Mission: Earth "Villainy Victorious" (3 page)

He was being alert now for some sign of Bang-Bang. He hoped his friend had gotten well ahead and wouldn't be spotted by that tank.

He went another five miles. The parkway slid inland from the high cliffs now and was bordered by tall, impressive trees.

Heller was afraid he'd lose them. He speeded up to eighty.

A turn was just ahead where the broad highway twisted once more east, back to the Hudson.

Heller took the turn.

Too late, he saw the tank only a quarter of a mile ahead!

They were only doing about forty!

Heller was closing a lot too fast!

As he saw the turret gun flash, he veered left.

The shell went by with a shriek.

A spray of machine gun bullets hit his windshield, pocks of sudden white in the bulletproof glass.

He veered to the right.

A shell screamed by on his left.

Suddenly he saw the motorcycle.

It was lying tipped on its side in the left lane!

Had Bang-Bang been caught up with?

Suddenly Heller understood what that motorcycle meant.

The limousine and tank were only a few hundred yards ahead. They were speeding around the turn where the parkway was directly above the Hudson three hundred feet straight down.

Heller stamped on his brakes and spun the cab.

It screeched in a full 360 degrees.

Heller had it in reverse.

He shot backwards.

Bright orange fire erupted from under the highway and bloomed hugely into the sky.

A hundred-yard strip of highway was going up into the air!

The tank was flung, as from a catapult, high out over the river!

As it hit the zenith of its flight, it suddenly exploded as a bomb of its own. Its ammunition and gasoline ripped it into a balloon of fire.

The concussion hit the cab and the tires screeched as it shot backwards.

Then Heller saw the limousine.

It was high in the air, turning over and over.

It spun slowly and plummeted down into the Hudson, hundreds of feet below.

The debris was pattering down, hitting the highway all around and the cab.

The column of smoke was puffing, like an expanding balloon, up into the summer sky.

Heller sped the cab forward, avoiding massive lumps of concrete. He came close to the edge of the enormous gash that had been gouged out of the cliffside.

He leaped out of the cab and raced to the edge of the precipice. Some pieces of debris were still striking the water.

The ocean tide apparently had been moving in, for the splashes were drifting a bit northward against the normal current of the river.

Heller was looking for any sign of the limousine three hundred feet below.

Footsteps came running behind him.

Bang-Bang Rimbombo. "I'm glad you saw the bike," he panted. "It was the only signal I could think of to tell you the road was mined ahead."

"Holy Heavens," said Heller. "I didn't tell you to blow the whole highway and cliff down! You were only supposed to blast down a barricade."

"Well, when I opened the satchel," said Bang-Bang, "those itty-bitty charges looked so small, I had misgivings. I really stuffed them in. I never saw such compact dynamite in all my years in demolition. Jesus, Jet, I'm sorry. I guess I overdid it!"

Heller didn't dare tell him he had been using Voltar explosives, a million times as powerful as Earth dynamite. He was looking anxiously for any sign of the limousine.

Suddenly, there it was!

It surfaced from the depths, upside-down, buoyed by the quantities of air trapped by its air-conditioning seals. It must have gone clear to the bottom and come back.

Bubbles were coming from it. It would sink again!

Jet was stripping off his clothes.

"No!" cried Bang-Bang. "You can't dive three hundred feet!"

Heller, down to his underpants, grabbed the satchel off Bang-Bang's shoulder. He snatched out a short jimmy with a wrist strap. He reached in again and grabbed a round cylinder. It was smooth and bright but it had a dial on one end. He gave the dial a twitch with his thumb.

"You're not seeing any of this," he yelled at Bang-Bang.

The limousine was again beginning to sink. Heller marked it from spots on shore.

Heller took a run and leaped off the top of the cliff. He went way out.

HE DIDN'T FALL!

Gaping, Bang-Bang saw him hanging by the cylinder in one hand. He did not know it was an antigravity coil and he couldn't register what he was looking at.

With the thumb of his other hand, Heller gave the dial another twist. He swooped down a hundred feet. He thumbed the coil again and, using his body as a plane, dived in the direction of the bubbles still coming up from the sinking limousine.

He hit the water. It was cold. Below the surface, he thumbed the coil to turn it off and then held it with his teeth.

He swam to the bubble chain.

He surfaced, took a deep breath around the cylinder and then dived.

The limousine was sinking very slowly but it had already reached twenty feet.

Heller looked along the metal hulk and peered in. Through the murky blue of the water he could only see some blobs inside. He found the edge of a door and inserted the jimmy. The thing did not want to open, held shut by water pressure. He couldn't break a window: they were bulletproof glass.

The limousine continued slowly down. If he let the air out, it would sink like a rock. He'd never be able to recover that heavy briefcase today: it would take divers and cranes and would be a lot too slow and a lot too public.

The vehicle was still upside down, its buoyancy inverted, possibly, by the tires and a partially empty gas tank.

Heller rose and got to one of the rear springs. He inserted the antigravity coil into it and used the jimmy to make it wedge tightly. He gave the dial a twist to maximum.

The limousine ceased to sink. The rear of it began to rise.

Heller was out of air. He battered his way to the surface and took a long gulp.

The rear of the limousine came out of the water slowly, rose five feet above it and hung there. The anti-gravity coil had reached its limit.

Heller went back to the rear door edge that was out of the water and attacked it with his jimmy. There was a snap as the lock broke. He opened the door.

Water rushed in and the limousine began to sink.

Heller pushed in. The driver's body was in the way. Heller pushed it aside. He spotted the case, half-buoyant. He grabbed its handle and pulled it. Moving backwards, he got out of the limousine door.

He found himself looking into the staring eyes of Rockecenter. The body had followed him, impelled by the current of water.

Heller had an impulse to push it back. Then he didn't. He took it by the collar and hauled it out of the car.

He only had two hands and he now had two objects, the case and the corpse. And he had to recover that coil! To leave it would be a Code break, for this car possibly would be recovered.

With one hand, he held the case and the collar of dead Rockecenter. The car was level with the water now. With his thumb he turned the dial and, following quickly as the vehicle abruptly sank, pried it out of the spring.

He surfaced with his burdens, treading water.

The Jersey shore seemed some distance away.

He took Rockecenter's coattail, pulled it up around the case and wedged it around his own arm. He slid the antigravity coil into his other hand and turned it on slightly. His burden buoyed.

With his free hand, he began to paddle to the cliffs. At the foot of them, at the bottom of the slide, he saw Bang-Bang dancing up and down, waiting to help him out of the water.

Heller, as he paddled, glanced around at the deserted landscape. These gasless days, they had the whole world to themselves. Americans, in a culture built around the automobile, could only stay home. Aside from a few birds, no witnesses.

Two hours later, Heller stopped the cab at the front door of the Pokantickle house. Bang-Bang got off the bike and opened the cab's rear door. Heller reached in and picked Rockecenter's body off the floor.

He turned and walked up the front steps. The National Guard major general was standing there staring, horrified, as he gazed at the drooping arms and lolling head of the corpse.

Bang-Bang was following, carrying the heavy case. Bang-Bang looked with contempt at the general. "Lousy army," he said. "See what your delay caused! Maysabongo saboteurs blew up the tank and the road. You cost Rockecenter his life!"

The general stared at the body, then at the pockmarked windshield. "We'll get after them at once!"

"They're all dead," said Bang-Bang. "Blown to bits. Weren't you responsible for Rockecenter's safety?"

The general sagged. "They'll court-martial me!"

Heller shook his head. "We don't want to end your career. We won't say anything if you don't."

"God bless you, Lieutenant!" said the general. "Just tell me what I can do for you."

"You can have them bring those two men you are holding back into the office. We weren't finished with them yet."

The general sprinted off.

Heller carried the body into the office and laid it on the couch.

Bang-Bang swung the heavy case up and put it on the desk. Heller came over and put his ear against it, twiddling the combination. Presently there was a click. He opened the cover.

The label said it was fireproof and waterproof and it must be true. The papers inside were all dry. Heller ruffled them to make sure they were all present.

A dry, rasping voice sounded at the door. "I think that you will need me. I'm a lawyer without a client." Bury! His head was all swathed in bandages, his prune face very solemn.

Heller stared at him. "You aren't dead then. You were even conscious when he fired you!"

"Of course I was conscious. But you didn't think I was going to go up against you again, did you? Anybody who can live through J. Walter Madison is unkillable!"

"So
you're
the one who put him on to me!" said Heller.

"Worse than that," said Bury. "I'm the one that relayed Rockecenter's orders to kill you when you were born."

"You criminal!" said Heller.

"Well, let me put it this way, Junior. I am a Wall Street lawyer. The client is dead: Long live the heirs."

"You don't keep your word!" said Heller.

"A Wall Street lawyer only keeps his word to his client, Junior. That's the legal profession. But you need me. You need my firm. The lines are intricate. For instance, I can handle Faustino."

Heller said, "He's probably just now passing through Hell Nine unless they let him live."

"Ah," said Bury, "then who is the
capo di tutti capi?"

Heller said, "Babe Corleone."

"Well, it will sure raise hell with I. G. Barben Pharmaceutical. Mrs. Corleone is death on drugs. But we can convert the firm to something legitimate. Long live Babe Corleone! Now, on this client thing, what do you say, Junior?"

"I could kick your bloody head in!" said Heller.

Bury felt his skull. "You already did."

They suddenly both broke out laughing, Bury with his "Heh, heh, heh!"

Just then Izzy and Twoey walked in.

Izzy couldn't believe his eyes. "Oy, what's this?"

"Bury knows where all the skeletons are buried," said Heller. "I think we just hired the firm of Swindle and Crouch."

"Wait, wait!" said Bury. "There's a codicil to this."

Heller looked at him suspiciously.

Bury said, "You have quite a bit of unfinished Rockecenter business hanging around. But two of them I want free rein with: one is Miss Agnes-known to the world as Dr. Morelay, a psychiatrist. The other is Miss Peace."

Heller shrugged. "I suppose it's all right."

"Even if I take them to see the Snake House in the Bronx Zoo?" said Bury.

Twoey spoke up. "Zoos is very educational. Sounds fine to me."

Bury said, "Oh, good. White mice are so dear these days! So that settles it. My firm and I are retained."

Bury walked over to the open case and pulled out handfuls of papers under Heller's watchful eye. "Why did you so tamely sign these two quitclaims?" he asked Heller.

Izzy was hovering near now. "Mr. Jet owns all the companies anyway. I just never put his name on anything because of you."

Bury shied the two quitclaims at the trash can. "If it was your intention for your brother to own everything, it takes quite a different form. But it would just snarl up probate. Forget it." He picked up the 49-percent oil-stock transfer to Rockecenter and threw it in the trash can. "It would just add to the inheritance tax. Why transfer it away when it's coming right back to you?" He selected out the document which gave Rockecenter 49 percent of the 180 billion being made on the sell options. He threw that in the trash can. "Just more inheritance tax, a thing we must avoid. And as for all this money breaking the American banking system, you own all the banks now and all the money as well, so there's no rupture of the economy. Now, as for this patent transfer, forget those, too. Just keep on owning them and keep them out of probate court. The trust fund is now yours, so no problem. The important thing here is the will. And it is not correct."

They all stared at him.

Bury looked toward the door. "Wills are seldom notarized. They're witnessed and this lacks two witnesses. I see two privates over there who came in just as Rockecenter finished signing it. Is that right, boys?"

Two of the men who had fetched Izzy and Twoey nodded. They stepped forward. Bury held a pen at them. "So if you fellows will just put your John Henrys on this document, it's all legal."