The Erection Set

Her finger tapped the back of my hand. “I do have something I can print,” she said mischievously.

“Oh?”

“About a possible romance between a Barrin scion and a certain secretary for a picture firm.”

“Sharon?”

Mona’s raised eyebrows gave me a positive nod.

“Kid, I’m damn near old enough to be her father.”

“A perfect Hollywood twosome,” she smiled. “How would you like to be a son to me?”

“You know what they’d call me then?”

“Sure. A son of a bitch. Very appropriate. You watch out for all those little hot-pants chippies out there, you hear?” Mona said and left.

My watch said ten forty-five. The call should have come in by now. I waved Lee out of the group he was with and made sure he had reservations at his club. He and another member were going to drive Sharon home, be certain she was locked in until I called her, then go directly to the Ryder A.C. where no one except members were admitted. I went out into the lobby, picked up a copy of Fruits of Labor and headed for the elevator.

XIII

My contact at Weller-Fabray answered my coded inquiry in French with the statement that they were closed until morning, which meant I was to call back on the hot line that had a scrambler attachment. I redialed and asked, “Your lines bugged?”

“They could be. We had Treasury Department agents in here this morning. Apparently the Surete in Marseilles are monitoring overseas calls. Jason placed two to us from the Pavilion of Crosses restaurant just before one of the couriers from Istanbul was shot to death. He had twenty kilos of heroine in a suitcase prepared for shipment to the United States.”

“Who hit him?”

“Nobody knows. They seem to think it was an attempted hijacking. The murderer escaped completely.”

“Damn,” I said. “Who got the stuff?”

The voice on the other end chuckled. “That is the joke. Nobody. The courier had anticipated a possible double cross and had substituted packages. The genuine stuff is still hidden somewhere. Had all gone well he would have accepted the money and told the transfer agent later where to recover the proper goods. Unfortunately, he didn’t anticipate being killed.”

“Any leads at all?”

“So far, none. The courier was a professional. Now the big hunt is on. It will be ... how do. you say? ... finders keepers”

“Who’s working our end?”

“The Irishman O’Keefe and Pierre Dumont.”

“Hell, O’Keefe has a record in Berlin and...”

“A simple assault charge. It’s not very likely he’ll be recognized. Besides,” ... he chuckled again “you should be the one to worry.”

“Now what’s up?” I asked him.

“The affair had your stamp on it. Your MO, so to speak. It is being rumored that the courier didn’t know a switch had been made and it was a first-class hijacking with the killing only a red herring thrown in to confuse everybody.”

“Nice.”

“Certain parties are very angry. Le Fleur himself has directed a bonus for either the recovery or your demise.”

Le Fleur, the flower. A gentle name for a human fungus. Someplace the bastard sat in royal opulence and pushed the buttons that could trigger the kill of anyone from a dope-head to a diplomat. Narcotics built his empire and the ones he couldn’t squeeze out he eliminated or organized. The only ones he couldn’t control were nibbling holes in his elaborate structure and if it happened often and successfully enough the whole damn thing would fall apart.

I said, “This may bring him out into the open.”

“No, I’m afraid not, although there are many who would like to know his true identity. Once that happened any one of the others in a fairly strong position would take steps to have him removed. These are the days of science and equipment. An aerial bombing raid on a stronghold is not an improbability and financially simple to arrange.”

“But complicated,” I told him.

“Quite. Therefore it is simpler to pick the fly out of the ointment, which, in this case, they think is you. One member of the syndicate has been selected to act as your executioner, especially in view of the fact that his natural animosity and suspicion has led him into instigating a kidnap order on you... followed by your death, of course.”

“The Turk?”

“Exactly. They already know what has happened to his two men. Either they succeed in the near future or The Turk becomes the object of Le Fleur’s attentions. This he certainly doesn’t desire.”

“Hell, he’s working at it. They tried again and I was lucky. They missed me. My friend wasn’t so lucky and they damn near killed him.”

“You shouldn’t expose your friends to yourself, Dog.”

“The Turk should know better.”

“Perhaps he didn’t take your retirement seriously.”

“But he’s going to. Who’s come in the last few days?”