Council of Kings

The Executioner looked at the two corpses, then motioned Joh

Behind them in the alley a black man with a full beard looked up from a blanket of newspaper and yawned. He locked his eyes on the license plate, memorized it and shuffled into the back door of the loan office. What were two honkies doing with that cote black chick?

That license-plate number should be worth at least two bottles of wine.

He went inside and placed a call to Jody Warren.

Half a mile from the loan office, Charleen Granger pulled the car over, leaned out the window and vomited, retching again and again until her stomach was empty. She transferred to the back seat and curled herself into a ball.

Bolan drove downtown to the hotel and parked outside.

"Can I drive you home, Mrs. Granger?" Joh

She nodded. "If you would. I haven't ever seen anything like what I saw today."

Bolan left the car. "I'll call your room when I'm clear. There's a big loan setup I need to check out. In fact I want to double-check this one." The Executioner looked in the side window. "Charleen, I hope you won't be talking to anyone concerning my work here."

She half smiled. "Don't worry. Anything you can do to those loan sharks has my blessing, the police be damned."

She waved, and Bolan walked quickly into the hotel, his raincoat covering the hardware. He went directly to the garage and found his Thunderbird.

9

Joh

Joh

The more he thought about the gun store, the more it seemed there should be some tie-in. There should be somebody there who would know how to get his hands on an illegal weapon.

Joh

He wandered around the store for a few minutes, then approached a clerk.

"You've got a lot of fine equipment here, but I'm looking for something a little more automatic. Can you help me?"

The clerk was in his midtwenties, with hair almost to his shoulders and tied in a ponytail.

The guy squinted and rubbed his nose. "We got semiauto weapons, like the Uzi and the M-16. You pla

Joh

"Illegal as hell," the clerk said.

"Illegal doesn't bother me. And I'm not from the feds. Look, some of you guys must have a contact who knows where I can find some."

The salesman looked around; no one else was near. "Hold it down, guy. Just look around for a clerk named Emmett. He's here somewhere."

Joh

Emmett, who was about thirty and had a trim beard and flattop haircut, took a semiauto Uzi out of the display rack.

"You ain't asking for much, buddy, you know that? What you need them for?"

"That's my business. I need a lot, say a sample order of a hundred M-16's fully auto, including ammo."

"You're talking big money, man, at least sixty to seventy thousand dollars!"

"You've got to spend money to make money. You have a contact I can talk to? I'm in a hurry."

Emmett scratched his head, stroked his beard and developed a small tic under his left eye. He inhaled deeply and nodded. "Hell, why not. Just don't say who told you. See a guy named Joey down at Portland General Accounting. Tell him what you need. If anybody can supply it, he can."

Joh

Joh

They went down a hall and into a bare room.

"Got to frisk you," the beast said. "Boss's rules."

Joh

Satisfied, the beast grunted and waved Joh

Joh

"You have the right man." Joey completed a computer operation on a terminal behind him, removed a diskette from the drive and put it in his desk drawer. "What do I call you?"

"Today I'm Jim Smith. My needs are simple — one hundred M-16 fully automatic rifles. The same ones the GI's use."

Joey sat in his executive-type leather chair and leaned back.

"You're serious. Who told you I could help?"

"He said not to tell you. And yes, I'm serious. I need these weapons quickly. I understand the going price is about six hundred each."

"Could be. I'm just an accountant."

"Sure, and my real name is Jim Smith. Can we talk business, or do I find someone else?"

The lighting seemed unusually bright, Joh

"If you can deliver the one hundred," he continued, "I'll pay you half in advance for five hundred more, along with five hundred thousand rounds of ammunition and support magazines."

"Would a foreign delivery be satisfactory?"

"Of course. I just need to be sure of the quality of the product."

Joey pushed a button on the side of the desk, then stood and paced around the room.

"Let's leave it this way," he said at last. "If I can help you, I'll know within forty-eight hours. Where do I contact you?"

"You don't," Joh

Joey smiled. "I admire a cautious man. Incidentally, Emmett called and said you might drop by. Now I have some work to do. I'll look forward to your call."

Joh

When the second door beyond his office closed, Joey pulled out a desk drawer and adjusted several knobs on a small control panel there. A television screen flipped up on his desk.

He pushed a switch and a videotape began rolling in a Betamax.

Joh

A few moments later the screen changed and the results were shown: NO EXACT IDENT. TWO SIMILAR CLASSIFICATION CHOICES.

The screen then showed a picture of a young television actor whose face resembled Joh

Joey laughed. He studied a split screen of the two profiles, first in line sketches, then with the best photograph they had of the Executioner. There were some similarities, but a dozen or so differences. Again, a coincidence. He hit the CONTINUE button and the computer reported: No EXACT MATCH ON SCREEN IMAGE. NOT A KNOWN FIGURE IN ANY OF THE IDENT BANKS. NOT A FRIENDLY. NOT A COPY WITH ANY LEA MEMBER ON FILE.