The Starshine Connection (7 page)

He scooped the gun off the floor, and jerked the door open. Number Three was standing on the landing, holding his broken hand
like a child about to burst into tears. Slayton pivoted sideways and kicked the man in the face. He went tumbling violently
down the stairs, and crumpled at the bottom just as the security men got the front door open.

Slayton promptly aimed for the stained glass windows above them, and emptied the clip of the fourteen-shot automatic. Slugs
ricocheted, careening wildly about. Glass blew out in multicolored fragments. And everyone outside hit the dirt, whipping
out their own weapons.

He meant them no harm; the stunt was strictly to buy a handful of seconds. Slayton dashed toward the corner of the apartment
where the floor-to-ceiling windows had been destroyed. He glanced out to the left and right: then, backing up against the
far side, where the glass frame met concrete, he sprinted along the edge.

Where the bar had stood, he dived out into space.

The split-second view of the drop below him would have made his stomach heave if he had not been in motion. He elected to
concentrate on his leap to the balcony railing instead.

His timing was good. On the ground, the jump would have been trifling. His hands caught the ornamental iron low, and inertia
tried to fling his body beneath the stone lips of the balcony. Foreseeing this, he put the whole grip into his forearms to
stop useless swinging around, and stabilized himself. His grip on the railing was solid, and he pulled himself up and over
onto the balcony itself.

The next balcony was another leap away. A long row of them led, in diminishing perspective, to the far side of the building.
Slayton figured that by now the Gendarme men below had regained their courage and would be thinking about trying the stairs
again. He planned to be absent.

He delayed only a second before jumping to the next balcony; an easier leap, thanks to his being able to push off with his
feet in a straight line from the first. It looked as if he would make it.

After he pulled himself onto the second balcony, he glanced up to see a svelte young woman with a lavish mane of billowing
brown hair looking quizzically at him through her own locked, sliding glass door. His immediate reaction was a pang of panic
in his gut, a feeling that the jig was up.

But the woman had no gun. There was no place to conceal any sort of weapon, since she stood naked on the opposite side of
the glass. She simply stood there, arms akimbo on her coltish hips, her mouth drawn up into a tiny O of surprise. Her hair
was magnificent, and streamed down to her waistline. She had high cheekbones and rather heavy breasts which fell naturally
outward, but didn’t sag. Her trim legs were toned, much like a dancer’s, even down to the wide, hard feet. She had been engaged
in some sort of calisthenic routine when Slayton had crashed into her balcony.

The fright in her eyes told Slayton that there was no way she would ever unlock the door and help to make his escape simpler.

“Pardon me,” Slayton said, catching his breath. “I’m just a transient fugitive, on the lam from the police!” He smiled winningly.

Her expression did not change. Neither did that of her boyfriend, shouting unintelligibly from the bed in the background.

“Ah, I knew you wouldn’t buy it,” Slayton shrugged. “See you.” As he leaped from the balcony, the woman screamed.

Snug in his coat pocket, as he mountaineered from balcony to balcony, was a ledger he had managed to snatch from the townhouse
safe. Luckily, its loss would now be blamed on the burglars.

Ben Slayton had done his job, if a bit chaotically. He had no conception of the can of worms he had just opened up.

“Jesus Christ, Ben! Just what are we supposed to do about this mess!”

The report, which was in a pristine manila folder as usual, hit the polished surface of the desk and slid across, skidding
to a stop between Slayton’s hands. He was standing, jaw working to contain his anger, leaning on the desk opposite the seated
Winship.

“I repeat, sir, this all has to do with following up the only leads that exist in the Starshine case. This
does
still have priority, doesn’t it?” His voice was leaden.

“Breaking into the residence of the special executive assistant to a senator? My god, man—
beating up three CIA agents?”

“There was no evidence that place belonged to a government official—other than the bad taste of the furnishings. And a senator’s
involvement in this sweetens the whole damned investigation more than a little bit, don’t you agree,
sir?”

Winship was torn, and he knew it. Obligated to rake Ben over the coals, thanks to the report on his desk, yet realizing that
Slayton had uncovered lead elements that made the whole Starshine business much nastier than mere narcotics violations or
moonshine running. Deaths were still tied to the stuff; now a senator, the CIA, and big business—courtesy of Pavel Drake II—were
tied to the stuff. And Winship knew Ben Slayton would endure chastisement from him longer than from any other mortal. It was
necessary, in a perverse way, but Slayton had already reached his limit.

In a more subdued tone, Winship said, almost helplessly, “But Ben—those CIA men… you wreaked quite a bit of damage there…”
He was vaguely aware that the whole sequence would be funny if the three men were not in the hospital at the present time.

Slayton sighed, as though burdened. “As far as I was concerned, I was fighting for my life in there. I had no inkling that
they were government men—although their bungling should have clued me in. Whoever assigned those idiots to investigate the
townhouse must have been the only guy who escaped prosecution for the Watergate thing. Which reminds me, Ham, those men being
in that town-house raises another question everyone would be a lot more comfortable just ignoring.”

“You suspect some kind of informational leakage as regards the Starshine investigation.” Winship steepled his hands.

“Yes, sir. Those men made the scene just minutes after I got the address from a Treasury-assigned tail on the Starshine delivery
men. Somebody—it doesn’t really matter who—tipped off the CIA. So why is the CIA interested in the Starshine case?”

“I was hoping you could tell me.”

“They aren’t. That’s just it.”

Winship’s hands made for a large-bowled, filigreed pipe. “And the connection is—?”

“Try this, sir. Let’s assume that the Starshine operation is overlorded by someone with government connections. The senator,
the senator’s assistant—that doesn’t matter either, right now. What
does
matter is that our man has enough clout with the CIA not only to catch wind of the Starshine operation, but to feed CIA resources
toward protecting his own interests. The only people in the dark are the CIA boys. This person, or his operatives, tip the
CIA that a clandestine operation needs to be carried out in the townhouse—he even supplies them with the keys. Could be a
tax dodge, could be anything. The important thing was that armed agents were supposed to run across me there. ‘Me,’ to this
person, was whoever was mucking about with the Starshine investigation—a vested interest, to be sure. Whether I was supposed
to be arrested, implicated, or killed, I don’t know.”

“We can’t afford to compound that right now, if you’re right,” said Winship. “That’s why this is a one-way report. They have
no idea it was you. Let’s hope your identity is secure, at least for the moment.”

“Assume that if you wish, sir. It’d be dangerous for me to.” Slayton was belaboring the point unnecessarily.

“It is an advantage, Ben.”

“I know that. But the whole Starshine operation will be compromised unless I move fast.”

“That brings us to your next lead.”

“I may not be around Washington D.C. long enough for the man to make me,” Slayton said. “It looks like a trip to Los Angeles
is inevitable now, and I’d like to leave tonight.”

“It’s cleared, it’s cleared,” Winship said wearily. “But I want a briefing first. Understand this: if the people we think
are involved in the Starshine operation really
are
involved in it, the flak will start soon enough. You know what I mean.”

“I can guess,” Slayton said. “A senator can apply a great deal of pressure to terminate an investigation—especially an investigation
that’s costing the taxpayers money, and
particularly
an investigation with elements of scandal. And we’ve got scandal in spades. We’ve got covered-up deaths, we’ve got government
officials’ names dredged through the cesspool, we’ve got sex, we’ve got violence… it wouldn’t be hard for Mr. X to kill off
the Starshine investigation if he wanted to.”

“Killing you off would be easier,” Winship said.

“I think so too, and I think
he
thinks so,” Slayton admitted. “I’m poking my nose into it, and getting rid of me would constitute a peachy warning shot across
the Department’s bow. I hate to say this, sir, but the government allows things a lot more corrupt than that little scenario
to pass unnoticed. My ass is on the line in terms of the investigation; the hope would be that the case would die along with
me. It probably would.”

“Not while I’m sitting in this chair,” said Winship, rising to the occasion.

“I hate to say this, too, sir, but if I was dead you’d most likely assign Brooks. And Brooks would not have been capable of
yielding the original lead to the Starshine delivery men in the first place.” There was a picture of Anna Drake burning away
in his brain, and the idea of Brooks trying to satisfy the woman was almost as funny as the picture of the trio of CIA gunsels
currently in traction.

“Alright, then,” Winship said, resigned to the job one way or the other. “Tell me about the ledger.”

Slayton’s Tarzanlike progression from balcony to balcony was simplified at almost the same time his arm muscles began to complain.
No amount of conditioning and exercise was ever equal to actual, in-the-field abuse.

He landed on a balcony whose windows were not curtained. The rooms within were dark and deserted, and at once Slayton saw
that this particular balcony appended to an unleased residence. At the prices tenancy probably commanded, it did not seem
unusual that there would be empty apartments; at the same time, this
was
Washington, and even the most outrageous rents were affordable in Congress terms.

He saw that he had ripped the armpits out of his leather jacket during his fight and flight, and tufts of the ski sweater
he wore protruded from the ruptured stitching. Inside his left interior pocket was the stolen ledger. Inside the right was
the wrap-up of lock picks and gimmicks he had used to enter the first townhouse.

The lock on the sliding glass door to the empty apartment was child’s play, and soon Slayton had left the night chill behind
in favor of the warm—though dead and unventilated—air inside.

Almost habitually, he checked the rooms—all empty and unfurnished. All that remained of the previous tenant was a black, push-button
telephone in the middle of the living room floor, its cord snaking off toward the far wall. It had a thick, gray cord, unlike
a normal residential phone, and no quick-release catches. Perhaps the previous user had run a business of some sort out of
the place. Or maybe the building was in charge of the phones. It was not significant.

What was significant was that when Slayton experimentally lifted the receiver, he got a dial tone.

In the dim light that filtered in through the glass doors, Slayton got his first close look at the ledger. It related to accounts
receivable, and the amounts listed in severe, black figures tallied with the payoff Anna Drake had handed over to the occupants
of the Trans-Am. It was not ironclad, but it was encouraging.

Listed in the front of the book were several phone numbers and notations, including an “emergency” number credited to someone
in Washington named Rutledge. There were also several names and numbers under the heading
Deliveries.

Slayton sat down, crossleggcd, by the phone, and ran down the first list. He got two no-answers, three irate sleepers wondering
which relative had just died, an all-night bakery, and a porno palace across the state line that was just shutting down for
the night.

He reconsidered the notations that he had assumed to be code phrases. A strange name was scribbled in the margin: Elos Califas.

He made the connection, mentally, and dialed the first number again. This time the ring was answered instantly, and Slayton
found himself speaking cross-country.

“Yeah?”

“This is Rutledge in Washington,” Slayton said quickly.

“So what? You guys are okay for this month.”

“We got us a little emergency.”

“I’m listening.” The voice was straight Anglo; it could be anyone speaking.

“We have to change the shipping schedule, maybe even the routes. Couple of people have died; things are hotting up. The guy
covering for us can’t pull his usual strings.”

“What guy is that?” The voice was immediately wary.

“You know who I mean; look, I don’t have any time to screw around!”

It was too late. Slayton was speaking to a dead line full of long-distance hiss.

He pinched his eyes together in the dark. “Shit, shit, shit.” He slammed the receiver into the rack only to pick it right
back up again, this time punching in the complicated dialing routine that would attach him to the priority line at the Treasury
Department.

“Slayton here. I need addresses, locations, and information relating to the following phone numbers. This is top-top-security.
And I need it yesterday.”

“How did you know to call Los Angeles?” Winship asked.

“Chicano slang—
Elos
is East Los Angeles;
Califas
is just as obvious if you know the key. Slap California area codes onto those phone numbers in the book, and they all make
sense. I doubt the addresses will do us much good—they’ve been alerted by my phony call.”

“What if they haven’t? What if they just thought it was a crank call?”