INTERVENTION (37 page)

"Excellent."

"Mr. Finster is standing by on the Washington land-line. However, I must also advise you that Mr. Camastra's car has just entered the Tower parking garage. He must have taken an early flight from Kansas City."

"Hmm. He'll be in a stew so we won't keep him waiting. Let me know as soon as he gets up to the office. There's time for the Finster call, I think. Put him through, full-sanitary scramble."

"Right away, sir."

The communicator screen displayed a sequence of security codes punched up by Kieran's executive assistant. Eventually these dissolved into a close-up of Fabian (The Fabulous) Finster, whose engaging smile featured two large upper incisors separated by a comical gap: chipmunk teeth. Most people were so captivated by that droll grin that they failed to take note of the icy green eyes above it. When Fabian Finster had earned his living as a bottom-of-the-bill mentalist in Nevada casino shows, he had enhanced his naturally striking appearance with neo-zoot suits trimmed in blinking LEDs. Now that he was one of the confidential agents of Kieran O'Connor, Finster strove for a more conservative image and had taken to Italian silk suitings and striped ties, with nary a trace of glitz. But the show-biz aura still clung to him, and he still performed occasionally to keep up a front, even though most of his time was now occupied by more serious and lucrative activities.

Kieran said, "We'll have to make this quick today, Fabby. Did you wrap up Senator Scrope?"

"Tighter than a rattlesnake's ass, chief. You should have seen his face when I mentioned the number of his secret Icelandic bank account ... Our pipeline into the Armed Services Committee is now secure. Damn good thing, too. Reading politicians' minds is like snorkeling in a sewer. Shit galore—but you got one helluva time finding the one piece you really need before you drown in the utterly extraneous."

Kieran laughed. "Congratulations on doing a super job. I suppose you're worn out with the effort now and ready for a quiet gig at the Hotel Bora Bora."

The mentalist's grin widened. "I can read your mind all the way from here ... almost. You got something interesting cooking, I wouldn't mind giving it a spin. Provided I don't have to stay in Washington. After digging in the brains of these politicos for six months, I'm fed to the teeth. Really makes a guy appreciate the lucid crumminess of the Mob mind."

"What I have for you is an excavation with a good deal more class. How would you like to go Ivy League, Fabby? Do a little investigating for me at Dartmouth College up in New Hampshire?"

"Ah hah. You want me to sniff around that ESP project!"

"So you've heard of it."

"I even read the new book by that Dartmouth prof that hit
The New York Times
best-seller list. It took me two weeks—what with having to look up all the big words—and I'm still not sure the guy said what I think he said."

Kieran's tone was incisive. "I had no idea that parapsychology research was being taken so seriously by legitimate institutions. Jason Cassidy and Viola Northcutt are looking into the work being done at Stanford on the West Coast, but I want you to find out what this man Denis Remillard is up to—especially what practical applications of the higher mental powers might lie behind the theoretical considerations set forth in his book."

"You mean, is the guy up to anything dangerous to
us
—or is he just blue-skying around?"

"Precisely. Remillard's book is a very unlikely best seller. It's difficult to read and its conclusions are veiled to the point of deliberate obscurantism. He almost seems to be bending over backwards to make his data appear prosaic. Of course he couldn't squelch the inherent sensationalism of the topic completely, even with the pages of dry statistics and the academic jargon. His experimental verification of telepathy and psychokinesis is one of the hottest scientific stories of the century. But I have a feeling that Remillard is holding back. I want to know what other psychic experimentation might be going on at Dartmouth that the good doctor has decided not to publicize ... for prudence's sake."

"Jeez," mused The Fabulous Finster. "If certain parties start taking mind reading and animal magnetism seriously, what's going to happen to our
edge?
"

"Work me up a complete dossier on Denis Remillard. Get as much information as you can on his close associates as well. I'm particularly interested in how many adept mentalists he's recruited for his research. How powerful they are. How committed."

"You want me to turn head-hunter if I turn up any live ones?"

"Use the utmost discretion, Fabby." Kieran's eyes rested for a moment on the photo of the late Rosemary Camastra O'Connor and the two lovely children. "This is a dangerous game. The government may have infiltrated the Dartmouth project—or even foreign agents. Remillard's book hints at a worldwide network of cooperating psychic laboratories beginning to achieve significant results after years of fumbling and marking time. I want to know if there's any truth in that idea, or if it's only wishful thinking."

"I get the picture."

"One last thing. If Remillard or any of his people show the least hint of being able to probe
your
mind, get out of there fast and cover your tracks."

"I understand," came the cheerful reply. "Not to worry, chief. I won't screw up. I've noticed how people who cross you seem to get these weird cerebral hemorrhages..."

"Senator Scrope's wrap-up nets you a cool Bahama million, Fabby. The payoff on Remillard's organization could be even bigger. Goodbye."

Kieran touched a golden square, breaking the scrambler patch. The screen went dark. Almost immediately, another square inset on the desk began blinking red.

Kieran keyed the intercom. "I'll see Mr. Camastra at once, Arnold." He recessed the com-unit into the desk, performed a brief Yoga transmutation designed to lift his coercive energies to the highest level, and sat back to await the arrival of his mafioso father-in-law.

"You heard, Kier? You heard?
He didn't veto!
I got the word from Lassiter in Washington on the car-phone just as we exited the Kennedy!"

Big A1 Camastra stormed into the room. His cyanotic lips trembled in fury and a small driblet of saliva trailed from the corner of his mouth. The two bodyguards accompanying Chicago's Boss wore expressions of apprehension.

"I heard, Al. I've been expecting this." Kieran came around his desk, solicitous, as Carlo and Frankie helped Big Al settle his bulky body into the office's largest leather armchair.

Al raved, "That yellow-belly bastard! That fink! He's just gonna hold the bill until tomorrow without signing it, then it automatically goes into law even without his signature."

Kieran nodded. "The President wants the law but he didn't want to give public affront to its opponents."

"What the hell kinda religious man is he? Goin' against the Catholic Bishops and the Council of Churches and the NAACP and the fuckin' PTA, for chrissake? They all lobbied for the veto. We all knew he'd
have
to veto! How could he do this? God—you know what this means? It's Repeal all over again!"

"Boss, take it easy," Carlo pleaded. "Your bionic ticker ... you gotta calm down!"

"A drink!" Big Al roared. "Kier, gimme a drink."

"Al, you shouldn't," whined Frankie, catching Kieran's eye and shaking his head frantically. "The doc in K.C. said—"

Kieran O'Connor lifted one hand in peremptory dismissal. The two bodyguards stiffened and their eyes glazed. Both of them turned, completely docile, and left the room—oblivious to the fact that Big Al had enjoined them only five minutes earlier not to leave him alone with Kieran O'Connor under any circumstances.

The don had forgotten his own order. He was leaning back in the chair, one puffed and blotchy hand over his eyes, muttering imprecations. Kieran busied himself at an antique sideboard where cut-glass decanters sparkled in the sunlight. "A little Marsala won't hurt you, Poppa. I'll have some, too. It's a nice virginale that DeLaurenti discovered and sent in to New York on the Concorde last week. If you like it, I'll have a couple of cases sent out to River Forest."

Kieran took one of the filled glasses and wrapped the old man's tremulous fingers around it. He let healing psychic impulses flow from his body to Camastra's through the momentary flesh contact. "Salute, Poppa. To your health." Kieran lifted his own glass and sipped.

A bitter smile cracked Big Al's pallid features. "My health! Madonna puttana, you should have seen those vultures giving me the eye in Kansas City, wondering if I'd drop dead right in front of 'em so's they could call off the Commission meeting and the vote!"

"The flight back has tired you out. You should have gone home to rest instead of coming downtown directly from O'Hare. Everything will work out fine. The Commission did as we expected. I won't have to exert mental pressure on them directly." He raised his glass to the old man again and returned to his seat behind the desk.

Big Al watched him with hooded eyes. At forty-six, Kieran O'Connor was still youthful, his dark hair only slightly silvered at the temples and at the distinctive widow's peak above his wide forehead. With his olive skin and dark brown eyes Kieran looked more Italian than Irish—but he
wasn't,
and that should have stalled him in the consigliere niche permanently, no matter whose daughter he had married. Big Al still didn't quite fathom why it hadn't.

"The Commission voted you your seat," Camastra told Kieran. "You're the Acting, as of today, and they give tentative approval for you to take over when I retire. But we're not outa the woods yet. Falcone and his dinosaur faction keep harping on tradition, bitching because you're not a paisan'. They're willing to give you respect—but not to the point of joining your new financial consortium."

Kieran made an airy gesture. "Patsy Montedoro's influence will keep the younger dons on our side, and the Vegas and West Coast people are solid. Let Falcone and his pigheaded conservatives stew in their own juice for another year. Their racketeering and gambling interests have been on a long slide for over a decade—and now that the Piccolomini legislation is on the books, they're caught by the shorts. The end of Prohibition was a Sunday-school picnic compared to the legalization of marijuana and cocaine, and the decriminalization of other drugs."

Big Al shook his jowls in bewilderment. "How could the President do it? Every piss-poor tobacco farmer in Dixie will be planting pot or coca trees. Little old ladies'll grow opium poppies in window boxes! We'll have a country fulla junkies." He gulped his wine.

Kieran got up and refilled the don's glass. "No we won't, Poppa. The other provisions of the Piccolomini Law will see to that. The educational campaigns against all forms of chemical abuse ... the compulsory treatment or confinement of hard-narc addicts ... the capital penalties for outlaw dealing. What the government has done is to say: 'Okay, you low uneducated trash, you unemployables, you losers, you cheap thrill-seekers. Go ahead and smoke yourself into a stupor if you want to—and pay Uncle Sam tax on each joint. Or snort till your nose falls off—but don't bother nice people while you're doing it, or we lock you up and throw away the key. And don't commit a crime under the influence, or recruit underage users, or peddle shit illegally—or you die.' It's a very simple, sensible solution to a nasty problem, Al. The Treasury will recover revenue lost from the declining sales of tobacco and hard liquor, the streets will be cleared of criminals supporting their habit, and the big bad Mafia will have the financial floor cut out from under it once and for all."

"It's indecent," Big Al said. "Sell cheap pot and crack and kids are gonna get it. I don't give a damn about the adult addicts. Let 'em turn their brains to stronzolo! But the little kids..."

Kieran resumed his seat with a shrug. "The bleeding-heart liberals and the church people and the social workers tried to tell the President and Congress that. And so did we, of course."

Al stared morosely into his wine. "Thirty percent. We lose thirty percent of our income just like that with the legalization—and we're the most diversified of the Families! New York, Boston, Florida, New Orleans—they're gonna drop fifty percent at least. And California—!"

"The Outfit will have a lean year or two. But those Families who go into my venture-capital pool will eventually end up richer than ever. Chicago is leading the wave of the future, Poppa, and my consortium will provide the impetus for a whole new profit structure. We'll survive, and so will the Families who follow us."

"Follow
you.
" Blood-webbed eyes burned for an instant with the old antagonism and fear; but then came a fatalistic little laugh. "What else could they do but follow you, stregone? Sorcerer!"

Kieran's expression was earnest, his coercive faculty working at max. "Al, we can't keep running a two-hundred-billion-dollar business like a gang of nineteenth-century banditti—squabbling over a shrinking pie, eliminating rivals by shooting them and stuffing their bodies in car trunks. Times have changed. In two years, human beings will be walking on Mars. All financial transactions will be fully computerized. Most of the old rackets will be as dead as the peddling of narcotics. Sure, the Mob is rich. But you know what they say about money: if you just sit on it, it might as well be toilet paper."

"Yeah, yeah," the don said wearily. "We gotta invest. I know."

"Invest properly, Al, so that the money makes more money. That's what I've been doing as your consigliere—and what I'll continue to do when I'm Boss."

"Boss of Bosses," Camastra muttered.

Kieran did not seem to hear. "In addition to our legitimate investment corporation for the Organization funds, we now have our own small tank of sharks to work with—three of them, all under my thumb and without the slightest off-color taint to attract Justice Department bloodhounds. We own Clayburgh Acquisitions, Giddings & Metz, and Fredonia International. They're takeover artists, Al, the kind of outfits that specialize in the leveraged buy-outs of troubled or vulnerable companies. So far, our little pets have confined themselves to modest raids of the loot-'em-and-dump-'em type. But now I'm ready to give them the go-ahead for some real action. Once the capital pool is ready, we're going after the biggest money there is."