Don Pendleton - Tower of Terror

"Where now?" Blancanales asked Bernardo.

"Wait here." Bernardo went into a corner luncheonette and moved to the phone. He dialed a number, watching Blancanales while he talked.

Blancanales leaned against a light pole, talked to himself. The minimike was in his inside coat pocket.

"He's making a call. I tell you, this kid is one very paranoid young man. But he doesn't know anything about counter-surveillance. I think he's just a street kid that they recruited. Also, when we went past the WorldFiCor, he didn't even notice."

Looking back to the luncheonette, he saw Bernardo hang up and step outside. "Talk to you later, he's coming back."

Bernardo returned and held up a hand for a taxi. "The meeting is set," he told Blancanales. "But first, we..."

"We must lose any surveillance?"

"My commander instructed me to be very careful."

They took a taxi to the next block, got out, ran through traffic to the entry of a tenement. Bernardo led him through the central hallway to a back stairway. Up the stairs to the second floor, through a window to a fire escape, down the fire escape to an alley. They crossed the alley.

Bernardo pulled open the unlocked rear door of a restaurant and hurried through the kitchen. The cooks and dishwashers turned their backs. Blancanales saw a waiter go to the rear door, lock it. Then they wove between the tables. The few patrons didn't look up from their lunches and conversations.

Out on the street, Bernardo flagged another taxi. "Where to, kid?"

"Drive." Bernardo pointed straight ahead.

"We're sight-seeing," Blancanales explained.

"Tourists, huh?" The driver commented. "Where you from?"

"My friend here's from New York," Blancanales said, "but I'm from California." .

"California! First time in the big city?"

"No. But it's the first time I've had time to look around. Any tourist attractions around here?"

"Hey, man! This is Little Italy. Unless you're into crime, you know, gangsters, the mob, Mafia, you got to go uptown for tourist action."

"This is Little Italy? This where Lucky Luciano grew up?"

"Out!" Bernardo interrupted. "We're getting out here."

They dodged traffic as they crossed the avenue. Bernardo led Blancanales around a corner, and without breaking stride, pushed him through the side door of a waiting florist's van. Bernardo slid the door closed, then got into the driver's seat. They were alone in the van.

There were no windows in the back of the van. As Bernardo started the engine, he leaned back and said tersely, "If you try to look outside, no meeting. If you try to signal anyone, no meeting. Understand?"

"Entiendo."

Bernardo jerked a curtain shut, then raced into traffic. Blancanales rode in the dark van, his companion a funeral wreath.

Cruising through the narrow streets of shops and tenements, Lyons watched the sidewalks and cars for his partner. The afternoon's heat had thinned the pedestrians. Kids sat on steps sipping Cokes. Teenagers gulped from bag-wrapped beer cans, passed wine bottles. But he saw no Latin ex-Green Beret in a business suit walking with a twenty-year-old FALN soldier. He glanced into the cars in traffic, trying to keep his face concealed behind the headlines of that afternoon's paper. He knew the boy would be watching the traffic for surveillance: for him to see Lyons might mean death for Blancanales. Lyons knew his threats had impressed Bernardo, but the boy was only one of the soldiers in this operation. The others might not give a damn about Bernardo's friends and family.

The D.F. signal faded.

"Go north a few blocks," Lyons told his driver. The secure phone buzzed. Lyons grabbed it.

"This is Hardman Three," Gadgets said.

"Where are you?"

"Driving north on Broadway. Where are you?"

Lyons glanced out at a street sign. "We're going north on Allen. The D.F. signal's picking up. Must be gaining on it. Do you have a D.F. receiver you can pass to Smith?"

"Sure do. I'll call him, arrange a pass. You have anything on the minimike?"

"Nothing. You ready for action?"

"I'm ready for anything. Things are popping all over. You got the news yet?"

"What now?"

"They made some demands. Finally. The Bureau has a negotiation team talking with them now."

"Give me the details in person. Keep moving, let's try to keep the D.F. between us."

Lyons broke the connection, punched the code for the phone with Mr. Smith in Little Italy. "You still parked, Mr. Smith?"

"Yes, sir. Waiting for instructions."

"We're driving north on Allen Street. Make some speed, come up behind us. I'm in the yellow cab. When you get here, Hardman Three has a D.F. receiver for you. Further instructions when you make it up here. Hit it!"

The D.F. beeps came faster and faster, became a buzz. Lyons pointed to the curb. "Pull over! We must be within a hundred feet of them."

Even as the driver swerved, the signal slowed. Looking back, Lyons saw traffic stop at a red light. The D.F. signal held a steady beep-beep-beep-beep. The lines of traffic at the light included a meat truck, an old Plymouth stationwagon, and a florist's van, in addition to the many passenger cars.

"Make a U-turn!" Lyons shouted.

"You want me to call for Bureau backup? We could use some more cars."

"No!" Lyons punched Gadgets' code on the secure phone. "We reversed direction. We're coming up behind some trucks. Signal very strong." Then he punched Smith's code. "Smith, Smith! Park. Wait for us to pass."

"Parking now. You got our man in sight?"

"Maybe. Watch for us."

The phone buzzed. "Hardman Three here. I'm on the Bowery, that's a block or two west of you. I'm continuing south."

"Get Smith's cross street," Lyons told Gadgets. "He's parked. Try to get there and give him that D.F. receiver. I think we're bumper-to-bumper with them."

The traffic light changed to green. Weaving the cab past slower vehicles, the driver brought them up behind the meat truck. Lyons stayed low in the seat. The D.F. signal shrieked.

"Stay behind this truck," Lyons glanced out the window, but he could not see the florist's van or the old stationwagon. "Just keep it on the truck's bumper until something changes. Any chance you got a periscope in the trunk?"

"No, sir. But I'll call for one..."

"That was a joke!" Lyons exclaimed, wide-eyed. "You Bureau guys crack me up. What happens when you can't get exactly what you need, right away?"

The cabbie-agent laughed. "Never happens. If we don't have it, we make a call. Like you guys. We called you."

Lyons smiled coolly, slid lower in the taxi's back seat as the Plymouth came up on their left. A white-haired black man was driving. Newspapers and card-board filled the back of the car. Through the taxi's open window, Lyons heard Chinese phrases coming from the stationwagon. The old man repeated each Chinese phrase. Lyons glanced over, saw the old man look at a three-by-five flash card, then say a Chinese phrase.

"I don't think that old man's with the FALN," Lyons told his driver. "Pull ahead of him, there's a flower-shop truck up there."

"What about this truck?" The cabbie indicated the meat truck.

"Keep it in the rearview mirror, we'll maybe follow it if it makes a turn."

His driver whipped the taxi past the stationwagon. Ahead of them, the florist's van raced through the intersection to beat a yellow light. The shriek of the D.F. signal modulated, became a fading beep-beep-beep as the truck sped away.

"That's the van!" Lyons grabbed the secure phone.

"Want me to run the light?" the cabbie asked.

"Stay back. I'm calling the others." In a second, he had Gadgets. "You've got a white and green florist's truck coming down on you. I didn't see the driver. There's no windows in the back of it. It's the truck we want."