Don Pendleton: California Hit

The two junior officers exbanged glances and Warnicke said, "Well it's clean now."

"Best way to beat the mob is just leave 'em alone, I guess," Gibson went on. "I been saying that for years. Leave 'em alone, they're their own worst enemies."

A medic grinned and commented, "I was just reading something along that line. A study of violent deaths by mobsters shows that most of them die at the hands of their own kind."

"Not any more," Lt. Warnicke said. He produced a folded cloth from his breast pocket, opened it, and placed it on the table.

Gibson leaned forward to glare at a metallic object which had been wrapped in the cloth. "What's that?" he asked.

"That," Warnicke told him, "is a military marksman's medal."

"Aw shit," the Captain said.

"One of the dead hoods is Greasy Waters. We pried that medal out of his fist."

It was an involuntary exclamation from Bill Phillips. "Mack Bolan!"

"You telling me that goddam guy is in our town now?" Gibson said angrily.

"'It would appear so," Warnicke replied with a sigh.

Sgt. Phillips spun about and went rapidly out of there, making fast tracks to his cruiser.

So Mack Bolan had come to town! And, all of a sudden, the pieces had come together in the Brushfire cop's head.

The Brushfire Squad was a special police detail which had been established for quick reaction against organized violence in this age of growing political anarchy — it was, in a sense, a combat team which was fully prepared to take up the defense of any threatened civic institution — or so they hoped. So far their activities had been confined mostly to a defense of their own police stations, but they had also investigated bomb threats, arson cases, campus violence and a variety of other radical threats against the city.

And if Mack Bolan's presence in town did not constitute a bonafide...

Phillips reached his cruiser and swung inside for a report to his operations center. "This is Bravo Three," he announced into the special radio net. "Possible Brushfire Alert, repeat, possible alert. I'm coming in for conference."

He returned the microphone to its bracket and put the car in motion, picking his way carefully across the disaster zone, and to himself he muttered, "Brushfire, hell. It's Little World War Three."

Capo Mafioso Roman DeMarco, at the age of seventy-two was a bit too old for early morning fireworks — and the testy lines of the usually genial face plainly showed his displeasure over getting dragged out of a warm bed at such an uncomfortable hour.

The lights were blazing on all three floors of the ancient mansion atop Russian Hill, and the place was filling up fast with the family rank and file as worried faces and angry voices continued to arrive in response to the urgent summons from Don DeMarco.

The Capo's strong right arm — enforcer Franco Laurentis — had been among the earliest arrivals. He had come complete with his usual retinue of hard-eyed, silent torpedoes who seemed to have worked out some method of communication which was restricted entirely to eye movements and facial expressions.

Underbosses Vincenzo Ciprio and Thomas Vericci were also present. They were the demigods of, respectively, the East Bay and the San Francisco Peninsula — and each had brought several lieutenants and their cadres to the big house on the hill.

A foot patrol of hardmen had been deployed along the streets surrounding the house; others cruised the neighborhood in gunmobiles or sat in solemn stakeouts at various approaches to the family home.

The Northern California arm of La Cosa Nostra was taking no chances with the wildass bastard in black who had moved his thunder and lightning to their sacred territories.

The Capo, appropriately clad for the formalities of the night in silk pajamas and a brocade robe with designs in heavy gold thread, was holding court in the library and explaining the seriousness of the situation to the ranking members.

"So this boy has no doubt come here looking for some more expensive glory," he concluded. "And I guess everybody here knows that we're all in for a damn lot of trouble. Unless we can get to this boy first and tear his head off and throw it in the bay."

Thomas Vericci, lord of the peninsular area, nervously cleared his throat to inquire, "Can we be sure this really was the guy, Don DeMarco? I mean, what if somebody else just wants to make it look that way? Just to get us off guard or something, I mean."

"Either way," DeMarco replied patiently, "it's a lot of trouble, and we don't need any of that."

A small dark man who had been almost hidden in the shadow of the Capo spoke up with, "I beg your pardon."

"Spit it Out, Matty," the Capo said softly.

"Well there ain't no mistaking in my mind. I saw the guy. I saw him with these two eyes right here, and I'm telling you it was him. It was Mack Bolan. He was dressed all in black like a fuckin' — excuse me, Don DeMarco — like a damn executioner. And the way he walked was like a fuckin' — a damn cat — you know a panther or something. I mean that was him! I was as close to him as I am to you right now, Mr. Vericci, and I seen them fuckin' — excuse me, them damn eyes of his, like two chunks of ice, and I guess I'm alive by a grace of God or something."

Enforcer Laurentis coldly declared, "What you mean is, you're alive because you turned your ass to him and ran away, that's what you mean, Matty."

"Yessir, I sure did, and I ain't ashamed of that. That guy had a fuckin' — a machine gun and he was cutting down everything in sight. I ran back inside to get some more help. He'd already blowed up the goddam joint and set everything on fire. I wasn't about to face down a guy like..."

"You shut up, Matty!" Laurentis snarled.

"Yessir, I beg your pardon, I was just..."

"Franco is right, Matty," the Capo said. "You shouldn't go around spouting off your mouth like that, about how mean this Bolan is. Our boys are already nervous enough. You watch it what you say. Understand?"

"Yessir, I'm sorry."

"That Bolan is just a lucky punk" Laurentis said angrily. "He's got hisself a big reputation just because of talk like that! I don't wanta hear no more of it!"

"Yessir," Matty said humbly.

The Capo quietly observed, "I'm happy to hear that you're not nervous about this Bolan, Franco."

"I'm not a bit nervous, Don DeMarco."

"That's good, because he's going to be your worry."

The enforcer's eyes roamed to the other rankholders as he replied, "I wouldn't stand for it no other way."

"Fine, then that's settled," DeMarco said, sighing. "Tommy... Vince... I want you both to shut everything down. I mean everything. Understand? Don't give this guy one little movement to grab onto."

Vericci stared at the glowing tip of his cigar and replied, "Even my Montgomery Street operation?"

The Capo nodded his head. "Even that. You don't move anything."

"I got a big deal, boss, just trembling at the finish line."

"Then let it tremble. Shut it down."

"We can't just shut down every thing," the East Bay boss declared in an unhappy tone. "Like my powder network. We stop supplying horse and we're going to have a town full of crazy people over there before the sun sets again. The other stuff, maybe okay. But not the horse. Some of those habits are running a hundred bills a day."

Ciprio's Berkeley lieutenant hurried in to support his boss. "That's right," he said. "Some of those heads are popping four and five caps a day. We cut 'em off cold, anything could happen. If we freeze the horse, the whole town might go up in smoke."

DeMarco drummed his fingers on the table for a moment, then he asked Ciprio, "How much dump have you been laying on your retailers?"

"Just like we agreed," the underboss replied. "We give them three days, and that's the limit And a third of those are due for re-supply today."