Nightmare in New York

Gambella coming over?'

'Didn't you get the… ? Well for Christ's sake!' Bolan's eyes rolled and he leaned closer to the wire mesh and dropped his voice even lower. 'I thought Freddiewas going to… never mind. There's a raid called. Three o'clock. Feds and everybody, the full bit. You're supposed to be getting the stuff out of here. You telling me you haven't done anything yet?'

Whitehair's lips firmed up and he whirled about without a word and began moving quickly among his bookkeepers and clerks. Things began happening, quickly and quietly. Ledgers and tapes began disappearing into canvas pouches. A youngish man with a deformed spine spun the wheel in the vault, opened the door, and stepped inside. Bolan heard a woman clerk call the whitehaired one 'Mr. Feldman' and a big brawny guy started tossing canvas satchels in a pile on the floor.

Feldman stepped back to the mesh fence and told Bolan, 'Yes, we're taking care of it. What about out front?'

Bolan shook his head and turned a thumb toward the floor. 'We're letting them have the front.'

The controller nodded his head in understanding. His face fell into sorrowing lines and he confided to Bolan, 'Ail these years with Mr. Gambella and this is my first bust.'

'Well, there's a first time for everything,' Bolan philosophized. 'These goddam feds are running wild.'

'It's a damn shame,' Feldman said, and spun around and went into the vault.

Feldman had no idea, Bolan was thinking, how big a shame it was. The pace was picking up, clerks dashing about in excitement, slamming things about in an ever-rising noise level. The guards were beginning to fidget and obviously wonder what the hell was coming off. Bolan walked down to the one at the rear door and asked him, 'Is the truck here?'

'What truck?' the guy asked, his eyebrows gathering into a perplexed scowl.

Bolan threw up his hands in a resigned gesture and he cried, 'Well kiss my ass! Nobody sent for the truck?'

The guard shifted his weight from one foot to the other as he replied, 'If you mean the armored car, it ain't due 'til five o'clock.'

'I know when it's duel'Bolan yelled. 'We gotta get this stuff outta here nowlYou get your ass out there and getsomething!'

The guard gawked at him with rising bewilderment, then he threw a pleading look toward the wire fence. Feldman, drawn by Bolan's yelling, was coming through the gate with a worried face. The guard asked him, 'What's this guy talking about?'

'We have an emergency, Harry,' the controller told him. 'Have to move everything out, and quick. Get us some transportation. We'll need… oh hell, we'll need several cars or a fairsize van. You'd better see what you can do.'

'Well how much time've I got?' the bewildered Harry wanted to know.

'You've got about ten damned minutes!' Bolan snarled. 'You better get your ass in gear!'

The other guard had come down to join the discussion. Harry thrust his burpgun at him and muttered, 'Shit, I'm a security man, not no goddam transportation expert. Awright, somebody let me out.'

Feldman went back behind the cage and pressed the door release. The buzzer squawked and Harry stepped into the alleyway muttering to himself. The other guard was standing there with a dumb look and a burpgun under each arm. Bolan took one of them, saying, 'Here, give me th' damn thing. Listen, you may as well go out there too. Don't let anyone get curious and start hanging around.'

The guard looked to the controller for an okay. Feldman nodded his head and again operated the doorlock. The guy went out, greatly perturbed and fiddling with the visor of his cap.

The man with the crooked spine came out of the vault pushing a wheeled cart bearing neatly wrapped packages. Bolan stepped in through the open gate and placed the burpgun on the counter as the crippled man was reporting progress. 'These are the tabulated receipts through noon today, Mr. Feldman. We'll have the balance in about five minutes. We're just going to sack it, if that's all right.'

The controller jerked his head in a quick okay. 'And leave the coin,' he commanded.

Bolan picked up one of the packages from the cart and was looking it over. It was a five-grand bundle. Yes, this was definitely a central station. There were at least fifty of those packets on the cart. And someone' had said that legalized betting in New York would put the mob onto hard times.

Bolan grabbed a canvas satchel off the floor and began stuffing it with five-grand packages. Feldman watched him for a moment, then said, 'Why don't we just leave it on the cart? If Harry gets a van…'

Bolan replied, 'And suppose he can't? You just want to toss these packages loose into the seat of a car?' He zipped the bag shut and threw it at the rear door, twenty-five thousand dollars worth, then grabbed another.

Feldman stood there through a brief moment of indecision, then he too began transferring the packets into a bag. Bolan completed Ms second baggy job and gave it a toss, then told the controller, 'Hey listen, I'm going to go out there and see what that clown is doing.'

Feldman nodded his head agreeably, obviously happy to lose 'Lambretta's' company. Bolan picked up the burpgun and walked to the door, then turned to stare at the whitehaired man. 'The fuckin' door,' he growled.

The controller grimaced and moved impatiently to send the unlock signal to the door mechanism, then turned away with an unhappy scowl. Bolan pulled the door open, kicked a money bag outside, quietly dropped a marksman's medal to the floor, and went out. The door clicked behind him and he told the waiting guard, 'Watch that satchel, it's got twenty-five thou in it,' then he walked quickly to the end of the alley, a matter of twenty-odd steps, peered into the street briefly and immediately returned to the doorway.

He told the guard, 'Okay, you keep your eyes peeled. Here, take this Hamn gun.' He shoved the burpgun into the guy's hand, picked up the satchel of money, and walked away.

Bolan did not look back as he made the turn onto the street. He was afraid to. The corners of his mouth were beginning to twitch out of control, and he might burst out laughing if he had to look at that guard's face one more tune.

The Executioner could not feel a bit bad about stealing from the mob, and he could think of no one he would rather have contribute to his war chest than Freddie Gambella.

Somebody was going to be catching a lot of hell, of course, but Bolan would save his sympathy for people who deserved it. That den of thieves back there would get everything they had coming to them. As for Gambella, if he thought thishurt then he'd better wait awhile.

The tall man with the canvas satchel went on unhurriedly along the quiet street and stepped aboard a downtown bus, and the corners of his mouth were still twitching, and he was wondering if Harry would ever come back with those wheels.

Bolan dropped into a seat across from an elderly black lady, and he allowed himself to break down and laugh a little. The lady was darting curious glances his way, but Bolan didn't mind. A pure fool had engaged the enemy in an act of pure war, and he'd exited laughing. Yeah, it was a hell of a way to run a world. But it would have to do until something better came along. Pure love, maybe. Yeah, and Bolan found himself thinking about Rachel Silver. Yeah. Pure love.

Chapter Six Friends

Freddie Gambella was seated casually in the big swivel chair, a telephone held to the side of his head by a softly manicured hand, when Sam the Bomber pushed hesitantly into the panelled library and made his way softly across the cushioned floor. Sam never had felt overly comfortable in this room — maybe it was the books that made him feel so depressed — and he was feeling particularly out of sorts on this visit.

Gambella threw his visitor a flash of the eyes that told him to have a seat, and he growled softly into the telephone, 'He traded a whatfor it?'

Sam sat down and watched the muscles bunching and unbundling in the Capo'sjaw, then he studied his own hands and picked nervously at the bandaids on his