Warren Murphy: Midnight Man

James Riggs was standing five feet inside the apartment looking at the broken door, then at Remo, with fright in his eyes.

"Well, as long as you're in anyway."

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"Thank you," Remo said. "Who filled the ad?"

"I don't really think . . ."

"Good. I'm used to dealing with people who don't think." Remo closed the door and brushed past Riggs into the apartment.

"If you don't leave, I'll call the police."

"Fine. I'll just tell them I came here to answer your advertisement for a murderer."

Riggs winced as Remo said the word "murderer." Finally he walked to a bar in the corner of the chrome and glass living room and poured himself a water tumbler full of Scotch. He drank half of it, then said, "I don't know. It was just a voice."

"You better explain this."

"I got a letter answering the ad. It told me to put a phone number in the Times. I did. I got a phone call from a man who told me to meet him in the Sheep Meadow last night at 1 a.m. I left my apartment to walk over there just around 12:40. The street was dark. He was waiting for me in the street. I couldn't see him. We negotiated a fee."

"How much?"

"A hundred thousand dollars."

"To kill the Emir?"

Riggs finished his drink, even as he was shaking his head.

"I didn't want the Emir killed."

"That's what your ad said," Remo pointed out.

"I just put that on it to attract attention. I figured anyone who'd tackle the Emir would be willing to take on a simple job like I had in mind. It was just a thought."

"Who did you really want hit?" Remo asked.

Riggs hesitated. Remo stepped toward him.

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"My business partner," Riggs said. ||

"What kind of business are you in?" Remo asked.

"Advertising."

"It figures," Remo said. He got the name and address of Riggs' partner and left. As he went through the door, Riggs was pouring himself another drink.

"Be sure to have this door fixed," Remo said. "There's a lot of crime in New York." Riggs didn't know how lucky he was. If he had been in any business but advertising, Remo might have extracted a price for his trying to have his partner killed. But Remo did not think there should be any law against killing advertising men.

He walked down the stairs and on the first landing met Princess Sarra coming up.

"We seem to be covering a lot of the same ground," Remo said. "No Pakir today?"

"I do not need an escort everywhere I go," she informed him. "Mr. Schwartzenegger."

"Call me Remo," he said.

"They told me at the magazine that you had been there," she said.

"No point in covering the same ground twice. Come with me and I'll tell you what Riggs had to say."

She considered it.

"Are you suggesting we work together?"

"We are on the same side, aren't we?" Remo asked. i|i|

"I know what side I am on, Remo. Is that your side?"

"Yes," he said.

"Then let us go to my apartment and talk," she offered.

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"All right. But we have a stop to make first," Remo said as he took her arm and walked her back down the stairs.

"Where?"

He told her what Riggs had just told him.

"We are going to warn his partner?"

"No. He's in advertising," Remo said. "But I want to see if Wimpler's been there yet. If not, maybe we'll just hang around for a while."

A taxi brought them to an apartment building almost identical to the one they had just left, except it was on New York's West Side, on the other side of Central Park. Remo checked the mailboxes, forced the door and they rode the elevator to the ninth floor.

The door was open.

"Stay behind me," Remo told the Princess.

"How gallant," she said, but Remo could hear the tension in her voice. She was frightened. Somehow it made her seem warmer and even more desirable.

The apartment did not appear to be ransacked. There was no sign of a struggle. Remo left her in the living room with orders to stay put while he looked around.

The bedroom was dark as Remo pushed open the door. Heavy drapes sealed out all light from outdoors. Remo remembered how close he had been to death last night, and he paused, heightening his senses, listening to hear if an invisible Wimpler was still in the room, ready to smack him over the skull with an invisible baseball bat.

But there was no sound from the room.

Remo went in.

The body of Riggs' partner was on the floor. He

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had apparently been undressing when Wimpler struck. He was wearing socks and underwear. His shirt and suit were tossed over the back of a chair. Next to him was a portable TV set with a cracked screen.

Remo heard a sharp intake of breath behind him. Sarra had followed him into the bedroom and seen the body. The back of her right hand was pressed up against her mouth; her eyes were opened wide; her left hand against her breasts completed the classic pose.

"Don't scream," he ordered.

"I do not scream," she told him as she dropped her hands to her side.

Remo bent over the body to examine it. His head had been crushed, but not with any special device. Apparently Wimpler had knocked the man unconscious, then dropped the television set on his head to make sure of death.

Advertising had scored again. Riggs' partner was dead. The death was just a little more direct and quick than that usually inflicted on Americans by advertising.

"Let's go," Remo told Sarra, touching her elbow and turning her around. "Don't touch anything."

"Shouldn't you call the police?" she asked.

"No."

They rode the elevator down and found a cab cruising past on the corner.

Sarra gave the driver the address of her apartment.

At her penthouse, overlooking the East River, she offered Remo a drink which he declined. It had been years since he had tasted liquor and the

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thought of drinking alcohol, a substance used to dilute lacquer, made him feel sick.

She did not make one for herself. She sat on the couch next to him, drew her long legs up beneath her and asked, "What did that all mean to you?"

"That dead guy?"

"Yes."

"Only that I missed a chance at Wimpler."

'That's all?"

He shrugged. "I'm sorry if that disappoints you, Sarra, but he didn't mean anything to me."

He could see that his viewpoint didn't disappoint her. It might even have excited her because she moved closer to Remo on the sofa.

"Do you think this man Wimpler will try to kill my brother?"

"Yes."

"Why? Who would he work for? What has he to gain?"

"You're right there. He doesn't have a contract. He didn't get one from us and he didn't get one from you. The other advertisement was a phony. But the fact is that your brother is a wanted man and the price on his head is very high. It won't be hard for a man, especially an invisible man, to make contact with somebody who'll pay him a lot of money to kill your brother."

She nodded. "I don't know why," she said, "but I have a feeling that he would do it even if there were no money involved."

Remo agreed. "We're talking about a man who was a pussycat all his life. Now he's got power, and last night Chiun and I challenged that power. I

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don't think he can ignore the Emir. Otherwise it tears down all he's tried to do with himself. I don't think he can resist the challenge."

"And you?"

"What about me?" he asked.

She touched his arm, then his cheek and finally his lips. Her fingers were cool and smooth as they traced the outline of his mouth.

"Can you resist a challenge?"

"Only when I want to, Princess," said Remo.

And this time he didn't want to.

It was almost midnight when Remo left Princess Sarra's penthouse apartment and her bed.

As he rode down in the elevator, he felt oddly satisfied with himself and began to analyze the feeling. For a long time, he had been able to satisfy any woman. He was like a machine, not getting personally involved, just doing a job. All the result of 27 steps taught to him by Chiun.