Armageddon Crazy

"Come in."

A junior officer came through the door first, holding it open for his boss. The top man of the trio sauntered in with studied deacon arrogance. His lip was slightly curled as if there were a bad smell under his nose. The heavy brought up the rear. He had a machine pistol slung under his right arm. The situation did not have the air of a social call. The three arranged themselves in front of his desk in positions of courteous menace. Charlie Mansard looked at each of them in turn. They were all variations on the same theme, cold-eyed and clean-shaven with those thin, smug, lipless mouths. The young one was a mere flunky, nodding and opening doors and absorbing the moves. The heavy was wider and flatter, flat mid-European cheekbones and a flat forehead. He had huge hands that looked built for crushing. Mansard did not even want to look at those hands. The top deacon did the talking. He was one of the ones with that constant aura of amused superiority. Soon they would be cloning the bastards.

"Charles Mansard?"

"Yes."

"Charles Everett Mansard?"

Mansard sighed. "Right. Charles Everett Mansard."

"Would you please come with us?"

The deacon's tone left no space for a refusal. Mansard felt sick, but he did not immediately move. He tried to maintain as much dignity as he could. He carefully replaced the pencil in the organizer.

"Am I being arrested?"

"Not at this moment, but we do want to ask you a number of questions."

"So please ask them."

"It'd be better if you came with us."

"I'm a very busy man. Couldn't you simply ask your questions here?"

The heavy started giving him a very hard stare. The top deacon leaned forward and placed a black-gloved hand on the top of Mansard's desk. "It would be better if the questioning was conducted down at the Astor Place complex."

Mansard was wondering if his legs would actually support him. He did not want to have to be carried from his own office. The top deacon straightened up. He glanced at the heavy, who managed to flex his muscles without actually moving. Mansard pushed himself up from the chair. His legs held.

"I'll get my coat."

The phone rang.

The top deacon put a hand on it but did not pick up the handset. Mansard looked at him questioningly. The top deacon shook his head.

"The phone will have to wait."

It continued to ring, nine times in all. When it stopped the deacon removed his hand.

"Shall we go?"

The door was pushed open, and Rita walked in just as if it were any other day. There was no sign of her coat or bag. "Charlie, you'd better take this call. It sounds important."

The booze was slowing him down. He did not have a clue as to what was happening.

The top deacon swung around. "There will be no phone calls."

Rita looked at the deacons as if she were seeing them for the first time and did not like what she saw. "I think you'll want him to take this one. It's from the White House."

The deacons froze. Junior and the heavy both looked at their boss for some sort of signal. He seemed at a loss as to which way to jump. Mansard took advantage of his indecision and slowly picked up the phone. He wished mat he had not drunk so much. The top deacon reached for the handset.

Mansard leaned back out of reach. "I don't think you want to be asking the White House if it's really them."

The top deacon stopped in his tracks. If Mansard had not already been so shook up, he would have enjoyed the man's discomfort. He spoke into the phone. "Mansard here."

The voice on the other end was as smooth as silk and twice as professional. "Charles Mansard?"

"Speaking."

"This is Ron Cableman, Charles. I'm President Faithful's Director of Special Projects. I '11 be in New York tomorrow, and I wonder if we might meet."

Mansard hated to be called Charles, particularly by people he had never met. "Could you give me some idea what we might be discussing, Ron?"

"Despite last night's very tragic incidents, the president was greatly impressed with your sky walker. I'd like to talk about the possibility of you doing the same kind of thing at a future presidential event."

Mansard laughed with relief. "I'd be delighted to meet you, Ron. There is, however, one small problem."

Ron Cableman's voice was suddenly very cautious. "A problem, Charles?"

"Right at the moment, I have an office full of deacons, and they seem to be trying to arrest me."

Ron Cableman sounded less than happy. "Why are they arresting you, Charles?"

"They seem to think I'm somehow responsible for last night's tragic incidents."

Ron sounded considerably relieved. "Perhaps I should speak to these deacons, Charles."

"I wish you would, Ron."

Ron Cableman spoke to the top deacon for just over a minute, during which time the deacon said almost nothing. By the end of it, he was all but standing to attention. Finally he handed the phone back to Mansard. When he spoke, his voice sounded as if it were choking him. He avoided Mansard's eyes.

"I think there's been some kind of misunderstanding. I'm sorry you've been troubled."

Mansard waved them away. They left quickly. Only the heavy looked back. His eyes indicated that, as far as he was concerned, it was only a reprieve, not a pardon. Mansard went back to Ron Cableman with a slight shudder. That had been much too close.

"Well, I guess I have to thank you for that, Ron. I never have been very good with policemen. About tomorrow, shall we say the Skylounge at one? You know it? I thought you would. Ciao to you, too."

He hung up and regarded Rita with some suspicion. "So who cooked up the phony call?"

"It wasn't a phony call."

"They'll be straight back and madder than hell. I don't think it's helped anything."

"It wasn't a phony call."

Mansard shook his head. His mind had to be caving in. "What?"

"The call was the real deal."

"Are you telling me that the president wants to hire us, after everything that's happened?"

Rita nodded. Mansard stood up. He moved like a man in shock.

"I'm going to the bar. I have to think about this."

Speedboat

The cab slowed to a stop in front of Terminal 4 at La Guardia. Speedboat slowly climbed out and handed the driver three twenties.

"Keep the change."

For a few seconds he just stood on the curb and looked around. He had seen too many old movies where people jumped on planes without a second thought, and airports were bright gleaming places with cocktail bars and newsstands packed with souvenirs, where sexy flight attendants made dates with handsome men in expensive suits. Speedboat pulled his parka around his shoulders. This place was like an armed camp. Ever since the cab had turned off the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, they had been driving through various levels of anti-terrorist defenses. Armored cars and light tanks were parked along the service roads and runways. The major intersections were controlled by quadguns in sandbagged emplacements. Even the most minimal security area was surrounded by rusting razor wire. The cab driver told him that there were even patrol boats out on the water under the flight paths.

He thought he had never been so pleased to see a cab for hire in his life. The scene outside the Garden, when he finally managed to get out of there with his forged travel passes in his pocket, had been like a scene from a World War II horror show. There were bodies strewn all across Eighth Avenue, and the road surface was slick and black with drying blood. The air was filled with sirens and the gut-wrenching stench of EZA. Emergency medical units came and went, but there were not enough of them to clear the hundreds of injured. Detainees in prison gray had been drafted up from the Tombs to help load the dead onto sanitation trucks. The helicopters that still clattered overhead were the sleek modern craft used by the STG, not the old and battered Cobras and Hueys that belonged to the police department. When people inside the Garden had talked about a massacre going on, he had thought they were exaggerating. The first step outside, however, proved them to have been perfectly accurate.