"According to the phone-company data files, the number that answered the ad is not a working number.
"Is that possible?"
"If they are using pirated telephone connections, it is. It has been done before."
"So it's a dead end?"
Smith logged off. He brought up a wire-frame state map of Massachusetts and input the names "Quincy" and "Saugus."
"Hmmm. They are not remotely near one another at all. That may mean Quincy is a private residence." He looked up. "We will deal with this later. Master Chiun, I would like for you to meet these people at the place they named and give them back their hard disk."
"What of the seventy-five thousand dollars mentioned?" asked the Master of Sinanju.
"Of course, collect it if you can."
"There is no 'can' when Sinanju collects a debt," Chiun said loftily. "There is only 'must.' "
"You will of course return the money to me."
"Minus my finder's fee, of course," suggested the Master of Sinanju, his eyes twinkling.
Smith sighed. "Is ten percent acceptable?"
"Yes," said Chiun slowly. "I will allow you to retain ten percent. But only because you are my emperor. Otherwise it would be five.
Both Harold W. Smith and the Master of Sinanju glowered at Remo as he broke into gales of laughter.
Clearing his throat, Harold Smith returned to his computer. He had to finish maintaining the LANSCII hard disk before it was delivered to Saugus.
Chapter 25
It was supposed to be a simple errand, thought Nicolo "Nicky Kix" Stivaletta. Meet the Jap. Hand the Jap the payoff. Take the hard-on disk. Then whack out the Jap where he stood.
"Simple. In and out. Bing bang boom. And home in time for Hunter," as he told Vinnie (The Maggot) Maggiotto, who had earned his nickname because he'd once been arrested for the heinous crime of dumpster diving. The Maggot's hairless bullet of a head contributed to its longevity.
"What if the Jap ain't alone?" the Maggot wondered.
"Then you got somebody to clip too," said Nicky Kix, who had come by his street name because of his habit of kicking in the ribs and skulls of people after he had brought them down with a sawed-off shotgun.
"Okay, I got somebody to clip too," said the Maggot, who had often boasted to his fellow Deer Island inmates that he had clipped as many guys as he had fingers. In fact, the Maggot had never clipped anything. Including his nails. The Maggot was not renowned for his grooming skills.
The headlights of their Dodge raced ahead of them as they came off the Saugus exit of Route One, north of Boston. They threw the chain-link fence of the Bartilucci Construction Company into sharp relief as the car slid through the open gate.
"Okay," said Nicky Kix. "It's show time."
They got out.
"See anything?" Nicky asked uneasily.
"Nothing. Maybe he ain't showed yet. Maybe he ain't gonna show," the Maggot added, silently hoping he would not have to clip anyone.
Then a low, stern voice seemed to surround them.
" I am here, messengers of the dreaded boss."
"Where? Where is he?"
A figure detached itself from the shadow of the long storage building.
He stepped into the headlight beams, clad in a kimono of dull black silk, his eyes narrowing to slits, his hands unseen in the tunnels of his joined sleeves.
"Put your hands where I can see them," warned Nicky Kix, amazed that the old Jap wasn't blinded by the lights.
"Show me your ransom first," returned the old Jap.
"Okay," said Nicky. "Have it your way." He pulled a thick manila envelope from inside his jacket, fat with greenbacks.
He held them up to the lights so the edges of two twenties were visible. "All seventy-five grand," he added, keeping a straight face. There was actually less than fifty dollars in the envelope sandwiching a dollar-size sheaf of cut newsprint.
"Very well," said the Jap, bringing his hands into view.
One hand-the left-was clutching a black plastic box.
"That's it," breathed the Maggot.
" I know that's it," hissed Nicky. "Now shaddup and let me do all the talkin'. Okay," he said, lifting his voice. "Let's swap. "
The Jap advanced. As he loomed larger and larger in the light, seeming to make no sound as he moved toward them, Nicky Kix lifted the envelope with one hand and reached out with the other to accept the all-important disk.
"When I've got the disk," he hissed to the Maggot, "you shoot him. In the stomach, not the head."
"I thought the head was better," the Maggot breathed back, beads of dirty sweat popping up on his shiny forehead.
Nicky Kix was speaking through clenched teeth so it would look as if he were smiling.
"It is," he said. "If you wanna clip a guy right off. I just want him down so I can kick the shit out of him while he's squirming and bleeding."
"Okay," said the Maggot, swallowing hard.
The old Jap was now less that five feet away. Then four. Three.
He stopped with less than two feet separating him from the outstretched money envelope. The hard disk came up into the moonlight. Nicky Kix laid blunt fingers on it as longnailed fingers simultaneously snatched away the envelope.
To cover for what was about to happen, Nicky Kix said, "You don't need to count it. It's all there."
"You are Romans," said the old Jap. "I need to count it."