The Israel Bond Omnibus (5 page)

A black speck at first ... high-tailing it south. It grew bigger. The blue Caddy! And behind it a patrol car, siren screaming, red rooftop light revolving madly.

He estimated the Caddy was hitting 150 kilos, at the very least 137.8 knots. There would be time for one shot, with luck, two.

Now he could see the face of the driver, a swarthy Levantine type, features flattened by the force of the wind. A fanatical face, maniacal eyes, teeth bared into the snarl of a rabid mongrel ...

Wang! Wang!

Bond squeezed the hair trigger on the Shar Shue Dung-55, the special that was crafted exclusively for him by Kok Eee Moon, the Hong Kong gunsmith whose clientele included other slim, well-tailored adventurers like Bond, men who casually threw down fat packets of money demanding weapons of the most exacting specifications.

The bullets had found the front tire, as Bond had intended, of the patrol car, now careening out of control. The assassin, however, startled at the reports, had taken his eyes off the road for a second, a fatal second. His own tires caught the cement ridge of the road, spinning the car into a horrible vortex.

Bond watched the Caddy leave the road, rip over some underbrush, then rip under some overbrush. It smashed into a billboard, went through it with a sickening sound of agonized metal. A flash! And the Caddy went up in a white-hot ball of flame.

Now two towering troopers were chugging from the patrol car several hundred yards up the road. They found a grim-visaged Bond staring blankly at the billboard which seconds ago had read:

CREST TOOTHPASTE — SHOWN TO BE HIGHLY EFFECTIVE WHEN USED WITH A CONSCIENTIOUSLY APPLIED PROGRAM OF ORAL HYGIENE.

Where a curly-headed moppet had stood before her adoring mother clutching a dental report in her hand there was a gaping hole, behind which smouldered what remained of the convertible.

Bond dragged on a Raleigh. The troopers saw a hint of a smile as he said, “Crest or no Crest. Our friend sure made a hell of a cavity, didn’t he?”

“RESERVE NOW FOR PASSOVER HOLIDAYS! THRILL TO THE FERVENT CHASSIDIC CHANTING OF SEXTUPLET CANTORS—MOISHEH, MISCHEH, PISCHEH, PAYSCHEH, GRISCHEH, AND GRUSCHEH NABUTOVSKY! ACCOMPANIED BY METROPOLITAN OPERA STAR SERGIO CABRINI AND AN ALL-MORMON CHOIR!” (A distinct novelty, Bond thought. This year the cantors are Jewish.)

“ESTRELLITA AND SCHUYLER KAHN, YOUR HOSTS AT MIAMI BEACH’S GLAMOROUS PALMETTO ROACH HOTEL, HOPE YOU ENJOY THEIR MOUNTAIN RESORT AS WELL! LET’S ALL MEET AT TONIGHT’S GET-ACQUAINTED SOIREE IN THE LITVAK LUAU ROOM! FEATURING THE WEST COAST COMEDY SENSATION — HENNY BENNY LENNY! DANCE TEAM OF ROSITA AND YONKEL, ‘STUPIDITY IN MOTION’! SONGS BY PERKY SONGSTRESS PATTI PERKY! HERMIE HOUSE AND HIS HOUSE HOUSE BAND FOR DANCING!”

One would need at least a two-week reservation to fully enjoy this place, Bond opined. It would take one week just to read the damn sign.

His smart Bakelite luggage stowed away, Bond warmed the tip-hungry palm of the bell captain with a shiny new Lyndon Johnson seventy-five-cent piece, frankly relishing the awed reaction. “Yes sir, Mr. Bond! Anything else, sir? Well, hope you enjoy your stay!”

He showered for three minutes under the bracing needles of Mountain Valley water, changed his suit (it was thoroughly soaked from the shower), slipping into the high-priced casual garb required in this class milieu ... skin-tight Ship N’ Shore levis, burnt cantaloupe shaded crew shirt with the prize Korvette’s label showing (perhaps a bit ostentatiously; it was on the breast pocket), and Mafia Raffia cord shoes.

He picked up the mauve Princess phone. “Operator, this is a Princess phone, isn’t it? Good! Well, I’d like to speak to Princess Margaret.” The hotel operator, Miss Studnia, unused to Bond’s dazzling spur-of-the-moment bon mots (he was as famed for his wit as Mother was for her proverbs), said, “Huh?” And Bond, sorry he’d wasted a goody on an unappreciative clod, was all business now: “Dr. Loxfinger’s suite, please.”

Her voice was guarded. “I’m sorry, sir, but no one is permitted to disturb the doctor ...”

“Look, honey,” said Bond. “This is Israel Bond. The doctor will respond, I assure you.”

“Just a minute, please, Mr. Bond.”

He inhaled deeply. The Raleigh tasted strangely arid. And the Arid in his armpits felt strangely Raleigh. This is going to be one of those days, he sighed.

“Dr. Loxfinger’s public relations representative will talk to you, Mr. Bond.” New respect in the metallic tones. “Go ahead, Mr. Saxon.”

“Mr. Bond?” A composed voice with a trace of hauteur. “Angelo Saxon here, the doctor’s P.R. man. Dreadfully sorry, but he can’t be disturbed now. The dreadful incident and all that. Perhaps tomorrow or—”

“Knock it off, Saxon!” Bond’s rasp slashed through the room. “This is Israel Bond, security, M 33 and 1/3 section. Stop ‘dreadfulling’ my ass to death and tell me what’s happened, how the old boy is and mach’is schnell!” In his ire he had slipped into Yiddish. Temper, temper. Can’t offend the old man’s flunky too much.

“Uh, perhaps first we’d best meet for a chat, Mr. Bond. See you in the Leni Lenape Lounge in ten minutes? Checko.”

Well, some of the spray starch had been taken out of Mr. Saxon. Now, a friendly drink or two and he’d put the man straight.

Bond lit a Raleigh, stretched his lithe frame on the bed. His nostrils caught the scent of the cordite on his hand from the shots he had fired on the Quickway. His lips formed a moue of distaste. Not even the fine Rokeach soap had been able to dispel it.

The two burly troopers had sniffed it, too, but had held off their queries until they examined the molten mess behind the billboard. A frightened tramp who had been squatting behind the billboard had emerged screaming: “Geez, ol’ Lukey can’t even take a dump without them there crazy drivers a-tryin’ ter run me down!” They handed him several sheets of Kleenex and booked him as a material witness.

“Okay,” said one of them curtly to Bond. “I’m Trooper Crawford; this here’s Trooper Broderick. Now what the hell was all this shootin’ about? You damn near kilt us both.”

I’d jolly well better make this good, Bond thought. He smiled: “It’s all right, trooper. We’re sort of in the same line of work.” And he produced his gold-edged top-priority security card from his wallet. On the other side was a photo of Fay Wray.

“This don’t mean a damn thing to me,” snapped Crawford. “We’re takin’ you in.”

“Call this number first,” Bond said indifferently. Taken aback by his coolness in an awkward spot, the two exchanged glances and led him to their car from which they radioed their dispatcher. The latter, putting his phone up to the microphone so they could hear, dialed.

“CIA—one moment, please.”

“Uh, this is Sgt. Gurski, radio dispatcher for the New York Quickway State Police. We got some guy here named Israel Bond. Says he knows you.”

Bond lit a Raleigh. “Have one, lads?”

They grunted eagerly, reaching their meaty hands for the pack. “You smoke ‘em, too, huh?” said Broderick, the slightly smaller one. “Us too. That’s how we got the patrol car ... 15,000 coupons.”

I daresay constabularies all over the world are feeling the pinch, Bond reflected. And though it stabbed his heart to do it, he reasoned it was time for a magnanimous gesture. He ripped the coupon from the pack. “Here, officer. Keep it.”

“Geez,” said the trooper. “You’re all right, pal.”

A voice crackled through the static: “Troopers, this is Monroe Goshen, head of the Mid-East section of CIA. Release Mr. Bond. I’ll be responsible. This is not—I repeat—not a matter for local jurisdiction. Put him on, please.”

Broderick, somewhat subdued, handed Bond his car mike. “Just talk into that, sir.”

“Iz, you old Hebe sex maniac, you!” Goshen’s voice was jovial, but held a note of concern. “What the hell have you mucked up now?”

“Nothing, Monroe, you old goyischeh New England lobster pot!” He heard Goshen’s appreciative chuckle. They’d crossed paths before and had a warm regard for one another. In fact, it was Bond who had brought a breath of spring to Goshen’s reticent, dour life, fixing up the CIA operative with his first sexual encounter at the age of 43. “Beats fishin’ for stripers,” the staid New Englander had admitted in a rare moment of self-revelation.

Bond swiftly explained the attempt on Loxfinger’s life (which Goshen had learned anyway from one of his key sources—the Huntley-Brinkley Report), his interception of the bungler-assassin’s car, the shots, the fiery climax behind the billboard. “Nothing much left of him, Monroe, but I did find a charred amulet with some symbols I’m quite familiar with. He’s from the Lebanese Order for Unified Sabotage and Espionage.”

“So, you got the LOUSE? Good! Listen, Iz, I’ll have to do a coverup job, fast! We’ll have to doctor up the story. ‘Course we can’t afford to have your renowned Old Man Moneybags killed on our real estate, but we do have relations with Lebanon, too. I’ll have the local boys enter it as death by natural causes— vehicular accident. Tell them to forget they ever met you ... and get the hell out of there. Oh, and put the tramp in the pokey for a couple o’ nights; see that he gets a big jug o’ Sneaky Pete every two hours. Two nights in stir and he’ll forget he ever saw anything, just chalk it up to the D.T.’s.”

Goshen was on the ball, Bond thought. To the bewildered troopers: “You heard him, fellas.”

“Sure thing, Mr. Bond. Say, uh ...” Crawford paused. He had something on his mind. “You mean to say that you shot out our front rubber on spite? You planned it that way?”

“Of course,” Bond smiled. It sounded lame even to his own ears. (Gottenu! I’ve got to get back to the range and do some serious practicing!) “You see, lads, if you had been forced to shoot him it would have been embarrassing for three countries. His, Lebanon, would have denied any knowledge of his murder mission, accused yours of collusion with ‘Zionist imperialists,’ etc. When I deliberately forced you out of the picture I simplified matters for everybody. Now our story is that during the chase he swerved off the road and bang-o! We’ll just say he was a kook with a personal grudge against Loxfinger.”

They seemed highly satisfied with the explanation. “Hey, that’s a fancy heater you got there, Mr. Bond. Can we look at it?”

Bond let them examine the Shar Shue Dung-55, noting with annoyance that there was a bit of dandruff on its hair trigger. Have to pay more attention to my equipment, he admitted.

He had shaken hands with them, given each man another Raleigh, and Ramblered north, with a farewell wave.

I guess the flashback killed the ten minutes, Bond reckoned. He started for the lounge and his meeting with Saxon. On the elevator he bumped into a girl. “Beg your pardon.”

She said nothing, content to flash a look of utter disgust.