"Have you got any more data on telepathic projection?" Malone said.
Sir Lewis Carter frowned. "Telepathic projection?" he said.
"The stuff--the phenomenon Cartier Taylor mentioned," Malone said, "in _Minds and Morons_. I think it was page eighty-four."
"Oh," Carter said. "Oh, yes. Of course. Well, Mr. Malone, we"ll see what we can do for you."
Malone sighed. "Thanks," he said mournfully. "I guess--I guess that"s all, then." He smiled at Lou, and turned the smile into a terrifying scowl when his eye caught Carter"s. "Oh," Malone said. "So long. So long, everybody."
"Ken--"
This was not, he told himself sadly, either the time or the place.
"Goodbye, Sir Lewis," he said. "Goodbye, Lou."
The elevator opened its doors and received him.
Exactly fifty-nine minutes after Cesare Manelli had hung up on him, Malone showed up in the stately and sumptuous suite that belonged, for a stiff fee every month, to the firm of Rodger, Willcoe, O"Vurr and Aoud. The girl at the desk was his old Spearmint friend.
"Mr. Manelli," Malone said. "I"ve got an appointment. My name is Malone and his is Manelli. He works here." That, he told himself, was an understatement; but at least he had a chance of getting his point across.
"Oh," the girl said. Her gum popped. "Certainly. Right away, Mr.
Maloney."
Malone opened his mouth, then shut it again. It just wasn"t worth the trouble, he thought.
The girl did things with a switchboard, then turned to him again. "Mr.
Manelli"s office is right down there in back," she said, pointing vaguely. "Think you can find it, Mr. Maloney?"
"I"ll try," Malone promised. He went down the long corridor and stopped at an unmarked door. It was at least an even chance, he told himself, and opened the door.
The room inside appeared to be mostly desk. The gigantic slab of wood sat against the far wall of the room, in the right-hand corner and spreading over toward the center. It appeared, in the soft half-light of the room, to be waiting for somebody to walk into its lair. Malone was sure, at first sight, that this desk ate people; it was just the type: big and dark and glowering and ma.s.sive.
There wasn"t anybody seated behind it, which reinforced his belief.
The desk had eaten its master. Now it was out of control and they would have to have it shot. Malone took a deep breath and tried not to veer.
Then he heard a voice.
"Sit down, Mr. Malone," the voice said. "How about you having a drink while we talk? If this is going to be so friendly."
The voice didn"t belong to the desk. It belonged, unmistakably, to Big Cheese himself. Malone turned and saw him, sitting in the left-hand corner of the room behind a low table. There was another empty chair facing Manelli, and Malone went over and sat in it.
"A drink?" he said. "Okay. Sure."
"Bourbon and soda, isn"t it?" Manelli said. He stood up.
"Your research department gets fast answers," Malone said. "Bourbon and soda it is."
"After all," Manelli said, shrugging slightly, "a person in my position, he has to make sure he knows what is what, and all the time.
It"s routine, what you call S. O. P. Standard Operating Procedure, they call it."
"I"m sure they do," Malone murmured politely.
"And besides," Manelli said, "you are a well-known type. I thought I knew the name when old Fred mentioned it, or I would never talk to you. You know how it is."
Malone nodded. "Well," he said, as Manelli went over to a small portable bar at the back of the room and got busy, "we"re being frank, anyway."
"And why shouldn"t we be frank, Mr. Malone?" Manelli said. "It"s a nice, friendly conversation, and what have we got on our minds?"
For the first time, as he turned, Malone got a glimpse of something behind the structured and muscular face. There was panic there, just a tiny seed under iron control, but it showed in the eyes and in the muscles of the cheek.
"Just a nice, friendly conversation," Malone said. Manelli brought the drinks over and set them on the table.
"Take your pick," he said. "That"s not what a good host should do, ask the guest to pick one, like a game; but I got into the habit. People get nervous about a.r.s.enic in the drinks. Which is silly."
"Sure it is," Malone agreed. He picked up the left-hand gla.s.s and regarded it carefully. "If you wanted to kill me, you"d need a motive and an opportunity, and you don"t have either at the moment. Besides, you"d make sure to be far away when it happened." He hoped he sounded confident. He took a sip of the drink, but it tasted like bourbon and soda.
"Mr. Malone," Manelli said, "you say these things about me, and it hurts. It hurts me, right here." He pressed a hand over the checkbook side of his jacket. "I"m a legitimate businessman, and no different from any other legitimate businessman. You can"t prove anything else."
"I know I can"t," Malone said. "But I want to talk to you about your real business."
"This is my real business," Manelli said. "The advertising agency. I work here. Advertising is in my blood. And I don"t understand the least little bit why you have to do things to me all the time."
"Do things?" Malone said. "What did I do?"
"Now, Mr. Malone," Manelli said. He took a swallow of his drink. "You said let"s be frank, so I"m frank. Why not you?"
"I don"t know what you"re talking about," Malone said, telling part of the truth.
Manelli took another swallow of his drink, fished in a jacket pocket and brought out two cigars. "Smoke, Mr. Malone?" he said. "The very best, from Havana, Cuba. Cost me a dollar and a half each."
Malone looked with longing at the cigar. But it was okay for Manelli to smoke cigars, he thought bitterly. Manelli was a gangster, and who cared how he looked? Malone was an FBI man, and FBI men didn"t smoke cigars. Particularly Havana cigars. That, he told himself with regretful firmness, was that.
"No, thanks," he said. "I never smoke on duty."
Manelli shrugged and put one cigar away. He lit the other one and dense clouds of smoke began to rise in the room. Malone breathed deeply.
"I understand you"ve been having troubles," he said.
Manelli nodded. "Now, you see, Mr. Malone?" he said. "You tell me you don"t know what"s happening, but you know I got troubles. How come, Mr. Malone? How come?"
"Because you have got troubles," Malone said. "But I have nothing to do with them." He hesitated, thought of adding: "Yet," and decided against it.
"Now, Mr. Malone," Manelli said. "You know better than that."
"I do?" Malone said.
Manelli sighed, took another swallow of his drink and dragged deeply on the cigar. "Let"s take a for-instance," he said. "Now, you understand my business is advertising, Mr. Malone?"