The apartment was not presidential, but still, living in a three-room suite alone was more luxury than convenience.
The innkeeper ushered us into the next room and seated us in chairs, opening a laptop computer that stood in the middle of a table that was extremely close to the piece of furniture where we had settled. He himself pulled up a small lacquered chair and leaned a finger to his lips, pressing a couple of buttons on the keyboard. On the monitor came up, "This place is full of bugs. Speak only through the computer."
My next move was, "Explain yourself about Brown. What kind of guy is he? And what else happened in my absence?"
"The thing is, of all the documents on the Cosa Nostra case, yours turned out to be the vast majority, and even too much. There was only a little general information and a couple of videos about the other 'managers' and above, so I thought you were in on it. But after I found out there was no Albert Cave, your alleged client, it all made sense. Your real client…"
I pulled his hands away from the keyboard and typed back, "I know who. And now we've temporarily gotten rid of them. By the way, I haven't heard anything about the 'mysterious explosions in Lyon'."
"No, there's nothing wrong there, but you see… You didn't just get one customer, you got several…"
"Yeah, the FBI is involved in this too…" — it hit me. Damn them all!!! Since the FBI is an equal ally of Interpol, they also have documents on the Cosa Nostra case. I can see why Lyon hasn't been bombed yet. Because if they had, the documents would have multiplied again from overseas friends, so they must be destroyed at the same time. And the organization figured it out. Good for them. That's why Richard on the phone said, "A guy who might know something about your case," that's why Brosman decided to help me. They all guessed, as I did, that Albert Cave and Interpol's alliance with the FBI and the CIA. It was this alliance that was the ordering agency, not some double-agent Albert Cave they made up and shoved into our archives!
I continued, poking at the keys: "Anyway, I got it, Pierce, where's Brown?" "Paladin Motel, #32."
"Is he alone in there?" "It's not known."
"His picture?"
Brosman with a slight movement of his hand on the "not the most recent miracle of technology" displayed a picture on the monitor: at the big jeep (which one, from this angle, you can't recognize) one man was shaking hands with another.
"Which one is it?"
The finger of the "technician" pointed to a tiny spot at the edge of the photo. I moved closer, straining my eyesight, and saw a frail "dystrophic" who could barely stand on his feet.
"What's that?"
{ "object".
"I sense this is going to be fun… Any personality traits?"
"None."
"When are we leaving?" "Now."
We're here
6:06 p.m. Aug. 18
Brosman pulled a Spas-15 (a nightmarish Italian-made Winchester) from under his cloak and fired a looping shot into the neighborhoods, then moved his foot on the door. After the front door fell open, he handed me a flick badge with the words, "Stay on the lookout," and "went deep" into his work, while I leaned against the doorjamb and began to wait for guests.
From the room there was crazy shouting, screaming, yelling, yelling, in short, someone was being tortured; the neighbors were very interested in this fact and came out into the corridor. I finally and irrevocably blocked the empty passageway, showing off my fresh badge and telling everyone about my job.
My cell phone rang. "Hello."
"This is Longe, we have guests here," — Lightning was sitting in his Jeep, keeping watch at the entrance gate to the motel grounds, and also waiting for us.
"Okay. Don't do anything, we'll figure it out."
There was a siren. Apparently someone just didn't believe my gibberish, because the voices were getting stronger and stronger from the apartment.
But if I'm going to play this opera, I'm going to play it to the end, even in front of the flicks that ended up in front of me, stepping out of the "crowd" (there was already one person watching the spectacle) and seeing the sign, "What happened?"
"Some hag is listening to the TV too loud, my partner's dealing with it right now." "What took you so long, Captain (I didn't understand why he called me that). And why is the door kicked in?"
I looked at the piece of wood lying two meters away from the hinges: "You know, they're getting so shoddy with all this stuff nowadays… If you pull it, it falls off…" The sounds stopped. — Well, that's it, you can go away," no one even blinked an eye.
Once outside, Brosman looked at the cops puzzled and seemed to want to do something. "So that's it I broke the dead silence with a steely expression. — What took you so
long?"
"I… Yeah. Uh… Well…" — Pierce reached under his jacket.
"Let me in…" — the cop mumbled and stormed in, the other one following him. Brosman gave me a dumbfounded look, and I ducked out the door and saw the blue- collar guys running into the bathroom, and the next moment there were ripping moans coming from the wet room. After sneaking a few meters through the apartment in their direction, I smelled a pungent odor of rot (or something like that) and, trying not to breathe, looked into the currently relevant room. There were two corpses lying there (one with his head in a … filled to the brim, the other on the floor with blood on his face and trickles of red stuff from his nose) and two of our disemboweled heroes. My hand snatched a revolver from the holster of the first flick and, pointing it at each of them in turn, fired a shot.
Faust is Bond
6:16 p.m. Aug. 18
"Oh, you asshole. And you call that 'standing guard'!" — I started the "bazaar" after we got back to the car.
"There were two of them there." "So…"
"They're faggots." "So…"
"I took them psychologically, meaning I tortured one and forced the other to watch." "So…"
"Bobby turned out to have a weak heart… But I managed to learn something about a certain 'Zipped'…"
"Oh, what about the other one?" "The other one had to be drowned."
"Uh-huh, good for you, slapping two pederasts…" "I always do that, since there are no witnesses…"
"Idiot, I was just waving my fake badge around here!"
"I've already called ours… The bodies are about to be removed, but see… There's no door…"
"Yeah, no way."
"And… We have to wait…" "There, you wait, and I'm off…" "Where to?"
"To the buttoned-up one, by the way, what's his name?" "I don't know…"
{ "address".
"I don't know…"
"You should have asked Brown." "Why?"
Details for latecomers
6:23 p.m. Aug. 18.
"Where are we going?" — while I was in the backseat with Pierce, Longe cranked up the first speed and set off (you never know what's going to happen in the next second).
"To the Long Island Bridge," — Brosman replied, turning on his cell phone and dialing the damn number.
"Who are you calling?"
"To your dispatcher… Hello. This is Brosman. Get me the location of the Zippy— Zippy. What are you listening to… All right… Uh-huh… Bye…"
Bond disconnected the receiver.
"Well, what?" — I asked the special effects buff. "Yeah, nothing… We'll find out soon enough…"
"Yeah, by the way, are you sure your guys cleaned up the bodies?" "Of course, they're professionals…"