"I told you to look out," he said disgustedly. "Now look what you've done. You wrecked the control tower."
"Sorry, Irving." I'd recognized his voice. "I'll try to see that it never happens again." My eyes lit on an object which had been hurled out of the wreckage along with me. I hurried to retrieve the four-foot bejeweled phallus.
"What's that?" Irving asked.
"What does it look like?"
"What happened to the rest of it?" Irving peered into the wreckage with worried eyes.
"There is no rest. This is all there is. And it isn't even scratched. That's what I call luck," I enthused.
"What are you going to do with it?" Irving asked.
"What do you think?"
"I don't know." He edged away. "Nothing would surprise me. Not after today. Now, you may not believe this," he added as he paused in the doorway before taking flight, "but this is the first time a man with a four-foot long golden dingus has ever crashed a plane into my conning tower!"
I hadn't time to chase after him and explain. I hustled over to the office of the man in charge and persuaded him to let me put in a call to Putnam in London. Putnam put the wheels in motion fast. I was saved from explanations and investigations. He arranged for a plane to fly me to New York immediately.
Just before take-off I spotted Irving walking across the airstrip. A voice called out to him as he passed the hangars. "Hey, Irv, coming to the New Year's Eve party tonight?"
"No," Irving replied.
"Why not?"
"It would be anti-climactic," Irving told him.
I chuckled to myself, hefted the phallus, and climbed aboard the plane. It was quite different from my last flight. It was good to be a passenger again and leave the driving to somebody else.
It was New Year's Day when I landed in New York. Putnam had arranged a room for me at a motel adjacent to the airport, and I went straight to it. I slept for twelve hours straight. The phone ringing beside my bed woke me. It was the room clerk. I had a visitor – "a friend of Mr. Putnam's."
I told the clerk to send him up to the room. A few moments later I was shaking hands with Singh Huy-eva. "I understand you have something for me," he said when the greetings were over.
"That I do." I opened the suitcase and produced the jeweled phallus with a flourish. "Gonads and all," I told him.
"Now my quest is over," Singh said. "But my instructions are to continue to help you if I can."
"I think you can," I told him. "Has S.M.U.T. discovered you're a spy yet?"
"No. Crampdick seems to believe I'm as legitimate as ever. He's back from Toronto now. I don't know why he was recalled. But I suspect something's up."
"Something is," I assured him. "Do you know if that blonde chick from the brothel is back, too?"
"Yes. I saw her up at the S.M.U.T. offices only yesterday." He looked at me curiously. "Don't tell me that she's-"
"Dr. Nyet. Right. Do you think you can find out where she's staying?"
"I can try. I'll get on it right away. I'll call you back when I have anything."
Singh left then. There was nothing for me to do but wait. I waited. Another day went by before he contacted me.
"I followed the young lady," he said over the phone. "She's staying at one of the S.M.U.T. branch offices in Forest Hills. People by the name of-"
"Highman." I finished the sentence for him.
"That's right. But how-?"
"Never mind that. Can you meet me over there right away?"
"As quickly as possible. But I'm afraid that won't be very quickly. Traffic's jammed up all over the city."
When the cab I'd called pulled onto Queens Boulevard, I saw that Singh hadn't been exaggerating. The transit strike had traffic tied up for miles. It was ridiculous in the direction I was going, and it was absolutely impossible coming from the other way. It was the evening rush hour, and cars coming from the city were averaging about a yard a minute.
We were doing a little better, but not much. Finally I couldn't take it any longer, and I got out and walked. I trudged some twenty blocks before I came to Highman's apartment house. Considering the transit mess, I figured it might be hours before Singh got there. I was just about to go it alone when my figuring was proved wrong.
Singh came pedaling up on a bicycle, his face quite composed under his white turban. "It's the only way to travel," he told me as he parked the bike.
"You are truly a unique eunuch." I grinned at him fondly. "Come on. The lion's den awaits."
The same acne'd faggot answered the doorbell. He hadn't changed since my first visit. He was still sweating for S.M.U.T. Singh waved his sharp, curved kukri under his nose, and we kept going through the S.M.U.T. offices back to Highman's private quarters.
"Look out!" Singh cried out, shoving me aside.
He'd seen them before I had: two gorillas behind the half-opened door, ready to pounce. They sprang out with guns blazing, but thanks to Singh's warning I was too fast for them. Using a table in the hallway for cover, I had time to aim more accurately. I fired twice and they both went down.
My gun was still smoking as Singh and I stepped over their bodies. I knew them both – though from different places. The first was one of the hoods who'd tried to kill me in the bordello. The other was the fellow who'd packed the violin case back in Salisbury.
"So I was right," Singh murmured, looking at the first.
I remembered then that he'd guessed the vice ring hooligans were really taking their orders from the same people who ran S.M.U.T. He'd guessed it that morning after the blackout in his hotel room. Now, with them playing watchdogs for
Highman, there could be no doubt. Only these watchdogs were through woofing for good.
"Those shots," Singh said. "They'll know we're coming."
"No," I disagreed. "This place is all soundproofed. It's a good bet that those shots were never even heard."
We continued cautiously into the interior of Highman's apartment. I led the way through the living room to the kitchen door. I shoved the door open and plunged in gun-first.
And there was Dr. Nyet!
She was perched on the kitchen table, a steak knife in her hand. The tip, of the knife was black with caviar. Dr. Nyet was smearing it on Ritz crackers.
"Steve Victor!" she exclaimed, surprised.
"Dr. Nyet." I returned the greeting.
"Then you know."
"That I do."
"Oh." She considered it a moment. "Well, would you like some caviar?" she offered.
"No, thanks."
"It's really delicious. I love caviar." She smiled. "Ethnic will out, I suppose."
She was wearing a low-cut peasant blouse and a skirt that was carelessly high on her thighs. She looked as blonde and sexy as she had the night we'd fanned the flames with our passion. Now my eyes gave me away, and she was amused at what they said I was thinking.
"Remember, Mr. Victor?" she said sultrily. "How could I forget?"
"It was a glorious blaze, wasn't it?" There was mockery in her sigh.
"But very out of character for Dr. Nyet," I remarked. "I was told the name came from your reluctance to have sex."
"That was before I became a victim of my own experiments," she explained. "You see, I tested the formula out on myself before I was forced to hide out in the brothel. Later, while I was actually working there, I did ust the opposite, of course. But the side effects of my formula must have lingered."
"What side effects?"
"The side effects which make it strongly aphrodisiac. They can't be done away with – not if it's to counteract birth-control pills."
"Steve Victor!" It was an exclamation coming from behind me.
I swung around fast, sure that I'd find Highman with a gun in his hand. Singh turned with me, but we were both wrong. Highman had been so shocked to see me alive in New York that he'd spoken my name without stopping to think. If he had stopped to think, he might have gone away silently and fetched a weapon. Now it was too late. He stood there with – of all things – a baby in his arms!