"Well, I'd like to talk to you, kid. How 'bout meeting me somewheres?"

"You name it," Bolan replied.

"You know the Tower of London?"

"I can find it."

"It's down by the Thames, down past London Bridge and, uh, let's see, like going down to th' docks. You got a picture?"

"Yeah, I'll find it. When?"

"Listen, meet me on Execution Row in about an hour."

Bolan almost laughed into the telephone. He controlled himself and said, "What's that Execution Row?"

"Aw, it's part of the sightseeing kick down there, it's where Ann Boleyn got hers, you know, a historical spot. Just ask a guide when you get there. Uh, kind of mix in with the tourists, you know, don't look obvious. I gotta talk to you about something important. It'll be worth something to you, don't worry."

"Okay, in about an hour."

"Uh, wait a minute. Somebody just told me it don't open 'til ten. Tell you what, meet me there at ten thirty."

"Ten thirty it is," Bolan agreed.

"Okay, and remember I said to don't look obvious. Nothing personal, kid, I mean I'm not ashamed of meeting you in the open, nothing like that. I just don't want no London cops busting me, you understand that."

Bolan understood perfectly. "Okay, and here's one for you, Leo. You come alone, n.o.body but you. I get nervous in a crowd."

Turrin chuckled and said something in an aside to a third person, then he told Bolan, "Don't worry, I'll be alone. You just watch your end."

Bolan growled a goodbye and hung up. It had been obvious that Turrin had been speaking in a crowd, probably from a table-top conference. Now he would be explaining to those listening that the call had come from a guy who could put him next to Bolan.

Okay, fine. So what happened if someone else at that table decided to get next to Bolan first? Bolan sighed. He would simply have to trust Turrin to handle that possibility.

It seemed that all of a sudden he was having to trust an awful h.e.l.l of a lot of people to keep his head on.

And Bolan didn't like it, not a bit. The jungle never saw after its own; in the jungle, survival was always an individual proposition.

A sound from across the room brought him out of his thoughts, and he looked up to see Ann Franklin quietly regarding him. He waved to her from the bed-stage-whatever and called down, "It's a swinging pad. What's a nice girl like you doing with all this schmazz schmazz?"

She ascended the steps with a hesitant smile and said, "Schmazz, is that good or bad?"

He shrugged and grinned at her. "Depends on what ticks you," he replied in the same light tone. "Did you get your labor problem settled?"

She jerked her head in a curt nod and did something behind her to make her dress fall off.

Bolan's eyes flared at the spectacular view. She wore little bikini panties which were a mere technicality, and a no-bra bra that wasn't even that. His earlier recollection of the flawless skin proved valid, and even somewhat unfair. He had viewed it then through wearied and bloodshot eyes. Now they were neither weary nor bloodshot and the beauty of this woman was almost appalling. He said, "Dammit, Ann!"

"I told you," she murmured. "I'm in your hands."

He pulled her down beside him and she fell onto her back, curving around in a graceful sprawl with one knee slightly raised and both arms yoked up above her head. He touched her here and there, almost reverently, and she responded with a purring little sigh.

"Kiss me," she whispered.

He did so, and found the inner man of him rising to mingle with the heady sensuality of the moment. Yeah, yeah-it could be love.

"Oh I love you, Mack," she whispered, voicing the thing he could not.

He touched her again and she squirmed under the sensation, catching her breath in a sharp intake and rising toward him for another soulful mingling of lips and teeth and tongue and all of it.

He got away from it, smiled, and asked her a h.e.l.l of a question, all considered. "You're sure this is what you want?"

She held his face with both hands and gave him a shivery confirmation. "Oh I'm sure."

"You already have the proof you wanted," Bolan pointed out.

She gave her head an emphatic shake and whispered, "Well not quite."

Bolan showed her a solemn smile and said, "Everybody turns off at the same switch, Ann. It's what turns us on that makes the difference." He waved a hand over her head in a mock ceremonial gesture. "I now p.r.o.nounce you a natural woman."

"Mack for G.o.d's sake make love to me," she pleaded in a half-strangled little voice.

He whispered a very ragged, "Okay," and pushed himself clear and began coming away from his clothing.

She watched him through heavy-lidded eyes, lying still as death except for the rapid rise and fall of her breath, the pink tip of a delicate tongue curled into the corner of parted lips.

He snapped off the gunleather and dropped it to the floor, very close to the bed, attacked the skinsuit then halted suddenly, aware of her intent gaze.

She giggled and said, "Carry on. I've seen it before. I put you to bed yesterday, remember?"

"You haven't seen it like this before," he growled, and peeled off the suit and threw it at her.

She squealed and flipped over onto all fours, and Bolan scooped her up and dragged her off the bed. She clung to him and their lips merged again, after which he told her, "I'll have a bath first, m'lady. Want to come in with me?"

She nodded starry-eyed approval of the suggestion and Bolan carried her down from the stage of a bed and deposited her at the edge of the bubbling-fountain pool. She slipped out of the bra and clung to Bolan's shoulder with one hand as she stepped out of the silken bikini.

Then she froze in that position, her fingers digging into Bolan's shoulder, and she let out a scream that shivered him clear to his feet. He overreacted, s.n.a.t.c.hing her away from the pool with a violence that sent her sprawling across the floor. Then he saw what she had seen, and he was shivered all over again.

The dead eyes of Harry Parks were staring up at him from beneath the water. The naked body was arched back with the head drawn between the knees in almost the same position in which Edwin Charles had died, and he was bound into that position with a thick tapestry cord. A heavy metal figurine was holding the body submerged.

Bolan went into the water and pulled him out while Ann Franklin had a mild case of hysterics on the sidelines. Except for bruises made by the bindings, no marks of violence showed on the body. Harry Parks had undoubtedly died down there with his lungs full of water, his nose barely beneath the surface and straining to break clear-it all showed in those horribly staring dead eyes. Rigor mortis had arrived, and Bolan did not even attempt to straighten the body. He covered the crouching figure with an oval throw rug and led Ann Franklin back to the bed, rounded up her clothes, and tossed them to her.

"You'd better get dressed," he said listlessly.

She did so mechanically. Bolan got into his and went directly to the bar. He found the brandy and poured two stiff doses and carried them to the bed. Ann took hers without looking at him, and held the gla.s.s with both hands, peering down into the liquid as though hoping to find something written there.

Bolan tossed his down, then whirled about and heaved the gla.s.s against the far wall. It hit with a crash, and Ann flinched.

Bolan muttered, "h.e.l.l, I am sick sick of this!" of this!"

The girl woodenly murmured, "Poor Harry," and delicately tasted her brandy.

"Poor Harry's been dead a long time," Bolan informed her. "When was the last time you were up here?"

"Last night," she whispered. "For a moment."

"What time last night?"

"Directly after you left here. Or a short time after. The police had a few questions. We answered them. Then I came up to change my clothes. I went straight back out. Harry and the Major were in the bar. I had a word of goodnight with them. Then I went straightaway to Queen's House. That was the last time I saw Harry." Her eyes strayed to the lump at the bottom of the platform. She shivered and added, "Alive."

"So about what time was that?" Bolan persisted.

"I suppose... shortly past twelve. I had thought that you would come to Queen's House. I waited until two o'clock. Then I went to the museum. The police were there and we had quite a fuss. You know about all that."

Bolan said, "Yeah." He paced the platform for a moment, then told her, "Okay, get your stuff, we're getting out of here."

"It's dangerous for you out there," she argued quietly. "And we shouldn't be trying for Brighton until-"

"It's liable to get a h.e.l.l of a lot more dangerous for both of us right here," he told her. "And to h.e.l.l with Brighton. I've got things to do. Come on."

He turned away and went quickly down to the main level. She scrambled after him, pausing for a moment beside the remains of Harry Parks to gaze frozenly at the tragic lump, then she s.n.a.t.c.hed up her coat and hurried on through.

Bolan was waiting for her at the door, and he was looking at the apartment as though he would never see it again and wanted to remember it.

Ann caught the look and joined him in it. "Well," she said with a soft sigh, "I'm sure it's dreadfully callous of me to feel so selfishly at such a time, but..." She sighed again. "I suppose it simply shall never happen."

He knew what she meant. He told her, "This place is a fantasy, Ann."

"Yes, quite," she agreed. "It's rather like p.o.r.nography, isn't it?"

"You don't need it," he said.

"You haven't proved that to me yet."

He said, "You proved it to yourself. Now come on, let's get out of here."

"Poor Harry," she murmured as they went out the door. "What a revolting way to die."

He led her down the stairway and replied, "It's an even more revolting way to live."

"Yes, I see what you mean."

They moved on through the lobby and Bolan said, "Charles told me that all of this is a symbol of our times. I mean this Sadian bit. What do you suppose he meant by that, Ann?"

"I suppose he meant that we live in a p.o.r.nographic age."

He steered her through the lobby and onto Frith Street. "No, I think he meant something more than that."

They hurried around the corner and along the side street to Ann's vehicle. She had been thinking about Bolan's last statement. "Well, I doubt that you'll ever know one way or another," she told him.

"Don't be so sure about that," he said. "We just might be on our way to an answer right now."

"Where are we going, Mack?"

"We're going to the Tower of London, m'lady."

"Oh Mack! In broad daylight and with bobbies scouring the city for you? Whatever for?"

"Maybe," he replied, "for a glimpse at this symbol of our times."

What Bolan did not realize then was that he had been walking in the shadow of that symbol since his arrival in England. It was a symbol of death.

Chapter Seventeen.

THE RAVENS.

Not one but two table-top conferences had been underway at the Mafia's London headquarters at the moment of Bolan's telephone conversation with Leo Turrin. A meeting in the library was chaired by Joe Staccio, and was attended by Turrin and the crew leaders of the peace delegation.

Staccio had told them, "Just in case any of you are wondering why I brought such a large bunch over, I just want you all to understand this one thing. It only takes one man to talk peace. That one man is me. Now Leo here is the contact man, and maybe he can get Bolan to stand still long enough to hear what I got to say. Okay, that takes care of the peace end. So you're asking yourselves, why'd Joe bring the rest of us along? Well, here's exactly why. Arnie Farmer is a Capo Capo, and we all have to respect him for that. But he's also a double-dealing rat at times, and we have to respect him for that also. That's why you're here, the rest of you. Arnie Farmer I know is going to try crossing me up. I feel it in my bones. And he's liable to get me killed. I want you all to feel that that in in your your bones." bones."

A Staccio underboss pushed a heavy ashtray into a slide down the mahogany table and growled, "He better not try it, Joe."

"Well, he's going to and we all know it. But listen, he will be the outlaw in this thing. I just want you all to understand that, and to know where you stand in this thing. When Arnie Fanner crosses me, he's also crossing the will of the Commissione Commissione, as decided in full council before I took on this responsibility. So you know where you stand. I brought you over here to keep Arnie Farmer honest. I guess I don't have to say any more than that."

There followed a spirited discussion of strategy, defense, and of ways and means of convincing Mack Bolan that an honorable and rewarding peace could be his. Turrin was asked to recount various intimate details of his earlier a.s.sociation with Bolan, "so as to give us all a better picture of how this boy thinks," and Turrin did so, relating the episode at Pittsfield with as much honesty as he thought practicable.

Toward the end of this recitation, Bolan's call came through. Turrin carried on his end of the conversation under the eyes and ears of "Staccio's Peace Corps," the tag laughingly applied to the delegation by its own members.

When he hung up, Turrin grinned at the New York boss and told him, "Okay, my feelers are starting to pay off. This boy here knows Bolan from way back. I think this is what we been looking for."

"Yeah, I got that," Staccio replied, a worried frown furrowing his forehead. "Now how many other ears you figure were listening on extensions around here?"

Still grinning, Turrin said, "Probably at least half a dozen. That's why I picked this Tower of London for the meet. We can protect a meet like that, huh Joe?"

"You bet your a.s.s we can," Staccio growled. His eyes snapped to one of the crew leaders. "You get out there, Bobby, and keep an eye on the ratpack. If anybody leaves, you report it back to me right quick."

The crew leader hurried out, and the other leaders of the Peace Corps bent their heads to the strategic problems of the moment.

Meanwhile another conference under that same roof involved Arnie Farmer Castiglione and his legion of headhunters. A large drawing room was filled to standing-room capacity with crew leaders alone, and the atmosphere of the room was charged with the tension and excitement of the task being outlined there.

Castiglione, of course, was running the meeting.

Nick Trigger and Danno Giliamo flanked the big man at the table. Both wore the look of a slightly whipped dog.