The big man paid no attention. He finished stuffing the night’s cash receipts into his pockets—less than nine hundred, already totaled on the adding machine by Faran, and surely not worth a house call by professional robbers—and then he reached out for the credit-card slips.
Faran was so startled he actually made a move to grab the slips back, saying, “Hey! What are you—”
The edge of the big man’s hand came down hard on the back of Faran’s wrist, thudding it against the desk top. “Don’t be stupid,” he said.
Faran pulled his hand back, astounded at his own actions even more than by the big man’s reaching for the credit-card slips. “I’m sorry,” he said, bewildered into babbling. “I thought—they’re no good to you, what do you —”
Diners Club. The big man picked up the slips, tucked them into his pocket, reached for the Bankamericard stack.
Faran watched him, so baffled he couldn’t think. “You can’t—you can’t use them. You can’t turn them into money.”
And credit cards were seventy-five percent of the club’s business. If there was nine hundred in cash tonight, that meant probably around three thousand in credit-card slips. It would cost the New York Room that much if the big man took the slips away, yet there was no way any robber could convert the slips into cash. The only result, if the slips were stolen, would be that a lot of tonight’s customers would have been feeding themselves free food and drink.
American Express. Master Charge. Carte Blanche. Faran watched the slips disappear into the big man’s pocket. On the other side of the room, the other guy was still talking to Angie, soothing and friendly things with even a hint of flirtation in them, and Angie was much calmer now, standing there watching it all happen, wide-eyed but no longer in a panic.
But Faran was in a panic, a panic of bewilderment. He said, “That stuff’s no use to you. You’re costing us, and you’re not getting anything for yourself. Jesus Christ, man, what’s the point?”
The big man had finished putting everything away in his pockets. Now he took a short mean-looking pistol out of his jacket side pocket, turned it around so he was holding it by the barrel, and leaned forward over the desk. Suddenly really scared, suddenly believing these people were crazy after all and not the professionals they looked like, Faran cowered back in his chair and put his trembling forearms up in front of his face.
The big man lifted the gun and smashed it into the desk top three times, making deep gouges in the walnut. Faran blinked at the sound of each stroke, and across the room Angie made a tiny startled sound like a mouse.
Faran lowered his arms. He looked at the gouges and the splinters in his expensive desk top, while the big man stood over him and said, “You call Lozini after we leave here, and you tell him this is interest on what he owes me. We don’t subtract this from the principal. You got that, Frank?”
Faran looked up. “Yes,” he said.
“Say it back to me.”
“What you took is interest on what he owes you. You don’t subtract it from the principal.”
“That’s right, Frank.” The big man stepped back a pace, put the pistol away again, and gestured toward Angie without looking at her. “We’ll take the young lady with us as far as the sidewalk,” he said. “You don’t make any moves until she gets back here.”
“No,” Angie said in a tiny voice, like the squeaking sound she’d made earlier.
The guy by the door said, casually, “Nothing’s going to happen, dear. Just another walk through the club together, like before.”
The big man was still looking at Faran. He said, “You got that, Frank?”
“I’ve got it,” Faran said. He was thinking that this was some kind of vendetta between these two and Mr. Lozini, or more likely between Mr. Lozini and some big shot who’d hired these two, and he was very glad all they’d wanted was the night’s receipts. Sometimes, in Mr. Lozini’s world, big shots showed they were mad at each other by killing off each other’s people. Faran was suddenly thinking he’d been a lot closer to major trouble than he’d realized.
The big man nodded at him, and turned to Angie. “Let’s go,” he said.
Angie stared toward Faran, as though needing him to help her start. He said, “It’s okay, Angie. They’re not out to hurt any people.”
“That’s right,” said the one by the door. “Absolutely right. We just don’t hurt people, and that’s all there is to it. Come on, Angie, take a walk down me alley and tell me who do you love.” He said the last in a deep Bo Diddley voice, and Angie even managed a shaky grin toward him as the three of them walked out of the office, the big man going last and closing the door behind him.
Faran slapped his hand out immediately onto the phone, but he didn’t lift the receiver. He could have, it didn’t make any real difference whether he waited for Angie to come back or not, but he didn’t. For some reason he just felt better doing it the way the big man wanted.
With his free hand he tapped the gouge marks in the desk top. Ruined, absolutely ruined. And a goddam expensive desk too, solid walnut. Deep bad gouges, rough splinters; no way to patch that up.
Angie came in, running, loud with relief. “Oh, Frank! Oh, my God!”
Faran lifted the receiver, started to dial.
“They had a car,” she was saying. She was panting, out of breath as though she’d run a mile. “There was dirt all over the license plate, but it was a dark green Chevrolet.”
“Rented,” he said. “Under a phony name. Forget it.” He finished dialing and listened for the ringing to start.
Angie came around the desk, leaning toward him, putting her hand on his shoulder for support. “God, Frank,” she said, “I was so scared.”
“Later,” he said. For the first time in the last five minutes his stomach growled and rolled. He had to break
