Assault on Soho

'It's the other way around, m'lady. I have placed myself entirely in yourhands.'

She understood his meaning. She shivered slightly and said, 'Trust me, Mack.'

'I guess I have to,' he said solemnly. But not entirely. Bodies like that one had launched armadas, sure. They had also brought down Samsons and Caesars. No. Bolan would never be entirelyin her hands. Or so he thought at the time.

Chapter Sixteen Proofs and symbols

Ann Franklin's 'plans' for Bolan's morning seemed headed for a readjustment the moment they entered the club. There was a sizeable crowd in the bar, there was considerable churning about, and voices raised in loud argument were spilling into the entrance lobby. Several girls stood idly just outside the doorway to the bar, and these reacted to Ann's appearance there with noticeable good humor.

'Thank heaven you've arrived, Miss Franklin,' said a tall beauty in tight pants. 'Perhaps you could go in there and set that ruddy Donovan straight over our rest periods.'

Apparently they had walked in on a heated labor-management dispute.

'Some cleaning personnel,' Bolan remarked to Ann Franklin, looking the girls over in an overtly masculine appraisal. He knew better. The tight seated one who had addressed Ann was the blonde tube girl Bolan had seen the night before. He was wondering if Ann 'staged' the entertainment here, too. She murmured an excuse to Bolan and pushed into the bar with the girls. The blond hung back at the door to send Bolan an over-the-shoulder examination, then she smiled and went on.

Bolan lit a cigarette and paced about the lobby, wondering what the hell was he doing there. Ann reappeared, looking flustered, and pressed a key into his hand. She pecked his cheek and told him, 'You may as well go on up. I'll be along as soon as possible. I've some trouble here.'

Bolan asked, 'Go on up where?'

She pointed out a drapery-concealed stairway at the end of the lobby, kissed his chin, and hurried back into the bar.

Bolan went up, with misgivings, and found a stunningly luxurious apartment. Here was no masculine austerity such as he had found at Queen's House. Persian carpets and oriental tapestries put him more in tune with the motif of the harem room at Museum de Sade, and the incidental decorations did little to refute that image.

Life-sized nudes, both sexes, dominated the walls and complemented a scattering of figurines and bronze castings of couples coupled in a variety of positions. Bolan whistled softly and went on through.

It was a single large room with a bed-in-the-round platform at dead center, raised several smooth steps above the rest of the place; like a stage, Bolan couldn't help thinking; and an Arabian Nights sunken bath just below with circular marble steps going down into a bubbling-fountain pool which could cheerfully accommodate a fairsized guest list all at once. It was filled with water and some sort of rotating light arrangement set into the fountain was sending sparkling psychedelic patterns all around.

A small kitchenette was thrown in, amost as an afterthought, and completing the arrangement were a well stocked bar and a tiny secretary shoved casually off to the side.

Yeah, Bolan decided, it would be a perfect spot to refresh one's self from time to time—any time. One half of his mind saw Ann Franklin fitting beautifully into the place; the other half saw her more naturally in Queen's House, at least a full world apart from the screamingly overt sexuality of this unbelievable pad. A virgin, eh?

So what could it all add up to, what could it possibly mean?

Bolan found a telephone at the center of the outrageous bed. He bounced gingerly on the soft fluff, then pulled the phone across by the cord and dialed the number Leo Turrin had given him.

It rang three times before a cautious voice responded with, 'Yeah?'

'Leo the Pussy,' Bolan growled.

'Just a minute.'

Bolan waited more than a minute. Then he heard the click of an extension phone coming off the hook and Turrin's voice asked, 'Who's this?'

'You ast me to call you when you come in.'

'Oh. This th' iron man?'

'Right.'

'Say I can't talk to you right now, kid. We got a meeting going on.'

Bolan grinned into the mouthpiece. 'Well it's your show. But you better know, I don't have a lotta time. I'm about to get tied up on something myself.'

'Well, I'd like to talk to you, kid. How 'bout meeting me somewheres?'

'You name it,' Bolan replied.

'You know the Tower of London?'

'I can find it.'

'It's down by the Thames, down past London Bridge and, uh, let's see, like going down to th' docks. You got a picture?'

'Yeah, I'll find it. When?'

'Listen, meet me on Execution Row in about an hour.'

Bolan almost laughed into the telephone. He controlled himself and said, 'What's that Execution Row?'

'Aw, it's part of the sightseeing kick down there, it's where Ann Boleyn got hers, you know, a historical spot. Just ask a guide when you get there. Uh, kind of mix in with the tourists, you know, don't look obvious. I gotta talk to you about something important. It'll be worth something to you, don't worry.'

'Okay, in about an hour.'

'Uh, wait a minute. Somebody just told me it don't open 'til ten. Tell you what, meet me there at ten thirty.'

'Ten thirty it is,' Bolan agreed.

'Okay, and remember I said to don't look obvious. Nothing personal, kid, I mean I'm not ashamed of meeting you in the open, nothing like that. I just don't want no London cops busting me, you understand that.'

Bolan understood perfectly. 'Okay, and here's one for you, Leo. You come alone, nobody but you. I get nervous in a crowd.'

Turrin chuckled and said something in an aside to a third person, then he told Bolan, 'Don't worry, I'll be alone. You just watch your end.'

Bolan growled a goodbye and hung up. It had been obvious that Turrin had been speaking in a crowd, probably from a table-top conference. Now he would be explaining to those listening that the call had come from a guy who could put him next to Bolan.

Okay, fine. So what happened if someone else at that table decided to get next to Bolan first? Bolan sighed. He would simply have to trust Turrin to handle that possibility.

It seemed that all of a sudden he was having to trust an awful hell of a lot of people to keep his head on.

And Bolan didn't like it, not a bit. The jungle never saw after its own; in the jungle, survival was always an individual proposition.

A sound from across the room brought him out of his thoughts, and he looked up to see Ann Franklin quietly regarding him. He waved to her from the bed-stage-whatever and called down, 'It's a swinging pad. What's a nice girl like you doing with all this schmazz?'

She ascended the steps with a hesitant smile and said, 'Schmazz, is that good or bad?'

He shrugged and grinned at her. 'Depends on what ticks you,' he replied in the same light tone. 'Did you get your labor problem settled?'