from an inside coat pocket, flicked it on.
Ten small businesses maintained offices on the sixteenth floor, six to
the right and four to the left of the elevators. He went to the right.
Two suites down the hall he found a door that bore the words CRACMONT
IMPORTS.
He turned off the flashlight and put it away.
He took out the Walther PPK.
Christ, he thought, it's going so smoothly. So easily. As soon as he
finished at Cragmont Imports, he could go after the primary targets.
Harris first. Then the woman. If she was good-looking ... well, he was
so far ahead of schedule now that he had an hour to spare. An hour for
the woman if she rated it. He was ready for a woman, full of energy and
appetite and excitement. A woman, a table filled with good food, and a
lot of fine whiskey. But mostly a woman. In an hour he could use her
up, really use her up.
He tried the door to Cragmont Imports. It wasn't locked.
He walked into the reception lounge. The room was gloomy. The only
light came from an adjacent office where the door was standing halfway
open.
He went to the shaft of light, stood in it, listened to the men talking
in the inner office. At last he pushed open the door and went inside.
They were sitting at a conference table that was piled high with papers
and bound folders. They weren't wearing their suit jackets or their
ties, and their shirt sleeves were rolled up; one was wearing a blue
shirt, the other a white shirt. They saw the pistol at once, but they
needed several seconds to adjust before they could raise their eyes to
look at his face.
'This place smells like perfume,' Bollinger said.
They stared at him.
'Is one of you wearing perfume?'
'No,' said blue shirt. 'Perfume's one of the things we import.'
'Is one of you MacDonald?'
They looked at the gun, at each other, then at the gun again.
'MacDonald?' Bollinger asked.
The one in the blue shirt said, 'He's MacDonald.'
The one in the white shirt said, 'He's MacDonald.'
'That's a lie,' said the one in the blue shirt. 'No, he's lying,' said
the other.
'I don't know what you want with MacDonald,' said the one in the blue
shirt. 'Just leave me out of it. Do what you have to do to him and go
away.'
'Christ almighty!' said the one in the white shirt. 'I'm not
MacDonald! You want him, that son of a bitch there, not me!'
Bollinger laughed. 'It doesn't matter. I'm also here to get Mr. Ott.'
'Me?' said the one in the blue shirt. 'Who in the hell would want me
killed?'
Connie said, 'You'll have to call Preduski.'
'Why?'
'To get police protection.'
'It's no use.'
