Nightmare in New York

himsealed in there. And, of course, in a minute or two there would be cops to contend with. There would always be cops, as dependable as heat in hell.

The shoulder was not hurting much now. That was a bad sign. Also his legs were getting rubbery and his eyes were becoming unreliable. The truth bore in on his dizzied consciousness — he would not find that stairway, and it would not do him much good if he should. He was losing consciousness. He stumbled, and threw his good hand out to steady himself against the wall. Instead he fell against the frosted glass of a door and his hand came to rest on the doorknob. Artful letters on the door told him that Paula's Fashionslay just inside.

Bolan pushed on inside just as his legs gave way altogether and the floor of the office floated up to receive him. A feminine voice squealed something in an alarmed falsetto, and impossibly long and shapely legs ran over to stand beside him. Then a pretty face was hovering above his and a disembodied voice gasped, 'Oh wow! I know who you…'

Bolan had lost his dark glasses somewhere back there in the fracas. Sure, everyone knew who he was. That face of his had been plastered across newspapers, national magazines, and television screens so often that it had become almost as familiar to the American public as John Wayne's or Paul Newman's.

His voice sounded to him as though it were coming from someone else as he feebly commanded, 'Call the cops and leave!' Death crews left no witnesses, and suddenly the most important thing in his spinning mind was to warn this girl of her danger. 'Quick, get out before…' The words became entangled in his tongue and he lost them.

Another pair of legs floated in from somewhere. The same voice he'd heard before was declaring, 'It's that guy, that Executioner.'

'Some executioner,' said another, less excited, female. 'It looks as though he tried once too often.'

With his final erg of conscious energy, Bolan whispered, 'Don't get caught here with me. Run, now— splitl'

Then the most incredibly beautiful face he had ever seen was hanging there just above his, inspecting him with a concerned smile, and he took that image with him into the beckoning whirlpool of utter blackness. Perhaps, he thought, he would not die with a snarl, after all. If he was dying, then it was with a quiet sigh of deepest regret.

Chapter Two Bodies

Bolan dreamed of lush Elysian Fields and of cavorting with beautiful naked nymphs with impossibly long legs, and of skinny-dipping in sparkling pools where the nymphs grew Mafia heads beneath their arms. The dream seemed uninterrupted and endless, and when he finally opened his eyes he could not be sure that he had been or was not still dreaming.

He lay beneath a sheet on a luxuriously large bed in a beautifully decorated room, and he was naked beneath that sheet. His shoulder was bandaged and the arm was taped to his side. Lying beside him above the sheet and propped onto multiple pillows was a lovely young thing in the briefest of bikini panties and a peekaboo shortie-top of purplish gauze; her face was angled away from him and all but buried in the pages of a book — but yeah, they were the same long legs that had stood over his bleeding body so many dreams ago.

At the far side of the room upon a table at an open window was something equally as interesting. He thought at first that it was a life-size statue or mannikin — maybe a female Buddha. Whatever it was, it was stony-naked and seated in a somewhat awiwardpose, facing the open window, legs folded and drawn up under it, ivory skin gleamingly reflecting the sun's rays, head slightly bent, absolutely unmoving, absolutely stark staring beautiful.

Bolan was gazing at the still figure and trying to get a better focus when another girl entered the room and came directly to the foot of the bed to stare at him in unblinking appraisal. She was clad in a long gown with a bulky shorter overgarment, maybe twenty-five or twenty-six, dark hair styled in a soft contour of the very lovely head, sensitive lips, eyes beautifully delineated and tending to brood a bit. Bolan returned her level gaze and presently she broke the silence. 'Welcome back to the world of light and beauty.'

He said, 'Is that what world this is?'

She solemnly nodded her head but whatever she had at the tip of her tongue was lost as the girl beside Bolan came out of her book and twisted toward him with a stifled little gurgle of excitement. 'You're back!' she squealed.

Bolan recognized the voice. It was one of the last things he'd heard before he died, or passed out, or whatever. He shifted his reluctant focus toward her and weakly asked, 'Where've I been?'

'Out of it,' she told him. 'Absolutely out of it for nearly twenty-four hours.'

The tall girl at the foot of the bed said, 'I'll fix you something light to eat,' and went back the way she'd come, silent as a wraith.

'That's Paula Lindley,' the girl at his side informed him. 'She went almost all the way through nurse's training. You can thank herfor fixing you up.'

'I'll do that,' Bolan murmured. His eyes had a new focus and his mind was lethargically cataloging the shareholder of his bed. She was a moppet, no more than nineteen or twenty, with luminously inquisitive eyes, gleaming golden hair looping down to softly rounded shoulders in two heavy braids, and the cutey-pie face of a rapturously expectant romantic.

'We knew we didn't dare get a doctor for you,' the cutey-pie was telling him in that very alive voice of bursting excitement. 'We know who you are, you see.' She giggled.

'But you don't know who we are, do you. I'm Evie Clifford.' She pointed to the girl in the lotus position at the window.

'That's Rachel Silver. Doesn't she have a fantastic body? Don't mind her, she's a home naturalist.'

Bolan shook at the cobwebs connecting his brain tissues and muttered, 'A what?'

'A home nudist. Also she's hung up on Yoga and she's meditating right now. At times she'll sit the whole day through like that, right there, and you might as well talk to the wall. Some roommate.'

'Til bet you have very attentive neighbors on the other side of that window,' Bolan commented sluggishly.

The moppet laughed and rolled her eyes. 'Yeah, I'll bet. But don't worry, no one saw us bring you in. We dress-carted you.'

'What?'

'We curled you up in the box of a dress cart, covered you with bolt ends, hung a bunch of fashions on the overhead rods, and just pushed you right through the whole mess, cops and everything.' Her eyes were dancing with the exciting memory. 'We thought we'd die when your blood started leaking out.'

Darkly, Bolan said, 'Yeah, me too.' He heaved himself to a sitting position then quickly eased back to the pillow when the room began revolving about him.

'How long did you say I've been out?' he asked her, his voice suddenly going thick and gutteral.

'Since two o'clock yesterday afternoon. This is Sunday, almost noon. Paula's been getting worried. She was thinking about trying to rent some I.V. equipment if you didn't come out of it pretty soon.'

'Rent what?' Bolan asked dizzily.

'You know the bottles and the tubes and needles and junk for intravenous feeding?'

'Oh.'

'So you'd better try eating whatever Paula brings you, unless you want to end up with a needle in the arm.'

Bolan closed his eyes and tried to piece things together in his mind.

The girl beside him was bubbling on. 'This is just like a movie. Just wait 'til I write home about this, they'll never believe me. I was scared to death when I saw the cops in the basement but Rachel just kept whispering, 'Push, Evie, push,' and finally I got myself together and I said, 'Right on,' and boy we just whisked you out of there and into the van.'