said, “Okay, thanks. Maybe I’m closer than I thought. About, uh, that judge, Leo …”

  “Yeah?”

  “Look into his love life.”

  “Okay.”

  “You might want to do a number on the Pine Grove Country Club, too.”

  “That’s in Cleveland?”

  “Metro area, yeah. Something’s out of focus there. You’ve heard of the Cleveland Fifty?”

  “Should I?”

  “Maybe not. It’s a social tag, the cream of local society. Pine Grove is their club. But a couple of Bad Tony’s legbreakers were making like it’s their own private playground.”

  “Did you say were?”

  “That’s what I said, yeah.”

  Another strong sigh came back at Bolan. Presently the little guy told him, “Watch that guy, Sarge. He’s not called Bad Tony for nothing. I mean, he kills for kicks. You know?”

  Bolan said, “I know. How do you read him as the Boss of Bosses?”

  Turrin seemed to be considering the idea. There was a long silence, then: “He’s got balls enough, that’s for sure. And you’ve given him a clear track. Yeah, sure. There’s no one here anymore to tell him no. He never got along too well with the New York crowd. Most of his ties lead westward. Big land interests in Arizona and Nevada. But … yeah. If he could come up with the right deal, I think the others might go along. He could be your man.”

  Bolan said, “Nothing is on the surface here, Leo. But every time I close my eyes, I see a giant octopus writhing all over this town. It’s being eaten. And I can’t even find the feast.”

  “Look for fat men, then,” Turrin wryly suggested.

  “Exactly what I’m doing,” Bolan told him. “Okay. I’ll try to hit you again sometime today. Go back to your warm bed. And tell the lady hello.”

  “She lights a candle for you every morning, Sarge.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  Turrin chuckled. “Any other guy in the world, I’d be jealous. There’s a lot you don’t know, guy. I bet there’s thousands of candles burning in your name right at this very minute. Hey. I light one myself.”

  Bolan was genuinely touched but he kept the secret. “Stay hard, Leo,” he said, and hung it up.

  Candles were okay, sure. As symbols of care and concern, they said a lot. Bolan’s guns were the same kind of symbols, though, and they also said a lot. They said that Mack Bolan cared. His cares were getting stronger, too, the deeper he delved into this Cleveland mess.

  “Thanks for the candle, Leo,” he muttered, and went to the bedroom to look in on the latest care.

  It was a terrible, grotesque dream. She was sailing on Lake Erie when this horribly violent squall came from nowhere and nearly capsized the boat. The waves became monstrous, continually washing the deck and clutching at her, trying to drag her overboard. And the rain was beating down in a merciless wind-driven torrent, entering her mouth and nose and choking her. It was terribly dark and she could not even see the shore. The squall was driving her farther and farther out and she could not bring the boat around. Then suddenly this huge giant appeared, way out on the horizon, suspended above the water, towering over everything—a man, but a giant of a man—clad in a black, tight-fitting suit of some sort, belts and military things strung across his chest. The squall was driving her straight toward the giant. She was very frightened—no, she was positively horrified. The giant was holding out his arms, reaching for her across a vast distance, those arms growing longer and longer … uh, no … huh-uh. This was a friendly giant. He was going to rescue her from the storm. His eyes were all warm and concerned—but just a moment earlier they had been …

  She sat bolt upright on the strange bed in a strange room and fought to keep the hysteria down, wishing the dream would come back. The friendly “giant” was standing there at the foot of the bed with those same worried eyes, bringing all the reality back in a crashing realization of all that had been.

  “You’re looking better,” he said in an incredibly soft voice, then immediately left the room.

  Better than what? she wondered vaguely. Her hair was stringing down around her shoulders, the blouse was ripped and dirty, her skirt was damp and wrinkled beyond hope. So what the hell had she looked like before?

  The giant returned, carrying a small plastic tray with two plastic cups. He sat down beside her and placed the tray on her lap. “I made some hot chocolate,” he said solemnly. “Let’s give it a try.”

  Any man who offered a girl hot chocolate in bed, in the middle of the night, could not be all bad.

  She sampled the offering and told him, “It’s good, thanks.”

  He took his cup and moved to a chair. In that same solemn tone he’d used with the chocolate, he told her, “We need some words, if you’re feeling up to it.”

  She was “feeling up to” a screaming fit, that was what, but she replied, “Sure. For openers, thanks. I don’t know where you came from but God I—” She was suddenly very strongly aware of the dampened clothing and then—entirely illogically—flamingly embarrassed.

  But he was a nice guy, yes. He turned away from that as he asked her, “How much do you remember?”

  Very quietly she replied, “I remember you dressing me. Then I guess I passed out.”

  “I meant before that.”

  “Oh, I remember every dismal detail,” she said dully.

  “Stand up,” he said.

  “What?”

  He smiled soberly. “Check out all your parts.”

  “I’m fine,” she assured him, lying through her teeth, “just fine.”

  He stood up and went to the door, then turned back to tell her, “The bathroom is straight ahead. Use the terrycloth robe on the back of the door, if you’d like. Your purse is on the dresser. I’ll be in the kitchen.”

  And he left her sitting there all damp and misty-eyed hysterical with a cup of damn chocolate in her lap.

  He was not the most talkative damn giant she’d ever met! But he sure got the message across. Get yourself in hand, Susan. You must look like the Witch of the West!

  Wow, damn, what a man!

  She struggled off the bed and wobbled to her feet, snared the purse, and took her cup of chocolate to the bathroom. It was an apartment, pretty nicely appointed but rather neutral—highrise. She could see—hell, she was at the Gold Coast.

  She stripped off the abused clothing and examined her hurts,
then stepped into the shower and gave it all the heat she could take. The hair was hopeless, just hopeless. She toweled it dry and piled it high, then draped the towel around it. If you can’t fix it, hide it—right? Right. The terrycloth robe was ridiculous. Susan was no small kid, but that damn thing made her feel like an underprivileged elf. She gathered it around and cinched it up as best she could.

  She felt like a damn teenager!

  Her heart was pitty-patting. And she could hardly wait to get that sober giant in sight again.

  This was ridiculous!

  She stepped into the kitchen and told him, “All my parts are here. Thanks to you. Say, you are really—I mean, you were something fine back there. And we’re total strangers. I mean …”

  Those concerned eyes were tearing her up. He said, very softly, “I know who you are, Susan. What I need now is what you are.”

  “That makes us even then, superman,” she replied, looking him up and down. “I know what you are. All I need, I guess, is who.”

  He gazed at her for ever so long, no expression at all in those eyes; then he told her, “I’m Mack Bolan.”

  “Oh God,” she said weakly.

  And she wished that she was on the lake, sailing her boat in a storm.

  4

  ROLES

  Mack Bolan’s war against the Mafia had been making headlines around the world for quite a while. He’d been the subject of television news specials and he’d been endlessly analyzed and dissected in magazines, newspapers—and even a series of books were being written to chronicle his exploits. Pretty soon, no doubt, the movies would be taking off with fictional expositions of his war. He’d become something of a “legend in his own time.” None of this had any direct effect upon the man himself or upon his war. He was still more ghost than reality to the majority of the world’s people. Even his enemy knew him more from his effect than by any firsthand encounter. Very few living mafiosi could offer any valid description of the man except in the vaguest of terms. Dozens of composite sketches had been tried and circulated widely, yet none had captured a worthwhile likeness. He had resorted to plastic surgery early in the war—very successful surgery—which rendered earlier photos totally invalid. The enemy itself had committed the supreme blunder of murdering the plastic surgeon after his technical sketches had been destroyed.