From the beginning, after his phone calls to useless emergency exchanges, Blaine had known that driving himself out of Newport was out of the question. Hiding in the trunk or the back of a truck was a possibility, but there was no one he trusted enough in this area to take the risk. The answer came to him with surprising ease.
He phoned for a cab, choosing a small private company. The driver turned out to be a young, bearded man. Blaine found it easy to strike a deal with him. For an agreed-on number of still drying bills, they would switch places. Blaine would drive the car with the cabbie as his backseat passenger. McCracken’s only disguise would be a cap tucked low toward his eyebrows, though he expected that was all he would need. After all, even the best of spotters would not waste their time with a taxi driver. Only the passenger mattered to them, and in this case that passenger bore only the slightest resemblance to the man they sought.
Blaine followed the driver’s directions exactly and ended up in the town of Bristol. His next order of business was to get somewhere where the resources he needed would be available, where he could learn what happened to Stimson. Trouble was, his lone wolf status on this mission had stripped him of backup, and his years abroad had evaporated any trusted contacts he might have had.
There was one, though, not in Washington, but in New York: Sal Belamo, who had saved his life twice already. He had Belamo’s private number. Assuming Sal wasn’t off on assignment, Blaine could use him to run interference and to arrange for someone to whom Blaine could take his story. Stimson’s unavailability served as a warning for him not to come in on his own. People would be watching. Stimson’s enemies were his as well.
Two phone calls later Blaine had determined his best route into New York City would be by train. It provided better cover than flying. A train was leaving from Providence just before noon, which gave him nearly an hour to reach the station.
Still using the cab, he got there five minutes prior to boarding and chose a seat in the no smoking section for the three-and-a-half-hour ride. The train proved more crowded than he’d expected, but the fact that there were only three stops between Providence and New York kept his most anxious moments to a minimum.
The train arrived on time, and Blaine had no trouble finding a cab outside Penn Station. He told the driver to head north. He had Belamo’s number but not his address. Once he reached him, it would take the ex-boxer a few hours to obtain the information he sought. Blaine didn’t fancy spending that period moving around, and a meal in a public place or even a drink in a bar were out of the question.
So when the cab swung past an apartment building with lots of lights out on East Fifty-sixth, Blaine instructed the driver to let him off. Getting past the doorman proved no trouble, and neither was finding an apartment left vacant for more than the afternoon. The slushy, snowy streets outside kept the standard issue welcome mats before each apartment constantly wet. Blaine had only to find a dry one that corresponded with darkened windows and he would have his temporary refuge.
He found one on the second floor overlooking the street. The lock was of the standard five-tumbler variety and thus easily picked in the time it would have taken to use a key. McCracken left the lights off as he dialed Sal Belamo’s number.
“Yeah?” came Sal’s raspy greeting.
“Do you recognize my voice?”
“If this is an obscene phone call, fuck you.”
“It’s not. Recognize it yet?”
“Keep talking. How ’bout a hint?”
“You saved my life twice last week.”
“McCrackenballs! How they hangin’?”
“Not so good and don’t use my name. I need your help.”
“Why not go through Stimson, pal?”
“His phone’s not working.”
A pause. “You ask me, that’s not good.”
“I want you to check the front for me and find out what’s happened. Then get a hold of General Pard Peacher or someone close to him. Find out if he’s made any progress with his city inspections. I’ll give you the details in a minute. Most important, I need a friendly party to bring me home.”
“Take me a couple hours. Where are you?”
“I borrowed an apartment at One Forty East Fifty-sixth Street.”
“I’ll be outside with the limo at six P.M. on the nose. We’ll talk as we ride. Nobody notices limos in New York.”
“Don’t bet on it.”
True to his word, Sal Belamo pulled the black limousine up to the front of the apartment building at six o’clock sharp. Blaine watched him from the window and made no move to leave until Belamo stepped out and switched on the interior lights so he could see the limo was empty.
“Your car, sir,” Belamo announced a minute later, holding the back door open.
“You own this tub?” McCracken asked when they were both inside.
“The Gap lets me keep it. Like I said, it makes good cover. You ask me, though, I don’t look much like a chauffeur. Too pretty.” He paused and looked at Blaine in the rearview mirror. “Look, excuse me for cuttin’ out most of the small talk, but I wanna make this a quick ride.”
“What’d you find out?”
“What do ya wanna hear first, the bad news or the bad news?”
“Let’s start with Stimson.”
Belamo swung onto Lexington Avenue. “Yeah, that’s the bad news, all right. He’s gone.”
“Is he dead?”
“That’s the indication, but nobody’s confirming. I pulled out every stop I know of to reach him, and so did a few others. When he goes this long without answerin’, pal, it’s a pretty good bet he won’t be answerin’ again at all.”
“Sounds like a cover-up.”
“SOP at the Gap, pal. Our chain of command doesn’t function like the three-letter boys’. We lose our top man and things get a bit interesting. You ask me, I’m glad all I do is sit and wait for phone calls. No complications that way.” Another glance in the rearview mirror. “Until you called, that is.”
“What about Peacher?”
“I got hold of his number-one man. We worked together a few times back in the old days. He didn’t know what the hell I was talking about. Said they haven’t heard from Stimson and none of those city inspections of yours have been taking place.”
“Oh, Christ …”
“That’s bad, ain’t it?”
“Yeah. Peacher must be a part of all this. Maybe the whole army is, at least at the top. It would explain a lot. What else have you got for me?”
Belamo took a left. “The best is yet to come, pal, the reason why this has gotta be a short ride. The real bad news is there’s people lookin’for ya.”
“Who?”
“Can’t say for sure. After I finished with the Gap I called a buddy at the Company and mentioned your name. Your file’s been pulled. You don’t exist anymore.”
“I’m supposed to be dead, remember.”
“Sure, but your file wasn’t pulled until this morning. Someone important wants to make the hoax real.”
“Gap or Company?”
“Neither. Or both. The order was coded Blue. Don’t see many of those. A joint effort you might call it and anybody with a gun’s involved. Streets won’t be safe tonight.”
“Do they know I’m in New York?”
“Not specifically but, you ask me, it won’t take them long.” Belamo shook his head. “It’s scary, pal, downright scary. Nobody’s talking ’cause they don’t know a thing. Everything’s goin’ down below the surface. The hired guns are being brought in. You can forget all about comin’ home. I can’t get you in, nobody can get you in. ’Less, of course, you don’t mind arriving in pieces.”