The Countess Krak got to the cab.
She glanced back. The two army men were closing the distance, arms outstretched clutchingly, crying cries of beasts in heat.
The Countess Krak leaped into the cab, inches ahead, of capture.
The motor roared!
Tires screamed!
She got the door closed and looked back.
The two men were pounding after them along the road.
Bang-Bang fed the cab more gas.
The pursuers were lost in the cloud of fumes behind them.
"JESUS!" said Bang-Bang, taking a weaving and rapid escape course from the neighborhood. "What was all THAT about?"
"She made it!" said one black woman.
"Yeah, and right in the teeth of the Army, too!" said the other.
"Did you see that colonel slaver?" said the first. "Great actor, Charlton Heston."
"(Bleep)!" said the other. "That didn't take no actin'. Not when you realize he was chasing Lauren Bacall!"
The Countess Krak said, "You and Jettero got your two weeks leave."
"What's the repercussions?" said Bang-Bang.
"No repercussions," said the Countess Krak mildly.
"Miss Joy," said Bang-Bang severely as he drove, "the Regular Army here is knee-deep every day in pretty college girls. Colonel Tanc and that sergeant looked like they wanted to swallow you whole. I know that look in army guys: not as bad as marines, but they meant business!"
The Countess Krak had taken a torn wrapper out of her purse. She was reading it.
Eyes and Ears of Voltar
Item 452: An emotional stimulator perfume capsule. Crush in contact with paper or cloth and
avoid. Causes a person to become
amorous so that he can be arrested for
making improper advances.
She muttered, "They ought to warn you that this stuff is STRONG!"
Bang-Bang said, "Miss Joy, Jet would kill me if anything happened to you. I know you're beautiful and I can understand that back there, up to a point. But did you DO something?"
"Me, Bang-Bang?"
"Miss Joy, I have just done an intelligence summary and estimated the dangers of this projected campaign. I think I better take you home."
"Bang-Bang," she said firmly, "drive to Hairytown, New York."
Bang-Bang turned north. He muttered, "Now I'm being a (bleeped) fool, too! It's awful what a beautiful woman can do!"
One of the black women behind me said, "This is where I get off. I want to catch the rest of that film at home on the TV. I love the part where she gets killed."
I smiled grimly to myself. I said, "So will I!" And I continued on downtown to make the final arrangements.
At the Boyd's of London U. S. office on Wall Street, the fellow sat there in a black cutaway with dandruff on his shoulders and said, "But I say, old chappie, this is a special rate."
"A five-day minimum at a thousand dollars a day for a measly twenty-five-thousand-dollar policy is NO special rate," I snarled.
He waved his cigarette holder in an airy way. "Hit men are hit men," he said. "And I must say the actuarial statistic shows that they themselves get hit. NOT what you would call a profession without risks. Rifles backfire, husbands take reprisals and," he fixed me with a beady eye, "cases have not been unknown where beneficiaries did a bit of hitting themselves, eh, what?"
I shook my head.
He took another approach. "It is not that your man is inexperienced. According to his record here, when he worked for Swindle and Crouch, he executed his contracts in quite a satisfactory way. It's just that records show he has a twist. A personality quirk, let's say. But I will tell you what I will do. Business has been slow today. Make it five thousand dollars for five days and I'll write the policy for seven days. It's the very best we can do, old chap."
I had to take it. It was the only way I had to hand to get Krak killed.
They wrote the policy with lots of scrolls and made his mother beneficiary. I paid them from my hard-earned hoard and I was on my way.
En route to Dr. Finkelbaum's I stopped off in a white-arm lunch, one of those places where the table is the arm of the chair. I took from my pocket a sheet and envelope of Apparatus self-destruct paper. You write on it and then spray it lightly and fold it and ten hours after it is opened it simply evaporates. No evidence left.
Disguising my handwriting, I wrote:
Find $850 enclosed. Your policy is clipped to the envelope so you can give it to your mother. Get a rifle. Get a car. Get to Hairy-town, New York. They're in an orange-colored cab, old style, unmistakable. Phone me at the number at the bottom of the page as soon as you have something to report.
X
I added Miss Pinch's number.
I sprayed the paper. I took a five-hundred-dollar bill, three one-hundred-dollar bills and a fifty, and wrapped the note around them: I didn't want them to get lost, for aside from thirty dollars they were all the money I had left. I put them in and sealed the envelope against air.
Not even finishing my bitter coffee, I sped for Dr. Finkelbaum's.
Arriving, I peeked in and, sure enough, there sat Torpedo.
I entered the waiting room with elaborate casual-ness. I picked up a two-year-old magazine from the table. I sat down. Unobserved, I slid the envelope and policy into the magazine while I pretended to read. Then, very casually, I rose, laid the magazine down in the chair beside Torpedo and walked out. Very smoothly done. Right by the manual.
I lurked around a corner, eyes fixed on a reflective shop window across the street. I saw Torpedo come out reading the letter.
Wonderful! The Countess Krak would soon be dead!
I raced down into a subway and was on my way home, conscious of pride in my organizational skill.
The moment I got home, I raced into the back room closet and put the viewer down.
I had expected by this time that they would be in Hairytown, for it is less than twenty miles north of Empire University, straight up the Hudson and right on the street or highway named Broadway.
I had only slightly misestimated. They were not yet into the town. They must have paused briefly somewhere for a bite of lunch. The Countess was watching torrents of air traffic going up and down the Hudson a mile west from their road.
Krak was saying, "This cab certainly rides roughly when you use it as a ground car, Bang-Bang. Why don't you take it off this bumpy cart track and fly it?"
"Jesus, Miss Joy," he said over his shoulder as he bounced along, "it won't do that."
"Is it broken or something? I see other vehicles flying up and down, way out there over the river."
"Those are choppers, Miss Joy. This is a cab: it ain't supposed to leave the ground."
"Are you afraid of the police?"
"Yes, MA'AM!"
"I am appalled, Bang-Bang, at how overregulated this planet is. It doesn't seem to reduce the crime rate any, either. Listen, Bang-Bang, I can fix it with any cop who stops us. I'm tired of the jolting. Take it into the air."
Bang-Bang said helplessly, "My chopper license isn't up-to-date."
"Now we're getting someplace," said the Countess Krak. "You should have told me and I could have made the parole officer renew it. Bang-Bang, you should understand here and now that you can trust me."
"Yes, ma'am," said Bang-Bang miserably.
She was looking at the road expectantly. Then she saw, apparently, that the old cab was not taking off the way any ordinary airbus would have. She said, "Well, get it into the air!"
"Ma'am," said Bang-Bang, with a sigh of relief, "we're here. There's the city limits sign of Hairytown."
"Good," said the Countess Krak. "But when we leave, make sure we don't have such a rough trip back. There's a shop. Stop and I'll go in."