«We solve them any way we can. I’m surprised at you, Bonner. You amaze me. Since when did someone’s way of making a living stop you from using them in the field?»
«Probably never. Because I knew I was using them, not the other way around. And whatever I did was pretty far down the line. Dog territory. You live differently down there. I had the mistaken idea that you people up here were better than we were. That’s right, General, better.»
«So you found out we’re not, and you’re shocked… Where the hell did you people in ‘dog territory’ think you got your hardware, soldier? From little old ladies in tennis shoes who shouted, ‘Support our boys’ and presto, there were ships full of jet fuel and cargoes of ammunition? Come off it. Major! The weapons you used in the Plain of Jars may have been loaded out of the San Diego waterfront courtesy of Mario de Spadante. The copter that picked you up ten miles south of Haiphong might just be the ‘snake’ we squeezed off a production line somewhere because De Spadante’s friends called off a strike. Don’t be so particular, Bonner. It doesn’t become the ‘killer from Saigon.’»
Deals were made on the waterfront, in the factories. Paul knew that. But that was different. That was as far down the line as «dog territory» was for him. De Spadante and his gunmen weren’t on the waterfront or at a factory last night. They were at Trevayne’s house. Couldn’t the brigadier see?
«General.» Bonner spoke slowly but with intensity. «What I made contact with eighteen hours ago, on the property of the chairman of a subcommittee appointed by the President and the Senate, were two hired killers and a Mafia boss who wore iron spikes on his fist and took a lot of skin off my arm and my neck. For me that’s different from stealing files and trying to louse up or outsmart some congressional committee that’s determined to knock us out of the box.»
«Why? Because the fight’s physical? Not on paper but in the flesh?»
«Maybe… Maybe it’s as simple as that. Or maybe I’m just worried that the next step will be for the De Spadantes to be appointed to the Chiefs of Staff. Or made part of the faculty at the War College… If they’re not on both already.»
«Is he dead?» asked Robert Webster into the telephone, holding his briefcase between his knees in the booth on Michigan Avenue.
«No. He’s a tough old guinea. They think he’ll pull through now,» said the doctor at the other end of the line in another public phone booth in Greenwich, Connecticut.
«That’s not particularly good news.»
«They worked on him for three hours. Tied up a dozen veins, spliced twice as many and patched walls all over. He’ll be on critical for a few days, but the odds are he’ll make it.»
«We don’t want that, doctor. That’s unacceptable to us… There’s got to be a miscalculation somewhere.»
«Forget it, Bobby. This place is swarming with guns. Every entrance, the elevators, even the roof. The nurses aren’t even ours, they’re his. Four priests rotate the last rites watch inside his room; if they’re priests, I’m Mother Cabrini.»
«I repeat, some way has got to be found.»
«Then you find it, but not here. If anything happened to him now, they’d burn the hospital to the ground with all of us in it. And that’s unacceptable to me.»
«All right, all right. No medical accidents.»
«You bet your ass!… Why the elimination?»
«He asked too many favors; he got them. He’s become too much of a liability.»
The doctor paused. «Not here, Bobby.»
«All right. We’ll think of something else.»
«By the way, the discharge papers came through. I’m clean. Thanks a lot. You didn’t have to add the citation, but it was a nice touch.»
«Better than dishonorable. You must have made a killing.»
«I did.» The doctor laughed. «If you’re strapped for a buck, let me know.»
«Be in touch.» Webster hung up and awkwardly manipulated his briefcase and the phone-booth door. He had to figure out what to do about De Spadante. The situation could become dangerous. Somehow he’d use the doctor in Greenwich. Why not? The doctor’s debt wasn’t nearly paid off. The doctor had run a series of abortion mills, in one Army hospital after another. He’d used government equipment and goddamned near advertised in base newspapers.
The doctor had made a fortune two years after he’d finished internship.
Webster hailed a taxi and was about to give the driver the White House destination. Then he changed his mind.
«Twelve-twenty-two Louisiana.»
It was the address of the Gallabretto Construction Company. Mario de Spadante’s Washington firm.
The nurse opened the door solemnly, silently. The priest removed his hand from his jacket, and the gold chain with the cross attached rattled slightly. He got out of the chair and whispered to the visitor.
«His eyes are closed, but he hears every fuckin’ word.»
«Leave us,» said the weak, rasping voice from the bed. «Come back when William’s gone, Rocco.»
«Sure, boss.»
The priest put his finger between the clerical collar and his skin and stretched his neck. He picked up his small leather missa solemnis and opened the door, slightly embarrassed.
The visitor and Mario de Spadante were alone.
«I can’t stay more than a few minutes, Mario. The doctors won’t let me. You’re going to be all right, you know that, don’t you?»
«Hey, you look good, William. Big West Coast lawyer now, huh? You dress good. You make me proud, little cousin. Real proud.»
«Don’t waste breath, Mario. We’ve got several things to go over, and I want you cognizant.»
«Listen to the word. ‘Cognizant.’» De Spadante smiled lamely. It took strength to smile, and he was pitifully weak. «They sent you in from the Coast. Imagine that.»
«Let me do the talking, Mario… First of all, you went to Trevayne’s place in hopes that he might be home. You didn’t have his unlisted number; you were in Greenwich on business—you’re doing some work down here—and you’d heard his wife was in a hospital. You knew him in New Haven, reacquainted yourselves on the plane to Washington. You were simply concerned. That’s all. It was purely a social call. Perhaps a bit presumptuous on your part, but that’s not contradictory to your … expansiveness.»
De Spadante nodded, his eyes half-closed. «Little Willie Gallabretto,» he said with his faint smile. «You talk good, William. I’m real proud.» De Spadante kept nodding his frail affirmation. «You talk so good. So quick, William.»
«Thank you.» The lawyer looked at his gold Rolex watch and continued. «This is most important, Mario. At Trevayne’s house your car got stuck in the snow. The mud and the snow. We’ve got confirmation from the police. Incidentally, it cost a thousand with a man named Fowler, and the tracks have been erased. But remember, the mud and the snow. That’s all you remember until you were attacked. Have you got that?»
«Yes, consigliori, I’ve got that.»
«Good… Now, I should go. My associates in Los Angeles send you their best. You’ll be fine, Uncle Mario.»
«Fine… Fine.» De Spadante raised his hand an inch or two off the blanket. The lawyer halted. «Now you finished?»
«Yes.»
«Fine. Now, stop talking the fancy talk and hear me. Hear me good… You put out a contract on this soldier boy. I want it tormento lento. You put it out tonight.»
«No, Mario. No contract. He’s Army, federal. No contract.»