Mickey Spillane - Survival... ZERO!

Spud Henry didn't know how to say it, the white lies not

quite fitting his mouth. Finally he said, "Oh, hell, Mikey boy, it's just that I got orders. He gimme special orders on the house phone. Nobody goes up. It's an important business meeting."

"How many are up there?"

"Maybe six."

"When'd the last one come in?"

"Oh, an hour ago. It was then I got the call. Nobody else."

"Look, Spud ..."

"Mike, it won't make no difference. They got the elevator locked up on that floor and there ain't no other way. All the elevators stop the next floor down. There's a fire door, but it only opens from the inside and you can't even walk up. Come on, Mike, forget it."

"Sorry, Spud."

"Buddy, it's my job you got in your hands."

"Not if you didn't see me."

'There's no way in that I can't see you! Look, four of them TV's cover the other exits and I got this one. How the hell can I explain?"

"You won't have to."

"Oh boy, will I catch hell. No more tips for old Spud. It's gonna be real dry around here for a while. Maybe that longhaired relief kid will get my job."

"Don't worry," I said.

"So go ahead. Not even a monkey can get there anyway."

The elevator stopped at the top, the doors sliding open noiselessly. It was a bright blue foyer, decorated with modem sculpture and wildly colorful oil paintings in gold frames. The single door at the end was surrealistically decorated with a big eye painted around the peephole and I wondered how long ago it was that I was watched by another painted eye.

I touched the bell and waited. I touched it again, holding it in for a full minute, then let go and waited some more. I wasn't about to try to batter down three inches of oak, so I took out the .45 and blew each of the three locks out of their sockets. The noise of the shots was deafening in that confined space, but the door swung inward limply. I wasn't worried about the sound. It wasn't going to reach anyplace else. The tenants here were paying for absolute privacy that included soundproofing. Tomorrow the shattered door would even be an asset when the explanations started.

I walked through the rooms to the back of the building and into the bedroom that faced the fire escape, covered the catch with my sleeve, twisted it open, then raised the window the same way. All around me New York was staring, watching me with curious yellow eyes in the darker faces of the other buildings, seeing just one more thing to store away in memories that could never be tapped.

Gusts of wind whipped around the corner, driving the ram in angular sheets. I grinned again and started up the perforated steel steps to that other window and leaned against it with my shoulder, putting pressure to it gradually until the small pane cracked almost noiselessly. The pieces came out easily and I got my hand through the opening, undid the lock and shoved the window up. A swipe at the catch wiped out any prints and I was inside.

When I eased the door open I heard the subdued murmur of voices, the words indistinguishable. I was in a small office of some type, functional and modern, the kind a dedicated businessman whose work never stopped would have.

Maybe there would be things in there, I thought, but let somebody else find it.

I leaned on the ornate handle of the latch and tugged the door open.

The maid heard me, but never had time to see me. I laid a fast chop across her jaw as she turned around and she went down without a sound. I pulled her into the little office and closed the door on her. And I was in a dining area with the voices a little louder now because they were right behind the one more door I had to go through.

One of the voices smashed a hand on a table hard and in choked-up anger said, "How many times do I have to tell you? There was nothing! I looked everywhere!"

"It had to be there!" I recognized that voice.

"Don't tell me my job! It was not in the room. It was like all the other places. Maybe he did not have it at all. To him, what would it mean? Nothing, that's what. A single piece of paper with names of places written down. Why would he have kept that?"

Then there was another voice I recognized too, a cold, calm voice that could be jocular and friendly at other times. "He didn't have to know what it meant. It was something that came from the wallet of an important person who would keep only important things on that person. It would have a certain value. Why else would he have made those calls?" The voice paused a moment, then

added. "You know, it would have been easier to have paid his price."

The other one said, "A blackmailer could have photostated it. If it were valuable to me, it would have been equally as valuable to someone else."

"To whom would he sell?" the cold voice asked.

"Who knows how a mind like his would work? Perhaps a newspaperman, or by now he might have even suspected just what he did hold. You realize what it would be worth then, the price he could demand for it? That's all it would take to smash everything we have built. We couldn't take the chance."

"I'm afraid the chance has already been taken," the flat voice stated. "Now there is no time for any alternative. We simply have to wait. At this point there is little possibility that we will fail. If the document is hidden or destroyed, it will stay hidden or destroyed. There is not enough time left for anyone to pursue the matter further. I suggest you ring for that maid again and inquire about our drinks so we can conclude this affair."

From another room I heard the annoyed sound of a buzzer. It rang again, then a voice I knew so well said, "Stanley, go see what's keeping her."

I stepped away from the door and crowded behind the angle of an ornate china closet. The door opened and clicked shut on its own closing device and I saw the face of the man who had come in, a still angry face at having been chewed out for bungling the job. It wasn't a new face. I had seen it twice before this night, once in a burst of gunfire at the top of the stairs and again coming out of an elevator in the hotel where Beaver had been sliced to death like Lippy Sullivan.

Like Lippy Sullivan.

The man called Stanley crossed the room and pushed open the swinging door that led into the kitchen calling loudly for somebody named Louise. He never heard me follow him in, but when he didn't find Louise he spun around and I let him see me, one big surprised look, and he knew who I was and why I was there and before he could get the knife out of his belt with an incredibly fast snatch and thrust, I leaned aside and threw a fist into his face that sent his features into a crazy caricature of a human and left teeth imbedded in my knuckles and a sudden spurt of blood spraying both of us.

I should have shot him and had it over with, but I didn't want it to happen that fast. I was a pig and wanted him all for myself and slowly and almost made a mistake. He was a pro and strong. He was hurt and death could be the next step and he was moving and thinking even before he hit the floor. He didn't waste breath yelling. What strength he had left kept the knife in his hand, his feet scrabbling for survival.

The blade flashed around when I jumped him, the gun forgotten now. All I wanted was to use my hands. I got my fingers in his hair and yanked his head around, pounding my fist against his ear. I saw the knife come up and blocked it with my knee, the razor edge slicing into my skin, then I let go of his hair and grabbed his wrist.

He was strong, but I had gotten to him first and he wasn't that strong any more. He was flat out under me and I was bringing his own knife up under his throat and this time he knew it couldn't be stopped and he tried to let out the yell he had held in. Then my knee caught him square in the balls with such impact he almost died then, eyes bugging out of his head in sheer agony.